"... that in some case the political winds will shift and some of those ideas will become popular again in the future," says Jeff Smith, a University of Wisconsin film professor, expressing great pride in The Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research, a huge archive which includes — among much else (as you'll see in this short video) — materials relating to Dalton Trumpo Trumbo and Hollywood's era of "blacklisting":
As you may have noticed, there's a new movie, "Trumbo," starring Bryan Cranston.
ADDED: The commenters enjoyed my "Trumpo" for "Trumbo" typo, above, which I've preserved with a strike-through. Meaning was striven for: "Maybe AA typo'd 'Trumpo' because she sees Donald Trump as a maligned avatar of truth that the establishment is trying to suppress."
also, Trumbo went out of his way to make sure that movies that were critical of Russia were not made. and he bragged about it. He blocked a movie about Trotsky from being made. and did same with anti-Communist books by James T. Farrell, Victor Kravchenko, and Arthur Koestler, all of which he called “untrue” and “reactionary.” Communist party had a “fine tradition . . . that whenever a book or play or film is produced which is harmful to the best interests of the working class, that work and its author should and must be attacked in the sharpest possible terms.”
Trumbo only got what he dished out. In the late 30s he bragged to his fellow travellers that he and his associates had successfully squashed films that made Stalin's Russia look bad.
It's ironic in hindsight that the blacklisters and anti-communists of the 1950s and '60s were probably right. And we know how much progressives love irony.
The story of Trumbo is a reminder that efforts to control screen content had existed in the past and there's always the chance that in some case the political winds will shift and some of those ideas will become popular again in the future...
I assume they're referring to Clinton or Sanders being elected and appointing Supreme Court justices who would overturn Citizens United, thus allowing government control of screen content critical of incumbent politicians.
Trumbo was the Duranty of the McCarthy era; an absolute apologist for a dictator and regime that murdered millions of their own people, in purges and otherwise, and subjugated entire non-Russian peoples to lives of terror and deprivation.
Cranston spent a lot of goodwill from his past work and flushed it. Its amazing what success on a level that he has achieved regularly and predictably does to folks.
But Trumbo wasn't against such controls: he was a Stalinist who used his art to promote the Soviet line.
Is there any evidence that he ever condemned the Stalinist control of the press and art?
It was wrong to punish him for his views; but it wasn't wrong to punish him for his treasonous behavior. The late Sidney Hook explained it best: Americans have the right to hold heretical views; they don't have the right to be agents of an enemy of the US. Which is what many of the members of the CPUSA were.
Trumbo, the ardent Communist? Yeah, I pity him. Really.
He was a far worse censor than the "Blacklist".
Its amazing what success on a level that he has achieved regularly and predictably does to folks.
Bill Gates is NOW a Socialist. Amazing that he had no qualms with capitalism while making his billions.
And given how tight the CPUSA was with the USSR, there is literally no way you could be a member and not be aware of the influence. It's like hearing a former Klansman say "What? We don't like BLACKS? Since when?"
Here's an interesting story that will never become a major motion picture. Juan Robles was a linguist, a minor poet, and a dedicated Communist. He taught Spanish at John Hopkins University. He went to Spain during the civil war there. He became a translator to the Russan general who was supervising the Commnist military effort. The Russian general fell afoul of Stalin and was killed. Since Robles knew what the Russian General knew, they liquidated him as well........Robles was best friends with the American author, John Dos Pasos. Robles was an American citizen. He couldn't just be made to disappear. Pasos and other friends asked around and discovered that he had been killed. The Communists then claimed that Robles was a Fascist spy and needed to be executed. This enraged Dos Pasos who knew the truth of the matter. Dos Pasos tried to enlist the aid of Lillian Hellman and Ernest Hemingway in publicizing this crime. They refused. They said that such publicity would be detrimental to the Republican cause, and that was what was of paramount importance........Dos Pasos persevered. His book about the matter was not controversial. It as simply ignored like Orwell's Homage to Catalonia. Dos Pasos was a major American writer. He was criticized as a reactionary and his later books went unread.......There you have it. A man gets murdered and then posthumously gets slandered. A writer who attempts to J'ai Accuse th situation gets trashed for his honesty and falls not limbo. The writers who participate in this conspiracy of silence get congratulated on their bravery. Major motion pictures, in fact, are made about their courage.
I am glad to see so many here on to the fact that Trumbo was a Stalinist who tried to suppress speech every bit as much if not more than his opponents did.
Ron Radosh, a former Madison leftie who changed his views, did some major research into all this here in the archives of the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research. It's too bad they could not have mentioned his work and that of others critical of Trumbo. NRO republished a piece Ron did two years ago, anticipating this film on Trumbo would be more of the usual whitewash. I recommend it.
Really, David Begley, only MSNBC and CNN? have you watched FOX lately?
The blatant right wing propaganda that they proliferate is every bit as bad as the perceived bias of CNN and MSNBC. And, though i have never watched FOX Business before, the bias towards the right-wing candidates was palpable. FOX and FOX business are in the bag for the republicans every bit as much as CNN and MSNBC are for the democrats. So get off your sanctimonious horse and look at the real world.
It would be nice to see today's critics of 1950s blacklisting take even the ounce of courage necessary to speak out against today's real opponents of free speech who seem to dominate the far left. We're seeing dissenting thought rooted out in academia, and a popular movement in the Democratic party to overturn Citizens United and limit political speech. How about some free speech advocates turn their attention to these fascist impulses before all dissent is finally squashed?
Trumbo was an idiot communist. He had a right to spout his idiot communist beliefs, but let's not kid ourselves about the awfulness of what he had to say.
The trailer proclaims an ideal, "The freedom to believe what you believe and not be persecuted for it."
Communists don't subscribe to this ideal yet express outrage they weren't protected by it. Not only that, the poor guys could no longer make big bucks participating in the capitalist system. Bummer. They actually got a good taste of the system they were promoting and they didn't like it much.
The Huac did subscribe to the ideal, but didn't trust the American people. They became the monster they were fighting.
When I was going through a pacifist phase as a university student, I read Dalton Trumbo's novel Johnny Got His Gun. The novel narrates the thoughts of a hospitalized soldier whose legs, arms, ears, eyes and mouth have been shot off during a war. Now the soldier cannot do or communicate anything. All he can do is think, and he thinks now that no war is worth fighting.
At the time, I found the novel to be a compelling argument for pacifism.
A few years later, I abandoned my pacifism and even joined the US Air Force.
I was very anti-Communist, and whenever the black-listing of Trumbo came up, I argued that he was a Stalinist, etc. I thought the black-listing of Trumbo was justified.
Now, however, I am re-thinking the black-listing issue. I am seeing people being hounded economically because they oppose same-sex marriage. Now I think that good citizens should exercise self-restraint during zealots' campaigns to destroy the livelihoods of political opponents.
I will say this for Cranston: He has praised Donald Trump, not for what he says, but for the fact that he dares to say what is on his mind. So I will take Cranston, at least, for a free speech fan.
Some years ago, I watched a forum on C-Span with Ronald Radosh & others on the work of the American Communist Party in NYC.
In the course of the discussion, it was revealed that one of the NYC Communists being discussed was sitting in the audience! He spoke up & identified himself & asked Radosh if he wanted to hear his side of the story. Radosh said 'Not really" & the guy said "Why not?". Radosh told him, in so many words, that he could tell he was lying because he was still breathing.
Now, however, I am re-thinking the black-listing issue. I am seeing people being hounded economically because they oppose same-sex marriage
I don't think anyone here is defending the blacklisting of people simply because they held Stalinist or communist beliefs or any other beliefs.
But the issue is not what he believed but how he acted; and more important, on whose behalf? Was he simply holding heretical views? Or was he acting on behalf of a foreign government, i.e., the Soviet Union?
The CPUSA was not just another, albeit more radical, political party. It was entirely funded and controlled by Moscow. Not all of its members were agents of Moscow of course. Many were sincere if not terribly wrong with their views.
An American has the right to support ISIS, right? But do they have a right to be acting on orders of ISIS and with an organization funded and supported by ISIS?
I think that's the distinction that needs to be considered.
If a screenwriter is using his work to promote a political view does a movie studio not have a right to say you won't work for us? Not work for us because you are using your work to promote views we disagree with?
There are numerous examples where Trumbo used his screenwork to promote his pro-Moscow political views. He admitted to doing this. In fact, as a member of the CPUSA he was expected to do just that.
Some of these screenwriters were blacklisted (all of the Hollywood Ten for example) NOT just because they had been members of the CPUSA but because they had used their art/work to promote the policies of Moscow.
Spielberg also has a picture out that deals with Cold War hysteria. Something about the lawyer who negotiated the swap for the downed U2 pilot Gary Powers. I haven't seen it, but my guess is that they don't mention the fact that the Russians used a proximity fuse supplied courtesy of the Rosenberg spy ring to bring down Powers' plane. There really were Russian spies, and Americans really did suffer because of their machinations.
"There really were Russian spies, and Americans really did suffer because of their machinations."
I don't think anyone has ever said there were never any Russian spies. We had our spies and other countries have their spies. Everyone knows this is the case, only the identities of the spies are (sometimes) unknown.
How did "Americans really suffer" because of the "machinations" of Russian spies?
Gary Powers said in his book that he thought Oswald, who was in Russia and who had been in the Marine Corps in Japan and knew the U-2’s altitude, gave the information to the Soviets that enabled them to shoot him down.
"Now, however, I am re-thinking the black-listing issue. I am seeing people being hounded economically because they oppose same-sex marriage. Now I think that good citizens should exercise self-restraint during zealots' campaigns to destroy the livelihoods of political opponents."
