I've always been morbidly fascinated by political and religious cults, like the LaRouchites and Scientology. It struck me as so bizarre -- how could all these intelligent people believe this nonsense? I'm really looking forward to reading this article.

How funny that Larouche is identified in the video grab above as "Independent Democrat."

I doubt if Joe Lieberman knew that when he selected the same party ID.

Is that asshole LaRouche still alive? I remember passing LaRouchies at card tables on the way to class 30 years ago, when they were passing out stuff about how MI5 was behind the U.S. drug problem or something.

Kevin Drum 1:47 AM Permalink | Trackbacks | Comments (3)

Say, Kevin. Is your computers clock off? On old computers, ie, most, the daylight savings code kicked in telling people that the clock was being set back one hour, (Fall back, Spring ahead.)

Oregon, time, now: 12:31 AM.

Just curious. I thought you were on the West Coast.

P. S. You a Night Owl?

Ahhh. Computer not in West Coast.

Goody! (Not the poor soul's suicide, of course, but I'm looking forward to reading this.)

Does the story mention their (mis)adventures with the local community orchestras?

Geographic nit pick: The center of Sterling, Virginia, is about 28 miles from downtown Washington and Capitol Hill, not 45 miles as the book asserts.

Larouche did help underwrite and finance the best biography of George H.W. Bush ever written. So, he does have that going for him! Which is nice.

A couple years back I was visiting the University of Washington campus in Seattle. It was one of the rainiest days on record in the region, and I was completely soaked, head to toe. On my way back to my car, I saw that for at least a minute, I had the opportunity to walk under a nice portico/arcade, which would give me shelter from the rain. Only problem was, there was a veritable gauntlet of LaRouchies who'd set up shop.

I ended up walking another several hundred feet in the rain just to avoid them.

I've always been morbidly fascinated by political and religious cults, like the LaRouchites and Scientology. It struck me as so bizarre -- how could all these intelligent people believe this nonsense?

Well, for starters, the two you mentioned are cults that claim not to be religious at all. They appeal to people who think they're too smart for religion and its non-falsifiable claims, but clearly have no problem believing outright falsehoods--so long as they're wrapped in an attractive package that flatters the mark's desire to feel intellectually superior to the unwashed masses.

Some years ago, when I was working for the Hawaii Legislature, we attended a convention of the Nat'l Conference of State Legislatures in San Antonio. At the convention center, my boss started talking to these very nice and well-groomed people who were manning a table outside the entrance, because he's a genuinely nice guy himself, and being the politician that he is, is willing to talk to anybody. These people certainly didn't seem out of the ordinary, so he gave him his card.

Only later, when we returned to Honolulu, did we find out that he'd been talking to LaRouchians, and his e-mail in-box was completely full of the most bizarre and fascinating messages.

It's like they'll lure you in with some eminently reasonably ideas and polite discourse, and then all of the sudden -- WHAMMO!! -- you're reading about how the Queen of England should be indicted and prosecuted for cocaine trafficking and being in cahoot with members of Columbia's Medillin Cartel, whom she smuggled into the country on her private jets and her royal yacht Britannia.

Very strange people, the LaRouchians are. They were nice and polite, to be sure, and for the most part appeared relatively benign, but they're certainly way out there in Never-Neverland.

All republicans running for the white house resemble Bush along with some democrats.

I am going to geographic netpick with pj in jesusland - considering that DC is north of the entire state of Virginia, it is hard to say that Sterling is northwest of DC.

I think it was 1980 when Larouche was running one of his after midnight half-hour screeds. My brother and I watched for about ten minutes until the bilge was repeating itself. I changed the channel and on the very next click of the dial was the Three Stooges "Wrong Brothers" short: Moe was getting his rubber coating removed with the air compressor.
Sometimes the highest art is chance art.

These kooks are always outside the Capitol South Metro station on Capitol Hill when I come to work in the morning, badgering the commuters with songs about Cheney, drugs, the Queen of England, etc. I always ask them who LaRouche will be voting for in the upcoming election. Invariably shuts 'em up. As a convicted felon, of course, old Lyndon can't vote for anyone.

