My “history” goes back to 1945, with valid real memories beginning in the 50s. It was a time of I Like Ike stickers on my Radio Flyer wagon. I see where that classic wagon now sells at Walmart for $208. An AI search tells me that my parents likely paid under $10 for it back then.
I grew up with the racial segregation of the South. There were “Colored” water fountains and restrooms and the schools were fully segregated through my high school graduation in 1963. The gay community was still closeted and risked legal consequences if they “came out.”
We got many things wrong back then, but we slowly evolved to enjoy the promises of our Constitution even if we had to fight our way through at times. Free speech was constantly threatened. We had both the HUAC (House on Unamerican Activities Committee) and Senator Joe McCarthy with his Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. Both entities thrived within the self-induced paranoia of the Red Scare.
While McCarthy focused on the State Department and the military, the HUAC directed its ire at Hollywood and unions. This period of ruthless investigations, suspicion, and paranoia was branded as McCarthyism. The HUAC started early in the 20th century fighting Germans and Nazi propaganda and would evolve to focus on investigating suspected communists. In 1946, they considered investigating the KKK but declined with one white supremacist member stating, “After all, the KKK is an old American institution.”
Fast forward to the present and we find that, while we have evolved a bit, some things never change. Joe McCarthy is now our president in the form of Donald Trump. While McCarthy had his “commies,” Trump has his Mexicans and Muslims.
Both men learned early on that allegations need not be consistent, accurate, or founded in fact. McCarthy claimed that he had the names of 205 State Department employees who were members of the Communist Party and probable spies. Trump would have you believe that America was overrun with immigrants, most of whom were active gang members involved in heinous crimes.
McCarthyism has given way to Trumpism. Their common tool, fear. Both McCarthy and Trump learned much of their trade from attorney Roy Cohn. Their mentor had a three-dimensional strategy: “1. Never settle, never surrender. 2. Counterattack, counter-sue immediately. 3. No matter what happens, no matter how deeply into the muck you get, claim victory and never admit defeat.”
As demagogs go, Trump has McCarthy beat. Trump’s ability to arouse the populace against the “elites,” scapegoating minority groups, exaggerating their danger to stoke fear, and lying for emotional effect to discourage deliberation, has no equal in modern memory. Since Trump is a billionaire and a member of the “elites,” he has redefined the bad guys as wealthy woke liberals.
McCarthy died in 1957, at the age of 48. He had been censured by the Senate and was an alcoholic who was also addicted to morphine. At the time of his death, he had declined physically and emotionally.
Trump turns 80 this year, so for a short time he and I will be the same age. He has floated the idea that he wants to celebrate both the nation’s 250th birthday and his 80th at the White House with UFC fighters brawling on the White House lawn. One of the scheduled headliners is Conor McGregor who was found liable for sexual assault in 2018 in Ireland.
Both McCarthy and Trump excelled in keeping people angry at one another to distract from their own failures and lack of progress. McCarthy’s exploitation using fear prompted his downfall. It remains to be seen what line Trump will cross that will end his reign. Also uncertain is the ultimate national cost of his delusion and cognitive decline.
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