LYM Takes Anti-Fascist Battle
to Rohatyn's Home Turf in NYC
by Matthew Ogden, LaRouche Youth MovementIn his December 1971 debate against liberal economist Abba Lerner, Lyndon LaRouche gained notoriety among the New York synarchist financiers as the man who blew the lid off their plot to impose economic fascism on the United States. As he exposed Lerner's "Schacht without Hitler" version of Nazi economics,[*] he is blowing the lid again today off Felix Rohatyn's plot to use the Democratic Party to privatize the entire United States and turn it into a mere franchise of an international banking cartel. As part of the LaRouche Youth Movement (LYM)'s ongoing mobilization all across the country to free the Democratic Party from its folly by destroying Rohatyn politically, we returned to New York City, Rohatyn's home town, to deliver a public ass-kicking for all his neighbors to see.
On Aug. 7-9, seventeen members of the LYM engaged in mass organizing, from early morning till night, penetrating all different areas of Manhattan, blanketing downtown and midtown with literature (406 bundles distributed total), and polarizing the political environment with, especially, singing. We sang political canons, set to tunes by Mozart and Beethoven. For example:
To the tune of "Herr Ganzewitz":
Hey Democrats, there's something rotten,
It smells just like that fascist Rohatyn.
There is something rotten,
Rohatyn, rotten, Rohatyn, rotten!
Democrats, you know LaRouche says so,
He's got to go, that stinking fascist
Rohat-rotten!
To the tune of "Come Follow Me":
Oh Felix, Felix, Felix, Felix ain't no Democrat
What the hell's a Felix, Felix, Felix,
What the hell's a Felix Rohatyn?
He's a Nazi, he's a Nazi,
He's a Nazi, not a Democrat.
This chorus was the spear-point of our deployment, creating a high-visibility presence, even in a city of 8 million. Everywhere, from Wall Street first thing Monday morning, to Union Square at night, to Rohatyn Associates, to "Ground Zero," to the United Nations and Rockefeller Center, we boldly made LaRouche's exposé of Felix the Fascist the issue. We found both economic hit men, who vociferously, and sometimes violently, announced their Nazi sympathies, and also Rohatyn haters, who would become emboldened seeing us telling the truth about their long-time enemy. Sometimes we witnessed fights between the two!
Felix 'the Fixer'
Anybody who has lived in New York City for more than a decade, has experienced Schachtian economics under Rohatyn's very own Big MAC. The severe austerity forcefully imposed, which shut down hospitals, sanitation, and other essential public infrastructure, in the interest of paying the debt, is referred to by friends of Felix "the Fixer" as the way Rohatyn "saved" the city. But for other New Yorkers who know what happened under Big MAC and who don't think like fascists, Felix Rohatyn is a dirty word. A shouting match broke out in front of Madison Square Garden between two New Yorkers, one defending Rohatyn as a "respected economist, how dare you call him a Nazi!" and the other shouting back, "This guy is a piece of crap! What Rohatyn did under Big MAC was so bad that it might as well have been the policy of the Nazis!"
Such fights have probably been catalyzed all over the city, both in the streets and behind closed doors. Outside a party being thrown for a New York Democratic Congressman, we introduced the element of truth which otherwise may have been missing. At a party where "everybody who was anybody" in the city was invited, "company manners" might have dominated the inside of this exclusive event, but outside we delivered our public ass-kicking of Filthy Felix in plain sight for all to see. There was a big mix of people inside, everybody from old-time FDR Democrats to hard-core fascists, including Felix himself, on a date with Donald Trump. On the inside they may have been eating cake and sipping martinis together, but all were confronted on their way out with our singing and our banner (which exposes Rohatyn as a Nazi penetrator of the Democratic Party). We ruined a "perfectly enjoyable evening" for some economic hit men and their families, and brought a breath of fresh air to patriotic Americans.
Response From the 'Lower 80%'
On the same day that we brought the issue of LaRouche's fight to free the Democratic Party from the influence of Rohatyn to this Congressman's friends and associates from among the upper 20% of family income-brackets, we intervened also, into the same Congressman's constituents from the lower 80%. Three members of the LYM were invited to do a radio interview on WHCR, Harlem Community Radio, aired out of City College of New York. The interveiw, which lasted for over an hour, focussed on the policies of Rohatyn versus the policies of LaRouche. The interview ended with us inviting all young people listening to become involved in our youth movement, and to help us lead the United States back to its historic role in bringing the world to a Westphalian solution for the crises of today. The young woman who conducted the interview volunteered afterwards to help us expand our outreach.
This is typical of the role of the LYM, organizing the lower 80% around LaRouche's solutions to the current crisis, setting up the Congressmen to be confronted by their contituents with demands for real leadership, like LaRouche's, when they return to their districts. This is what LaRouche describes in the end of his statement, "Who Is Behind World War III?": "Our task is to arouse and unite the mass of the population, including both the poor and those not-so-poor, to defeat the great forces of evil typified in the state of mind of those dupes who defend the lunacies of globalization and a world trade organization today."
The Democrats must begin telling the truth. The world needs leadership with the courage to tell the truth, like LaRouche, coming out of the United States. Faced with the potential for the Lebanon conflict to escalate into world war, the United Nations was in intense debate, with attempts to pass some sort of peace resolution. We deployed there, to distribute hundreds of "Who Is Behind World War III?" leaflets. We delivered the message, that our fight against Rohatyn, and his fellow "agents of globalization," was the way to stop world war, since those were the powers pushing this war.
This point was critical to communicate to these ambassadors and other diplomats, to confront any false conceptions that the war is being caused by "American Imperialism." The extremely serious responses, and high recognition of LaRouche, proved that many parts of the world see him as a very important voice of reason inside the United States.
What we did in New York City is certainly causing tremors still, since we left. Our rally in front of Rohatyn Associates at 280 Park Ave. has probably made Felix the laughing-stock of many in the building, leaving others red with rage. Many of his neighbors, and even some who are his employees, were shocked to find out about Rohatyn's fascist roots. Some, however, committed fascists, who have worked at Lazard for several decades, might call themselves Liberals, but their violent reactions to the young people in the LYM, were damning, with one man emerging from the building to grab one youth organizer and slam him against the wall, while his partner threatened to punch another youth in the face. As we stationed ourselves out front, with the famous banner and our political canons, a whole gang of financiers gathered in the lobby, behind a big glass window, to watch.
The critical element to our organizing was not just that we were able to boldly expose the Nazi roots of Rohatyn, but that we were ready to provide real solutions to the crisis that the world is in, and the general population of New York responded eagerly to that leadership. Our willingness to tell the truth made the LYM the same kind of threat in the eyes of these New York synarchist financiers as Lyndon LaRouche announced himself to be in 1973.
[*] For more information, see Lyndon LaRouche, "Who Is Behind World War III?" EIR, Aug. 11, 2006.
