|
 The
Hollywood Left and the Real Blacklist
The distain of the annointed elites...
[Wes
Vernon] 3/29/06
Hollywood's
film colony has had a long romance with the Left. Today's Hollywood,
with the help of the "mainstream" media, regularly savages
those who stand up to America's enemies.
Hollywood's
earnest belief appears to be that anyone who attains show-business
celebrity—actor, producer, or writer—is automatically possessed
of more political wisdom than the rest of us. Americans have
come to resent it. Radio talk-show host Laura Ingraham has
written a very good book on the subject titled "Shut Up and
Sing." And when no Hollywood parlor politico is within
earshot, some liberal politicians have whispered (likely with
a smirk) their lack of respect for show business moneybags
who open their wallets and purses to the coffers of liberal
and pro-Democrat causes. In some insider liberal circles, spending
time at a Barbra Streisand soiree in Malibu is necessary to
keep the money flowing, but not a source of smart well-thought-out
political strategy.
Today's Hollywood
Left is more open in its distaste for Middle American values.
Michael Moore is a prime example. He is a cruder and more outwardly
hateful propagandist than the Hollywood left of earlier eras.
Contributor
Wes Vernon
Wes
Vernon is a Washington-based writer & broadcast
journalist and contributor to Accuracy in Media [AIM]. [Vernon index] |
Americans
often wonder exactly why so many of Hollywood's self-anointed
political sages bash America, bash this country's traditions,
bash Christians, bash Western Civilization, bash corporate America,
bash traditional marriage, bash anti-communists (of course),
and above all bash conservatives of every stripe (including free
enterprise economic advocates whose offense seems to be in believing
that even people not living in Beverly Hills mansions are entitled
to realize the fruits of the American Dream).
Currently,
Hollywood denigrates the War on Terror [See "Hollywood
Surrenders to Terrorists" by Cliff Kincaid and Roger Aronoff-AIM
Report January-B], more or less in the tradition of its previous
blindness to the Cold War.
What makes
these people tick? Why is Hollywood, for example, so anti-religious?
Why
is it that films such as "The Passion
of the Christ" or TV shows such as "Touched by an Angel" are
the exception, not the rule?
For some on-the-ground insight, AIM turned to longtime pop recording
and box office star Pat Boone.
Talking To Pat Boone
"I've thought a lot about it," he told me. Of course he moves
amongst "all kinds of people who are 180 degrees from me spiritually
and politically, and we get along fine." But the "underlying
cause for the ultra-liberalism and humanism here is that Hollywood
does not want rules. They don't want any restrictions on what
they can do to make money or be successful. So obviously any
religion embodies some form of rules and expectations for behavior,
and even consequences, and they don't want to hear any of that." To
the Left that dominates the Hollywood culture, religion "poses
a tremendous threat economically, professionally, and socially
[even though] it's not meant to be that," Boone explained.
Some Hollywood producers don't mind actually losing money in
order to make their anti-religious, anti-patriotic statements.
One noted movie critic, Michael Medved, wrote a book several
years ago, Hollywood vs. America, wherein he cited movie-makers
who produced films they knew were destined to be total flops
at the box office, just so they can get across anti-American
and anti-religious messages.
Public outrage
and threatened boycotts forced NBC to cancel the pro-homosexual
show, "The Book of Daniel." Unchastened by
the experience, NBC struck back at Christians by scheduling for
April 13—the night before "Good Friday"—an episode of "Will and
Grace" where Britney Spears was to appear on a fictional TV network
with a cooking segment called "Cruci-fixin's," to mock Christianity.
That, too, was canceled due to public pressure.
As Pat Boone
tells us, the Hollywood Left not only rejects religion, "but
[actually] there is an antipathy to it. Not just Christianity,
but Judeo-Christianity" is seen as a threat in "Tinseltown."
The Hollywood
culture is such that known identified religious or political
conservatives
believe they must try harder to succeed
or (perhaps before establishing their celebrity) stay "in the
closet" about their beliefs.