In a country that brags on itself as being the acme of human freedom, equality, and justice--that is to say, ours--it is never acceptable to "black-list" or otherwise persecute any individuals or groups simply for their religious or political beliefs, practices, and associations, unless they violate the law.
One thing I try to impress upon my impressionable kids is one salient fact of WW2:
The Stalin-Hitler pact of 1939 was the primary cause of the carnage that killed 75 Million people. The Nazis and the Commies conspired, essentially, to invade Poland (from the West & East). The fact that USSR delayed their invasion by 2 or 3 weeks confuses people -- the headlines of the day are "Germany invades Poland! Britain and France Declare War!"
Also, I try to convey that Stalin, head of the Commies, murdered many more millions of people than Hitler.
The point is that, of course, Hitler and the Nazis were evil; and Stalin and Communists were just as evil.
The second point of confusion is why we joined with Stalin after his break with Hitler. It's a good question. I just tell them that to beat Hitler, we made a compromise to assist Stalin on the Eastern Front. It doesn't change the fact that Stalin was evil, and that various dupes in this country failed to see this.
Once that point is made, many good, natural conservative things flow such as why Nixon had to nail Alger Hiss, why the Korean War was noble, why we fought in Vietnam, why Reagan was great, why Bernie Sanders is an idiot, etc, etc.
The Communists were as evil as the Nazis. Wash, rinse, repeat often.
Mike Sylwester said... When I was going through a pacifist phase as a university student, I read Dalton Trumbo's novel Johnny Got His Gun.
I read that book in high school. Trumbo wrote it during the period when Stalin and Hitler had a non-aggression pact. Encouraging America to stay out of the war was the Party line. Immediately after Hitler invaded the Soviet Union, cries went out for a "Second Front Now!" Trumbo tried to pull the book from the shelves. Getting America involved in the war was the new Party priority.
The movie "Trumbo" will have the same relationship to the truth as the movie "Truth" has to the Dan Rather fake emails case - none that doesn't fit the narrative. Narrative - that's the new(ish) word for the Party line.
"If a screenwriter is using his work to promote a political view does a movie studio not have a right to say you won't work for us? Not work for us because you are using your work to promote views we disagree with?
"There are numerous examples where Trumbo used his screenwork to promote his pro-Moscow political views. He admitted to doing this. In fact, as a member of the CPUSA he was expected to do just that.
"Some of these screenwriters were blacklisted (all of the Hollywood Ten for example) NOT just because they had been members of the CPUSA but because they had used their art/work to promote the policies of Moscow."
This is dubious. Screenwriters are not the final word on any film project, (unless they are also the directors). Especially in the 50s, when the studio system was still extant, screenwriters were just the "hired help" from the point of view of the studio heads: they provided the script, the starting point--not the end point--of the final product. To the extent any film contained the personal political or philosophical ideas of the screenwriters, it was because everyone else up the line--including studio heads--approved. From what I understand, most of Trumbo's film scripts were apolitical comedies and romances.
No matter what may have been claimed at the time or subsequently, those blacklisted and imprisoned were punished simply for their political affiliations, and/or refusal to cooperate with Congress.
"Yeah. I see no moral difference between a Nazi and a Communist."
And yet, under our system, any citizen is legally entitled to belong to the Communist party or the Nazi party. We have quite a few American Nazis all over this country. Rightly, they are not being herded into prisons or hounded out of jobs.
And yet, under our system, any citizen is legally entitled to belong to the Communist party or the Nazi party. We have quite a few American Nazis all over this country. Rightly, they are not being herded into prisons or hounded out of jobs.
And we have professors who are admitted Communists teaching.
Should they be arrested? No. Communists don't agree (dissenting opinions don't tend to last long in Communist states).
But should we fund it? No. I don't see a benefit in funding college any longer.
No matter what may have been claimed at the time or subsequently, those blacklisted and imprisoned were punished simply for their political affiliations, and/or refusal to cooperate with Congress.
Which still happens. There is a reason why there are so few Republicans in Hollywood or academia. Systematic discrimination.
In a country that brags on itself as being the acme of human freedom, equality, and justice--that is to say, ours--it is never acceptable to "black-list" or otherwise persecute any individuals or groups simply for their religious or political beliefs, practices, and associations, unless they violate the law.
As I wrote above, I am re-thinking this issue.
In the past, I justified the black-listing of Trumbo and his ilk.
Now, however, I am disturbed by campaigns to ruin the livelihoods of people who have opposed same-sex marriage.
I like the concept of "civil society". Political disagreement should be limited to political realms. People should remain largely undisturbed in their private realms. People should enjoy -- to use a current expression -- "safe spaces".
It's fair game to expose the activities of people like Trumbo -- his support for Stalin, his suppression of anti-Communist film projects, etc.
Likewise, it's fair game to expose people's positions on same-sex marriage or any other issue.
However, good citizens should restrain themselves from trying to ruin the livelihoods of political opponents. It's excessive to try to get opponents fired, to try to bankrupt them, to destroy their careers.
"Sure, Trumbo literally was a Soviet propagandist, but he was the good guy!"
Re. Mr. Cook's statement about blacklisting -
I agree, absolutely, that the State has no business blacklisting people from working in any industry (except, perhaps ones legitimately requiring a security clearance in Defense and the like) for their politics.
But equally, private [in the sense of non-Governmental] entities can decide any set of beliefs they want is so distasteful that they won't deal with such people.
I think mass-social-media pile-ons make people look worse than their opponents, and of course death threats and personal harassment have no place in civil society.
But refusing to hire/patronise the distasteful is freedom of association; boycotts are not beyond the pale, so I see no reason why refusing to hire someone should be, either.
(If a blacklist is organized as a cartel decision, that's another matter, and can easily be wicked. "You'll never work in this industry again!" is different from "This company will never hire you!"
The problem there is not the refusal to patronise, but the cartel.)
Hollywood already has made many movies about Communist writers who were black-listed. Who's going to buy tickets and spend time to watch this Trumbo movie?
Hollywood should make a movie about a family that owns a bakery and is destroyed financially by same-sex-marriage zealots. That would be a much more current and thought-provoking movie to watch and probably would sell a lot more tickets.
"But refusing to hire/patronise the distasteful is freedom of association; boycotts are not beyond the pale, so I see no reason why refusing to hire someone should be, either."
Then you re-open the door--not yet entirely closed, in any case--for employers to freely discriminate in their hiring practices for all sorts of reasons.
1. They belonged to the Communist party. 2. They followed orders.
I've known several blacklisted Communists from that period. They were nice people in person, but the party required obedience and the Soviet Union was at war with the rest of the world almost from the beginning. Heck, it wasn't so long ago that an old cache of weapons buried by Communists in preparation for the revolution was uncovered in Switzerland. Communists who retained a shred of personal morality left the Party either after the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact or after the switch in Soviet marching orders after the Germans invaded the Soviet Union.
I've also met old Nazis in Germany. Also nice people in person for the most part, although the intellectual ones were as annoying as intellectual lefties always are. But I wouldn't trust them as tools of Nazi Germany. The personal *is* different from the political.
Says who? How do you know? What does that mean, formally, to be an agent of a foreign power?
As much as I admire your straight-forward lefty presence here, there's no doubt about this anymore. The CPUSA was a guided missile, & it was guided from Moscow.
How do we know this? From the words of the people who were in it. From the Venona files. From the released records from the archives of then Soviet Union/now Russia. From the archives of ALL the former Warsaw Pact countries, who have opened their Soviet era archives to historians.
If the CPUSA wasn't a tool of Moscow name once that they ever deviated in the slightest from the Gospel According to Moscow. They never did. Never.
Hell, even in the 30's, the joke among NYC lefties was "How is the CPUSA like the Brooklyn Bridge? Both of them work by cables".
"Says who? How do you know? What does that mean, formally, to be an agent of a foreign power?"
The name under the post? That's the author.
Read up on the CP, Cookie. And not Zinn's account either.
The CPUSA during the period that Trumbo was a member was funded by and operating on the direction and orders of Moscow.
As I said, not EVERY member was an agent. But the main members - those at the top - knew that Moscow as funding their party and they were taking orders from it.
People had every right to be a communist and be a member of the CPUSA. They didn't have a right to be working for and operating on behalf of the Soviet Union.
Robert Cook said... In a country that brags on itself as being the acme of human freedom, equality, and justice--that is to say, ours--it is never acceptable to "black-list" or otherwise persecute any individuals or groups simply for their religious or political beliefs, practices, and associations, unless they violate the law.
If it were the government doing the blacklisting, I would agree fully with you.
It was not the government, it was the studios. Are you saying that they do not have the right, particularly on an individual studio level, to say what kind of movies they will or will not make?
When they collude, when Warner, Paramount, Universal et al, collectively decide that they won't make certain kinds of movies with certain writers, it may be a Sherman violation.
Similar to Google, Apple and others deciding who would be allowed to hire who and how much they would pay.
TRUMBO could be an interesting object lesson on something I've noticed with great sadness. I'm an artsy type who, most of my adult life, been around various artists--writers, actors, painters, etc. These people all see themselves as "free spirits;" yet, politically, they're almost always lockstep, Eloi-like State-cultists. In any election, given the usual choice between moderate statist (usually the Republican) and all-out Staatshtupper (almost always the Democrat), these "free spirits" invariably support the more statist candidate, while swallowing uncritically whatever party-line the "liberal" Hive is pushing this season. Some might say that it's because most artists are poor and need Big Brother's financial assistance to practice their arts; but when when they're successful they still drink the Hive's Kool-Aid. The Hollywood Ten weren't exactly the starving masses.
