Lyndon LaRouche

Lyndon Hermyle LaRouche, Jr. (a.k.a. "Lyn Marcus" when he was in the Socialist Workers PartyOf Thugs and Liars by Nat Hentoff (January 24, 1974) Village Voice) was a very special kind of cult leader/American political animal, a perennial candidate for President and the ultimate wingnut/moonbat, encompassing both the extreme left and extreme right.
You know those sketchy-looking people that you see giving out pamphlets and newspapers near college campuses and subway stations? Carrying hand-lettered posters with pictures of Bush, Cheney, or Obama with a Hitler mustache? Chances are, they were working for Lyndon LaRouche.Behind the Hitler-Obama slur: That outrageous comparison that Limbaugh and town-hall screamers have been making? Max Blumenthal tracks its origins to cult leader Lyndon LaRouche, whose followers pushed the attacks. by Max Blumenthal (08.24.09 1:44 AM ET) Daily Beast.
LaRouche was a perpetual office seeker who ran for President eight times. For a while, he lived under heavy guard in a rural Virginia compound named Ibykus,Some Are Out to Kill Me, LaRouche Says by John Mintz (January 13, 1985) The Washington Post.Larouche's Va. Estate List for Sale by Robert O'Harrow Jr. (October 5, 1990) The Washington Post. where he operated his own batshit loony—but thankfully ineffective—political machine in a manner freakishly similar to a religious cult.Open Letter #2 to LaRouche Youth Movement members: To the Ice Floes! (originally posted on Factnet, 04-29-2008, 08:33 PM) Lyndon Larouche Watch (archived from February 5, 2012). LaRouche and his second wife, German-born had a peculiar obsession with German philosopher author of Die Kraniche des Ibykus. Many of his political workers are young adults who think LaRouche, and only LaRouche, knows what needs to be done to Save the World™.Ideological Odyssey: From Old Left to Far Right by John Mintz (January 14, 1985) The Washington Post.
The LaRouche organization attempts to recruit followers from across the political spectrum. Though his organization has been active in other countries (particularly Australia and Germany), his home base and constituency has traditionally been largely American. Perhaps most surprising has been their success in recruiting old civil rights leaders into their movement. These include former SCLC leader Reverend James Bevel ,Omaha World-Herald (January 6, 1991) "Bevel was one of 10 people who came to Nebraska in October as members of a group calling itself the Citizens Fact-Finding Commission to Investigate Human rights Violations of Children in Nebraska. That group was organized by the Schiller Institute of Washington, D.C., and Wiesbaden, Germany. The institute was founded in 1984 by Helga Zepp-LaRouche. She is the widow of Lyndon LaRouche, who was serving a 15-year sentence for fraud and tax evasion… The Schiller group's printed statement disputed the findings of two grand juries in the Franklin case. A check by the World-Herald of some of the 'facts' in the statement turned up several apparent errors." and Amelia Boynton Robinson ,Historic Leipzig Peace Rally Hears: 'LaRouche Is the Man' by Thomas Rottmair (April 4, 2003) The Schiller Institute (archived from June 2, 2003). a leader in the Selma-Montgomery marches. He also had a great deal of success wooing nuclear scientists into alliances with his group over nuclear power advocacy, including some big names who should have known better, although most of them jumped ship quickly once they realized LaRouche was nuts.Lyndon LaRouche and the New American Fascism by Dennis King (1989) Doubleday. ISBN 0385238800. Dr. Robert Budwine of Lawrence Livermore Laboratory: "They kept talking about this great method they have, but I kept asking: 'What kind of method is it that consistently gives you the wrong answers?'" After reading up on brainwashing and cults, he came to the conclusion that "LaRouche is not a serious man, he's even less than that … LaRouche is crazy."
==Views==
LaRouche's wild theories seem especially strange to the Great Unwashed because they don't realize his thinking and his sympathies are stuck in the past − way, way in the past. LaRouche wanted to use 17th and 18th century political ideas to solve 21st century problems, and he was likely to use a peace agreement between England and Vietnam from the year 1643 as an example of what needs to be done to solve a current political crisis (even one that exists only in his own mind) today.Lyndon LaRouche on the idea of a Danish maglev-network (April 21, 2007) address to Berlin LaRouche Youth Movement school, 4.21.07. Schiller Institute. LaRouche: "Ever since the Saxons ran up there, to get away from Charlemagne, you've had Danes up there. And it sticks to Jutland and so forth… Denmark is a hub of transportation. The ratio of seacoast and border, to interior territory is very high. It is essentially, Jutland from the days of the sea robbers, was a maritime power!"
