{"id":2540,"date":"2007-08-30T16:05:29","date_gmt":"2007-08-30T23:05:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/2007\/08\/30\/earliest-days\/"},"modified":"2013-05-20T18:55:28","modified_gmt":"2013-05-21T01:55:28","slug":"earliest-days","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/2007\/08\/30\/earliest-days\/","title":{"rendered":"earliest days"},"content":{"rendered":"

From the Winter 85-86 “Spartacist”, propaganda rag for a long running Trotskyite organization…<\/p>\n

An illustrative example of a cult is the Lynn Marcus organization in the U.S., which is today a virulently reactionary outfit which seeks to function as a think tank for the far right wing of the bourgeoisie.\u00c2\u00a0 In the mid-60s, the Marcus group, the Labor Committee, was a leftist group active in the New Left mileu.\u00c2\u00a0 We ran into them a lot at Columbia University, and when they suggested a debate between our groups on Marxist economics, we agreed readily.\u00c2\u00a0 We sent our most highly qualified comrade, Joseph Seymour, as our debater:\u00c2\u00a0 the Marcusites were mortally insulted because we hadn’t sent our “leader”.\u00c2\u00a0 But just because someone is elected head of a party does not mean he is thereafter the ultimate fount of all knowledge and authority in every field of human endevour.\u00c2\u00a0 In ordinary organizations, there are dozens of comrades who have more knowledge and expertise in particular fields relevant to the Marxist movement.\u00c2\u00a0 But not in Marcus’ organization.\u00c2\u00a0 And not in Healy’s either.<\/em><\/p>\n

I have read “The Conceputal History of the Labor Committees”, found [surely at the laroucheplanet website by now<\/em>], in tandem with various news articles from 1968 concerning the Columbia University student strike.\u00c2\u00a0 The history of “Lynn Marcus” was that he rolled out of various Trotskyite circles into the student New Left at Columbia University, and according to him from behind the scenes lead the strike, splintered as he was within SDS between what he aptly called “Action Faction” and “Praxis Axis”.\u00c2\u00a0 From there, he rolled that humble beginning on… and on… and on through its metamorphoses to what we have right now — everything becoming insane in the period of 1973 to 1974 when the cult of Personality solidified.\u00c2\u00a0 The game I have with old news articles is to find any particular resonance in which you can say Larouche and the earliest imprints of the Labor Committee.\u00c2\u00a0 It is somewhat difficult to spot, even if one can plug in certain names — Tony Papert.\u00c2\u00a0 Out of school class sessions for an alternate education, all the rage as the students struck a blow against the Establishment in the late 1960s, somewhat craftily copied in a sick parody in\u00c2\u00a0today’s cult in “Larouche cadre schools”.<\/p>\n

BTW… the Student Strikers were actually referred to as “The 68ers<\/em>“<\/a>… and a bit of a step down from events in French Universitys\u00c2\u00a0 Columbia being the largest one in the United States.\u00c2\u00a0 Which is the point of reference for the attack on the “68ers”, … whom “Lyn Marcus” claimed to have lead in the first place.<\/p>\n

But the “Marcus” group was the sane group<\/em> in that mileu of SDS.\u00c2\u00a0 In many ways.\u00c2\u00a0 I imagine him as one of any number of “third choices” of where one finds themselves when looking around SDS.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0One is\u00c2\u00a0fooling yourself if\u00c2\u00a0one does not see that Cult of Personality being forced as Lynn Marcus holds his lectures and places himself in the middle of some historic events — and the photograph of the bow-tie wearing man holding forth at a lecturn to a full auditorium sits there.\u00c2\u00a0 But, at that time, the events he tossed himself into were reasonably plausible.\u00c2\u00a0 (Did he spark the Columbia student strikes?\u00c2\u00a0 Probably not him, but some of his followers played some role in that one.)\u00c2\u00a0 “Action Faction” devolved into The Weathermen terrorist group, for gawd’s sake, and much of the other grouping burned out on drugs.<\/p>\n

As it were, the earliest group joined “The Labor Committees”.\u00c2\u00a0 Note the name.\u00c2\u00a0 Which is a far cry, in terms of what it is you\u00c2\u00a0think you are joining,\u00c2\u00a0from today’s “Larouche Youth Movement”.\u00c2\u00a0 Crucial difference in names, crucial difference in political focus.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 One can at least plausibly see themselves working on the edges of Labor politics (as all Marxist organizations tend to see themselved doing), as regards to what is the final burst of members in a cult who haven’t much excuse there — the very name tells them they are working for the aggrandizement of a lunatic.<\/p>\n

So what happened?\u00c2\u00a0 Any outer motives clouded out as Lyn, always a self-aggrandizement sort, weaved his way further and further into his self-importance, today making no pretense of purpose — I think the idea at the moment being that a college student learns a whole lot of new names, and Larouche’s minions float Larouche as just one more new name.\u00c2\u00a0 It doesn’t work too much, but for the past few years it’s worked well enough for his purposes, ie: a small group wholly committed persons joining him in his Fantasy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From the Winter 85-86 “Spartacist”, propaganda rag for a long running Trotskyite organization… An illustrative example of a cult is the Lynn Marcus organization in the U.S., which is today a virulently reactionary outfit which seeks to function as a think tank for the far right wing of the bourgeoisie.\u00c2\u00a0 In the mid-60s, the Marcus […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-the-larouche-challenge","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2540"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2540\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11955,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2540\/revisions\/11955"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.struat.com\/election\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}