By the way, I forgot to mention that I'm working on a screenplay, ZASU! It's about how Nazi sympathizers in Hollywood were persecuted by The Man during WWII.
As someone else has indicated, Robert Cook seems about as ignorant of the nature of the CPUSA as he is about economics.
If the CIA funded a political party operating in, say, Iran, and funded the leaders of the party and gave them orders on what to do and say and how to operate we all would agree - Robert Cook at the top of the list - that those leaders and members of that party were operating on behalf of the US and were agents of the US government.
But for some reason if you substitute Moscow and the communist party for the above leftwingers like Cook can't think straight.
"But for some reason if you substitute Moscow and the communist party for the above leftwingers like Cook can't think straight."
If they could think straight in the first place, they wouldn't be leftwingers. At this stage of human history--particularly after the experience of the 20th Century--with all the blood spilled and treasure looted by Big Brother, to be any kind of statist is a sign of some form of mental retardation.
Many historians have pointed out that the American Communist Party slavishly followed the Moscow line throughout the pre-war and post-war period. This was in distinction to the European Communist Parties that often broke with Moscow over things like the Hitler-Stalin pact and the Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe.
The CPUSA was funded largely by Moscow and never once broke with Soviet policies. The Venona intercepts, which were the decoded messages by American intelligence of Soviet communications to the US, for example, document this relationship.
Again, not all or even most of the members were traitors or agents. But the leaders were. And people like Trumbo and the Hollywood Ten were among those who knowingly and willingly supported the Soviet line. In fact, the reason they took the 5th Amendment when testifying was because they were ordered by Moscow to do so.
This is well known but not taught in our universities. And we see the results of this - to a degree - today.
They tried to blacklist Mel Gibson but failed. But they've proven their point - no one's tried to make another Hollywood big money movie about Jesus Christ.
"As far as I am concerned, the Hollywood 10 and the blacklisted got nothing less than exactly what they deserved from McCarthy."
Well, John Henry...this means you will not object if and when whatever religious or political or other social or civic organizations you may belong to or to whose tenets you subscribe to become unpopular in America, to the point where any who are associated with such tenets or associations are demonized, and you are forced out of your job or sentenced to jail time simply for practicing the freedoms you are (purportedly) guaranteed by our Constitution.
"If the CIA funded a political party operating in, say, Iran, and funded the leaders of the party and gave them orders on what to do and say and how to operate we all would agree - Robert Cook at the top of the list - that those leaders and members of that party were operating on behalf of the US and were agents of the US government."
But how do you know which (if any) members of the American Communist Party during the decades prior to and including the 50s were paid by and following orders from Soviet Russia, as distinct from those who simply supported the political tenets of the party? There were certainly plenty of schisms and factions in the Socialist and Communist parties who vehemently disagreed with each other and are not likely to all have been at the same time paid, order-taking agents of the Soviets.
Ol Robert is unable to distinguish a civic organization from a revolutionary movement sponsored by a foreign power and an ideology that murdered some 100 million people. All my life the Left has been unable to distinguish between a stubbed toe and mass murder, it's all the same to them. Except they only complain about the stubbed toe.
For all the handwringing over anticommunist hysteria of the '50s, here's one thing to remember--even during the height of McCarthyism, it was far safer to be an out and open communist of any stripe in the U.S. than it was to be the wrong kind of communist in the Soviet Union or its allied states.
And while Nazis and communists are on about equal moral ground (that is, none), keep in mind that being an admitted communist in this country today is still far more socially acceptable than being a Nazi. Remember the episode of Seinfeld where Elaine finds out her boyfriend is a communist, and her reaction was one of amusement? Replace that with "Nazi" and try to imagine the same reactions. It's not that Nazis shouldn't be reviled (even while they enjoy the same rights as everyone else) it's that communists are not reviled enough. Theirs is an evil ideology and when put into practice it did what its ideology called for.
"When I was going through a pacifist phase as a university student, I read Dalton Trumbo's novel Johnny Got His Gun. The novel narrates the thoughts of a hospitalized soldier whose legs, arms, ears, eyes and mouth have been shot off during a war. Now the soldier cannot do or communicate anything. All he can do is think, and he thinks now that no war is worth fighting.
At the time, I found the novel to be a compelling argument for pacifism.
A few years later, I abandoned my pacifism and even joined the US Air Force." <br you know who else abandoned their pacifism? Dalton Trumbo. He himself fought against having his book, which was taken out of print, recirculated. And many argue that he took that stnsce because Hitler broke the pact with Russia, and Russia was now at war with it. Since he got his marching orders from them, he was now Pro war. Also, people came to him wanting to know how they could read the book. And he turned their names over to the FBI!
"Ol Robert is unable to distinguish a civic organization from a revolutionary movement sponsored by a foreign power and an ideology that murdered some 100 million people."
Again, how do you know American citizens who were members of the Communist party were paid agents of a foreign power? Some may have been, even almost certainly were, while others, probably most, were not.
At this stage of human history--particularly after the experience of the 20th Century--with all the blood spilled and treasure looted by Big Brother, to be any kind of statist is a sign of some form of mental retardation.
In my life I have learned from movies that the US having nuclear weapons would lead to total Armageddon, that the problem in Vietnam was the presence of the US, that Kennedy was killed by a US government conspiracy, that GW Bush as president was surrounded by caricatures of insane henchmen, and should have been court-martialed for being AWOL from his Air National Guard unit, that Nixon was insane, that we are all doomed to drown in a hot ocean within mere years, and that AIDS was caused by the CIA.
Taking movies as a source of information is not all that good an idea.
Although the original Willie Wonka is still fun to watch, as is Blade Runner and Fifth Element and many others.
Again, how do you know American citizens who were members of the Communist party were paid agents of a foreign power? Some may have been, even almost certainly were, while others, probably most, were not.
I bet some Klansmen didn't agree with everything the KKK did. Some Nazis didn't support all of Hitler's ideas.
Does that excuse their membership.
And, people, HUAC dealt with Hollywood. The name of the organization shows that McCarthy wasn't involved.
...given, you know, that he wasn't in the House.
McCarthy dealt with government Communist infiltration, and was rather accurate (if not understating)
(Quoting me) "As far as I am concerned, the Hollywood 10 and the blacklisted got nothing less than exactly what they deserved from McCarthy."
Well, John Henry...this means you will not object if and when whatever religious or political or other social or civic organizations you may belong to or to whose tenets you subscribe to become unpopular in America, to the point where any who are associated with such tenets or associations are demonized, and you are forced out of your job or sentenced to jail time simply for practicing the freedoms you are (purportedly) guaranteed by our Constitution.
Oh, Cookie, Cookie, Cookie. There is just so much wrongth packed into that one paragraph I hardly know where to begin.
We some of this taking place, mainly from progressives, as they other Dr Carson for being SDA. I see it in my life when SDAs are turned down for jobs because they refuse to work on the Sabbath. Seen it in the case of my son once, to be very specific.
But back to the HW10 and whether they got what they deserved from McCarthy. I guess my main question to you would be: What did McCarthy do to them that was so horrible? Horrible in your mind, at least.
I will await your answer.
In the meantime, here are some points to consider:
1) What was the crime the HW10 committed in front of Congress? Did they go to jail for their beliefs or for their actions?
2) When did that crime happen?
3) When did the blacklist begin?
4) What government agency, state or federal, administered the blacklist?
5) When did McCarthy become a senator?
6) When did McCarthy start going after communists?
7) On what legal basis did he go after communists?
8) How many people went to jail as a result of McCarthy's hearings?
9) Finally, was McCarthy right to go after the people he went after? I don't mean was he proved right by later info like Venona as several have mentioned. I mean were the people he went after potentially dangerous to the US government evn knowing only what was known at the time?
We are all ignorant, just on different subjects. Some people are ignorant on more subjects than most people. Far too many people are ignorant about what McCarthy did or did not do. You sound like one of those.
Could you elucidate what McCarthy did to Trumbo that was so horrible?
McCarthy didn't do anything, actually. HUAC dealt with Hollywood.
McCarthy was never a member of HUAC.
Quite right and I confess to baiting some of the Althousians. For Robert Cook's and other's sakes, let me expand your statement a bit.
Could you elucidate what SENATOR McCarthy did to Trumbo that was so horrible?
SENATOR McCarthy didn't do anything, actually. The HOUSE UnAmerican Activities Committee dealt with Hollywood.
SENATOR McCarthy was never a member of the HOUSE UnAmerican Activities Committee.
Bolding for the historically challenged.
It is easy to see why some folks get confused since senators routinely chair House committees in their spare time. Representatives are always grateful for the assistance.
For those with Kindles let me recommend 2 books that may be on point here.
I Am Spartacus by Kirk Douglas. This is about making the movie Spartacus and the shenanigans that Douglas (as the producer) had to go through to hire the then still blacklisted Trumbo. Interesting throughout on a number of levels. The blacklist is only one of them.
Icebreaker: Who started WWII by Viktor Suvarov. I am only just starting it so no real opinion other than good so far. He apparently makes the case the Stalin started WWII. Wikipedia says, of Suvarov, that he may be full of crap. As I said, interesting so far so I'll make up my own mind when I finish.
You can buy both through Ann's Amazon portal or, if you have the $10/month all you can eat plan, they are both free.
P.S. Joe McCarthy is Kathleen Kennedy's godfather. Her dad worked for McCarthy's Senate Permanent Committee on Investigations. For realz.
And grampa Joe Kennedy was probably McCarthy's biggest financial backer.
When all the rest of the Senate turned their backs on McCarthy, JFK stood by him. Kinda sorta, anyway. As much as he could. JFK did not vote for censure.
