COMMENTARY: Neo-McCarthyism is alive and well (02/06/05)

COMMENTARY

Neo-McCarthyism is alive and well

by Dr. Bohdan Vitvitsky

It started with a newspaper article on January 25 by Warren Strobel and Jonathan Landay for the Knight Ridder chain of newspapers titled "Delegate's Remarks Embarrass White House." The first sentence of the article read: "A delegation sent by President Bush to Ukraine's presidential inauguration last weekend included a Ukrainian American activist who has accused Jews of manipulating the Holocaust for their gain and blamed them for Soviet-era atrocities in Ukraine."

The article identified the purported sinner as Myron B. Kuropas. It went on to explain that in 2000 Dr. Kuropas had written: "Big money drives the Holocaust industry." And that in 1996 and on other occasions, he wrote that Jews played a major role in the rise of Bolshevism in the Soviet Union. About this an "unnamed" White House official said: "We were not aware of his previous statements. Had we been aware of such comments beforehand, we would not have invited Dr. Kuropas to be a member of the delegation."

Malcolm Hoenlein, the executive vice-chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations, was apparently one of the Jewish-American leaders who was "dismayed" by Dr. Kuropas's presence in the delegation to Ukraine. Mr. Hoenlein stated: "It's disturbing to give him credibility and to put him on the delegation." He added that Dr. Kuropas's argument that Jews played a prominent role in the Soviet Union during its first few decades "is one of the great anti-Semitic canards in Ukraine today.

The next day, at the daily State Department briefing, the index for the briefing listed a question about the Kuropas trip as "Reports of Anti-Semitic Member of U.S. Delegation to Inauguration." Two days later, the Chicago Sun-Times reported that two congressmen, Rahm Emanuel of Illinois and Henry Waxman of California, had written to the president of Northern Illinois University, where Dr. Kuropas has long taught in the College of Education, asking that this university "re-evaluate" its relationship with Dr. Kuropas. In their letter, the two congressmen wrote: "as a participant in that delegation, Mr. Kuropas refused to withdraw anti-Semitic remarks he made as recently as the year 2000, when he stated: 'Big money drives the Holocaust industry. To survive, the Holocaust industry is always searching for its next victim. Ukraine's turn is just around the corner.' "

Let me get this straight. A man has for many years served the Ukrainian American community in various leadership capacities. He has contributed time, effort and money to help Ukraine. He has been a long, vociferous and uncritical cheerleader for the Bush administration. The Bush White House understandably invites him as one of three representatives of the Ukrainian American community to attend the presidential inauguration in Ukraine. He attends and comports himself appropriately. There is not even a suggestion by anyone that this man did or said anything in the slightest that was inconsistent with his role as one of the community representatives at the Yushchenko inauguration. Then, someone "discovers" that this man has written some things that some consider "controversial" and all of a sudden the White House is "embarrassed" and some Jewish leaders are "dismayed."

I have a confession to make. I have on many occasions found myself strongly disagreeing with various things Dr. Kuropas has written, mostly relating to the virtues he has imaginatively attributed to the current administration and to his misreading of what happened during the Vietnam War. What do I do when I encounter a view with which I passionately disagree? I do what any civilized person in American is expected to do, I write in response and rebuttal and do my best to explain why Dr. Kuropas is dead wrong.

Pray tell, since when is that not what we do in this democracy? Since when is it acceptable for someone who doesn't like what someone else says instead to smear that other person by suggesting anti-Semitism and, through innuendo and implication, try and turn him into a pariah? Since when are such intimidation tactics politically kosher? Are we back in the early 1950s? Are we living in an era of new McCarthyism?

What was objectionable about McCarthyism is not that Sen. Joseph McCarthy made Americans aware of the danger posed by Communist influence in the United States during and after World War II. The influence was real and dangerous enough. What was objectionable were the bullying tactics employed indiscriminately and the smear tactics used indiscriminately to destroy people's reputations. We are apparently seeing a revival.

What is simultaneously the most interesting and frightening part of the Kuropas saga is its genesis. Given that Dr. Kuropas neither did nor said anything prior, during or after his participation in the delegation to the Yushchenko inauguration, how is it that he suddenly found himself in the glaring spotlight? The only possible answer is that some organization or person has a dossier on Dr. Kuropas and then some people decided that his participation in the delegation was an opportune time to teach Dr. Kuropas a lesson. What's the lesson? If we don't like what you say, we can shut you up.

Few allegations have as devastating an effect as an allegation of anti-Semitism. It's the political analogue to an accusation of being a child molester. If someone is accused of anti-Semitism, our natural reaction is to cringe and move away from any association with that person. Anti-Semitism is moral leprosy. That's why a specious charge of anti-Semitism is such an effective tool of character assassination.

Life must be good at the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations if the good folks there spend their days worrying about whether Dr. Kuropas should have attended the inauguration in Ukraine. News flash: if you don't like what he writes, how about taking the trouble to explain how and why he's wrong? And, if new research has disclosed that Leon Trotsky, Lazar Kaganovich and some of their friends who helped run the Soviet secret police were really Irishmen in disguise, please, don't keep that a secret from us. (Of course, what relevance, if any, any of this has to do with our lives today is altogether another story.)

Various writers have expressed different views about how organized Jewry treats the Nazis' victimization of the Jews. They include leading historians such as, for example, Peter Novick in "The Holocaust in American Life," Jewish Holocaust victims and their progeny. How/why is that subject "off limits"? According to whom? The new thought police?

It's ironic. A Jewish Ukrainian is to help head up the new government in Ukraine, a Jewish American is the director of the leading center of Ukrainian studies in North America, and, as far as I can tell, their being Jewish is a non-issue in Kyiv and in the Ukrainian community. Yet, some spokespersons in the Jewish community have taken it upon themselves to opine as to which Ukrainian American should have attended the recent inauguration in Ukraine.

The supposedly saintly Elie Wiesel has in print expressed a vicious, racist-like hatred for Ukrainians. Yet, it would never occur to me to presume to suggest that he should or should not represent us Americans at some Holocaust commemoration. Why not? There are several reasons. Because I'm not that arrogant or presumptuous. Because Mr. Wiesel's prejudice against Ukrainians is not directly relevant to how effectively he can speak about the Holocaust. And also because it would not occur to me that someone whose views are odious should for that reason alone be blackballed. I guess I'm old-fashioned. I still believe in rebuttals.

Bohdan Vitvitsky is an attorney, writer and lecturer who holds a Ph.D. in philosophy.

| Home Page |