Though LaRouche traditionally ran as a Democrat since 1980, whether he was right or left is hard to prove. The best that can be said is his beliefs were a unique amalgamation of wingnuttery and moonbattery, where far-left and far-right meet on the far side of the moon. His earliest political background was decidedly on the hard-left, where he was a Trotskyist and an organizer for the Socialist Workers Party (kicked out when they noticed his messiah complex even then), and then led a Marxist study group of New Left students during the late 1960s, from whence he assembled most of his early following."How the Worker's League Decayed" by Lyn Marcus (June 27, 1970) National Caucus of Labor Committees via Lyndon LaRouche Watch (archived from January 29, 2012). Some say he did this on the grounds that, according to Marxist theory, a proletarian revolution would not be possible until industrial development and a strong middle class were first a reality.A 60's 'Radical' Takes a Hard Right by Tim Wohlforth, PublicEye archive. Wohlforth: "He assumed that the comment in the Communist Manifesto that "a small section of the ruling class cuts itself adrift, and joins the revolutionary class…" was written specifically for him […] The second strand of LaRouche's thought was his Theory of Reindustrialization… In order to overcome stagnation at home and revolution abroad, the metropolitan countries needed a new industrial revolution in the Third World." This may explain his infatuation with nuclear power and big development projects.
===SimCrank===
He wanted to build nuclear-powered desalinization plants off the California coast, use tactical nukes to build a canal across Africa to solve the world's water crisis,South Africa's Great Task: A 'Grand Design' for All of Africa by Uwe Frieseck (June 20, 1986) 'EIR 13(25):39-40. Archived from March 13, 2022. thought that the economy would collapse unless we build a high speed maglev railroad through Alaska and Siberia,LaRouche on Dollar Collapse: Create a New Bretton Woods, End Post-Industrial Society by Lyndon LaRouche (November 2007) Schiller Institute (archived from May 12, 2008). and thought that Henry Kissinger,Kissinger: The Politics of Faggotry by Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. (August 3, 1982) Lyndon LaRouche Watch (archived from January 16, 2008). the ADL,Soldiers of Satan LaRouche P.A.C. the Queen of England, Greenpeace, and the World Wildlife Fund are agents of the Royal family"Greenpeace is Linked to Earth First!", EIR vol.. 22, #35, 9.1.95. "...Greenpeace-which brags about its "independence"­is in reality just the "direct-action" arm ofthe international environmentalist movement, run top-down by Prince Philip and the House of Windsor and its allies for the purpose of reducing the world's population and destabilizing political opponents of the European nobility." the KGB"Greenpeace: Shock Troops For a New Dark Age", EIR vol. 16, #17, 4.21.89. "The KGB-trained Gorbachev and his team have decided to play the "green card" as a destabilization factor in the West, to make "environmentalism" the new weapon of Russsian imperialist chaos and confusion." international Satanism"Icelanders Compare Greenpeace to the Nazis", EIR 3.31.89. "Greenpeace is part of the "network" of the Lucis Trust, formerly Lucifer Trust, one of the elite Satanist organizations in the West." who control the drug trade.Is Satan in Your Schoolyard? (1989) New Federalist. LaRouche: "Put the pieces together. First, the creative capacities of the nation's youth — truly their most precious possession — are destroyed by drugs. Next, the sexual identities of millions of Americans are thrown topsy turvy by a culture that extols the virtues of homosexuality. And finally, Satanism, the worship of Evil, emerges as a new religion." LaRouche had been repeatedly accused of anti-Semitism as well, though this is more prominent outside the United States, where he mostly blames the British for everything.
His apparent endgame was the militarization of all corners of society, the expulsion of British influence from western culture, and the creation of a new super-race he calls "Golden Souls" (a term he borrowed from PlatoLaRouche, "Despite What Israel Has Done", The Campaigner, March 1978. LaRouche: Can one punish sheep for being sheep? The Israelis have behaved with monstrous, worse-than-Nazi bestiality. But are not sheep bestial? Are not the Israelis behaving with the bestiality of terrified sheep, driven to homicidal psychosis by their won bestial fears? What can be done with such bestial Israelis, except to transform them from bestial sheep, to take them out of the kibbutz sheep-pens of psychosis, and employ the method of the Platonic dialogue to transform them into genuine men and women of reason?" — LaRouche was obsessed with both ancient Greece and at times modern Greeks.The LaRouche Youth Movement by Scott McLemee (July 11, 2007) Inside Higher Ed. and accused his enemies of being Neo-Romans).The Bones in Bush's Closet by George Canning (1-22-80) EIR. LaRouche: "The cult-organization under the Roman Empire is an excellent example of what is intended. The use of drugs, "rock-music-like" dance orgies, and antitechnology doctrines were typical of, for example, the Phrygian cult of Dionysus and the Roman version of the cult of Dionysus, the cult of Bacchus." Note: LL's interpretation of Pagan religions is hugely coloured by his own Quaker upbringing, in which alcohol and ecstasy (Dionysus) is synonymous with "Satan."Soviets Brag: Moscow is the Third Rome, Seat of World Empire by Konstantin George & Luba George (September 9, 1998) EIR 15(36):44-45.The Emperors Bush and Nero by Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. (April 2, 2002) EIR. The common thread in his views from the 1960s onward was a doomsday scenario in which finance capital is about to bring about a worldwide economic collapse (along the lines of the communist concept of "Cyclical crisis of capitalism") or a "new dark age" unless LaRouche's leadership and economic proposals are adopted. (Heh heh.) He predicted imminent global collapse for 40 years, effectively beating Ron Paul at his own game. We're still waiting.No Joke: Eight-time presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche may be a punchline on 'The Simpsons,' but his organization — and the effect it has on young recruits — is dead serious by April Witt (October 24, 2004) The Washington Post. "I have a better chance of being elected than you have of surviving if I'm not."
