Is anyone familiar with Lyndon LaRouche?

[sweetladybug]

I've been getting calls from his office and they've sent me papers and magazines. Now they want money. What do you think about his views and politics?

[NEDem]

Run away!

LaRouche's people are nuts.

[tainowarrior]

54. yeah, really...run away!

LaRouche's people are as about as sane as Fred Phelps and his Kansas bunch.

[NEDem]

1. dupe

Sorry

[ret5hd]

2. nope, sorry...nobody here...

really, he's quite an amusing crackpot. his tinfoil hat makes mine look quite small and insignificant.

[John Q. Citizen]

3. He's not worth investing in. Beware.

[crispini]

4. Total. Lunatic! nt

[ncteechur]

5. Only Pat Paulson ran for president more than LaRouche.

[H2O Man]

46. One big difference:

Pat Paulson could be taken seriously.

[jjmalonejr]

6. Crazy MF

[noahmijo]

7. He's a complete lunatic

I mentioned him a report I did a long time ago he supports banning ALL forms of media, from video games to movies that he deems "offensive"

The man is somewhere between Warren Moon and Pat Robertson.

Last I heard he's in jail too.

[More Than A Feeling]

69. Warren Moon?

The former NFL quarterback?

I think you mean Rev. Sun Myung Moon, the head of the unification church, and Bush stalwart.;-)

[rox63]

8. Total nutbag

Run away. Then change your phone number.

[flyingfysh]

9. LaRouche was in prison for fraud

His people would accept credit card numbers for their magazine, then charge huge amounts to the cards.

LaRouche is a loon.

[genius]

30. That doesn't sound correct. A lot of people claim he was set up

for his liberal beliefs. I recall being told the details of the set-up and the circumstances, but I don't recall what specifically was said. I'm sure that if you asked any of his people, they'd be glad to go into the details. They seem like very nice people.

I've seen lots of set-ups. Rove set up Dan Rather. Kevin Shelley was set-up, which is why we have McPherson. The Democrats in California were in on the set-up, asking Shelley to resign for something he didn't do. Then the Democratic leadership in the legislature blackmailed the Democratic legislators into backing McPherson. Four Democrats refused to show up and vote for the Republican their leaders had pressured them into supporting. Bob Battin (Orange County, CA) was set up. He went to jail. People are always out to get rid of our protectors. Notice, Blackwell, Harris, and Rove are out of jail and free. Jail is generally for Democrats, only.

I've seen people here go after Kucinich (probably the best Democrat ever) as if it is their calling in life and so seeing people savage others here doesn't surprise me.

[6th Borough]

40. Sure, he was set up by the Queen of England and the Pope...

Throw in the masons for good measure.

He's a nutjobber, plain as day.

[genius]

58. That's not what his people are saying. They're claiming the Republicans

and right-wing Democrats (remember the Party used to have Southern Democrats) did it.

Rather than attack someone over non-sense, why not do some research. You might start by reading "The Unauthorized Biography of George Bush," which was co-written by a co-founder of the group and see what these people really believe.

Witch hunts really bother me. They remind me of the Germans going after one group and then another. If people would get their facts straight, they might stop these witch hunts before they reach their door.

[TankLV]

78. He's nuts. If you believe that crap - you're nuts too.

I've had personal BAD experiences with this cult of nutjobs.

It's very hard to leave - but I managed to do so.

They are completely bullshit artists, living in a crisis world of their own making.

[salin]

43. go back to the time of the case - and his positions at the time

and I ask: What "liberal ideas".

Some people think that because he goes off on how awful bushco is that he is "liberal."

Back around the time he was arrested for (well documented) credit card fraud - his big issue was quarantining all people who are HIV positive - even pushed a ballot initiative (in CA I believe) pushing this position.

Kucinich is great - and is liberal. No comparison.

[fujiyama]

83. Defending LaRouche is crazy

even for you.

LaRouche is a protector? Are you smoking crack?

[FogerRox]

96. I volunteered with the La ROuches back in the late 1990s--

They are a cult
They have a very good private intell service--
Conected to Vatican Bank heist
Propaganda Doua in Italy

LaRouche loved Reagan---untill Reagan put him in Jail

Larouche is a Fasicst---

he sent his people into anti Veit NAm war protests, they beat people up-- beat up the protesters

I got a big file on these folks thru a friend that worked in their intell operations-- he quit-- he doesnt like Cults either

The more you read what Lyndon hgas written-- the more you will realize he is truly a lair.

[flyingfysh]

10. self delete

key bounce duplicated post

[despairing optimist]

11. What can you say about a libertarian jailbird?

Went to prison for tax evasion, a sleazy character on the political scene for too many decades.

