THE ROBERT W. WHITAKER ARCHIVE

LEFTIST MCCARTHYISM IS ALIVE AND WELL AND LOVED BY ALL | 2001-06-16

What the Evil Senator McCarthy did was called "guilt by association." He would ask witnesses if they were or ever had been members of the Communist Party. This question brings out gasps of horror today.

McCarthy would quote people's many pro-Communist statements. He would list their Communist associates who were Party members. He would point out their memberships in Communist Front organizations.

This sort of "guilt by association" is now condemned, BUT ONLY IF IT IS USED BY THE RIGHT AGAINST COMMUNISTS.

On the other hand, it is always open season on anybody who ever said anything Politically Incorrect.

Nixon nominee Judge Haynesworth was denied Supreme Court confirmation in the early 1970s. His crime was that he had made a segregationist speech thirty years before in his native Florida.

Actually, a lot of the senators who voted against him had made the same kind of speech in the late 1940's. But, like all conservatives, they were more anxious to lynch Haynesworth than the liberals were.

We are all familiar with leftist McCarthyism today.

Anything Politically Incorrect you did fifty years ago years is the latest news. In the case of Thomas Jefferson, the passage of two centuries is no excuse.

And nobody supports leftist McCarthyism more fanatically than do respectable conservatives. Anything leftists declare "racist" brings out the respectable lynch mob.

And each year, the term "extremist" is applied to people who are less and less far right. If you oppose open borders today, both "neoconservatives" and liberals join together to call you a racist. That label is now applied to opponents of affirmative action and busing. It applies to English Only advocates.

What is happening is exactly what any person who knows political strategy would expect. The respectable right has given the "extremist" weapon to the left, and the left is using it more every day.

Today the term "extremist" is applied to Bush's Federal Court nominees. They never uttered a Politically Incorrect word in their whole careers, but the label now sticks.