This presidential election is unprecedented. Just look at the candidates. Some represent segments of the population that have never had a serious presidential candidate of their own.

Look at the voters. They're older than ever. Look at what you're looking at. More people are turning to YouTube bloggers and the rest of the Internet for political news and information.

Finally, look at the stakes. It's been a generation since social programs and an unpopular war were both front-burner issues. Here are seven reasons this election is different.

1. The 50-Plus Election
People age 50-plus are expected to vote in record numbers, and they'll make up a larger portion of the electorate. In the 2004 presidential election, 50-plus voters accounted for more than 35 percent of those who cast ballots, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Exit polls in the 2006 midterm elections put the number much higher, at 52 percent.

That percentage is expected to continue increasing as huge numbers of boomers move into retirement, a phase of life that traditionally yields the highest voting rate, says Curtis Gans, director of the nonpartisan Center for the Study of the American Electorate.

While the 50-plus vote always counts heavily, this year its effects will be enormous. In traditional swing states Florida, Pennsylvania and West Virginia, the percentage of the population made up of older people is greater than the national average. A surge of older voters, who made the biggest move toward Democrats in 2006, has turned Arizona and Nevada into swing states, too.

At the same time, age isn't the issue for candidates it once was. A hearty Sen. John McCain, who will be 72 by Nov. 4, could become the oldest candidate elected to a first term (Ronald Reagan was almost 70). At the other end of the age spectrum, Sen. Barack Obama will be 47 on Election Day, four years older than John F. Kennedy was in 1960.

2. Guns vs. Butter
There are three overarching issues in this election. The war in Iraq is the biggest international concern. Economic security and health care top Americans' domestic worries. What do they all have in common? In a word, money.

Not since Lyndon Johnson juggled the Vietnam War and his Great Society programs—including Medicare and Medicaid—has the challenge been so stark. The difference is that during the 1960s, Johnson learned the hard way that his twin objectives were unrealistic without raising taxes. With today's faltering economy and budget deficits, that's a given, and public antipathy to new taxes puts the next president in a fiscal box.

If the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan cost the $2.4 trillion projected through the end of the decade, that will be $2.4 trillion that's not available for health programs. The tradeoff became clear during last year's congressional debate about SCHIP, the children's health insurance program. The national health care systems that some candidates are proposing would come with high costs. And the Medicare board of trustees predicts that the system it oversees will run out of money in 2019.

Look for Congress to appoint a commission soon to assess the Medicare problem, giving all the candidates the ability to punt that particular political ball to the incoming administration.

3. Ka-ching
This election will set new benchmarks for spending. The presidential money chase will surpass $1 billion, a whopping 50 percent rise over the price of the 2004 campaign, predicts the Washington-based research group the Center for Responsive Politics, which tracks campaign financing. Add in congressional elections and special interest spending, and the total could top $5 billion.

More important, this election may spell the end of the public's financing of presidential campaigns, the tax return checkoff begun in the early 1970s in response to Watergate-era abuses of special interest and private donations. On 2006 tax returns a mere 8 percent of Americans chose the option to designate $3 of their taxes to the fund. All but McCain, Rep. Tom Tancredo, John Edwards and Sen. Chris Dodd are forgoing public financing and avoiding the spending limitations it imposes. Has the checkoff outlived its ability to keep up with the cost of campaigns? It would seem so.

4. The Rainbow Race
Candidates from various slices of the population that have never produced a president have a serious chance of winning in 2008. While there have been minority and female candidates before (think Jesse Jackson in 1984 and 1988, Patricia Schroeder in 1988 or Shirley Chisholm in 1972), this time contenders from these groups are real potential winners.

Democratic Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have gotten most of the attention as potential groundbreakers, but there are others. Former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani (Italian American) and former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney (Mormon) have been in a battle for the GOP nomination. And New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson (Hispanic) has been nipping at the heels of the Democratic contenders.

All of these candidates have been trying to attract first-time voters, especially Clinton, Obama (with Oprah) and Richardson, who have the potential to increase significant chunks of voter turnout.

5. The Post-Internet Election
Last time around, Democrat Howard Dean made headlines by raising money on the Internet. Now, every candidate is doing it, and Clinton even threw her hat into the ring on her website.

During the midterm elections in 2006, Sen. George Allen possibly cost himself a victory when a video of his racial slur to an Indian American man was posted on YouTube. This time, YouTube is sponsoring presidential debates—and has featured even puppets and snowmen asking questions.

Ubiquitous cellphone cameras and recorders provide the public—including the explosion of bloggers—with instant access to every campaign gaffe, quip, grimace or sneeze. Web-savvy candidates must remain aware that nothing they say will stay in the room—nor do they necessarily want it to. To observe candidates up close in your own home, you can boot up your computer any time you want. Though it all seems geared to younger voters, the percentage of the 50-plus population using the Internet rose from 22 in 2004 to 49 in November 2007.

6. Heir Apparent?
For the first time since 1952, there's no obvious successor in either party (think vice presidents George H.W. Bush in 1988 and Al Gore in 2000). Part of President George W. Bush's reasoning for choosing Dick Cheney as a running mate in 2000 was that Cheney wasn't interested in the top job, but that decision has left a void in the Republican Party and turned the GOP race into a scramble.

The same holds true on the Democratic side, as other candidates have closed ground on Clinton, the early favorite. Her candidacy raises another question: Will voters countenance an unprecedented Bush-Clinton-Bush-Clinton "dynasty"?

"I wonder sometimes if we are the American republic or a banana republic," says University of Virginia election expert Larry Sabato. "If another country were passing the presidency between two families for 24 years, we would laugh."

7. The Long and Short of It
This campaign cycle started earlier than ever, with candidates declaring and campaigning full tilt nearly two years before Election Day. In response, many states started moving up the dates of their primaries. It got so chaotic that the major political parties had to step in and schedule the primaries so the states, scrambling to get ahead, wouldn't step on one another.

Still, the primary schedule is so completely front-loaded that the major party nominees may be known by Valentine's Day and surely by St. Patrick's Day. That means that the general election campaign will also be the longest in history. It could be eight months of two candidates slugging it out in a nasty, negative contest that will turn off the voters before they even engage, according to Washington Post political reporter Dan Balz.

And—as a final reminder of why the 2008 election is different—that could open the door for an independent, well-financed candidate like New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg to be viewed as a credible candidate, as a fresh voice among all the bickering.

Elaine Povich is a freelance writer who covers congressional politics.