But papers and magazines can be recycled. Some groups even make cat litter out of them, so all isn't lost.

[LoZoccolo]

12. He's basically a political cult leader.

One day I was downtown going to tape some stuff with my videocamera and the LaRouchies were in front of a state government building protesting that LaRouche was not being allowed in the debates for the Democratic primary (he's ineligible to be the Democratic presidential candidate because party rules forbid anyone being a candidate for president who is not registered to vote, and LaRouche lives in Virginia where convicted felons do not have voting rights). I started taping them because they looked interesting (not as in, I'm interested in their views, more like, I'm interested in staring at them as a bunch of people who are making a spectacle of themselves). One woman who was there came up and started saying stuff like LaRouche is starting a youth movement and the youth are rallying around LaRouche in the Democratic primary, and it got really weird when she said that LaRouche is the most truthful man who's ever lived on this planet and he's the only one qualified to be president because of his mastery of the Socratic method. So it's pretty weird. Sure they point out some stuff every now and then that's actually true, like the fact that a lot of people in the government at the time of the Iraq war were a part of PNAC, but they also have these weird conspiracy theories and stuff, plus they generally act like cult members.

[dave502d]

13. He want your money.n/t

[genius]

14. Not directly. His supporters are liberal Democrats. Don't buy the lies.

I've never met him. However, I met the daughter of the co-founder of his group. She's Jewish as are a number of the other LaRouchees I've met. So the anti-Semitism nonsense is a lie. She said that people have worked hard to frame him and make him look bad because he is a Roosevelt Democrat who wants the party to remain true to it's values. He backed Kerry in the general election. His favorite of the ten candidates was Dennis Kucinich. His followers are anti-war, pro-Palestine, anti-free-trade, anti-death penalty. They are extremely intelligent and are wiser to Bush than most of those who are accusing them of stuff.

At the Santa Ana Kucinich rally in 2003, some Larouche supporter tried to ask a question and people were rude. Dennis told them to "show respect for the representative from Mr. LaRouche." Dennis is obviously willing to give people a fair shot rather than just buying propaganda, as some people do.

My concern about the way LaRouche and his people (many of whom are members of the Democratic state central committee) are treated is that if he was set up and framed because of his liberal beliefs, who will they do it to next? I think we all need to stand up against injustice and give all Democrats a fair chance. You never know when they will come for Kucinich or Lee or Waters. If we don't draw a line in the sand and stand up for those under attack, who will stand up for other liberals when they are attacked.

Also, I'm opposed to witch hunts. I know nice people who claim to be witches. But, I'll save that information for another post.

[seafey]

15. I agree but...

I feel some of his politics are a bit racist. And the LLR people in my neck of the woods are really just incomprehensibly *out there* and they just seem so brainwashed....... I don't know. I am cautious too, about villifying people unnecessarily, but the people I know who like LLR seem really cultish to me!

[genius]

28. Actually, I've found his people to be pretty open-minded.

They are opposed to racism in the criminal justice system and in the government. They back all the liberal resolutions.

Everything I've heard about the man is second-hand, but his people take strong stands opposing war and the death penalty and supporting labor that I'd like to see other Democrats take.

[juajen]

18. I had several conversations with one of his supporters

over the telephone. She was knowledgeable, polite and an obvious democrat. I agreed with everything she said; so, I don't get the attitude everyone gives him on DU. Maybe he is crazy, but I certainly didn't think his representative was.

BTW, she knew I had limited income and was not soliciting; I did promise her that if the subject came up when I was hanging around DU, I would take up for his movement, as she said it was greatly maligned by right and left. So, golly, gee, I finally kept my word.

[genius]

29. That was my impression of them, too.

They haven't called me. But I've seen them at rallies and in connection with the Democratic Party and they seem to be knowledgeable, polite and definitely liberal Democrats.

I think they are mostly trying to get out the truth about Bush. I doubt that anyone in their movement seriously expects LaRouche to be elected.

[eridani]

22. You haven't been around long enough to remember Lyn Marcus, I see

A whackjob who disrupted any leftie organization in the 60s that he could with bands of thugs. I've never seen any proof that the credit card scam was a setup. There's a good reason his followers tend to be young, and that is that older people remember Lyn Marcus, Offical Asshat. That, and the fact that it's very flattering to be told that you are part of a new generation of intellectual supermen--people generally outgrow that nonsense with time.

