I don’t disagree with your take on things. I generally use Leftist and Liberal interchangeably today. That can get me in trouble if we’re talking the pre McGovern years.
I do agree that neither Johnson or Nixon were pro Communist, so you have a valid point there.
With the onset of McGovern, I do think the die was cast and the two words began to mean pretty much the same thing.
The McGovern era introduced a vile form of the Democrat party that has gone downhill since that day. To one degree or another, they were all people who supported communism in the U. S.
One might argue that Carter wasn’t a Commie lover, but his inclination to fawn over the worlds leading Communists call that into question. I think he was very much pro Communist.
As for Hannity, I agree that his elevator doesn’t go all the way to the top floor.
Carter’s problem was that he suffered from a trait all too common among liberals, and that is the lack of ability to recognize the dangerous and evil. It is a type of naivete.
In the 60s liberals routinely acted this way in regard to violent criminals and this was largely why by the end the decade the public began to hate them, and movies like Death Wish and Dirty Harry became popular.
In Carter’s case he had no idea how to deal with ruthless and tough characters like Brezhnev.