truthaction.org

[Scott N]

“LaRouche's beliefs were anti-Stalinist but vanguardist. LaRouche considers himself, and has so proclaimed publicly, the best qualified to lead (today, he claims that he is at the peak of his mental prowess at the age of 81).”

Source:

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Lyndon_LaRouche

His name keeps popping up in connection to the Bunk-port warning. Until yesterday I had only heard of him via pop culture references. A cursory glance at his political views seems to put him in fairly good company.

At first.

He supports 911 truth, he is fervently anti-neocon, he is anti-Zionist, he opposed deregulation of major industries during the Reagan administration, he opposes the IMF and World Bank.

Interestingly, his views on government and economics seem to mirror Tarpley’s exactly. And I do mean exactly:

“He argues that an oligarchical faction within the financial community is in fact the principal enemy of progress.

“LaRouche maintains that supranational financial institutions such as the International Monetary Fund are committed to a policy of looting the living standards of the world's populations through austerity and speculation, while contracting the actual productive base of these economies — a policy that he claims is a revival of the economic approach of the German central banker Hjalmar Schacht, who held office both before and during the Nazi government of Adolf Hitler. To remedy this, LaRouche proposes a new international conference, modeled on the Bretton Woods conference, for the purpose of reorganizing a bankrupt monetary system, and eliminating most of the presently unpayable debt. For example, he advocates the retroactive cancellation of all financial derivatives contracts. He proposes that new credits be created for very large infrastructure projects all over the world; LaRouche has published specific proposals for such projects in Europe, Asia, Africa, the Middle East, North and South America, and Australia. LaRouche considers it to be the unfinished mission of the United States of America to end any form of colonialism, which he associates in particular with the austerity policies of the International Monetary Fund in the post-1972 period.”

No problem here.

Like Tarpley he is also particularly concerned about the British Royal Family, arguing that the center of power lies more in the palaces of Windsor than the boardrooms of the Pentagon, and that the drug trade is largely controlled through MI6. Maybe, maybe not, I have no idea who the real kingpins are, though I’m pretty sure they're not Colombian.

So far so good. Now we start to delve into more controversial territory.

LaRouche “often disparages the counterculture. In 1978, he wrote that ‘The Beatles had no genuine musical talent, but were a product shaped according to British Psychological Warfare Division (Tavistock) specifications, and promoted in Britain by agencies which are controlled by British intelligence." [73][74]

This seems to be a popular theme amongst the populist right: the birth of Rock N’ Roll was actually the day the music died. Black and White become groovy multicolored and “traditional values” like “honey I’m home” and “yessa massa” and “that Lawrence Welk sure is swell” began to fade from our collective consciousness . Surely a development this heinous could only have been hatched in the bowels of Tavistock?

LaRouche is anti-feminist, arguing (like Jones and the late Aaron Russo) that the feminist movement was a Rockefeller plot designed to break up the family and turn men and women against each other.

On the last two points, I consider both theories quite absurd. The feminist movement – or something very like it – has been around since the dawn of civilization – and indeed long before.

There was no such thing as a Rockefeller empire when Mary Wollstonecraft wrote “A Vindication of the Rights of Women”. Similarly, there has always been a counterculture. You simply cannot have a culture without something approaching a counterculture. Call it Yin and Yang. Whether we’re talking about the birth of the blues, or jazz, or the beatnik culture, or the hippies, or the Yippies, or the British Invasion with their mop-tops and screaming fans, there have always been underground movements threatening to shake things up and replace the old with the new. These movements grow organically, usually amongst the rebellious downtrodden, and are then appropriated by the middle and upper classes.

This does not mean that the CIA and other entities did not infiltrate and successfully steer the 60’s counter culture (for instance, through the introduction of LSD or bogus front groups like the SLA) or attempt to de-radicalize the feminist movement (by replacing its anarchist roots with Marxist authoritarianism and anti-male rhetoric), but they certainly did not “create” them.

