20 Apr Freedom Movement Faces Dire Threats From Within
April 20, 2010
By Thomas DeWeese
After more than forty years as an activist in the fight to restore the American Republic, I have never been more positive that the goal could now actually be achievable. The Tea Party movement represents the awakening of the great American sleeping giant of freedom. It is the most exciting change to take place in the last 100 years. Politicians are shuttering in its wake. Political strategists are trying to figure how to deal with it. Bad policy has been stopped or slowed. And massive change from the ballot box appears on the horizon of the next election.
However, some very dark clouds are gathering over the movement. The freedom fighters and their precious movement are being stalked by clandestine predators, quietly creating discord and suspicion among their ranks. If not exposed and stopped, the only result can be the destruction of the movement, the end of the burgeoning freedom revolution and the solidifying of the tyranny they seek to end.
The great threat to the Freedom Movement comes from a group of political extremists who have been around the U.S. political scene for decades. These operatives have been perceived at various times to be on the right and/or on the left. They have tried to work through the Democratic and Republican parties. Now they are trying to infiltrate and manipulate the Tea Party movement.
I am talking about the dangerous Lyndon LaRouche cult. It is a cult because of the fanatical devotion of LaRouche’s followers to his peculiar brand of Marxism, which sees the British – not the United States – as being behind economic catastrophes and world conflicts and wars. LaRouche followers can often be seen manning literature tables outside political events, including and especially 9/11 “truth” conferences.
Interestingly, one of LaRouche’s “former” high-level associates, Webster Tarpley, is now openly working with self-described “patriot” Alex Jones, who runs the infowars and prison planet web sites. Tarpley appears in two of Jones’ films, “The Obama Deception” and “Fall of the Republic.” Many conservatives have bought these films, thinking they have critical information about the threats to freedom that face us today. But the films are actually slick propaganda meant to deceive and distort the real situation.
The Tea Party movement must wake up — and wake up fast — before these political extremists carry out a strategy that will divide and discredit the movement.
Some History
Lyndon LaRouche is a former member of the Trotskyite Communist Socialist Workers Party (SWP) and his first political organization, the National Caucus of Labor Committees (NCLC) , began as a faction of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), the same group that laid siege to college campuses in the 1960s. This is the same group that spawned terrorists Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn. The NCLC became the U.S. Labor Party.
In the 1960s, LaRouche built a political intelligence network with about one thousand operatives stationed in North America, Western Europe, and South America. In a series of lectures in 1976, titled “What only Communists Know,” LaRouche described his network as the “world’s Marxist labor movement.”
The network created a series of front organizations and publications that included the National Democratic Policy Committee, the New Solidarity International Press Service (NSIPS), the National Anti-Drug Coalition, the Fusion Energy Federation, and the Executive Intelligence Review – all designed to spread propaganda – all directed by Lyndon LaRouche. He ran for president under the US Labor Party banner; and then again in 1980 as a Democrat.
In 1978, following the presidential election of Jimmy Carter, LaRouche began a new effort to spread his influence by attempting to create ties to the American Right. Through the US Labor Party, LaRouche followers began to fan out across the nation, contacting conservative leaders. One of their themes was that they possessed documentation that Carter had stolen the election and that there was a possibility the election results could be overturned.
At the time, I was serving as State Chairman of Ohio Young Americans for Freedom and was contacted by the LaRouche operatives concerning the Carter story. I invited one of their representatives to attend our board meeting to give us the details. My feeling after the meeting (which provided little concrete evidence about a Carter election scandal) was that LaRouche was attempting to infiltrate the conservative movement.
Beginning with the Carter effort, LaRouche stepped up his activities to reach out to conservatives. In the 1980’s, LaRouche operatives could be found in airports and in front of Post Offices collecting signatures on petitions calling Jane Fonda a traitor. Other petitions called for support of President Reagan’s Space Defense Initiative (SDI).
