bestkungfu weblog

Kristen and I attended the 46th Legislative District caucus most of the day yesterday.

Of the hundred or so candidates for state delegate in the Kerry subcaucus, seven — seven — were supporters of Lyndon LaRouche. Yes, Lyndon LaRouche, the paranoid, misogynist cryptofascist cult leader and convicted felon. He’s got supporters. They’re numerous. They’re rabid. And they’re infiltrating the Democratic Party. Again.

The LaRouche Seven, four men and three women, all of college age, stood up in front of the crowd as candidates, all to take their alloted 30 seconds to state that Kerry was going nowhere unless he engaged LaRouche in a debate on the issue of Iraq. Each identified him or herself as a member of the LaRouche Youth Movement — which sounds eerily like the Hitler Youth to me. To add to the Hitler theory, the men all wore sweatshirts over their button-up shirts, like it was a little uniform. They were creepy, they were loud, and above all, they were uninformed, many of them having read from their LaRouche cheat sheet just before speaking. And to top it all off, this process of subverting the political process in a coordinated and sometimes intimidating fashion is patterned after the Nazis’ rise to power in the 1930s.

LaRouche, sadly, has a number of followers in Seattle, usually taken from the colleges around town. They’re out in downtown Seattle, or at the post office, or in front of the Democratic Party meetings, always full of literature. I’ve had to step over many a LaRouchie in the past year. It is important to remember at all times that LaRouche supporters are a cult, with all the brainwashing, intimidation, money-grubbing, and silly simple answers to complex problems that comes with. LaRoucheism is the Scientology of politics.

In any case, the caucusgoers tolerated their pontifications with some audible groans, and went about their business. But this just ended up being another reason for keeping a watchful eye over your political process: sooner or later, a group like this may infiltrate your political party and cancel your vote. Stay alert.

More on the actual Democratic part of this caucus is coming tomorrow.