Anyway, I digress. So far I see nothing here that would paint LaRouche as a raving lunatic. His views, or some of them anyway, seem to be fairly common amongst 911 truthers, even if (again, some of them) would be considered wildly unorthodox in “mainstream” circles. He’s even been attacked by the (“anti”) Defamation League and our old pal Chip Berlet for “anti-semitism” and “Conspiracism”, respectively. So what’s the problem?

--

The first problem is that he appears to be megalomaniac with delusions of grandeur. How do I know this? Well for one because he founded something called the LaRouche Youth Movement:

LaRouche Youth Movement

“A significant change in the LaRouche organization since LaRouche's release from prison has been the development of the LaRouche Youth Movement (LYM) beginning in 1999. Often described as a cult which employs brainwashing techniques, the LYM's recruitment of young people in the 18-25 year-old age bracket has reportedly brought more members into the LaRouche organization than at any time in the past. On September 9, 2003, members of the LYM interrupted a debate of the Democratic candidates for president at Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland and disrupted Democratic Party candidates' events during the 2004 campaign, occasionally leading to arrests.”

Again, nothing wrong with disrupting Democracy Party Events – it’s a great idea – but consider the context.

“In 1973, according to some press accounts, the NCLC adopted violent and disruptive tactics under LaRouche's direction. According to the Village Voice, NCLC members physically attacked meetings of the Communist Party and later of the SWP, and other groups who were classed by LaRouche as "left-protofascists." According to the New York Times, they also attacked CP members on the street and used nunchaku. LaRouche called these attacks "Operation Mop-up."[25][26]

“The NCLC argued that they were acting merely in self-defense, but according to Dennis King, their rhetoric suggested otherwise. "From here on in," LaRouche proclaimed at a mass meeting of his East Coast followers, "the CP cannot hold a meeting on the East Coast....We'll mop them up in two months."[27]

I don’t know the source and I’m not sure if the allegations hold water. LaRouche, for his part, claims that the violence was directed at him, not vice versa, via provocateurs in the communist party.

Perhaps someone who lived through the era can shed more light on the subject. An individual on blogger claims he witnessed many of these shenanigans first hand.

Let’s put aside the alleged mob violence. What exactly does it mean to be a “LaRouchie”. A former disciple outlines his experience here:

“One becomes completely child-like again and subject to the groups teachings and the leaders wishes. The irony of the matter is that LaRouche himself, who had studied mental manipulation, when he was thinking of deprogramming members who he said had been kidnapped by the CIA (actually a lie), describes very well how one can, in three short days, change the “axioms of a person’s thinking”, and “tear off the mask of the persona bourgeoisie” by intensive sessions that he called “psycho sessions” or “ego stripping”, as well as “school for managing executives,” using a much milder term.

Please refer to his brochure called “Beyond psychoanalysis” published in the 70’s in the United States. In short LaRouche in my opinion and from my experience makes his money from selling methods of mind control!!!! (One cannot help but recognise the similarities between the LaRouche organisation and such parties as the Nazi Party or the Soviet Stalin Party, and one can conclude that he has made use of some of their methods.)

…This is why, around the age of twenty, when one still has the time to ask oneself good questions, and one does not yet have many responsibilities to consider, one becomes the ideal prey for cults, in particular those who tend to be more of a politically alternative nature.”

http://www.justiceforjeremiah.com/content/case/living_prison.htm

Which brings us back to the LaRouche youth movement. What is he teaching these kids anyway? Well, to cherry pick two examples: LaRouche is opposed to the legalization of drugs because it “creates a culture of self-centered hedonism”, and he believes that global warming is caused by “the Crab Nebula”.

So now we’re getting into David Ickean territory or the “National Enquirer” method: large doses of truth mixed in with a healthy dose of patent nonsense in order to discredit people who dare deviate from official orthodoxy. Either that or he really does believe Global Warming is caused by the Crab Nebula. I’m not sure which is worse, frankly.

