Speaker 1: M Hi. There, it's Josh and for the s Y
Speaker 1: s K Selects this week, I've chosen how McCarthyism works. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: it seems like it's always a pertinent time to cover
Speaker 1: McCarthy ism. There's always some jerk who's persecuting other people.
Speaker 1: And I hope it opened some eyes might not otherwise
Speaker 1: have been open. Uh. To our friends in the gay community.
Speaker 1: Are apologies for using the word homosexual without making air quotes. Uh.
Speaker 1: This was five or so years ago, and I like
Speaker 1: to think we've evolved somewhat since then. But still sorry
Speaker 1: about that. Uh. And just as a final note, you
Speaker 1: should probably disregard the rules to the contest that's now
Speaker 1: defunct that's come up at the end of the episode.
Speaker 1: Contest has come and gone and it was fun. So
Speaker 1: enjoy this Stuff you Should Know Selects. Welcome to Stuff
Speaker 1: you Should Know from House Stuff Works dot com. The
Speaker 1: dream Police, they get me out of my bed in
Speaker 1: my head right, the dream Police, I live inside of
Speaker 1: my head. Okay, Well come to me in my bed. Okay,
Speaker 1: thank you. I'm so glad you're here. Mr fourty year
Speaker 1: old guy. Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh
Speaker 1: and that is Chuck Bryant. Is that how we're starting? Yeah?
Speaker 1: All right, and uh, since we started, since we started
Speaker 1: off with Dream Police, you know that this is stuff
Speaker 1: you should know. And you actually now know more about
Speaker 1: the Dream Police than you did before. I'll wager. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's one of my Halloween costume goals one day is
Speaker 1: to dress up as a dream Policeman. How would you
Speaker 1: do that? Just mimic what they did on the cover.
Speaker 1: They were like these white police uniforms and it was
Speaker 1: all white. Huh, it's cool. Okay. I saw a tour
Speaker 1: T shirt and an original tour T shirt? Who is that?
Speaker 1: Cheap trick? Oh? Is it? Yeah? No, I didn't know that.
Speaker 1: That was my very first concert. Nice? Was it the
Speaker 1: Dream Police Tour? I'm not that old. Okay, that's the
Speaker 1: one on one tour. So I'm Josh. That's Chuck Charles
Speaker 1: w Chuck Bryant. And this is the weirdest intro we've
Speaker 1: ever done, hands down. But um, we're here, we've started,
Speaker 1: Uh STU. Words can only afford so much tape, so
Speaker 1: we can't go back and record over the nope. Um,
Speaker 1: so we're just gonna plug ahead, all right, are you ready?
Speaker 1: I'm ready, Chuck, Josh, we talked about cheap trick. But
Speaker 1: have you ever heard of another band called the Dixie Chicks. Indeed, yeah,
Speaker 1: so you may remember that back in two thousand three,
Speaker 1: and I believe March or two three, apparently like ten
Speaker 1: days before the US invaded a Rock But when everybody
Speaker 1: knew that the US was about to invade a rock,
Speaker 1: the Dixie Chicks had a concert in London and Um
Speaker 1: on stage Age Uh, the lead singer whose name escapes
Speaker 1: me at the moment, okay, Natalie Um, she Uh basically
Speaker 1: came out and said that they opposed the war, Um,
Speaker 1: and that they they opposed the violence. And then here
Speaker 1: was the kicker that they're a shamed that the President
Speaker 1: of the United States is from Texas. Dixie Chicks are
Speaker 1: also from Texas, but they were saying they're a shamed
Speaker 1: of the president right that this is in London, and
Speaker 1: they still did not have an easy time of it.
Speaker 1: Immediately the international press jumped on it made its way
Speaker 1: back to the United States, and it was war on
Speaker 1: the Dixie Chicks and their lack of patriotism and their disloyalty.
Speaker 1: People held demonstrations where they burned their CDs, and T
Speaker 1: shirts and stuff. Um, and uh, ultimately there was a
Speaker 1: radio group called Clearwater I believe that refused to give
Speaker 1: them any radio play, and uh, it was pretty rough
Speaker 1: going for him. They couldn't get any work or anything
Speaker 1: like that for several years. And I was looking for,
Speaker 1: um something to intro this episode of McCarthyism with. There
Speaker 1: you go, that is new McCarthyism. Yeah, they were blacklisted. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they couldn't get work because they expressed an unpopular, unpatriotic
Speaker 1: sentiment and basically everybody turned on him McCarthy ism almost hysterically.
Speaker 1: One could say they were turned on very good. But
Speaker 1: they're back, baby, The Dixie Chicks are back and better
Speaker 1: than ever. Are they? I don't know. Didn't they do
Speaker 1: like a whole lot of like USO touring and stuff
Speaker 1: to like kind of shake it off? I don't know.
Speaker 1: I think they did. Hooked up with Toby Keith. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that'll do it. That jingoism rubs off on you like
Speaker 1: stank getting near that guy, and you just like start
Speaker 1: to turn red, white and blue. Uh, McCarthyism, Is that
Speaker 1: where we are? Yeah? I think I got us there.
