Ellington

By Raj Jayadev writes for Wiretap about problems with the youth voting movement. "[A] movement is about creating choices. The gulf is about imagination. As Desmond Tutu said, it's not just about having a seat at the table, it's about setting the menu. If young people really did set the menu, I doubt they would be serving up the Democratic Party or John Kerry.

"If the 'youth movement' is going to be more than a mere footnote in George Bush's story of continuing manifest destiny, it won't be up to Puff Daddy or John Kerry. I don't even think it will be based on the actions of the college youth organizers who were trying to console each other that day after the election. A youth movement will be led by those who were as removed from the vote as they are from MTV. It will be based on the 24-year-old who is living on the streets of downtown San Jose, jobless, and keeps his poetry book hidden under his 40-bottle in his backpack. The same one who told me, as I was about to drive over to the polling station on voting day, that sometimes he hates himself. I don't reflect about what president we need when I think of him. I think of what movement we need to imagine."