Slander Gene? I’m frequently appalled at what passes for analysis on the left, so I guess Neal Gabler’s unbelievably vapid analysis at the Los Angeles Times, claiming that conservatism was really started by Joe McCarthy, and that what we’re seeing from conservatism is a “McCarthyism Gene,” is no real suprise. As political science, Gabler’s article is simply incoherent. He liberally switches between “republican” and “conservative” in his descriptions of his targets, but really means neither;