Subject: Re: The Newmanites, NAP and Fulani
From: [email-masked] (NLG Civil Liberties Committee)
Date: 12 Dec 92 02:31:00 GMT
Newsgroups: alt.conspiracy

/* Written  9:15 pm  Dec  8, 1992 by cberlet in igc:publiceye */
/* Written  7:45 pm  Dec  8, 1992 by cberlet in igc:p.news */
/* Written  2:12 pm  Feb 14, 1992 by cberlet in igc:publiceye */

Clouds Blur the Rainbow:
   The Other Side of the
   New Alliance Party 

Copyright 1987 PRA

Printing downloaded copies is forbidden.

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Clouds Blur the Rainbow:
   The Other Side of the
   New Alliance Party 

By Chip Berlet 

December, 1987 

PART 1

What is the New Alliance Party? 

The New Alliance Party describes itself as a 
Black-led, women-led, multi-racial, pro-gay 
independent political organization. Its most 
outspoken critics call it an opportunistic 
political movement controlled by an unethical 
therapy cult whose white male guru once led his 
followers into an affiliation with neo-fascist 
cult leader Lyndon LaRouche. 

The actual nature and history of the New Alliance 
Party is complex, controversial, and ultimately a 
matter of individual perspective and judgment. 
The controversy surrounding NAP, however, is 
seldom discussed with candor. With the New 
Alliance Party already well-established in 
several cities, including New York and Boston, 
and with newly-opened national headquarters in 
Chicago, a discussion of the group is long 
overdue. To discuss NAP without reference to the 
political milieu in which it operates is 
impossible. This report attempts to seriously 
analyze the history, activities and internal 
dimensions of NAP in the context of its work in 
the American progressive political community. 
This analysis is highly critical of the role of 
NAP within that community, but is not an attempt 
to bait the organization on the basis of its 
publicly-espoused political views. 

Current NAP Activities 

In May of 1985 the New Alliance Party held a 
national founding convention in Chicago. The 
significance of the event is blurred by the fact 
that its own history dates the original founding 
of the New Alliance Party as 1979. The 
chairperson elected at the 1985 Chicago meeting 
was Emily Carter, an organizer from Jackson, 
Mississippi who joined the New Alliance Party in 
New York in 1981. She calls herself a "former 
organizer, now therapist." 

When the New Alliance Party moved its national 

headquarters to Chicago, it came with a related 
"medical and therapeutic center." In fact, 
wherever the New Alliance Party has a major 
organizing effort underway, there is a related 
"therapy" group reaching out to persons with 
progressive politics who are also seeking 
emotional or psychological counseling. The 
therapy groups use a technique they call "Social 
Therapy" or "Crisis Normalization" designed to 
provide "immediate help for the everyday crisis 
situations that happen to everyone." Both the 
political organization and the therapy institutes 
make a point to involve persons of color, gay men 
and lesbians, and political radicals. 

Closely allied with the New Alliance Party is the 
Rainbow Alliance and the Rainbow Lobby. That the 
slogans of the New Alliance Party, Rainbow 
Alliance and the Rainbow Lobby tend to reflect a 
progressive political framework is not 
questioned. Here for example are some of their 
slogans and issues: 

*** Put teeth back into Civil Rights laws 

*** Repeal Gramm-Rudman 

*** Support the Fair Elections bill introduced by 
Rep. John Conyers (D., Mich.) 

*** Seek legislation that would "protect the 
democratic rights of gays and all Americans." 

One flyer explains: 

"The Rainbow Lobby is fighting for grand jury 
reform, affordable public housing and Congolese 
liberation from the human rights abuses of the 
Mobutu dictatorship....The Rainbow Lobby is 
fighting against the death penalty, against aid 
for the C.I.A. supported contra terrorists and 
against arming South African supported 
mercenaries in Angola. And the Rainbow Lobby is 
exposing the Right's misuse of federal funds for 
AIDS. "

The New Alliance Party moved its national 
headquarters to Chicago to be closer to Minister 
Louis Farrakhan, The Rev. Jesse Jackson and Mayor 
Harold Washington, according to NAP chairwoman 
Emily Carter. The office is located on Chicago's 
north side (in the 44th Ward), and fundraisers 
are already soliciting support for the "Rainbow." 
The NAP-related Chicago Center for Crisis 
Normalization is open and another therapy center 

is planned for the west side. NAP organizers have 
been recruiting in some sectors of the Black and 
progressive political community for almost five 
years, and have a presence in several Chicago 
colleges. 

In New York the New Alliance Party offers a free 
legal clinic in Harlem, sponsors lectures, and 
publishes its newspaper, the <National 
Alliance>. <National Alliance> discusion 
groups are held in Chicago, Illinois; Jackson, 
Mississippi; Long Island, New York; Philadelphia, 
Pennsylvania; Washington, D.C. and Boston, 
Massachusetts. 

The New Alliance Party maintains regional and 
state offices in: Alaska, Arizona, California 
(Oakland and Los Angeles), Colorado, Connecticut, 
Delaware, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, 
Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan (Ann Arbor and 
Detroit), Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, New 
Jersey, New Hampshire, New York (Albany, New York 
City and Buffalo), North Carolina, Pennsylvania, 
Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Vermont 
and Washington, D.C. 

Fred Newman and the Historical Roots of NAP 

The history of the New Alliance Party starts 
with a history of its primary theoretician, Dr. 
Fred Newman. In 1968 Newman and several followers 
formed "IF....THEN", a political collective in 
New York City. "IF....THEN" prided itself on its 
anarchistic and confrontational approach to 
organizing and consciousness-raising. During the 
early 1970's Newman and his followers established 
a group called Centers for Change in New York 
City. Centers for Change (CFC) was characterized 
by a more introspective approach to political 
organizing. CFC described itself as: 

"...a collective of liberation cenu	jD including; 
a school for children, ages 3 to 7; a community 
oriented therapeutic and dental clinic located in 
the Bronx; and a press (CFC Press) operating out 
of the CFC offices....Also, the Community Media 
Project; (an) information service for the people 
of the upper west side.... "

While involved with CFC, Newman and others in his 
circle began developing a unique perspective 
within the evolving theory of radical psychology. 
This movement attracted attention and debate in 
progressive circles; Newman, however, soon 

branched off from the mainstream of the radical 
psychology movement and eventually developed a 
theory of "social therapy". By 1973 CFC was 
offering therapy and counseling at its drop-in 
center. 

