Hi stevea, just missed your post before settling down, if that's the right expression in the pub, to watch the football. Obviously it's half-time and not my round.
Using McCarthyism (defined in Chambers) is an attempt to mislead as here it refers to Mary McCarthy, a witty novelist, satirist and political correspondent to name but a few of her recognised accomplishments. A quotation (I thought well known, listed in ODQ) from her book "On the Contrary" is:
Europe is the unfinished negative of which America is the proof