===The real British Invasion!===
The underlying theme used as the basis for nearly all of LaRouche's actions stems from the conspiracy theory he embraced for most of his political career: the idea that the Royal monarchy still rules the world-spanning British Empire, and that we are all still slaves to England.Image captioned "Mickey Mouse & Pluto Move to Washington" Queen Elizabeth appears as the top image surrounding a Star of David by Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr., Lyndon Larouche Watch (archived from February 3, 2012). The difference is that instead of overtly ruling the member nations of its empire, the British monarchy secretly controls the world's governments from behind the scenes. He also thought that rock and roll, especially The Beatles,"Why Your Child Became A Drug Addict" by Lyndon LaRouche (1978) Campaigner Special Report. LaRouche: "The Beatles had no genuine musical talent, but were a product shaped according to British Psychological Warfare Division specifications, and promoted in Britain by agencies which are controlled by British intelligence." is a British intelligence plot to lead us into a dark age, and only classical music played in C=256 Hz Verdi tuning can bring about a new political and cultural renaissance,The LaRouche Youth Movement and Classical Music (July 2, 2005) The Schiller Institute. Jenny Kreingold: "It’s really paradoxical for people, who see us out, who see this guy LaRouche who ran for President, and he’s talking about how evil Cheney is, and a few paragraphs later in his speech, he’s talking about Classical principles and bel canto singing." and that Harry Potter and Pokémon are cults reprogramming children's brains to commit acts of violence.LaRouche, Harry Potter as 'Pokémon II' by Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. (December 9, 2001) The Schiller Institute.
In LaRouche's eyes, the key event that led to the birth of this vast British cartel took place in the year 1711. This was the time of the insidious conspiracy by Isaac Newton and the Royal Society to undermine the workings of Gottfried Leibniz and his development of calculus (never mind the high likelihood of Multiple discovery). Everything in modern politics stems from this event, even to the point where an issue of his cult's self-published fanzine, Executive Intelligence Review (EIR), rarely passes without a mention of Leibniz.
According to LaRouche, all of the worst United States Presidents of the 20th and 21st centuries have been pawns of London – and not the other way around, as the insidious British-controlled media tell you."Why the British Kill American Presidents" by Anton Chaitkin (November 15, 2013) EIR Pp 7-16. LaRouche respects Franklin Roosevelt highly,Where Franklin Roosevelt was interrupted by Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. (July 17, 1998) EIR 25(28):16-43. but don't mention Harry Truman in his presence – because, you see, Truman was actually a tool and pawn of London!The End to 'Bail-Out'! by Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. (December 6, 2012) EIR 39(50):4-12. LaRouche: "On this account, there is an essentially elementary principle of economy which demonstrates exactly how a set of London-directed, Wall Street interests' sometime hat-peddler, Truman, had been used to betray our nation with his economic shell-games deployed against the legacy of the United States' President Franklin D. Roosevelt." Likewise, Dubya and Dick Cheney were following London's agenda to wage a fake "War on Terror" especially to take away your freedoms and keep you under the yoke of England. When Larouche examined the candidates in the 2008 election, he concluded that Barack Obama was a tool of London, so he threw his considerable political clout (ahem) behind Hillary Clinton.LaRouche Denounces DNC Treachery, Calls on Hillary Clinton To Take the Fight for the Nation to Denver (June 2, 2008) EIR press release.
But of course the ruling cabal won, and the reins of power from London were merely transferred from Bush to Obama. Therefore, in LaRouche's eyes, Obama is Hitler.LaRouche: 'Obama Is Now Impeachable' For His T4 Plan by Nancy Spannaus (July 31, 2009)EIR 36(29):4-7. Aktion T4 was a euthanasia program whereby hundreds of thousands of people with illnesses and disabilities were killed under the oversight of Nazi doctors. Exactly like the Affordable Care Act! This explains why LaRouche supporters have taken part in the Tea Party protests against the Obama administration, holding signs proclaiming Obama to be the new Hitler… even though LaRouche and his supporters have run their political campaigns under the Democratic Party? (The Democrats, however, soundly reject LaRouche and kick his followers out on a regular basis.)LaRouche supporters disrupt Democrats by Jeanne Meserve & Sasha Johnson (January 27, 2004 Posted: 10:07 AM EST) CNN.Dems scramble to stop LaRouche candidate by Jasmine Sachar (3/3/14, 2:04 pm) The Hill.
