The term refers to U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy and has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from 1947 to 1956 and characterized by heightened political repression as well as a campaign spreading fear of Communist influence on American institutions and of espionage by Soviet agents. There was no "heightened political repression" in this country unless you were a Soviet agent or a fellow traveler. And from what we now know, we shouldn't have been scared during the Second Red Scare--we should have been downright terrified. For more information on the era, I would recommend reading the following books:
- Andrew,Christopher, and Vasili Mitrokhin, The Sword and the Shield. (London: Penguin, 2009)
- Haynes, Johgn Earl, and Harvey Klehr, VENONA: Decoding Soviet Espionage in America. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale, 1995)
- Klehr, Harvey, The Secret World of American Communism. (New Haven, Conn.: Yale, 1995)
- Sudoplatov, Pavel, Special Tasks. (Bston: Little, Brown, 1994)
- Trenear-Harvey, Glenmore S., Historical Dictionary of Atomic Espionage. (Lanham, Md.:, Scarecrow, 2011)
- Weinstein, Allen, The Haunted Wood: Soviet Espionage in America--The Stalin Era. (New York: Random House, 1999)