At the same time, another New York political 
organizer, Lyndon H. LaRouche, Jr., was also 
espousing controversial psychological theories, 
and Newman began to examine LaRouche's writings 
on psychology and economics which were appearing 
in published collections of Marxist analysis. 

Lyndon LaRouche in 1973 was the leader of the 
National Caucus of Labor Committees (NCLC), a 
Marxist political organization based in New York 
City. LaRouche, using the name Lyn Marcus, had 
led the Labor Caucus of the Students for a 
Democratic Society (SDS) until SDS voted to expel 
LaRouche and his followers in 1969. The 
controversy inside SDS arose when the SDS Labor 
Caucus under LaRouche called for support of 
striking members of New York City's teacher's 
union. A key union issue was opposition to 
community control of schools in New York City--a 
demand of community leaders which had the support 
of many Black parents. The union's opposition to 
community control of schools was widely perceived 
in the progressive political community as having 
racist overtones. After being expelled from SDS, 
LaRouche created the National Caucus of Labor 
Comittees, which in 1973 had at least 1,000 
members nationwide. 

Newman says he first made contact with Lyndon 
LaRouche's forces within the National Caucus of 
Labor Committees (NCLC) in October of 1973. In 
January of 1974 Newman's organization, Centers 
for Change (CFC), published a newsletter <Right 
On Time> which called for the organization of 
leftist political cadres and relied heavily on 
psychoanalytic terminology. LaRouche's theories 
were in many ways similar to those espoused by 
Newman, and in June of 1974, Newman led almost 40 
CFC members into an official political alliance 
with LaRouche and the National Caucus of Labor 
Committees (NCLC). 

Newman's Alliance with LaRouche 

Even NAP supporters concede that Newman and some 
of his followers worked for a time under the 
political leadership of LaRouche. What keeps this 
aspect of the controversy alive is what critics 
feel are misrepresentations regarding the 

character of the relationship and the nature of 
the LaRouche organization at the time of the 
alliance. NAP's position is stated in a letter 
circulated by its supporters under the name "The 
Committee to Set the Record Straight:" 

"Five years prior to NAP's founding, a handful of 
activists, five of whom now sit on NAP's 
40-member national Executive Board, joined the 
National Caucus of Labor Committees, then a left 
organization founded by LaRouche. At the time, it 
was attracting many organic progressive leaders 
from the welfare, trade union, and electoral 
arenas. Dr. Newman was one of those who joined. 
He and his colleagues' membership in the NCLC 
lasted approximately two months. "

"Following their departure in the summer of 1974, 
they began an extensive political and 
methodological critique of LaRouche and the NCLC 
and by 1975 became among the first on the Left to 
explicitly identify LaRouche as a neo-fascist. "

This characterization of the Newman/LaRouche 
relationship is at best self-serving and at worst 
largely fictional. With some ten percent of the 
current NAP executive board comprised of persons 
who at one time chose to put themselves under the 
political leadership of Lyndon LaRouche, it 
becomes crucial to examine the relationship 
carefully. 

During most of 1974, the NCLC under LaRouche was 
primarily attracting middle-class and upper-class 
white intellectual students from prestigious 
eastern and mid-western college campuses--hardly 
a core of trade unionists and welfare recipients 
as characterized by Newman's supporters. 

A former member of LaRouche's NCLC remembers the 
arrival in 1974 of what were called the 
"Newmanites:" 

"They put themselves under the actual political 
leadership of LaRouche for a few months, and we 
came to believe that what Newman really wanted 
during that period was to act as an understudy to 
LaRouche --to learn his methods and techniques of 
controlling persons in an organization. "

"The individuals in Newman's group seemed to lack 
clarity and political focus and were obsessed 
with psychology and sexuality. Newman was clearly 

the leader and it was obvious that LaRouche's ego 
and Newman's ego were too big to allow them to 
work together in the same organization for long. "

While actual membership by New Alliance Party 
executive board members in LaRouche's NCLC may 
have lasted only a few months, the working 
alliance between groups led by LaRouche, Newman 
and a third New York political leader named Gino 
Parente lasted far longer. Some activists 
from New York remember the three groups working 
in a loose alliance around issues such as welfare 
reform, farm labor, and organizing the working 
class for a period as long as one year. One 
internal NCLC discussion of the Newmanites 
describes "ten months of serious political 
discussion" before several months of actual 
membership. "Joint forums" between the Newmanites 
and the LaRouchites were held in November and 
December, 1973, and the Newmanite split took 
place in late August, 1974. 

Even after officially leaving NCLC in August, 
1974, Newman and his followers continued to 
debate and criticize LaRouche and the NCLC over 
issues of shared political ideology as if it 
represented legitimate leftist theory long after 
the rest of the American Left had denounced NCLC 
as either proto-Nazi Brownshirts, a sick 
political cult, or outright police agents. 

Fred Newman insists his group was not 
sophisticated about the American Left when it 
joined with LaRouche, yet when the Newmanites 
split from NCLC, they announced the formation of 
a "vanguard" Marxist-Leninist political party. In 
the resignation letter signed by Newman and 38 of 
his followers, there is a significant use of 
Marxist-Leninist terminology which suggests a far 
greater degree of political sophistication than 
admitted. Announcing that Newman's International 
Workers Party (IWP) had "now become the vanguard 
party of the working class," the letter went on 
to say: 

"The organization of the vanguard party is, as 
Marx makes clear, the organization of the class. 
The formation of the IWP has grown from our 
attempt to organize the [NCLC] from within that 
it might move from a position of left hegemony to 
a position of leadership of the class. "

When joining the NCLC, Newman announced he was 
putting himself and his followers under the 
political "hegemony" of LaRouche. After leading 

his followers out of the NCLC, Newman continued 
to struggle with LaRouche over theory within the 
principles of criticism among friends. None of 
this indicates a casual, naive or short-lived 
relationship. 

The Nature of NCLC During the Newmanite 
Alliance 

Still, Newman's merger and split with LaRouche 
would have little merit as a criticism of NAP 
(after all it is a sign of political maturity to 
recognize mistakes) were it not for how 
supporters of Newman relentlessly misrepresent 
the nature of LaRouche and the NCLC in late 1973 
and 1974--the period when Newman grew close to 
NCLC and then put himself and his followers under 
the political leadership of LaRouche.In 1974 NCLC 
was not attracting "organic progressive leaders " 
from the welfare rights movement, as claimed by 
the Newmanites. In fact, it was having trouble 
attracting significant Black support at all, 
since it was leading a successful attempt to 
destroy the Black-led National Welfare Rights 
Organization and defame its popular leader, the 
late George Wiley. 

