Sen Joe McCarthy: American Patriot and Hero

[Gadawg73]

At the end of the McCarthy hearings having been made fools all over the country with their factless allegations, another Senator involved with McCarthy in this witch hunt started to wear down as their circus of lies was unfolding. Senator Stuart Symington was then interested in the secret files that McCArthy had been claiming he had, yet no one ever saw them. Symington, like Joe, was out of ammunition so he next accused McCarthy's own staff of having communists on them! He offered to take the stand in the hearings to reveal their names in exchange for another investigation into staff members of McCarthy.

Amazing anyone with any brains would have fallen for this circus.

 

[Cecilie1200]

Every one of his "targets" were incorrect.

Idiot knee jerkers never seem to have a fucking clue what you're yammering about.

Unfortunately for your idiot worldview, YOU are incorrect.

And I can only assume this vague, broadbrush assertion is because you don't actually even know any of the names of the people investigated by Senator McCarthy's subcommittee, let alone whether or not they were guilty.

Feel free to prove me wrong and produce a name and evidence of innocence . . . and feel free to prove me right by coming back with another meaningless, "I'm right, you're wrong!" pronouncement. Either way works for me.

McCarthy claimed Annie Lee Moss of the Army Signal Corps was a communist.
When asked at the hearings if she knew who Karl Marx was she answered "Who's that".
Moss was a timid black woman that no one with any intelligence believed was a communist and there was NO evidence whatsoever that she was a communist other than rank hearsay from a supposed paid informant from the 40s that claimed she saw the name Ann Moss on a communist membership list.
She never saw Moss and never identified her.
Ditto that for most all of McCarthy's "subcommittee" hearings.
They had no credibility in any investigative or intelligence agency anywhere other than the political hack for political power FBI run by J. Edgar Hoover.
Frankly, it surprises me someone like you that has above average intelligence would fall for such a fraud as all of this was proven to be.
Need more names like Moss that there WAS NO EVIDENCE whatsoever to prove they were communists?
How many do you need?

You should probably not get your "historical facts" from Broadway plays and leftist movies. I'm just sayin' . . .

Here's the truth about Annie Lee Moss, and you're welcome to provide any evidence - by "evidence", I mean something more than just a post saying, "That's not true!" - disproving it.

The Army Signal Corps was the site of the Rosenberg spy ring, and McCarthy's subcommittee investigated the lax security that had allowed that spy ring to exist. During that investigation, they found an FBI memo concerning Annie Lee Moss, a cafeteria worker, being made a code clerk and given security clearance for the job. Obviously, they were curious as to why such a decision was made, and investigated. Moss was identified by FBI operative Mary Stalcup Markward as a member of the Communist Party.

Just for the record, there is also an FBI memo to the effect that the Bureau actually briefed Democrats on the committee that Moss WAS a Communist.

Unsurprisingly, Markward and Moss were called before the committee to clarify the issue. Markward testified that she had seen records of Moss paying membership dues to the Communist Party, and that Moss was also on the subscribers' list of the Daily Worker.

Moss and the Democrats on the committee - despite the fact that those very same Democrats had already been told by the FBI that the Annie Lee Moss appearing before them WAS a member of the Communist Party - tried to pretend that she was just a confused, frail old lady, and that maybe it was all a case of mistaken identity. And, naturally, they tried to play the race card, since Moss was black.

Also just for the record, the fact that Annie Lee Moss - the same Annie Lee Moss who was called to testify before McCarthy's committee - was, in fact, a Communist was verified by the Subversive Activities Control Board in 1958.

Moss herself acknowledged that one of the leaders of the Washington DC Communist Party visited her home, and that she had lived with an active party member who hosted meetings in their home.

Despite her claims that the Daily Worker was delivered to her home, addressed to her, by mistake, none of the three other Annie Lee Mosses in Washington had ever lived at any of the addresses the Communist Party had on file . . . but the Annie Lee Moss called before the committee had lived at all of them.

No, Annie Lee Moss - the Annie Lee Moss called before McCarthy's committee to testify - was most definitely EXACTLY what McCarthy said she was: a Communist, and an inappropriately-employed security risk.

Strike one. Would you care to try again?

