Venona Cables - McCarthy absolved?

[epepke]

Simply stated:
McCarthy tried to prove the US Government was infiltrated in high positions by communist sympathizers and spies.
McCarthy was censured.
History made McCarthy the icon of false accusation.
The presumption is that McCarthy was wrong about US Gov being infiltrated with communists.

This line of argument doesn't make sense to me.

A lot of people thought that the US Government was infiltrated with spies, and they were right. It's long been common knowledge that there was a Soviet spy on the Manhattan project, for instance, which is probably why the USSR got the bomb so quickly.

However, McCarthy essentially used the (correct) suspicion that there were Soviet spies in the US Government as a pretense to further his own political agenda.

This should be considered reprehensible by all people. History is that it was considered reprehensible by people who did not consider Soviet espionage a problem. However, it should, by all reason, be considered even more reprehensible by people who considered Soviet espionage a problem, because McCarthy's own political ambitions diverted attention away from the people who really were spies. De Facto, McCarthy acted as a Soviet agent, and he was more effective in that job than in any other.

I have learned from experience that what I am saying cannot be conveyed, except to people who have figured it out for themselves. The overt appearance of intention and ideological rectitude blinds many people to the possibility that what their "friends" do may actually be counterproductive. I've seen this happen often, notably with the feminism of the late 1980s and the early 1990s.

McCarthy's claims that the US government was infested with Soviet spies served, for him, the same purpose as a carnival barker's top hat or the pretense of the Catholic Church to protect rapists of children.

 

[jj]

Your response is pretty emotional. I never said anything about athiests.

Is that ignorance speaking, or are you being disingenious?

McCarthy had lots to say about atheists. He said a lot of it in regard to HUAC.

Hello? Perhaps you ought to learn what really happened? Give it a try, learn something for once.

 

[jj]

Communism is hostile to competing religons. Communism is a religion in and of itself. It merely attempts to replace God with a man made system.

Oi! Dat's what I said already!

(but it does bear repeating)

 

[LW]

Also, the US Constitution protects the right of pursuit of happiness and the right of ownership of property (sorry, but right now I cannot think of what article and in what way), which would contradict the Manifesto's stand on ownership of capital goods.

On the other hand, a communist could (and many did) claim that in capitalist system the pursuit of happiness is only possible for the few privileged oppressors while the masses toil in virtual slavery without a hope of better tomorrow and that only the institution of a communist society could bring freedom and happiness to them.

 

[headscratcher4]

McCarthy was censured for abuse of his office, not for claiming there were Communists and spies in the government. He went after the Army because the Army wouldn't give Roy Cohen's "boy friend" David Shine special priveledges. Had he spent his time rooting out real communists, you might have a point, instead, he was happy to go after traitors like George Marshall.

I would argue that McCarthy set the whole effort to expose real Soviet infiltration back by many years...

 

[drkitten]

Simply stated:
McCarthy tried to prove the US Government was infiltrated in high positions by communist sympathizers and spies.
McCarthy was censured.
History made McCarthy the icon of false accusation.
The presumption is that McCarthy was wrong about US Gov being infiltrated with communists.

I don't think that this is a correct representation.

I'll grant that the first three statements are accurate, but the "presumption" is somewhat different -- and this gets back to my statement that, to the best of my knowledge, McCarthy never made a correct accusation. (If you read rikzilla's little soap opera, that wasn't McCarthy's accusation, but HUAC's -- the HUAC had a somewhat better, although still unacceptably bad, record of accuracy.)

The usual metaphor for McCarthy's investigation is a "witch hunt." That's a pretty good metaphor. The key aspect that it captures is the inaccuracy and hysteria associated with historical hunts for witches. In early modern Europe, there actually were people who self-identified as "witches," But a key observation of many of the witch hunts was that the number of "witches" identified by the official investigations was unbelievably high, and the "evidence" on which witchcraft accusations were made (and proven) was an unbelievably low standard of proof. Entire villages were in some cases put to death, merely on the unsupported say-so of a few people, often on confessions made under torture. No rational jurist in the 20th century could support the idea that most of these "witches" were in fact, guilty of the crimes of which they were accused.

Similarly, McCarthy's methods of identifying communists was overbroad, coercive, and almost undiscriminating -- and the standard of "proof" required to brand someone as a Communist was almost trivial.

So the presumption -- and I would regard it as a conclusion, instead -- is that McCarthy was overreacting (and hysterically so) and resulted in the punishment of a huge number of innocent people, while missing, without exception, all the guilty ones.

I posited that McCarthy was correct.... but obviously unsuccessful. Correct because Venona revealed what it did about communists in US office.

And I submit that McCarthy was incorrect -- because Venona revealed that McCarthy had missed on every single one of his accusations. And many people suffered unjustly because of it.

 

[VonNeumann]

Is that ignorance speaking, or are you being disingenious?

