James Hansen, Michael Mann, David Appell, and many other warmists advocate prosecuting climate skeptics for what they believe, and making climate skepticism a crime.
There is a long tradition behind the idea of making politically incorrect thought illegal. It was SOP in the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany.
Warmists believe that the survival of the planet depends on their nutty belief system, just as Islamic extremists do. It is amazing that Dinosaurs survived 165 million years with CO2 levels 10X higher than at present.
Reblogged this on Climate Ponderings.
Steve and all, here is the “2016 Obama” full film not a trailer. Quite interesting.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tDY6v8KdSYs
They took it down.
“Anti-Obama Movie Mailed to 1 Million Ohioans.”
http://www.buzzfeed.com/rosiegray/anti-obama-movie-mailed-to-1-million-ohioians
Mercy is predicated on repentance, yet who among them yet shows remorse in the light of day?
McCarthy believed that there was no greater threat to freedom of thought, belief and expression than those who masquerade as defenders of such freedom while simultanously plotting and conspiring to destroy it and replace it with totalitarian communism.
To that end, and considering the Cold War and the fact that the Soviet-dominated communists had established many sleeper agents in the U.S. for the purpose of co-opting youth and fomenting revolution, he came to view disbelief in free enterprise and in freedom of thought as tantamount to being an enemy of the U.S., during a time that the U.S. was caught up in a war whose outcome would determine what kind of social and political system our children would live within.
He was hardly alone in these views; quite the contrary. In these views, he had tens of millions who agreed with him.
He started to take flak when he was over the target. The response of his enemies to his effectiveness in exposing them? To bait him and lay traps for him, of course. Which he responded to in a spectacularly bad fashion. He couldn’t take the heat when it was turned up on him. He wasn’t prepared. Perhaps he simply wasn’t up to the challenge. Anyway, apparently caught up with fear, he reacted with paranoia and indiscriminate aggression. Regrettably, he could not seem to see that this behavior caused him to resemble some of the despots that he most despised — notably Stalin, of course.
These flaws of his character are serious, but they do not change the fact that he was an avowed enemy of communism and socialism and an avowed believer in liberty, private property, and free enterprise. I believe that we would be much worse off today if there had been no one to do the work he did of exposing the massive and criminal conspiracies to overthrow the U.S. constitutional system on behalf of the Soviet Union and its allies.
Actually, those with whom we are sparring right now in the climate debate are the ideological descendants of those true enemies of justice and liberty who were exposed by McCarthy in the 1950’s, at no small effort on his part.
RTF
McCarthy persecuted people for their beliefs. That is as un-American as it gets.
All I’m trying to say is he had the right intention, to expose people for a desire to destroy the freedoms of America. He messed it up, perhaps because he was unequal to the task. I don’t believe he originally intended to go after people merely for their beliefs. I ask that you try to separate his early acts of exposing communism from his later, paranoid acts of persecuting people for their beliefs. There are two very different McCarthys there. To throw the first one under the bus simply because the second one was unwittingly behaving in an un-American way is exactly what our present enemies hope for, because that is how they hope to win. McCarthy did not start out as an enemy of freedom. Yes, it is true he ended up that way. I ask only that if one insists on bringing up the latter, that one qualify it by mentioning the former.
And perhaps you can appreciate how difficult it is to defend someone like him who at times desperately needs defending for some of his actions, even though other actions of his were totally indefensible. Initially, he did what someone had to do, and which no one else wanted to, and it was to his lifelong detriment, but to our benefit. And our present enemies would like nothing better than that we throw him entirely under the bus, repudiate his beliefs completely, and walk away and forget everything about him except of course the evil things that they want to turn into a perpetual sideshow monstrosity. That is viewed by them as essential for victory. And that, Steven, is what we call “propaganda”.
RTF
Appell also believes that he has the “right intention”
That’s right! But that doesn’t mean McCarthy is the political equivalent of Appell. Politically, the two are almost the polar opposite of each other. Socialists are aggressively trying to change us into a society that hates and attacks all independent thought and expression. McCarthy was aware of the dangers of such a society, and was trying to do his best to prevent that change from happening. It’s like night and day. Yes, there is shadow in the daylight, but that doesn’t make it nighttime.