During the same period, LaRouche also propounded 
ideas which were widely perceived to represent 
outright racism. LaRouche, for instance, 
offended the Hispanic community in a November, 
1973 essay (published in both English and 
Spanish) titled "The Male Impotence of the 
Puerto-Rican Socialist Party." An internal memo 
by LaRouche asked "Can we imagine anything more 
viciously sadistic than the Black Ghetto mother?" 
He described the majority of the Chinese people 
as "approximating the lower animal species" by 
manifesting a "paranoid personality....a parallel 
general form of fundamental distinction from 
actual human personalities." 

As early as the spring of 1973 LaRouche had begun 
to articulate a psychosexual theory of political 
organizing and began descending into a paranoid 
style of historical analysis that stressed not 
Marxist dialectical materialism and class 
analysis, but macabre conspiracy theories and a 
subjective egocentric analysis. LaRouche warned 
of a global plot by the CIA/KGB to kidnap and 
program his membership to assassinate him. His 
homophobia became a central theme of the 
organization's conspiracy theories. He said 
women's feelings of degradation in modern society 

could be traced to the physical placement of 
sexual organs near the anus which caused them to 
confuse sex with excretion. 

A September, 1973 editorial in the NCLC 
ideological journal <Campaigner> charged that 
"Concretely, all across the USA., there are 
workers who are prepared to fight. They are held 
back, most immediately, by pressure from their 
wives...." Writing in an August, 1973 memo, 
LaRouche propounded the startling and sexist 
psychological theory that "the principle source 
of impotence, both male and female, is the 
mother." LaRouche claimed only he could cure the 
political and sexual impotence of his followers. 
NCLC members were forced into what was called 
psychological therapy and "deprogramming" but 
were what former members call "brainwashing" and 
"ego-stripping" sessions. The NCLC rapidly became 
totalitarian in style, with a peculiar obsession 
with sexuality and homophobia used as a weapon 
against internal dissent. "To the extent that my 
physical powers do not prevent me," LaRouche told 
his followers in August, 1973, "I am now 
confident and capable of ending your 
political--and sexual--impotence; the two are 
interconnected aspects of the same problem." 

By 1974 LaRouche had started his swing toward 
fascist economic and political principles--well 
before Newman and his followers joined NCLC and 
announced that they would place themselves under 
LaRouche's political leadership and "hegemony." 
It was during this period that LaRouche began 
talking of the need for rapid industrialization 
to build the working class. He talked of a 
historic tactical alliance between 
revolutionaries, the working class and the forces 
of industrial capital against the forces of 
finance capital. He began developing an 
authoritarian world view with a glorification of 
historic mission, metaphysical commitment and 
physical confrontation. He told reporters that 
only he was capable of bringing revolution and 
socialism to the United States, and his speeches 
began to take on the tone and style of a 
demagogue. LaRouche, in short, began to adopt the 
same ideas and styles which had formed the basis 
of National Socialism, a political tendency that 
historically became part of the European fascist 
movement and eventually played a key role in 
Hitler's rise to power in Nazi Germany. In fact, 
LaRouche was denounced as a Nazi by U.S. 
Communists following physical attacks on them in 
1973 by NCLC members who were likened to 

Hitler's violent Brownshirts. 

>From May to September of 1973, LaRouche followers 
engaged in "Operation Mop-up" which consisted of 
NCLC members brutally assaulting rivals such as 
members of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA) and 
the Socialist Workers Party (SWP). NCLC thugs 
used bats, chains, and martial arts weapons 
(<numchukas>) in their campaign to control and 
establish "hegemony" over the American 
revolutionary movement. There were many injuries 
and some persons required hospitalization. 

"Operation Mop-up" was front-page news in 
virtually every American progressive newspaper 
during 1973, and it is difficult to believe it 
was not known to Newman and his followers when 
they first contacted NCLC a few weeks after 
Operation Mop-Up was declared a success by 
LaRouche. Furthermore, physical assaults by NCLC 
members against critics were reported regularly 
well into 1976, and periodic assaults by LaRouche 
fundraisers still occur. In 1974, many former 
NCLC members report, they were still required to 
take paramilitary training classes led by fellow 
members. 

The trigger for Operation Mop Up was a March, 
1973 warning by NCLC to the Communist Party, USA. 
to stop opposing the creation by LaRouche of an 
alternative to the Black-led National Welfare 
Rights Organization (NWRO) which LaRouche 
denounced as being part of a "union-busting 
slave-labor" alliance. LaRouche set up an 
alternative, the National Unemployed and Welfare 
Rights Organization (NUWRO), and, according to 
LaRouche, NCLC then sent delegations into public 
Communist Party meetings, "demanding that this 
criminal behavior of the CP leadership"--that is, 
support for the original NWRO--"be openly 
discussed and voted down by the body assembled." 

Eyewitnesses recall this "discussion" usually 
consisted of primarily-white and young NCLC 
members standing up and disrupting meetings of 
the primarily-Black and older NWRO with calls for 
a debate on LaRouche's charges against NWRO 
leaders until members of the audience were forced 
to physically drag the NCLC members out of the 
meeting. These confrontations became formalized 
under Operation Mop-Up. 

When the Socialist Workers Party joined in 
supporting the original Black-led NWRO, they too 
were attacked by the predominantly white NCLC 

supporters. While the Operation Mop-Up attacks 
were officially ended in late 1973 or early 1974, 
another campaign of assaults was launched in 1974 
against local rank-and-file leaders of the United 
Autoworkers and other industrial unions. Reports 
of these assaults continued through 1976, and 
NCLC members have continued until recently to 
assist in assaults on members of Teamsters for a 
Democratic Union and another rank-and-file 
Teamster reform group, PROD. 

In 1974, according to former NCLC members, 
LaRouche first began to seek contact with 
extremist and anti-Semitic right-wing groups and 
individuals around the idea of tactical unity in 
opposing imperialism and the ruling class in 
general, and the Rockefellers in particular. 
LaRouche's obsession with conspiracy theories 
blossomed in 1974, and during this period he 
began expounding a view linking certain Jewish 
institutions to a plot to destroy Western 
civilization and usher in a "New Dark Age". 

