Menace of our Time: The Long War Against American Communism

Rev Left Radio

Breht O'Shea

Communism, Politics, Liberalism, Society & Culture, Philosophy, News, History, Leftwing, Socialism, Marxism

4.8 • 3.4K Ratings

🗓️ 1 October 2025

⏱️ 102 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

For over a century, the U.S. ruling class has waged war on communists, anarchists, and radicals. From the Palmer Raids of 1919 to McCarthyism in the 1950s, from COINTELPRO in the Cold War to today’s MAGA rhetoric about “woke communists" and his crackdown on "Antifa Radicals", state repression has always sought to crush revolutionary politics before they could take root; especially in times of capitalist crisis.

In this episode, historian Aaron J. Leonard joins us to discuss his new book Menace of Our Time: The Long War Against American Communism. We trace how the U.S. developed its arsenal of anti-radical laws and FBI surveillance programs, and how these were deployed against generations of activists, workers, and organizers. We talk about the Communist Party USA’s early growth, its leaders like William Z. Foster and Earl Browder, and its contradictory relationship with Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who both advanced social reforms hated by capitalists and cracked down on communists in his time. Leonard explains how McCarthyism and COINTELPRO not only repressed communists but created a climate where the majority of Americans came to accept mass violations of civil liberties in the name of anti-communism. As Trump and the far right recycle the language of anti-communism to justify repression in 2025, Leonard argues that knowing this history is not just an academic exercise -- it’s a weapon for the struggles ahead.

----------------------------------------------------

Support Rev Left and get access to bonus episodes: www.patreon.com/revleftradio

Make a one-time donation to Rev Left at BuyMeACoffee.com/revleftradio

Follow, Subscribe, & Learn more about Rev Left Radio https://revleftradio.com/

Outro Beat Prod. by flip da hood

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	Hello everybody and welcome back to Rev Left Radio.
0:10.8	All right, on today's episode, we have back on the show multiple-time guest, Aaron J. Leonard,
0:16.1	to discuss his newest book, Menace of Our Time, The Long War Against American Communism.
0:22.6	And this really covers huge swaths of the 20th century from the perspective of not only the Communist Party of the USA and the surrounding and related cultural, political, social movements, but also the state crackdown from the first red scares,
0:39.6	from the reaction to the McKinley assassination by an anarchist in Buffalo in 1902,
0:45.2	through the Smith Act, the Palmer raids, McCarthyism, and the rise of Cointel Pro.
0:50.5	During the Cold War period, we touch on contemporary issues like the Charlie Kirk assassination,
0:56.1	as well as how the Trump administration and the reactionary right today
0:59.9	still carry on the rhetoric, policies, and worldview of this anti-communist movement
1:06.3	that has been present in the United States since communism was a thing, since socialism or anarchism
1:12.1	were a thing. And so I think it's really, really important to understand this history,
1:17.7	to get a better understanding of the present and also learn lessons on how the capitalist state
1:24.1	reacts to organized radical revolutionary left-wing movements and what we can learn from that,
1:30.6	as well as what we can learn from the successes and failures of previous iterations of American socialist and communist movements in our society.
1:39.5	So a really, really fascinating conversation.
1:41.7	It goes a whole bunch of different places.
1:49.6	And I think people with any interest in the history of socialism, communism,
1:54.5	Marxism, or just American history writ large, will get a lot out of this episode.
2:00.6	As always, Rev Left is 100% listener funded. We could not survive without you.
2:13.8	And if you want to support the show and in exchange, be a part of Buddhist sangas we run, be a part of the situation rooms that we have open Zoom meetings whenever a really big story breaks. So us as a community can discuss the event and make sense of it together in real time,
2:19.0	as well as bonus monthly episodes that I put out exclusively for patrons.
2:25.7	You can join us at patreon.com forward slash revel left radio for only $5 a month and get access to all of that.
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Breht O'Shea, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Breht O'Shea and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.