CALIFORNIA RECALL

Failed by Dems,
Enraged Voters Elect a Hitler;
LaRouche Is Sole Opposition

Confirming with a shock, the collapse of the political strategy of the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and the pathetic irrelevance of all nine "DNC-approved" Democratic Presidential candidates, California's looted, enraged, and leaderless Democratic voters elected a Hitler on Oct. 7, as a Republican governor. They were sucked in by a dirty trick of Vice President Dick Cheney's "war and Wall Street" faction of the Republican Party, which financed and ran an openly fascist-profiled "Recall" campaign around Hollywood-movie "Beast-Man" Arnold Schwarzenegger. The Democratic national leadership did nothing to oppose it. Gray Davis became the only the second governor recalled in American history; and cartoonish robot-actor Schwarzenegger—whose admiration for Adolf Hitler and lifelong desire to wield fascist social-political power were on display during the brief Recall campaign—will be sworn in by Thanksgiving to replace him.

The election of Schwarzenegger should be the ultimate "wake-up call" for those in denial that the United States, under Cheney, is barrelling toward fascism. From the Nuremberg-style rallies that characterized his campaigning, to the vacuous, yet menacing, appeals he made to voters to let him lead them, there was an unmistakable whiff of Hitlerian fascism emanating from Schwarzenegger.

California, the nation's biggest state, now has an "imported Austrian head of state." Beginning with President George W. Bush's visit to California on Oct. 14 to rub Schwarzenegger "charisma" on his own failing Presidency, the Republicans will now go for a fascist movement for the election in 2004, and will use this for their national campaign. Demands to amend the U.S. Constitution to allow Schwarzenegger to become a candidate for President, have instantly arisen not only from Republican Congressmen like Orrin Hatch of Utah, but in a Washington Post editorial, and in pathetically fearful echoes from liberal syndicated columnist Richard Cohen, among others.

"Will Bush salute the new Führer?" asked Democratic Presidential candidate Lyndon LaRouche. LaRouche is the only leading Democrat whose forces fought the Recall by exposing the Cheney faction's bankrupting of the state, with hundreds of thousands of Who Robbed California pamphlets, and constant rallies and interventions. LaRouche's campaign and his LaRouche Youth Movement won a significant victory when Los Angeles County, where their forces were most active, voted against the recall—the only large county to do so in the southern half of the state. Moreover, LaRouche's strategy, for California Democratic leaders to put the focus on "Halliburton" Cheney's energy pirates and their looting of California, was working statewide in early September; then Davis and others abandoned the "Cheney flank," on advice from the DNC.

The Democrats' national fiasco is measured by the fact that California's registered Democrats overwhelmingly blamed Davis for the energy-deregulation disaster, huge budget deficits, new taxes—all of which looting was run by Cheney Republicans. Some 25% of the state's registered Democrats voted to recall Davis, and close to 40% of voters from trade-union households voted for Schwarzenegger—who has immediately demanded the unions agree to slash their wages and benefits to "solve" the state's fiscal disaster.

The 'Beast-Man' Phenomenon

LaRouche said in an Oct. 4 statement, "Schwarzenegger was selected because his training for film-acting had produced a type who fit the essentially Satanic, 'beast-man' role played by leading fascists such as Benito Mussolini, Adolf Hitler, Francisco Franco, and so on. He was another such 'Dionysos' from the pages of Friedrich Nietzsche's wild rants.... Hitler was developed as a figure of charisma. Schwarzenegger has been transformed to similar effect, by Hollywood productions. Transformed from a sleaze-ball sex-freak of the body-builder sweat parlors, into a figure of charisma of a special kind: the charisma of the beast-man."

The smell of fascism around Schwarzenegger's emergence was also picked up across the Atlantic within the British political establishment, and expressed by a long-term adversary of LaRouche, Lord William Rees-Mogg, in his editorial column in the London Times on Oct. 8. "Schwarzenegger relies on catch phrases and on empty generalization. He does not debate the issues. His campaign exists outside rationality, in the world of celebrity and sensation. The politics of mass emotion are the politics of fascism. The core of all fascist movements is the direct relationship between the leader and the masses," Rees-Mogg wrote. "What does the leader do? He provides leadership. What allows him to provide leadership? The strength of his will. What is the evidence of the leader's will? The exciting feeling he creates of ultimate ruthlessness."

The identification of Governor-elect Schwarzenegger with Hitler is evident from his own words, as brought out in the last days of the campaign by the release of an interview transcript where he gushed his admiration for Hitler's charisma and power over masses at rallies—while saying he abhorred Hitler's "use" of that power. Schwarzenegger also insisted, "We can't live without authority. Because I feel that a certain amount of people who were meant to do this and control, and larger amount, like 95% of the people who we have to tell what to do and how to keep order ... You have to tell people what to do." That identification is also clear in his promotion of an aura of power around his Hollywood-manufactured "type"—particularly his main Hollywood movie role as a robotic super-killer, "The Terminator."