Kucinich is respectful of everyone, including crazy people. Our local campaign had one of those, a mild-mannered crackpot who is convinced that the human race is going to be saved by aliens who will land their starships any minute now. Kucinich just thanked him for his support, which led him to think that Kucinich must also know about the imminent alien landing. Just being kind to people who are a few fries short of a Happy Mean certainly does not mean that you believe their crackpot theories.

To hear the LaRouchies rattle on you'd think that there weren't any other Dems backing New Deal-style public works. His supporters tout basic stuff from the Progressive Caucus platform as if they had just invented it yesterday and no one else really understands it. The ones I know hang around with piles of literature, but are never seen volunteering for any of the grunt work of organizational maintenance.

If Kucinich ever started saying that he, and only he, and no other person, is qualified to be president, I'd be off his bandwagon instantly.

[genius]

24. He backed Kerry

According to his paper, LaRouche liked Clinton but he didn't like Gore. I'm not sure what that is about. Gore seemed more liberal to me and more in agreement with what the guy supposedly stands for. He also really liked Kucinich. When some of his supporters would come up and speak with me, I'd tell them I was supporting Kucinich and they were impressed. We actually got some of the LaRouche people to help pass out Kucinich literature.

[eridani]

35. The ones I know will never carry any literature other than their own

LaRouche thought of all that New Deal stuff first, you know.

[LittleClarkie]

38. I was insulted by one outside the library

He tried to get me to sign his petition to get LaRouche on the ballot. I said I was not interested, and that I was sorry.

He said, "You certainly are sorry."

Yeah, lovely way to make friends and influence people.

My politeness went bye bye. I shouted that their guy was a nutjob, and then got in my car and left.

[genius]

52. We got some of them to put down their literature for a while and to help

canvas for Dennis. These people are realistic and they seem to know their man can't win. They justified it to themselves by noting that LaRouche liked Dennis.

The main thing is to talk to them and you will find out how reasonable they are. Everyone looks weird if no one is talking to them.

The one place where they seem to be off is on nuclear power. Apparently, LaRouche has some notion that it can be made safe. As someone who is totally anti-nuclear, I find this hard to swallow. However, since they are against free trade, war and the death penalty and for universal health care and see Bush for what he is, I'm not holding one issue against them.

[genius]

53. Anton Chaitkin, who co-founded the group, co-wrote H. W.'s biography

George Bush:The Unauthorized Biography

You can find it on-line.

http://www.tarpley.net/bushb.htm

It makes the Bush family look really sick.

[TankLV]

79. You're nuts if you support this dangerous deranged wacko. He's nuts.

There's a reason why so many are out to get him - he's dangerous.

I know from personal experience.

They want your money and won't accept "no" for an answer.

There are good reasons why he is in prison.

And they aren't "witch hunts" - they are from people like myself seeking justice.

Get a clue.

[frankly_fedup2]

16. I don't know anything about LaRouche but about every 3 months,

someone throws a small like newspaper regarding everything LaRouche, how he would handle taxes, the war, etc. I just looked at a few headlines. Never have read them because someone does this during the middle of the night which makes it creepy.

[NYCGirl]

17. Long, fascinating article in the Washington Post about LaRouche:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A46883-2004Oct20.html

[genius]

57. This nonsense fits with the Hillary's affair with the Alien.

Did you see the pictures of Bill with the black eye after his fight with Hillary's outer-space boyfriend? It used to be that the press used triple sources for their stories (but that was 30 years ago). Now they print whatever sells. If you want to attack someone or a group, use a story that has some credibility.

The WP is a front for the Republican Party and has been for some time.

[europegirl4jfk]

87. This British boy is really dead!

And no, the LaRouchies didn't kill him. But yeah, they are responsible for his death. Read his parents' website and you will see how dangerous LaRouche is for young idealistic people who want to create a better world: http://www.justiceforjeremiah.com/

[fujiyama]

84. LOL

I love how the Simpsons made fun of him:
http://www.rotten.com/library/bio/religion/cult/lyndon-larouche/
20 Apr 1997 Simpsons episode 4F17 "The Old Man and the Lisa": As an incentive for his workers at the Springfield Retirement Castle, Mr. Burns promises to take the seniors to "the most duck-filled pond" they ever saw. Grandpa Simpson replies: "Oh, hot-diggity! That's how they got me to vote for Lyndon LaRouche!"

[BBradley]

19. Be afraid, be very afraid.

A simple googling should tell you everything you need to know.

[JohnLocke]

20. Nutty at best, dangerous at worst (nt).

[SaveElmer]

21. Complete Whack Job...

Run's here in Virginia for every office... incoherent, conspiracy type ideas that even tin-foilers run away from.