Nonetheless,
the dominant leftists in Hollywood insist it is they who are
the "victims." For 50 years now, they have been
wailing at the "evils" of the "blacklist" of the Forties and
Fifties. They have produced about a dozen movies peddling the
idea that Hollywood was one happy harmonious family-friendly
place until those evil ignorant cowboys from the House Committee
on Un-American Activities came along and persecuted innocent
artists for their "political beliefs."
Communism In Hollywood
Ronald and Allis Radosh explode that myth in their book, Red
Star Over Hollywood. What the committee investigated was
not anyone's "political belief," but a well-organized plot
by the Communist Party to take over the movie industry and
place its considerable influence in the service of the Soviet
Union which, in those years immediately following World War
II, was gobbling up Eastern Europe. Many of our fighting men
who had put their lives on the line to save Europe from Nazism
found out after they returned here to civilian life that much
of the territory that Adolph Hitler had conquered was instead
conquered by Joseph Stalin.
Against that background, the congressional committee believed
if this nation was to fight the Cold War as effectively as we
fought World War II, we should know exactly what our enemy was
up to right here on our soil.
Red Star Over Hollywood is fully documented and heavily
footnoted. It clearly shows how the highest echelons of the Soviet
Union decided as far back as the late 1920s that they would make
the then-burgeoning film capital a prime target. They had learned
the lesson of history that the way to undermine any society's
values was not to try directly to influence its leaders (often
impossible), but to convey the message to the masses through
those who write its entertainment scripts and its songs.
You may never
have heard of Willi Munzenberg. The German
native was specifically assigned by the Soviets to plant the
seeds of communism in Hollywood. As the Radoshes comment: "What
better place for the Russian Revolution's promise of a classless
society to take hold than in Hollywood, the capital of dreams?"
This book smashes to smithereens the poignant myth of the brave
and unflinching Lillian Hellman (a Stalinist playwright), the
persecuted Hollywood Ten, and the supposed contemptible rats
who cooperated with the committee.
Red Star Over Hollywood documents chapter and verse
the hard cold fact that every single hostile witness in those
congressional hearings was either a hard-core member of the Communist
Party or at the very least hip-deep in Communist discipline.
Hard-Core Reds
Just so there
is no misunderstanding: These were no "parlor
pinks." They were true believers—part of a group that advocated
the violent overthrow of the U.S. government. They were pivotal
in the ongoing effort to insert the propaganda line of a foreign
power into the movies seen by millions of us. The 1st Amendment
gives them the right to propagandize to their heart's content.
The committee's point was that if they were spreading propaganda
on behalf of this country's enemies, the movie-goer was entitled
to know that he was being lectured on behalf of that agenda.
Suppose some Nazi brown-shirts had been found making our movies
in those days. Does anyone doubt that Washington would have taken
more than a casual interest?
The congressmen initially focused on the infamous Hollywood
Ten. Those were witnesses with Communist affiliations and activities
as far as the eye could see. They were writers and producers
who defied the House committee, refused to answer its questions
and spent some time in jail for doing so.
One of them
was producer John Howard Lawson, described by the Radosh husband-and-wife
team as "the top Hollywood Communist."
According
to All Media Guide, Lawson "began writing numerous
plays, most of them promoting Marxism." In yet another book,
the 1998 volume Hollywood Party, author Kenneth Lloyd
Billingsley quotes the producer as saying, "As for myself, I
do not hesitate to say that it is my aim to present the Communist
position and to do so in a most specific manner."
The Radosh
book cites as an example of Lawson's work the 1943 film "Action in the North Atlantic," which the authors describe
as "a unique propaganda effort" on behalf of the Communist-run
union that represented sailors on the East Coast, Joe Curran's
Maritime Union-CIO."
