McCarthy was an Irish Catholic. Until not long before his Senate runs, he was still a Democrat as most Irish Catholics were. The Wisconsin Democrat party had generally been the weak party. The state was dominated by the Socialist La Follettes who used the Republican Party as a vehicle for their agenda. In the 1930s, the La Follettes split entirely from the Republicans to form the WI Progressive Party. It was during that period that a young McCarthy was a Democrat. With the rise of the WI Republicans again by the late '30s and early '40s over the Progressives, McCarthy then switched to the GOP. The Democrats had reason to worry that if one of their most valuable bloc voters, Catholics, left the party for the GOP, this could have disastrous consequences nationally.
When McCarthy, on his second try for the Senate in 1946, managed to upend Sen. Robert La Follette, Jr. after he returned to the GOP in the Senate primary, it was nothing short of a revolution in WI. Junior La Follette didn't take losing very well and ended up committing suicide not long after. McCarthy was a dangerous figure to the Democrats on a number of fronts: he was very popular to the working class Catholics, and secondly when he began to take on the cause of the Soviet infiltration of the government and their sympathizers. He was also using his newfound celebrity to take down left-wing Democrats in the Senate, many of whom were supported by anti-American interests. He was also not well-regarded by the elitist establishment wing of the GOP, which had grown more and more comfortable with Socialism in the post-1932 era.
"I know that’s exactly what I would have done had I been them and I been opportunistic since that’s EXACTLY what most Democrats did. In fact, the vast majority of the Democrats, even Harry Truman, who was painted as a hardliner against Communism, practically turned on McCarthy like a used car. The fact that JFK actually sided with him, AGAINST the rest of his party, would strongly suggest he isn’t opportunistic, or at least, he’s less opportunistic than most other members of the party. I know if I were one of those other democrats and operated under their viewpoint, then Irish Catholic Democrats in Massachusetts or not, I would have probably gone out of my way to ensure he got tarred and feathered, NOT defend him even when the rest of the democrat party is against me, because that’s exactly how the others acted during that time, again, including even Harry Truman."
And yet it was raw opportunism that motivated the Kennedys in linking themselves to Joe McCarthy. As I said, in the early '50s, McCarthy was a hero to Irish Catholic Democrats, especially in Massachusetts. At that time, Jack Kennedy was a Congressman trying to distinguish himself. His paternal grandfather, John Fitzgerald, had also been a Congressman and ran against the grandfather of Lodge, Henry Cabot, Sr. in 1916 for Senator. Politics in Massachusetts had been largely divided between the Protestant Republican Brahmins and Irish Catholic Democrats. When the then-heavily Whig Massachusetts in the 1850s saw the collapse of that party, many members briefly utilized the anti-Catholic Know-Nothing Party for the interim before the Republican Party was officially organized. Because of this, it bitterly divided the two religious groups. The Protestants feared the incoming Catholics would eventually outpopulate and outvote them in time, which eventually happened. The 1916 race was a warning of things to come. The corrupt, but affable Honey Fitz vs. the stalwart Conservative Lodge Sr. The most serious warning came in 1928 when reliably Republican Massachusetts repudiated Herbert Hoover for NY Irish Catholic Al Smith for President (as did neighboring Rhode Island, which also was heavily GOP, but with a burgeoning Catholic population).