[Independent_Liberal]

23. Google LaRouche Cult

The guy is a nutcase.

[genius]

26. You can find right wing attack jobs on anyone that way.

The best way to find out something about the man is to talk to one of his people, the next time you see one. There is a newspaper they have that tells about his position. It is not much different than the papers that the other liberal groups pass out.

I noticed that his people seem better educated on 9/11 than most other people. I had a great conversation with one of his people at the California Democratic Convention about 9/11 a year and a-half ago. It was great to speak with someone who saw through Bush's lies. I wish more people were aware of what happened that day.

[democracyindanger]

34. Believes Queen Elizabeth is a drug dealer. 'Nuff said.

[genius]

55. H.W. Bush is a drug dealer. Watch "Cover-Up: Behind the Iran-Contra

Affair." I haven't studied the Queen so I don't know much about this. However, it wouldn't surprise me. Her son certainly did not turn out normal.

[democracyindanger]

59. No, you don't understand.

He thinks Queen Elizabeth is a drug dealer like Al Pacino in Scarface.

LaRouche is insane. Treating him as if he isn't is also insane.

[genius]

60. Bush is insane and treating his attackers as insane is insane.

I never saw Scarface. I don't know much about the Queen and don't care to as she's England's problem. Her family is certainly really messed up.

[WildEyedLiberal]

71. So if Hitler was belched up from the bowels of hell and attacked Bush

You'd find a way to justify his "Final Solution"? It sure sounds to me like you're willing to forgive an awful lot of evil on behalf of one completely unrevealing opinion. Lots of nasty, horrible people hate Bush - Kim Jong Il and Fred Phelps, for starters. The white supremacist hate group Aryan Nations opposed the Iraq war on the grounds that it was waged on behalf of Israel - are they our buddies now, because they hate Bush and his war?

:eyes:

[genius]

76. HItler was with the Bush family. LaRouche has attacked them both.

That book his co-founder co-wrote discussed the Bush-Hitler connection. I've only read pieces but it really puts down the Bush family and makes a bit deal about the Bush-Hitler connection.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

92. Larouche has also written

'It is argued that the culmination of the persecution of the Jews in the Nazi holocaust proves that Zionism is so eessential to "Jewish survival" that any anti-Zionist is therefore not only an anti-Semite, but that any sort of criminal action is excusable against anti-Zionists in memory of the mythical "six million Jewish victims" of the Nazi "holocaust."

This is worse than sophistry. It is a lie. True, about a million and a half Jews did die as a result of the Nazi policy of labor-intensive "appropriate technology" for the employment of "inferior races," a small fraction of the tens of million of others - especially Slavs - who were murdered in the same way Jewish refugee Felix Rohaytin proposes today. Even on a relative scale, what the Nazis did to Jewish victims was mild compared with the virtual extermination of gypsies and the butchery of Communists.'

New Pamphlet to Document Cult Origins of Zionism in "New Solidarity", 8/12/78 (emphasis mine)

It's worth remembering that Larouche served time under a Bush administration & that he has always had a thing against the 'blue blood', secret society elite (somewhat ironic considering his own advocacy for a fascist dictatorship).

The Tarpley/Chaikin book is a fun, conspiracy dominated, read that goes completely cuckoo at the end (the "thyroid" chapter).

[BL611]

49. Ummm...

They are a fascist cult, there is no ifs, ands, or but's about it. They have (at least had) ties with the KKK and other far right neo fascist organizations, Larouche is insane his followers all live together in a brainwashed conspiracy driven nightmare, they are trained to make it sound like they make sense to get you to go to their meetings were they can begin the process of brainwashing, the next time you speak to one of them, ask them when was the last time they spoke to their family or had a day off from "campaigning".

[ISUGRADIA]

25. He's a homophobic nutcase with a cult following RUN AWAY

[spuddonna]

27. Run, don't walk the other way...

Tin foil hats abound in the land of LaRouche! :)

[ladylibertee]

31. No Clue, Sorry

[OneBlueSky]

32. thoroughly nuts, been around forever, BUT . . .

sometimes performs a valuable service . . . when he latches onto an issue, he's relentless in his research and documentation . . . when his position happens to coincide with the progressive position, this kind of thoroughness can be a valuable resource . . .

but don't sign on the dotted line . . .

[AntiCoup2K4]

33. He's every bit as much of a Democrat as Al From or Zell Miller

Of course that's not saying much....

[LittleClarkie]

36. But batshit crazy on top of it

He's only trying for a veneer of normal now.

