>>"McCarthyism", like "fascism" has become a buzzword that most often reflects that the user intends it as code to elicit huzzahs from fellow believers rather than something rooted in actual history {s}
>>>
>>Sort of like "Socialism"???????????????
>
>Actually, yes. Very little proposed seriously by the 'left' in this country would be recognized as socialism in really socialist countries. (as Dragan while quickly confirm) I'm also not fond of 'racism' and 'treason' except in truly appropriate context.
>
>But fascist and fascism is particularly misused and I think really unwittingly by people who really don't know what it means. The word "progressive" is equally tricky if one knows anything of Wilson's people and the US in the first two decades of the last century.

Flashback to the 60's.............................

I always thought, back then, that the left had the advantage in the name calling business. Call a right-winger a Facist and you were insulting him. Call a left-winger a Communist and it was either shrugged off as a McCarthyite slur or accepted as a compliment.

Nowadays, all those things seem to be labels with meaning only to the insulter and easily ignored by the insultee.