However, in collecting the petition signatures, LaRouche’s people were strangely aggressive and obnoxious to airport passengers. That was part of the LaRouche strategy – use conservative issues to the extreme and get labeled as pests and radical fringe. Then, when a legitimate advocate for such issues spoke in public, the people who had been accosted by the LaRoucheites in the airports would instantly respond negatively, resulting in the discrediting of the entire movement as “just those kooks I saw in the airport.” The motivation for LaRouche, then and now, is to discredit the Right.
The LaRouche troops continued to press their efforts to take up pseudo-conservative issues through their communications network and publications. They spouted conspiracy theories about “Zionist” plots and that Wall Street controlled the Communist Party USA. And they claimed that the CIA was responsible for most of the world’s terrorism. They twisted issues around to make it look like conservative leaders were really communist spies and agents. They charged that the anti-nuke movement was run by the Council of Foreign Relations. They charged that communist China was the center of the world drug trade – conveniently leaving out drug trade involvement by the Soviet Union – the avowed enemy of communist China. They even charged that the conservative Heritage Foundation was a KGB front. In every charge made by LaRouche followers, they included classic Soviet disinformation tactics designed to make the Soviets appear to be more victim than villain – while successfully helping to discredit the Right or promote Soviet positions.
Back-and-forth went the conspiracy theories woven by the LaRouche propagandists. There were lots of the right catch-words for conservatives: Hate Rockefeller; Anti-Kissinger; expose the CFR; Jane Fonda is a traitor; and charges of hidden KGB spies in the government. Attacks on the Council on Foreign Relations made the LaRouche movement seem like it was on the right path in uncovering the source of a U.S. foreign policy that seems designed to intentionally fail. The pro-nuclear power theme was perhaps the most successful.
Many on the Right fell for it and invited them to their meetings. The Conservative Book Club even took out ads in LaRouche’s Fusion magazine and the Freedom Foundation gave an award to Fusion for a series of pro-nuclear articles. Later, the Freedom Foundation did acknowledge that it had made a mistake in giving the award, but at the time, to them, LaRouche seemed to be a bona fide “conservative.”
However, as investigative journalist Cliff Kincaid wrote in 1981 in Human Events, “The evidence is overwhelming, however, that LaRouche and his followers have not repudiated their Marxist beginnings. They push the Soviet line and, at the same time, smear some of the most effective conservative groups and individuals, who are exposing Soviet operations. Responsible conservatives should not snap at LaRouche’s bait.”
According to the website LaRouche Planet, written by former LaRouche followers who have left him, he is an anti-Semite, a Holocaust denier, and has spent years campaigning against what he called the “Zionist/Nazi Jewish Lobby.” The site also claims that LaRouche has had direct ties with the Ku Klux Klan and neonazis. LaRouche’s main conspiracy theory is that the British crown is plotting to take control of the world, helped in that endeavor by world bankers. British agents, he claims, are the source of much of the lies and havoc in the world. Somehow, into that conspiracy, he also manages to tie in the United States and Israeli “Zionists.”
Same Tactics, New Target – Tea Parties
Today, LaRouche has entrenched himself in the rising anti-government sentiment that has given birth to the Tea Party movement. He talks of “taking back the Republic” – an interesting statement from an avowed Marxist. He makes strong arguments about saving NASA and the space program, knowing it is one of the most popular government programs; and he has joined the chorus of voices (including mine) against the Global Warming scam, calling the environmental movement “green fascism.” Then, as usual, he goes overboard and calls it “green genocide.”
These are all issues popular with freedom advocates who are joining forces in the Tea Party movement. Speakers at Tea Party rallies who speak of these issues and use similar catch phrases and language are instant crowd pleasers. So LaRouche operatives have become adept at endearing themselves to many in the movement simply by using the popular language. But always, LaRouche’s arguments come with a twist – that the evil comes from the British Empire or Zionist forces. Anyone he opposes, including Barack Obama, is labeled a “British agent.” The effect of rolling legitimate issues around outlandish conspiracy theories is to discredit the entire movement, just as LaRouche has been doing since the 1970s.
