When her son left for a year abroad, she felt desolate. (Definition of âdesolateâ from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary Â© Cambridge University Press) Blogs about desolate
Instigating this fear was Joseph McCarthy. McCarthy was a Republican senator from Wisconsin and was the leader behind the ethos of McCarthyism. The term was created in 1950 by Washington Post writer Herbert Block.
Since the time of the red scare led by Joseph McCarthy, the term McCarthyism has entered the American vernacular as a general term for the phenomenon of mass pressure, harassment, or blacklisting used to instill conformity with prevailing political beliefs.