Posted on 11/02/2005 4:17:07 PM PST by SJackson
Joe McCarthy hated The Capital Times and The Capital Times hated Joe McCarthy.
The red-baiting Republican senator from Wisconsin used to refer to this newspaper as "the Pravda of the Prairie" - and in the Cold War era when he was running roughshod over civil liberties, McCarthy's attempts to portray this newspaper as a tool of the Soviet Union were dangerous accusations indeed. They were, as well, untrue. The man who ran The Capital Times during the McCarthy era, William T. Evjue, was not "the red editor" that the senator so feverishly denounced.
Rather, Evjue was a journalist in the mold that Thomas Jefferson and James Madison intended when they wrote that "freedom of the press" protection into the Bill of Rights. The wisest of the founders of this country recognized that, for the American democratic experiment to succeed, leaders would need to be held accountable. They did not trust opposition parties to always do the job, so they empowered the press to strike blows against those who were corrupted by power.
Unfortunately, in McCarthy's time - as in the current era - the men who ran the media were, generally, lacking in courage.
Tonight, with a free showing of actor George Clooney's new film, "Good Night, and Good Luck," we will recall the fight against McCarthy and McCarthyism by celebrating the challenge that CBS newsman Edward R. Murrow posed to McCarthy in a 1954 national television broadcast.
In a speech to the CBS staff before that broadcast, Murrow said to his fellow journalists, "No one can terrorize a whole nation, unless we are all his accomplices." He was right, and there is no question that Murrow's blunt criticism of McCarthy's dishonest attacks on loyal Americans who did not share his right-wing views regarding foreign policy played a critical role in bringing down the man who used his Senate seat to destroy people's careers and silence dissent.
But it is important to remember that Murrow's challenge came not at the beginning of the McCarthy era but in the midst of "the red scare." The veteran journalist was breaking ranks with the national media elites who had for the better part of a decade been accomplices to McCarthy's reign of terror.
Even in Wisconsin, where there was broad popular opposition to McCarthy, most of the media backed the senator. He was a favorite of the Milwaukee Sentinel and the Wisconsin State Journal. And media outlets, including The Capital Times and The Progressive, that challenged his lies - beginning with Capital Times editorials published in 1946 - were condemned for their "disloyalty."
Only over time did it become clear that the critics of McCarthy were the patriots.
There is an important lesson here for the contemporary moment. The Capital Times and a handful of other publications - including The Progressive and The Nation - were called disloyal in 2002 when they revealed that the Bush administration's "case" for war with Iraq was based on lies. Now, as the White House scrambles to manage a scandal that evolved from the attempt of Vice President Dick Cheney's office to defend those lies, many in the media are criticizing the administration.
It is good that they are doing so. But, as Clooney pointed out when he explained why he made "Good Night, and Good Luck," it is essential that the media challenge those in power not just when they have stumbled but also when they are strong. For the most part, American media failed to mount that challenge when the Bush administration was steering this country into the quagmire that is Iraq.
And we are still looking for the Edward R. Murrow of today - the national broadcast journalist who will pierce the bodyguard of lies and tell the people that this administration has attacked not just Iraq but America.
The Capital Times, still red after all these years.
Even in Wisconsin, where there was broad popular opposition to McCarthy, most of the media backed the senator. He was a favorite of the Milwaukee Sentinel and the Wisconsin State Journal. And media outlets, including The Capital Times and The Progressive, that challenged his lies - beginning with Capital Times editorials published in 1946 - were condemned for their "disloyalty."
I wonder if the editorial writers know what century we're in?
McCarthy was right. Communists in America are real pukers.
No one has yet to prove McCarthy wrong about anyone he accused. The reds DID have the government thoroughly penetrated. Joe's only fault was that he didn't work hard enough exposing the commies in the media and academia.
You can see the result of that failure today in just about every university and college in American, and at most major news organizations.
Fox, WaTimes, NY Post, and some others excepted.
The Capital Crimes is still one of the foremost Anti-American Rags in the the USA.
I think as the Soviet Union has allowed some of it's formerly secret files to be made public, it is clear that McCarthy was basically right.
I suspect the new movie will simply be Commies patting themselves on the back.
Boy, Wisconsin sure isn't short on Bolsheviks.
"The red-baiting Republican senator from Wisconsin used to refer to this newspaper as "the Pravda of the Prairie"
I've always been sort of amused, that socialists continue to refer to McCarthy as being a "red baiter," while continuing to deny that there were any "reds" to bait.
McCarthy is so hated by the left because he was implying that their gods were evil and he was making it harder for their gods to operate.
Dec. 13, 1917 - from the first editorial in his newspaper The Capital Times
They should take their own rhetoric to heart.
Joseph McCarthy exposed the Left for what it was, which is why the Left has never stopped hating him.
Tell me about it.
My grandma knew McCarthy. Said that he was a nice guy.
Yes, so nice that he was Godfather to one of Robert Kennedy's kids.
There are probably more Alger Hiss's now than they were in the McCarthy era due to out of control political correctness.
Yeah, but patriots for whom?
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