Curiously, Rhode Island Republicans could see the writing on the wall and ran a Quebec-born French Canadian Catholic for Senator in 1928 against an incumbent Democrat, Felix Hebert (same name as a future long-time Democrat Congressman from Louisiana, though no relation). Even as Hoover lost RI, Hebert took the Senate seat and went to DC. Massachusetts, tightly controlled by the GOP Brahmins, largely failed to begin to make inroads into the Catholic population, which remained overwhelmingly Democrat. Flash forward to 1952 and Kennedy is making his run against Cabot, Jr... It would've been unimaginable for JFK to go against Joe McCarthy in Massachusetts, even if national Democrats despised him. In this case, religion was thicker than party. Cabot, Jr. was not seen as a particular ally of McCarthy, he was regarded more as the rabble of the Democrat opposition in his state. But former Ambassador Joseph Kennedy realized that it would be McCarthy that would turn the race. His son would ride on McCarthy's popularity in the state to victory, despite his being a Republican. They cultivated Joe in every way possible (Bobby, of course, went to work for him). Had he repudiated McCarthy, JFK would not have won in 1952, it's that simple. Although ultimately McCarthy gave a tepid endorsement (solely due to party) to Lodge, there was already the appearance that a JFK win would not be seen as a "bad" thing. Lodge's problem, too, was that he had jettisoned the old Conservative politics of his grandfather and was a trendy young liberal. Between that and the religious politics of the state, it allowed for the toppling of the Republican majority, and Massachusetts would rapidly move to the Democrat party control (and ultimately, leftward).
I'll add, too, that when the attacks against McCarthy by the usual suspects began to take its toll on his popularity and when it came time for the "censure" vote against him in 1954, JFK made sure he was conveniently out of the Senate so that he wouldn't have to vote. Opportunism and cowardice. If he voted against censure, he would've been severely damaged as a future Democrat Presidential candidate nationally. If he voted for it, he would've been voting against the wishes of his Irish Catholic base, who viewed the attacks on McCarthy because of his religion.
"I can name quite a few liberal people who stood against it regardless of party ties: Jack Nicholson, for starters, is liberal enough that he spoke glowingly of Cuba under Castro of all places, and you’d be surprised to learn that he’s actually one of the more pro-life of them, especially when he himself nearly ended up aborted. Same goes for Martin Sheen, who actually went as far as to avoid associating himself with Barack Obama precisely BECAUSE of the latter’s pro-Abortion stance, and part of the reason he was against Obama’s pro abortion stance was because he was also Catholic. And let’s not forget Randall Terry, who is explicitly a Democrat, yet has even gone to jail to push the pro-life message, campaigned on it. And bear in mind, Nicholson and Sheen are both current and very openly left-wing in various issues. If they can speak out against abortion even today, let alone presumably back then, I’m pretty sure JFK would do the same, period, even if he is leftist. There’s even a whole list of them compiled here, and with footnotes as well:"
But celebrities are still not elected officials. If their power and influence were at stake as elected officials, I guarantee they would've changed their tune or be kicked out of office. In the scope of things, Nicholson, Sheen and Terry were not particularly influential political figures. Again, if you think JFK would've been a pro-lifer had he lived into the '70s and '80s (or '90s), I think you're fooling yourself. He was always going to eventually go with the prevailing party opinion. You might have a point had Teddy defended life issues, but that got in the way with appealing to the radical feminist lobby. It would've been no different with JFK.
Friends...
These inane arguments about Kennedy, Confederates, what time the ‘News At 6’ comes on etc., are pointless.
Like I said to one of you offline: “It’s not worth wresting with the f**ktarded.”.
“McCarthy was an Irish Catholic. Until not long before his Senate runs, he was still a Democrat as most Irish Catholics were. The Wisconsin Democrat party had generally been the weak party. The state was dominated by the Socialist La Follettes who used the Republican Party as a vehicle for their agenda. In the 1930s, the La Follettes split entirely from the Republicans to form the WI Progressive Party. It was during that period that a young McCarthy was a Democrat. With the rise of the WI Republicans again by the late ‘30s and early ‘40s over the Progressives, McCarthy then switched to the GOP. The Democrats had reason to worry that if one of their most valuable bloc voters, Catholics, left the party for the GOP, this could have disastrous consequences nationally.
