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ZEPP-LAROUCHE, LYM SPARK MONDAY DEMONSTRATIONSFrom the LaRouche Youth MovementMarcia Merry Baker, host of "The LaRouche Show," on Aug. 21 interviewed two members of the LaRouche Youth Movement from Germany, Tina Rank and Stefan Tolksdorf—who, with the leadership of Helga Zepp LaRouche, are leading Zepp LaRouche's BueSo Party in theagainst Germany's "Hartz IV" austerity plan. Here are excerpts:

Baker: Helga Zepp-LaRouche issued a Manifesto, a statement, on the key elements of this situation, where in Germany, you have an official austerity program.

Stefan: Gerhard Schroeder, the Chancellor, is right now digging his own grave politically. That is, the situation we have here, with a worsening economic situation—and since we are calling from Dresden, that is, the lower part of the former east of Germany, and a part that has been hit, especially over the course of the last 14 years.

We see a reaction from the political machines, not only of the SPD, the Social Democratic Party of Schroeder, but also from the other parties—the Christian Democratic Union, the liberals [FDP], the Greens, that just shows that these people are not in reality. That is, from discussions, we know that the heads of banks, of the leading political parties, know that the international financial system is about to blow out. But, the reaction they show, is always the same: austerity, austerity, and more austerity. They cut every budget they can. And, it has reached a certain point, psychologically, with the introduction of the Hartz IV legislation, what they call "Sparmassnahmen," the austerity measures....

Now, this has led to a situation where, over the course of the last year, we saw the SPD is falling apart. They are losing members—I think it's around 100,000 so far....

And interestingly, in the last couple of days, actually, a certain terminology has come into play, which is that of 1989. And there's a special word, "Betonkoepfe", which is, "heads of concrete." That is, they're unable to move. They're unable to change. And this is now what has been said about our leading political class, including Schroeder.... - The Betonkoepfe -

If you talk about Betonkoepfe, these Concrete-heads, this was said about Honecker, for instance, the head of the GDR, the former East German state. And, he was presenting, at the 40-year anniversary of the GDR in 1989, in the summer, an outlook where he just said, "The Wall is going to stand for another hundred years. Socialism and communism (and whatever) is going to make it." And then, it took about one to three months—and that was it, the state was gone.

So, they refused to change, and the GDR collapsed. And now, in the present situation, it appears that Schroeder refuses to change.

And people are angry. A lot of people are unemployed. Even the official institutions have verified that we have, not the so-called "official" number of 4.5 million people unemployed—but rather, some 8.6 million people unemployed. And, these people are on the street. They're seeing no chance, whatsoever, from the leading parties or leading institutions, that they could turn to.

So, you have a situation, in a sense like 1989, where a system comes to an end. But, in the perception of the population, there is a crucial difference to 1989: And that is, in '89, people had a certain vision. There was also an explosive factor in that, which was the question of the freedom to travel which they wanted to have. This time, they're faced with an impossible system, but apparently also no way out. That is, they have no other state that they could look for, for another reunification, or whatever. It just appears that a second system is crashing—and that's it.

And so, with this situation, what we have to do, is inspire people. And Tina's going to tell you how we do that, right now. - The Goetterfunken -

Tina: Well, we had this situation in front of us. We saw that the government did not have any connection to the population any more, which people more and more realized. And the fact was, what we could see—because we're going out every day; we're going out to the universities, we're going to the inner cities, we're going to the poor parts of the cities—and we saw that the population, especially in the East, that they've been really angry.

And you have to understand that, because, you know, you have to come into the East German cities, and they are empty. There are no people. Because, people, after the Wall came down, they all flew into the West, because they got promised, they would get a job there. And everything that happened here, they destroyed all of the economy, all of the industry—there was a huge industry here in East Germany.

So, people are—since more than 14 years, they got cheated! They got traded, they got sold out. And they became more and more angry. And the thing is, there was no solution there. So, what you would call, what happened, was the "Goetterfunken," God spark, what Schiller is talking about in his poem—and what is also the European hymn. What we did, is that Helga ignited the God spark: She took up the idea of the '89 revolution. She saw that, now, all the people have to be united, we have to bring people together, we have to gather them, and let them do what they did in '89: That is, to become big persons.

Because, in that time, people were also enraged—you know, they actually lived in a prison in '89. They couldn't move anywhere. And this became the last drop in the glass of water, which brought the glass of water to overflow, which was, then, the Wall came down. And this is what Hartz IV is, today: which is, that Hartz IV is the last drop in the glass of water.

So, there she comes with the idea, "Let's do the Monday demonstrations." So, we took our sound-car, and we went into Leipzig: Leipzig was the city, in '89, where, with the leadership of Father Fuehrer, who is the priest of the Nikolai Church—he was leading the peaceful demonstrations in '89, which had been the key factor to bring down the Wall, to bring down the Communist system in the GDR. And, Leipzig also has the tradition of great people, like Johann Sebastian Bach, like Kaestner, and those people we're always referring to.

So, we took these cities, and said, "We have to take out these Monday demonstrations." And we got around 50 people, in the first demonstration, together— - Call for Monday Demonstrations -

Baker: Tina, was this in July?

Tina: Yeah, we got the leaflet which Helga wrote, and this leaflet officially came out on July 7, with the caption where Helga calls for the Monday demonstrations. So, that means that we've been the first people who started the Monday demonstrations in Germany, which was in Leipzig.

And, it was fantastic! I mean, the first demonstration we had, we'd been 50 people or so—but, where we distributed the leaflets, people just got inspired. "Yes! We have to come there! This is the idea how we can be together!"

And, the next week—and it was raining like hell, the next week! We gathered together 150 people—this was a huge breakthrough. And the main thing is, if you look now at our demonstrations, you have a population, where in Leipzig, you have more than 30% unemployment. And these people are enraged. You know, we would have people coming up to us, and saying, "The next time, I see Mr. Schroeder—I'm gonna kill him!" That's what people tell us! They are enraged.

And now, we are gathering these people together, and what we do, we are making a unit. Because, what we are doing is, we are singing. We are taking up all the songs they sang in 1989, for example, "Die Gedanken sind Frei," which means, "Thoughts are free." Or, songs like "We Shall Overcome," which connected the civil rights movement of '89 with the civil rights movements of Dr. Martin Luther King.

And also, we are taking up "Jesu meine Freude," which is a piece by Bach. It's a motet. And people are getting inspired! Because, we are in the city Johann Sebastian Bach was leading the church choir, and was leading the music in a church, and where he was living. So, this is something really, really, really different.

We have around 50 young people here, in Saxony, and these young people—we have the focus. With the people in Saxony, these were our marching orders, from Helga: With these 50 people, and with the population, we're going to make a change, coming from Saxony. Because the people in Saxony, they know that a system can come down. But, what our mission is—and this is the inspiring part!—this is where the spark comes in: is that we give them the idea. And with the ideas we're giving them, with showing them, "Okay, we need a renaissance." Our mission is now, to take up this anger, to take it, and to transform it! To turn it around. And to get out of this anger, turn it into an emotion which uplifts people.

And this is the mission we have.