Welcome to Pride in America Month. Every day in the month of June and through Independence Day, we will highlight a figure who has demonstrated and defended American values. Consider it a healthy alternative to the Left's June celebration that has taken over the media and corporate America.
To leftists, his very name is a curse. To conservatives, he is a third rail, a dangerous topic to broach. Yet history has proven that Sen. Joseph McCarthy was absolutely right.
Joseph McCarthy became the youngest circuit judge in Wisconsin history in 1939, winning the election at the age of 30. Despite being exempt from the military draft during World War II, he chose to enlist in the Marine Corps, serving as an intelligence officer for a dive bomber squadron in the Pacific theater. Several times, he volunteered to fly on bombing runs himself as an observer, earning the nickname Tail-Gunner Joe. The name became ironic later after accusations that he had embellished his combat record.
In 1946, McCarthy challenged three-term Senator Robert La Follette, Jr., in the Republican primary, winning a close race before crushing his Democratic opponent in the general election.
In 1950, Sen. McCarthy spoke to a Republican women’s club in West Virginia and said that he had a list of known Communists who were subverting American policy within the State Department. This set off a chain of events that led to several congressional committees and a media firestorm.
In an era where communism seemed to be spreading across the globe — China had fallen to Mao Zedong and the Soviet Union had developed an atomic bomb within the past year — McCarthy’s accusations were taken seriously by the American people. However, the chairman of the Senate committee tasked with investigating McCarthy’s allegations despised him, believing that he was simply attacking President Truman’s administration for purely political purposes.
Unfortunately, McCarthy’s zeal was not matched by his care when it came to accusations. By 1954, even his allies were concerned that he was doing more damage to the cause of anti-communism than help. During hearings on alleged Communist infiltration of the U.S. Army, legal counsel Joseph Welch famously asked McCarthy, “Have you no sense of decency, sir?”
This was the beginning of the end of McCarthy’s time in the spotlight. He was censured by his own party, and he died merely three years later. Unfortunately for our country, by discrediting McCarthy, the left discredited anti-communism, as well. His name has become a synonym for a baseless witch hunt.
Nevertheless, time has proven Joseph McCarthy’s concerns correct. There were people in our government who believed that the Soviet model was superior and that the American people should not be trusted with the truth or the ability to vote in any meaningful way. The State Department especially has become the source of statist propaganda that afflicts the entire world, the first impeachment of President Donald Trump demonstrates how they operate completely without accountability.
Joseph McCarthy had many flaws, but a love of his country was not one of them. He saw the danger of communism spreading throughout our government and tried to stop it. If only his colleagues had taken the threat as seriously.
Do you have a great American who deserves to be celebrated this month? Let us know!
