My first article ever for Salon. That’s my original title, and this is how my version of it opened:
Current speculation about a possible Bernie Sanders challenge to Hillary Clinton in 2016 is not the first time a prominent socialist has considered a bid for the Democratic nomination.
It reminds me of a time nearly four decades ago when I was a young socialist in New York. It was the summer of 1978, and liberal Democrats had grown increasingly disillusioned with the Carter presidency.
Carter was never going to be our favorite candidate. On the eve of the 1976 elections, Michael Harrington, the leader of the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee (DSOC) had called on Leftists to vote for Carter “without illusions”. We expected very little and that’s exactly what we got.