The socialist movement is getting younger and turning into a left-wing force

[TexasTowelie]

After Democratic Socialists of America became the largest Marxist organization since World War II, its members broke into song. As Marcus Bennett, an organizer for Britain's left-wing Labour Party, stood up to address the DSA's biggest-ever convention Saturday, scores of the nearly 700 delegates stood up and belted out the name of the party's unapologetic leftist leader.

"Oh, Jeremy Corbyn! Oh, Jeremy Corbyn!" they sang, to the melody of the White Stripes' "Seven Nation Army." Bennett raised his fist in the air and sang along, dazzled that a Britishsoccer chant had traveled all the way to Chicago.

"We got our Bernie," he said, referring to Corbyn and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. "Don't give up hope. Your time is coming now."

DSA, founded in 1982 to create a political foothold for Marxists, has transformed into an ambitious left-wing force. Membership grew during Sanders' presidential campaign, and then started surging the day after Donald Trump was elected president in what some DSA members jokingly call the "socialist baby boom."

Read more: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/politics/ct-socialist-movement-bernie-sanders-20170806-story.html

[yallerdawg]

1. The Democratic Party (the road to socialism?) ELECTS younger candidates!

Many "old timers" like Senator Sanders (I-VT) and Michael Moore keep reminding us that the future of the Democratic Party is getting younger and younger. 3,000,000 new voters turn 18 every year!

What do we offer to attract them?

The average age of DSA members has since 2015 dropped from 64 to about 30, according to an organizer. A May 2016 Gallup poll, conducted after most of the Democratic primaries, found just that 35 percent of Americans viewed socialism favorably. Among voters under 30, that number rose to 55 percent.

The youth of the DSA's new membership has infused it with humor, irony and a dizzy confidence - much of it inspired by left-wing parties in Europe and South America. But on Saturday, after a short debate, DSA delegates voted to end their 35-year relationship with the Socialist International, the global network of left-wing parties.

Instead of seeking out stars, DSA members have focused on ultra-local campaigning. They joined sit-ins and protests against the Republican effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act, but they used them to advance arguments for single-payer health care similar to Canada's. In California, DSA members have phone-banked and knocked on doors to back a state single-payer bill that the legislature's Democratic supermajority has tabled; the campaign, however, is designed to continue even if the bill were to pass.

[Bladewire]

2. o.0