In addition to HUAC and in addition to McCarthy , don't forget Democratic President Harry Truman's Executive Order re Loyalty in 1947, where government workers could be fired for Disloyalty, defined as being part of any organization that advocated:
1. sabotage, espionage, spying or the advocacy thereof 2. treason, sedition or the advocacy thereof 3. intentional, unauthorized disclosure of confidential information 4. advocacy of the violent overthrow of the U.S. government 5. membership in, affiliation with or sympathetic association with any organization labeled as totalitarian, fascist, communist or subversive
Arguably, Truman was the last good Democratic president.
Quite right and I confess to baiting some of the Althousians. For Robert Cook's and other's sakes, let me expand your statement a bit.
True. Just a pet peeve of mine. McCarthy (while hardly perfect, is WAY too harshly condemned for a guy who, tragically, was basically spot-on in his "obsession") didn't ever profess to care about Hollywood. And the whole "He was a drunk" nonsense is hilarious given that MOST pols were utter drunks back then.
Robert Cook said... this means you will not object if and when whatever religious or political or other social or civic organizations you may belong to or to whose tenets you subscribe to become unpopular in America, to the point where any who are associated with such tenets or associations are demonized, and you are forced out of your job
What does he mean "if and when"? How revealing that while this happens regularly with Cook's support he still manages to rouse his outrage at events half a century old simply because they effected his ideological comrades. And he does this while explicitly making the argument that we should be aware of the standard applying to everyone.
The blind spot is mind-boggling. It's so big in fact reminds me of the MU protesters who tried to intimidate the journalist. The left's key breakthrough in activism is understanding that statements do not have to conform to reality. This principle allowed those protesters to say whatever would advantage them without regard to truth.
this means you will not object if and when whatever religious or political or other social or civic organizations you may belong to or to whose tenets you subscribe to become unpopular in America, to the point where any who are associated with such tenets or associations are demonized, and you are forced out of your job .
I think Dreyfus was innocent and his prosecution and imprisonment is a shame on his persecutors. But the left since Dreyfus has been in a never ending quest to find the next Dreyfus that will simultaneously prove their own virtue and the wickedness of the right. Alan Turing got a raw deal, but I think back then both the left and the right were equally opposed to homosexuality. The Communists claimed it was an artifact of decadent capitalism and that homosexuality didn't even exist under Communism. The bet here is that Trumbo wasn't outspoken in defense of Turing. He had his own liitle list of victims and villains, and it didn't include many true martyrs. How about a biopic about Trumbo that highlights his apathy and indifference to the martyrdom of Turing.....,It would be too much for Hollywood to take cognizance of his indifference to the willful starvation of millions of Soviet agricultural workers, but surely there is some drama to be found in his tacit support of homophobia.
Vickie noticed that the Fox moderators were civil and asked pertinent questions of the Republican candidates. To her this proves that Fox is biased as much or more that MSNBC and CNBC.
The old studio moguls were great patriots and loved America. Guys like Sam Goldwyn and Louis B Mayer and Daryl Zanuck and the Warner brothers and Harry Cohn knew poverty, were grateful immigrants, and appreciated the opportunity that America gave them to be as great and as successful as they could be. Of course they despised progressive maggots like Trumbo and Lawson- spoiled ingrates and knee-jerk anti-Americans who would be right at home in today's democrat party alongside the likes of Sanders, Warren, and Reid. Progressives have done much in the intervening years to portray those studio heads in the worst possible light, but if you'd read the words of guys like Sam Fuller on Zanuck and Garson Kanin on Cohn and Goldwyn, then you would know what revisionist history claptrap it was and is. They were the kind of men that made this country great, and Trumbo and his ilk are the kind that gave this country Chris Matthews and Payton Head and Melissa Click. This nation misses those striving, grateful, daring and great men very badly.
"Again, how do you know American citizens who were members of the Communist party were paid agents of a foreign power? Some may have been, even almost certainly were, while others, probably most, were not."
Read the histories on the CPUSA. Read up on the Venona intercepts.
The documentation is there.
Hell, read what Trumbo himself later admitted.
Again, most of the members of the CPUSA were not agents but the leadership and many of the top people in it were quite aware that they were being funded by Moscow and were active on its behalf.
When Stalin signed the pact with Hitler the communist parties in Europe - the French party for example - broke with Moscow. And when Stalin occupied Eastern Europe they protested. And when the USSR invaded Hungary they protested. And when the USSR invaded Czechoslovakia they protested.
But not the CPUSA. Not one time did the CPUSA protest Moscow's policies.
Why do you think they did that?
To my knowledge, Trumbo didn't protest those actions either. Certainly not the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact.
Just as a point of information, Alan Turing was a Brit and his ordeal was at the hands of English justice, or by the policy of our European masters if you prefer. USG and we did not singlehandedly convert Europe into homophobes from libertines post-war.
"To my knowledge, Trumbo didn't protest those actions either. Certainly not the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact."
Trumbo was an isolationist and pacifist from Sept 1939 to June 22, 1941. He was vociferous in being against any aid to Britain and opposed Lend-lease. In the Fall of 1941, he told his publisher to stop any more printings of "Johnny got his Gun".
After August 1945 he went back to being a pacifist again -except in support of Communists revolutions in China, Cuba, etc.
I wonder if future historians will be as harsh on those who were lackadaisical in their opposition to the crimes of Communism as they are today to those who were not emphatically against slavery or segregation. Maybe in another hundred years. The mills of God grind slow......Napoleon sent an army to reinstitute slavery in Haiti. It never occurred to him to free the slaves in Egypt or the serfs in Russia when he invaded those countries. Nevertheless, he was a hero to the left for about one hundred years after his death. Even today he has many admirers. I note in passing that both Pitt the Younger and Wellington were abolitionists. Wellington was the man responsible for freeing the slaves on the Empress Josephine's sugar plantations......Artists and intellectuals are unreliable witnesses to their own era. Beethoven and Goethe and Byron got Napoleon wrong. Trumbo, a far lesser talent, got Stalin wrong. And Hollywood gets Trumbo wrong. Another hunded years or so and they will sort it all out.
Congratulations on an epic example of complete failure to understand the point.
I didn't miss your point. I made a different point which you've tried to dodge by redirecting focus. It remains true people are discriminated against for their politics and you have no concern over it because you support those discriminating.
Robert Cook said... Your response shows you miss my point, or you completely misunderstand me.
It shows I reject your faux brand in favor of a deeper understanding that incorporates the contradictions between your statements and the person you want us to believe you are.
In this case you're complaining about blacklisting a few dozen people 60 years ago and urge those on the right to criticize this practice even though it was against their political opponents. But Americans on the right are experiencing significant political discrimination today - in academia, media, and government as well as a few selected industries like Hollywood and "tech". Rather than act on your advice to us and stand against political targeting in employment you simply pretend this isn't happening.
The result of your preferences would be that we protect everyone but you only protect the left.
Support the Althouse blog by doing your Amazon shopping going in through the Althouse Amazon link.
Amazon
I am a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for me to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.
Support this blog with PayPal
Make a 1-time donation or set up a monthly donation of any amount you choose:
Posts
104 comments:
Trumpo named names himself. He was a stalin apologist. I spit on him.
One word for Trumbo - Stalinist.
Yes, because even Stalinists need to make a living off of the capitalist system.
Is "Trumpo" a Freudian slip?
also, Trumbo went out of his way to make sure that movies that were critical of Russia were not made. and he bragged about it.
He blocked a movie about Trotsky from being made. and did same with anti-Communist books by James T. Farrell, Victor Kravchenko, and Arthur Koestler, all of which he called “untrue” and “reactionary.”
Communist party had a “fine tradition . . . that whenever a book or play or film is produced which is harmful to the best interests of the working class, that work and its author should and must be attacked in the sharpest possible terms.”
That is controlling screen content.
Scott wrote:
Is "Trumpo" a Freudian slip?
I hope it was just a typo.
Trumbo only got what he dished out.
In the late 30s he bragged to his fellow travellers that he and his associates had successfully squashed films that made Stalin's Russia look bad.
It's ironic in hindsight that the blacklisters and anti-communists of the 1950s and '60s were probably right. And we know how much progressives love irony.
The story of Trumbo is a reminder that efforts to control screen content had existed in the past and there's always the chance that in some case the political winds will shift and some of those ideas will become popular again in the future...
I assume they're referring to Clinton or Sanders being elected and appointing Supreme Court justices who would overturn Citizens United, thus allowing government control of screen content critical of incumbent politicians.
Right?
Maybe AA typo'd "Trumpo" because she sees Donald Trump as a maligned avatar of truth that the establishment is trying to suppress.
Trumbo was the Duranty of the McCarthy era; an absolute apologist for a dictator and regime that murdered millions of their own people, in purges and otherwise, and subjugated entire non-Russian peoples to lives of terror and deprivation.
Cranston spent a lot of goodwill from his past work and flushed it. Its amazing what success on a level that he has achieved regularly and predictably does to folks.
"Control screen content?"
That's what CNN and MSNBC do 24/7.
"Its amazing what success on a level that he has achieved regularly and predictably does to folks."
Yeah. I've made my stack, so now I can tell people what I really think.
Billingsley's "Hollywood Party" is a good book to read about the Communists in Hollywood.
Highly recommended.
Althouse Amazon Portal:
http://www.amazon.com/Hollywood-Party-Stalinist-Adventures-American-ebook/dp/B00MWCP900?tag=althouse09-20&linkCode=w13&linkID=IFNQD6FYIV3JIVSQ&ref_=assoc_res_sw_us_dka_crp_c_result_2&ref-refURL=http%3A%2F%2Falthouse.blogspot.com%2F
I am Laslo.