When McCarthy, on his second try for the Senate in 1946, managed to upend Sen. Robert La Follette, Jr. after he returned to the GOP in the Senate primary, it was nothing short of a revolution in WI. Junior La Follette didn’t take losing very well and ended up committing suicide not long after. McCarthy was a dangerous figure to the Democrats on a number of fronts: he was very popular to the working class Catholics, and secondly when he began to take on the cause of the Soviet infiltration of the government and their sympathizers. He was also using his newfound celebrity to take down left-wing Democrats in the Senate, many of whom were supported by anti-American interests. He was also not well-regarded by the elitist establishment wing of the GOP, which had grown more and more comfortable with Socialism in the post-1932 era.”
Again, Barack Obama ran as a black man during the 2008 and 2012 elections, and despite doing everything he can while in office to completely screw over his representative block in favor of far left donors, he still managed to win re-election in the latter. I’m pretty sure JFK would have pulled something similar if he were truly opportunistic, like how Obama opportunistically backstabbed his so-called fellow blacks, or how the Congressional Black Caucus repeatedly backstabbed their fellow blacks in favor of far left positions, and continue to be voted back in again and again.
And for the record, McCarthy during the McCarthyist period, in fact, during all two terms of his time in the Senate, was actually a Republican, which is the most important point, especially among Democrats (take Nixon for example: It didn’t matter to them that he capitulated to their demands and implemented leftist policies such as Title 4 or created the EPA, they still wanted his blood for exposing Alger Hiss as a Communist to be condemned, made sure he ended up being pressured to resign under Watergate. And bear in mind, Nixon, Kennedy, AND McCarthy were allies regarding anti-Communism.). That if anything would have been even MORE reason to turn against him in favor of the Democrats and thus be opportunistic. Yet they didn’t, they aided and defended him right to the very end. Contrast that with, say, Harry Truman, who refused to listen to Whittaker Chambers and his exposing Alger Hiss as a Soviet agent and also fired MacArthur for his trek into China, or heck, most of the Democrats who turned against McCarthy in a heartbeat, and even several Republicans/Conservatives such as Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Am I saying he’s ideally Conservative? No, not really, JFK is guilty of several left-wing stuff, but he at least did promote some Conservative stuff, which STILL makes him more Conservative than, say, Clinton or Obama.
“And yet it was raw opportunism that motivated the Kennedys in linking themselves to Joe McCarthy. As I said, in the early ‘50s, McCarthy was a hero to Irish Catholic Democrats, especially in Massachusetts. At that time, Jack Kennedy was a Congressman trying to distinguish himself. His paternal grandfather, John Fitzgerald, had also been a Congressman and ran against the grandfather of Lodge, Henry Cabot, Sr. in 1916 for Senator. Politics in Massachusetts had been largely divided between the Protestant Republican Brahmins and Irish Catholic Democrats. When the then-heavily Whig Massachusetts in the 1850s saw the collapse of that party, many members briefly utilized the anti-Catholic Know-Nothing Party for the interim before the Republican Party was officially organized. Because of this, it bitterly divided the two religious groups. The Protestants feared the incoming Catholics would eventually outpopulate and outvote them in time, which eventually happened. The 1916 race was a warning of things to come. The corrupt, but affable Honey Fitz vs. the stalwart Conservative Lodge Sr. The most serious warning came in 1928 when reliably Republican Massachusetts repudiated Herbert Hoover for NY Irish Catholic Al Smith for President (as did neighboring Rhode Island, which also was heavily GOP, but with a burgeoning Catholic population).
