Posted By Vicki McClure Davidson on August 6, 2009

In high school, I dreamed about having a career as a successful stage actress. Fair singer, terrible dancer, but man alive, I could act. Comedy, drama, melodrama, Shakespeare… I could do it all. Or, at least, that’s what I thought when I was 17. I qualified for competing in the state speech tournaments for oral interpretation, and did very well, earning a number of awards for both humorous and dramatic interpretations.

The Crucible by Arthur Miller was one of my favorite plays and I placed fifth in the state for my dramatic interpretation of a scene from it. This drama has it all… mayhem, distrust, sex, religion, treachery, lust, jealousy, and death in a Puritanical, restrictive society. While Miller wrote about the infamous Salem, Massachusetts witch trials in early American history, he was drawing a parallel between those Puritanical witch trials and similar rabid hunts at the time that were motivated by political distrust and, ultimately, butchered Americans’ civil liberties.

These anti-Communism hunts were the brainchild of one man, and while they were originally conceived to protect the country’s citizens from the “Second Red Scare,” they evolved into the government’s powerful, tyrannical McCarthy hearings in 1950s America.

In a nutshell, if you’re not familiar with The Crucible, the play takes place in early America around 1692. Several young Puritan women and a Barbados slave, who are caught dancing outdoors at night and play-acting at casting spells, are accused of being witches. To avoid imminent punishment (Puritans were very strict on what was and was not proper behavior), these women falsely accused innocent neighbors of witchcraft. This transparent diversion, with no evidence, worked.

Being accused of witchcraft was an almost-certain death sentence, as the accused people of Salem had to prove that they weren’t witches. The accusers, on the other hand, were left scot-free of having to produce a shred of evidence to support their accusations. Lies, fears, and jealousy gripped the community and the Salem residents ultimately turned on each other. Reputations and families were ruined, and harmony and happiness in the community… well, it was adiós to harmony and happiness. Adiós to “hope and change” as well.

Miller’s gripping play was inspired by the McCarthy hearings of the 1950s… those hearings were and still are referred to as “witch hunts.” Miller was moved to write the play in 1952 when he saw how McCarthyism, spearheaded by U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy, took on an odious life of its own and created the notorious Hollywood blacklist. This was a list of screenwriters, actors, directors, musicians, and other U.S. entertainment professionals who were “blackballed”—denied employment in Hollywood—because of their political beliefs or associations, whether or not they were real or just suspected. This blacklist existed until 1960, but even then, many who had been on the list remained unemployable in the film industry for years thereafter.

The government’s anti-Communist agenda was nurtured by members of our government; powerful newspaper columnists, like Walter Winchell and Hedda Hopper, as well as regular American citizens, were encouraged to make reckless accusations or report suspicions of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without any substantial regard for evidence. A bleak, disgraceful time in our nation’s history.

And here we are in 2009, with uncomfortable echoes of The Crucible and the McCarthy hearings emanating from the White House.

From The Hill:

…Yesterday, the White House asked supporters to forward “fishy” claims or rumors about the President’s healthcare plan to a White House email address as a way to respond to “disinformation.”

[Congressman John] Cornyn says this practice would let the White House collect personal information about people who oppose the President.

“By requesting citizens send ‘fishy’ emails to the White House, it is inevitable that the names, email, addresses, IP addresses and private speech of U.S. citizens will be reported to the White House,” Cornyn wrote in a letter to Obama. “You should not be surprised that these actions taken by your White House staff raise the specter of a data collection program.”

Cornyn asked Obama to cease the program immediately, or at the very least explain what the White House would do with the information it collects.

“I am not aware of any precedent for a President asking American citizens to report their fellow citizens to the White House for pure speech that is deemed ‘fishy’ or otherwise inimical to the White House’s political interests,” Cornyn said.

This “ratting out your neighbor” as it pertains to non-support of the still-to-be-completed, government-run health care bill has a “McCarthy fishiness” all its own. Supplying the government with “suspicious” information or lax RUMORS about private citizens, based on no guidelines or accountability, is so fraught with holes that violate judicial and privacy protection, it looks like aged Swiss cheese. Political adversaries could easily be targeted and/or punished by the current government—a direct violation of the US Constitution. A reckless, irresponsible, solicited rally requested of millions upon millions of Americans, some of whom are unhinged, vengeful, dishonest, drug- or alcohol-addicted, and/or politically motivated.

There’s an important cautionary tale here.

We could be on the same destructive path that plummeted the residents of Salem in The Crucible to chaos and disaster. To be able to accuse and condemn innocent people of any perceived wrongdoing, for any number of self-serving motivations without hard and true evidence, is morally wrong. It is also wrong for any civilized government, that embraces the liberties of its citizens, to request that kind of information, to do with whatever that government wishes.

The mere accusation of being a Communist or Communist sympathizer during the McCarthy era destroyed careers, destroyed lives. On a similar, more ominous note, during Adolf Hitler’s bloody reign, the brainwashed “Hitler Youth” were encouraged to report “fishy” activities and suspicions about family, including parents, and neighbors to authorities about those who were allegedly not supportive of the Fuhrer.

That’s a road America CANNOT go down.

Related “fishy” readings:
B.S. Report: White House Asking People To Point Out “Fishy” Claims About Obamacare To Their Website!
RedState: Call For Informants: If You Oppose Obamacare, Even in ‘Casual Conversation,’ the White House Wants to Know About It
Kevin McCullough, FOX News: Go Ahead and Report Me — I’ll Shout Louder
Vets On The Watch: The Force Is Strong
Hot Air: ABC at health-care townhall: Gee, the anger here seems authentic and New DNC ad: Mobs of right-wing lunatics want to feast on your flesh
Michelle Malkin: Who’s behind the Internet Snitch Brigade and This is what mob rule looks like and Obama summons his army: “This is the moment our movement was built for.” and Help out the Internet snitch brigade: Report on fishy health czar office and Yes, they are talking about a government takeover of health care and Lanny Davis wants you photographed and investigated and Protest a health care town hall; more scenes from the counterinsurgency
Obi’s Sister: Be the Tattletale
Clinging to G & G: Is your neighbor ratting on you?
Steven Crowder, Big Hollywood: ‘Flag Yourself!’ Campaign (With Ann Coulter)
Patterico’s Pontifications: Fishy Emails
Gathering of Eagles: NY: Barack Obama: Why Can’t They Just Obey?
Political Derby: The Arlen Specter spectacular
Independent Eyes on America Blog: White House Move to Collect ‘Fishy’ Info May Be Illegal, Critics Say
RBO: ObamaCare’s Little Helpers
Behind Blue Lines: Linda Douglass: White House Snitch Czarina
Stop The ACLU: Fearmongering Democrats Can’t Accept Americans Don’t Want Their Health Care Crap Sandwich
Victoria Jackson, Big Hollywood: Fishy
The Substratum: Obama White House Violating Government Website Rules – Domain Could Be Suspended
Gateway Pundit: DESPITE HEAVY POLICE PRESENCE– Dem Reps Booed at Obamacare Rally

Categories: Freedom of Speech, Government, Health, Knowledge, Law & Constitution, Media & Communication, Social and Political Climate
Tags: Arthur Miller, Communist, health care, Hollywood blacklist, John Cornyn, Joseph McCarthy, McCarthyism, nationalized health care, Obama, ObamaCare, playwright Arthur Miller, political, politics, Second Red Scare, Single-Payer System, socialized medicine, The Crucible, universal health care, witch-hunt