But Trumbo wasn't against such controls: he was a Stalinist who used his art to promote the Soviet line.
Is there any evidence that he ever condemned the Stalinist control of the press and art?
It was wrong to punish him for his views; but it wasn't wrong to punish him for his treasonous behavior. The late Sidney Hook explained it best: Americans have the right to hold heretical views; they don't have the right to be agents of an enemy of the US. Which is what many of the members of the CPUSA were.
Trumbo, the ardent Communist? Yeah, I pity him. Really.
He was a far worse censor than the "Blacklist".
Its amazing what success on a level that he has achieved regularly and predictably does to folks.
Bill Gates is NOW a Socialist. Amazing that he had no qualms with capitalism while making his billions.
And given how tight the CPUSA was with the USSR, there is literally no way you could be a member and not be aware of the influence. It's like hearing a former Klansman say "What? We don't like BLACKS? Since when?"
Here's an interesting story that will never become a major motion picture. Juan Robles was a linguist, a minor poet, and a dedicated Communist. He taught Spanish at John Hopkins University. He went to Spain during the civil war there. He became a translator to the Russan general who was supervising the Commnist military effort. The Russian general fell afoul of Stalin and was killed. Since Robles knew what the Russian General knew, they liquidated him as well........Robles was best friends with the American author, John Dos Pasos. Robles was an American citizen. He couldn't just be made to disappear. Pasos and other friends asked around and discovered that he had been killed. The Communists then claimed that Robles was a Fascist spy and needed to be executed. This enraged Dos Pasos who knew the truth of the matter. Dos Pasos tried to enlist the aid of Lillian Hellman and Ernest Hemingway in publicizing this crime. They refused. They said that such publicity would be detrimental to the Republican cause, and that was what was of paramount importance........Dos Pasos persevered. His book about the matter was not controversial. It as simply ignored like Orwell's Homage to Catalonia. Dos Pasos was a major American writer. He was criticized as a reactionary and his later books went unread.......There you have it. A man gets murdered and then posthumously gets slandered. A writer who attempts to J'ai Accuse th situation gets trashed for his honesty and falls not limbo. The writers who participate in this conspiracy of silence get congratulated on their bravery. Major motion pictures, in fact, are made about their courage.
I am glad to see so many here on to the fact that Trumbo was a Stalinist who tried to suppress speech every bit as much if not more than his opponents did.
Ron Radosh, a former Madison leftie who changed his views, did some major research into all this here in the archives of the Wisconsin Center for Film and Theater Research. It's too bad they could not have mentioned his work and that of others critical of Trumbo. NRO republished a piece Ron did two years ago, anticipating this film on Trumbo would be more of the usual whitewash. I recommend it.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/362876/will-new-trumbo-movie-rehash-old-myths-ronald-radosh
Really, David Begley, only MSNBC and CNN? have you watched FOX lately?
The blatant right wing propaganda that they proliferate is every bit as bad as the perceived bias of CNN and MSNBC. And, though i have never watched FOX Business before, the bias towards the right-wing candidates was palpable. FOX and FOX business are in the bag for the republicans every bit as much as CNN and MSNBC are for the democrats. So get off your sanctimonious horse and look at the real world.
Vicki From Pasadena
It would be nice to see today's critics of 1950s blacklisting take even the ounce of courage necessary to speak out against today's real opponents of free speech who seem to dominate the far left. We're seeing dissenting thought rooted out in academia, and a popular movement in the Democratic party to overturn Citizens United and limit political speech. How about some free speech advocates turn their attention to these fascist impulses before all dissent is finally squashed?
Trumbo was an idiot communist. He had a right to spout his idiot communist beliefs, but let's not kid ourselves about the awfulness of what he had to say.
"in some case the political winds will shift and some of those ideas will become popular again in the future"
Yeah, Communism worked great the first time, let's bring it back. The old reds just didn't crack enough eggs to make their omelettes, is all.
"... that in some case the political winds will shift and some of those ideas will become popular again in the future," says Jeff Smith,
Right, because political blacklisting doesn't happen at all today, but someday some scary notus might be in charge.
These people are clueless.
But Trumbo only blocked BAD thoughts and campus speech rules only block BAD speech. Otherwise I might cry.
Movies like this are more of the Hollywood left (pardon the repetition) paying honor to their totems.
Unless the film is incredibly well acted and written I predict a mighty soft box office.
Stalin's henchmen are Hollywood's good guys. Spend those entertainment dollars wisely, ya'll.
Commie scum, just like Alger Hiss.
The trailer proclaims an ideal, "The freedom to believe what you believe and not be persecuted for it."
Communists don't subscribe to this ideal yet express outrage they weren't protected by it.
Not only that, the poor guys could no longer make big bucks participating in the capitalist system. Bummer. They actually got a good taste of the system they were promoting and they didn't like it much.
The Huac did subscribe to the ideal, but didn't trust the American people. They became the monster they were fighting.
Scott: It's ironic in hindsight that the blacklisters and anti-communists of the 1950s and '60s were right.
FTFY
Trumbo was a Commie, and a tool for the Stalinists.
When I was going through a pacifist phase as a university student, I read Dalton Trumbo's novel Johnny Got His Gun. The novel narrates the thoughts of a hospitalized soldier whose legs, arms, ears, eyes and mouth have been shot off during a war. Now the soldier cannot do or communicate anything. All he can do is think, and he thinks now that no war is worth fighting.
At the time, I found the novel to be a compelling argument for pacifism.
A few years later, I abandoned my pacifism and even joined the US Air Force.
I was very anti-Communist, and whenever the black-listing of Trumbo came up, I argued that he was a Stalinist, etc. I thought the black-listing of Trumbo was justified.
Now, however, I am re-thinking the black-listing issue. I am seeing people being hounded economically because they oppose same-sex marriage. Now I think that good citizens should exercise self-restraint during zealots' campaigns to destroy the livelihoods of political opponents.
I will say this for Cranston: He has praised Donald Trump, not for what he says, but for the fact that he dares to say what is on his mind. So I will take Cranston, at least, for a free speech fan.
Some years ago, I watched a forum on C-Span with Ronald Radosh & others on the work of the American Communist Party in NYC.
In the course of the discussion, it was revealed that one of the NYC Communists being discussed was sitting in the audience! He spoke up & identified himself & asked Radosh if he wanted to hear his side of the story. Radosh said 'Not really" & the guy said "Why not?". Radosh told him, in so many words, that he could tell he was lying because he was still breathing.
Now, however, I am re-thinking the black-listing issue. I am seeing people being hounded economically because they oppose same-sex marriage
I don't think anyone here is defending the blacklisting of people simply because they held Stalinist or communist beliefs or any other beliefs.
But the issue is not what he believed but how he acted; and more important, on whose behalf? Was he simply holding heretical views? Or was he acting on behalf of a foreign government, i.e., the Soviet Union?
The CPUSA was not just another, albeit more radical, political party. It was entirely funded and controlled by Moscow. Not all of its members were agents of Moscow of course. Many were sincere if not terribly wrong with their views.
An American has the right to support ISIS, right? But do they have a right to be acting on orders of ISIS and with an organization funded and supported by ISIS?
I think that's the distinction that needs to be considered.
If a screenwriter is using his work to promote a political view does a movie studio not have a right to say you won't work for us? Not work for us because you are using your work to promote views we disagree with?
There are numerous examples where Trumbo used his screenwork to promote his pro-Moscow political views. He admitted to doing this. In fact, as a member of the CPUSA he was expected to do just that.
Some of these screenwriters were blacklisted (all of the Hollywood Ten for example) NOT just because they had been members of the CPUSA but because they had used their art/work to promote the policies of Moscow.
Spielberg also has a picture out that deals with Cold War hysteria. Something about the lawyer who negotiated the swap for the downed U2 pilot Gary Powers. I haven't seen it, but my guess is that they don't mention the fact that the Russians used a proximity fuse supplied courtesy of the Rosenberg spy ring to bring down Powers' plane. There really were Russian spies, and Americans really did suffer because of their machinations.
"There really were Russian spies, and Americans really did suffer because of their machinations."
I don't think anyone has ever said there were never any Russian spies. We had our spies and other countries have their spies. Everyone knows this is the case, only the identities of the spies are (sometimes) unknown.
How did "Americans really suffer" because of the "machinations" of Russian spies?
William,
Gary Powers said in his book that he thought Oswald, who was in Russia and who had been in the Marine Corps in Japan and knew the U-2’s altitude, gave the information to the Soviets that enabled them to shoot him down.
Layers and layers.
"Now, however, I am re-thinking the black-listing issue. I am seeing people being hounded economically because they oppose same-sex marriage. Now I think that good citizens should exercise self-restraint during zealots' campaigns to destroy the livelihoods of political opponents."
In a country that brags on itself as being the acme of human freedom, equality, and justice--that is to say, ours--it is never acceptable to "black-list" or otherwise persecute any individuals or groups simply for their religious or political beliefs, practices, and associations, unless they violate the law.
One thing I try to impress upon my impressionable kids is one salient fact of WW2:
The Stalin-Hitler pact of 1939 was the primary cause of the carnage that killed 75 Million people. The Nazis and the Commies conspired, essentially, to invade Poland (from the West & East). The fact that USSR delayed their invasion by 2 or 3 weeks confuses people -- the headlines of the day are "Germany invades Poland! Britain and France Declare War!"
Also, I try to convey that Stalin, head of the Commies, murdered many more millions of people than Hitler.
The point is that, of course, Hitler and the Nazis were evil; and Stalin and Communists were just as evil.
