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We've been posting releases on places like Indy Media to let the general public know that the Socialist Party in Los Angeles is up and running, that there's an active presence in Los Angeles with an infrastructure positioned to move forward with the Socialist agenda.
We have people in place who are motivated to carry out the Socialist agenda in the context of their particular fields of interest.
We organized and carried out our first meeting in Los Angeles, which you were a part of, to set up issue-specific committees intended to carry forth a plan of action in the community.
People have volunteered to run with those committees, and these volunteers are already meeting and setting up dates for future plans of action to have a positive impact in the Los Angeles County.
We are seeing this with the Feminism / Family Services committee, the Youth Action committee, and the Gay and Lesbian committee.
We have a goal, which is to reach 10,000 Los Angeles residents who have registered with the Socialist Party in a one year time period.
Having said all of this, we are still in need of help, which we are actively seeking. Los Angeles County is the largest in the country, and as I mentioned in the meeting, we need a sizable cadre of members to run with the Socialist agenda, to reach every pocket of the County, to provide examples of how the Socialist Party is determined to satisfy the needs of the working class, the impoverished, the hungry, the disenfranchised. As Chair of the Los Angeles Local, I can only hope to facilitate this process.
MB: Well, I think I may have asked the wrong question or I'm not understanding the meaning of that last answer. There are 10,000 registered Socialists in LA?
MS: Oh no. I think there are roughly 100 registered in the state of California. The goal is 10,000 by the end of 2011.
A goal of 10,000 registered in the city of Los Angeles.
MB: That makes more sense. I was gong to ask why those 10,000 didn't vote for the Socialists.
MS: I think that there were less than 7,000 who voted Socialist nationwide in the '08 general election.
MB: 6,528 votes is a far cry from the 900,000 votes that Gene Debs was able to receive at the beginning of last century. What do you think happened to those Socialists and, judging from the activity in the LA area, is there anything that can be done to recapture what Debs was able to bring to Socialism?
MS: Let me start by saying that my answers are purely my own, and that I give great deference to Greg Pason and Stewart Alexander, as well as Lynn Lomibao and others active in the Party.
I believe that the political and social climate is considerably different now than when Eugene Debs garnered 900,000 votes across the country. Third parties haven't had a lot of success in the U.S. as of late.
MB: That's putting it mildly.
