Question You said, you were talking about, that the way that we're going to make a change in the world, is by organizing a youth movement here in the United States, and using the power of the United States to shift the world. My question is, what's the role of the youth movement, in places like Germany and France, and Peru, Philippines, etc.?

LaRouche: The other side of what we're doing, which is not different, but it's just a different facet of the same thing, what we're doing is we're launching a Classical Renaissance. Now, in Germany, if you see Germany, and look at the educational system, you realize that the people who did their "abitur" before the Brandt reform in education, were almost a different species than the people who were victimized by the changes in education since the Brandt reform. So, therefore, what's happened is, the German population has been culturally mangled, if not destroyed, by this change in educational policy.

As I've said, an effective youth movement, of what we're doing, is a university on wheels. And therefore, what we're really doing is, we're having fun. The basic thing is, we're having fun, in my sense of fun. I keep telling people, "Have fun." You're having fun by taking a stinking, smelly terrible world, which doesn't function, where people are abused, where they have no sense of morality, or personal purpose for living, pleasure-seeking, by no satisfaction. It's like the prostitute in hell. Seeking pleasure, but never finds satisfaction.

And instead of that, is a sense of enjoying life. Enjoying being human. Knowing what it is to be human. Enjoying being human! Being happy because you're human. And this state of happiness, because of humanity, which is called the "erhabene," the sense of the sublime, this is the problem.

And [ ...] the purpose and the instrument. If human beings can be happy human beings, as they should be, they have, by being happy, the power to address any problem, because they can't do it any better, any other way. And to enjoy the fact that you're such a person, gives you the strength to do what you have to do. If you're happy at what you're doing, you have the strength to do what you're doing. All creative people...

A great inventor, a great discoverer, how many years do you think they spend working on some of the more important discoveries they develop? They devote a good part of their life to that. Why should they do that? Why should they do that?

Why should you want to go to a university, secondary school, university which is a good one, in which you enjoy yourself? You enjoy yourself in the process of developing knowledge and competence, knowing that's your mission for that part of your life. So, you take that period, which may run to a dozen years of your life -- from beginning of secondary education to the time you may graduate with a doctoral degree, in something else, get professional status -- you're devoting your life, to developing your ability as a human being! And your source of happiness, is being a human being who is doing that!

This gives you... This happiness, in this way, which is what Leibniz means by happiness. What the Declaration of Independence means by happiness, because it's Leibniz's argument against Locke. Happiness. Happiness, joy in being human! Joy in doing things that a human being should do! Joy in knowing that the power to be happy, is the power to deal with all kinds of problems that humanity faces. The joy of making a discovery. The joy of being able to perform music well. These are joys, per se!

Great drama is joy. Why would somebody put on a great drama? Why would one put on great Shakespeare, or great Schiller, for example, as drama? Why? Why would they devote their lives to doing that kind of thing? Because they enjoy it -- in the highest sense. They know it's important. They know the conveying of ideas, the ability to communicate these kinds of ideas, from the geniuses of the past to the present, it's important! What's your emotion when you're doing it? You're happy!

You may be fighting and squabbling about the thing, but you're happy about the fact that you're doing that. You have a sense of satisfaction with your own life. And, we have in Europe and elsewhere, we need people who are mobilized, happily, to undertake the great missions which stand before humanity as a whole. And if you have happy people, who are happy in that way, you'll do it all.

And our purpose, after all, is the self-development of humanity. And the natural condition of a self-developing humanity is called happiness. And therefore, you want people to be happy, not in the sense of sensual satisfaction, but in pleasure in the fact that they have a talent, it's called a mortal life, and they're spending it wisely, and they can laugh at death, when it comes, because they spent their life happily. And say...

We had a great friend of ours, Gertrude Pitzinger. She's a great alto. She died a couple years ago. She was a great friend of ours for some time. One of the greatest singers in Germany in the period of the 1930s, until she left the stage, to continue working as a teacher, a coach, for others. You should hear her, some of the things she recorded. She was absolutely magnificent. And a magnificent personality.

Shortly before she died, Helga and I had a meeting with her. Her brother was there, and another friend. She knew she was about to die, and she wanted us over there, for a meeting. And it ended up, we had discussion... The first time I met her, I walked into her room, and she sang the famous second song from the Frauenliebe, from Schumann, for me. She's that kind of person -- playful. But then what she did with Helga, the last time we met, we were in her room, her apartment, a nice place, and she had recordings that she'd made, all over the place. She had books, a whole library full of books. And she took turns doing this: she no longer was singing, of course, she was 92 years old. But she would have Helga go in to her library, and said: "Go get this book. Bring this poem out. Now, you read the poem." And then she would turn to her collection of recordings she'd made in the past, and she'd pull it out, and put it on, and perform it, again. And they had this thing between Helga, and Gertrude this way.

And toward the close of the evening, after she'd done this, she said, "What a wonderful life. I have lived to sing such great [garbled -- poems?]."

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