According to his own publications, LaRouche is the one who created the poster of Obama with a Hitler mustache. His political action committee (LaRouchepac) takes great joy in describing how LaRouche followers appear at Tea Party rallies and pass out the pictures. The anti-Obama fervor in the crowd makes the images very popular.
In an editorial published on the pages of one of his magazines Executive Intelligence Review, LaRouche relishes how the Obama/Hitler photo creates violence at the Tea Party rallies, reporting, “More than once, in the face of angry Obamophiles seeking to destroy the poster, groups of citizens have intervened to defend the LaRouche Pac organizers.” The poster, which many see as funny or appropriate, is used in two very effective ways if one wants to discredit the movement. First, as LaRouche himself reports, it causes discord and even violence. Second, it is the image national news media cameras immediately focus on to present a negative image of the rally and its organizers. If that image is coupled with violence – so much the better. LaRouche has done his job.
The strength of the LaRouche appeal to some Tea Partiers was dramatically demonstrated in a recent election when LaRouche-Democrat Congressional candidate Kesha Rogers won the nomination in the 22nd District in Texas. She campaigned on one main issue – impeach Obama. That message had great appeal to many in the freedom movement and they came across party lines to nominate her.
She appeared to be the candidate who advocated, not only opposition to Obama’s drive for massive government buildup, but also the dedicated advocate to restore the American Republic. However, the freedom forces weren’t listening carefully. In a radio interview after her victory, she accused Obama of “spitting on the grave of Franklin D. Roosevelt.” The question begs to be asked – how can one who supports the American Republic speak in positive terms about the one President who did more to crush that Republic than almost any other – Franklin Roosevelt? That is a prime example of the LaRouche followers using double-speak mixed in with real issues. Another example of Rogers employing the standard LaRouche propaganda was a statement that her victory was part of the effort “to win a war against the British Empire.”
However, the Rogers victory has caused massive harm to the freedom movement by giving LaRouche the one thing he lacked – his own political foothold on the elective battleground. He has used the Tea Party movement to give him what he never had before – legitimacy.
The 9/11 “Inside Job” Conspiracy
Lyndon LaRouche became the first public figure to challenge the story that the 9/11 attacks were executed by Bin Laden’s, Al Qaeda. The LaRouchePlanet website reports that LaRouche was actually live on the radio during the Twin Tower attacks, being interviewed by Dr. Jack Stockwell. He immediately blamed the Israeli government, telling Stockwell, “I know the Arab governments. I’ve been talking to them directly or indirectly over some time period. At least key ones. And they don’t want this kind of thing. But I know who does want it.” Stockwell suggested he was talking about the Israeli government and LaRouche replied, “Or certain factions within it.”
The claim that Israel – or the U.S. government itself – brought down the World Trade Center and attacked the Pentagon soon developed into a full-blown conspiracy designed to make the U.S. not the victim but the perpetrator. Some reasonable questions about how the buildings collapsed were used to further undermine the obvious fact that a foreign attack on America did indeed take place. These accusations of Israeli spy networks in the U.S. were then broadcast over Arab government-funded Al Jazeera television network, taking LaRouche’s unfounded charges onto the world stage and the 9/11 “truth movement” was born.
Indeed, all of this was a gift to Al-Qaeda’s main propaganda outlet, which jumped on the conspiracy theory that Muslim terrorists were not really behind the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Al Jazeera even covered a 9/11 “truth” conference in the U.S. which suggested that 9/11 was “an orchestrated U.S. attempt to incite world war.”
One of the speakers at that conference was none other than Webster Tarpley, a long-time associate of Lyndon LaRouche who wrote the book, 911 Synthetic Terror: Made in USA. One of the lead propagandists for the 9/11 Truth campaign, Tarpley insists that the Bush Administration orchestrated the attacks, never bothering to explain how the plot was hatched in just several months and how the cover-up was staged without one of the “insiders” blowing the whistle.