This is the character of the NCLC that attracted 
Newman and his followers in early 1974. In his 
1974 book <Power and Authority>, Newman wrote 
that his followers would "organize in the spirit 
outlined" by LaRouche. The question is not how 
long the Newmanites worked under the political 
leadership of Lyndon LaRouche, but how they can 
explain what attracted Newman and his followers 
to LaRouche in the first place. To this day NAP 
leadership has refused to renounce or to deal 
candidly or accurately with the fact that the 
Newmanites at one time joined an organization 
which was at best a collection of paranoid sexist 
homophobic thugs and at worst a nascent fascist 
political movement. 

Using the FBI to Harass Dissidents 

It was during the period that the Newmanites were 
involved with NCLC that NCLC began to collect and 
disseminate intelligence on progressive groups. 
It is well documented that NCLC went on to 
provide intelligence to domestic and foreign 
government agencies. While documents released 
under the Freedom of Information Act reveal that 
U.S. government agencies frequently dismissed the 
material provided by the NCLC, it was provided 
nonetheless. As early as February, 1974, NCLC 
representatives met with an official in the U.S. 
Department of Commerce to "provide substantial 
evidence which would exonerate President Nixon 

from Watergate charges," according to a Commerce 
Department memorandum released under the Freedom 
of Information Act. 

The Newmanites were at the center of the first 
documented instance of NCLC collaboration with 
U.S. intelligence agencies. In 1974, several 
Newmanites in NCLC attempted to use the FBI to 
locate and spy on a former Newmanite who had left 
at the time of the NCLC/Newmanite merger and 
taken his child with him. Jim Retherford had left 
the Newmanites citing psychological manipulation 
among other reasons. His spouse, Ann Green, 
remained in the organization and quite reasonably 
sought access to their child. Green and Newmanite 
Harry Kresky, an attorney, contacted the FBI and 
suggested that Retherford was a former member of 
the Weatherman faction of SDS, had harbored 
Weather Underground fugitives, and was in contact 
with Jane Alpert, a fugitive the FBI was 
particularly keen on locating. 

Supporters of Newman claim he was unaware of the 
contact with the FBI. However, a former member of 
Newman's Centers for Change who joined and left 
NCLC with Newman, and then later split with the 
Newmanites, recalls the FBI incident was widely 
known within NCLC and the Newmanite faction. "The 
CFC [Centers for Change/Newmanite] people for the 
most part stuck together while in the 
NCLC....denying Fred Newman knew about the 
communications with the FBI is utterly absurd." 

The International Workers Party 

After leaving the NCLC, Newman formed the 
International Workers Party (IWP). The Newmanite 
document issued upon their leaving NCLC and 
establishing the International Workers Party 
re-affirms a commitment to carry out current and 
future joint work with the LaRouche organization. 
The charge of a direct and ongoing LaRouche 
connection to the Newmanites, however, 
appears to be speculation--no credible reports of 
a direct connection between Newman and LaRouche 
since the mid-1970's have been documented, and it 
is unlikely that any such relationship exists 
today. 

Manipulative and Confrontational Style 

In many ways the theory, ideology, strategy, 
tactics, and internal organizing practices of the 

LaRouchites and the Newmanites are very similar: 

*** A methodological link between the 
psychological and the political which forms both 
a theoretical world-view and a justification for 
indoctrinating members through so-called 
"therapy". 

*** Psychologically coercive techniques to 
manipulate members' views and actions. 

*** Organizing strategies that target according 
to stratas or sectors rather than social class. 

*** Attempts to establish hegemonic relationships 
with other similar political groups, and, failing 
that, attempts to undermine the group and 
establish parallel organizations. 

*** Virulent and unprincipled attacks on critics, 
including insults, agent-baiting, threats by 
attorneys and defamation lawsuits. 

*** A shared political strategy (vanguardism with 
roots in Trotskyist political theory). 

*** Re-writing of the group's political and 
organizational history to meet current needs. 

*** A closed and covert hierarchical internal 
structure that is not necessarily congruent with 
the public organizational structure. 

*** Differentiation between internal in-group and 
external out-group reality, use of propoganda, 
and implementation of a "secret-society" 
style--all markedly similar to that of a 
totalitarian movement. 

These similarities do not change the fact that 
LaRouchite philosophy is apparently neo-fascist 
while Newmanite philosophy is apparently 
left-progressive, but it does mean that 
internally both groups have an authoritarian 
hierarchy whose existence is denied, and both 
groups rely on psychologically-manipulative 
theories to control core members. Both groups 
match a cult paradigm and are far from 
democratic, despite outward claims and 
appearances. 

It is crucial to note the relationship of 
LaRouche, Parente, and Newman during the early 
1970's in light of their subsequent activities. 
All three white male political leaders saw 

Marxist revolution through the prism of 
ego-mania, and used psychologically manipulative 
techniques to enforce obedience in the 
institutions they have built--institutions which 
sought political hegemony over other groups. 

All three groups share many elements of a 
totalitarian movement as outlined by Hanna Arendt 
in <The Origins of Totalitarianism>. In recent 
years there has been a revisionist interpretation 
of Arendt's work, linking nazism and communism as 
two sides of the same ideological coin, or 
claiming that all communist or Marxist movements 
are totalitarian, or that only nazi and communist 
ideologies can become totalitarian. Arendt 
specifically repudiates this simplistic 
interpretation of her work when she writes 
"...ideologies of the nineteenth century are not 
in themselves totalitarian," and that although 
fascism and communism became "the decisive 
ideologies of the twentieth century they were 
not, in principle, any `more totalitarian' than 
others." According to Arendt, the ideological 
victory of fascism and communism over other 
twentieth century belief structures was "decided 
before the totalitarian movements took hold of 
precisely these ideologies" as a vehicle for 
seizing and holding state power. 

A totalitarian movement is correctly defined by 
its style, structure and methods not by its 
stated or apparent ideology. 

The Intellectual Vanguard 

The early theoretical writings of LaRouche and 
the early and current theoretical writings of 
Newman reflect a derivative (and heretical) form 
of Trotskyist Marxism that is both unusual and 
virtually unique on the American Left. This 
shared theory is best described as an aberrant 
"Messianic" form of Trotskyism with an 
ego-centric view of the importance of the 
individual leader in shaping history, coupled 
with a patronizing "noblesse oblige" approach to 
organizing the working class and people of color 
that reflects a political colonialist mentality. 

