Neville, you insulted me greatly with this description: “RSo (the evil misnaged)”. I would much rather you had called me by my correct title: SNAG!
Now down to less serious stuff. I find it interesting that with all the back and forth no one – including Ortho – has answered the claim, mentioned by a number of posters, that before Gimmel Tammuz the proof that the Lubavicher rebbe was Mashiach was that Mashiach HAS TO BE SOMEONE ALIVE at the time. And don’t tell me that that isn’t true. It’s 100% true.
As I wrote earlier – perhaps in a different thread – I heard many many times, “Look around. Who is greater nowadays than the Lubavicher rebbe? And Mashiach has to be someone alive, so he must be Mashiach.”
Then, during the levayah (that did or did not take place; it depends on whom you ask in Lubavich) papers were distributed that implied that the Lubavicher rebbe said that Mashiach can be someone who had died. This was NOT an acceptable opinion on Beis Tammuz! Ortho, I don’t know how long you’ve been around Lubavich, but I venture to say that I have been around much much longer, so please don’t try arguing with me what the official Lubavich policy was prior to Gimmel Tammuz.
Again, as I’ve said in the past, people who can blithely change what to them was one of the ikarei emunah to suit themselves, never had an ounce of emunah. Not beforehand and not afterwards.