McCarthy had lots to say about atheists. He said a lot of it in regard to HUAC.

Hello? Perhaps you ought to learn what really happened? Give it a try, learn something for once.

Again (you missed it the first time?). I never said anything about atheists. If you have a beef with McCarthy about atheists, go argue with him.

 

[VonNeumann]

On the other hand, a communist could (and many did) claim that in capitalist system the pursuit of happiness is only possible for the few privileged oppressors while the masses toil in virtual slavery without a hope of better tomorrow and that only the institution of a communist society could bring freedom and happiness to them.

Ok, they could and many did argue that. Do you assert there is truth to that claim?

 

[VonNeumann]

McCarthy was censured for abuse of his office, not for claiming there were Communists and spies in the government. He went after the Army because the Army wouldn't give Roy Cohen's "boy friend" David Shine special priveledges. Had he spent his time rooting out real communists, you might have a point, instead, he was happy to go after traitors like George Marshall.

I would argue that McCarthy set the whole effort to expose real Soviet infiltration back by many years...

You think Marshall was indeed one? ...or being sarcastic?

 

[VonNeumann]

This line of argument doesn't make sense to me.

A lot of people thought that the US Government was infiltrated with spies, and they were right. It's long been common knowledge that there was a Soviet spy on the Manhattan project, for instance, which is probably why the USSR got the bomb so quickly.

Yes.

However, McCarthy essentially used the (correct) suspicion that there were Soviet spies in the US Government as a pretense to further his own political agenda.

I suppose so. I wish the real world consisted of businessmen who would serve in government for 4 years and then go back to business (like jury duty). But instead most if not all politicians are (mostly lawyers, and that's another problem) people whose whole goal is to attain and keep power.

This should be considered reprehensible by all people. History is that it was considered reprehensible by people who did not consider Soviet espionage a problem. However, it should, by all reason, be considered even more reprehensible by people who considered Soviet espionage a problem, because McCarthy's own political ambitions diverted attention away from the people who really were spies. De Facto, McCarthy acted as a Soviet agent, and he was more effective in that job than in any other.

That's interesting and I'd say, defacto: true. But it could still be true, as I posit that it could be, for the MAIN reason that it follows logically from the premise. 1. Assume there is a communist infiltration, 2. Chicken Little warns of it. 3. Chicken little gets a high profile, 4. Chicken little is correct about his warning. 5. The infiltration is powerful enough to kill Chicken Little. So while it is true that McCarthy did damage to "anti-communism", there were also many communists who were rooted out, nevertheless. But I wonder how much damage to anti-communism was really due to McCarthy being bad at what he did. Could a charming person have done it and not been censured? How could we ever know for sure? I translate what you have said to this: after McCarthy, what politician in their right mind, who wanted to stay a politician (or stay alive?), would make much anti-communist noise after seeing what happened to McCarthy? So, for whatever reason McCarthy got clobbered, it had a lasting effect that was helpful toward communists. I'm not sure you are right that it was specifically a McCarthy flaw - I posit that anyone at that time would have been rooted out for delivering the message to the public about the 80-something names.

I have learned from experience that what I am saying cannot be conveyed, except to people who have figured it out for themselves. The overt appearance of intention and ideological rectitude blinds many people to the possibility that what their "friends" do may actually be counterproductive. I've seen this happen often, notably with the feminism of the late 1980s and the early 1990s.

I don't see your point as being so ephemeral as to be difficult to grasp - I just do not completely agree. Feminists destroyed feminism because most women do not relate to extreme feminism. Tree-huggers might destroy ecological purposes, too, I suppose. But I do not buy the line: McCarthy was right but his methods sucked. It seems to be the lock-step mantra from the left. Some espouse it because their favorite hallowed poly-sci prof said it enough for it to burn a groove in the neural network. Sorry, but that's what you sound like when you say "what I am saying cannot be conveyed...". I do not know much about McCarthy as a personality - he maybe DID suck, big time. But what I have read about what he DID, sounds to me like he was set up, vis a vis how the Truman Administration changed the rules on him.

McCarthy's claims that the US government was infested with Soviet spies served, for him, the same purpose as a carnival barker's top hat or the pretense of the Catholic Church to protect rapists of children.

Before, I erroneously said it was McCarthy's job. I read some and see that he adopted this role on his own, apparently. So he may have done it because of strong convictions or (being a politician) mostly for the attraction as you suggest. But I'm not cool, unless I say "McCarthy sucks" after I say he may have been right.

I have already seen how, on this forum, asking a few questions that may imply some defense of McCarthy, quickly casts you in a domain of some sort of undesired association. If anything, that is quite revealing about a powerful mind-game being played out to this day. ...and very few have the balls to open up discussion about those subjects that are politically incorrect. Jeez, what was I thinking... to suggest McCarthy was right? How insane. Wait - no, now I get it ... its OK to say McCarthy was right if I follow up with a comment about how he sucked. Seems like Orwellian 'newspeak' to me.

