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marantzo

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 10:45 am

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I think that you (Tim and Billy) are misreading what Marc wrote. I'm sure he was saying that we shouldn't be so satified that McCarthy is dead because his legacy lives on. He wasn't implying that Tim's and my post was a form of McCarthyism.

Mr. Brownstone

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 10:54 am

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 2450

I entertained that possibility, which is why I wanted marc to clarify.

_________________
"My name is Gunnery Sergeant Major Highway. And I have drunk more beer, pissed more blood, banged more quiff and knocked more skulls than all you numbnuts put together." - Clint Eastwood, Heartbreak Ridge

Marc

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:07 am

Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424

Quote:

To equate despising the demagogue wannabe McCarthy with McCarthyism is complete, utter, total bullshit.

extremism in any guise is dangerous. brown and gary think they're so right
they wish someone dead. McCarthy thought he was right. I see similarities.

Clearly, McCarthy was a nutjob and dangerous. And I find him sad and tragic.

Mr. Brownstone

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:19 am

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 2450

"brown and gary think they're so right
they wish someone dead. McCarthy thought he was right. I see similarities."

I don't wish him, dead, idiot. He is dead. And fuck him.

McCarthy may be tragic and sad, but I would rather expend my tears on the lives he destroyed rather than the destroyer himself.

I may think I'm right (I don't know anyone who thinks they're wrong), but I'm certainly not going to destroy anyone's life, reputation and career to prove it.

Actually, come to think of it, the similarity holds no water, because McCarthy KNEW many of the people he was accusing were actually innocent of any wrong doing.

Therefore, he didn't know he was right. He actually knew he was wrong, and savaged innocents anyway.

So fuck him dead.

God, you're fucking toxic.

Marc

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:33 am

Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424

Quote:

God, you're fucking toxic.

and you're overreacting.

McCarthy believed (and he would have liked us to believe) there was a communist "conspiracy so vast" that our country was in genuine danger of being destroyed. Now you and I know this was paraniod bullshit. But, McCarthy believed it. And as an "patriotic" American he felt it was his duty to protect his country from this conspiracy. Unlike the lies of Bush and Co., I really think McCarthy believed his line of shit. As a country, we're in a far worse situation under Bush than McCarthy's '50s. At least McCarthy had strong opposition in the government. We have spineless wimps.

Marc

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:34 am

Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424

Quote:

I don't wish him, dead, idiot.

I want you all to notice brown's mode of operation. He'll come in calling names and as soon as I retaliate (which I won't) he'll leave.

Mr. Brownstone

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:35 am

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 2450

Marc,

In light of your last post and please explain to me the fucking similarity between Joseph McCarthy and Gary & me.

Marc

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:36 am

Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424

my comment to gary and brown about extremes and mccarthyism was to illustrate all of our tendencies toward absolutes. I am reading a biography of McCarthy right now and he was a fascinatingly complex and warped man.
Nothing is black and white in politics and Washington.

Marc

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:41 am

Joined: 19 May 2004 Posts: 8424

tim,

I understand your righteous indignation. It kind of reminded me of McCarthy's righteous indignation. I wasn't being all that serious. Reading your and Gary's posts reminded me of how black and white we see certain things. And maybe in McCarthy's case that is as it should be. I just see a very layered situation with lots of complexities. Just listen to the homophobic jokes that several politicians and military men make during those hearings.
McCarthy wasn't alone in being a biased and paranoid prick.

Mr. Brownstone

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:44 am

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 2450

"I want you all to notice brown's mode of operation. He'll come in calling names and as soon as I retaliate (which I won't) he'll leave."

So you can see the future, now?

I won't leave, Marc.

You just compared me to Joseph fucking McCarthy. Excuse me if my feathers get a little ruffled.

And you have an incredibly skewed sense of history, recent and less.

I didn't "come in calling names." And for YOU to complain about name-calling is hilarious. See, this is now your achilles' heel, hipster. Due to your habitual urge to inject as much poison into this site as possible, any attempt you make to call into question anyone else's conduct is fucking laughable. Congratulations. You're the Michael Brown of Third Eye.