Speaker 1: So where do we start with this man communism? I well,
Speaker 1: let's define McCarthy ism. I mean, that's a pretty good,
Speaker 1: uh modern touchstone, but there's an actual definition of it.
Speaker 1: What does Webster say? Well, what is the American Heritage Dictionary?
Speaker 1: Hey man, Webster is British. You turned to the American
Speaker 1: Heritage Dictionary to look at McCarthy ism. That's right. The
Speaker 1: political practice of publicizing accusations of disloyalty or subversion with
Speaker 1: insufficient regard to evidence. So that's kind of the key there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's basically saying, like, I publicly accuse you of being
Speaker 1: disloyal to this country and not caring about mom and
Speaker 1: apple pie and baseball, and I'm going to tell everybody
Speaker 1: about it, and I do, even though I don't really
Speaker 1: have any real evidence. It's just suspicion. It's rail roading.
Speaker 1: And this was all because of Jenny McCarthy, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: Cormac McCarthy, sure, okay, no, of course, Joseph McCarthy. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was his name, and he was a senator. Should
Speaker 1: we give a little background on this guy? Yeah, born
Speaker 1: in eight If I'm not mistaken, that is right. He's
Speaker 1: a Scannie. He went to Marquette Golden Eagles, Go Golden
Speaker 1: Eagles really, Yeah, you know they're from basketball. No, I
Speaker 1: looked it up. Okay, let's gonna say it's pretty impressive.
Speaker 1: I do know them for basketball though. Uh. He became
Speaker 1: an attorney in ninety five during the Great Depression, and
Speaker 1: became the youngest circuit court judge in Wisconsin history in
Speaker 1: nineteen thirty nine at thirty one. Very young. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: is young for a judge even then, even when old
Speaker 1: timey times, that's right. Uh. Joined the Marines in World
Speaker 1: War Two, but because of a hazing uh incident or accident,
Speaker 1: had a broken foot, so he was I guess discharged years.
Speaker 1: But impressively, he made it to captain in those two years.
Speaker 1: So he's a Marine captain. And he rode that for
Speaker 1: all it was worth, as far as using it to
Speaker 1: get elected to a senate, right he he. In nineteen
Speaker 1: forty four he ran for Senate in Wisconsin and lost,
Speaker 1: but that's where he cultivated his image of tail gunner
Speaker 1: Joe that was his name. Yeah, uh and he uh
Speaker 1: he he just kind of, like you said, wrote that
Speaker 1: military service for all it was worth. Yes, But he
Speaker 1: did win a couple of years later in the nineteen
Speaker 1: forty six and became a junior senator and was sort
Speaker 1: of floundering as a senator as far as making a
Speaker 1: name for himself until he latched onto the idea of, um,
Speaker 1: let's get some attention here and start calling out people
Speaker 1: and in power as is secret communists. Yeah, so he
Speaker 1: had like this two pronged attack. Chucky. It wasn't just
Speaker 1: like calling out these secret communists, it was simultaneously calling
Speaker 1: out the soft liberal establishment that was apparently fine with
Speaker 1: letting communists game position of powers within the U. S. Government,
Speaker 1: which was not true or was it? It's not well
Speaker 1: In in nineteen fifty in West Virginia, he gave a
Speaker 1: speech um on Lincoln's birthday, and he had this list
Speaker 1: of like two hundred and eight names of people who
Speaker 1: worked for the State Department that he said, we're like communists,
Speaker 1: drug addicts, sexual deviance which was a k a for
Speaker 1: being gay, um, and said that these people need to
Speaker 1: be rooted out. And the list was accurate. It had
Speaker 1: been published a few years before by the State Department.
Speaker 1: But he was using it as an example of not
Speaker 1: only are these is this real? Are these people really
Speaker 1: in government power? But the State Department itself published this
Speaker 1: list and these people still work there. So what's going on.
Speaker 1: Let's go get the Communis out of government, okay? And
Speaker 1: Um almost immediately this fervor, this anti communist fervor that
Speaker 1: had just been kind of slumbering and was there and
Speaker 1: taking shape. It was plenty there. People didn't like the
Speaker 1: Communists in the US before McCarthy, but McCarthy came in
Speaker 1: added a level of jingoism to it that just completely
Speaker 1: created this anti communist hysteria in America. Yeah, there's a
Speaker 1: little bit of I don't know about controversy, but back
Speaker 1: and forth about how many people were on this list.
Speaker 1: Uh initially was like he said two oh five, but
Speaker 1: then when he submitted the speech formally to Truman the
Speaker 1: next day or I think two days later, it was
Speaker 1: fifty seven names. And so it's kind of gone back
Speaker 1: and forth over the years on whether it was two
Speaker 1: or five or fifty seven. So I think it was.
Speaker 1: I think the original list that he got his hands
Speaker 1: on and was unedited was two oh five, but possibly
Speaker 1: there's just fifty seven communists on the list and the
Speaker 1: rest were drug addicts or alcoholics or whatever. The irony is,
Speaker 1: Chuck that Um had he been screened by that State
Speaker 1: Department test. He probably would have been on the list
Speaker 1: himself because he was a pronounced alcoholic. Joe McCarthy was.
