A Conspiracy So Vast

The Wall Street Journal | July 7, 2003 | DOROTHY RABINOWITZ

[martin_fierro]

I report, you decide.

[Cincinatus]

What are we supposed to decide?

[martin_fierro]

If you had a point there, I sure didn't see it.

[DainBramage]

Thats exactly how I chose my ex-wife, the one on the left there.

[gr8eman]

It is true enough that there was nothing particularly wild-eyed about McCarthy, though that eerie giggle of his which tended to erupt at odd moments did have a certain out-of-this world pitch.

As usual, Annie's critics prove her material to be spot on!

[MEG33]

Ann isn't everyone's cup of tea!I am sure there were mistakes and excesses but the truth is there was a communist infiltration of our government."Mc Carthyism has come to mean all the charges from Chambers and HUAC were a witch hunt.Hiss was a spy.Hollywood had become a haven for communists who wanted the communist message to subtly be inserted in film.

[Dave S]

If you had a point there, I sure didn't see it.

You posted the two pictures and said you decide. From that I take you base your political analysis on the cut of someones face and color of hair. I was wondering whether you choose your wife soley on the same basis or whether you looked at other more lasting qualities as well.

[ricpic]

The cliche about the truth lying somewhere in the middle clearly applies here.

On the one hand McCarthy wasn't too scrupulous about riding the wave of hysterical overreaction to the communist threat that prevailed in the early '50s.

On the other hand a significant infiltration of government agencies, particularly The State Department, had in fact occured.

[babaloo]

Dorothy Rabinowitz was one of the panelists on the Wall Street Journal show that CNBC used to have on Friday nights. She seemed very conservative on that show and was quite witty. Paul Gigot was the host. I thought it was great.

[7thson]

What is remarkable is that this writer proves Ann's point. I returned from vacation on Saturday and my book was waiting for me. I am now halfway through it and the question that Ms. Coulter keeps asking and is never answered - was there communists in the United States government? We know what the answer is but the liberals refuse to not only answer the question, they do not want the question raised.

[MEG33]

She wrote of the Juanita Brodderick rape after she interviewed her.I like her,too.You don't have to like Mc Carthy's political use of the situation to realize that more than just the State Dept had communists.

[Dave S]

As usual, Annie's critics prove her material to be spot on!

Ann is right about their being communists in the government but she is wrong about McCarthy being a saint or that he didnt overeach. She may be entertaining to read but she is not going to persuade anyone that's not already a card carrying member of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy. :-)

[randita]

Dorothy Rabinowitz is an excellent, thoughtful writer. Well researched and usually of a conservative nature. It's clear that Ann Coulter hit a nerve there. Ann must have criticized someone or something that D.R. holds dear in order to engender this kind of response.

[roderick]

Coulter's previous book, Slander is heavily sourced and footnoted. The reader is never faced with the question, "Gee, where did she get that?".

I can only assume that Treason is similarly sourced.

Ad hominem attacks and non-regard for her source material are not expected in a WSJ column.

[martin_fierro]

From that I take you base your political analysis on the cut of someones face and color of hair.

Oh, sure -- that follows. Keep your Psych 101 analytical skills to yourself, please.

[MEG33]

I do think Dorothy could have been a more balanced in the question of communists in the government and elsewhere.Ann can turn me off at times but I felt this was too much like a hit piece.

[PGalt]

It is worth remembering that during that bleak political time the universities, faculties and students understood the threat McCarthyism posed to intellectual freedom -- and, dismal to note today, that the universities which were once hotbeds of opposition to McCarthy are now little worlds of their own, where political censorship, speech codes and other ideologically driven assaults on freedom are the accepted order of things.

So what you're saying Dorothy is that universities have always been hotbeds of assaults on freedom (truth). What the hell is intellectual freedom you moron?

There is more truth in an Ann Coulter book than in Dorothy the Dinosaur's entire professional career.

[jocon307]

"Dorothy Rabinowitz is an excellent, thoughtful writer. Well researched and usually of a conservative nature. It's clear that Ann Coulter hit a nerve there. Ann must have criticized someone or something that D.R. holds dear in order to engender this kind of response."

I read this piece and what I think that nerve was is the whole "witch-hunt" aspect of the 50's search for Communists in gov't, entertainment, etc.

Rabinowitz is well known for leading the charge against the lunatic "child molestator" witch hunts of the 1980's. The ones featuring Margaret Kelly Michaels (as a victim) and Janet Reno (as an overzealous - to say the least - prosecutor). I think Rabinowitz is arguing against gov't over reaching on little or no evidence. Since I haven't read the book I can't say if her criticism is valid or not, but I think this is the bee in her bonnet.