I remember back in the 1980s when Larouchites helped start the Fusion Party and would harass everybody at Atlanta's airport trying to get them to endorse fusion rather than fission as an energy source. They would literally chase people down the concourses hectoring them about fusion power.

I remember years ago (late 60's early 70's) these guys would hang out at L.A. International Airport with signs blasting Jane Fonda with photos of her from "Barbarella" saying "Jane Fonda spreads faster than radiation" and hassleing incoming passengers and there families and making absolutely no sense.

They were real dicks

Well, it's a well known fact, Sonny Jim, that there's a secret society of the five wealthiest people in the world, known as The Pentavirate, who run everything in the world, including the newspapers, and meet tri-annually at a secret country mansion in Colorado, known as The Meadows.

So who's in this Pentavirate?

The Queen, The Vatican, The Gettys, The Rothschilds, and Colonel Sanders before he went tits up. Oh, I hated the Colonel with is wee beady eyes, and that smug look on his face. "Oh, you're gonna buy my chicken! Ohhhhh!"

Dad, how can you hate "The Colonel"?

Because he puts an addictive chemical in his chicken that makes ya crave it fortnightly, smartass!!! Alright, now give your mother a kiss, or I'll kick your teeth in.

ET -- You don't need to phone home, you need to look at a map: http://encarta.msn.com/map_701590042/Washington_D_C_Metropolitan_Area.html

Sterling is northwest of DC, along with a considerable chunk of Northern Virginia.

Time to toot my own horn here too, I think.

There's at least one New Jersey politician -- a Democrat no less -- who believes (or did until recently) that LaRouche is just fine ...

go to http://www.tiny.cc/larouche

When I read the Record story, I was thinking, Whatever happened to LaRouche? Great link, thanks ...

This may be one of the funniest Comments threads in a while - intentionally or unintentionally.

I remember watching those Larouche commercials back in the day. They really taught me something about life, back then when I was was young and impressionable. It taught me to be very cynical and cautious when you live in a society where somebody as seriously f'd up as Larouche could afford enough money to buy half hour blocks of prime time television.

Stuart Mackenzie on October 29, 2007 at 10:24 AM:

Well, it's a well known fact, Sonny Jim, that there's..

That's from So I Married an Axe Murderer, right? Funny stuff in that flick..

The best chuckle I got from the article was this:

"Experts who study political cults have observed that such groups thrive on an imagined enemy in opposition to which the group constructs it own collective identity. LaRouche had always encouraged members to believe they were the victims of mass conspiracies (usually perpetrated, according to LaRouche, by John Train, a New York investment advisor and cofounder of the Paris Review). While LaRouche maintained his belief in these plots, he concocted a sinister new nemesis: the baby boomer."

Slightly off topic, but FWIW, a lot of Ron Paul supporters I see are driving non-descript (usually white or pastel) Oldsmobuicks as noted by Chevy Chase in the movie "Fletch".

Larouchians are still in Manhattan, including upper west side, leafetling AGAINST Bush/Cheny, calling for impeachment, out of Iraq, etc.

They will piggy-back on anything.

considering that DC is north of the entire state of Virginia, it is hard to say that Sterling is northwest of DC.

Uh, no.

Northern tip of DC: 38.86 N 77.03 W
Sterling: 38.97 N 77.41 W
Northern tip of Virginia: 39.47 N 78.37 W

I remember back in the 80s I had a relative who worked in the LaRouche offices answering phones or something, when they were raided. She was completely freaked out and told of how they all ran out the back door like little squirrels! Actually, I saw some LaRouche-ites passing out brochures just the other day.

Maybe they meant that Sterling was 45 minutes from DC, instead of miles. It can take that long, depending on traffic and which route you choose...

Thanks for pointing to this article. I read it on the bus this morning, and like you said, I couldn't stop. I've passed by the LaRouchies many times and always chuckle about their simultaneous burning hatred for Dick Cheney and Al Gore. They are still pretty ubiquitous here in Seattle, though I haven't been able to wander around campus as much this last year. Maybe their print shop woes have slowed things down.

Not surprisingly, they have some very bizarre views on evolution. Sort of a hybridization of creationism and new age wackiness. A goofy group of kids.