Journalist Dennis King has studied numerous 
internal documents from the Newmanites and 
concluded that in terms of their political theory 
of organizing, they make a crucial distinction 
between the core cadre (primarily white 
intellectuals) and the "organic" members 

(primarily people of color). According to King, 
the primarily-white intellectual vanguard trained 
by Newman through "therapy" is in the process of 
using "therapy" to raise the consciousness of the 
primarily Black and Latino recruits so that some 
day in the future they will have the wherewithal 
to actually lead the organization...but not yet. 
King has described this as "paternalistic 
racism." 

Institutes for Social Therapy 

Dr. Fred Newman's doctorate is not in a 
health-related field, but in the philosophy of 
science and foundations of mathematics. For 
several years psychologists and groups concerned 
about cults have questioned the ethics of the 
process used by the Institutes for Social 
Therapy. These criticisms are crystallized in the 
following statement by an East Coast Latina 
activist working in the area of support for 
Central Americans: 

"I first came into contact with the Social 
Therapy Institutes through a friend who...said 
there was a group that offered therapy for people 
with progressive views, so I went to see what 
they offered."

"I was told everybody has problems, which is true 
everyone does, but they use that as an excuse to 
recruit people. People with emotional problems 
think they are going to be helped but they don't 
help people. "

"Before or after the therapy session, they would 
say `why not sell the newspaper', or `maybe you 
could do us a favor and hand out these leaflets.' 
The therapy offices are full of their political 
propaganda. In the group therapy sometimes we 
discussed politics and their political party. 
They want people to get involved in their 
political activities, but they don't really give 
any treatment. This was something I didn't like. "

"Some people get involved because they think the 
political work will help them get better 
emotionally. They told us societal problems are 
making people ill and the New Alliance Party is 
going to change things so people will get better. "

"They got angry with me when I asked for 
individual therapy. `You need group therapy not 
individual therapy', I was told, so I left. Then 

they started sending me literature about their 
political organizations. "

"In the literature and in the therapy sessions 
they try to destroy any other left organization 
by saying bad things about it. They also destroy 
a progressive organization by recruiting away its 
members. "

"They call themselves Leftists but they use the 
dialectic method just to recruit people. When you 
get involved there is no dialectic, it is static, 
they don't progress beyond the criticism of the 
other group. They have no real program, they just 
say `if you are not with NAP you are the enemy'. 
They raise a lot of money by saying they are 
doing all these things, but they are a fraud. "

"It is not true that there is no pressure to work 
with the New Alliance Party when you are in the 
therapy. They tell you if you are working with 
them you will feel good. I said `I need help, I 
need individual therapy'. Instead they had me 
assisting them in the group therapy sessions. "

"They don't like it if you pay a low fee and 
don't work for them politically, such as doing 
propaganda work for the New Alliance Party. If 
you pay more, you get a better work position in 
the organization. If you can afford a lot, you 
can get individual therapy. Everything is money 
or power. "

"Some people are fooled, especially the 
uneducated or emotionally ill, they use them. It 
is disgusting. They don't care about people--they 
want numbers: more money, more people, more 
power. The social therapy is just an excuse to 
recruit members. It is just like their many other 
activities, concerts, rallies, they are active in 
many areas, but they accomplish nothing."

Certainly it is legitimate as part of 
psychological counseling to recommend that a 
person become involved directly in the 
community--even to the extent of becoming part of 
a political movement. But for a patient to know 
the therapist is involved in a particular 
political movement is to consciously or 
unconsciously steer the patient, who is in a 
dependent and fragile relationship with the 
therapist, toward that political movement. This 
error is compounded by the fact that, according 
to several Therapy Institute staff members, a 
portion of the fees for the therapy go to support 

the work of the New Alliance Party. 

Therapy centers with ties to the New Alliance 
Party include the following locations listed in 
the November 27, 1987 issue of the <National 
Alliance>: 

New York: Harlem Institute for Social Therapy and 
Research; Bronx Institute for Social Therapy and 
Research; South Bronx Annex; West Side Social 
Therapy Network; East Side Center for Short Term 
Therapy; Brooklyn Institute for Social Therapy 
and Research; Long Island Institute for Social 
Therapy and Research. 

Massachusetts: Boston Institute for Social 
Therapy and Research. 

Illinois: Chicago Center for Crisis 
Normalization. 

California: Los Angeles Center for Crisis 
Normalization. 

Pennsylvania: Social Therapy Associates. 

Washington, D.C.: Washington Center for Crisis 
Normalization. 

Mississippi: Jackson Center for Crisis 
Normalization. 

New Jersey: New Jersey Center for Crisis 
Normalization. 

Cultism 

Chicago-based political consultant Don Rose 
summed up the feelings of some NAP critics when 
he told <Chicago Sun-Times> columnist Basil 
Talbot that NAP "is a left group with the modus 
of a cult." Talbot noted that critics call NAP 
the "LaRouchies of the Left." Several cult 
watchdog groups list the Newmanites as a cult, 
other critics say the core of the cult is the 
Therapy Institute, while a few critics think the 
entire NAP movement displays cult aspects. Those 
that say the Newmanite movement is totalitarian 
in style feel the word cult is superfluous, since 
totalitarian groups by definition enforce a high 
level of blind loyalty and unquestioning 
obedience. 

As early as 1977, journalist Dennis King was 

writing of the cult-like nature of the 
Newmanites, and interviewed Frank Touchet, a New 
York professional psychotherapist who studies 
therapy cults such as the Reichians and the 
Sullivanians. After studying the therapy group 
which forms the core of Newman's followers, 

Touchet concluded:

"What you are dealing with is people who have 
been criminally tampered with in the deepest 
fibers of their being, and who have descended 
into a strange childlike world of dependency, in 
which the rational functions of the ego are 
relinquished completely to Fred Newman--who 
regulates their lives on the most intimate level. "

It is difficult to resolve the issue of 
psychological manipulation because there are 
undoubtedly NAP supporters who are sincere and 
genuine in their beliefs and have no connection 
to the Newmanites, the IWP nor the Social Therapy 
Institutes. Still, most of the functional core 
leadership of NAP has a connection to the Therapy 
Institutes and the Newmanite political 
philosophy. Ultimately the question of 
psychological manipulation, cultism and cult of 
personality can only be resolved by each person 
who comes into contact with NAP on the basis of 
the individual practice and process observed, and 
within the framework of one's own sensitivity to 
and wariness about cultism. 