[AntiCoup2K4]

51. Al & Zell aren't batshit crazy?

[Hippo_Tron]

114. Disagree, definately as Crazy as Zell Miller, but not a Republican

I've seen him absolutely trash Bush on TV. Although on second thought, I'd say that he is CRAZIER than Zell Miller, but he's certainly not a Bush supporter.

[LittleClarkie]

37. Send everything back marked "deceased"

and when they call, stick to that story.

"Sorry, she died" click!

[baron j]

39. Last year, while waiting in line to see Fahrenheit 911, a group of young

LaRouche supporters got up in the face of everyone in line and yelled incoherently while also attempting to forcibly distribute their newspaper. I do believe they seem loony, and cult-ish, and the articles in that paper were raving nonsense.

Someone also tagged many buildings in our neighborhood with LaRouche's name. I suggest ignoring them.

[Pepperbelly]

41. tekk 'em you want all drugs legal NOW and they will leave you alone. nt

[Totally Committed]

42. Two Words: WHACK JOB. n/t

TC

[WoodrowFan]

44. they make the Scientoligists look sane....

well, maybe not the Scientologists, but he is a cult leader, pure and simple.

[genius]

56. The Scientologists are Bush's biggest religious contributor.

[sadiesworld]

45. He doesn't deserve the wholesale trashing he is receiving here, IMO.

Take a look at his websites and decide for yourself.

[ISUGRADIA]

61. Yeah, I've looked at his works from the past and he's hateful

Someone who promotes gay bashing is no progressive

"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.

[genius]

62. He hates Bush. I don't believe that other stuff. It doesn't fit.

All the people handing out literature are nice. And they support gay rights. So something funny is going on with these smear tactics.

[ISUGRADIA]

64. So are you saying that he did not write this in his own publication?

He was behind the AIDS quarantine initative in California in 1986. Check the newspapers of the time and consult LGBT rights organizations who were involved in the fight. He has been an enemy of LGBT rights. Words in his own publications do not lie.

If you can show me he's condemned his earlier statements that would be great because I cannot find anything to that effect on the net.

[genius]

65. I don't read propaganda. And writings can be mischaracterized.

If someone took a paragraph out of Zinn's books out of context, it would make him appear to stand for the opposite of his own positions. Sometimes writers write from different points of view to make a point.

I've never read anything by LaRouche - unless he is actually writing that paper his people hand out. If he does, a glance at it will tell you he's a liberal and the opposite of a bigot.

The guy has to be in his 80s or 90's. There is no way he's ever going to be elected to public office. Why are the conservatives so afraid of him that they make attacking him a religion? Personally, I'll take liberals any day over DLCers. The man's people were on the correct side of the Iraq War. They opposed it completely. They are on the correct side of the death penalty. They oppose it. They are on labor's side and against free trade. They hate Bush and they know all about the PNAC. That makes them better educated than Durbin's chief counsel. The ones I've spoken too also know more about 9/11 than most people here at DU. If you wan't to find out where they stand, talk to them. They are human beings and very articulate ones.

As far as I can tell, their main goal is to get the word out about what a bad guy Bush is. Whatever the propaganda everyone is launching about the founder of their group, this is, for the most part, attacking Bush is the main thing his people are doing. Someone needs to do that. It's sad that they take such abuse here for supporting our Party and opposing Bush.

[europegirl4jfk]

88. I think that you don't "get" the LaRouche movement

I'm sorry but this guy is NOT a politician at all! He USES politics - from the right (20/30 years ago) to the left (now) to attract young people to his CULT, young people who have to "organize" and make money for him and his wife. He always opposes those in power just to make himself more interesting.

I studied this guy and his movement for years and the funniest thing is that LaRouche is the reason I'm interested in politics now. It was an old friend, a LaRouche supporter, who first told me about the PNAC and the neocons right after 9/11. I too found LaRouche's ideas interesting in the beginning. But I soon found out that they have no substance. Politics as well as culture for him is just a pretext to lure people in his movement. If you really want to know more about LaRouche - not only what his brainwashed members tell you - go to this website and read the testimonies of all the former members posting there:
http://www.factnet.org/discus/messages/4/358.html?1099441306

[TankLV]

81. Yeah - like the TRUTH.

Kinda hard to argue with it, huh?

[fujiyama]

85. If he hates Bush he's automatically a good guy then?

nt

[sadiesworld]

67. That's some nasty stuff there.

I've perused his websites a few times and haven't seen anything like that. I'm more familar with his writings on corporate globalization, * and Iraq, etc.

Assuming the accuracy of your quote, I can only hope he's progressed in his thinking regarding homosexuality in the past 20 years.

