‘McCarthyism’ is still used as a convenient term to cover the unjustified hounding of people. What is fascinating is that the Venona Intercepts showed the now much derided Senator from Wisconsin to be not too far from the truth – despite the fact that a vast amount of information was kept secret till the Venona Intercepts were released in the 1990’s. Yet much of society does not seem to have updated on the fact that the FDR/Truman Govts were riddled with pro-Soviet people of varying degrees of usefulness to the USSR cause ranging up to active Soviet agents.
The recent book American Betrayal by Diana West surveys the evidence.
Finished American Betrayal a few months. Thought it a very credible book – copiously referenced.
Much of pre and post WW2 history is a lot clearer now.
I have read on 20C and WWII history for decades and I can not recall a book that surprised me so often. I had read where Stalin finessed FDR – just surprised it was so constant and so successful.
Here is the blurb from dust cover of American Betrayal –
The book:
Blacklisted by History: The Untold Story of Senator Joe McCarthy and his fight against America’s enemies
by M. Stanton Evans
is another excellent, well documented refutation of the propaganda that our academics and media continue to spew about McCarthy.
wazsah,
the question is still whether Papa Joe finessed FDR or FDR was COMPLICIT!!! Doubt if that question will be answered in my lifetime unless someone comes up with some well buried documentation. We don’t really know why Eisenhower shut down McCarthy. The excuse that it was to prevent McCarthy from gaining backing to run for Pres against Ike just doesn’t hold water for me. All Ike had to do was enable McCarthy and be seen to be as concentrated on rooting out the rot to stay on top of that encounter, yet, he chose to stop the housecleaning.
If I was placing bets I would opt for an interpretation that said FDR expected that over time the USSR and the USA would converge towards similar social outcomes. He sure knew where he wanted to take the USA. A hangover from those sort of ideas is these UN inspired socialist programs like Agenda21.
This is amazing when you ponder it – there is Joe Stalin and his heirs after WWII – dictators of about one sixth of the planet – untold natural resources – large obedient population – yet they could not make it work – with the entire mess imploding at the end of the 80’s. Could a handful of typical competent western managers have succeeded if they had been transplanted in just to run the USSR like a giant corporation? Assuming the people in charge could count – and at least had the talent to employ clever staffers – how could they fail so comprehensively? There has to be a movie in this.
wazsah:
“If I was placing bets I would opt for an interpretation that said FDR expected that over time the USSR and the USA would converge towards similar social outcomes.
We have a Marxist in the WH and many fellow travelers scattered throughout our country and institutions. Does that count?? Notice that Russia has been through problems yet are still in the Central Control camp. Both actually look more Fascist, which was all the rage back then before the holocaust.
I would also point out that while the US has been reasonably successful it has been by BORROWING based on our Reserve Currency status. Don’t go looking to any current people in the west to solve anything. Progressivism is just a slower version.