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Dynamic Magazine
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The quarterly magazine of the YCL
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YCL 8th National Convention May 2006
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Our Future, Our Fight: Youth Beat Back the Ultra-Right!
Young Communist League, USA
Eighth National Convention
May 27-29, 2006 * New York City
Our Future, Our Fight: Youth Beat Back the Ultra-Right
On Memorial Day Weekend members of the Young Communist League, USA refused to sit back while ultra-right attempts to destroy our future by holding our 8th National Convention in Brooklyn, New York. During the weekend, over 250 delegates and guests from Oakland, Chicago, Maine, Providence, Florida, St. Louis, New York and many other communities came together to celebrate the successes of the YCL in the last 4 years and to plan how to move the YCL forward in the struggle for peace, jobs and education for young people.
Convention highlights include:
Convention-goers attended “War and Peace”, an art exhibit and hip-hop performance co-sponsored by Dynamic Magazine, World Up and Upper Playground
Convention-goers demonstrated outside of a Brooklyn military recruitment center demanding money for schools, jobs and not for war
Convention adopted a national Action Plan, a document that provides a foundation for our work over the next 4 years
Convention approved resolutions covering our approach to the struggle of immigrants, the struggle for peace, and aid to survivors of Hurricane Katrina
Convention elected of new National Council and National Coordinator, Erica Smiley
The convention opened with a rousing speech from out-going National Coordinator Jessica Marshall, setting the tone for the rest of the weekend by noting “This country needs a radical youth organization, a strong and vibrant multi-racial organization. The YCL knows that unity is not a secondary vision. We are not victims, we are fighters!” Also addressing the convention were Congressman Major Owens (D-NY) who welcomed us to Brooklyn “on behalf of all the progressive forces of the nation and world”, Jarvis Tyner, executive Vice Chair of the Communist Party USA who reminded us that “Tomorrow is Yours”, and international guests from the World Federation of Democratic Youth (WFDY), YCL of Canada, YCL of Greece, YCL of Israel and the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN) of El Salvador.
Throughout the weekend YCL members and guests participated in workshops on topics ranging from issues such as “Youth and the Poverty Draft”, skills-building sessions on how to get involved in the upcoming elections to ideological workshops highlighting the YCL’s approach to fighting racism, the struggle women’s equality and the fight for democracy.
As we all return home, pumped from the Convention and ready to hit the streets in the upcoming elections, we invite you to join us in the fight for the rights of young people and for a better future for all youth. You can do this in many ways, signing up for the upcoming YCL School where you can dive deeper into the many ideological questions raised at the convention, you can participate in our elections work, and be a part of implementing our Action Plan in so many ways.
But before you do anything, consider joining the YCLUSA.
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Upcoming Events
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2008 Elections
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Check back soon for more information!
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Photo Courtesy of United for Peace and Justice www.unitedforpeace.org
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Throughout U.S. history, immigrant labor, either voluntary or involuntary, has helped build the industries, schools, roads, railways, and neighborhoods of this country. The push to end the exploitation of immigrants and expand their rights to live, work, vote, and prosper in the United States is a fundamental goal of the larger working-class movement. Both the Bush Administration and corporate America use race, gender, sexuality and immigration status to divide workers and communities for their own profit.
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If you turned on the TV on November 3rd CNN mentioned to you that young people showed up at the polls but it was nothing too impressive. They told you that while the numbers went up, so did all voter-turnout numbers and there was no significant shift or big change in how many young folks showed up as compared to the rest of the population. Some of them even went so far as to blame the youth for not turning out enough to impact the elections favorably for Kerry. But the numbers tell another story.
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If you turned on the TV on November 3rd CNN mentioned to you that young people showed up at the polls but it was nothing too impressive. They told you that while the numbers went up, so did all voter-turnout numbers and there was no significant shift or big change in how many young folks showed up as compared to the rest of the population. Some of them even went so far as to blame the youth for not turning out enough to impact the elections favorably for Kerry. But the numbers tell another story.
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YCL Recommended Reading List
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Bush Sucks!
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WASHINGTON — Bruised but unbowed by labor’s failure to oust George W. Bush in the Nov. 2 election, AFL-CIO President John Sweeney told a news conference here that the movement will “fight like hell? to stop Bush’s ultra-right agenda in his second term. reprinted from the People's Weekly World newspaperclick here for Spanish text
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California’s Ozomatli, whose rap-tinged Latin dance music has provided the soundtrack to the struggles for immigrant rights, global justice and youth revolt since their founding in 1995, has brought us another instant-classic album in their newly released Street Signs.
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This year, the massive annual Notting Hill Festival in London, England is remembering the life and work of Claudia Jones, “mother of the Notting Hill Festival?. In her memory it is being hosted under the slogan of “Freedom and Justice?.
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Imagine waking one morning to find a major national symbol of your country destroyed by an act of terrorism and your country caught up in a wave of insecurity, xenophobia and blind ultra-nationalism.
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Absent for 12 years, the Young Communist League (YCL) is back on the Canadian political scene. Young members of the Communist Party of Canada (CPC) have reestablished the YCL across the country.
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Together now for nearly 25 years, these American punk rock legends have never been shy about their political and philosophical judgements. From their firm stand against the Gulf War to recent songs like “Kyoto Now!? and “Materialist,? Bad Religion has long been a militant voice for peace and progress. This 14th and latest album, The Empire Strikes First, is no exception.
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Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi was first available in the US last year and is now out in paperback. It has been widely read and reviewed in France where it was originally published in two volumes in 2000 and 2001 Persepolis 2: The Story of A Return is due out at the end of August.
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In political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal’s new book “We Want Freedom?, he places black liberation in historical context through the history of the Black Panther Party(BPP).
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For two years I’ve been a member of a group in Harlem called the Liberation Program. In a group of about 15 young folks, we’ve been active in the fight to stop gentrification in the Harlem community.
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More 2004 - October
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On July 19, as part of a contingent of the 35th annual Venceremos (We Shall Overcome) Brigade, I crossed the US/Canadian border in a direct action challenging the Bush administration’s travel ban to Cuba.
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More 2004 - October
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The following is a quick and dirty list of the main issues at stake for young people come Election Day:
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American recording artist and activist Michael Franti recently traveled to the Middle East. In this diary excerpt, he describes conditions in East Jerusalem and the Occupied Territories (West Bank and Gaza Strip) - Palestinian land that Israel has controlled by force since 1967.
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The Latin American School of Medical Sciences in Havana, Cuba
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The Latin American School of Medical Sciences in Havana, Cuba, currently has over 9,000 students from 24 countries, including Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa. Eighty of these students are from the United States. Just a month ago, poor black, Latino and Native-American med-school hopefuls faced the possibility of being stripped of the right to a free education in Havana, Cuba because of regulations that restricted travel to the island.
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Representatives from the World Federation of Democratic Youth meet to plan the festival.
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From June 6-9, delegates from 30 countries representing 50 organizations converged in the Brazilian capital of Brasilia to launch the preparatory process for the 16th World Festival of Youth and Students (WFYS). The 16th WFYS will take place in Caracas, Venezuela, Aug. 5-13, 2005, under the slogan "for peace and solidarity - we struggle against imperialism and war."
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