James Delingpole writes at the Telegraph:
Personally I don’t believe in banning words – but I do believe in intellectual and moral consistency. You’d never hear an organisation as eggshell-treadingly right-on as the BBC use pejorative terms for Jews or black people or homosexuals or sufferers of cerebral palsy. So why, pray, does it feel it can persist in using the deliberately offensive term “denier” to write off anyone who is sceptical about Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming?…
Personally I’m not going to write into the BBC and complain. I’m delighted they’re still using the word so freely. Every time they do so, it marks them out for the unreconstructed, scientifically illiterate bigots the Cambridge Media and Environment Programme has helped them become. Nice work, Harrabin!
I have no doubt it was the democrats. Of course, the same is true of climate change today. Mostly it’s democrats that are pushing it. It fits right in with dependent people who need a nanny government. Plus, democrats are very effective with the labeling and name-calling. Already, it’s Bush’s fault, or Rush Limbaugh, or the Tea Party.
Good historical summary.
Most of what McCarthy was blamed for was done by The House Committee on Un-American Activities. It was a Democrat led committee as they were the party in power. McCarthy was a Senator. His Investigation was concerned with finding Communists/Foreign Agents in Government. Was he a bully, probably yes. The real hysteria was not caused by him but by the House committee, Democrats. They are the ones who called in the Hollywood writers. They are the ones who wanted witnesses to rat out everyone. History has effectively been re-written to eliminate the Democrat involvement and the fanning of the flames of hysteria and paranoia.
You see the same things at work today. The Democrats are fanning the flames of hysteria but later they will claim it was all John McCains fault and they were the calm voices of reason.
BTW. There were actually quite a few Communists working in Government who were active agents of the USSR.
I’m starting to believe that “denier” is not used to denote holocaust deniers, but rather a label like “communist” in McCarthyism. Flinging the word “denier” at someone is designed to make people suspicious of the person, to get everyone to move a little ways across the room to avoid “contamination” and to try and get people thrown out of office. It really isn’t relevant what is being denied any more than genuine political philosophy was important to McCarthy. It’s the accusation that is meant to destroy, without substance or question.
The Beebs stock-in-trade is rhetoric, not logic.
The ad hominems are irresistible, and tell you more about the accuser than the accused.