Opportunism 

One example of what critics call the political 
opportunism of the Newmanites and the New 
Alliance Party is their continuing effort to 
imply a connection with Rev. Jesse Jackson and 
the Rainbow Coalition. For instance the 
Newmanites have established in Washington, D.C. 
the "Rainbow Lobby" billed as "The Lobbying 
Office of the Rainbow Alliance." The Rainbow 
Lobby has offices at 236 Massachusetts Avenue, 
N.E., and lists Nancy Ross as Executive Director 
and Tamara Weinstein as Assistant Director. 

The Rainbow Lobby office has been frequently 
mistaken for the Washington office of Jesse 
Jackson's Rainbow Coalition, a mistake that in 
the past, NAP leadership seems to have gone out 
of its way not to clarify. Newspaper articles 
have appeared about NAP's Rainbow Lobby in which 
throughout, the reporter assumes the Rainbow 

Lobby represents Jackson and the Rainbow 
Coalition--a circumstance NAP leadership could 
have easily avoided by explaining upfront that 
the two groups are unrelated. 

Jackson has had to publicly distance himself and 
the Rainbow Coalition from NAP and its Rainbow 
Alliance and Rainbow Lobby on several occasions. 
Most recently Jackson told <Chicago Sun-Times>
reporter Basil Talbot that "we have no 
relationship at all." 

In the June 21, 1985 issue of the <National 
Alliance>, an article on the Rainbow Alliance 
shows how artfully the question of a relationship 
has been dodged in the past: 

"Hostile critics and curious allies are forever 
saying to Nancy Ross, "Does Jesse Jackson support 
what you're doing?" "

"Ross, who heads the Washington office of the 
Rainbow Alliance Confederation's lobbying arm, 
has learned how to respond to such inquiries. "

> The point is not whether Jesse Jackson 
> supports me, but whether I support Jesse 
> Jackson," says Ross, a founder of the 
> six-year-old independent New Alliance Party, and 
> candidate for Jackson delegate in Harlem in 1984. 
> "And I support Jesse completely because of the 
> social vision he has articulated on behalf of the 
> Rainbow movement. Yes, I have real differences 
> with Jesse--he thinks independent politics is 
> `prophetic' whereas I believe its time has come 
> right now--but I won't allow anyone to sever the 
> historic ties between Jesse and myself, because I 
> am committed to see that his vision of a just 
> society be brought about today."

While admittedly clever, the above explanation is 
essentially a dishonest misrepresentation of the 
facts, designed to confuse the issue and suggest 
a connection where none exists. The confusion 
over support from Jesse Jackson and the Rainbow 
Coalition is exacerbated by how the New Alliance 
Party describes itself. The February 13, 1987 
edition of the <National Alliance> newspaper 
contained a centerfold spread with the 
multi-color slogan "The Real Rainbow" spanning 
the two pages. A letter on New Alliance Party 
stationery to gay activists on the west coast had 
the slogan "The Party of the Rainbow." A petition 
calling for an independent Black Presidential 
campaign was titled "An Open Letter To Reverend 

Jesse Jackson." 

Ironically, in a 1983 issue of the Newmanite 
theoretical journal <Practice>, Newman attacked 
Jesse Jackson and Jackson's progressive 
supporters in strong terms: 

"The U.S. ultra-Left has traditionally suffered 
very badly from a mental disorder perhaps best 
identified as premature vanguardulation. There 
has, over the past few years, been a positive 
attempt by some to rectify this problem (called 
by some friendly left critics `wrecktification') 
which, however, has dealt mainly with the 
symptoms of the disease by essentially helping 
the `client' to feel more comfortable 
masturbating. Hence, some of the rectified 
ultra-left--for example supporters of `Jesse 
Jackson, Democrat'--are smilingly convincing 
themselves these days that it is alright to unite 
with Jackson's `progressive aspects'. Many have 
raised questions as to which part of Jackson's 
political anatomy embodies his `progressive 
aspects.' "

At the end of 1987 the <National Alliance> 
newspaper column by Rainbow Lobby Executive 
Director Nancy Ross began to include a disclaimer 
which reads: 

"The Rainbow Lobby is an independent citizens' 
lobby based in Washington, D.C. which supports 
important legislation that affects civil, human, 
voting and democratic rights at home and abroad. 
For more information on the Lobby, please contact 
Nancy Ross at 236 Massachusetts Ave., N.E., Suite 
409, Washington, D.C. 20002 (202) 543-8324. "

"The Rainbow Lobby, Inc. is an independent lobby, 
not affiliated with the Rainbow Coalition, Inc. "

The disclaimer began appearing during the same 
time period that NAP launched the campaign of 
Lenora Fulani for President. During 1987 the NAP 
began to publicly attack the Rainbow Coalition 
and in the <National Alliance> Lenora Fulani 
was quoted as saying "With all due respect to 
Brother Jesse Jackson, almost everyone knows he 
hasn't built a real Rainbow. He might have 
incorporated something called the National 
Rainbow Coalition, Inc., but he hasn't built a 
Rainbow. <We've built a real Rainbow.>" 

Despite the criticisms and disclaimers, there is 
still much public confusion concerning the 

relationship of NAP to the Rainbow Coalition, and 
Jackson's Presidential candidacy. This confusion 
is not alleviated by NAP public statements. For 
instance in the November 20, 1987 issue of the 
<National Alliance>, William Pleasant attacks 
the Rainbow Coalition as "the Democratic Party's 
<phony> left wing", but then writes that 
"Fulani, under her `Two Roads Are Better Than 
One' plan, backs Reverend Jesse Jackson in the 
Democratic Party primaries. But she has done 
everything possible to ensure that the 
progressive Rainbow agenda will be carried 
through to the general election in November...." 

Smearing Critics 

Among the most persistent critics of the New 
Alliance Party are freelance writer Dennis King 
of New York, the author of this study, Chip 
Berlet (and other members of the Public Eye 
Network), and two researchers who often work 
closely together, Ken Lawrence of Mississippi and 
Dan Stern of Illinois. In 1985 Ken Lawrence and 
Dan Stern provided information on NAP to Charles 
Tisdale, publisher of the <Jackson Advocate> 
newspaper in Mississippi. Tisdale ran a series of 
articles critical of Newman and NAP in the 
<Advocate>, which for many years has served as 
a voice for Black residents in the area. 