Speaker 1: And did you know this, he was apparently gay. Uh,
Speaker 1: I've heard that, but there's been no proof of that. No,
Speaker 1: it is conjecture, but there's conjecture that not only was
Speaker 1: he gay, and there was a rumor back in the fifties,
Speaker 1: but not only is there conjecture of he was gay,
Speaker 1: but that his top aide, Roy Kane, and Roy Khne's
Speaker 1: top aide, David Shine, we're gay as well. Well, I
Speaker 1: don't think I think Cone was. Was he definitely gay? Yeah? Okay,
Speaker 1: I mean he died of AIDS in the eighties, not
Speaker 1: that that means you're gay, but I think he was
Speaker 1: known to be gay, and that one was of course,
Speaker 1: uh what's his name to uh j Edgar? Well, yeah,
Speaker 1: so it was weird a weird time. Yeah, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of homosexuals persecuting other homosexuals. Yeah, public office for
Speaker 1: that allegedly. Well I'm curious then, I mean it was
Speaker 1: McCarthy just gay by association because Roy Khne was. I
Speaker 1: don't know, I think it was just never proven, Like
Speaker 1: he dated two of the Kennedy Girls and was married
Speaker 1: later on. Well he got yeah, he got married in
Speaker 1: nine nifty two, right after the first public accusation that
Speaker 1: he was gay was published in a column. So he
Speaker 1: turned around and married a secretary and then they adopted
Speaker 1: a five week old. That's kind of the formula, isn't it.
Speaker 1: I guess so like, oh no, I'm in love with
Speaker 1: my secretary. Look watch this. So whether he was or
Speaker 1: whether he wasn't, it's kind of irrelevant. But it's fun
Speaker 1: to talk about um or is it irrelevant? Well, no,
Speaker 1: it's not, of course not. Okay, all right, Well let's
Speaker 1: let's get back to it. So he uh, he starts
Speaker 1: waiving this list. The list is out there. He's got
Speaker 1: proof that the government's turning its back on known communists
Speaker 1: who work in its own ranks, and um America starts
Speaker 1: just going crazy. Well yeah, and it's it's important to
Speaker 1: know what's going on here at the time. This is
Speaker 1: the second Red Scare. The first one was during World
Speaker 1: War One and after, and it was pretty brutal, like
Speaker 1: jailing people, deporting people with not much evidence. This was
Speaker 1: the second one, and at the time, a couple of
Speaker 1: things had it happened that proceeded a speech. UM, China
Speaker 1: had just been taken over a couple of months earlier
Speaker 1: by communists chairman, very big deal. Uh. The Soviet had
Speaker 1: just exploded their first atomic bomb thanks to the Rosenberg's
Speaker 1: very well we'll get to that too, uh. And uh,
Speaker 1: leaders of the Communist Party of the United States, which
Speaker 1: I think they maxed out at about seventy five thousand
Speaker 1: members at a certain point, which a lot of people
Speaker 1: uh Uh, they had been convicted of conspiring to overthrow
Speaker 1: the government, So people were ready for the speech, which
Speaker 1: it was like just the icing on the cake for
Speaker 1: this fervor. Right. And I think something that's often overlooked
Speaker 1: because all of the blame for this hysteria, if you
Speaker 1: can call it that, even these days, um is late
Speaker 1: at the feet of Joe McCarthy. But he was definitely
Speaker 1: building upon, like you say, something that was already there,
Speaker 1: Like there was the Sedition Act, that's Bionage Act, the
Speaker 1: Alien Registration Act. All these were acts that were passed
Speaker 1: by the U. S Government in response to fear of communists,
Speaker 1: and he figured out how to use them to his
Speaker 1: advantage to root communists out of the country. Basically and
Speaker 1: to make a name for himself. Well, that was part
Speaker 1: of it, might have been a big part of it.
Speaker 1: His big problem was, though, was that, um, it's not
Speaker 1: illegal to be a communist in the United States. Sure
Speaker 1: it is. It's not though, it is illegal thanks to
Speaker 1: the Alien Registration Act to even a bet to basically
Speaker 1: sit by and let somebody try to overthrow the government.
Speaker 1: And that's what they used to arrest the leaders of
Speaker 1: the Communist Party of the United States. Subversion. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: what he was trying to get everybody on. So basically
Speaker 1: he would bring you in front of his Congressional committee
Speaker 1: and just give you the business, basically say admitted. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And the other thing too, though, is like he was
Speaker 1: immediately almost attacked by both political parties for this speech.
Speaker 1: He wasn't. It wasn't like people the president was rallying
Speaker 1: around McCarthy. He didn't get along with Truman or Eisenhower. No,
Speaker 1: Truman was one of his great detractors. Eisenhower was a
Speaker 1: supporter at first, but as we'll see, changed changed sides.
Speaker 1: But yeah, he he found Truman to be a little
Speaker 1: too soft on communists, even though Truman was the one
Speaker 1: who made sure the Alien Registration Act got passed. It's
Speaker 1: a weird time. Yeah, it really was. So should we
Speaker 1: talk about the Rosenberg since you've lobbed that out there?
