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Honorable beaters of children, sadists, uniformed and in plain clothes, distinguished Dixiecrat wearing the clothing of a gentleman, eminent Republican who opposes an accommodation with the one country with which we must live at peace in order for us and all our children to survive.

My boy of fifteen left this room a few minutes ago in sound health and not jailed, solely because I asked him to be in here to learn something about the procedures of the United States government and one of its committees. Had he been outside where a son of a friend of mine had his head split by these goons operating under your orders, my boy today might have paid the penalty of permanent injury or a police record for desiring to come here and hear how this committee operates.

If you think that I am going to cooperate with this collection of Judases, of men who sit there in violation of the United States Constitution, if you think I will cooperate with you in any way, you are insane! This body is improperly constituted. It is a kangaroo court. It does not have my respect, it has my utmost contempt.

William "Bill" Mandel
House UnAmerican Activities Committee
http://www.billmandel.net/h/HUAC.shtml

It will take a long time to catalogue just how much damage HUAC and related did to "the Left" and for how long. It is arguable that once the CIO was derailed, the Labor Movement was going to be the walking dead until such time as it actually walked into its own coffin. So too with so much else.

How come they pulled it off? One reason was that it was a complete surprise - coming at the end of WW2 and in an epoch of "decolonization". Part of the reason was that postwar U.S. prosperity produced as big a carrot as HUAC did a stick. There is more though to put one's finger on...

What it assured more than anything else is that "the Left" was left still-born, ideologically narrow (and abutting liberalism in many cases), theoretically shallow and practically flaky. McCarthyism disconnected "the Left" from "the People", and we are still there.

It will take a long time to catalogue just how much damage HUAC and related did to "the Left" and for how long. It is arguable that once the CIO was derailed, the Labor Movement was going to be the walking dead until such time as it actually walked into its own coffin. So too with so much else.

How come they pulled it off? One reason was that it was a complete surprise - coming at the end of WW2 and in an epoch of "decolonization". Part of the reason was that postwar U.S. prosperity produced as big a carrot as HUAC did a stick. There is more though to put one's finger on...

What it assured more than anything else is that "the Left" was left still-born, ideologically narrow (and abutting liberalism in many cases), theoretically shallow and practically flaky. McCarthyism disconnected "the Left" from "the People", and we are still there.



That's the first time I heard that - McCarthy disconnected "the Left" from "the people." Damn!

Re McCarthy, didn't Orson Welles say something like this: "In Europe people betray their friends to save their lives. In Hollywood, they do it to save their swimming pools."

That's the other thing that separated people form their own interests, swimming pools, or "the carrot" as you called it.