==Political (mood) swings and flip flops==
===It's just a jump to the left...===
The son of orthodox Quakers who themselves had a yen for tin hattery, LaRouche (then-known as "Lyn Marcus") came to Columbia University as a disaffected former member of the Spartacist League. He began teaching courses on Marxism at a "free university" set up in New York for student radicals. When the 1968 Columbia University student strike broke out, led by the left-wing Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), he formed a "Labor Committee" to mobilize student support for a sanitation workers' strike that was taking place at the same time. After the Columbia strike the Labor Committee became a full-blown faction within SDS called the SDS Labor Committee, and later the National Caucus of Labor Committees (NCLC). SDS at that time had several factions, one of which was controlled by the Maoist Progressive Labor Party (PL), another of which was also Maoist but opposed to PL (this faction later spawned the Weather Underground), the older social democratic wing of SDS who weren't happy with all the Maoist sects, an anarchist faction, a faction of white students who wanted to work with the Black Panther Party, etc. LaRouche assembled most of his early following from his students at the free university, and when SDS fractured at their 1969 convention, LaRouche went his own way with his National Caucus of Labor Committees gaining a reputation as an especially hard-line leftist sect. The chaotic demise of the Cultural Revolution in China around 1970 proved to be a windfall for the Labor Committees, with disaffected former PLers already conditioned to hard line cult politics and familiar with LaRouche from SDS days seeing him as a suitable stand-in for Mao, who had left them disillusioned. The Labor Committees became known mainly for calling for "strike support" in a form that striking workers really didn't want, and showing up at antiwar functions to pontificate and denounce the movement for ideological impurity.
===Transformation into a personality cult===
The transformation appears to have happened around 1973-74. In 1973 he ordered his followers to physically attack meetings of the Communist Party USA, claiming this would establish the "hegemony" of LaRouche's group over the U.S. left.Operation Mop-Up Archives of Political Research Associates (PublicEye.org). Photos of "Operation Mop-Up". Sick stuff."Of Thugs and Liars" by Nat Hentoff (January 24, 1974) The Village Voice. p. 8. Former NCLC member: "Our hearts were not in it. But with LaRouche it was all or nothing; the attacks were supposed to harden the membership.""Mind Control, Political Violence & Sexual Warfare: Inside the NCLC" by Charles M. Young (June 1976) Crawdaddy. p. 48-56. Young: "Incidents are too numerous to mention, but among the choicer ones were disruption of a Martin Luther King Coalition meeting in Buffalo where they beat a women who was seven months pregnant; a riot at Columbia where about 60 NCLCers stormed a stage during a mayoral debate in a failed attempt to assault the CP candidate, and an attack on an SWP meeting in Detroit where they beat a paraplegic with clubs."Chronology of Labor Committee Attacks, issued by New York Committee to Stop Terrorist Attacks, 1973. New Solidarity (4/3-5/5, 1973). "The clown show is over. The NCLC warns the SWP and its comrades-in-hysteria: when you did all the fighting for the CP at the Mayoral forum, we held back — we gave you a mild warning, though several of your members were bloodied and broken. But should you repeat as goons for the CP, we will put all of you in the hospital: we will deal with you as we are dealing with the CP." Shortly thereafter, he began incorporating a weird psycho-sexual analysis into his politics and subjecting followers to "deprogramming" sessions, claiming that only he could fix their erectile dysfunction, cuckold marriages, or homosexual leanings."A True History of Lyn Marcus and the Labor Committees" by Dan Jacobs (1975) Critical Practice: The Theoretical Journal of the International Workers Party. Jacobs: "In addition to brutally stifling any dissent and free discussion, the `mother's fears' polemic led to a vicious breakdown in the relationship between the sexes in NCLC. Female members-especially those who at all asserted themselves-came under continual, merciless attack for being 'sadistic bitches' and 'witches,' for 'mother-dominating' their men." LaRouche also claimed he was being targeted for assassination.Small Town in Virgina Tense Host to LaRouche by Matthew L. Wald (April 11, 1986) The New York Times. LaRouche memo: " I have a major personal security problem… the assassination teams of professional mercenaries now being trained in Canada and along the Mexico border may be expected to start arriving on the streets of Leesburg. If they come, there will be many people dead or mutilated within as short an interval as sixty seconds of fire." Basically a repeat of his 1974 delusion that Cuban frogmen were traveling up the Hudson River to assassinate him. Ex-followers call this period the "great freakout of 1974."
===…and then a step to the right===
In 1976 he made his first run for president on the U.S. Labor Party ticket, best remembered for posters claiming that a vote for Jimmy Carter would cause global thermonuclear war. His abandonment of Marxism came a little later around 1978. This may have happened because in 1976, the extremist right-wing group Liberty Lobby took notice of some of LaRouche's campaign material and its conspiratorial overtones (LaRouche, like Liberty Lobby, was an early critic of the Trilateral Commission),British Steer Plan for Bloody War on Kwazulu David Hammer (April 1, 199) EIR International via Lyndon LaRouche Watch (archived from February 2, 2012). and began promoting LaRouche publications to their audience, while criticizing it for not identifying what Liberty Lobby thought the "real source" of the "conspiracy" was.Nazis Without Swastikas by Dennis King (1982) League for Industrial Democracy via Lyndon LaRouche Watch (archived February 6, 2012). King: "LaRouche's own statements leave no doubt that "British" is a code word for the Rothschilds and other wealthy Jews...All but one of the families named are Jewish, and LaRouche went on to claim that 'these same families directly control the key policy-making institutions of British society.'" Soon, sensing a new potential source of converts, LaRouche publications were filled with conspiracy theories originating in the extreme right, with anti-Semitic overtones.Editorial: Zionism Is Not Judaism (December 1978) The Campaigner: Campaign for Humanism 11(10):2. LaRouche: "Zionism is the state of collective psychosis through which London manipulates most of international Jewry." In 1977, his group was still Marxist in some sense, as they published a translation of a Rosa Luxemburg book,The Industrial Development of Poland by 	Rosa Luxemburg (1977) Campaigner Publications. ISBN 0918388007. but by 1979 he abandoned any remaining traces of Marxism.
