Smithsonian Channel - Enemies Within Joe McCarthy (2011)

- Also known as “The Real American: Joe McCarthy”-

The word McCarthyism has become synonymous with moral panic and any kind of resulting political witch hunt. The docudrama Enemies Within – Joe McCarthy attempts to separate the man from the myth and presents the first real comprehensive picture of one of the early “bad guys” of televised politics, his background and the political and cultural landscape that enabled his rise to power. The film depicts the farmer's son's meteoric rise from freshman senator to televised “commie” hunting demagogue and finally, the lack of foresight that led him into the media circus of the “Army-McCarthy Hearings”. Blinded by his desire to be “the number one guy in Washington”, McCarthy took up misguided battles with the Army, the State Department, the CIA and even the President himself – until these forces, most notably the CIA, took active measures against him. Following five years of extensive research through international archives, newly released material, including interviews with the last members of Joseph Raymond McCarthy's family in his hometown of Appleton, Wisconsin, and a number of elite eyewitnesses and media historians, the film is a mixture of original footage, previously unseen archive photos / film, and dramatic original script brought to life. Among others, names such as Former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, Pulitzer Prize winner Haynes Johnson, Conservative Best Seller Ann Coulter, Watergate Legend Ben Bradlee, and Ex-KGB general Oleg Kalugin lend their voices and unique insights to the rise and fall of a man who literally drank himself to death, only 2 years shy of his 50th birthday. For the first time McCarthy's former staff member James Juliana talks about his time with the Senator in an exclusive interview; former Harvard professor Leon Kamin reports on his experiences standing accused before the McCarthy committee as does writer and publisher Sol Stein, also a target of McCarthy's accusations regarding his work for the Voice of America.

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