Not enough in the article about how LaRouche wormed his way into Reagan's NSC during the first term with info from his personal contacts in foreign countries. Until the media started reporting the NSC's interest and exposing LaRouche's record he was quite welcome by the Reaganites.

I did a little research on him earlier this year when my local county Dem party chair appointed a self described LaRouchee as the chair of the newly minted county Issues Committee. Being familiar with the 1986 debacle in Illinois when Adlai the Third had to form a new party to disassociate himself from the LaRouchies on his ticket I knew what kind of damage they can do when they worm their way in.

I argued strenuously with the county chair when I heard about the appointment. Her reasoning was shocking, he was supposedly the only who was interested, and he's always helps out around the office when needed.

So I went to the first meeting of the Issues Committee. Just 4 of us including the LaRouchee - who I must point out is real nice guy - sat down at a Starbucks.

He had an inch high stack of material and started right in. The first issue he wanted our midwestern county party org to advocate was building a giant rail tunnel between Alaska and Siberia, through the Bering Straits. That's some of the most forbidding geography on the planet, it's where they film "Deadliest Catch" the Discovery Channel's program about crab fishermen who take their lives in their hands in those freezing, treacherous waters for a shot at big bucks.

So I asked to what purpose? There's few people in Alaska, fewer in Siberia, little trade and less tourism between the two. Who is gonna use this tunnel? He then suggested we build it in conjunction with this vast maglev rail network across Siberia, Canada and the northern US. And here's the kicker, we'll build it using a new style WPA, paid for the US government! This is a Republican wetdream, just the kind of thing they'd love some national Dem to propose, a giant, wildly expensive nonsensical boondoggle they'd justly ridicule for the lunacy it is.

I gently urged we table that idea and stick to something closer to home. So he pulls out an item on runoff from a landfill seeping into the local aquifer. This is a serious problem, we've had numerous dustups with this around here. But his solution? Build a couple of huge incinerators right here in the middle of suburbia. We'll burn the garbage and put the toxins in the air instead of the water. That'd go over real well.

I hadn't mentioned I'd heard he was a LaRouchee before this, I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt. Both of the guys who told me he was weren't even sure what a LaRouchee is. At that point I told him this stuff all sounds like LaRouche propaganda to me. He admitted it was and he is one of the faithful. I told him LaRouche isn't a Democrat and these aren't Democratic proposals. He claimed they were and LaRouche is a "FDR Democrat", one of their favorite positions I've since discovered.

I've only talked to him a few times since. The Issues Committee is moribund because they give him no duties and I guess he's not interested in getting himself in trouble by pushing this foolishness. I did get an earful from him about the Queen being the world's biggest drug dealer at a picnic this summer. It was all based on the opium trade in Hong Kong in the 1800s and how her influence extends to Afghanistan these days. It just gave me a headache.

Steve Paradis: "Sometimes the highest art is chance art."

Years ago I was sitting in a bar in S. Jersey watching the Sixers play the Rockets. The Rockets looked like they were going nowhere and Charles Barkley was back in Philly for what was looking likely to be one of his last NBA games in town, I think he'd already announced he'd be retiring at the end of the season. Right near the end of the first half Barkley goes down with a sprained quadracep. They had to carry him off. He comes out at the half in civvies in a soft cast and on crutches.

As the game ends he hobbles to half court to shake hands with some of the Philly players, coaches and other Philly media notables etc. that he long had a love/hate relationship with from his years there as the "franchise". Just as he does, by coincidence Sinatra's "That's Life" blares out of the jukebox in the bar. It's obvious this is it, he's done for the season and is calling it a career.

The local TV announcers are reveling in it, verbally recapping some of his career highlights, while the backslapping fest is going on midcourt, Sinatra is singing "I've been a puppet, a pauper, a pirate, a pawn and a king..." and just before they break for commercial the song ends as Sir Charles turns to hobble back to the locker room..."Many times I thought of cuttin' out but my heart won't buy it...But if there's nothin' shakin' come this here July...I'm gonna roll myself up in a big ball a-and die, By, by!"

Perfect, absolutely perfect.