In 1980 LaRouche made the first of several runs for president in the Democratic primaries. He attempted to build a grand coalition that would "piggy-back" (his words) him to the White House and make ties with the far-left and far-right. For example, he condemned counter-culture as a conspiracy to enact the drug trade and staunchly criticized the environmentalist movement, to the point of blaming them for the 1979 Iranian Revolution. At the same time, LaRouche also attempted to build ties with civil rights and labor union leaders (the then-mobbed-up Teamsters especially),Rank and File Rebellion: Teamsters For a Democratic Union by Dan La Botz (1990) Verso. ISBN 0860915050. Note: LaRouche's attempts at allying with the Teamsters consisted of throwing his support behind the most thuggish, mob-linked elements in the union, while opposing and publishing hit pieces on reformist elements such as Teamsters for a Democratic Union. claimed he alone could bring Arab-Israeli peace, as well as hammering Carter on enacting trucking deregulation. That failed to materialize, as LaRouche won a massive 0.09% of votes and Ronald Reagan took Carter's seat. Still, try, try again they say, so LaRouche ran six more times, either barely improving or winning fewer votes (the sign of a true perennial candidate). He later tried to establish ties with the New Right in the early years of Reagan, especially regarding his pet issues: nuclear power, homofascism,Origins of the art of inducing suicide? LaRouche alleges a giant CIA psycho-sexual brainwashing plot by Lyn Marcus (January 1974) New Solidarity special supplement via Lyndon LaRouche Watch (archived from January 16, 2008). LaRouche: "The person goes into a final total caricature, sort of a steppin-fetchit homosexual act. Pathetic. Worse. Like a dead cow. It begins to die. He's free. Automatic crematoria. No gas ovens required. The person is programmed to self-destruct. That's his freedom." the War on Drugs, and opposition to the environmental movement.
LaRouche was an early proponent of laser and space-based weapons ("which we absolutely need" to destroy the Oligopoly, says LaRouche's wife, Helga Zepp-LaRouche), and is credited by many with successfully lobbying Ronald Reagan into funding the Strategic Defense Initiative, or "Star Wars" program.Party Chiefs Say Larouche Team No L.v. Threat by Valerie Hildbeitel (April 01, 1986) The Morning Call (archived from 20 Feb 2016 19:05:27 UTC). So yeah, it's his fault.
A group of his followers calling themselves PANIC, the Prevent AIDS Now Initiative Committee, actually put a measure on the ballot in California in 1986 that could have led to a quarantine of people with HIV, on account of LaRouche's erroneous belief that HIV can be spread by insect bites and casual contact.LaRouche Turns to AIDS Politics by David, L. Kirp (September 11, 1998) The New York Times. Among their awareness-boosting slogans was "Spread Panic, Not AIDS."Grindley, Lucas, The 45 Biggest Homophobes of Our 45 Years by Lucas Grindley (August 21 2012 5:00 AM EDT) Advocate.
===LaRouche's intelligence network===
Starting around the time of his 1976 run for the presidency, the LaRouche organization built a private intelligence gathering network, rivaling that of many governments and major media. According to one critic, the LaRouche organization used this intelligence network in an opportunistic way to try to establish ties and information exchanges with anyone and everyone, and would often pass information between agencies and groups hostile to each other, either as a deliberate go-between or in an opportunistic way. The organization established such communication channels with both the CIA and KGB, with both African-American civil rights activists in the U.S. and the South African apartheid government, and with several Latin American military dictatorships and the left-wing Christic Institute, which opposed U.S. policy in Central America. Some of these people eventually figured out LaRouche was a loose cannon only interested in promoting himself, but only after a bunch of stuff was leaked that shouldn't have been.
Give credit where credit is due, though: LaRouche's EIR magazine broke the Iran-Contra affair several months before anyone in the media picked up on it.The New American Fascism Revealed: Author Dennis King explains how Lyndon LaRouche convinced two million Americans to vote for quarantine by Neenyah Ostrom (July 3, 1989) New York Native via Lyndon LaRouche Watch (archived from October 2, 2008).
