Joseph R. McCarthy Quotes
I note your refusal to give us answers to our questions. Your insistence is extremely revealing. It would seem that the last man in the world who would try to protect and hide the facts about one of his top officer's [William Bundy] association with, and contributions to, a convicted traitor [Alger Hiss] would be the head of the CIA.... That the matter cannot and will not rest here is, of course, obvious.
Bundy had been a member of the same law firm as Hiss's brother. He, like other members of the firm, had made financial contributions to Hiss's legal defense. Bundy was completely cleared of any wrongdoing or disloyalty later.
Joseph R. McCarthy, 1908-1957, U. S. Senator (Republican, WI), Letter to CIA Chief Allan Dulles, August 3, 1953
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
If Casey had listened to Sofaer as the State Department did, President Reagan would have been spared the worst Scandal of his Presidency—Iran Contra. Casey had a great antipathy to lawyers. See {637470}.
During the 2006 War on Terror, the George W. Bush Administration established secret prisons in friendly countries where suspected terrorists could be housed and questioned without regard to the American laws and regulations—or even Presidential directives about torture. The prisons were on the soil and under the jurisdiction of foreign countries whose laws were not as respectful of human rights and the rule of law as ours. Therefore the administration could deny that the U. S. was responsible for what occurred even though we secretly transported the suspects to the secret prisons and American agents participated in their “interrogation.”
Commenting on a former CIA agent's defection to Russia:
of the September 11 Commission
Bush had served earlier as the head of the CIA and understood the costs of such better than most. He was put in a difficult position when his son was President and one of the senior White House operatives, for small partisan advantage, leaked the name and identity of Valerie Plame, a covert CIA operative. Bush the father, remained silent even after the leaker was identified.
See {642341} for the CIA role in obstructing the Warren Commission investigation. The FBI also withheld evidence about their contacts with Oswald. The investigators for the Commission only came from the two agencies that had much to hide and who lied to the commission.
This was a pointed criticism of McCarthyism and his red scare and red-baiting behavior. Others were cowed by the risk that any criticism of McCarthy’s methods would bring an accusation that the critic was a Communist which all too often would mean loss of a job and social isolation. However as a Federal Judge, the lifetime tenure protection of his position could lead to impeachment which would be brought and tried by a Congress that was itself intimidated by McCarthy. He was one of the relatively few courageous Americans who risked exposing McCarthy who turned out to be an alcoholic bully and consummate liar.
Senator Dianne Feinstein, Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, had released an unclassified Summary of the Committee Report on the CIA using torture and perverse treatment of suspect terrorists in the aftermath of the 9-11 attack on New York. Most Republicans argued vehemently that the Report should be classified and kept secret as the CIA behavior was so egregious, unpalatable, and morally reprehensible that there would be negative consequences including perhaps demonstrations and attacks against Americans in foreign countries. Moreover, Terrorist organizations would use the heinous CIA behavior as a recruiting tool for anti-American terrorists. McCain, who had himself been the victim of North Vietnamese torture cited the moral and ethical reasons to prohibit torture but also explained what has been proven over and over again that torture victims will tell the torturer any nonsense that they think the torturer might believe just to get obtain relief from the agony of the torture.
Joseph Raymond McCarthy was an American politician and attorney who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957. Beginning in 1950, McCarthy became the most visible public face of a period in the United States in which Cold War tensions fueled fears of widespread communist subversion. He is known for alleging that numerous communists and Soviet spies and sympathizers had infiltrated the United States federal government, universities, film industry, and elsewhere. Ultimately, the smear tactics that he used led him to be censured by the U.S. Senate. The term "McCarthyism", coined in 1950 in reference to McCarthy's practices, was soon applied to similar anti-communist activities. Today, the term is used more broadly to mean demagogic, reckless, and unsubstantiated accusations, as well as public attacks on the character or patriotism of political opponents.