In response to the <Advocate> articles, NAP 
embarked on a smear campaign against its 
critics--a tactic it frequently employs. An 
article by William Pleasant in NAP's <National 
Alliance> newspaper attacked Tisdale, Lawrence, 
Stern and Berlet. A photograph of Tisdale (who is 
Black) is accompanied by a bold headline which 
reads: "Jackson Advocate publisher Charles 
Tisdale: The Advocate has come to play the role 
of a Black front for a national network that is a 
nesting place for agents." 

The same article claims that Dennis King and Chip 
Berlet have shown "a willingness to relent on 
their earlier false and sectarian charges of 
LaRouche affiliation or cultism." (In fact, both 
Berlet and King still stand by their earlier 
charges.) Ken Lawrence and Dan Stern are 
described as "absorbed in another agenda, beyond 
sectarianism, bordering on straight out 
provocateurism." NAP organizers also began 
circulating charges that Ken Lawrence was a 
government agent. 

When Tisdale refused to back down from his 
criticisms of NAP, and continued to detail the 
charges of other NAP critics, NAP chairwoman 
Emily Carter responded by filing a defamation 
lawsuit against Tisdale, the <Jackson Advocate> 
and Ken Lawrence. (A judge subsequently ordered 
Lawrence dropped from the lawsuit). After the 
lawsuit was filed, when well-known organizer Flo 
Kennedy accepted an invitation to speak at a 
banquet sponsored by the <Jackson Advocate>, a 
self-described NAP member disrupted a press 
conference with her by shouting "You're a very 
stupid woman." Other critics of NAP are 
frequently ridiculed or attacked in an 
unprincipled manner. 

Penetration and Disruption of Rival Groups 

Critics of the Newmanites claim one of the 
tactics used by the group is to penetrate a 
progressive organization and seek to take it over 
or recruit away its membership. One of the themes 
in the <Jackson Advocate> series on NAP was the 
frequency with which NAP engaged in what critics 
considered disruptive tactics. Lily Mae Irwin, a 
well-known welfare rights activist told the 
<Advocate> how, in 1985, NAP tried to merge 
with the group she was leading, the Mississippi 
Welfare Rights Organization. After she refused 
the merger idea, she soon discovered NAP was 
scheduling their meetings with her key organizers 
opposite the regular monthly Welfare Rights 
Organization meetings. "Yes Siree," said Irwin, 
"they were trying to hold meetings at the same 
time we were; they were trying to mess us up." 

Eddie Sandifer, a well-known Mississippi Gay 
rights activist, told the <Advocate> he 
resented the claim by NAP that it is the party of 
gays, lesbians, Blacks and dispossessed people in 
general. In particular, Sandifer was angry that 
NAP contacted several members of the Mississippi 
Gay Alliance and invited them to NAP meetings, 
but did not contact him, the group's leader. "I 
think their purpose is to divide and conquer," 
said Sandifer. "I'm very suspicious of 
them....I'm worried about what they are doing in 
Mississippi." 

A long-time gay activist in California voiced 
similar concerns to the author after NAP 
sponsored a gay rights conference in that state. 
He feared the NAP wanted to duplicate the work of 
existing gay organizations as a way to build 

credibility and recruit new members for the NAP. 

A woman activist in New York told the author of a 
call she received from a friend in England 
complaining of disruptive activities by a NAP 
organizer who attended functions of a women's 
peace group. Disruption has been a hallmark of 
NAP organizing for years, and reports of this 
nature have been consistently surfaced over the 
years from a wide variety of sources. 

One early example of a Newmanite attempt to 
penetrate and manipulate a progressive 
organization involved the now-defunct People's 
Party, a multi-racial progressive electoral party 
which once ran Dr. Benjamin Spock for President. 
In early 1978, according to a former People's 
Party organizer, the People's Party "expelled the 
Newmanites when it was uncovered that they were 
operating within the party as a secret faction 
with an undisclosed agenda as to their intentions 
and plans." 

The Newmanites had told members of the People's 
Party that Newman's International Workers Party 
had been disbanded, but the People's Party 
stumbled across a secret Newmanite newsletter 
marked "confidential internal bulletin" and 
bearing the name <Party Building>. According to 
<Party Building>, the Newmanites were 
recruiting inside the People's Party and other 
progressive groups to build a secret 
"pre-party formation." The confidential Newmanite 
newsletter explained it was being published to 
"function as intelligence and communications 
networks, reporting on the social movement of 
various strata in particular areas. 

Even though the IWP was supposed to have 
dissolved, plans were sketched out in <Party 
Building> for its "Fourth Party Plenary" held 
in Gary, Indiana in early 1977. The meeting 
brought together representatives from various 
Newmanite front groups organized under the public 
banner of the "Council of Independent 
Organizers." 

Depth of Black Leadership 

The New Alliance Party does engage in activities 
which support Black candidates, as the following 
excerpt from a letter by NAP supporters points 
out: 

"In 1984, after campaigning for Reverend Jesse 
Jackson and witnessing his public rejection at 
the Democratic National Convention in San 
Francisco, NAP moved ahead with its independent 
Presidential campaign for the Afro-American 
candidate Dennis L. Serrette in a record-breaking 
33 states where the party had managed to secure 
access to the ballot. "

What the letter fails to mention is that Serrette 
left the New Alliance Party after unsuccessfully 
struggling for a meaningful leadership role for 
Black NAP officials who he felt had 
organizational titles but no real influence or 
control. At first, Serrette, as a point of 
personal and political principle, refused to 
openly criticize NAP, but when it became obvious 
NAP leaders were characterizing his reasons for 
leaving as primarily personal, and implying that 
Serrette continued to support NAP, Serrette went 
public with his charges in Mississippi's <Jackson 
Advocate> newspaper. 

"I left the party because it continued to claim 
it was Black-led--I knew better," Serrette is 
quoted as saying in the <Jackson Advocate>. "I 
mean no harm to these powerful Black women, Emily 
Carter, Lenora Fulani and Barbara Taylor, when I 
say that....I knew from being there that they 
were not leading Fred Newman--he was leading 
them--that's why I left....I don't feel they can 
use `Black-led' continuously without falling on 
their faces--falsehoods just won't hold up under 
close scrutiny." 

According to Serrette, NAP had no real commitment 
to Black-led independent politics. "I had to 
think about my reputation then--of people who 
continue to believe in me." After raising his 
criticisms internally, Serrette said he was cut 
off from the flow of information within the 
party. "It got so I didn't know when they were 
holding meetings or anything," said Serrette. 

