Used to be, the glory of freedom was self-evident. We had plenty of examples of totalitarianism for contrast. Who knew it would only take two generations after the fall of the Berlin Wall for everyone to forget freedom. McCarthy was right. Communism burrowed it’s way into the fabric of our society, and we did not do enough to root it out.
I consider it an honorable thing to be called a McCarthy-ite. If something ‘smacks’ of McCarthyism, good. :)