Taking the theory one step further, Tarpley has insisted that planes hijacked by Muslims did not strike the Pentagon and that one of the planes in question landed in Ohio. When asked what happened to the people, he answered, “We just do not know,” indicating some vast conspiracy in which people who had phoned loved ones from the planes to say goodbye, simply disappeared.
When other terrorist incidents happen in the U.S. and Britain, Tarpley is also quick to get the Muslims off the hook. He claims that the Islamic terrorist plot to bomb planes leaving Britain for the US was a “false flag” operation sponsored by British Intelligence and that the massacre of 331 people in Beslan, Russia, was really instigated by the U.S. and British governments.
As noted by Cliff Kincaid of America’s Survival, Inc. (www.usasurvival.org) and Accuracy in Media, Tarpley wrote a book about Barack Obama insisting that the President’s childhood mentor, Communist Party member Frank Marshall Davis, was not a true Marxist and that Karl Marx himself was a British agent.
As if Tarpley isn’t strange enough, other leaders of the so-called 9/11 “truth” movement include several people who make a living claiming that the United States is a rogue or “imperialist” government that has covered up its own diabolical role in the events of 9/11. They include:
- David Ray Griffin, who insists that the Pentagon was not hit by a plane – but by missiles – ignoring the question of what happened to the people on that particular flight that, if not hitting the Pentagon – just disappeared into thin air. Griffin is a prominent liberal theologian who advocates a world government under the UN.
- Richard Falk, a former Princeton University Professor and advocate of a world government under the UN.
- Byron Belitsos, co-author of the book “One Planet: a Progressive Vision of Enforceable Global Law” andan advocate of “global democracy,” has written a call for “the need for a genuine global legislature that can pass enforceable global laws.” He uses 9/11 as the excuse for destroying national independence, replacing it with a global world government.
- Van Jones, appointed by Barack Obama to be the “Green Jobs” Czar, left the administration after he was exposed as a communist who had signed a 9/11 “truth” petition. Jones is on record denouncing America for its supposed imperialism as he regularly condemns capitalism.
These are some of the people who suggest that 9/11 was designed to kill thousands of Americans in a cold blooded scheme to start an imperialistic war with the Arab world.
Lyndon LaRouche’s tactics are all over the message of the 9/11 Truth Movement. It’s fact mixed with lunacy, designed to discredit anyone involved. There are many freedom activists who passionately support and advocate the 9/11 Truth issue. In fact, they are beginning to dominate the Tea Party effort, with some rally organizers screening speakers, demanding to know if they support the 9/11 Truth movement before they are allowed to take the stage.
There are many holes in the 9/11 “documentation” that honest grassroots activists must question. If government missiles, instead of planes, crashed into the Pentagon on September 11th, what did happen to the people, many of whom made frantic phone calls from planes they claimed were hijacked? If the Bush Administration really did orchestrate the attacks that fateful day (a remarkable feat considering they had only been in office less than eight months) why, then, couldn’t they also create the necessary weapons of mass destruction in Iraq so vital to make the legitimacy of their war? And, why could they not make the connection to Al-Qaeda and the anthrax attacks, if federal authorities were so good at orchestrating attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon?
Finally, take a look at the abovementioned 9/11 “truth” spokesmen. All of them have one thing in common – all of them advocate the establishment of a one-world government under the United Nations. The solution to America’s “rogue” status, say these self-appointed 9/11 Truth “investigators,” is a new international order or world government, which would compromise American sovereignty by outlawing the United States’ ability to defend itself.
Is there any serious activist in the Tea Party movement who advocates such policy – the destruction of the United States Constitution? To the contrary, the movement has come together to save the United States Republic and its founding documents.
Why then do such patriots allow themselves to be manipulated by those who want to destroy the very country they are trying to save? The answer is that Lyndon LaRouche is a master at double-speak and deception and these good folks have fallen victim to it.