He is rabidly anti-gay. According to a personal account from an ex LaRouchie published here:

Lyn would constantly pepper his talks with his diatribes against "faggots and sodomizers" to whip us up.

During one of our campaigns we published a pamphlet called "The Aquarian Conspiracy". Now we were calling Right to Life groups and religious people to support Lyn. Part of our polemic was that Homosexuality was Satanic in nature and part of the evil oligarchy's plan to bring on the Dark Ages. We linked Homosexuals to Babylonian cults, Aristotle, Jesuits, Tavistock, every British scientist and every evil in the world.”

xlcr4life@hotmail.com

Although technically this is hearsay, it gels perfectly with the words of LaRouche himself. In 1986 he wrote:

“We have another purpose in fighting AIDS, for our fighting AIDS — for our inducing people to do what they should have done anyway without our speaking a word. Government agencies should have done this. There should be no issue! But government agencies didn't! That's the issue. Why didn't they? Because of a cultural paradigm shift. They did not want, on the one hand, to estrange the votes of a bunch of faggots and cocaine sniffers, the organized gay lobby, as it's called in the United States. (I don't know why they're "gay", they're the most miserable creatures I ever saw! The so-called gay lobby, 8% of the population, the adult electorate; the drug users. There are 20 million cocaine sniffers in the United States, at least. Of course it does affect their mind; it affects the way they vote!

… They're already beating up gays with baseball bats around the country! Children are going to playgrounds, they go in with baseball bats, and they find one of these gays there, pederasts, trying to recruit children, and they take their baseball bats and they beat them up pretty bad. They'll kill one sooner or later. In Chicago, they're beating up gays that are hanging around certain schools, pederasts; children go out with baseball bats and beat them up-which is perfectly moral; they have the civil right to do that! It's a matter of children's civil rights!

– Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr., "The End of the Age of Aquarius?" EIR (Executive Intelligence Review), January 10, 1986, p. 40.

I will not argue that LaRouche is an intelligence asset because I have no proof as such. Being that he has been attacked by an obvious mockingbird in Chip Berlet I would like to give him the benefit of the doubt; perhaps he’s just your run-of-the mill cult leader with a penchant for deep politics.

Unfortunately there isn’t much difference between your run-of-the mill cult leader and your run-of-the mill cult-of-intelligence leader.
The ultimate goal is self-aggrandizement and expansion of power over one’s minions. There is no honor in being the “leader” of a movement. The real honor lies in teaching others to be leaders and in sharing knowledge and power with all concerned. Far better to help someone realize their own unique potential and learn from them in turn than recreate people in your own image like a bunch of bobbleheads on an assembly line.

That’s what’s great about the 911 truth movement. We HAVE no leaders. We are ALL leaders.

“Since the 1980s, a new set of theories about fascism has gained attention in academia. These include the work of Roger Griffin (fascism as a right-wing populist movement calling for heroic rebirth — palingenesis) and Emilio Gentile (the sacralization of politics). According to Griffin:

[F]ascism is best defined as a revolutionary form of nationalism, one that sets out to be a political, social and ethical revolution, welding the ‘people’ into a dynamic national community under new elites infused with heroic values. The core myth that inspires this project is that only a populist, trans-class movement of purifying, cathartic national rebirth (palingenesis) can stem the tide of decadence”[20]

I worry that this is where the “populist right” is taking us. Although the ostensible enemy is fascism and the ostensible cure “saving the Republic”, a homophobic, mysoginist, anti-abortion pseudo-Christian theocracy where Mexican children are rounded up and placed in camps and a giant wall built along the border and corporations deregulated doesn’t strike me as a particularly good solution.

[T++]

[Scott N]

Go read "Acid Dreams", or a synopsis.

[casseia]

Danse, thank you, I really appreciate your work here. I've always liked Tarpley and I've always been disturbed by his connections to LaRouche, without knowing enough about LaRouche. What I had heard was that his followers used physical violence to disrupt Leftist organizations -- and I didn't really need to know much more to conclude he was very bad news. On the other hand, his "people" regularly set up tables on my campus, and I walked out of the library one day feeling unusually friendly and let one give me the whole spiel. And it sounded...umm...pretty reasonable.