RTF
McCarthy was an asshole, who spent a lot of time investigating other men’s assholes, and who tried to wreck the First Amendment which he claimed to defend.
The Constitution is not a suicide pact.
McCarthy may have been an asshole, but he was our asshole.
RTF
Not mine. The end does not justify the means.
I wasn’t saying it does. Intentions matter. The communists do not “intend” to preserve freedom of speech, belief, expression, or property.
McCarthy harmed and even ruined countless innocent people in his insane quest to expose some that might have been guilty. That is not the way our system works (innocent until proven guilty). His actions were indefensible.
AndyDC, “countless”? Allof his actions were “indefensible”??
McCarthy and many, many others were involved in investigating and successfully exposing a massive Soviet-backed communist conspiracy within the Executive Branch of the United States government. Did you get that entire sentence, or just parts of it? Successfully exposing, that means that an actual conspiracy was exposed, not that some half-baked conspiracy speculation was presented as fact.
Regarding the abuses you mention of criminal procedure (which was NOT the basis of the investigation, since there was a war on and the U.S. was decidedly not in the stronger position at that time, i.e., there was a national security emergency in progress), I assume you are familiar with the concept of friendly fire and why it is sometimes held to be excusable. Ironically, as a Christian I am a pacifist and do not believe in using arms offensively in battle. However, what McCarthy and his commission did was not even that. The “friendly fire” in question was not literal, merely figurative. It originally involved the use of information derived from investigations based on reasonable suspicion to publicly expose and discredit certain enemies (who were known to be out there and operating) based on congressional war powers. Yes, it got way out of control and that was totally indefensible. But that fact does not make the original investigation or attempts to expose actual enemy activity indefensible.
So if you believe that no accidental “friendly fire” injuries were acceptable in the attempt to win the Cold War, would that mean you also oppose all clandestine activities of the Executive Branch during said War, since they could and likely did result in some “friendly fire” incidents including damage to reputations? One could of course argue that some restitution was in order by the Congress, but if it was not given, that fact alone in no way invalidates all efforts to find and expose Soviet agents within the U.S., including in the upper ranks of the United States government. These are two separate questions … an honest, good-faith effort to deal with a known, proven, massive problem that had been allowed to grow unchecked for some time, and the deplorable failure to properly restitute victims of abuse (as well as the deplorable abuse in the first instance). Many people seem ready and anxious to decry the abuses of McCarthy, but much less prepared to point out the much worse abuses of the communists which engendered the investigations in the first place.
Now I’ll pause and again wait to see if there is further interest in painting my words as an attempt to defend everything McCarthy did (i.e. strawman), rather than a limited defense of certain of his actions taken against communism (the greatest threat ever to the national security of all countries and the freedoms of all people).
RTF
Beliefs are one thing and sedition is another. Communists during the cold war who were believed to be in communication with counterparts in the USSR, actively organizing, recruiting, propagandizing in newspapers etc I think were fair game. We pretty much do the same thing now with individuals that are suspected to be sympathetic to or members of organizations, sects & ‘brotherhoods’.
I’m sorry for failure of boldface. RTF
What actual communist conspiricy against the USA did McCarthy ever uncover? Of all the people he accused, how many were convicted of actual crimes?
There is no data in the geologic record establishing a link between CO2 and temperature. From the Geocraft Web page:
The Carboniferous Period and the Ordovician Period were the only geological periods during the Paleozoic Era when global temperatures were as low as they are today. To the consternation of global warming proponents, the Late Ordovician Period was also an Ice Age while at the same time CO2 concentrations then were nearly 12 times higher than today– 4400 ppm. According to greenhouse theory, Earth should have been exceedingly hot. Instead, global temperatures were no warmer than today. Clearly, other factors besides atmospheric carbon influence earth temperatures and global warming.
An excellent summary of the non-impact of CO2 is here:
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/Carboniferous_climate.html
Well I have to respectfully disagree with Steve on this one ( Hey, nobody agrees on everything! Don’t believe me? Get married! 🙂
Well yes, there was persecution. But I don’t know how anyone can look back and not conclude that the two most persecuted were Joe McCarthy and Roy Cohn. Nobody can even name those who they supposedly persecuted. They were focused on public officials, government employees and armed forces members. People continually confuse McCarthy with Hoover it seems, and it was ( and is ) the FBI that ‘persecutes’ civilians.