The day after the Recall vote, LaRouche said, "It is not a question of his quotes, what he said. They are valid, in that we have seen them. There is no doubt—and I'm an expert in this—he is a Hitler, I have seen him appear on TV, and I have seen the face of Hitler in his appearances. He must be stopped, now. This is why you have to dump Cheney, now."

Many California voters, who were angry about the economic crisis and fearful about the future, voted for Schwarzenegger for the perception of power—that he, the Beast-Man, would impose his will, to save the impotent little man incapable of acting in his own self-interest. "I will terminate the car tax," he snarled, during his rallies. "I will terminate 'special interests.' And I will terminate Davis."

Frenzied crowds of little men ate this up at the rallies, which were punctuated by the out-of-tune blaring of rock bands shouting, "We're Not Gonna Take It," while a wrecking ball demolished a car with "increased car tax" scrawled on it. The mood of rage was fed across the state by right-wing radio talk-show "shock jocks," like Ken Champeau of KFI radio in Los Angeles, who repeated constantly that if the "liberal bureaucrats" stood in Arnie's way, there would be "bodies flying out of windows in Sacramento," the state capital.

Democrats Capitulate

It took the complicity of the national Democratic Party, led by frightened DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe, and the nine irrelevant "official candidates," to insure victory for the new Hitler project.

Schwarzenegger and the Recall populist circus which elected him were both managed by a millionaires' and billionaires' club, all of whom were instrumental in looting California into bankruptcy through energy deregulation since 1999—Dick Cheney, George Shultz, Warren Buffett, disgraced Enron CEO Kenneth Lay, former Gov. Pete Wilson, and Las Vegas casino moguls like Steve Wynn who provided Schwarzenegger's two-month campaign with $6 million through the City National Bank.

The LaRouche Campaign provided documentary evidence in its pamphlets that the gang of high-level Synarchist bankers backing Schwarzenegger was identical to those who used electricity deregulation to loot the state. Wilson, Shultz, and Buffett—all top advisers and/or campaign managers for Arnie—and Cheney through his White House national energy task force, had played leading roles in draining more than $70 billion from the state during the energy crisis of 2001. This precipitated the $38.2 billion budget deficit voters blamed on Governor Davis.

Instead of using this to demolish the band of pirates, leading Democratic consultants tied to the DNC and Al Gore advised Davis to avoid "finger-pointing" and to be "contrite, accept the blame," and ignore economic issues. Exit polls showed the disastrous folly of this approach, as voters said the energy crisis and the budget disaster were the two most prominent reasons they voted to recall Davis. The DNC's only response to the interview exposing Schwarzenegger's Hitler fantasies, was to ask him to apologize for it!

In California itself, Democratic Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante—part of Sen. Joseph Lieberman's national faction of pro-war, right-wing, and organized crime-linked Democrats—stabbed Governor Davis in the back, deliberately misleading Hispanic voters to cast ballots to recall Davis and vote Bustamante in to replace him. Bustamante's slogan, "Vote YES for Cruz," confused masses of Hispanic voters since the only "YES" vote on the ballot was for the recall of Davis itself. More than 50% of Hispanic voters voted for Recall, which prevailed by 55-45% statewide. While Lieberman was there in person backing Bustamante's treason, Lieberman's pro-war Republican "twin" Sen. John McCain, was campaigning hard for Schwarzenegger.

Pyrrhic Victory

LaRouche is now the sole clearly-recognized leader of Democratic opposition to this fascist threat. On Oct. 8, LaRouche emphasized that California's tragedy would be "a Pyrrhic victory" for Schwarzenegger and for Cheney. "We will alarm the country, and the world," LaRouche said. Schwarzenegger has never had a plan to deal with the state's fiscal disaster. In the days after his Oct. 7 victory, he arrogantly declared he would eliminate by executive fiat, new automobile taxes passed by the legislature; demanded unions give up wages and benefits; said he believed "legislators up there have gotten the message" to follow his orders; and threatened that he would make fiscal and economic changes by referendum if necessary. None of this, however, changes the reality that the state is looted dry by Cheney's energy pirates; what is likely coming is a demand by Schwarzenegger to President Bush, for Federal aid to California. This will link the burning issue of the Cheney/Schwarzenegger fascist threat, with the collapse of the national economy and Federal budget revenues, which LaRouche alone has shown the ability to solve. The national fight by LaRouche and his movement to force Cheney out of office has now taken on an immediate urgency—"within 30 days," as LaRouche said on Oct. 8.