‘You Woke folks will get a rude awakening when the true light of Communism is shining sharply in your eyes — and you are not allowed to blink.’ — Letter to the Editor from Dr. John R. Cleary

Report by Paula Antolini, January 27, 2022, 11:00PM EDT

LETTER TO THE EDITOR / OPINION

Communists are a patient lot — as relentless as their present proselytizing manifests itself.

Globally, Reds have been spreading their propaganda slowly, steadily and fervently since the turn of the 20th Century through World War II and during the Cold War (1962–1979), between the aftermaths of the Cuban Missile Crisis in late October 1962, through détente beginning in 1969, to its end in the late 1970s.

One need only recollect the 1948 Alger Hiss-Whittaker Chambers spy hearings. One need only listen for the echoes of Senator McCarthy (R-Wisconsin), bellowing in the Senate chamber: “Are you now or have you ever been a member of the Communist Party?” “McCarthyism” referred to his controversial practices and policies in the U.S. era known as the Second Red Scare, lasting from the late 1940s through the 1950s.

We old folk remember our early school days practicing “Stop, drop, roll and cover!” — self-defense against the (more real than alleged) threat of the nuclear fallout of an A-bomb or later the H-bomb.  Remember the stark signs with CD (civil defense) emblazoned in yellow against a black backdrop hanging on buildings’ walls, sites to take (fallout) shelter if we were being bombed.

When Nikita Khrushchev delivered his dictum in September 1959, he characterized Americans as gullible.  How accurate his observation as applied to how our current-day Woke folks appear to be. None of you Woke folks remember the terror that permeated the country, the world. You can glibly cancel any aspect of American history or culture that may offend your sensitivities or does not please your global perceptions.

Well, what was the future is now the present. You Woke folks will get a rude awakening when the true light of Communism is shining sharply in your eyes — and you are not allowed to blink.

Dr. John R. Cleary

Winterville, North Carolina

(former 46-year Bethel resident)

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