Speaker 1: I have Julius and Ethel Rosenberg very famously were executed.
Speaker 1: Only Americans ever to be executed for espionage in the
Speaker 1: Cold War period, right now? No, I think Civil War
Speaker 1: had plenty of people executed. First, they hung people left
Speaker 1: and right. Uh, and they were were in fact communists.
Speaker 1: There were known communists and played the Fifth which a
Speaker 1: lot of people did, which ended up biting them all
Speaker 1: in their collective took uses because that was tantamount to
Speaker 1: a lot of people. Is a guilty plea right? And
Speaker 1: of course the Fifth Amendment gives you the right to
Speaker 1: not testify on your own behalf um, to incriminate yourself, Yeah,
Speaker 1: to protect against self incrimination. The problem is is, I
Speaker 1: think even today a lot of people say, well, what
Speaker 1: what do you have to incriminate yourself about? If you
Speaker 1: don't want to say anything, doesn't I mean you have
Speaker 1: something to hide, You're guilty. And that was huge, huge
Speaker 1: during the McCarthy trials that if you played the Fifth
Speaker 1: you're basically saying, like, I'm not admitting to being guilty,
Speaker 1: and everybody said it's guilty. That's true. But however, the
Speaker 1: Rosenberg's um it has been found through the the Venona
Speaker 1: transcripts and those where they they were secret Russian taped
Speaker 1: recordings that were decoded in the forties but held onto
Speaker 1: until what the two thousands when they were released it
Speaker 1: made public. So now that the Venona transcripts are out,
Speaker 1: we know that Ethel McCarty, I'm sorry, Ethel Rosenberg was
Speaker 1: at the most and an accessory to this and not
Speaker 1: you know, a blatant seller of of American secrets her
Speaker 1: husband was guilty of of. Well, here's what this says.
Speaker 1: It says they did not give the Soviets the secret
Speaker 1: of the bomb because they never possessed the secret of
Speaker 1: the bomb, and that there was evidence that Julius was
Speaker 1: passing on information to the KGB, but it was military
Speaker 1: industrial rather than atomic well selling out Boeing, So it's
Speaker 1: not like they were like, yeah, that's great, they were
Speaker 1: just working with the KGB on other things. But the
Speaker 1: fact that they were executed is largely looked on now
Speaker 1: that this has come out as a miscarriage ad justice. Well,
Speaker 1: plus also if they're blamed like in this very article.
Speaker 1: They're blamed for passing along the information that gave the
Speaker 1: Russians the bomb, which live which led to like one
Speaker 1: of the tensest periods in world history. So I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: they I imagine just their reputation, aside from the fact
Speaker 1: that they were executed, just their reputation being tarnished in
Speaker 1: that way. That's kind of a big deal. It was.
Speaker 1: But you mentioned the Venona cables. They were intercepted and
Speaker 1: decoded in the forties. The problem was McCarthy apparently didn't
Speaker 1: have clearance enough to get his hands on these things.
Speaker 1: So this is all the evidence he ever needed, but
Speaker 1: he could never produce it. So what he did instead
Speaker 1: was used really awful bully tactics to intimidate people into
Speaker 1: admitting they were communists. And every single interview, every single
Speaker 1: session was started with the same question, as far as
Speaker 1: I understand, right, yeah, are you hour? Have you ever been?
Speaker 1: I don't even have in front of me what was
Speaker 1: it it is? Are you now or have you ever
Speaker 1: been a member of the Communist Party of the United States.
Speaker 1: That's how I thought you're gonna open the show. By
Speaker 1: the way, no, I was going to talk about the
Speaker 1: dream Police how did you not see that kind of Uh,
Speaker 1: he did all this, it should be known from the
Speaker 1: seat as the chairman of the Senate Committee on Government Operations,
Speaker 1: which um increases level of power. But I think initially
Speaker 1: he was given that position to sort of say, here,
Speaker 1: just go playing that sandbox. Yeah. I don't think they
Speaker 1: realized what power it gave him at the time. He
Speaker 1: was very smart. He knew what he was doing. But
Speaker 1: this was not who Act. No, and let's talk about
Speaker 1: who Act. The House and American Activities Committee, Yes, first
Speaker 1: established in seven and it was established to investigate things
Speaker 1: like espionage, subversion, that kind of thing, including stuff by communists,
Speaker 1: but it also originally investigated subversion by the right and
Speaker 1: the left. And it was a house and he was
Speaker 1: a senator. Yeah, so that's why a lot of people,
Speaker 1: I think I still think that he was the chairman
Speaker 1: of who Act, but that's not the game. Well he
Speaker 1: how did he use it? Then? I think they worked
Speaker 1: in concert. That's the best I could figure out. And
Speaker 1: I was looking at that, I was like, well, why
Speaker 1: is it always talking about who because they were involved
Speaker 1: in the blacklist of Hollywood. But he was heading up
Speaker 1: that thing, so so I guess maybe it was just
Speaker 1: kind of hand in hand, like you say, working in concert,
Speaker 1: because the blacklist of Hollywood happened three years before he
Speaker 1: even gave his speech in West Virginia. How was that
Speaker 1: when it started? Yeah? Um, well WHO ACT, the House
Speaker 1: and American Activities Committee I was started in the seven
Speaker 1: by UM. Like I said, they investigated the right and
Speaker 1: the left, but they never investigated the clan because apparently
Speaker 1: the three guys who were in power of the WHO ACT,
Speaker 1: we're all clan sympathizers, if not members. So the clan
Speaker 1: never got investigated, but everybody else did, including the communists.
