A Conspiracy So Vast: Meet Ann Coulter, the Maureen Dowd of the conservatives

Opinion Journal ^ | 07/14/03 | DOROTHY RABINOWITZ

[Pokey78]

John G. Adams, a key figure in the proceedings that effectively ended Sen. Joseph McCarthy's career, passed quietly from the scene last week at age 91. Not surprisingly, his death made no news; it's been a while since those heady days when McCarthy launched his investigations of the Army, which had, he charged, been shielding countless Communist agents at Fort Monmouth and elsewhere. It fell to Adams, the Army's chief counsel, to deal with the charges, which he did to devastating effect in the Army-McCarthy hearings that held the nation in thrall in the 1950s.

[rightofrush]

As for firebombing...The former populations of Warsaw, Rotterdam, Coventry, and London are all aware of the results. If the Germans didn't want to get bombed they shouldn't have tried to set the standard.

The Brits started the deliberate bombing of civilians. The German pilots who hit London civilian areas inadvertantly when bombing the dockside areas were court martialed.

As for your previous point, I wrote German POWs, even though we could have sent food to the general population, and didn't.

[Eva]

I am not sure which she you are referring to, so I shall address both.

Ms. Rabinowitz mentions a Hollywood actor that committed suicide as a victim of McCarthy.

Ann Coulter mentions at the bottom of page 56 and the top of page 57 that the Hollywood blacklists were a product of the HUAC, as in HOUSE, not Senate where McCarthy worked. They were two very different investigations. The HUAC stemmed from a law that was passed in the thirties and stretched over a much longer period of time.

[hoosiermama]

Precisely! That's an example of why I questions if Rabinowitz had read the book. Infact Ann points out many issues/truths that were completely ignored. Not to mention she missed the point of the bookand went off on a completely different tangent. Would have expected that reaction from a liberal, not Ms. Rabinowitz.

[Eva]

My guess is that Rabinowitz is Jewish and the Nazi/McCarthy issue is all that she thinks about in regard to McCarthy. I don't know what the circumstances of that were, so I can't make any judgement.

I would just like to summarize what I see as the main premise of the book (because so many seem to be missing the point). Ann quotes Whitaker Chambers as writing, "Other ages have had their individual traitors--men who from faint-heratedness or hope of gain sold out their causes. But in the 20th century, for the first time, men banded together by the million in movements like Fascism and Communism, dedicated to the purpose of betraying the institions they lived under. In the 20th century, treason became a vocation whose modern form was specifically the treason of ideas."

[beckett]

Outstanding.

Thanks. Very good of you to say so.

[rightwinggunnut]

My Grandfather's cousin was a fella named Clinton Hester and he worked in the Roosevelt and Truman Administrations. He died in the late 60's defending McCarthy to his last breath...

[beckett]

The info you provide on Moss makes Rabinowitz look bad, I agree.

[Misterioso]

Rabinowitz: There always is, in the book, which ranges from the martyrdom of Sen. McCarthy--without whose great fortitude and perspicacity in exposing the Communist menace, we might, Ms. Coulter suggests, all now be in the gulag--to such matters as the Hollywood blacklist and the House Un-American Activities Committee hearings, which in fact had little to do with McCarthy. Here Ms. Coulter pauses to reflect on the whining of those on the blacklist, all of whom she mocks as prosperous exiles racing happily around Europe with rich friends and having a good time. In Ms. Coulter's version of this history, of course, the blacklisted are only the rich and resourceful--a history that doesn't include the countless people destroyed because their names had popped up on some list of alleged Communists or fellow travelers, or sounded like a name on one of those lists. People like the actor Phillip Loeb, for example, unemployable and ultimately driven to suicide because he could no longer pay the bills for the care of a mentally ill son.

The confusion stems from Ms. Rabinowitz's lapse of clarity, I now see. She did distinguish between McCarthy and the HUAC but then went on to pillory Coulter for her insensitivity to the "victims" of the House investigation--a separate issue. But there is no question that DR recognizes the difference.

[Lancey Howard]

My Grandfather's cousin was a fella named Clinton Hester and he worked in the Roosevelt and Truman Administrations. He died in the late 60's defending McCarthy to his last breath...

Gutsy fellow. It is not an easy thing to go against the "conventional wisdom" of the massive ignorant chattering class. It is far easier to "go along to get along", like Dorothy Rabinowitz has done in her column.

We could use more people with your relative's kind of guts - - people like Ann Coulter and others who are now examining the new evidence and trying to give McCarthy a fair shake.

[Poohbah]

My guess is that Rabinowitz is Jewish and the Nazi/McCarthy issue is all that she thinks about in regard to McCarthy. I don't know what the circumstances of that were, so I can't make any judgement.

<sarcasm> McCarthy was complaining loud and long that the valiant Waffen-SS heroes who massacred American untermensch at Malmedy were mistreated by the US Army when they were incarcerated. I mean, the nerve of the Americans, insisting on that Americentric notion that one doesn't execute prisoners of war out of hand. We failed to show respect for the concept of diversity and moral relativism. After all, we can't judge other people by our standards. By Nazi standards, those brave young men were the very flower of civilization and served as magnificent defenders of the Aryan volk. </sarcasm>

When he discovered that the folks in Wisconsin weren't buying it, he decided to start yammering about Commies instead.

[Eva]

I would suggest that the lack of clarity is intentional. Rabinowitz chooses to blame McCarthy for all the abuses of the period.

[Eva]

Here is a link to McCarthy's side of the Malmedy issue. I haven't had time to read the whole thing but it looks as though McCarthy may have been right on this one as well. It may be what gave him the impetus to go after the Democrats, to get back at them for smearing him on this issue.

[hchutch]

In a way, Joe McCarthy was right: The Army screwed up.

Those Waffen-SS should not have been capable of complaining about their treatment by American soldiers after what they did at Malmedy was discovered.

[Misterioso]

One thing has always bothered me. Why is it that McCarthy and the HUAC get all the negativity but no one seems to remember that the "black lists" were the creation of the movie industry, not the government? Where is the list of the studio honchos that promoted the blacklisting? What we have here is selective demonization by the left. But what else is new?

[hoosiermama]

Thanks Eva for the link. I think the entire thing should be posted, but where? Here? Others need to be pinged to it!

Also do you recall that AC said the journalist from the NYT assigned to cover McCathy was a "card carrying communist". I've tried to find it in the book and can't. She sure makes the case for SLANDER 50 years ago.

[nopardons]

I didn't call the author, nor anyone else on this thread a " LIBERAL ". Have you confused me with another poster, or do you just like to throw any old thing out there for the heck of it ?

Hey, it's a free country and if you and Dorothy want to have a fit over Ann's new book, Ann herself, and /or McCarthy, for totally invalid reasons ... go for it. You'll just get replies refuting the " wisdom " of your positions, by those far better informed than you. LOL