The First Amendment does not apply to public officials, government employees and armed forces members. It specifically does not apply because that would legalize spying. For example Greenglass and Rosenberg had no First Amendment right to communicate our secrets to the Soviets. Neither did their civilian contacts for that matter. They were all rolled up, several executed.
McCarthyism was the true birth of Political Correctness, it is the mold for it. It legitimized the media as the fifth column for the enemy, with Murrow famously doing to McCarthy what Cronkite did for Vietnam, Donaldson to Reagan, Gregory to Bush 43, … ad infinitum. That is the single biggest consequence of McCarthyism.
McCarthyism can also be defined as the shameless hypocrisy of doing things like describing the FBI director as a cross-dresser, painting a veteran WW2 tailgunner as a dysfunctional Irish drunk, and outing a lawyer and loyal public servant as a closeted gay. The ends justify the means to the enemy.
Joe McCarthy was a Senator, but he never did anything like what the current crowd is trying to do with that anti-Islam movie (dragging the producer into questioning, POTUS and SoS continually slamming it and apologizing for it). McCarthy banned no movies, nor got anyone blacklisted. Even the unrelated HUAC achieved very little. Personally I wish they had successfully wiped-out the fifth column and their Hollywood allies, got them stripped of citizenship and deported. The damage they did and continually do is all around us. You cannot allow the enemy to take up residence next door and expect things to all work out neatly because they really are the enemy and they have plans for you and your kids and grandkids. Alas, this will only be corrected in a civil war.
That is why words such as heretic (believer of incorrect thoughts) and infidel (non-believer) are so closely related to the word denier (of the (one?) truth).
Andy DC,
There must be a half dozen different strawmen in that question. McCarthy was a Senator, not an FBI agent, not a U.S. Attorney, not an Agency spook. Senators and Congressman have hearings as representatives of the people to keep the public informed. That is their work product.
What is the significance of a conspiracy or a lone wolf? I ask since it sounds as if “conspiracy” is prerequisite to assuaging your criticism of the investigations. Aside from the obvious fact that a conspiracy involves any number greater than one, how could there be anything other than a “conspiracy” in the spy game since every spy has at the minimum one handler, but in reality many more contacts.
Congressman don’t have batting averages, the amount of people he allegedly “accused” vs. quantity convicted of something are mutually exclusive. I repeat, he was not a U.S. Attorney. Congress is not a courtroom ( except the rare times their are impeachment trials ), the only thing they have in common is the seldom enforced crime of perjury for lying.
Communist actions against we the American people were wide and varied and VERY REAL. It ranged from infiltration of high public office like Alger Hiss and Harry Dexter White, stealing nuke secrets, the armed forces enlisted and contractors, troop deployment and war plans, and Lord only knows what else.
These guys worked with both hands tied behind their backs because the live ammunition was locked up, not seeing the light of day ( let alone a courtroom which seems so important to you ) for 50 years. Even Wikipedia: Venona touches upon the seriousness of the era …
To stand back now and criticize McCarthy and many of the other unknown warriors fight this thankless battle without disclosing classified information, with the fifth column in the media aligned against them, because they didn’t have a long list of convictions is beyond petty, beyond ignorant, its just evil. Who would want to be in the intelligence game when this is the thanks they get. These were very serious times …
Walter Duranty the traitor reporting for the New York Times in the 1930’s, Berlin blockade and airlift in 1948, Harry Hopkins (FDR’s buddy) spying at the White House the entire time, Algier Hiss at the State Department, Harry Dexter White at Treasury, Whittaker Chambers defection and the Pumpkin Papers, Atom spies: Klaus Fuchs, Harry Gold, David and Ruth Greenglass, Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, Morton Sobell, August 1949 Soviet A-Bomb test, China communist takeover, Korea invasion, August 1953 Soviet H-Bomb test.
And that’s just some of the stuff that made it into the news! Yep, McCarthy had no business as a U.S. Senator looking out for America, because such a fine job was being done by the Democratic-Socialist FDR machine. What was the alternative again? Play nice with Queensberry rules like the AGW debate. See the problem now?
