Editing Joseph McCarthy (section)

{{Important}}
{{Villain_Infobox
|Image = Joseph_McCarthy adjusted.jpg
|fullname = Joseph Raymond McCarthy
|alias = Tail-Gunner Joe<br>The Pepsi-Cola Kid
|origin = Grand Chute, Wisconsin, United States
|occupation = U.S. Senator from Wisconsin (1947 - 1957)<br>Chair of Senate Government Operations Committee (1953 - 1955)<br>U.S. Marine (1942 - 1946)
|type of villain = Hypocritical Paranoid Fearmonger
|goals = Rid the U.S. Government of secret communists (failed)
|crimes = [[Hate Speech|Hate speech]]<br>Demagoguery<br>[[Homophobia]]<br>Fearmongering<br>[[Russophobia]]<br>[[Anti-Semitism]]
|hobby = Accusing people of being communists}}
{{Quote|Until this moment, Senator, I think I never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness...let us not assassinate this lad further, senator.  You've done enough.  Have you no sense of decency, sir?  At long last, have you left no sense of decency?|Joseph N. Welch's infamous remark during the Army-McCarthy hearings.}}
'''Joseph Raymond "Joe" McCarthy''' (November 14, 1908 – May 2, 1957) was an American politician who served as a Republican U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 until his death in 1957. Beginning in 1950, McCarthy became the most visible public face of a period in the United States in which [[Cold War]] tensions fueled fears of widespread communist subversion. He is known for alleging that numerous communists and Soviet spies and sympathizers had infiltrated the United States federal government, universities, film industry, and elsewhere.<ref name = redscare>[https://millercenter.org/the-presidency/educational-resources/age-of-eisenhower/mcarthyism-red-scare McCarthyism and the Red Scare], The Miller Center</ref>

Ultimately, the smear tactics that he used led him to be censured by the U.S. Senate.<ref name = censure></ref> The term "McCarthyism", coined in 1950 in reference to McCarthy's practices, was soon applied to similar anti-communist activities. Today, the term is used more broadly to mean demagogic, reckless, and unsubstantiated accusations, as well as public attacks on the character or patriotism of political opponents.

In his book ''The Bureau: The Secret History of the FBI'', journalist Ronald Kessler quoted former FBI agent Robert J. Lamphere, who participated in all the FBI’s major spy cases during the McCarthy period, as saying that FBI agents who worked counterintelligence were aghast that FBI Director [[J. Edgar Hoover]] initially supported McCarthy. “McCarthyism did all kinds of harm because he was pushing something that wasn’t so,” Lamphere told Kessler. The VENONA intercepts showed that over several decades, “There were a lot of spies in the government, but not all in the State Department,” Lamphere said. However, “The problem was that McCarthy lied about his information and figures. He made charges against people that weren’t true. McCarthyism harmed the counterintelligence effort against the Soviet threat because of the revulsion it caused. All along, Hoover was helping him.”<ref>[https://www.upi.com/Archives/1983/12/21/Hoover-fueled-McCarthys-anti-communist-crusade/3580440830800/ Hoover fueled McCarthy's anti-communist crusade], ''United Press International''</ref>