Joseph McCarthy"Joe McCarthy may have been the most destructive demagogue in American history." p. 5"McCarthy's Senate colleagues voted sixty-seven to twenty-two to censure him for his reckless accusations and fabrications." back cover</ref>"Joe McCarthy was a demagogue, but never a real leader of the people." p. 193"McCarthy represented what Richard Hofstadter called 'the paranoid style of American politics.'" pp. 193–94"While he never approached the importance of a Hitler or a Stalin, McCarthy resembled those demagogic dictators by also employing the techniques of the Big Lie." p. 194</ref> was a U.S. Senator from the state of Wisconsin from 1947 to 1957. Though a poor orator, McCarthy rose to national prominence during the early 1950s by proclaiming that high places in the United States federal government and military were "infested" with communists, contributing to the second "Red Scare". Ultimately his inability to provide proof for his claims, as well as his public attacks on the United States Army, led to the Army–McCarthy hearings in 1954, which in turn led to his censure by the Senate and fall from popularity.