Jump to content

Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Lyndon LaRouche/Evidence

Add links
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
< Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration | Lyndon LaRouche

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by Herschelkrustofsky (talk | contribs) at 20:12, 19 July 2004 (→AndyL's response). The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Anyone, whether directly involved or not, may add evidence to this page. Please choose an appropriate header for your evidence and sign your comments with your name.

This page is not for general discussion - for that, see talk page.

If you disagree with some evidence you see here, please provide counter-evidence, or an explanation of why the evidence is misleading. Please do this under a seperate header, to seperate your response from the original evidence.

Be aware that the arbitrators may at times rework this page to try to make it more coherent.

Key past versions of Lyndon LaRouche

Over the last 500 edits

Martin 21:55, 8 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Protection log

  • 17:35, 21 Jun 2004 Mirv protected Lyndon LaRouche (edit war)
  • 06:07, 30 Jun 2004 Everyking unprotected Lyndon LaRouche (requested on talk)

No other protections noted in log. Martin 12:26, 11 Jul 2004 (UTC)

  • 15:15, 15 Jul 2004 Ambivalenthysteria protected Leo Strauss (Protection requested due to edit war.)
  • 11:28, 16 Jul 2004 Angela protected Frankfurt School (Edit war. Protection requested on Wikipedia:Requests for page protection)
  • 01:10, 17 Jul 2004 AndyL unprotected Frankfurt School (no request to protect this page was made at Wikipedia:Requests for page protection)
  • 01:37, 17 Jul 2004 AndyL protected Frankfurt School (My allegation that proper procedure was not followed is incorrect. )

AndyL 16:35, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

  • 17:05, 16 Jul 2004 Ambivalenthysteria protected Counterculture.
  • 00:15, 17 Jul 2004 Mirv protected Synarchism

Note that both of these pages are on the list of pages cited by Andy at Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Lyndon_LaRouche/Evidence#AndyL.27s_response, implying that he would never, in a thousand years, dream of deleting my work on those pages. In fact, he started edit wars leading to the protection of those pages. --Herschelkrustofsky 20:03, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Talk pages

AndyL 14:32, 15 Jul 2004 (UTC)

--Herschelkrustofsky 19:49, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

AndyL 01:13, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Refusal to provide justification

Hershel is now arbitrarily refusing to provide justification or evidence for his version of Frankfurt School on the basis that his critics are not "compotent" and is thus abusing the page protection mechanism

From Wikipedia:Requests for page protection:

Frankfurt School - please consider UNPROTECTING. User:Herschelkrustofsky has made no attempt at Talk:Frankfurt School to justify his inclusion of LaRouche as a critic and is the only editor who thinks this inclusion is justified. As well the version currently protected is the more controversial page. AndyL 17:12, 17 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Andy has been pursuing a sort of grand edit war against every article that I have edited, along with his cohort Adam Carr. He generally appeals for page protection as soon as he has deleted my contribution. This matter is presently under arbitration (see Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Lyndon_LaRouche/Evidence). This time, it was The Wrong Version (http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/The_Wrong_Version) that got protected, and it should remain so until arbitration has been given time to work. --Herschelkrustofsky 02:46, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)


Herschel, you need to provide some sort of justification for your version on the Talk pages. You've refused to do so thus far. The point of protection is to allow time for discussion on the Talk page but if you refuse to discuss then there's no point in having the page protected. See Talk:Frankfurt School. AndyL 04:56, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Andy, as I said at Talk:Frankfurt School, you are not a serious participant in this discussion. The only reason that you wish to edit this page, is that you are carrying out an obsessive vendetta against my work at Wikipedia, which has been amply documented at Wikipedia:Requests for arbitration/Lyndon LaRouche/Evidence. In your feverish pursuit of this vendetta, you recently violated procedure by reverting this page while it was protected. I have responded to your posts at Talk:Frankfurt School, but not because I believe that you have any real interest in the topic. --Herschelkrustofsky 15:07, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)


So you are unilaterally deciding that you do not need to provide any justification or back up to support your inclusion of LaRouche as a serious critic of the Frankfurt School and are simply using the protection as a way of enforcing your opinion and insulating it from others. That is precisely why protection is not valid in this case. AndyL 15:46, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Adam's version of events

In case anyone really wants to investigate this absurd complaint, this is my version of events, first posted on the LaRouche Talk page on July 6:

  • The first version of the article was pure LaRouche propaganda, full of blatant lies and total inventions (such as the mythical Eurasian Land-Bridge), so I rewrote it.
  • I used as my principal source Dennis King's book, which is the only LaRouche biography in existence. While it is not an academic biography, and has the deficiencies of a book written to prove a case (that LaRouche is a fascist), it is nevertheless adequate, and gives standard citations for most (though not all) of its attributions. I am not aware that the factual accuracy of King's citations have been challenged by any non-LaRouche writer. If King's book cannot be used to write a LaRouche biographical article, then so such article can be written, because there is no other account from a non-LaRouche source.
  • I also used various online sources (with due caution) and the Washington Post account of LaRouche's trial and conviction.
  • Who funded King to write the book is completely irrelevant. Most academic books are funded by someone.
  • Krusty did not "call me" on using King, and I did not "admit" it (these are standard LaRouche polemical distortions).
  • King does indeed "assert that LaRouche uses a code language to secretly convey a message of anti-Semitism," and I think he is correct, at least when talking about the 1970s, but my article gives due credit to what appears to be LaRouche's recent shift of position on matters Jewish.
  • I did not "announce my intention to respond to any efforts to edit my article by embarking on revert wars." I said I would revert attempts by Krusty to re-insert LaRouche propaganda in the article, as I have done and will continue to do. This was why I reverted Krusty's edit after the page was unprotected.
  • Readers of this controversy need to understand that Krusty is obviously a LaRouche activist of some seniority: he says himself he remembers things LaRouche said in 1978. Given the nature of the LaRouche cult, everything Krusty says and does here must be seen as LaRouche propaganda. It can no more be taken as true than what a neo-Nazi would say at Adolf Hitler or what User:Hanpuk says at Khmer Rouge. Krusty is not interested in writing an encyclopaedia article, he is interested in protecting the LaRouche cult's view of itself and particularly the fantasy biography that LaRouche has spent 30 years creating around himself.
  • It is of course true that I and others editing here are hostile to LaRouche. But there is no equivalence between that hostility to LaRouche and Krusty's support for LaRouche. I and others are trying to write an encyclopaedia article, as objectively as is humanly possible and using the available, admittedly inadequate, sources. Krusty is merely acting as a mouthpiece for the LaRouche cult.
  • Krusty complains that "Adam and Andy continually attempt to rig the debate by insisting that any source they prefer, such as the thoroughly disreputable Dennis King, must be accepted as gospel, whereas any source associated with LaRouche is automatically excluded, in their world." In a sense this is true, for reasons I have already stated. Material from LaRouche sources is always propaganda, and often untrue. Since truth cannot be separated from myth in LaRouche propaganda, it must all be excluded unless it can be verified from independent sources. The anti-LaRouche material is of varying quality, and must be assessed critically in the way any historian is trained to do, but if it is properly referenced it can be used unless shown from an independent (ie, non-LaRouche) source to be false. This may seem unfair on Krusty, but it is the price he pays for choosing to become an acolyte of a proved liar, slanderer and fabulist like LaRouche. Adam 17:11, 10 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Herschelkrustofsky's Statement

Adam's role

Hopefully, Adam has gone a long way toward making my case, in his above comments. I would suggest that in order to get an article that conforms to NPOV, it will be necessary to find some thoroughly neutral third parties who can cobble together the relatively unassailable portions of Adam's article, my article (Lyndon LaRouche/draft), and perhaps even portions of the original article. And then, I fear, it will be necessary to reinstitute protection.

  • Lyndon LaRouche is a political activist. If no one were paying attention to him, he would not merit an article, nor would he inspire such vituperation from Adam. I think a suitably NPOV article should incorporate LaRouche's consultations with heads of state, such as Mexican President José Lopez Portillo, Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, and other notables, plus his addresses to such bodies as the Russian Academy of Sciences and Russian Duma. There should also be mention of the individuals who signed various public calls for the exoneration of LaRouche, following his imprisonment. This latter material is available at Significant Omissions from the current version. Adam and Andy apparently do not dispute these facts, but insist that they be excluded from the article.
  • Adam writes above, I did not "announce my intention to respond to any efforts to edit my article by embarking on revert wars." I said I would revert attempts by Krusty to re-insert LaRouche propaganda in the article, as I have done and will continue to do. This was why I reverted Krusty's edit after the page was unprotected.

When the article was unprotected on June 30, Adam reverted my edit (which I invite 3rd parties to inspect, at the relevant history page), without comment. This edit consisted of removing assertions which I knew to be false, for which no attempt at documentation was made (see my list of false and downright bizarre assertions,) and the addition of some material on LaRouche's legal case which is in the public domain. Contrary to Adam's assertion, I "inserted" no propaganda to his version of the article, and I am confident that an inspection of my edit will pass muster. This is the sole attempt I have made to edit the article after unprotection -- with one exception. I added the the {{TotallyDisputed}} bug on July 4; 11 minutes later Adam removed it; I replaced it later that day, and it remains.