The second point of confusion is why we joined with Stalin after his break with Hitler. It's a good question. I just tell them that to beat Hitler, we made a compromise to assist Stalin on the Eastern Front. It doesn't change the fact that Stalin was evil, and that various dupes in this country failed to see this.
Once that point is made, many good, natural conservative things flow such as why Nixon had to nail Alger Hiss, why the Korean War was noble, why we fought in Vietnam, why Reagan was great, why Bernie Sanders is an idiot, etc, etc.
The Communists were as evil as the Nazis. Wash, rinse, repeat often.
Mike Sylwester said...
When I was going through a pacifist phase as a university student, I read Dalton Trumbo's novel Johnny Got His Gun.
I read that book in high school. Trumbo wrote it during the period when Stalin and Hitler had a non-aggression pact. Encouraging America to stay out of the war was the Party line. Immediately after Hitler invaded the Soviet Union, cries went out for a "Second Front Now!" Trumbo tried to pull the book from the shelves. Getting America involved in the war was the new Party priority.
The movie "Trumbo" will have the same relationship to the truth as the movie "Truth" has to the Dan Rather fake emails case - none that doesn't fit the narrative. Narrative - that's the new(ish) word for the Party line.
The Communists were as evil as the Nazis. Wash, rinse, repeat often.
Yeah. I see no moral difference between a Nazi and a Communist.
"If a screenwriter is using his work to promote a political view does a movie studio not have a right to say you won't work for us? Not work for us because you are using your work to promote views we disagree with?
"There are numerous examples where Trumbo used his screenwork to promote his pro-Moscow political views. He admitted to doing this. In fact, as a member of the CPUSA he was expected to do just that.
"Some of these screenwriters were blacklisted (all of the Hollywood Ten for example) NOT just because they had been members of the CPUSA but because they had used their art/work to promote the policies of Moscow."
This is dubious. Screenwriters are not the final word on any film project, (unless they are also the directors). Especially in the 50s, when the studio system was still extant, screenwriters were just the "hired help" from the point of view of the studio heads: they provided the script, the starting point--not the end point--of the final product. To the extent any film contained the personal political or philosophical ideas of the screenwriters, it was because everyone else up the line--including studio heads--approved. From what I understand, most of Trumbo's film scripts were apolitical comedies and romances.
No matter what may have been claimed at the time or subsequently, those blacklisted and imprisoned were punished simply for their political affiliations, and/or refusal to cooperate with Congress.
"Yeah. I see no moral difference between a Nazi and a Communist."
And yet, under our system, any citizen is legally entitled to belong to the Communist party or the Nazi party. We have quite a few American Nazis all over this country. Rightly, they are not being herded into prisons or hounded out of jobs.
> punished simply for their political affiliations
They were agents of a foreign power.
"They were agents of a foreign power."
Says who? How do you know? What does that mean, formally, to be an agent of a foreign power?
And yet, under our system, any citizen is legally entitled to belong to the Communist party or the Nazi party. We have quite a few American Nazis all over this country. Rightly, they are not being herded into prisons or hounded out of jobs.
And we have professors who are admitted Communists teaching.
Should they be arrested? No. Communists don't agree (dissenting opinions don't tend to last long in Communist states).
But should we fund it? No. I don't see a benefit in funding college any longer.
No matter what may have been claimed at the time or subsequently, those blacklisted and imprisoned were punished simply for their political affiliations, and/or refusal to cooperate with Congress.
Which still happens. There is a reason why there are so few Republicans in Hollywood or academia. Systematic discrimination.
Guys...don't engage with Comrade Cookie.....there is no point.
As far as he is concerned there is no such thing as a bad Communist and no such thing as a good capitalist.
He is quite dedicated to being a modern day Squealor.....
Remember Four legs good, two legs better........
In a country that brags on itself as being the acme of human freedom, equality, and justice--that is to say, ours--it is never acceptable to "black-list" or otherwise persecute any individuals or groups simply for their religious or political beliefs, practices, and associations, unless they violate the law.
As I wrote above, I am re-thinking this issue.
In the past, I justified the black-listing of Trumbo and his ilk.
Now, however, I am disturbed by campaigns to ruin the livelihoods of people who have opposed same-sex marriage.
I like the concept of "civil society". Political disagreement should be limited to political realms. People should remain largely undisturbed in their private realms. People should enjoy -- to use a current expression -- "safe spaces".
It's fair game to expose the activities of people like Trumbo -- his support for Stalin, his suppression of anti-Communist film projects, etc.
Likewise, it's fair game to expose people's positions on same-sex marriage or any other issue.
However, good citizens should restrain themselves from trying to ruin the livelihoods of political opponents. It's excessive to try to get opponents fired, to try to bankrupt them, to destroy their careers.
"Sure, Trumbo literally was a Soviet propagandist, but he was the good guy!"
Re. Mr. Cook's statement about blacklisting -
I agree, absolutely, that the State has no business blacklisting people from working in any industry (except, perhaps ones legitimately requiring a security clearance in Defense and the like) for their politics.
But equally, private [in the sense of non-Governmental] entities can decide any set of beliefs they want is so distasteful that they won't deal with such people.
I think mass-social-media pile-ons make people look worse than their opponents, and of course death threats and personal harassment have no place in civil society.
But refusing to hire/patronise the distasteful is freedom of association; boycotts are not beyond the pale, so I see no reason why refusing to hire someone should be, either.
(If a blacklist is organized as a cartel decision, that's another matter, and can easily be wicked. "You'll never work in this industry again!" is different from "This company will never hire you!"
The problem there is not the refusal to patronise, but the cartel.)
Hollywood already has made many movies about Communist writers who were black-listed. Who's going to buy tickets and spend time to watch this Trumbo movie?
Hollywood should make a movie about a family that owns a bakery and is destroyed financially by same-sex-marriage zealots. That would be a much more current and thought-provoking movie to watch and probably would sell a lot more tickets.
Good to know no one's controlling film content. How much work is John Milius getting lately?
I thought Trumpo was the oldest Marx brother. He played a horn, didn't he?
"But refusing to hire/patronise the distasteful is freedom of association; boycotts are not beyond the pale, so I see no reason why refusing to hire someone should be, either."
Then you re-open the door--not yet entirely closed, in any case--for employers to freely discriminate in their hiring practices for all sorts of reasons.
Shane,
Could you elucidate what McCarthy did to Trumbo that was so horrible?
As far as I am concerned, the Hollywood 10 and the blacklisted got nothing less than exactly what they deserved from McCarthy.
John Henry
William said:
claimed that Robles was a Fascist spy and needed to be executed.
You misspelled fascist there, I think. Unless the claim was that Robles was a member of Mussolini's Italian Fascist Party.
When fascist is used in the Orwellian sense of someone whose politics you disagree with, it should never be capitalized.
John Henry
> Says who? How do you know?
1. They belonged to the Communist party.
2. They followed orders.
I've known several blacklisted Communists from that period. They were nice people in person, but the party required obedience and the Soviet Union was at war with the rest of the world almost from the beginning. Heck, it wasn't so long ago that an old cache of weapons buried by Communists in preparation for the revolution was uncovered in Switzerland. Communists who retained a shred of personal morality left the Party either after the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact or after the switch in Soviet marching orders after the Germans invaded the Soviet Union.
I've also met old Nazis in Germany. Also nice people in person for the most part, although the intellectual ones were as annoying as intellectual lefties always are. But I wouldn't trust them as tools of Nazi Germany. The personal *is* different from the political.
@RC,
Says who? How do you know? What does that mean, formally, to be an agent of a foreign power?
As much as I admire your straight-forward lefty presence here, there's no doubt about this anymore. The CPUSA was a guided missile, & it was guided from Moscow.
How do we know this? From the words of the people who were in it. From the Venona files. From the released records from the archives of then Soviet Union/now Russia. From the archives of ALL the former Warsaw Pact countries, who have opened their Soviet era archives to historians.
If the CPUSA wasn't a tool of Moscow name once that they ever deviated in the slightest from the Gospel According to Moscow. They never did. Never.
Hell, even in the 30's, the joke among NYC lefties was "How is the CPUSA like the Brooklyn Bridge? Both of them work by cables".
"Says who? How do you know? What does that mean, formally, to be an agent of a foreign power?"
The name under the post? That's the author.
Read up on the CP, Cookie. And not Zinn's account either.
The CPUSA during the period that Trumbo was a member was funded by and operating on the direction and orders of Moscow.
As I said, not EVERY member was an agent. But the main members - those at the top - knew that Moscow as funding their party and they were taking orders from it.
People had every right to be a communist and be a member of the CPUSA. They didn't have a right to be working for and operating on behalf of the Soviet Union.
They are called agents.
Robert Cook said...
In a country that brags on itself as being the acme of human freedom, equality, and justice--that is to say, ours--it is never acceptable to "black-list" or otherwise persecute any individuals or groups simply for their religious or political beliefs, practices, and associations, unless they violate the law.
If it were the government doing the blacklisting, I would agree fully with you.
It was not the government, it was the studios. Are you saying that they do not have the right, particularly on an individual studio level, to say what kind of movies they will or will not make?
When they collude, when Warner, Paramount, Universal et al, collectively decide that they won't make certain kinds of movies with certain writers, it may be a Sherman violation.
Similar to Google, Apple and others deciding who would be allowed to hire who and how much they would pay.
