McDowell’s view on peace march is an insult to those who took part

“UNTIL this moment, Senator, I think I never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness. Let us not assassinate this lad further, Senator. You have done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you no sense of decency?”

The words of Joseph Welch, the brilliant lawyer who represented the US Army against Senator Joe McCarthy's charges of communist infiltration. That couple of sentences, uttered on live television as McCarthy was attacking a young lawyer on Welch's team, effectively ended McCarthyism.

McCarthyism was essentially a political tactic. Designed to boost the career of an otherwise worthless US Senator, it consisted of making wild allegations of communist activity, usually without a shred of evidence, and using those allegations to convict people of un-American activities. McCarthyism fed the paranoia of the early cold war, it inflamed opinions in America, it destroyed careers and lives, and it wasn't stopped until it was confronted.