The American people are keenly aware of the grave and evil hazards to our freedom and to our way of life which international communism is eternally dedicated to

The American people are keenly aware of the grave and evil hazards to our freedom and to our way of life which international communism is eternally dedicated to destroy. I speak of another danger we confront, not as dread or as foreboding, but equally offensive and evil to all reasonable, rational, free American citizens. It is the danger of hate and venom, of slander and abuse, generated by fear and heaped indiscriminately upon many great Americans by another relative handful of zealots, in the ranks or clutches of self-styled “I am a better American than you are” organizations. In every day’s deluge of mail at my office, there are generally a hundred and even two hundred letters which I describe simply as “fright mail.” [ ... ] Lunatic columnists, apostles of hate and fear on radio and television; and loony letters to the editor provoke their share of fright mail. The curious fact is that the fright peddlers, from the simple simpletons to the wretched racists, all claim to be conservatives. They are anything but patriotic. It is curious to me that they all have generally the same aims: Get the United States out of the U. N. Stop all foreign aid. Repeal the income tax. Abandon NATO and bring our troops home from Europe. It is ironic that these very aims are very likely identical to the real hopes and aspirations of the Kremlin. And I find it hard to believe that the followers of the fright peddlers are all wholly oblivious to the anti-Semitism, anti-Catholicism, and outright racism of many of their “saviors.” Thomas Kuchel, CA(R) "The Fright-Peddlers", Cleveland State Law Review 1963 The more things change, huh.