Speaker 1: And it was already UM sniffed out as uh so
Speaker 1: really um, insincere political tool, that's how it was being used.
Speaker 1: And uh there was a guy who was the head
Speaker 1: of the Progressives and he basically said, you guys are
Speaker 1: using this committee as a way to wrap the flag
Speaker 1: over your grease stained togas um and and you never
Speaker 1: have to you never have to explain your vote because
Speaker 1: all you can do you can oppose anything. You can
Speaker 1: oppose labor unions, you can oppose the farmer, you can
Speaker 1: oppose anything you want and never have to answer for
Speaker 1: it because you just say that you're fighting the communists,
Speaker 1: and well, the labor unions was a big part of
Speaker 1: the first Red Scare was the rise of the labor
Speaker 1: unions and all these strikes going on. And people are
Speaker 1: like the labor parties, they're they're communists, right exactly, But
Speaker 1: that's how it happens. Like basically they say the Labor
Speaker 1: Party communism, same thing. The American public doesn't put too
Speaker 1: installed into it, buys it. And now still to this
Speaker 1: day people people compare the two. It's sad, it's left
Speaker 1: an indelible mark. You could say it has um And
Speaker 1: like you said, he was an intimidator, threatened prison, no
Speaker 1: evidence or very little evidence, and he would attack people,
Speaker 1: release names publicly, and ruin people's lives without any recourse.
Speaker 1: Uh except that in seven the Supreme Court ruled that
Speaker 1: constitutional rights of witnesses were guaranteed during a congressional investigation,
Speaker 1: even though it's not court. So they got along in
Speaker 1: the books thankfully thanks to him. Yeah, um yeah. Apparently
Speaker 1: McCarthy's big problem was he had good information, just no evidence.
Speaker 1: Like he got all of his information from the FBI,
Speaker 1: from Hoover's FBI, but it was basically just here staying
Speaker 1: conjecture that was right. There's just no evidence to back
Speaker 1: it up. So yeah, he just used to try to
Speaker 1: beat people over the head and intimidate them into agreeing,
Speaker 1: and it worked a lot of times. It had worked
Speaker 1: before too, when Hollywood was blacklisted. UM, there was Do
Speaker 1: you want to talk about Hollywood? Yeah, let's let's do it.
Speaker 1: This is the most interesting part to me as a
Speaker 1: movie guy. UM. So we were talking about how there
Speaker 1: was this blacklist that was created. There's an official version,
Speaker 1: as I understand, right, an official blacklist? Is there? Or
Speaker 1: was it all unofficial? Um? No? I mean like three
Speaker 1: people were on it, but there's some like Orson Welles
Speaker 1: was supposedly on it and Charlie Chaplin, but I don't
Speaker 1: think that was proven or maybe I'm wrong. I couldn't
Speaker 1: find found a list of people, but I don't know
Speaker 1: if there was an official list passed around. There probably was.
Speaker 1: So basically there was. Um there was a pamphlet called
Speaker 1: Red Channels and it was put together by um, some
Speaker 1: FBI guys and a producer in Hollywood, a right leaning producer,
Speaker 1: and it was a blacklist. It was basically the blacklist, UM,
Speaker 1: and it was distributed to everybody in the entertainment industry,
Speaker 1: and basically, if your name was on there, to get work,
Speaker 1: you had to go appear before the House on American
Speaker 1: Activities Committee or McCarthy and clear your name and then
Speaker 1: you could get work again. Or name names. Name names,
Speaker 1: and a lot of people did, like Lee J. Cobb,
Speaker 1: great actor and twelve Angry Men. He named names. He
Speaker 1: apparently put up a heck of a fight for a
Speaker 1: while and then finally said, like, my family's starving, and
Speaker 1: I thought about it. I'm not willing to die for this,
Speaker 1: so here's some names. And then he named some names,
Speaker 1: and some of those people would name some more names,
Speaker 1: and people were naming names. Other people were going to Europe,
Speaker 1: like Check Baker. He was on the list because he
Speaker 1: was gay, as far as I understand, so he went
Speaker 1: to Europe and never came back to the US. I believe. Yeah,
Speaker 1: chaplain went overseas to get work too. Um. Elijah Elliot
Speaker 1: Kazan very famously named names. Director Legendary Director on the
Speaker 1: Waterfront named eight names of people that, uh, we're already
Speaker 1: known to be communists. So that was his reasoning, was
Speaker 1: I gotta save my career I'm not willing to go
Speaker 1: down for this. They already know these people, so I'm
Speaker 1: just gonna name those eight. And he was did you
Speaker 1: watch the Officers in two thousand two when he got
Speaker 1: his honorary award. It was divisive, to say the least.
