Promise of a Generation & Fears of Obama Administration

Before I launch into the insanity of Inauguration Day let me just say that some of the events I attended leading up to Jan 20th's swearing-in where unbelievable. Including the Netroots Nation ball which was organized, delicious, ample in drink tickets which came with your purchased ticket, and all around the best event I attended.

However, I was first able to attend the New Leader's Council cocktail party where many of the DC fellows were in attendance. I've talked about the NLC quite a while back, but as a refresher its a training organization for youth who are in entry level political jobs who want to gain the skills necessary to climb the latter - but don't want to quit their jobs. Many times in training programs an applicant can't have a job because they are sent to a campaign or an org for 3-6 months. So, for folks who don't have the freedom to leave their life don't have a real option for advanced training.

The NLC provides that kind of quality training at that advanced level but does so in an area that is near to its fellows but on Saturdays for the course of what amounts to be a semester.

The theme of the NLC event was 10 by 2010. They have chapters now going strong in LA, San Francisco, Boston, DC, and NYC and are eager to grow to 10 within the next year. I know there is someone excited to develop one in Oklahoma City and there is buzz of one starting in Kansas that I'm trying to push along as well.

At a time when so many organizations are faltering because of the economy or the Madoff scandal and other organizations spend tons of money on parties or concerts, the NLC has tangible results in leadership development that grows young people into a generation of political and organization workers.

Their event on Sunday was great. I was able to connect with old friends and meet with new ones. Newly elected State Rep from Maine spoke, as did California Secretary of State Debra Bowen.

Monday I had a great lunch meeting with a few people who are also leaders in the youth movement. While the purpose of the meeting was truly just to catch up, shop talk ensued and we shared our fears of the new administration only paying a lip-service to the youth movement and trying to funnel us all into "service" rather than meaningful policy initiatives.

For example: one member of our party lamented that the Obama Administration didn't have a youth representative working with any economic recovery or jobs packages or efforts. There is a huge focus on labor and helping older workers develop new tech skills so they have options in the jobs market. However, there is an entire generation graduating ... possibly the largest graduating class in our nation's history who is just now entering the work force with these skills already... and yet our generation has a 20% unemployment rate.

Why aren't young people or a rep from our generation anywhere near the table when discussing these issues, particularly since we have a much higher unemployment rate even with the skills policy makers say are necessary to get jobs??

Our further fear/discussion was that the Obama Administration will simply continue to pat us on the head and we will miss out on any real meaningful possibilities of engagement. When the Administration Youth Liaison met with leaders of the youth movement she commented that the one thing the youth movement wanted as a unit was a seat at the table. The fear we discussed at lunch was that those seats at the table will be minimized to meaningless outreach tools that merely create an appearance of engagement.

Perhaps we have a complete lack of trust from our years of experiencing what I just described to believe that an administration will actually consider us assets to policy initiatives.

Initial thoughts, I will have more on the insane disasters we saw at the actual Inaugural ceremonies and the pointlessness of the Youth Ball that had so much promise but in the end was a total FAILURE.