In the course of the lawsuit by Emily Carter 
against the <Jackson Advocate>, Dennis Serrette 
was called by Carter's attorney to answer 
questions in a deposition. Serrette thoroughly 
denounced Newman and his followers as running a 
racist, sexist "therapy cult" that put people of 
color in public leadership positions merely as 
window dressing. Regarding the New Alliance 
Party, Serrette said: 

"...I don't believe that it's organic...in terms 

of it being a working-class movement...Black, 
white and Latino. I think it's an elitist 
organization. It certainly serves the purposes of 
its leader....it was a lie, it was clearly a 
tactical ...a racist scheme of using Black and 
Latino and Asian people to do the bidding of one 
man, namely Fred Newman, that's my opinion, and 
to use other whites as well, you know through the 
therapy practices. "

"No one challenges Fred Newman. I have seen 
people maybe raise a few polite questions 
in...planning sessions...but Fred Newman's word 
is the word. There is no such thing as opposition 
within that organization, or principled 
opposition, that in my opinion could demonstrate 
a different will or challenge to power, a 
different political position of a major order, 
unless he agreed with it in some way. "

Serrette said he came to believe the promise that 
the organization would eventually be turned over 
to Black people was a lie, and he challenged 
Newman on the point: 

"And I stated to him, "turned over" means, you 
know, resources, it means making policy, it means 
running personnel...that's Black control to me. I 
don't understand it as just having a Black face 
in a high place. That's nothing more than racism 
and nothing more than window dressing. "

"It's no different from the system we seem to 
fight in this case. So I raised those questions 
to Fred and we had ... a very heated meeting. It 
was a meeting in which many of the Black 
leadership was there. "

"It was very intense. We had Lenora [Fulani] 
making criticisms...Emily [Carter] making 
criticisms, there was a lot of folks making 
criticisms of some of the racism that they 
heretofore hadn't mentioned to Fred, but had told 
me and told other Blacks in a whisper type kind 
of way, the times that we were together...and 
they came forward. "

Shortly after that meeting, according to 
Serrette, his stature and treatment by other NAP 
leaders changed dramatically. Serrette said he 
was not opposed to therapy on principle since he 
believed many people are helped by other forms of 
therapy. But therapy played a different role 
inside NAP according to Serrette: 

"...therapy was a way of getting people to not 
only operate in an organizational way, but also a 
way of controlling every aspect of their 
lives...you certainly couldn't straighten anybody 
out. But it was certainly effective in terms of 
controlling a lot of people to do the kinds of 
things that were asked of them...they would do 
anything, just about, that he would ask them to 
do. "

"I wouldn't even be surprised if they'd turn from 
a so-called left organization to a right-wing 
organization with a blink of an eye. I think that 
the ideological question that is supposedly 
the thrust of who they call themselves, 
International Workers' Party, there's nothing 
more than a front itself. "

"I certainly believe that [of] the New Alliance 
Party, and when I say "front," I just mean it's 
the cover to cover, possibly the ego of Fred 
Newman and the control of so many individuals in 
terms of power. "

Serrette also said the therapy was not voluntary 
and that one Newman associate made this clear: 

"She said that it was an order that if you wanted 
to be part of this organization, you will have to 
take therapy because it is the backbone of our 
tendency...she says that comes as an order...from 
the governing body. "

Support for Minister Farrakhan 

When Minister Louis Farrakhan addressed a New 
York City rally of his supporters in 1985, he was 
greeted with a telegram of support from the then 
NAP mayoral candidate Dr. Lenora Fulani: 

"It is with deep respect and the most profound 
commitment to the liberation of our people that I 
welcome you to New York City, hopeful that your 
visit will bring us, as Black people, the 
leadership of all this country's oppressed, a 
step closer to our freedom. "

NAP at the time was seeking "a working 
relationship with Farrakhan's Nation of Islam," 
and members of both groups had attended each 
others' conferences. Fulani was not unaware of 
the controversial nature of some of Farrakhan's 
remarks regarding Jewish people and other groups. 
"I remain concerned that Minister Farrakhan's 

language can be interpreted as anti-Semitic or 
anti-gay. But I know, as do my Jewish friends and 
followers, that the Jewish people have nothing to 
fear from the Nation of Islam." 

Minister Farrakhan's language is indeed a cause 
for concern, as are the actions of his 
organization. In Chicago, representatives of the 
Nation of Islam invited the author of a book 
calling the Nazi Holocaust a hoax to share their 
stage with other special guests. Members of 
anti-Jewish white racialist groups have been 
invited to attend Nation of Islam events. 
Representatives of the Nation of Islam have made 
speeches where white racial characteristics have 
been held up for ridicule. 

It is true that many critics of Minister 
Farrakhan treat him in a racist manner. Further, 
many of Farrakhan's statements against political 
Zionism and the actions of the state of Israel in 
the Middle East are, for whatever reason, 
incorrectly labeled "anti-Semitic." However there 
is ample documentation that Farrakhan regularly 
makes references about the Jewish people that 
reflect a bigoted and stereotyped bias. This is 
not a question of semantics, but a question of 
prejudice. 

Conclusions 

The refusal of the Newmanites to deal 
candidly with, and accept criticism for, the 
LaRouche period--no matter how short-lived--and 
the attempt to provoke the FBI to target a former 
member and critics, will continue to be a valid 
issue to raise publicly concerning the New 
Alliance Party until that group's leadership 
accepts responsibility for the actions of its 
founders and current colleagues. 

The connection between the leadership of the New 
Alliance Party and the Newmanite Social Therapy 
centers is manipulative and unethical. So long as 
there is such a relationship, the New Alliance 
Party must be judged in the context of being a 
political moment that lacks clarity concerning 
basic moral issues involving personal and 
political exploitation. How can a group aspire to 
moral and political leadership when with one hand 
it reaches out to those in need of emotional 
help, and with the other hand points to a related 
political organization as a cure? 

Finally, the issue of the apparent opportunistic 
use of the "Rainbow" slogan is important to 
confront. This is especially true in Chicago 
where political consultant Don Rose, hardly a 
political neophyte, thought a Rainbow Lobby 
fundraiser that came to his home was representing 
Jesse Jackson until he spotted a name he 
recognized as being involved with the Newmanites 
on the literature. If a person with political 
sophistication can make the mistake, what about 
the average citizen? This continued confusion in 
the city that provides a base for Jesse Jackson 
and the real Rainbow Coalition can only serve to 
weaken Jackson's credibility among potential 
constituents whose first crucial introduction to 
the Rainbow may well be through the distorted 
prism of the Newmanites and NAP.