Speaker 1: They brought him out there. I think um Scorcese and
Speaker 1: de Niro brought him out and um they showed reaction
Speaker 1: shot to the crowd, some people standing and cheering, and
Speaker 1: then like Ed Harris and Amy Madigan like sitting there scowling,
Speaker 1: and like Nick Nulty sitting on his hands. Yeah, you
Speaker 1: don't want to take off. She's mean. But so yeah,
Speaker 1: that was really divisive. Um before the Blacklist though, or
Speaker 1: I don't know if it was before the Blacklist, but
Speaker 1: the Hollywood Ten we're very famous because they were ten screenwriters.
Speaker 1: I think one was a I think nine of the
Speaker 1: ten were screenwriters. One was a director. But they always
Speaker 1: picked on the writers, it seems like. But they were
Speaker 1: questioned by McCarthy and said, we're not cooperating. We're gonna
Speaker 1: claim our First Amendment right to free speech. And eight
Speaker 1: were sentenced to a year in prison, to who received
Speaker 1: six month sentences and out of the black list, and
Speaker 1: that was the Waldorf Statement, very famously was issued. Um,
Speaker 1: the head of the m p a A met with
Speaker 1: basically the member of every major Hollywood studio behind closed doors,
Speaker 1: developed their blacklist, released the Waldorf statement because it was
Speaker 1: at Waldorf Historia and said, uh, these people aren't gonna
Speaker 1: work again, and hear their names, and I think only
Speaker 1: at the end, out of the three hundred and something,
Speaker 1: only about ten percent ever like worked again. It's so sad,
Speaker 1: Burgess Meredith, he was on the list. He worked again.
Speaker 1: He was great in the Rocky movies. Oh and Batman.
Speaker 1: Yeah remember the point um so zero Mustel he was
Speaker 1: on there. He was creating the Producers pizza here he
Speaker 1: was folk singer. Uh so. Um. There were like real
Speaker 1: repercussions of this, not just you know, basically a single
Speaker 1: senator deciding that he was going to interpret the Constitution
Speaker 1: anyway liked um, not just whipping up this fear among
Speaker 1: the average American person. Um, but there were people whose
Speaker 1: careers were ruined, whose lives were ruined, who who just
Speaker 1: lost their livelihoods because they went to a Communist meeting
Speaker 1: or something ten years before or maybe even we're communists.
Speaker 1: Probably The big problem with this is um McCarthy took
Speaker 1: a really iron rand esque approach to this, where he
Speaker 1: kind of interpreted allowing Hollywood to bows any kind of
Speaker 1: um communist ideas as a moral crime, just like um
Speaker 1: you know, recently, Congress tried to go after um MPR
Speaker 1: for having liberal bias. They were going to cut off
Speaker 1: its funding. It's very randy in where it's a moral
Speaker 1: crime to support something that's trying to destroy you, and
Speaker 1: McCarthy definitely had that that viewpoint, and I think that's
Speaker 1: why he was going after Hollywood himself or at least
Speaker 1: supporting it well, because yeah, they were supposedly making movies
Speaker 1: that subversively, you know, supported communism. But the problem is
Speaker 1: is that's going after the intellectuals. He's not going after
Speaker 1: the spies any longer. He's going after communist thinkers, like
Speaker 1: people who aren't trying to overthrow the government. They just
Speaker 1: think communism is a better idea, and that's when that's
Speaker 1: it's going after spies. I don't think anybody really has
Speaker 1: a problem with that, but he went well beyond that.
Speaker 1: So that, combined with his tactics, have basically smeared his
Speaker 1: name through the mud. For the rest of history. It's true. Uh,
Speaker 1: if you're interested in some good movies on on the
Speaker 1: Blacklist era Guilty by Suspicion as one DeNiro really good movie,
Speaker 1: and good Night and good Luck of course, which was awesome,
Speaker 1: or just read The Crucible that was great. Arthur Miller
Speaker 1: famously in nineteen fifty three wrote a play that was
Speaker 1: a very thinly veiled attack on McCarthy is m by
Speaker 1: way of the Uh. The portal was the the witch Hunts,
Speaker 1: the Salem witch Trials switch. It's basically like, here's what's
Speaker 1: going on now, Goodie McCarthy right, Surprisingly didn't just outright
Speaker 1: say it. Um. Also he went after Um books too.
Speaker 1: He apparently had people scan the libraries for books that
Speaker 1: contain anti American sentiments. They identified thirty thousand titles and
Speaker 1: purged libraries of these books. What a jerk, so Um said,
Speaker 1: you said it, so chuck this guy. At one point
Speaker 1: in for it his peak, there was a poll taken
Speaker 1: that found it was a gallop pole. So you know
Speaker 1: that's quality. Uh. Fifty percent of the American people had
Speaker 1: a favorable opinion of McCarthy, Like I don't think Ronald
Speaker 1: Reagan even ever had. Yeah, and everybody loved Uncle Ronnie. Well,
Speaker 1: that was in January, that same pole taken in June.
Speaker 1: I saw that number of fall tot for very good reason.