===Success… and hard time===
Originally based in New York City, the entire LaRouche operation pulled up stakes in 1985 and relocated to Virginia in the rural Leesburg area near the West Virginia state line. The locals were not amused.LaRouche Arouses Fears in Rural Area of Virginia by Ben A. Franklin (October 3, 1985) The New York Times. In 1986, his followers Janice Hart and Mark Fairchild won the Democratic primaries in Illinois for Secretary of State and Lieutenant Governor respectively;Democrats Scrutinize LaRouche Bloc by Robin Toner (March 30, 1986) The New York Times. that, combined with LaRouche's move from the relative anonymity of New York City to the fishbowl environment of Leesburg (population 8000) where they quickly came under close scrutiny from local law enforcement and media, and his group's sponsorship of a controversial AIDS ballot initiative in California, called enough public attention to his movement that his fundraising practices came under scrutiny. It was during this time that the LaRouche organization had its biggest successes in running candidates in Democratic primaries. Although their only major victories were the two primary wins in Illinois, his supporters also won a number of minor seats, mostly local Democratic precinct captains and party chairmanships, the most significant of which was in Houston, Texas. The hundreds of "LaRouche Democrats" running in primaries, as the media dubbed them, sent the Democratic Party into a panic and there was a brief media hysteria circa 1986 over the possibility that LaRouche's movement was gaining traction with voters. This ended with the criminal convictions of LaRouche and several top aides.
The Leesburg office was raided by the FBI in October 1986, and he was convicted in 1988 on mail fraud and tax evasion charges.LaRouche Warns U.S. on Any Move to Arrest Him by Phillips Shenon (October 8, 1986) The New York Times. He served five years of a 15 year sentence, at one point sharing a prison cell with fellow-kook Jim Bakker.Bakker, LaRouche Shared Jail Cell (Nov 3, 1990 Updated; Jan 24, 2015) News & Record. The LaRouche PAC only pays attention to C=256 Hz notes, not bank notes. He and his apologists claim this was solely a politically-motivated prosecution and that LaRouche was a "political prisoner," but in fact was the same sleazy malady every televangelist knows and does well: scaring old people with lurid stories of the imminent End of the World and bilking them out of their retirement money.LaRouche Convicted Of Mail Fraud by Caryle Murphy (December 17, 1988) The Washington Post.
===After prison===
During the early 1990s he attempted to establish ties with the "" movement, which is a catch-all term for a wide variety of groups, some of them grassroots organizations on a shoestring budget in timber, ranching, and mining communities who saw their jobs and culture under attack from hard greens; others, corporate-funded astroturf groups engaging in environmental denialism and greenwashing. The LaRouche organization wasn't the only fringe group trying to establish hegemony over this movement, another was the Unification Church. LaRouchies would typically show up at their meetings peddling bizarre conspiracy theories about a British cabal conspiring to de-industralize the planet through environmentalism and their rock-sex-drug counterculture to bring about, again, a "new dark age". They had little success,This shouldn't have come as a surprise: The Larouchites had neither the financial muscle of the industry-funded astroturf groups, nor the "country credibility" of the actual grassroots groups. and when they found themselves rebuffed by rough-and-ready loggers and miners who recognized bullshit when they saw it, LaRouche fired a volley at "wise use" around 1995,The Wise Use Movement: How Populists are Turned into Traitors by Anton Chaitkin (June 2, 1995) EIR 22(23):30-31. Via Lyndon LaRouche Watch (archived from June 3, 2013). Bonus: "The Oklahoma City Bombing can only be understood in the context of these secessionist rumblings from the Club of the Isles and the House of Windsor." writing off the movement as a front for "British" libertarian interests taking their cues from Milton Friedman (one of LaRouche's main bugaboos).The Ugly Truth About Milton Friedman by Lyndon LaRouche & David P. Goldman (1980) The New Benjamin Franklin House Publishing Company. ISBN 0933488092. "Friedman has admitted, without the slightest sign of embarrassment, that his economic doctrines are a resurrection of those of Nazi Economics Minister Hjalmar Schacht." … "Does Friedman himself propose to murder some tens of millions of 'useless eaters'?"
On other matters, LaRouche's conviction had effectively cut off his ties with the Reaganite right, and his group's breaking of the Iran-Contra affair pointed to a different direction and an eventual swing back to the left. Two LaRouche associates wrote George Bush: An Unauthorized Biography which became one of their most popular books, detailing George H.W. Bush's various misdeeds (albeit with typical LaRouchian distortions and conspiracy theories woven in). LaRouche opposed the 1991 Gulf War and his followers joined anti-war protests.
===See-sawing back to the left===
At some point in the late 1980s LaRouche began to distance himself from the U.S. extreme right, which was then moving into some bizarre new areas itself such as the militia movement and black helicopter conspiracy theories; even LaRouche realized these movements were dangerous and crazy, and he denounced these (predictably) as "British" propaganda (he likes blaming the British for a lot of things). He began offering staunch support of Bill Clinton, which had gradually begun almost immediately after the 1993 inauguration. LaRouche strongly denounced the Clinton impeachment, attacked right-wing Republicans like Newt Gingrich and called for impeachment of the Republican (then-governor of Pennsylvania) Tom Ridge in 1996.Dupont Heir Wants Ridge Ousted * Larouche Follower Compares Medicaid Cuts In Governor's Welfare Reform To War Crimes. by Joe McDermott (July 18, 1996) The Morning Call (archived from 9 Feb 2016 07:00:51 UTC).