The film
also portrays the Soviet Union in a most favorable light. Lawson
is described
as using the film as an "opportunity" to "show
support for the Party," and also it "implies that in every sense
the Soviet Union was America's most noble and reliable ally"
Toward the
end, Soviet planes arrive on the scene just in time to save
an American
vessel from Nazi dive-bombers. Then an American
says of the Soviet planes, "They're ours!" as a close-up shows
the Red-star insignia on the fuselage. The vessel arrives on
shore to the cheers of Russian men and women yelling, "Comrade!
Comrade!" The American sailor responds in kind.
The Communist Line
The movie
followed the twofold Communist Party line of that era. First,
make Americans
forget that only a short time earlier,
the Soviet Union had helped bring on World War II by collaborating
with Hitler in the first place. Secondly, soften up Americans
for the postwar era when Stalin would make his move to swallow
the countries of Eastern Europe and arm the Chinese Communists.
Ron and Allis Radosh describe "Action in the North Atlantic" as "unique" in
the sense that it is "a perfect representation of the wartime
Party line; patriotic and pro-Soviet at the same time."
John Howard
Lawson, who beamed that "soft" propaganda into theatres
from coast-to-coast, testified before the House Committee on
Un-American Activities on October 27, 1947 (starting on page
290 of the transcript). He was disruptive, shouted defiance at
the committee and was ejected from the hearing room. Committee
investigator Louis Russell cited 34 instances of Communist activities
on Lawson's part, including his Communist party Card No. 47275.
The Hollywood Ten
Similar defiance
marked the testimony of the others in the Hollywood Ten. And
today
it is an article of faith in Hollywood that the
most dastardly evil that befell film-land was "the blacklist," i.e.,
actors and directors who had problems finding work. We are asked
to believe that nobody was guilty and those who were exposed
were persecuted for their "political beliefs." Even the popular
TV series "Touched by an Angel" bought into that line in a 1997
episode. Communism, of course, was not a "political belief," but
was in fact a conspiracy aimed at bringing down the United States.
Studio moguls did not deny Communists jobs merely because of "political
beliefs." They simply realized many Americans did not want to
feed America's enemies at the box office. It was a business decision.
The real
blacklist—totally mean-spirited—has
been directed against those in Hollywood who cooperated with
the Un-American Activities
Committee's efforts to root out Communists.
Take producer
Elia Kazan, for example. He told the House committee on April
10,
1952 that he had joined the Communist Party in the
mid-Thirties, explaining he had been motivated by the threat
of Hitler and sympathy for the poor. In his testimony, Kazan—by
then a fierce anti-Communist— named eight others who were in
the Party with him and suggested they shared his own humanitarian
motivations for joining. This charitable explanation won him
no points from the Hollywood Left. He took out an ad in
the New York Times urging others who had seen the "conspiracy" from
the inside to join him in coming forward. That drove the Hollywood
culture over the top. Kazan heard that Communist Party meetings
were held to isolate Kazan in the show business community. The
Communist Daily Worker accused him of "belly-crawling."
But that
did not deter him from producing some widely acclaimed motion
pictures, most
notably "On the Waterfront," which glorified
whistleblowers against the forces of evil.
Ultimately, due to friends he had in Hollywood and despite the
many others who had turned their backs on him, Kazan finally
received a well-deserved Lifetime Achievement Award on Oscar
night in 1999. Even then, the venom reappeared not only among
aging Stalinists, but in the liberal mainstream media. When Kazan
died in 2003, Allan H. Ryskind in Human Events cited Maureen
Dowd (New York Times), Sharon Waxman (Washington Post), and Robert
Koehler (Los Angeles Times) as among those who supported the
charge that Kazan had behaved badly.
Other anti-Communists
in Hollywood have suffered for their "apostasy," some
post-humously. Years after his death, a monument to actor Robert
Taylor was removed precisely because he "named names."
Today's Hollywood
blacklist targets conservatives. It is not written down anywhere.
But it's there. As Pat Boone told AIM
in our interview, "[T]here is sort of the unspoken—but very real—wish
that anybody who subscribes to these ancient Judeo-Christian
concepts would get out of Hollywood."
