Thirty Years of Treason: Excerpts from Hearings Before the House Committee on Un-American Activities, 1938-1968

A fascinating book--we're talking transcripts of the sessions before the HUAC. You'll discover who sang for the committee (and how loudly; some of the famous people who caved before the committee will suprise you), and those who ran it in riotous circles. The best reads: Zero Mostel, Pete Seeger, and Tom Hayden. Original history, without the filters. (The index, however, is terrible.) A must have.

This book is intended to show how bad those mean old anti communists were and how noble and heroic the communists were. Except. By showing us the communists themselves, by letting us read their actual words, it is impossible come away with out feeling intense revulsion. These people were unpleasant liars at best, Evil at worst. They condemn themselves. Why anyone thought that printing transcripts of their testimony would help the liberal cause is beyond me. Communism can only be defended if things like facts and morality are not allowed to cloud the issue. The book is a valuable resource for the anticommunist cause. Not what the liberals intended. But their myopia is all encompasing. Inexplicable.