One point that I accidentally left on the cutting room floor of today’s Goldberg File, is that the substantive problem with McCarthy wasn’t that he was a lout, but that he undermined the cause of anti-Communism through his loutishness. I think there is substance to this argument and, as I just said, I meant to include it. But at the same time, I think many anti-McCarthy folks overplay this point. Some of them strike me as Johnny-come-latelies to anti-Communism, trying to justify their enduring anti-anti-Communism with a new spin. And some of them, though sincere, miss the point that the Left would have invented Joe McCarthy if he didn’t exist. They certainly invented all sorts of arguments against non-McCarthyite anti-Communists all the time. The notion that anti-Communism would have won the hearts and minds of the liberal anti-anti-Communists if only McCarthy stayed quiet is as laughable as saying that liberals would have supported Clinton’s impeachment if only someone other than Ken Starr had served as Indpendent Counsel.