===Who even knows anymore===
thumb|right|We did Nazi that coming.
His brand of "leftism" in his final years, however, was still full of the same conspiratorial talk from his far-right period. He endorsed John Kerry in 2004, the first time he ever endorsed a Democratic presidential candidate other than himself, and shared many of the criticisms of Dick Cheney and the Bush administration with the left. But he also considered George Soros public enemy #1Beck's bizarre, dangerous hit at Soros by Michael Wolraich, (November 14, 2010 2:15 a.m. EST) CNN. Wolraich: "Anti-Sorosism first arrived in the United States in the late 1990s, courtesy of renowned crackpot Lyndon LaRouche. LaRouche published a number of articles in EIR accusing Soros of devious manipulations ranging from an attempt to start World War III to running drugs for Queen Elizabeth II's drug cartel." (apparently replacing his old nemesis Henry Kissinger) and took a conspiracy-laden view of Barack Obama's administration — possibly putting him in the PUMA category, although we're sure the PUMAs don't particularly want anything to do with him either.
LaRouche attacked Obama's health care proposals from the left — LaRouche wants single-payer and only single-payer — and his followers have been showing up at health care debates with signs showing Obama with a Hitler moustache.Woman Comparing Obama to Hitler is a Lyndon LaRouche Democrat by John McCormack (August 19, 2009 09:08 AM ) The Washington Examiner (originally published in the Weekly Standard).
===Logan's Run===
Still very much a cult, he tried organizing younger "Millennial Generation" people into his movement through the LaRouche Youth Movement, and took to denouncing "Baby Boomers" and suggesting they commit suicide,Morning Briefing for Wednesday, April 11, 2007 by Tony Papert, Lyndon LaRouche Watch (archived from December 25, 2007). which may have influenced one of his longtime followers to do just that.Mariella ("Molly") Kronberg, Plaintiff v. Lyndon LaRouche, Barbara Boyd, and Lyndon LaRouche Political Action Committee, Defendants: Complaint charging harassment of a Federal witness and libel (August 21, 2009) The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia via Lyndon LaRouche Watch (archived from April 17, 2016). The widow of cult victim sues LaRouche in federal court.
Longtime LaRouche watchers and ex-followers noted that his organization has essentially split: the older followers based in Leesburg are now on their own, while LaRouche and his LaRouche Youth Movement relocated to nearby Purcellville. The speculation here is LaRouche knew he was not going to live much longer, had given up on his older followers whom he recruited in the 1960s-1970s, and thought that he could ensure the longevity of his ideas by cutting the older baby boomers loose and putting his stock entirely in building the LaRouche Youth Movement. As of 2008, his older followers, who had been loyal to him all that time, needless to say were confused and feeling betrayed, and the state of the LaRouche movement was not good at that point.
===Fascism===
LaRouche occasionally called others fascists without much justification.Star Wars and Littleton by Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. (June 11, 1999) Executive Intelligence Review (archived from November 9, 2017).The Power of Reason, 1988: An Autobiography by Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr. (1987) Executive Intelligence Review. ISBN 0943235006. And others in turn have frequently called LaRouche a fascist."NCLC: A Domestic Political Menace" by Stephen S. Rosenfeld (September 24, 1976) The Washington Post. p. A15. But lest there be any doubt, in 1999, LaRouche published an English translation of a Russian fascist and antisemite, Sergei Glazyev's book Genocide: Russia; and the New World Order.Genocide: Russia and the New World Order by Sergei Glazyev (1999) Executive Intelligence Review. ISBN 0943235014.The Road to Unfreedom: Russia, Europe, America by Timothy Snyder (2018) Tim Duggan Books. ISBN 0525574468. LaRouche had collaborated with Glazyev for two decades around the International Jewish conspiracy, the genocide conspiracy theory of Russians by Jews, and support for Russian irredentism ("Eurasianism").
==Front groups and recruiting==
*21st Century Science and Technology magazine — the main outlet for LaRouche's views on nuclear power and his esoteric proposals for space-based weaponry and high speed rail.
**Fusion Energy Foundation, and Fusion magazine. FEF is defunct; the magazine was later replaced by 21st Century Science and Technology.
*Bürgerrechtsbewegung Solidarität (BüSo) (Civil Rights Movement Solidarity) — the LaRouche political party in Germany
*"Committee for the Republic of Canada" in Quebec
*Executive Intelligence Review (or EIR) — his comically misnamed journal
*National Caucus of Labor Committees (NCLC) — name of the LaRouche-led faction of and split-off from SDS; renamed the US Labor Party in 1976
*New Federalist newspaper (prior to 1988 known as New Solidarity)
*Parti Ouvrier Européen (European Labor Party) — French counterpart to the US Labor Party (74-89)
*Schiller Institute — established in Wiesbaden, Germany by Lyndon's wife Helga Zepp-LaRouche, a German national; this group is also active in the U.S.The What is the Schiller Institute? The Schiller Institute. It is named after philosopher Friedrich Schiller. It is involved in musical crankery regarding the so-called "Verdi pitch", seeking to mandate the tuning of A above middle C to 432 Hz.A Revolution in Musical Tuning: Return to Verdi’s Scientific Pitch C=256 Hertz The Schiller Institute. Other cranks claim this magical frequency to be "mathematically consistent with the universe."What is 432 Hz tuning? Frequency of Learning.
