In the MOMENTIn RETROSPECT
“… We believed, and we believe in what we were expressing.”
“Two (on screen) … millions (in real life) gave their lives and were prepared to sacrifice everything in the fight against fascist and racist NAZI Germany” said actress Vanessa Redgrave in the moment of the film “Julia” in an acceptance speech at the (50th) Academy Awards April 3, 1978, held at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion https://aaspeechesdb.oscars.org
“I salute you and I pay tribute to you (who have) … stood firm and … refused to be intimidated by the threats of a … bunch of Zionist hoodlums whose behavior is an insult to the stature of Jews all over the world and to their great and heroic record of struggle against fascism and oppression.…
“I salute all of you for having stood firm and dealt a final blow against [a] period when NIXON AND MCCARTHY launched a worldwide witch hunt against those who tried to express in their lives and their work the truth that they believed in.”
RED SCARE 1900s - 2000s
THE RED SCARE (Background) “… illustrates the ease with which excuses can be offered and accepted “for taking away civil liberties” … then steamrolling “into overreach on the part of governments at all levels” says author Clay Risen.
The second Red Scare also labeled McCarthyism is linked to Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, initially “a little-known junior senator from Wisconsin until February 1950 when he claimed to possess a list of 205 card-carrying Communists employed in the U.S. Department of State.”
Henceforth, until he was dethroned, the senator “became a tireless crusader against Communism … in a period that has been commonly referred to as the Red Scare.” Source: Eisenhower Library Online Document: https://www.eisenhowerlibrary.gov/research/online-documents/mccarthyism-red-scare
EXCERPT from a Risen Interview with Chapter 16 “Revisiting a Witch Hunt”
CHAPTER 16: Joseph McCarthy, at least three US presidents [Harry Truman, Dwight Eisenhower, Richard Nixon], and one presidential candidate [Robert F. Kennedy] had roles in the Red Scare. (Chapter 16 is a publication of Humanities Tennessee)
RISEN: He (Joseph R. McCarthy) was a useful tool for a lot of different groups because he was willing to say stuff they couldn’t. … People who wanted to protect their reputations could feed stuff to McCarthy, and McCarthy was willing to say it. He became a puppet for these folks, even though, obviously, I think he did have his own volition and his own ideas about where he was going.
RISEN (on TRUMAN): With the death of the thirty-second US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Vice President Harry S. Truman “was dropped, midstream, into a lot of issues that, even a year before, he probably didn’t anticipate (having) to deal with. … [He] was ultimately a little naïve…, (believing) that the American public had too much common sense to be drawn in (either) by the far left and communism, or … into red baiting and the Red Scare.”
RISEN (on NIXON): “… Everything was in service of Richard Nixon…, an amoral opportunist” who “started off as a centrist, very concerned about civil liberties and the potential for overreach”; but … when he saw that he could make a real splash, he dug in [on the Red Scare].”
RISEN (on EISENHOWER): The thirty-fourth US President Dwight David Eisenhower “created a compromise …, reinforce[ing] the establishment and push[ing] aside the far left and the far right…,” demonstrating “faith in the establishment and in the ultimate wisdom of moderation.” However, “had he taken on McCarthy more aggressively, he could have done more to disabuse more people of (widespread) conspiracy theories and witch hunting.”
RISEN (on Robert F. KENNEDY, a member of Joseph McCarthy’s Staff during the Red Scare): “There is probably a lot to be said about why (his) … was not a profile in courage….” “Early on… [Robert F.] Kennedy was … an opportunist…” and while it is unclear “whether he agreed with what McCarthy was doing…, like his brother [John F. Kennedy],” [Robert F. Kennedy] “fundamentally believed in anti-communism and that Communists needed to be attacked in every way.” https://chapter16.org/revisiting-a-witch-hunt/ Patterson, Jim, February 24, 2025, Chapter 16 “Revisiting a Witch Hunt: Clay Risen’s Red Scare offers a fresh take on the legacy of Senator Joseph McCarthy,” https://chapter16.org/revisiting-a-witch-hunt/ Jim Patterson is a Nashville freelance writer whose work appears often on the United Methodist News website. He has been a reporter for The Associated Press in Nashville and senior writer and public affairs officer for Vanderbilt University; author of Red Scare: Blacklists, McCarthyism, and the Making of Modern America by Clay Risen (also author of other books and a New York Times reporter and editor, https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Red-Scare/Clay-Risen/9781982141806
NAZISM 1900s – 2000s
In the year of the 70th anniversary of Victory in World War II, the founding of the United Nations and the institution of the Nuremberg trials, the UN General Assembly adopted
“… the Russia-initiated resolution on combating glorification of Nazism, neo-Nazism and other practices that contribute to fueling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance.”
“The resolution denounces the glorification of the Nazi movement and former Waffen SS members in a number of countries, which is done by unveiling monuments and holding demonstrations. It points to persisting attempts to desecrate or destroy monuments erected in honor of those who fought against Nazism in WWII.” The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, December 18, 2015, https://www.mid.ru/en/foreign_policy/news/1520357/
“NEVER AGAIN”
What does it mean in practice?
Is it just another (thoughts and prayers) mantra: casual, careless, cavalier utterance …babytalk, meaninglessness?
What exactly does Never Again mean to delusional men who occupy positions of enormous power, men bereft of human values and moral sensibility, men who believe that the lands they cause to be razed and ruined, the bombs and chemical weapons they order to be released or exploded upon all nature—
“… will somehow spare them.”
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PROLIFIC SOUTHERN-BORN AMERICAN WRITER DR. CAROLYN LADELLE BENNETT focuses on People, Press, Politics USA; Domestic and Foreign Affairs (no copyright claimed in direct quotes and individual image)
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