 

[Cecilie1200]

McCarthy introduced numerous doctored and forged photos and documents at these hearings including a supposed memorandum written and signed by J. Edgar Hoover. Hoover offered an affidavit to the committee stating that he never signed that letter, never wrote the letter, never authorized the letter and that NO record of it exists anywhere in FBI files.
Another example of the fraud that was the show, the norm in the McCarthy "hearings".
Need more?. I have dozens.
Facts sure are a bitch to ideologues.

Well, if these bitches are "facts", then you won't mind substantiating them, rather than expecting me to take your word for it, right?

I'll be waiting, but I won't be holding my breath.

 

[Luddly Neddite]

At the end of the McCarthy hearings having been made fools all over the country with their factless allegations, another Senator involved with McCarthy in this witch hunt started to wear down as their circus of lies was unfolding. Senator Stuart Symington was then interested in the secret files that McCArthy had been claiming he had, yet no one ever saw them. Symington, like Joe, was out of ammunition so he next accused McCarthy's own staff of having communists on them! He offered to take the stand in the hearings to reveal their names in exchange for another investigation into staff members of McCarthy.

Amazing anyone with any brains would have fallen for this circus.

Worse, some of us didn't learn from the mistakes, from the terrible damage done by McCarthy.

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

At the end of the McCarthy hearings having been made fools all over the country with their factless allegations, another Senator involved with McCarthy in this witch hunt started to wear down as their circus of lies was unfolding. Senator Stuart Symington was then interested in the secret files that McCArthy had been claiming he had, yet no one ever saw them. Symington, like Joe, was out of ammunition so he next accused McCarthy's own staff of having communists on them! He offered to take the stand in the hearings to reveal their names in exchange for another investigation into staff members of McCarthy.

Amazing anyone with any brains would have fallen for this circus.

It’s a textbook example of playing on the fears of Americans. For McCarthy it was the fear of the ‘spread of communism,’ today it’s the fear of ‘terrorism.’

 

[Cecilie1200]

At the end of the McCarthy hearings having been made fools all over the country with their factless allegations, another Senator involved with McCarthy in this witch hunt started to wear down as their circus of lies was unfolding. Senator Stuart Symington was then interested in the secret files that McCArthy had been claiming he had, yet no one ever saw them. Symington, like Joe, was out of ammunition so he next accused McCarthy's own staff of having communists on them! He offered to take the stand in the hearings to reveal their names in exchange for another investigation into staff members of McCarthy.

Amazing anyone with any brains would have fallen for this circus.

Worse, some of us didn't learn from the mistakes, from the terrible damage done by McCarthy.

Aren't you supposed to be coming up with some names of innocent people incorrectly accused by McCarthy? And yet, here you are, posting yet another empty "I'm right, you're wrong, no I can't prove it, just take my word for it" blurb.

Once again, shitstain, if McCarthy did "terrible damage", as you keep asserting, you should be able to tell us exactly WHAT "terrible damage" he did, and to whom, and provide proof. The fact that you continue to decline to do so is evidenced that you're a liar, and you know you're a liar.

So this post is YOUR Strike One. Care to go for two?

 

[regent]

One of the hits of the army-McCarthy hearings was a doctored photograph introduced by the McCarthy side. The commentary on the photograph by army attorney Welch was priceless. Those hearings should be put on TV every so often so that we remember what McCarthy and the McCarthy period was truly like. Since those hearings, has America had another McCarthy, not a junior version, or a period of McCarthyism?

 

[Cecilie1200]

At the end of the McCarthy hearings having been made fools all over the country with their factless allegations, another Senator involved with McCarthy in this witch hunt started to wear down as their circus of lies was unfolding. Senator Stuart Symington was then interested in the secret files that McCArthy had been claiming he had, yet no one ever saw them. Symington, like Joe, was out of ammunition so he next accused McCarthy's own staff of having communists on them! He offered to take the stand in the hearings to reveal their names in exchange for another investigation into staff members of McCarthy.

Amazing anyone with any brains would have fallen for this circus.

It’s a textbook example of playing on the fears of Americans. For McCarthy it was the fear of the ‘spread of communism,’ today it’s the fear of ‘terrorism.’

It's the textbook example of denial: Nope, nothing to see here, you're just paranoid. First it was Communism, now it's terrorism. Leftists never get any smarter.