The very
fact that, as the entertainer says, "It's not something
that somebody has sat down and written out," arguably makes it
all the more insidious. He adds, "It's just sort of a collective
recognition of certain people that are not 'in'—[who] are not
welcome in the circles of those who feel that there are no restrictions
on their behavior." Those who are "openly committed to and ….vocal
about moral precepts or conservative political ideas" are considered
outsiders.
From other
credible sources, I have heard—but for obvious reasons
cannot confirm—that Hollywood workers in all parts of the film
industry who are political conservatives and/or are religious
people meet in private. Nothing formal. No minutes are kept.
No one takes any names. There are probably no dues. All they
do is meet and offer each other moral support. That reflects
a fear of making Hollywood's informal "blacklist."
The Pat Boone Case
Pat Boone believes he has at times been targeted by that informal
list. He cites an example:
"Even a movie like Robert Wise's 'Sand Pebbles,' a role that
Steve McQueen played, and of course, he did it beautifully. But
I was up for that role, and Robert Wise, when I was proposed
by a casting director—I was perfect for that role—[Wise] said,
'No, I don't want a singer. I want an actor.' Well, I had been
in the top ten [at the] box office, and I think I had proven
that I could act." Boone saw "a certain disdainful view of me
as a singer, a guy with a wife and four kids, and pretty straight-laced
if not totally square."
The film
capital has tried to use Pat Boone's clean-cut image against
him, and to
mock traditional values. He says "the last
half dozen" roles that he had been offered "would have caused
me to portray a Pat Boone-like person—a preacher, a husband,
a citizen who on the surface lives like I do, and then it comes
out that he's a hypocrite, a pedophile, an abuser. In other words,
they want me to play those roles because it would have been tremendously
effective." Of course, he turned down the roles.
Another point:
The McCain-Feingold campaign finance reform law, which restricts
citizen groups from advertising their views within
30 days of a primary or 60 days of a general election, benefits
Hollywood and the media, which are exempt. Any such ad could
incur a stiff fine. The intent of the law is that such advertising
should be the exclusive responsibility of the campaign of the
candidate supported by the ad. So Pat Boone believes left-tilting
propaganda TV shows such as "Commander-in-Chief" and "West Wing" be
counted as "in-kind" contributions to the Democratic National
Committee.
"'Commander-in-Chief,' recognized by many as free advertising
for Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, comes off as "suspicious" in
that regard, says Boone, though he allows as how the TV show
is "beautifully acted, written, and portrayed." That, of course,
makes it all the more effective.
From the
Cold War era right up to the present terrorist threat, Hollywood
has
had a curious inclination to soft-pedal the offenses
of America's enemies. One can cite the 1975 Academy Awards Night,
with its gloating rhetoric about how "in a few days" anti-Communist
South Vietnam would be "liberated" by Communist North Vietnam.
There was Hollywood's sympathy for the Communist Sandinista regime
in Nicaragua in the Eighties. Actor Ed Asner flew south of the
border in 1990 to celebrate the anticipated Sandinista victor
in Nicaragua's election. He was to be disappointed. The Nicaraguan
people elected the pro-freedom forces. And then today, Michael
Moore produces movies that viciously attack America and excuse—if
not support—our enemies.
To this day,
Hollywood still clings to the myth of martyrdom on the Left—a Left that defended Communism and today soft-pedals
the terrorist threat—as Billingsley put it—"while earning, substantial
fortunes in the very country they attacked as repressive and
fascist." In Hollywood's land of dreams, as author Richard Grenier
once said, "Capitalism is evil except for the three-picture deal
with Paramount, the Malibu mansion, the swimming pool, the tennis
court, and the Mercedes Benz."
To which
Billingsley adds, "Or, as Marx himself might have framed
it: From each according to his credulity, to each according to
his greed." ONE
Copyright 2006 Accuracy in Media www.aim.org
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