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→Overall evaluation: What can be gained?
Was Augusto Pinochet a Communist? Rios Montt? D'Aubisson?
Was Augusto Pinochet a Communist? Rios Montt? D'Aubisson?
--[[User:PF Fox|PF Fox]] 15:40, 27 March 2007 (EDT)
--[[User:PF Fox|PF Fox]] 15:40, 27 March 2007 (EDT)
::IMHO, McCarthy & McCartyism is viewed as a onetime aberration in the early 1950s of partisan excess. This is not true. McCarthy was a pioneer in modern mindless partisan warfare,and his tactics & techniques have become the mainstay of Washington media and other rabidly partisan types.
::'McCarthy's objective was basically threefold. (1) to remove Security Risks from an opposition Executive Branch at a point in time when the US was at war with enemies who had gained nuclear weapons & know-how from American citizens inside the US Government. (2) Demonize opposition POVs as untrustworthy and anti-American. (3) Payback or a vendetta for twenty years in the wilderness as the minority party.
::McCarthy largely accomplished the first two, but created lasting vendettas with the third. But numerous illustrations are available today to show how McCarthyite tactics are employed regularly in Washington. Ten years ago, for instance, Gingrich appointed a new Historian to the House of Representatives. Unproven McCarthyite smears were used to tar her as an anti-Semite. She was forced to withdraw, and months later recieved a clean bill of health from the Anti-Defamation League. But the damage was done, and the purpose of the wreckless smear was to grandstand, create headlines, demonize Gingrich as allegedly supporting fascists, force an innocent person disprove a negative, etc. So the perpetrators of this vile smear accomplished what they intended--that's all that mattered. Ten years after the fact, the vile smear was still being repeated in Wikipedia, and only after it was brought to the attention of an Arbitrator, the Epopt, did Wikipedia then see fit to rectify the slander.
::In this regard, McCarthy is the teacher and mentor of all contemporary partisan political operatives. Learning the lesson about the [[blowback]] engendered by such methods should be equally important as any short-term advantages that can be gained. [[User:RobS|RobS]] 15:58, 27 March 2007 (EDT)