[ISUGRADIA]

68. One doesn't see much about social issues in his publications anymore

he seems to concentrate on the areas you mention. I think anyone or any LGBT group who was involved in fighting the HIV LaRouche quarantine proposition that was in the ballot in 1986 will testify that his was a pretty rabid homophobia.

Unlike some hardline racist segragationists, I've never seen LaRouche recant any of his earlier hate speech. He just seems to have move on to more fruitful subjects for his fundraising.

[TankLV]

80. He deserves it in SPADES. I know. I was involved with these nutjobs

once.

Every derrogatory comment describes him and his followers to a tee.

They are all spot on.

I speak from personal experience.

He goes from one extreme to another - first a repuke supporter to a so-called democratic supporter - as long as he gets to be the big cheeze.

He's dangerous - wacky, cultish, crazy dangerous!

And you're nuts to defend this dangerous nutjob him!

[sadiesworld]

90. I'm sorry that you had an unfortunate experience with this group.

Fortunately, I am not at all susceptible to cults or cult-like groups, behaviors, etc. In a way, I think this quality has made me pretty unpopular here with some. lol.

[fujiyama]

86. Actually he does...

nt

[FogerRox]

97. I volunteered with them for more than a year, Lyndon is insane

his people beat up viet Nam war protesters--

He is connected to the Vatican bank heist, right after the heist--- he started spending lot of money in the US.

His people in the EU are flat out fasicst, make no bones about it.

I have a friend who worked in Lyndons intell unit--- he has a huge file on these folks--

Lyndon used to love Reagan--- now he hastes Reagan---

Most of us knew Reagan was the Devil incarnate-- not LaRouche he wanted to talk to him about SDI--- now a days LaROuch has nothing good to say about Reagan,

[genius]

111. So did you beat up Vietnam War Protestors and love Reagan?

If that's what they did and you were with them, I gather that's what you did, right?

[Lochloosa]

47. Run don't walk away ....I had to get really rude to get rid of them.

[Witchy_Dem]

48. Ran into a LaRouche supporter about 20 years ago.

They were telling me that the gov't needed to do something about AIDS since mosquitoes were the ones spreading the disease.

'Nuf said.

[Waistdeep]

50. Here's a decent history

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_Larouche

It doesn't quite capture the horrifying cultish qualities of the NCLC in the early 70s. I knew several brilliant people who were attracted by the intellectualism and found themselves enmeshed in a cult with no easy way out.

I've known of Lyn Marcus since the late 60s and he has always been a brilliant, but paranoid and crazy man.

Read his writing, if you want --- some of it is actually quite on the mark --- but know his history and recognize that he can veer into insanity without losing a step. Here's a sample:

"Jazz was foisted on black Americans by the same oligarchy which had run the U.S. slave trade, with the help of the classically trained but immoral George Gershwin and the Paris-New York circuit of drug-taking avant-garde artists."

"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."

"Who is pushing the world toward war? is the forces behind the World Wildlife Fund, the Club of Rome, and the heritage of H.G. Wells and the evil Bertrand Russell."

[npincus]

63. he's nuts

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

66. As others have noted

he's a fascist, anti-semitic, homophobic nutjob. If you're really interested, Dennis King wrote a great book about him (that's desperately calling for an update) called "Lyndon LaRouche and the New American Fascism". King is a sworn enemy of Larouche, who claims that King is a government agent tasked to destroy him.

He has a website:

http://dennisking.org/

and a blog:

http://denniskingblog.typepad.com/

(which has an update on the death of Jeremiah Duggan whose death highlighted how the Larouche organization has begun recruiting in Europe)

Another of Larouche's enemies is Chip Berlet whose website - 'Public Eye' - has a great deal of Larouche resources.

http://www.publiceye.org/larouche/

To see people defend him in this thread staggers me.

(on edit - to them, may I recommend the (slightly dated) Berlet essay "Right Woos Left": http://www.publiceye.org/rightwoo/rwooz9_TOC.html )

[T Town Jake]

75. "To see people defend him in this thread staggers me"...

...I understand your feeling, and agree. But I think Captain Renault is on the case, and got it right again:



"Round up the usual suspects"





On edit: HTML work.

[ProudDad]

70. His cellie was Jim Bakker

need I say more?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jim_Bakker

[otohara]

72. The Last Call I Got

I was told that he was meeting with Democratic Senators discussing how to get us out of this mess, that he was the only one who had a plan. I said, oh really - which Senators would that be? She didn't know. I continued to challenge her statements, she finally got mad at me and said she felt sorry for me and hung up.

he's a loon

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

73. At least one person in this thread.

[T Town Jake]

74. He's a gibbering idiot...

...and his supporters make Jim Jones's followers look like paragons of sanity & mental health.