The Alex Jones Connection
One common link that threads through Lyndon LaRouche, conspiracy theories, and the Tea Party movement is bombastic radio personality Alex Jones.
Jones, a self-described “aggressive Constitutionalist,” has worked to establish himself as the “true leader” of the Tea Party movement. A showman who regularly creates drama on his show or at Tea Party rallies with his famous bullhorn and loud, raspy voice, he personifies a “stick it to the man” attitude. The crowds love it. His followers are dedicated and loyal. The genius of Jones is that he weaves the outlandish claims with more serious commentaries on real and legitimate issues.
The genius of Jones is that he is able to weave the most questionable conspiracy theories with more mainstream conservative issues to reach out to the Tea Party movement. On his show, he regularly rants about American imperialism and secret plots against him by the government (mostly CIA) allegedly because the government views his criticism of U.S. policy as dangerous. That makes him an instant martyr for “the cause.”
As Jones postures himself to be a conservative spokesman, he relies heavily on former LaRouche associate Webster Tarpley. Jones has featured the avowed Marxist prominently in at least two of his videos, “Fall of the Republic” and “The Obama Deception.” The common ground between Jones and Tarpley is, of course, the 9/11 Truth Movement, of which Jones has become the most visible spokesman.
Jones regularly accuses the U.S. government of promoting worldwide terrorism, especially through the CIA. Interestingly, so does Tarpley, who wrote of the Christmas Day underwear bomber, “The recent failed attack on a U.S. passenger jet traveling from Amsterdam to Detroit was a set-up provocation controlled by U.S. intelligence.” The message of U.S. plots on its own people is right out of the LaRouche playbook and serves only to stir up more distrust among followers of the freedom movement, helping to discredit it to a more mainstream audience.
There is another common connection between Jones and Tarpley as both now regularly appear on Russia Today television to condemn American policy.
It must be understood by freedom advocates that Russia, led in effect by former KGB spy Vladimir Putin, is using its state-owned media to blacken the reputation of the United States and to weaken our nation internationally – just as it did in the old Soviet Union.
The difference today is that the Russians are using Americans to make their propaganda points. As Cliff Kincaid reports, Russian television, especially the Russia Today (RT) network is still quoting and featuring interviews with American communists.
Alex Jones is now a regular, willing participant on the propaganda channel, described as “the U.S. investigative journalist.” He even appeared on Russia Today to defend the Russian invasion in the independent country of Georgia, a former Soviet Republic. In his August 26, 2008 appearance, Jones insisted that the U.S. “private international military industrial complex” had “launched a sneak attack” on the “Russian enclaves” in Georgia in order to support the “U.S.-backed Georgians (and) the Israelis – and NATO- backed Georgians.” Jones said the U.S. was guilty of “unprecedented crimes” and urged Russia to continue to occupy the regions it had invaded.
Out of one side of his mouth, Jones encourages the Russians to invade and occupy a free, sovereign nation like Georgia, and at the same time condemns the United States for doing the same thing in Iraq. Again, this is right out of the LaRouche playbook of double-speak. The purpose is to get followers and gain access to a movement and discredit it in the process.
Alex Jones has even used his bully pulpit radio show to shout down anyone who seems to disagree with him. In February, 2010, he stormed into a Tea party rally in Dallas with bull horn in hand, shouting down the speaker who was in the middle of his presentation. He stopped the rally, pushed and shoved organizers who tried to quiet him. He then told his radio audience that he was shouting down agent provocateur- radicals who were trying to infest the freedom movement. Incredibly, he was describing his own tactics and blaming it on others.