Speaker 1: What happened, What happened. What happened was he made the well,
Speaker 1: he didn't make the mistake. Uh President Eisenhower. For the
Speaker 1: very first time in broadcast history, he said, let's broadcast
Speaker 1: these hearings and this at this time, it wasn't the
Speaker 1: Hollywood Blacklist hearings. That was the his war on the Army. Yeah,
Speaker 1: which is a bad move to do when your president
Speaker 1: is a decorated general from the last war, like five
Speaker 1: years before. Yeah. It was called the Army McCarthy hearings,
Speaker 1: broadcast in nineteen fifty four on live television, and after
Speaker 1: some one of a mundane start to the hearings, he
Speaker 1: started accusing very heavily decorated and respected Army officers of
Speaker 1: not being fit to wear the uniform. He told Brigadier
Speaker 1: General Ralph Wicker, he compared him mentally to a five
Speaker 1: year old, said he was a disgrace to the uniform.
Speaker 1: And then everyone watching this on TV, it's like, wait
Speaker 1: a minute, wait, this is what he's been doing. This
Speaker 1: guy is a total jerk. Yeah, because before they were UM,
Speaker 1: there were transcripts and there were minutes, but they were classified. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well they weren't out. The media was also very sympathetic,
Speaker 1: so they're portraying everything in a real light. So basically
Speaker 1: Eisenhower was like, I'm gonna give you a little rope
Speaker 1: and I think you'll go hang yourself with it, and
Speaker 1: he did, UM, and the American public turned on him
Speaker 1: like crazy Truman or I'm sorry, not Truman, but Eisenhower.
Speaker 1: UM also instructed as Vice President Richard Nixon to go
Speaker 1: speak vaguely but publicly against McCarthy, which he did, which
Speaker 1: gave the media tested approval to go after McCarthy. Gave
Speaker 1: who the media, but who did he get to? Nixon?
Speaker 1: Nixon was Eisenhower's VP, and Nix him out there was like,
Speaker 1: oh okay, I love the UM and he uh yeah.
Speaker 1: After that, the floodgates open and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: everybody was all against McCarthy because basically Nixon had been
Speaker 1: like a government against McCarthy too, and the Army started
Speaker 1: feeding the media. Army intelligence had dirt McCarthy. He used
Speaker 1: his office or tried to unsuccessfully UM to influence the
Speaker 1: army to keep from drafting um David Shine, Roy Cohn's
Speaker 1: lover or aid um. And it didn't work. And then
Speaker 1: once he was drafted, they he used he tried to
Speaker 1: use his influence again to get the army to take
Speaker 1: it easy on the guy so that he wouldn't go
Speaker 1: into battle. Um. So they released that to the media.
Speaker 1: So this guy who's like, you know, smearing decorated army
Speaker 1: generals on TV right, has has tried to use his
Speaker 1: power to keep somebody else from having to serve. That
Speaker 1: didn't play very well either. So basically they centure him, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: they said, you know what, uh, we don't like you anymore.
Speaker 1: I think that's the official statement, because we don't like
Speaker 1: you anymore. Um cruel and reckless. And he was centered
Speaker 1: by a vote of sixty to twenty two. Originally in
Speaker 1: nineteen there were forty six charges of abuse of legislative power,
Speaker 1: but they reduced that to two. Or they only centured
Speaker 1: him onto because they didn't want to appear like there
Speaker 1: were big softies on communism. They were trying to strike
Speaker 1: the right balance of getting him out of there without
Speaker 1: looking like there you know, commues themselves. Um. So He
Speaker 1: remained uh in office at least for a little while
Speaker 1: longer um, but at age forty eight in nineteen fifty seven,
Speaker 1: he died of acute hepatitis from alcohol abuse. If you're
Speaker 1: forty eight and you die from alcohol abuse, then you've
Speaker 1: been drinking since you were one and a half. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he said. Apparently read some biography a bit that said
Speaker 1: that he when he was on the wagon, that meant
Speaker 1: he just drank beer and didn't drink whiskey. So when
Speaker 1: he quit drinking, that meant he only drank beer. He
Speaker 1: was like Dennis Hopper and Hoosiers, except in the Senate.
Speaker 1: Very powerful. Wait, so he was like Ted Kennedy. Well,
Speaker 1: he was actually a friend of the Kennedy's, which is
Speaker 1: weird because Kennedy's were very liberal obviously, but he was Catholic.
Speaker 1: He identified with the Kennedy's because they were Catholic. Joseph
Speaker 1: Kennedy was big anti communist, and he thought, Hey, if
Speaker 1: I can help this guy get into office, then that
Speaker 1: will be a good road paved for other Catholics. Like
Speaker 1: my son's Johnny, like my Johnny, my Bobby, and like
Speaker 1: I said earlier, he dated two of the daughters supposedly
Speaker 1: and um, well not supposedly he did. I just don't
Speaker 1: know what went on on those dates. And um uh
Speaker 1: John Kennedy was very quiet about this whole thing. He
Speaker 1: never came out and attacked him because Uh McCarthy was
Speaker 1: very uh had a lot of sway in campaigning against
Speaker 1: Democrats and elections, and he never did that too to
Speaker 1: John F. Kennedy. So Kennedy kind of laid off when
Speaker 1: it came time to attack McCarthy. And I think Bobby
Speaker 1: Kennedy actually worked with him. Well, that was another abuse,
Speaker 1: Like basically he used this whole hysteria and the power
Speaker 1: given to him by by targeting New Deal Democrats and
Speaker 1: basically helping further Republican policies rather than going after the communists. Yeah.