I'd end all contact with them, were I you.

[TankLV]

82. That's an understatement.

I speak from personal experience.

[TankLV]

77. Run Away - very FAST!

Same thing happened to me when I was in my 20's in college.

THEY'RE A CULT - AND A BAD CULT!

They live in a continual state of crisis.

Stay very far away. They're nuts.

[europegirl4jfk]

89. LaRouche is NOT a politician!

Maybe he was when he started his "career" thirty/forty years ago, I really don't know. But what's left of his movement right now is a CULT who uses politics as a pretext to attract young people to his Youth Movement. The only reason: money! These young people who leave family and college for LaRouche bring him the money they actually should use for their education and have to "organize" more money for him. I know of a lot of devastated parents who haven't heard back from their kids lured in the LaRouche movement. It's a classical cult and nothing else. For everyone who wants to know more, please read the testimonies of parents and ex-members at the FactNet forum: http://www.factnet.org/discus/messages/4/358.html?1099441306 and the heart-breaking story of Jeremiah Duggan, a young British guy who lost his life during a LaRouche anti-war conference in Germany: http://www.justiceforjeremiah.com/. Believe me, I know what I'm talking about. I lost a friend to the LaRouche movement a few years ago.

[LittleClarkie]

93. Thanks for those sites

what's eerie on the factnet site is that some of the LaRouchies showed up, and you can just tell how brainwashed they are.

[europegirl4jfk]

99. It's amazing, isn't it?

I read the messages on this site since a while. Then and now a LaRouchie comes along and challenges the posters. But of course it isn't working with the people there who often are ex-LaRouchies and know the tactics and arguments. LOL The LaRouchie leaves and after a while another one comes along and tries the same game.

[cranston36]

91. He's a Nazi

He's a Nazi and a foolish one at that.

He is literally a Nationalist Socialist.

[genius]

106. You've confused Bush with him. He considers Bush a NAZI.

I think he's right on that one.

[genius]

107. Ask yourself: Why are people trying so hard to smear this man.

Clearly some people want him to go away and to discredit the liberal ideas of his people.

I find it interesting that, at the Democratic Underground, I have had to defend, Kerry, Clark, Edwards, Gephardt, Lieberman, and now LaRouche from attacks and I don't particularly care about any of them. I just don't like extremist smears. Why are people here so nasty and so eager to defame certain people? What are they afraid would happen if had an open mind with regards to these people.

[genius]

108. Currently we are supposed to be fighting Bush. We need allies not division

LaRouche's people are clearly some of Bush's strongest critics. Let's thank them for helping us prove what a bad guy he is.

I only occasionally run into his supporters - except for the ones who are in the party and, if they hadn't told me, I wouldn't know who they were. Most of the ones I've seen handing out his papers are college students. That's good energy and they could get their fellow college students to, also, oppose Bush. It is stupid to make a quest out of going after someone who is clearly on our side. It is counter-productive. We need to unite. We will never know for sure whether he was framed. I don't believe in holding grudges or in condemning people for eternity. I have to wonder about the people who treat going after Democrats as a mission.

[democracyindanger]

109. Trying so hard?

Nobody has to put any real effort into demonstrating that LaRouche is a hate-filled lunatic. The easily available evidence says it all.

But you're sure putting in the overtime trying to defend him. Hmm.

[genius]

110. Listen to yourself. Your posting sounds a little extreme.

[democracyindanger]

112. Hilarious.

All sorts of people, not the least of which a few claim to have followed LaRouche themselves, they all conclude that LaRouche is a nutjob. Yet we're the extremists.

And there you are: the outlier. The only LaRouche defender. Poor little Lyndon, so misunderstood, so persecuted.

Thanks for the Friday night comedy.

[eridani]

94. Selected quotes

Anyone who thinks that the author of the following statements is some kind of intellectual giant is a couple of tacos shy of a combination plate.

Impotence

"To the extent that my physical powers do not prevent me, I am now confident and capable of ending your political - and sexual - impotence; the two are interconnected aspects of the same problem."

"The Politics of Male Impotence", Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr., (under pen name L. Marcus) NCLC Internal Document, August 16, 1973

Warmongers

"Who is pushing the world toward war? is the forces behind the World Wildlife Fund, the Club of Rome, and the heritage of H.G. Wells and the evil Bertrand Russell."

"An Open Letter to President Brezhnev", Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr., Executive Intelligence Review, June 2, 1981

Jazz

"Jazz was foisted on black Americans by the same oligarchy which had run the U.S. slave trade, with the help of the classically trained but immoral George Gershwin and the Paris-New York circuit of drug-taking avant-garde artists."

