On April 15, 2002 an estimated 100,000 American Jews, and their right-wing Christian allies, descended on the U.S. capitol to “stand in solidarity” with Israel in the largest Washington rally in support of Israel in U.S. history.  Five days later, an estimated 100,000 diverse protesters took to the streets of Washington DC to demand an end to the U.S. war on communities of color at home and abroad. The crowd overwhelmingly demanded justice for Palestine from Israel’s brutal occupation in what was the largest demonstration for Palestine in U.S. history.

The last decade has been a period of profound struggle and realignment for the Left in the United States. We entered the decade with a disorientation shaped by the exhilaration of the 1999 Seattle protests and the world-changing events of September 11, 2001. Ten years later, that disorientation has started to shift, and a new level of clarity is emerging.

We are, however, far behind the clock in terms of preparing ourselves to play the kind of political leadership role that history is going to demand as a number of intersecting crises unfold in the coming decades. To try to capture the development of our work over the last decade, I’m offering a few “snapshots” describing how we entered the last decade, how we are leaving it and how we need to approach the next ten years.

On September 25, 1957 nine Black students started classes at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, beginning the school’s process of integration. On June 16, 1976 in Soweto, South Africa, thousands of young people gathered in their schools for a student-run demonstration against apartheid. In 1989 hundreds of street youth in Brazil took over the Brazilian National Congress to fight for the passing of laws that favored young people. Throughout history, youth have been at the forefront of social movements. When the 2010 United States Social Forum arrives in Detroit, youth will again rise to the occasion. Youth are already organizing across the country for the USSF, holding community forums and meetings and spreading the word to get more people involved.

Despite the somewhat rocky relationship between the labor movement and the Obama Administration, Democratic hopes for holding on to Congress were largely dependent on the political efforts of organized labor—still the only grassroots organization that has a track record of turning out reliably Democratic voters in key battleground states like Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Wisconsin. According to a recent Wall Street Journal/NBC poll, 55 percent of union members prefer to see the Democrats in control of Congress, compared to the general population, which is split down the middle.