 

[VonNeumann]

I would argue that McCarthy set the whole effort to expose real Soviet infiltration back by many years...

Yes. But was it due to "McCarthy sucks" or was it due to a cunning display made against McCarthy, to demonstrate to other would-be-heroes "lay off exposing the infiltration"? The latter seems logically consistent to me. The former merely appears to be "what everybody is supposed to say".

 

[VonNeumann]

That would be me.


Rik and I got into a heated discussion about this, as my grandfather found himself at the wrong end of McCarthy's blacklist, despite not being a communist and especially not a spy. Rik was taking a, shall we say, contrarian position that (in essence) McCarthy was fundamentally correct, and the non-communists who got fingered were collateral damage who, since they were mainly liberals or left-wingers, had it coming anyway.

Interesting. I read that McCarthy became infamous starting with an announcement in Wheeling, WVa where he said " I have in my hand 57 cases of individuals who would appear to be either card-carrying members or certainly loyal to the communist Party, but who nevertheless are still helping to shape our foreign policy." Was your grandfather on that list? How was he affected?

 

[VonNeumann]

I'll grant that the first three statements are accurate, but the "presumption" is somewhat different -- and this gets back to my statement that, to the best of my knowledge, McCarthy never made a correct accusation. (If you read rikzilla's little soap opera, that wasn't McCarthy's accusation, but HUAC's -- the HUAC had a somewhat better, although still unacceptably bad, record of accuracy.)

The usual metaphor for McCarthy's investigation is a "witch hunt." ...snip... No rational jurist in the 20th century could support the idea that most of these "witches" were in fact, guilty of the crimes of which they were accused.

Similarly, McCarthy's methods of identifying communists was overbroad, coercive, and almost undiscriminating -- and the standard of "proof" required to brand someone as a Communist was almost trivial.

So the presumption -- and I would regard it as a conclusion, instead -- is that McCarthy was overreacting (and hysterically so) and resulted in the punishment of a huge number of innocent people, while missing, without exception, all the guilty ones.

And I submit that McCarthy was incorrect -- because Venona revealed that McCarthy had missed on every single one of his accusations. And many people suffered unjustly because of it.

I read that three men came to McCarthy in late 1949 with a report that was a 100 page summary of Communist subversion in the US. It was prepared by the FBI under H. Hoover. The report had already been distributed to the White House, Sec of State, et al.

I think that means that the 57 names he talked about in his first expose in West Virginia, were those given in the FBI report. From what you tell me, it seems you are saying that all the 57 names were wrong? They were all innocent? But then that means that the FBI was wrong, and that McCarthy just trusted the FBI too much - is that it?

On the other hand, I thought I read that McCarthy never released those names. Is that incorrect?

 

[LW]

Ok, they could and many did argue that. Do you assert there is truth to that claim?

You said that the "pursuit of happiness" is in contradiction with Communist Manifesto. I pointed out this is not necessarily the case.

Whether I agree with communists is completely different matter.

 

[UrsulaV]

But I do not buy the line: McCarthy was right but his methods sucked. It seems to be the lock-step mantra from the left.

Speaking as a member of the left, let me just say that my opinion is that McCarthy was a jackass and I don't think he was right. Sorry if that doesn't fall into the obligatory lock-step mantra we're supposed to be believing over here.

 

[grunion]

I think that means that the 57 names he talked about in his first expose in West Virginia, were those given in the FBI report. From what you tell me, it seems you are saying that all the 57 names were wrong? They were all innocent? But then that means that the FBI was wrong, and that McCarthy just trusted the FBI too much - is that it?

On the other hand, I thought I read that McCarthy never released those names. Is that incorrect?

Based on the fact that the number 57 changed several times, growing each time he cited it, I would contend that the 57 names were a fantasy, a desperate attempt to use whatever insider status he had to catapult him to national fame. It worked but eventually he had to pay the piper for the fantasy.

Not to say there were no Communist infiltrators in government, but he certainly wasn't targetting them, as I suspect he wouldn't know a Communist if one bit him. McCarthy and HUAC spent most of their energies focusing on the suspected "fellow travellers" to try to get them to name names to save themselves from the blacklist. Are you arguing that this is an effective tactic? Are you arguing that it is the way our system of government should work? I think it is neither.

 

[headscratcher4]

You think Marshall was indeed one? ...or being sarcastic?

I was being sarcastic. George Marshall was a great American patriot -- and McCarthy went after him for knowingly harboring Communists...even Ike was reluctant to stand up to McCarthy and defend his friend and former commander.

