On Friday I stumbled into the tail-end of a Lyndon LaRouche rally.

THE YOUTH FOR LAROUCHE (handing me an 8 1/2 x 11 sheet of newsprint with the headline "LaRouche Leads Democratic Presidential Candidates in Number of Individual Contributions"): LaRouche in 2004!

ME: Good lord, is he still alive?

TYFL (surprised): You know who he is?

ME: Uh, yeah. He’s the perennial Libertarian candidate. Why is he running as a Democrat?

TYFL: No, no, he’s not a Libertarian. He’s for big government. He’s an FDR Democrat. They’re just trying to discredit him.

ME: I’m pretty sure he ran for president as a Libertarian in 1984.

TYFL (who may not have any first-hand experience of 1984, is not quite sure what to do with my troubling specificity, so he ignores it): No, he’s like FDR, like Alexander Hamilton…

ME: Uh huh.

TYFL: You know, the Secretary of the Treasury.

ME: Right. The guy on the twenty. One of the authors of The Federalist Papers. Established the gold standard.

YFL: Exactly, the gold standard!

ME: Shot Aaron Burr.

YFL: Uh, yeah…

ME: Well, good luck.

Now, the interesting thing here is that it turns out the Youth was right – once again my memory of the Eighties failed me. LaRouche ran as an Independent in 1984 (and in every presidential election since, usually after losing in the Democratic Primary).

I take some comfort in knowing I’m not alone in this confusion - apparently a few news organizations made the same mistake...and the Libertarians weren't any happier about it than the Youth for LaRouche.