 

[Cecilie1200]

One of the hits of the army-McCarthy hearings was a doctored photograph introduced by the McCarthy side. The commentary on the photograph by army attorney Welch was priceless. Those hearings should be put on TV every so often so that we remember what McCarthy and the McCarthy period was truly like. Since those hearings, has America had another McCarthy, not a junior version, or a period of McCarthyism?

More unsubstantiated assertions.

Swing . . . and a miss!

Insofar as the COMPLETE Army-McCarthy hearings provide a VERY different picture than the accepted propaganda version, there's no way in Hell the left would EVER allow such a thing to be televised.

Try again.

 

[Cecilie1200]

McCarthy claimed to have a list of communists working in defense plants.
He was confronted by the Army numerous times in these hearings and the Chief Counsel of the Army TO PRODUCE THAT LIST.
McCarthy never did and then they demanded he produce that list to the FBI and the Department of Defense.
McCarthy never produced any list because NO LIST EXISTED.

Substantiation? No? ::yawn:: Then all I hear is the hisssss of escaping gas.

 

[Toronado3800]

My wife is Jewish and my sons were bar mitvah, I've been asked to consider converting by 2 separate rabbis and at my first real job they added "-owitz" to my very Italian last name.

Nothing else in your post is on topic that McCarthy tried to warn us that the Russians had a very robust and active spy network at US State and the White House, all of which has since been confirmed by the Soviets themselves

Now I meant no offense. Some of my "pro Israel" opinions probably helped along that rumor I was Jewish.

Also, I was already talking in reference to that post about missle locations. No biggie.

Hey, what level of "accuracy" do we demand from McCarthy? Do folks actually have to have been convicted of being a spy? Just thinking the commies seemed better for China in '47?

What did we decide...he was 100% right in finding folks who attended at least one communist party meeting?

I think what's been proven is that the left, for all their whinging and hand-wringing, have not been able to find one person "targeted" incorrectly by Joseph McCarthy. Half the time, they're busy talking about people McCarthy had nothing whatsoever to do with (ie. Lena Horne).

Wait, was that reply to my question?

Just please tell me what counts as "guilty" or "not guilty" or heck, even throw me a "worth investigating".

Just please give an answer not a dodge.

 

[Cecilie1200]

Now I meant no offense. Some of my "pro Israel" opinions probably helped along that rumor I was Jewish.

Also, I was already talking in reference to that post about missle locations. No biggie.

Hey, what level of "accuracy" do we demand from McCarthy? Do folks actually have to have been convicted of being a spy? Just thinking the commies seemed better for China in '47?

What did we decide...he was 100% right in finding folks who attended at least one communist party meeting?

I think what's been proven is that the left, for all their whinging and hand-wringing, have not been able to find one person "targeted" incorrectly by Joseph McCarthy. Half the time, they're busy talking about people McCarthy had nothing whatsoever to do with (ie. Lena Horne).

Wait, was that reply to my question?

Just please tell me what counts as "guilty" or "not guilty" or heck, even throw me a "worth investigating".

Just please give an answer not a dodge.

What the fuck are you talking about?

You asked, "What did we decide?" And I told you. It has been "decided" - ie. proven - that the left is full of shit on the subject of McCarthy.

In regards to your blather about "guilty or not guilty", these people weren't on trial. They were being investigated as possible security risks by a Senate subcommittee whose job was government oversight. The fact that you don't even fucking know what the point of the whole exercise WAS tells me you have no business discussing it.

Is that straightforward enough for you?

 

[C_Clayton_Jones]

McCarthy was a liar, a demagogue, and a partisan hack – he contrived controversies where none existed, just to advance his career.

By the end of the McCarthy hearings, the senator's career was over; before an audience that often numbered 20 million Americans, he came across as bullying and unscrupulous. Yet today, more and more conservative writers are trying to vindicate the late senator. Authors M. Stanton Evans and Ann Coulter, for example, have claimed that McCarthy was more right than wrong because he, along with dozens of other anticommunists, was correct that the government was riddled with spies.

The FBI agents who actually chased Soviet spies have a very different perspective.

Robert J. Lamphere, who participated in all the FBI's major spy cases during the McCarthy period, was one. Lamphere also was the FBI liaison to the U.S. Army's Signal Intelligence Service's Venona program, which was intercepting secret Soviet communications. He used leads from the intercepts to work cases involving notorious espionage figures such as Klaus Fuchs, Harry Gold, David Greenglass, Ethel and Julius Rosenberg and Kim Philby.