Of course, his charges were simply not true. I personally know and work with the organizers of that rally; Catherine Bleish, Executive Director of the Liberty Restoration Project and John Bush, Executive Director of Texans for Accountable Government. I served with both of these passionate patriots in the Continental Congress 2009, held last November. Since then, they have spent almost every waking hour traveling to government-run fusion centers to investigate and expose possible violations and threats to personal privacy rights and government surveillance. They are outstanding and dedicated freedom activists – but Alex Jones chose to attack them. Why? Perhaps they are too effective in the cause of liberty.
The Possible Destruction of the Freedom Movement
The result of Jones’ attacks and LaRouche’s manipulations has been a growing paranoia among the freedom movement about who can be trusted. Jones presents himself as the perfect patriot, accusing other movement spokesmen of being traitors, “neo-cons,” and infiltrators if they don’t toe his line. That “line” entails acceptance of conspiracies, hate and suspicion and leads to discrediting the movement and ultimately to its own destruction.
The attacks perpetrated by Jones and LaRouche lead to manipulation of the Tea Party message. They use such tactics to shed doubt and suspicion on anyone they view as a threat to their agenda. If they want to get rid of someone in the movement they will find a way. Just start a rumor that they are a “globalist,” or a “neo-con.” The terms are used so often now that their meaning is becoming little more than a label that says “not one of us.” Today, when those in the freedom movement hear that label being cast about, they need to ask this question: “says who?”
As a result of such diatribes, the tone of the freedom movement is changing rapidly. Paranoia and suspicion is growing. Attacks have been relentless against some, like Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, Fox News, former Congressman Dick Armey and his group Freedom Works (which put together the largest freedom rally to date – more than one million in Washington, DC), and even Ron Paul, whose campaign was the launch pad for the Tea Party movement.
No one in the freedom movement is an expert on every issue – that is next to impossible. And not everyone agrees on the exact position or action that should be taken. That’s why the strength of the grassroots Freedom Movement is to have a mix of groups and spokesmen for a variety of issues. Some groups only focus on single issues. Others work on many. Some make mistakes on certain issues and feel the heat from the “troops.” Others just see the issue differently.
I’ve watched as newcomers to the movement struggle to comprehend the very complicated issues. Others like Beck and Palin have grown in their knowledge in a genuine desire to get it right. But none of these people are evil, racist or “neo-cons” simply because they have a difference of opinion. All advocate controlling the power and size of government – and that’s what the real freedom movement is about.
No one person or group speaks for the movement. But Alex Jones insists he does, shouting into his microphone or bullhorn that “only I speak for you…only I tell you the truth…and anyone who attacks me is the real enemy.” Perhaps Lyndon LaRouche should transfer that Hitler mustache to a picture of Alex Jones.
Most recently, it appears that some rallies have been infiltrated with thugs shouting racial slurs at black congressmen in the fight over health care. Violence has broken out a few times. The tea party movement is being successfully discredited as radical fringe – just as Lyndon LaRouche has planned. Coincidentally, that violence and racism falls right into the plans of the Southern Poverty Law Center and its government sanctioned reports that label our entire movement as potential terrorists. How convenient.
I believe it all goes together – LaRouche, Jones, and the Southern Poverty Law Center – possibly leading to a government crackdown of our movement.
This is a warning to the Freedom Movement: the growing anger and suspicion is being planted in order to destroy the most important grassroots effort in American history. Forces led by Lyndon LaRouche and, in my opinion, Alex Jones, are working deep inside our movement to see it implode into fights, caused by distrust and hatred. I believe they are manipulating the media to show the freedom movement as simply a band of nuts not to be taken seriously. It is by deliberate and calculated design. LaRouche’s tactics have always been to discredit lovers of American freedom and he is succeeding now, expertly. Today, with a powerful mouthpiece like Alex Jones, LaRouche is reaching greater heights than he could have calculated.
The battle to preserve our precious rights and freedoms could disappear before our eyes, destroyed from within by committed Marxists like LaRouche, who hold no love for our Republic. It will happen unless we focus on this very real enemy and cleanse ourselves of these monsters who are playing on fear in order to stop our true mission – restoring the Republic.