Speaker 1: He he was quoted at one time saying that Democrats
Speaker 1: uh had been operating on quote twenty years of treason.
Speaker 1: He accused them of being treasonist Democrats and Truman um
Speaker 1: once referred to him as the best asset the Kremlin
Speaker 1: has and said he was out the set abotage with
Speaker 1: the foreign policy of the United States. So man, they
Speaker 1: were not. They did. He did not get along with anyone,
Speaker 1: so chuck outside of his group. Of course, here's the kicker,
Speaker 1: as shamed and publicly humiliated and just kicked to the curb.
Speaker 1: Joseph McCarthy. The big jerk was he was writing a
Speaker 1: lot of instances. He was in a way. Um, I
Speaker 1: have a historian on my on my speed dial named
Speaker 1: John Earl Haynes. He went over the Venona transcripts and
Speaker 1: his conclusion was that out of a hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: nine people identified by McCarthy, nine of them were aiding
Speaker 1: Soviet espionage efforts. And he said a majority of those
Speaker 1: could legitimately have been considered risks, but a substantial minority
Speaker 1: could not. So he said he has nine people, which
Speaker 1: included a captain in the navy, Uh, Davy, he was
Speaker 1: still in the Navy, And imagine he would be for
Speaker 1: life to two atomic spies, someone who held meetings with
Speaker 1: Churchill and Roosevelt. Yeah, who who is that? I don't know.
Speaker 1: I couldn't find out. I'm very curious. Um, and somebody
Speaker 1: who held the top office in today's equivalent of the
Speaker 1: c I A, oh yeah, it also says ten senior
Speaker 1: level officials. Uh. We're also later shown to have had
Speaker 1: Communist ties. Even though they weren't necessarily a security risk, right,
Speaker 1: so there were a Um, you can also make the
Speaker 1: case that if you cast a wide enough net, you're
Speaker 1: gonna catch some some tuna along with the sea spiders.
Speaker 1: As the old saying goes, Yeah, it's it's still divided
Speaker 1: like some people and culture loves the guy now and said,
Speaker 1: you know, history has shown that he was right about it.
Speaker 1: All is. She's still around. Yeah, she's alive. Okay, well
Speaker 1: what do you what do you think having to her?
Speaker 1: I just thought she fell off the radar. Oh, I
Speaker 1: don't know. Okay, she's not on my radar, but I'm
Speaker 1: sure she's on somebody's radar. She's on Bill Mar's radar.
Speaker 1: She's on um oh man, Ted Nugent's radar. Really yeah, man,
Speaker 1: he used to uh he he would guest host for
Speaker 1: Neil Boort's years back. And I heard her on his
Speaker 1: show once and um, He's like, I'm look, I'm just
Speaker 1: a guitar player. And she stopped him. She's like, I
Speaker 1: love it when you say that. It was like really wow.
Speaker 1: Like I was like, if I were Ted Nugent's wife,
Speaker 1: I'd be mad. Right now. That's a little creepy. You
Speaker 1: got anything else? No, So in this episode, if you
Speaker 1: come across the stuff, you should know quiz that mentions
Speaker 1: the McCarthy ism episode. The four bands that made an
Speaker 1: appearance were Cheap Trick Yep, the Dixie Chicks, Billy Joel,
Speaker 1: and Ted Nugent. You knew, I don't know. The Billy
Speaker 1: Joel that was a cheap one. It was good. It
Speaker 1: was good man. Um. So that's about it for McCarthy ism.
Speaker 1: It's still alive today. Instead of communists, we know, target
Speaker 1: Muslims what a lot of people say, um, and the
Speaker 1: Dixie Chicks Muslims in the Dixie Chicks. Basically anybody who
Speaker 1: opposes America invading other countries. That's the new McCarthy ism.
Speaker 1: All right. Um, I could throw an r M reference
Speaker 1: in there already I already said it. We're not gonna
Speaker 1: exum him what exuming McCarthy's r M? Oh is it? Well?
Speaker 1: How did you wait this long to throw that in?
Speaker 1: I don't know. I just think it would be a
Speaker 1: little cheerry on top. All right, So the five bands
Speaker 1: are Cheap Trick, Billy Joel, Dixie Chicks, Uh, Ted Nugent
Speaker 1: in r E M. But Ted nugent was in r
Speaker 1: A M so oh Man. Anyway, just go type in
Speaker 1: McCarthy ism and c C A R T H y
Speaker 1: I s M into the search part hows to first
Speaker 1: dot com and that will bring up new stuff that
Speaker 1: we didn't even touch on, um, including factual errors about
Speaker 1: such groups as the Rosenberg family. Uh and I said
Speaker 1: search part how stuff works dot com, which means it's
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