Adam's announcement of his intentions was fairly unambiguous:
"Do grow up, Everyking. You know perfectly well what is going on at Lyndon LaRouche. I have almost singlehandedly turned it from a mess of propaganda and outight lies into a reasonably acceptable article, something which no-one has had the persistence to do. Doing this inevitably means fighting a revert war with the LaRouchies. If you don't want to help, fine, but kindly don't carp at the methods which are necessary to defeat such malevolent slanderers. Adam 17:34, 3 Jul 2004 (UTC)" (User_talk:Everyking#Lyndon_LaRouche)
"A great deal more will be removed when I get time to tackle this article again. And I agree with 172 (let history note), that Krusty should now be reverted on sight. A bit of stalinist rigour is just what this debate needs. Adam 02:33, 3 Jul 2004 (UTC)"
Talk:Lyndon_LaRouche/archive4#Lerner_vs_LaRouche
  • With respect to Adam's use of Dennis King as a source, Adam concedes in his above comments that "it is not an academic biography," but then goes on to say that "Who funded King to write the book is completely irrelevant. Most academic books are funded by someone." In fact, King's "academic" credentials were limited to the article he wrote about LaRouche for High Times, entitled "They want to take your drugs away." I would be delighted to have the article include King's highly original attacks, provided that there is a sufficient degree of caveat emptor: each charge that originates with King should be clearly indentified as such, and as well, the article should expand a bit on King's role in the fascinating "Get LaRouche Task Force," which included the John Birch Society, billionare neo-con Richard Mellon Scaife, various intelligence stringers, and so on -- see Significant Omissions from the current version.
There is no prospect of "mutual understanding" with Krusty, because he is (in my humble opinion) a malicious vandal and a lying slanderous piece of filth with whom civilised discourse is not possible.
--Talk:Lyndon_LaRouche/archive4#Page_protection
Sam should be careful about associating himself in this debate with Krusty, who is clearly a deliberate, calculated liar and slanderer.
--Talk:Lyndon_LaRouche/archive4#Krusty's_talk_archiving
Herschelkrustofsky, proven liar and slanderer
--heading on Talk:Lyndon LaRouche/archive4

John's role

I give John Kenney full credit for conducting his part of the debate in a relatively civilized manner. My only problem is that he is intransigent with respect to his insistence, shared with Adam and Andy, that the article on LaRouche be an "attack piece."

Andy's role

Andy entered the debate somewhat late in the game. Perhaps taking his cue from Adam's demand for "Stalinist rigour", he has commenced a campaign to systematically revert or delete everything I have written, effectively making me a Wikipedian "non-person." Case in point: in an article on Henry Carey, Andy went so far as to delete the external links (see the relevant history page.) Note that one of the deleted links was simply a collection of writings by Carey.

I will respond expeditiously to any inquiries left on my talk page. --Herschelkrustofsky 20:48, 12 Jul 2004 (UTC)

AndyL's response

Actually the Henry Carey article disproves Herschel's claims. Had I truly been trying to "systematically revert or delete everything" Herschell has written then I would not have left the article itself almost intact. Herschell is correct that I deleted the external links, one a piece from a LaRouche publication which I thought had no value (I had meant to only delete one link, not both), but the article itself was left intact except for a rewriting of the first sentence in order to make it accord with wikipedia standard (see this link to compare Herschell's original version with the version after I had finished editing). If this is Herschell's only piece of evidence against me then it's quite weak. AndyL 21:11, 12 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Further to Herschell's claims that I have been trying to "systematically revert or delete everything (he has) ever written, effectively making (him) a Wikipedian "non person"" this is a list of articles which Herschell has edited since June 1st which I have *not* subsequently edited:

Clearly I have not been systematic in editing Herschell's work as all of the above articles have not been touched by me and as, in fact, the vast, vast majority of articles which Herschell has edited in the past six weeks ALONE have not been touched by me. The list would only grow if I went back before June 1. Therefore his accusation that I have been trying to "systematically revert or delete everything" he has written and make him an "non-person" is untrue and nonsensical. AndyL 21:44, 12 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Andy, I think that it might be more illuminating for the arbitrators if you provided a list of articles that you did edit. Or, if you prefer, just the number of articles that you edited. And, it would also be useful if you would indicate those cases where you did something other than simply delete my work. --Herschelkrustofsky 01:06, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)
My comments above clearly disprove your claim. It's interesting that you want more than that. Let me direct you to my counterclaim at Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Lyndon_LaRouche. AndyL 04:40, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)
A burglar could make the same argument, saying, "The charges are obviously false. Look how many homes I haven't burglarized yet!"--Herschelkrustofsky 20:56, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Herschell, it is you who claimed I deleted or reverted "everything" you've ever written when in fact I only edited a small percentage of articles you have touched in the past six weeks. Clearly your claim is a wild exaggeration. AndyL 02:27, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I said that you had "commenced a campaign." I did not say that you had completed it.--Herschelkrustofsky 06:13, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Weasal words. AndyL 07:10, 14 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Note that two of the pages that Andy cites as examples of those that he has not subsequently edited, have not only been edited by Andy, but are now protected due to edit wars:

17:05, 16 Jul 2004 Ambivalenthysteria protected Counterculture. 00:15, 17 Jul 2004 Mirv protected Synarchism

I am not challenging Andy's other deletions and reversions, in hopes that the Arbitration Committee will soon intervene on this whole mess. --Herschelkrustofsky 20:12, 19 Jul 2004 (UTC)

A Day in the Life of Adam and Andy

Andy's list of my contributions which he has not yet molested is now hopelessly out of date. He and Adam are busily pursuing their vendetta, as this grid of activity for July 15 illustrates -- and the day is not yet over! --Herschelkrustofsky 00:12, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)


There is an interesting pattern emerging, as Adam and Andy continue their locust-like ravages of articles to which I have contributed. There are certain ideas, offensive to their neoconservative sensibilities, that they wish to erase altogether: for example, Internal improvements (which is certainly a more powerful idea, with a richer history, than "Public Works"), and Neocolonialism -- Adam's edit memo on that one speaks for itself. There is a certain Orwellian quality to their attempts to erase particular ideas from Wikipedia, and I think that it sheds some light on their motives for the hate-LaRouche campaign. --Herschelkrustofsky 00:23, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Public Works is the more common term. In any case this is the first time anyone's ever called me a neoconservative or any kind of conservative which just goes to show you that you're not very good at spotting patterns.AndyL 01:23, 18 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Adam's Response

Wikipedia owes thanks to Andy for providing a List of articles possibly infected with LaRouche propaganda. I hope he does "systematically revert or delete" everything Krusty has written, since it will all be LaRouche lies. In response to Krusty's comments above, I am not going to bother responding again to all his various lies and misrepresentations. My comments on his personal character were made in response to his disgusting slanders, made from the safety of anonymity, of a person not involved in this debate. I used stronger language than I normally would, but then I don't normally encounter people as contemptible as Krusty. If he doesn't like it he can sue me, since unlike him I edit here under my real name. I should also say that I am working on obtaining more detailed information on LaRouche from sources in the US who specialise in monitoring him and others like him. When I get this material I hope to expand and improve the article. Krusty will of course dislike this material just as much as he dislikes the current article, and for the same reason. Adam 04:47, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)

If Adam wishes to use the defense that I "made him do it", i.e., I was responsible for his use of personal attacks because I produced "disgusting slanders, made from the safety of anonymity, of a person not involved in this debate," he ought to be more specific. There has been no exchange between Adam and myself, public or private, that is not recorded in the record of the various Talk:Lyndon LaRouche pages. A thorough inspection of these pages should reveal that I have been more than courteous with Adam. I suspect that he refers to my mention that his employer, Australian M.P. Michael Danby, advocated a piece of legislation which I think most people would find shocking (see Talk:Lyndon LaRouche/archive4); I brought this up because I suspect that Adam, who, like his employer has expended a great deal of effort trying to denigrate LaRouche, has a real disagreement with LaRouche on the issue of the Iraq war and the larger context of the "Clash of Civilizations" thesis. However, rather than discuss the real disagreement, they prefer to attack LaRouche indirectly, with pretexts. I find it curiously ironic that Adam brands both LaRouche and myself as "slanderers," when the whole basis of this dispute is in fact Adam's incessant slander of LaRouche. --Herschelkrustofsky 23:51, 13 Jul 2004 (UTC)


The article Counterculture strikes me as being highly POV and designed to promote a particular LaRouche viewpoint rather than be an objective article.AndyL 22:30, 15 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Well of course it does. That's the only reason Krusty comes here. If he would like to post an up-to-date list of articles he has "edited" we can start the necessary work of vetting them for LaRouche propaganda and nonsense. Adam 07:55, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

I have blanked Counterculture because it was nothing but LaRouche nonsense and beyond redemption. Someone familiar with the field needs to write a new article. Adam 08:18, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Please note that this is not the Talk page, although most of what Adam has contributed could certainly be construed as Evidence. --Herschelkrustofsky 14:10, 16 Jul 2004 (UTC)
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Wikipedia:Requests_for_arbitration/Lyndon_LaRouche/Evidence&oldid=4733443"