"The Racist Roots of Jazz", Back Cover, The Campaigner, September-October 1980

The Beatles

"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."

"Why Your Child Became A Drug Addict" Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr., Campaigner Special Report, Copyright 1978

The Philippines

"First, we have the situation in the Philippines, where the State Department is virtually campaigning to give the islands to Moscow. The major source of complaints about 'human rights' in that island nation is now the same circle of U.S. senators, newspapers, and State Department Bureaucrats who were responsible for bringing down the Shah of Iran."

"The Dangers of the Summit Obsession", Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr., Executive Intelligence Review, November 8, 1985

[LittleClarkie]

95. My favorite is the Beatles quote

Great googlymoogly.

[sepia_steel]

98. nutbag

with robotic zombies for goons. stay away.

[rman]

100. Ramsey Clark: LaRouche frameup

On Aug. 31, 1995, former U.S. Attorney General Ramsey Clark testified before an independent commission of inquiry, probing criminal abuse of power by top officials of the U.S. Department of Justice and the FBI. Clark spoke of the frameup of leading American political economist and statesman Lyndon LaRouche as the single most grievous case of prosecutorial abuse he had ever encountered.
...
Among the documents later released exposing FBI criminality, was a 1973 FBI headquarters Cointelpro memorandum on LaRouche and the NCLC, showing that the FBI was considering supporting an assassination attempt against LaRouche by the Communist Party USA.
http://www.schillerinstitute.com/health/dc_js_on_kkkatie.html

[genius]

105. Ramsey Clark was Carter's Attorney General. He's pretty credible.

And this doesn't surprise me.

Look at all the people at DU backing Bush's conspiracy theory of 9/11.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

116. Clark

(who was AJ under LBJ not Carter) has become less-credible in the past 15-20 years as he's got progressively further and further left and his association with the WWP through the IAC. His client list in recent years has included some seriously nasty sons-of-bitches which makes me question his judgement.

-- you may also be interested to know that he's accused by some on the left of cover-up in both the Martin Luther King & the Kennedy assassination

[rman]

101. It's interesting that the denouncers think they don't need evidence

to support their claims of "nazi", "nutcase" etc...

[salin]

102. In 1985 or 1986 (or both)

when I spent several days a week up on Capitol Hill - frequently there was a group of LaRouche protesters on the south corner of the Rayburn House Office building with signs calling for the quarantine of people who were HIV+ to an isolated island. I witnessed it. Sorry I can't recall which year aging and all - but it was hateful.

Around the same time LaRouche was pushing a quarantine-type ballot initiative, I believe in California - tried a couple of times and I think a version of it actually was up for a referendum vote in 1988. That one can be googled.

Granted my memory and witnessing of the protests is only evidence as much as you want to believe me (but it is evidence to me - and the ballot initiative suggests that it was consistent with his views at the time.) I am sure there are others around who worked on or near the Hill in that time frame who also witnessed these bigots.

[Monkey see Monkey Do]

103. read Dennis King's book

[eridani]

104. See post #94

Why would anyone with all his or her marbles back anyone who said things like that?

[GetTheRightVote]

113. Rep. John Conyers works with him and takes his advise as well !

If he and his group is good enough for Rep Conyers then they are for me as well. Also, I sat down with a group of these young people and they were very nicely behaved and even paid for my meal. I thought them to be very democratic and committed to bringing * down out of power and the White House. They speak of his family's past history and connection with the Nazis thru his grandfather Prescott and they hate what he and his family have done to this country. I have learned a great deal about the workings of the * admin thru them.

They do not like the Oil Companies or the other evil coporations running this country. In fact, they are followers of FDR, Social Security and helped the Democrats stand together in saving it for us. Perhaps DU does need to open it eyes to the fact that at least they are on the side of the progressive/liberals in this world. We need all the friends we can to defeat this evil adminstration. I wish some people would see the trees thru the forest and accept the assistance as Rep Conyers does.

:kick:

[eridani]

117. They CLAIM that Conyers works with LaRouche

"Takes advice" just means that these bullshitters think that they invented the notion of spending on infrastructure and public works. Anyone else who thinks of such things can't possibly have originated the thoughts themselve, so they must be taking LaRouche's advice.

[jfern]

115. LaRouchies are crazy

The interesting thing is how they're right about half the time, and completely wrong about half of the time. On the one hand, they're anti-semetic anti-abortionists, on the other hand they were trying to talk Nader supporters into voting Kerry.