And I'd point out your modus operandi, but it's pretty fucking obvious to all.

1. Complain that the site is too personality-driven and that no one is talking film.
2. Pick fights with members by attacking their personal character
3. Complain that the site is too personality-driven and that no one is talking film.

(Repeat ad nauseum)

And you can't even blame it on your frustration as moderator anymore. What will be your new excuse for being a shithead?

billyweeds

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:46 am

Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City

But, McCarthy believed it. And as an "patriotic" American he felt it was his duty to protect his country from this conspiracy. Unlike the lies of Bush and Co., I really think McCarthy believed his line of shit.

First of all, I'm not at all sure McCarthy believed it. I think it's perfectly plausible--in fact, completely credible--that he saw the "communist threat" as his ticket to the White House, and he used it and used it and used it.

But for argument's sake say he did in fact believe it. The way he used it was immoral in the extreme.

And the fact that he died of alcoholism makes him no more sympathetic. As you probably know, more than half of my friends are recovering alcoholics, and we all know that the fact that you have a disease is no excuse for being evil. McCarthy was evil, pure and simple. And like Brown says, fuck him.

jeremy

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:49 am

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 6794 Location: Derby, England and Hamilton, New Zealand (yes they are about 12,000 miles apart)

I tend to agree with Marc’s nuanced picture of McCarthy, who was a product of his time. He didn’t send anyone to a gulag or a death camp, but he rode the same paranoia and divisive impulses mirrored in excesses elsewhere. Fortunately, America’s democracy and civil institutions were robust enough to resist the assault by a self-important, misguided bully. Indeed, McCarthy, a product of that same society, could never have gone to those extremes, even if given free rein to do so. I actually think the whole episode is overstated (compared to civil rights issues, say) because the successors of those affected are today’s players.

Being against Senator McCarthy is a bit like being against white only restaurants. It’s yesterday’s battle, a waste of anger. Or perhaps that’s the point. Righteous indignation feels good, especially when it’s about something on which there is already a consensus.

Where McCarthy’s story is interesting is in the parallels we see with what’s happening in the Western World today. Substitute communism for terror and the exploitation of fear, the assault on our freedoms, the replacing of reason with rhetoric and the wrap-yourself-in-the-flag language is scarily similar.

_________________
I am angry, I am ill, and I'm as ugly as sin.
My irritability keeps me alive and kicking.
I know the meaning of life, it doesn't help me a bit.
I know beauty and I know a good thing when I see it.

Mr. Brownstone

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:54 am

Joined: 21 May 2004 Posts: 2450

Jeremy & Billy:

See, if this was to be the resultant discussion regarding McCarthy when this particular thread was initiated, I would happy to be a part of it.

If Marc's sole point was to offer the consideration that McCarthy was a complex soul (which is a prettymundane point as well - what human being aside from Ashton Kutcher isn't complex?), that is a discussion/debate to which I would gladly contribute.

Unfortunately, Marc couldn't resist comparing Gary & myself to McCarthy, which is pretty unkind in general, let alone when you consider Lee Grant to be a mentor, a colleague and a friend, as I do.

Lee Grant fought tooth and nail against those bastards, and her early career suffered for it. She's an amazing lady, and to be grouped in with the son of a bitch who nearly destroyed the careers and lives of people I know and care about is unconscionable.

billyweeds

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:55 am

Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City

Dude, I was alive and watching the hearings day after day at the age of 13. Even then--before I knew the word "homosexual"--I knew there was something fishy about the relationship between Cohn and Schine. And I certainly knew the concept of evil, and I knew Joe McCarthy was a working definition of the word. This was at a time when a lot--a lot a lot--of people thought McCarthy was the savior of the United States. So don't try to denigrate my hatred of McCarthy as "yesterday's battle." When I see McCarthy's smarmy, smirking face and hear his disgusting characterization of Welch as a "man who knows what a pixie is," then I am 13 years old again--and absolutely incensed, and obsessed.

billyweeds

Posted: Mon Nov 28, 2005 11:57 am

Joined: 20 May 2004 Posts: 20618 Location: New York City

That was to Jeremy, not Tim. Certainly not Tim.

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