As a young Democrat this is a worrying trend, the party doesn't need to be fragmented like the GOP by letting in more hard line ideology. The sub groups of both parties have the possibility to hold the larger blocs of power ransom if they gain enough influence (like the tea party and freedom caucus have) and we could end up with 10+ years of obstructionist shit show on top of the previous 8 years of obstructionist shit show *sigh*
What part of the DSA platform would you consider hard line? There are some, I'm sure, but the core movement is mostly concerned with broadly popular policies like universal health care and $15 minimum wage.
They are, but it's important for them to realize they aren't the only generation to inherit a shit show, and that there is an established way of doing things that doesn't involve blowing everything up. Young people tend to be opposed to incremental change because of a skewed scale of time when compared to their life span in general. 4 years is a long time to someone who is 20, 4 years is not a long time to someone in their 40's, and it's even less to someone in their 70's.
While the Bernie revolution got a lot of young people interested, it also was a double edged sword because those same young voters became upset when the change they desired was not instant and it resulted in a lot of them not voting at all in 2016. There will be friction against change, and if change is going to happen we need the under 30 crowd to not lose interest in the process because of a single failure. Failure means there are lessons to be learned, and it's important that we don't fracture the party moving forward by trying to rush change when we aren't in control of The House, Senate, or Executive Branch.
I'm not sure what part of the DSA platform involves blowing anything up. Quite the opposite, the DSA believes in rebuilding the communities that have been obliterated by capitalism.
What single failure are you referring to? Do you believe things were moving in the right direction before November 8, 2016? Because I think there's a lot of evidence that they weren't. The shit show you referred to has been brewing for 40 years.
That is my worry as well...the perfect is the enemy of the good. I get why people, especially young people who tend to embrace ideals more, would look at the Democrats and be disgusted. At best they are another face of the same slimy political machine, albeit IMO not as slimy as the GOP. I know quite a few people who voted Johnson/wrote in Bernie this time around (or said they did) and it won us all Trump.
Now maybe Trump will burn down the GOP for a while (awesome), and it would be worth it...it's just awful risky to me due to his environmental stance (destroy it) and his apparent willingness to start wars tweeting from the toilet.
My understanding is that a larger percentage of Bernie supporters voted for Clinton in '16 than Clinton supporters voted for Obama in '08. I'm not saying that you won't find a lot of Sanders supporters that didn't vote. My brother was one of those, but he never would have voted for Clinton, Sanders or no Sanders (he didn't vote for Obama in '08 or '12).
There is a huge number of alienated voters out there, I think the DSA has the potential to reach some of them. I think it's a big mistake to just think of them as cannibalizing and splintering support for the Democratic Party.
I saw some folks talking on Twitter last night about what an incredible idiot and buffoon Trump is, and that we might not be so lucky with whatever fascist runs in 2020 or 2024, it could very well be a skilled politician. In my view, a strong DSA could be a big asset in preventing that kind of disaster.