1728 The Life and Times of Joe McCarthy: A Biography, by Thomas C. Reeves (read 10 Jul 1982) This purports to be a straight biography, and claims to be "balanced." It simply is not well-done--it is superficial even though the author--a professor of history at a branch of the University of Wisconsin--supposedly spent six years at the book. Except for finding for McCarthy on the Lustron affair, it berates him for nearly everything else. Instead of being analytic, the book often pretends to convey fact by opinionated adjectives. The book reeks with adjectives like "ultra-conservative," "Far Right," 'liberal,"--all indicating an effort to analyze by label. But I could not resist reading the book, since it does deal with a big matter in the days of intense consciousness of my youth. If the author spent six years and does as poor a job as this, I suppose a decent job would take much longer. This book enjoys quoting secondary sources. Just a small instance: there is a statement McCarthy inserted in the Congressional Record--the footnote cites, not the Congressional Record, but a book by somebody! This I find pure laziness on the author's part, and indicates Reeves is not much of a scholar. [These are my notes made right after finishing the book, but I should indicate that I always deplored McCarthy's tactics and rejoiced at his being censured by the Senate, though you might not be able to tell that from the comments re this book--I was interested in a detailed analytical account showing that McCarthy was mostly always wrong, which I did not find in this book.] ( )