Lamphere (who died in 2002), told me in an interview that agents who worked counterintelligence were appalled that FBI director J. Edgar Hoover initially supported McCarthy. True enough, the Venona intercepts revealed that hundreds more Soviet spies had operated in the government than was believed at the time.

"The problem was that McCarthy lied about his information and figures," Lamphere said. "He made charges against people that weren't true. McCarthyism harmed the counterintelligence effort against the Soviet threat because of the revulsion it caused."

The Army-McCarthy hearings followed a pattern, notes Donald A. Ritchie, associate historian of the Senate. Typically, McCarthy held hearings in executive session first, "like a dress rehearsal," says Mr. Ritchie, who studied the transcripts of the hearings. Mostly McCarthy didn't have any hard evidence against the people he was interrogating; he just hoped to get them to contradict themselves or to take the Fifth Amendment, or to confess.

During the hearings, McCarthy failed to substantiate his claims that communists had penetrated the Army.

The Real Joe McCarthy - WSJ.com

“Mostly McCarthy didn't have any hard evidence against the people he was interrogating…”

And the likes of Darrell Issa continue that republican tradition today with equally baseless accusations.

McCarthyism indeed.

 

[Toronado3800]

I think what's been proven is that the left, for all their whinging and hand-wringing, have not been able to find one person "targeted" incorrectly by Joseph McCarthy. Half the time, they're busy talking about people McCarthy had nothing whatsoever to do with (ie. Lena Horne).

Wait, was that reply to my question?

Just please tell me what counts as "guilty" or "not guilty" or heck, even throw me a "worth investigating".

Just please give an answer not a dodge.

What the fuck are you talking about?

You asked, "What did we decide?" And I told you. It has been "decided" - ie. proven - that the left is full of shit on the subject of McCarthy.

In regards to your blather about "guilty or not guilty", these people weren't on trial. They were being investigated as possible security risks by a Senate subcommittee whose job was government oversight. The fact that you don't even fucking know what the point of the whole exercise WAS tells me you have no business discussing it.

Is that straightforward enough for you?

Ma'm, you sound way to confrontational and emotional about this.

If you would just say something adult or intelligent like "everyone he called out did something suspicous" I might say "yup" and that is the end of it.

Instead you get all sounding like Rush Linbaugh taught you how to talk to people. I hope we never agree on anything because you can make a reasonable point of view look otherwise

 

[Toronado3800]

McCarthy was a liar, a demagogue, and a partisan hack – he contrived controversies where none existed, just to advance his career.

By the end of the McCarthy hearings, the senator's career was over; before an audience that often numbered 20 million Americans, he came across as bullying and unscrupulous. Yet today, more and more conservative writers are trying to vindicate the late senator. Authors M. Stanton Evans and Ann Coulter, for example, have claimed that McCarthy was more right than wrong because he, along with dozens of other anticommunists, was correct that the government was riddled with spies.

The FBI agents who actually chased Soviet spies have a very different perspective.

Robert J. Lamphere, who participated in all the FBI's major spy cases during the McCarthy period, was one. Lamphere also was the FBI liaison to the U.S. Army's Signal Intelligence Service's Venona program, which was intercepting secret Soviet communications. He used leads from the intercepts to work cases involving notorious espionage figures such as Klaus Fuchs, Harry Gold, David Greenglass, Ethel and Julius Rosenberg and Kim Philby.

Lamphere (who died in 2002), told me in an interview that agents who worked counterintelligence were appalled that FBI director J. Edgar Hoover initially supported McCarthy. True enough, the Venona intercepts revealed that hundreds more Soviet spies had operated in the government than was believed at the time.

"The problem was that McCarthy lied about his information and figures," Lamphere said. "He made charges against people that weren't true. McCarthyism harmed the counterintelligence effort against the Soviet threat because of the revulsion it caused."

The Army-McCarthy hearings followed a pattern, notes Donald A. Ritchie, associate historian of the Senate. Typically, McCarthy held hearings in executive session first, "like a dress rehearsal," says Mr. Ritchie, who studied the transcripts of the hearings. Mostly McCarthy didn't have any hard evidence against the people he was interrogating; he just hoped to get them to contradict themselves or to take the Fifth Amendment, or to confess.