Curiously, Rhode Island Republicans could see the writing on the wall and ran a Quebec-born French Canadian Catholic for Senator in 1928 against an incumbent Democrat, Felix Hebert (same name as a future long-time Democrat Congressman from Louisiana, though no relation). Even as Hoover lost RI, Hebert took the Senate seat and went to DC. Massachusetts, tightly controlled by the GOP Brahmins, largely failed to begin to make inroads into the Catholic population, which remained overwhelmingly Democrat. Flash forward to 1952 and Kennedy is making his run against Cabot, Jr... It would’ve been unimaginable for JFK to go against Joe McCarthy in Massachusetts, even if national Democrats despised him. In this case, religion was thicker than party. Cabot, Jr. was not seen as a particular ally of McCarthy, he was regarded more as the rabble of the Democrat opposition in his state. But former Ambassador Joseph Kennedy realized that it would be McCarthy that would turn the race. His son would ride on McCarthy’s popularity in the state to victory, despite his being a Republican. They cultivated Joe in every way possible (Bobby, of course, went to work for him). Had he repudiated McCarthy, JFK would not have won in 1952, it’s that simple. Although ultimately McCarthy gave a tepid endorsement (solely due to party) to Lodge, there was already the appearance that a JFK win would not be seen as a “bad” thing. Lodge’s problem, too, was that he had jettisoned the old Conservative politics of his grandfather and was a trendy young liberal. Between that and the religious politics of the state, it allowed for the toppling of the Republican majority, and Massachusetts would rapidly move to the Democrat party control (and ultimately, leftward).
I’ll add, too, that when the attacks against McCarthy by the usual suspects began to take its toll on his popularity and when it came time for the “censure” vote against him in 1954, JFK made sure he was conveniently out of the Senate so that he wouldn’t have to vote. Opportunism and cowardice. If he voted against censure, he would’ve been severely damaged as a future Democrat Presidential candidate nationally. If he voted for it, he would’ve been voting against the wishes of his Irish Catholic base, who viewed the attacks on McCarthy because of his religion.”
That never stopped the likes of, say, Harry Truman from firing General MacArthur regarding his trek into China during the Korean War, or his demonizing Whittaker Chambers while he tried to expose that Alger Hiss as a spy, and that was despite his cultivating a pretty big reputation during that time of being a hardline anti-Communist (a reputation, BTW, that’s being pushed in our history books as we speak). If he could do it, JFK most certainly could vote against him openly and not even worry about the Catholic base turning against him. Heck, Obama managed to backstab his own black base multiple times and STILL got reelected despite that, same goes for the so-called Congressional Black Caucus, where despite leaving them even poorer than before they STILL get reelected. And don’t get me started on several other big-name Democrats who went out of their way to ensure McCarthy was demonized, not to mention the likes of Ed Murrow, a CBS newscaster. And again, raw opportunism would have them explicitly siding with the Democrats, stabbing their Irish Catholic base in the back, simply to toe the party line, just as Obama did with his black base, or how the Congressional Black Caucus repeatedly backstabbed the guys they claimed to represent, all for pushing left-wing views.
“But celebrities are still not elected officials. If their power and influence were at stake as elected officials, I guarantee they would’ve changed their tune or be kicked out of office. In the scope of things, Nicholson, Sheen and Terry were not particularly influential political figures. Again, if you think JFK would’ve been a pro-lifer had he lived into the ‘70s and ‘80s (or ‘90s), I think you’re fooling yourself. He was always going to eventually go with the prevailing party opinion. You might have a point had Teddy defended life issues, but that got in the way with appealing to the radical feminist lobby. It would’ve been no different with JFK.”
They may not be elected officials, that much is true, but make no mistake, those actors are politicians, trying to sway public policies, even being members of political organizations such as “Not My War” and ANSWER and other stuff. Can’t get any more political than that. And besides, you clearly haven’t seen how leftist Hollywood celebrities shun anyone who even steps slightly out of line (for goodness sakes, the wife of Ted Nugent actually got shunned by Hollywood just because she happened to be the wife of Ted Nugent, and only revealed this absentmindedly while taking a cell phone call. If they can do that, I’m pretty sure they’d risk their standing by even speaking in favor of being pro-life. In fact, one director, Lionel Chetwynd, was actually barred from making films in Hollywood due to his conservative politics.). In fact, they make Jacobins seem tolerant, that’s how intolerant of any slight dissent they are. Heck, Cher actually pushed for abortion in spite of the fact that she herself was nearly an abortion victim, something which not even Jack Nicholson, himself no stranger to left-wing politics, would never support under any circumstance and made very clear he’d even go against his party if necessary when it came to that issue.