**Bizarrely, LaRouche's Schiller franchise has also branched out to Denmark, where The Friends of the Schiller Institute (Schiller Instituttets Venner) are perennial crank candidates at various Danish elections.Schiller Instituttets Venner In a stopped clock moment, they recommended reinstating the Glass-Steagall Schiller Instituttets Venner. but the relevancy of this policy in a Danish municipal election campaign is essentially de minimus. The party also ran on planks demanding trains across the and colonization of Mars as antidotes to the Great Recession in their bid to gain a foothold in municipal politics in Denmark.Infrastruktur Schiller Instituttets Venner. Hey, just because we're trying to get elected to the Copenhagen city hall doesn't mean we can't think big, right?
*Solidarité & Progrès (Solidarity & Progress) — the French LaRouche party, allegedly founded in 1996
*Worldwide LaRouche Youth Movement - Pro tip: if you don't like people calling your movement fascist, don't call your young followers "LaRouche Youth."
*WTRI — radio station owned by LaRouche between 1986-1991.
*LaRouche-controlled book publishers, past and present, include Campaigner Publications and New Benjamin Franklin Publishing House
===21st Century Science and Technology===
21st Century Science and Technology is a quarterly magazine published by the Lyndon LaRouche organization. The magazine mainly serves as an outlet for LaRouche's crank views on science, which tend toward denialism of global warming, space-based weaponry, and a lot of quirky and odd science woo.
It replaced an earlier magazine called Fusion,AIDS Seen As Job Hazard In Some Labs by Amy Mcdonald (Jan 24, 1988) The Scientist. which was the publication of the Fusion Energy Foundation, a LaRouche front group which had some success in wooing mainstream nuclear scientists into alliances with him.
LaRouche was a big fan of building high-speed rail transport and big infrastructure projects. Don't be fooled, this is the stopped clock effect at work folks.
LaRouche appears to have been fascinated with the work of 19th century German scientist and mathematician who is frequently referenced in this magazine. He also seems to be fascinated with the pseudomathematical concepts of "squaring the circle" Nicolaus of Cusa’s ‘On the Quadrature of the Circle’ by William F. Wertz, Jr. (Summer 2001) Fidelio Magazine 10(2). Reprinted by The Schiller Institute. and "doubling the cube".The Volumes Experiment LaRouche PAC (archived from June 3, 2017).
Originally a print magazine, since 2006 it has been web-only.Back Issues Content 21st Century Science and Technology. The last issue was produced in 2013.21st Century Science and Technology
==Electoral history==
LaRouche ran for president in every election from 1976 through 2004, and for U.S. Congress in Virginia in 1990. His best results were in the 1980 New Hampshire Democratic primary (2%), and in the 1996 and 2000 Democratic primaries (4.55% and 2.2% nationwide respectively, mainly because the only candidate of note in the 1996 primaries was Bill Clinton, and in 2000, Al Gore and Bill Bradley). In 1996 and 2000 the Democratic Party refused to seat his delegates won in the Virginia and North Dakota primaries in 1996 and the Arkansas primary in 2000. The LaRouche organization has a long history of falsely exaggerating LaRouche's electoral results and claiming he outright "won" some states. His best showing in a general presidential election was 0.09% in 1984 as an independent candidate, billed in his half-hour TV ads as an "Independent Democrat." Unfortunately he did not run for president at age 86 in 2008.
It's been stated that Abraham Simpson once voted for LaRouche.The Simpsons episode 4F17 (20 Apr 1997) "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!"
==See also==
*Galileo gambit: During the trial, he compared his writings to the works of Dante, St. Augustine and Plato, among others.
*David Icke: A proponent of the "Queen Liz is secretly Scarface" theory.
*Ron Paul: Another ideologue with views across the spectrum who draws the support of young white Americans.
*Rothschild family: The focal point of his various Jewish bankstah conspiracy theories.
==External links==
*LaRouche PAC — A vortex of blithering insanity
**LaRouche PAC science - A glittery asshole of vapid pseudo-science
**J'accuse!
*LaRouche articles at culteducation.com
*A Menace or Just a Crank?, New York Times
*Partners in Bigotry: The LaRouche Cult and the Nation of Islam, Nizkor Project
===Videos===
*1976 half hour TV ad, in which Judge Doom LaRouche moves his head around a lot, prophesies Carter will launch nuclear war no later than 1977, and claims "aliens" (or Aliens?) in California are going to move from precinct to precinct in vote fraud to throw the election to Carter.
*LaRouche on Weekend Update, 1988. "I'll get you for that."
*Tell us what you really think of Walter Mondale
==Notes==
==References==
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