I would like to give Tarpley the benefit of the doubt and propose that maybe he left the organization over just the things you cite which are repellent and abhorrent (at least the cult of personality stuff -- I have no reason to think Tarpley is a feminist or supports gay rights.) But Tarpley is getting no benefit of any doubt from me right now during the Kennebunkery fiasco.

Would you mind if I made this a "book page" over at RT's site? Or would you consider doing it yourself?

[casseia]

And one other thing... the people who have an obvious emotional involvement in hating "the sodomizers" are usually tragic closet cases a la Senator Craig. I used to think this theory was just a way of tweaking homophobes, but more and more I'm beginning to think it represents plain reality.

[JoanJones]

Great post, Danse.

Apparently, Tarpley was the founder of the LaRouche movement's european branch, he was LaRouche's intelligence chief for many years, a regular host on The LaRouche Connection cable television show and ran for Senate on the LaRouche platform.

One unique aspect of the LaRouche cult that you didn't touch on was the obsession with intelligence gathering.

This article (one of a five part series published in the mid-80s by the WP) touches on it a bit:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/cult/larouche/larou1.htm

[YT]

[JoanJones]

Adding to Tarpley's Larouchian resume:

He also served as President of Helga Zepp-LaRouche's Schiller Institute.

[Scott N]

Hi Casseia.

[Arabesque]

LaRouche and Operation Mop-Up
http://www.publiceye.org/larouche/Mop-Up.html

Operation Mop-up officially raged from May to September of 1973. Less organized fistfights and other acts of violence continued into 1974.

In 1973, the predominantly White LaRouche group, the National Caucus of Labor Committees (NCLC), attempted to take over the Black-led National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO). When the Communist Party USA (CPUSA), objected and tried to assist the NWRO, LaRouche's followers in NCLC were ordered to brutally assault members of the CPUSA. When members of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP), helped defend victims of the attacks, they were added to the enemies list. NCLC thugs used bats, chains, and martial arts weapons in a campaign to establish "hegemony" over the American revolutionary movement. There were many injuries and some persons required hospitalization.

"Our hearts were not in it," a former NCLC member says about his participation in Operation Mop-Up. "But with LaRouche it was all or nothing; the attacks were supposed to harden the membership." Forcing student intellectuals into violent confrontations was an exercise in self-degradation which cemented their loyalty to NCLC, ex-members say, Their working-class Marxism gave way to an unquestioning, cult-like devotion to LaRouche. "Most of us now find the whole thing was crazy," says a seven-year NCLC veteran who left the group in the mid-1970's.
_________________
Arabesque: 911 Truth
2008 Declaration: Standards and Strategies for 9/11 Truth
A 9/11/2008 Resolution: Start Your Own 9/11 Blog

[JoanJones]

Some of the most detailed, in-depth reports on the Larouche organization are unfortunately from Chip Berlet (publiceye), a notorious JFK/9-11 denialist shill. It's probably best to avoid promoting his work. Fortunately, there are quite a few other good sources.

[Scott N]

Thanks for the piece on Mop Up. Looks like the case is fairly cut and dried. Former LaRouchies have confessed to their actions in detail. LaRouche ordered his minions to physically attack leftist groups. This guy's bad news. I'm amazed Tarpley worked for him for twenty years. Can't help but wonder if he still does, or if perhaps he has been annointed LaRouche's successor?

[Scott N]

[Rowan Berkeley]

Let me take a shot at explaining their world view if I can. I think their key concept is "synarchism". This term as they use it refers to a hypothetical elite-of-elites, which manipulates both 'Left' and 'Right' from behind the scenes. They seem to find it very difficult to grasp the nature of what marxists call 'class forces', so they fall back into this conspirological model.

[Hocus Locus]

(((oops dup thread. Sorry, reposted here)))