Forget the war for the White House for a moment. Among young people, Barack Obama appears to be beating John McCain in the battle for "cool.''

"Obama is a tad cooler than McCain on probably 57 fronts,'' said Emily Goulding, 25, of Los Angeles. "Obama's better looking than McCain, Obama's more stylish than McCain, Obama's more fit than McCain. He refers to better music than McCain.''

"Obama's big with the kids, everyone knows that,'' said Tom Johnson, 21, of Norfolk, Va. "McCain -- that guy's not cool. I just can't call McCain cool.''

"It's got to be Obama,'' said David Munn, 20, of Keene, N.H. "He's younger, I think he has more of a connection with my generation. I just think he communicates better to my generation, especially with issues in Iraq. (McCain) is all right, but not as cool as Obama.''

According to these members of Generation Y, Obama, 46, has the "cool'' thing down. He's an avid basketball player, listens to Jay-Z on his iPod and was on the cover of this month's issue of Rolling Stone magazine.

McCain, on the other hand, has admitted he's a big fan of the '70s-era Swedish disco band ABBA and an "illiterate'' when it comes to using a computer. He turns 72 next month, and if elected, he'd be the oldest president in American history to begin his first term.

Obama has a two-to-one lead over McCain among 18-to-34-year-olds, according to a Washington Post-ABC News poll released last week. The same poll gave Obama an eight percentage point lead among registered voters countrywide. In an AP-Yahoo News poll in July, the two were virtually tied among voters overall.

But does "coolness'' -- or the perception of it at least -- really matter to young voters?

"I don't think you can ignore that factor,'' said James Kotecki, a 22-year-old political video blogger who achieved fame on YouTube last year after he interviewed former Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul in Kotecki's Georgetown University dorm room.

"What Obama's been able to do is capitalize on his hipness, at least as far as younger voters go,'' said Kotecki, whose video commentaries now appear on Politico.com, the website for the Washington political newspaper.

"I think it's not that they don't support his issues and his policies, but younger voters are more willing to work for him and work passionately for him because he's someone who resonates more on their wavelength.''

"Coolness'' is often associated with youth, but elder status doesn't automatically signify "uncool,'' Kotecki said.

Ron Paul, 72, amassed a considerable following among younger voters, largely because his libertarian message was deemed countercultural, Kotecki said.

"You can certainly be cool at any age,'' Kotecki said. "Look at Hugh Hefner. He'll be cool til the day he dies. But for him and for Ron Paul or anybody who's elderly and who's cool, part of it is what they represent that makes them that.''

Anastasia Goodstein, who founded the youth marketing blog YPulse.com, said McCain shouldn't change his image too much to attract younger voters. Most young people just want to know they're being heard and taken seriously by political candidates, she said.

"The most important thing in terms of reaching youth is not being cool, it's being authentic, or true to who you are,'' Goodstein said. "I think he'd look ridiculous if he tried to purposefully seem younger than he is, if he started doing extreme sports or something ridiculous.''

Evangelia Souris, a Boston-based image consultant who has worked with political candidates, said that what you learned in middle school is true: Sometimes coolness really can be about who you hang out with.

McCain's wife, Cindy, "has a very conservative image, and that doesn't really help him either,'' Souris said. "She's not the type like Obama's wife, who can get down and dirty with younger people and really relate to them.''

One way McCain could improve his image among young voters would be to choose a younger running mate, Souris said. He also could give his children more active, visible campaign roles. Four of McCain's seven children are in their teens and early twenties. His 23-year-old daughter, Meghan, already blogs about life on the campaign trail.

Maurice Bonamigo, a Chicago-based conservative political strategist and image consultant, said McCain should take a page from the Ronald Reagan campaign playbook by reaching out to young voters as a grandfather figure. During his 1984 re-election run, Reagan won 59 per cent of voters under age 30.

"He's not running for class president here,'' Bonamigo said. "It's not a popularity contest. He's running for leader of the free world.''