During the hearings, McCarthy failed to substantiate his claims that communists had penetrated the Army.

The Real Joe McCarthy - WSJ.com

“Mostly McCarthy didn't have any hard evidence against the people he was interrogating…”

And the likes of Darrell Issa continue that republican tradition today with equally baseless accusations.

McCarthyism indeed.

Clayton, if angry Joe could not find 50 folks with at least some "ties" to communism in the 50's he would have been an even bigger idiot. Remember these folks all lived through the 30's when a socialist revolution seem a possibility. These folks just do not seem to know how to say that.

 

[Wry Catcher]

Sen. McCarthy was a drunk and a liar. At least that was how he was perceived by the Journalists of the day; a time when Journalism had ethics, I should add. Today the history of his time of fame is being rewritten as foreseen in the Novel "1984".

See:

Edward R. Murrow: A Report on Senator Joseph R. McCarthy

 

[Vandalshandle]

"Tailgunner Joe" Mccarthy had his picture taken in the tailgunner position in an airplane in WW2, although he actually had a desk job. That did not keep him from claiming that he had flown 32 missions. He had actually flown none. He used the photo in his campaign to get elected. I used to live in Reno. and the story is that Joe and his aids where staying at the Mapes Hotel there one night, and together drreamed up the communist witch hunt as a way to get publicity. China had been taken over by communists, and the Soviets had deveoped the bomb. Everyone was paranoid about the world wide communist conspiracy, especially after the Korean War began. In the movie, "Manchurian Candidate" McCarthy was represented by a character who was accusing everyone to be a communist, in order to get on the ticket as a VP candidate. In the last scene of the movie, he was assasinated by the hero.During the Army hearings, the attorney that finally stood up to Joe, and cut him down to size in a statement he made to the effect that , "...at long last, have you no decency, sir....?". This attorney later played the part as the judge in the movie, "Anatomy of a murder", with Jimmy Stewart.

Joe was actually on good terms with JFK, since he dated one of JFK's sisters for a while. However, he became a full blown alchololic while in office. He bragged to people that he did not get drunk, no matter how much he drank, because he ate a stick of butter that lined his stomach when he was drinking, and kept his body from absorbing alcohol too quickly. Robert Kennedy worked for him for about 6 months, but bailed out when he saw what Joe was all about. He did everybody a big favor by dying of acute alcoholism in 1957 at a very early age.By that time, Edward R. Murrow had destroyed Joe's career.

 

[Gadawg73]

The very few communists that McCArthy did come outwith from his supposed "list" WERE communistsand a few spies.
But everyone had been exposed and filtered out by the late 40s long before Joe McCarthy and his hearings.

This all came about with Ann Coulter's book which she waited for every one involved on the intelligence and defense side to die before she published it.

No one with any credibility in the intelligence or defense industry takes it seriously.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Now I meant no offense. Some of my "pro Israel" opinions probably helped along that rumor I was Jewish.

Also, I was already talking in reference to that post about missle locations. No biggie.

Hey, what level of "accuracy" do we demand from McCarthy? Do folks actually have to have been convicted of being a spy? Just thinking the commies seemed better for China in '47?

What did we decide...he was 100% right in finding folks who attended at least one communist party meeting?

I think what's been proven is that the left, for all their whinging and hand-wringing, have not been able to find one person "targeted" incorrectly by Joseph McCarthy. Half the time, they're busy talking about people McCarthy had nothing whatsoever to do with (ie. Lena Horne).

Every one of his "targets" were incorrect.

Idiot knee jerkers never seem to have a fucking clue what you're yammering about.

Name one.

Please give me one name that Joe McCarthy incorrectly identitfied

 

[CrusaderFrank]

McCarthy claimed his list had 205 names.
Then it went to 57.
Eisenhower knew a con man when he saw one.
No other man in America during that era had mastered world wide intelligence better than Ike.
He identified McCarthy as a fraud with nothing other than decades old pre-war minor communist associations long gone through mountains of intelligence gathering over 20 years.

So you know nothing about McCarthy.

Mmmmkay

Did you know that Communist spies were feeding information on our Korean troops back to their masters in China and getting US soldiers killed?

Why do you think Korea is "The Forgotten War"?