And, yes, I contend that McCarthy pushed the cause of exposing real communists back...not because communist sympathizers turned the tables and made McCarthy the bad guy, but BECAUSE he abused basic rights, focused on people like Marshall and Dean Atkinson, never expoused a real communist, and did it mostly to get himself political power....

Further, the whole presumption here is that the embedded "communists" were having some kind of effect, subverting Ameirca. Some real communists, like Rosenberg, helped the Soviets get the bomb and technologies they wanted (notice that Rosenberg was not exposed by McCarthy, nor was Algier Hiss). Mostly the men and women in the file were ineffectual dreamers...there is nothing, nowhere to indicate that the essential practices, policies or political culture of the United States was ever put in peril...at least not by anyone McCarthy "exposed."

I highly recommend a wonderful book called "A Conspiracy so Immence" it is a great over-veiw of McCarthy and his rise and fall.

 

[rikzilla]

Who is Cleon? ...someone who pointed you to this thread? I ask myself the same question about why I get into meaningless debates, but I am glad you registered a post here. Could you tell me what it was about McCarthy's personality or character that made him "bad", if we give him the benefit of the doubt?

Good question. Cleon is a friend who has taken time and great effort and not a little passion to debate me on issues such as this. I came to JREF as an ex-military traditionalist. My cherished traditions have taken a great beating on the stones of logic and reason. What remains of them may look like tatters of their former selves...but they are clean tatters...and thus are more precious and real. When you come here...if you are honest...you will be put through the wringer. It is a worthy process and I'm glad I did it and am still doing it. Cleon is a guy I'd have put on ignore a long time ago if my illusions of tradition were more dear to me than reason and logic. Cleon is simply my friend. He knows that oldJoe was a pet project of mine for a time...and he knows I'm going through some hard times in my life right now...pointing this thread out to me is his small way of saying he cares about me. That's pretty cool if you ask me.

As for McCarthy himself? I don't know. I'm not a psychiatrist; but I think he sure could have used one. McCarthy did mean and vindictive things on a regular basis. Things like daily threats or dirty tricks against his opponents. He was so good at it that even his conservative republican allies feared him. Get that. Even his natural political friends feared him! He was a bad man because he did bad things which never seemed to bother him. If what I read about him is even remotely accurate; I'd venture that old Joe was a sociopath.

All this of course has nothing to do with whether or not McCarthy was right or wrong on the communist threat. His character was independent of the facts surrounding VENONA and HUAC. He'd have been a reprehensible human being had he been the Senate gardener.

My own theory is this; McCarthy was the same kind of creature J. Edgar Hoover was. He was not averse to bending or breaking the rules. HUAC formed around a hard kernal of truth in the testimony of Elizabeth Bentley...but there was no public evidence to bolster Liz Bentley's story. There was only VENONA and it was so secret that the evidence gleaned from it could not be used ever without compromising the source. During the time of HUAC and the heyday of the VENONA intercepts J. Edgar had access to it all. He also was rumored to have fed VENONA intel to McCarthy...and it's not out of the question. Hoover was at least as ruthless as McCarthy and even more powerful. That these two guys would compare notes to nail some reds makes sense to me. The caveat of course was that although McCarthy could know that all Liz said was true...he could not bolster her story using anything from VENONA. How frustrating that must have been! That McCarthy kept hunting even after all Liz Bentley's witches were accounted for is a product of his character (or condition). He hurt a lot of innocent people. People who thought a lot like my friend Cleon.

Guilt by association is a hallmark of McCarthyism...VENONA can never wash that unconstitutional stain away from McCarthy. That he began from a truth cannot and should not save his legacy. He earned his reputation. History must of course be accurate and so the impact of VENONA should actually have been debated far more widely in the public domain. I think some liberals were afraid that VENONA might deprive them of their favorite boogey-man. That the charge of McCarthyism might lose it's sting. But after reading so much about it all I came to the realization that McCarthy as bad example is valid even in light of VENONA. So I guess it doesn't really matter much that the general public has not thought too long on it. (They don't really seem to think too long on much eh?)

I hope this answered your questions. If I come across as too deep or philosophical it's just a phase I'm living through right now. Everything seems both deep and meaningless when you've lost someone. I'm trying like hell to get over it and folks like Cleon are helping...even participating in this old debate is helping.

Thanks for listening.
-z

 

[Bronze Dog]

Guilt by association is a hallmark of McCarthyism...VENONA can never wash that unconstitutional stain away from McCarthy. That he began from a truth cannot and should not save his legacy.

In a way, even when McCarthy was right, he was wrong. Even if he did help catch Communist spies, that wouldn't change the fact that he used vile, depraved witch-hunt tactics to do so.

 

[headscratcher4]

In a way, even when McCarthy was right, he was wrong. Even if he did help catch Communist spies, that wouldn't change the fact that he used vile, depraved witch-hunt tactics to do so.

Ah, right or left, sometime you gotta burn that old village to save it.