John Henry
TRUMBO could be an interesting object lesson on something I've noticed with great sadness. I'm an artsy type who, most of my adult life, been around various artists--writers, actors, painters, etc. These people all see themselves as "free spirits;" yet, politically, they're almost always lockstep, Eloi-like State-cultists. In any election, given the usual choice between moderate statist (usually the Republican) and all-out Staatshtupper (almost always the Democrat), these "free spirits" invariably support the more statist candidate, while swallowing uncritically whatever party-line the "liberal" Hive is pushing this season. Some might say that it's because most artists are poor and need Big Brother's financial assistance to practice their arts; but when when they're successful they still drink the Hive's Kool-Aid. The Hollywood Ten weren't exactly the starving masses.
By the way, I forgot to mention that I'm working on a screenplay, ZASU! It's about how Nazi sympathizers in Hollywood were persecuted by The Man during WWII.
As someone else has indicated, Robert Cook seems about as ignorant of the nature of the CPUSA as he is about economics.
"In a country that brags on itself as being the acme of human freedom . . . ",
And we all know how much Cookie values human freedom.
If the CIA funded a political party operating in, say, Iran, and funded the leaders of the party and gave them orders on what to do and say and how to operate we all would agree - Robert Cook at the top of the list - that those leaders and members of that party were operating on behalf of the US and were agents of the US government.
But for some reason if you substitute Moscow and the communist party for the above leftwingers like Cook can't think straight.
"But for some reason if you substitute Moscow and the communist party for the above leftwingers like Cook can't think straight."
If they could think straight in the first place, they wouldn't be leftwingers. At this stage of human history--particularly after the experience of the 20th Century--with all the blood spilled and treasure looted by Big Brother, to be any kind of statist is a sign of some form of mental retardation.
Many historians have pointed out that the American Communist Party slavishly followed the Moscow line throughout the pre-war and post-war period. This was in distinction to the European Communist Parties that often broke with Moscow over things like the Hitler-Stalin pact and the Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe.
The CPUSA was funded largely by Moscow and never once broke with Soviet policies. The Venona intercepts, which were the decoded messages by American intelligence of Soviet communications to the US, for example, document this relationship.
Again, not all or even most of the members were traitors or agents. But the leaders were. And people like Trumbo and the Hollywood Ten were among those who knowingly and willingly supported the Soviet line. In fact, the reason they took the 5th Amendment when testifying was because they were ordered by Moscow to do so.
This is well known but not taught in our universities. And we see the results of this - to a degree - today.
They tried to blacklist Mel Gibson but failed. But they've proven their point - no one's tried to make another Hollywood big money movie about Jesus Christ.
As others have noted, Trumbo and the hollywood communists never had a problem with blacklists, they just wanted to the ones doing the "listing".
Is the word "blacklisting" racist? Why isn't it "whitelisting"?
"As far as I am concerned, the Hollywood 10 and the blacklisted got nothing less than exactly what they deserved from McCarthy."
Well, John Henry...this means you will not object if and when whatever religious or political or other social or civic organizations you may belong to or to whose tenets you subscribe to become unpopular in America, to the point where any who are associated with such tenets or associations are demonized, and you are forced out of your job or sentenced to jail time simply for practicing the freedoms you are (purportedly) guaranteed by our Constitution.
"If the CIA funded a political party operating in, say, Iran, and funded the leaders of the party and gave them orders on what to do and say and how to operate we all would agree - Robert Cook at the top of the list - that those leaders and members of that party were operating on behalf of the US and were agents of the US government."
But how do you know which (if any) members of the American Communist Party during the decades prior to and including the 50s were paid by and following orders from Soviet Russia, as distinct from those who simply supported the political tenets of the party? There were certainly plenty of schisms and factions in the Socialist and Communist parties who vehemently disagreed with each other and are not likely to all have been at the same time paid, order-taking agents of the Soviets.
Ol Robert is unable to distinguish a civic organization from a revolutionary movement sponsored by a foreign power and an ideology that murdered some 100 million people. All my life the Left has been unable to distinguish between a stubbed toe and mass murder, it's all the same to them. Except they only complain about the stubbed toe.
For all the handwringing over anticommunist hysteria of the '50s, here's one thing to remember--even during the height of McCarthyism, it was far safer to be an out and open communist of any stripe in the U.S. than it was to be the wrong kind of communist in the Soviet Union or its allied states.
And while Nazis and communists are on about equal moral ground (that is, none), keep in mind that being an admitted communist in this country today is still far more socially acceptable than being a Nazi. Remember the episode of Seinfeld where Elaine finds out her boyfriend is a communist, and her reaction was one of amusement? Replace that with "Nazi" and try to imagine the same reactions. It's not that Nazis shouldn't be reviled (even while they enjoy the same rights as everyone else) it's that communists are not reviled enough. Theirs is an evil ideology and when put into practice it did what its ideology called for.
"When I was going through a pacifist phase as a university student, I read Dalton Trumbo's novel Johnny Got His Gun. The novel narrates the thoughts of a hospitalized soldier whose legs, arms, ears, eyes and mouth have been shot off during a war. Now the soldier cannot do or communicate anything. All he can do is think, and he thinks now that no war is worth fighting.
At the time, I found the novel to be a compelling argument for pacifism.
A few years later, I abandoned my pacifism and even joined the US Air Force."
<br you know who else abandoned their pacifism? Dalton Trumbo. He himself fought against having his book, which was taken out of print, recirculated. And many argue that he took that stnsce because Hitler broke the pact with Russia, and Russia was now at war with it. Since he got his marching orders from them, he was now Pro war.
Also, people came to him wanting to know how they could read the book. And he turned their names over to the FBI!
"Ol Robert is unable to distinguish a civic organization from a revolutionary movement sponsored by a foreign power and an ideology that murdered some 100 million people."
Again, how do you know American citizens who were members of the Communist party were paid agents of a foreign power? Some may have been, even almost certainly were, while others, probably most, were not.
At this stage of human history--particularly after the experience of the 20th Century--with all the blood spilled and treasure looted by Big Brother, to be any kind of statist is a sign of some form of mental retardation.
I'm stealing that.
In my life I have learned from movies that the US having nuclear weapons would lead to total Armageddon, that the problem in Vietnam was the presence of the US, that Kennedy was killed by a US government conspiracy, that GW Bush as president was surrounded by caricatures of insane henchmen, and should have been court-martialed for being AWOL from his Air National Guard unit, that Nixon was insane, that we are all doomed to drown in a hot ocean within mere years, and that AIDS was caused by the CIA.
Taking movies as a source of information is not all that good an idea.
Although the original Willie Wonka is still fun to watch, as is Blade Runner and Fifth Element and many others.
Could you elucidate what McCarthy did to Trumbo that was so horrible?
McCarthy didn't do anything, actually. HUAC dealt with Hollywood.
McCarthy was never a member of HUAC.
Based on actual events!!!!
Code words for: The Following Will Contain Vast Amounts of Bull Shit.
> paid agent
Who claimed paid. Not every nut requires money to proselytize. Because history.
Again, how do you know American citizens who were members of the Communist party were paid agents of a foreign power? Some may have been, even almost certainly were, while others, probably most, were not.
I bet some Klansmen didn't agree with everything the KKK did.
Some Nazis didn't support all of Hitler's ideas.
Does that excuse their membership.
And, people, HUAC dealt with Hollywood. The name of the organization shows that McCarthy wasn't involved.
...given, you know, that he wasn't in the House.
McCarthy dealt with government Communist infiltration, and was rather accurate (if not understating)
Robert Cook said...
(Quoting me) "As far as I am concerned, the Hollywood 10 and the blacklisted got nothing less than exactly what they deserved from McCarthy."
Well, John Henry...this means you will not object if and when whatever religious or political or other social or civic organizations you may belong to or to whose tenets you subscribe to become unpopular in America, to the point where any who are associated with such tenets or associations are demonized, and you are forced out of your job or sentenced to jail time simply for practicing the freedoms you are (purportedly) guaranteed by our Constitution.
Oh, Cookie, Cookie, Cookie. There is just so much wrongth packed into that one paragraph I hardly know where to begin.
We some of this taking place, mainly from progressives, as they other Dr Carson for being SDA. I see it in my life when SDAs are turned down for jobs because they refuse to work on the Sabbath. Seen it in the case of my son once, to be very specific.
But back to the HW10 and whether they got what they deserved from McCarthy. I guess my main question to you would be: What did McCarthy do to them that was so horrible? Horrible in your mind, at least.
I will await your answer.
In the meantime, here are some points to consider:
1) What was the crime the HW10 committed in front of Congress? Did they go to jail for their beliefs or for their actions?
2) When did that crime happen?
3) When did the blacklist begin?
4) What government agency, state or federal, administered the blacklist?
5) When did McCarthy become a senator?
6) When did McCarthy start going after communists?
7) On what legal basis did he go after communists?
8) How many people went to jail as a result of McCarthy's hearings?
9) Finally, was McCarthy right to go after the people he went after? I don't mean was he proved right by later info like Venona as several have mentioned. I mean were the people he went after potentially dangerous to the US government evn knowing only what was known at the time?
We are all ignorant, just on different subjects. Some people are ignorant on more subjects than most people. Far too many people are ignorant about what McCarthy did or did not do. You sound like one of those.
John Henry
The Stalin-Hitler pact of 1939 was the primary cause of the carnage that killed 75 Million people.
The "Great Patriotic War" was nothing more than a falling-out amongst thieves. The Reds dismembered Poland with as much gusto as did the Nazis.
damikesc said...
Could you elucidate what McCarthy did to Trumbo that was so horrible?
McCarthy didn't do anything, actually. HUAC dealt with Hollywood.
McCarthy was never a member of HUAC.
Quite right and I confess to baiting some of the Althousians. For Robert Cook's and other's sakes, let me expand your statement a bit.
Could you elucidate what SENATOR McCarthy did to Trumbo that was so horrible?