It's like they'll lure you in with some eminently reasonably ideas and polite discourse, and then all of the sudden -- WHAMMO!! -- you're reading about how the Queen of England should be indicted and prosecuted for cocaine trafficking...

Wow! No kidding. They marked me coming out of (or into, I forget) the DMV in Danvers, MA, about 15 years ago. Wanted me to sign some petition opposing some genocide somewhere, or horrorshow of some sort, that any reasonable person would be opposed to. And like you said -- WHAMMO!! -- my mailbox (this was before the WWW) is crammed with newsletters describing... well, you know. Crazy, crazy stuff, about the British Royal Family and the Vatican. Help me with my British history, but the Windsors are Anglican, no? The Protestants came out on top in the UK, didn't they? Oh well, maybe it was all a ruse. :)

These guys are nucking futs. And I was on their damn mailing list for years.

Oh, and I was going to urge ET to consult a map, but somebody beat me to it. I understand the source of his confusion: the trick is that the Potomac does not flow directly west-east. Cheers.

ET, you need to look at a map before opining about the entire state of Virginia being north of D.C.

http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/maps/virginia_map.html

(D.C. is not shown but is the "other side" of Arlington County)

Sterling is indeed northwest of D.C., as is all of Loudoun County.

It was a great article Kevin. The fact that someone as certifiably out there as LaRouche was able to co-opt the talents of so many seemingly normal people gives on pause about the susceptibility of people generally to sign on to crazy and self-destructive notions just because the person espousing them has charisma. Not making any direct comparisons, of course . . .

Oops, I meant about D.C. being north of the entire state of Virginia.

I've read the arguments for lowering the pitch and they convinced me. And I am sane, mostly.

Odd place, the US.

Malcolm X: the white man is the devil.
Lyndon Larouche: boomers are the devil.

Etc.

...The fact that someone as certifiably out there as LaRouche was able to co-opt the talents of so many seemingly normal people gives on pause about the susceptibility of people generally to sign on to crazy and self-destructive notions just because the person espousing them has charisma. Not making any direct comparisons, of course . . .
Posted by: Barbara on October 29, 2007 at 3:38 PM
-----

It makes one wonder if these people are the origin of the term "Kool-Aid drinker". That image unfortunately also brings up Jim Jones and The People's Temple... and those people that committed mass suicide waiting for that Spaceship that never came, etc. There was the mention of suicide in that email at that meeting before that guy dove off the bridge. Somehow, this is like the inverse of the Twilight Zone episode "The Printer's Devil".

Not a month ago I was at a local shopping center and outside Trader Joe's a very young, progressive-looking girl spotted me and came running up to me asking, "HEY! Do you want to join me in kicking the Democrats' asses with Lyndon LaRouche?!?!" I laughed heartily and said, "Not with Lyndon LaRouche, I don't!", to which her shoulders sagged and she replied, "Awwww...MAN, do you know how many people have said that to me today?!"

Geographic nit pick: The center of Sterling, Virginia, is about 28 miles from downtown Washington and Capitol Hill, not 45 miles as the book asserts.

Normally its 28 miles, but it's at least 45 miles during rush hour.

Correction note: the name of the publisher is John Wiley & Sons, not John Wylie.

Not a month ago I was at a local shopping center and outside Trader Joe's a very young, progressive-looking girl spotted me and came running up to me asking, "HEY! Do you want to join me in kicking the Democrats' asses with Lyndon LaRouche?!?!" I laughed heartily and said, "Not with Lyndon LaRouche, I don't!", to which her shoulders sagged and she replied, "Awwww...MAN, do you know how many people have said that to me today?!"
Posted by: Hope Chest on October 29, 2007 at 6:39 PM |

So that's what my ex-fiancee is doing now! From unemployed law school grad to conspiracy theorist to supermarket petitioner, and it all started when she found out that the "Democratic Policy Committee" was interested in her talents...

Who knew we needed reconfirmation that the LaRouchies are crazy? What's next? The Monthly blows the lid off the Prohibitionist Party?

You're right Kevin. That's a very well written, interesting analysis.

Too bad LaRouche knocked Hume. David Hume is one of the best skeptics in philisophy's history.