From: "Charles Brown" <CharlesB at CNCL.ci.detroit.mi.us>
>Sullivan labeled the media attack "sexual McCarthyism" and the relationship
>to McCarthyism (however overblown) is that based on political disagreement,
>people's personal lives and their personal associations will be
investigated
>and then they will be forced to answer for it in public forums, eroding
both
>personal privacy and dignity.
(((((((((
-CB: Politically motivated investigation of personal lives is NOT the or a unique aspect of McCarthyism. That -occurs in political fighting in general. Many small town or big city political struggles unrelated to McCarthyism -use it. The President was just impeached based on it. -The unique characteristic of McCarthyism was anti-communism. People were persecuted for their political, -not personal lives.
As is Sullivan (not that I'm that sorry for him as an individual for the reasons you note). The folks exposing Sullivan don't object to his personal life but are exposing it as punishmnet for his political beliefs they disagree with.
You can reasonably hold out for applying the term "McCarthyism" only to politically-motivated personal investigations of leftwingers, just as some Jews hold out using the term "holocaust" only for the unique event of Hitler's actions, but many folks attacked McCarthyism not because of affinity for its victims but because they found the invasive tools of investigation by McCarthy repugnant, whoever the target might be.
I think Sullivan's political views should be lambasted from sea to shining sea but my basic points have been that this kind of invasive investigation of personal lives is violative of personal dignity, destructive of the very public space where serious political discussion gets displaced for gossip, and is, worse, often ineffective in achieving the ends of discrediting the IDEAS of the person being destroyed.
I'm not a purist; as with physical violence, there are times when any weapon may be justified. I just think its casual use is usually counterproductive.
- Nathan Newman
It is a feature of this discussion's diversion from the real issue, Sullivan's rightwing politics , that he could get away with trying to analogize himself as a vicitm of anti-communism, when he is , no doubt, an anti-communist.