From McCarthy’s Wikipedia page … after receiving his resolution of “condemnation” from the Senate,
“McCarthy continued to rail against Communism. He warned against attendance at summit conferences with “the Reds”, saying that “you cannot offer friendship to tyrants and murderers … without advancing the cause of tyranny and murder.”[102] He declared that “coexistence with Communists is neither possible nor honorable nor desirable. Our long-term objective must be the eradication of Communism from the face of the earth.”
I believe it is possible to look with distaste and abhorrence upon McCarthy’s very real sins, while still agreeing with him in the above-quoted statements.
From the same page:
“He was given a state funeral attended by 70 senators, and a Solemn Pontifical Requiem Mass was said before more than 100 priests and 2,000 others at St. Matthew’s Cathedral. Thousands of people viewed the body in Washington. He was buried in St. Mary’s Parish Cemetery, Appleton, Wisconsin, where more than 30,000 filed through St. Mary’s Church to pay their last respects.[106] Three senators—George W. Malone, William E. Jenner, and Herman Welker—had flown from Washington to Appleton on the plane carrying McCarthy’s casket. Robert F. Kennedy quietly attended the funeral in Wisconsin.”
This will be my last post on this page unless I am specifically questioned by Steven. I just ran across the below-quoted passage at the Wiki article for “Smith Act trials of communist party leaders” and I really hope the passage helps to crystallize the issue for people, as it has for me. I ask that readers of the passage ask themselves the following question:
“What exactly are these judges citing to justify the means that they are endorsing here? Is it merely ‘the ends’ (i.e. the expected effects and their relative goodness as perceived by the government), or is it something greater than that? If it’s something greater, then what, exactly?”
Think about it.
From the article:
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In May 1950, one month before the appeals court heard oral arguments in the CPUSA case, the Supreme Court ruled on free speech issues in American Communications Association v. Douds. In that case the Court considered the clear and present danger test, but rejected it as too mechanical and instead introduced a balancing test.[124] The federal appeals court heard oral arguments in the CPUSA case on June 21–23, 1950. Two days later, on June 25, South Korea was invaded by forces from communist North Korea, marking the start of the Korean War; during the two months that the appeals court judges were forging their opinions, the Korean War dominated the headlines.[125] On August 1, 1950, the appeals court unanimously upheld the convictions in an opinion written by Judge Learned Hand. Judge Hand considered the clear and present danger test, but his opinion adopted a balancing approach similar to that suggested in American Communications Association v. Douds.[78][106][126] In his opinion, Hand wrote:
“In each case they [the courts] must ask whether the gravity of the ‘evil’, discounted by its improbability, justifies such invasion of free speech as is necessary to avoid the danger…. The American Communist Party, of which the defendants are the controlling spirits, is a highly articulated, well contrived, far spread organization, numbering thousands of adherents, rigidly and ruthlessly disciplined, many of whom are infused with a passionate Utopian faith that is to redeem mankind…. The violent capture of all existing governments is one article of the creed of that faith [communism], which abjures the possibility of success by lawful means.”[127]
The opinion specifically mentioned the contemporary dangers of communism worldwide, with emphasis on the Berlin Airlift.[95]
Appeal to the Supreme Court
Chief Justice Fred M. Vinson wrote the majority opinion in Dennis v. United States. The defendants appealed the Second Circuit’s decision to the Supreme Court in Dennis v. United States. {. . .} The 6–2 decision was issued on June 4, 1951, and upheld Hand’s decision. Chief Justice Fred Vinson’s opinion stated that the First Amendment does not require that the government must wait “until the putsch is about to be executed, the plans have been laid and the signal is awaited” before it interrupts seditious plots.[128] In his opinion, Vinson endorsed the balancing approach used by Judge Hand:[129][130]
Chief Judge Learned Hand … interpreted the [clear and present danger] phrase as follows: ‘In each case, [courts] must ask whether the gravity of the “evil”, discounted by its improbability, justifies such invasion of free speech as is necessary to avoid the danger.’ We adopt this statement of the rule. As articulated by Chief Judge Hand, it is as succinct and inclusive as any other we might devise at this time. It takes into consideration those factors which we deem relevant, and relates their significances. More we cannot expect from words.
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