Equal Time: How a post-World War II ‘Red Scare’ resonates in modern America

08/04/2025 47 min
Equal Time: How a post-World War II ‘Red Scare’ resonates in modern America

Listen "Equal Time: How a post-World War II ‘Red Scare’ resonates in modern America"

Episode Synopsis

Fights over how American history is taught. Labels of “Communist” and “Socialist” used to smear. Civil rights gains seen as a loss for the “real” America. While all that might sound like last week’s headlines, those battles and the hysteria surrounding them are nothing new. In “Red Scare: Blacklists, McCarthyism and the Making of Modern America,” Clay Risen details how the conspiracy-mongering and cultural backlash of that post-World War II period speak to the divisiveness of today. The award-winning historian and New York Times editor joins Equal Time.
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