SENATOR McCarthy didn't do anything, actually. The HOUSE UnAmerican Activities Committee dealt with Hollywood.
SENATOR McCarthy was never a member of the HOUSE UnAmerican Activities Committee.
Bolding for the historically challenged.
It is easy to see why some folks get confused since senators routinely chair House committees in their spare time. Representatives are always grateful for the assistance.
John Henry
P.S. Joe McCarthy is Kathleen Kennedy's godfather. Her dad worked for McCarthy's Senate Permanent Committee on Investigations. For realz.
What does that mean, formally, to be an agent of a foreign power?
Ask the Rosenbergs.
For those with Kindles let me recommend 2 books that may be on point here.
I Am Spartacus by Kirk Douglas. This is about making the movie Spartacus and the shenanigans that Douglas (as the producer) had to go through to hire the then still blacklisted Trumbo. Interesting throughout on a number of levels. The blacklist is only one of them.
Icebreaker: Who started WWII by Viktor Suvarov. I am only just starting it so no real opinion other than good so far. He apparently makes the case the Stalin started WWII. Wikipedia says, of Suvarov, that he may be full of crap. As I said, interesting so far so I'll make up my own mind when I finish.
You can buy both through Ann's Amazon portal or, if you have the $10/month all you can eat plan, they are both free.
John Henry
furious_a said...
P.S. Joe McCarthy is Kathleen Kennedy's godfather. Her dad worked for McCarthy's Senate Permanent Committee on Investigations. For realz.
And grampa Joe Kennedy was probably McCarthy's biggest financial backer.
When all the rest of the Senate turned their backs on McCarthy, JFK stood by him. Kinda sorta, anyway. As much as he could. JFK did not vote for censure.
John Henry
@John Henry
Great posts, thanks.
In addition to HUAC and in addition to McCarthy , don't forget Democratic President Harry Truman's Executive Order re Loyalty in 1947, where government workers could be fired for Disloyalty, defined as being part of any organization that advocated:
1. sabotage, espionage, spying or the advocacy thereof
2. treason, sedition or the advocacy thereof
3. intentional, unauthorized disclosure of confidential information
4. advocacy of the violent overthrow of the U.S. government
5. membership in, affiliation with or sympathetic association with any organization labeled as totalitarian, fascist, communist or subversive
Arguably, Truman was the last good Democratic president.
Ha ha, stupid communist.
Quite right and I confess to baiting some of the Althousians. For Robert Cook's and other's sakes, let me expand your statement a bit.
True. Just a pet peeve of mine. McCarthy (while hardly perfect, is WAY too harshly condemned for a guy who, tragically, was basically spot-on in his "obsession") didn't ever profess to care about Hollywood. And the whole "He was a drunk" nonsense is hilarious given that MOST pols were utter drunks back then.
Robert Cook said...
this means you will not object if and when whatever religious or political or other social or civic organizations you may belong to or to whose tenets you subscribe to become unpopular in America, to the point where any who are associated with such tenets or associations are demonized, and you are forced out of your job
What does he mean "if and when"? How revealing that while this happens regularly with Cook's support he still manages to rouse his outrage at events half a century old simply because they effected his ideological comrades. And he does this while explicitly making the argument that we should be aware of the standard applying to everyone.
The blind spot is mind-boggling. It's so big in fact reminds me of the MU protesters who tried to intimidate the journalist. The left's key breakthrough in activism is understanding that statements do not have to conform to reality. This principle allowed those protesters to say whatever would advantage them without regard to truth.
Cook's writings are he same.
this means you will not object if and when whatever religious or political or other social or civic organizations you may belong to or to whose tenets you subscribe to become unpopular in America, to the point where any who are associated with such tenets or associations are demonized, and you are forced out of your job .
You mean like Brendan Eich, or that Pizza parlor in Indiana? Or the conservative 501(c)3s targeted by the IRS? Or staffers of Joe McCarthy's former Senate committee trolling Romney donors' divorce records? Or the 'ObamaforAmerican.com' 's "Enemies List"? Or how the President would publicly name prominent private citizens as a targeting mechanism for his press enablers?
You mean like that? Almost as creepy as 'barackobama.com' knowing that you haven't wished DearLeader a 'Happy Birthday'.
I think Dreyfus was innocent and his prosecution and imprisonment is a shame on his persecutors. But the left since Dreyfus has been in a never ending quest to find the next Dreyfus that will simultaneously prove their own virtue and the wickedness of the right. Alan Turing got a raw deal, but I think back then both the left and the right were equally opposed to homosexuality. The Communists claimed it was an artifact of decadent capitalism and that homosexuality didn't even exist under Communism. The bet here is that Trumbo wasn't outspoken in defense of Turing. He had his own liitle list of victims and villains, and it didn't include many true martyrs. How about a biopic about Trumbo that highlights his apathy and indifference to the martyrdom of Turing.....,It would be too much for Hollywood to take cognizance of his indifference to the willful starvation of millions of Soviet agricultural workers, but surely there is some drama to be found in his tacit support of homophobia.
Vickie noticed that the Fox moderators were civil and asked pertinent questions of the Republican candidates. To her this proves that Fox is biased as much or more that MSNBC and CNBC.
BTW, Trumbo was a traitor.
The old studio moguls were great patriots and loved America. Guys like Sam Goldwyn and Louis B Mayer and Daryl Zanuck and the Warner brothers and Harry Cohn knew poverty, were grateful immigrants, and appreciated the opportunity that America gave them to be as great and as successful as they could be. Of course they despised progressive maggots like Trumbo and Lawson- spoiled ingrates and knee-jerk anti-Americans who would be right at home in today's democrat party alongside the likes of Sanders, Warren, and Reid. Progressives have done much in the intervening years to portray those studio heads in the worst possible light, but if you'd read the words of guys like Sam Fuller on Zanuck and Garson Kanin on Cohn and Goldwyn, then you would know what revisionist history claptrap it was and is. They were the kind of men that made this country great, and Trumbo and his ilk are the kind that gave this country Chris Matthews and Payton Head and Melissa Click. This nation misses those striving, grateful, daring and great men very badly.
"Again, how do you know American citizens who were members of the Communist party were paid agents of a foreign power? Some may have been, even almost certainly were, while others, probably most, were not."
Read the histories on the CPUSA. Read up on the Venona intercepts.
The documentation is there.
Hell, read what Trumbo himself later admitted.
Again, most of the members of the CPUSA were not agents but the leadership and many of the top people in it were quite aware that they were being funded by Moscow and were active on its behalf.
When Stalin signed the pact with Hitler the communist parties in Europe - the French party for example - broke with Moscow. And when Stalin occupied Eastern Europe they protested. And when the USSR invaded Hungary they protested. And when the USSR invaded Czechoslovakia they protested.
But not the CPUSA. Not one time did the CPUSA protest Moscow's policies.
Why do you think they did that?
To my knowledge, Trumbo didn't protest those actions either. Certainly not the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact.
Turns out Ethel, Julius and Mort were guilty as hell.
Just as a point of information, Alan Turing was a Brit and his ordeal was at the hands of English justice, or by the policy of our European masters if you prefer. USG and we did not singlehandedly convert Europe into homophobes from libertines post-war.
"To my knowledge, Trumbo didn't protest those actions either. Certainly not the Ribbentrop-Molotov pact."
Trumbo was an isolationist and pacifist from Sept 1939 to June 22, 1941. He was vociferous in being against any aid to Britain and opposed Lend-lease. In the Fall of 1941, he told his publisher to stop any more printings of "Johnny got his Gun".
After August 1945 he went back to being a pacifist again -except in support of Communists revolutions in China, Cuba, etc.
I wonder if future historians will be as harsh on those who were lackadaisical in their opposition to the crimes of Communism as they are today to those who were not emphatically against slavery or segregation. Maybe in another hundred years. The mills of God grind slow......Napoleon sent an army to reinstitute slavery in Haiti. It never occurred to him to free the slaves in Egypt or the serfs in Russia when he invaded those countries. Nevertheless, he was a hero to the left for about one hundred years after his death. Even today he has many admirers. I note in passing that both Pitt the Younger and Wellington were abolitionists. Wellington was the man responsible for freeing the slaves on the Empress Josephine's sugar plantations......Artists and intellectuals are unreliable witnesses to their own era. Beethoven and Goethe and Byron got Napoleon wrong. Trumbo, a far lesser talent, got Stalin wrong. And Hollywood gets Trumbo wrong. Another hunded years or so and they will sort it all out.
Rick @ 4:27 pm:
Congratulations on an epic example of complete failure to understand the point.
Robert Cook said...
Congratulations on an epic example of complete failure to understand the point.
I didn't miss your point. I made a different point which you've tried to dodge by redirecting focus. It remains true people are discriminated against for their politics and you have no concern over it because you support those discriminating.
Rick,
Your response shows you miss my point, or you completely misunderstand me.
If so Cook then you've wasted one or more posts saying so instead of clarifying whatever it is you do mean. But clarity is not your weapon of choice.
Robert Cook said...
Your response shows you miss my point, or you completely misunderstand me.
It shows I reject your faux brand in favor of a deeper understanding that incorporates the contradictions between your statements and the person you want us to believe you are.
In this case you're complaining about blacklisting a few dozen people 60 years ago and urge those on the right to criticize this practice even though it was against their political opponents. But Americans on the right are experiencing significant political discrimination today - in academia, media, and government as well as a few selected industries like Hollywood and "tech". Rather than act on your advice to us and stand against political targeting in employment you simply pretend this isn't happening.
The result of your preferences would be that we protect everyone but you only protect the left.
Post a Comment