Red Star Over Hollywood

This article/book review is a fascinating exposition about the influence of the Communist Party USA in Hollywood, especially during the McCarthy Era. It appears ol' Joe wasn't far off the mark after all--at least when it came to Hollywood:

Equally disturbing in terms of human behavior, however, is...the inner workings of Party intellectual discipline in Hollywood during the 1930s and 1940s. Here were creative artists who either willingly or under enormous and savage psychological pressure submitted their talent to the complete control of a central committee. The preferred instrument whenever anyone sought intellectual or artistic independence from the current Party line was a "“trial"” in which the defendant was brutally criticized and mercilessly excoriated for hour after hour as "“unrevolutionary"” and "“anti-working class"” by people he had previously thought of as his friends. That these Stalinist "“trials"” often took place in sumptuous Beverly Hills mansions complete with swimming-pools only makes the situation more grotesque.

It also appears that the Hollywood Communists were the originators of what we now call "Political Correctness":

In [the Negro Liberation Movement] campaign, Party people who used terms such as "white wash" or "black sheep" suddenly found themselves expelled from the Party as "white chauvinists"; the whole atmosphere was evidently like today’s average university at its worst.

As the reviewer points out, while the HUAC was a travesty of justice, it didn't come about in a vacuum. The "Red Menace" was--and remains--a very real and tangible threat. Unfortunately, it all too often finds fertile ground in the gullible, inexperienced youth of the American Left, especially when encouraged by the self-serving mouthpieces of Hollywood. Ronald Reagan knew exactly what he was saying when he referred to the Soviet Union as "an evil empire." As you'll see from reading the article, he also knew from first-hand experience that there was a pro-Soviet fifth column in control of Hollywood, and he knew the lengths they would go to in order to prevent their exposure. Unfortunately for them, Ronnie did an end-run on their pinko butts; he destroyed the Soviet Union instead.