Over a thousand Young Democrats from all over the USA converged last weekend on Chicago, Illinois, for YDA’s biennial convention. The location of the Convention was a symbol of its own since Illinois's own, President Barack Obama, rallied young people from across the country to an overwhelming victory last November.
The Convention was notably the occasion of many traditional caucus meetings (LGBT, rural, labour, high school…) and training sessions on campaigning techniques. Among keynote speakers were the former Chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Howard Dean, the mayor of San Francisco, Gavin Newsom, President Bill Clinton, and Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi.
But the main item on the agenda was the hotly contested election for YDA’s national officers, which saw the election of President
Crystal Strait, Executive VP
Rod Snyder, VP
Coleman Elridge, VP
Isaac Robinson, VP
Renee Hartley, Secretary
Emily Robinson, and Treasurer
Mark Newman – all with an impressive track record of action. A number of resolutions were also approved. The main hotly debated topics at the Convention were without surprise healthcare reform and marriage equality for gays and lesbians.
The European Liberal Youth (LYMEC) reacts with great disappointment to the results of the UN climate summit in Copenhagen. Delegates refused to endorse formally and only "took note" of a declaration negotiated at the last minute between the US, China, India, South Africa, Brazil and a number of EU Member States, but leaving outside 165 countries. The declaration contains language about holding the rise in global temperatures down to 2°C, and a promise of €20 billion over the next three years and €70 billion a year from 2020 in climate aid from rich to poor countries.
The European Commission's Directorate-General for Competition released last August a review of guarantee and recapitalisation schemes in the financial sector in the current crisis. In this review, the Commission emphasised the need for Member States to ensure that there were exit strategies in place for the assistance they provided. In other words, Member States should ensure that they were providing this assistance only to re-heat the economy, as a means of moving away from the crisis more smoothly. Once the economy would grow again, Member States would then pull out.
As Europe's left failed to capitalise on widespread concerns over the recession, Europe’s voters said no to protectionism and nationalization.