11/17/15

Breaking Red: The Truth about Dalton Trumbo and the Hollywood Ten

Dalton Trumbo (inset: Bryan Cranston)

Breaking Red: Bryan Cranston, the lead character from the viral TV series Breaking Bad, sells communism in the new film Trumbo.

Via USA Survival:

Bryan Cranston is famous for his role as meth cook “Walter White” on the AMC drama series, “Breaking Bad.” He is playing the role of Stalinist Communist and Hitler apologist Dalton Trumbo in the new film, “Trumbo.” Allan H. Ryskind, author of the book, Hollywood Traitors, says the film “Trumbo” celebrates Dalton Trumbo, a major Hollywood Ten figure and longtime Communist enthusiast. Ryskind, the son of famous Hollywood screenwriter Morrie Ryskind, reports that Trumbo was a full-fledged Stalinist who had the distinction of siding with three of the most barbarous dictators in the 20th century: Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler and North Korea’s Kim-Il Sung. The film portrays communism, from Trumbo’s viewpoint, as a philosophy of “sharing,” not mass murder. The film also attacks anti-communists in Hollywood such as John Wayne.

Dalton Trumbo was a Hollywood screenwriter in the 1940s who was a Soviet, Stalinist sympathizer, and a hardcore Communist. Trumbo is listed as one of the “Hollywood Ten,” along with nine other screenwriters, producers and directors.

John Howard Lawson (1894 – 1977)

It was John Howard Lawson who, in the mid-1930s, organized the Hollywood branch of the Communist Party. Lawson was a determined New York Communist and a writer for theater productions. He moved to Hollywood and began his recruiting efforts under the aegis of Moscow.

Prior to 1939, the Hollywood Communists, along with Communist Party members worldwide, were vehemently anti-fascist and anti-Nazi. But, following the signing of the Non-Aggression Pact (i.e. Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact) by Hitler and Stalin in 1939, the group switched their stance—literally overnight—from anti-Nazi to pro-Nazi. This sudden switch in position was ordered by Josef Stalin. Some Communists did, in fact, leave the Party as a result of the abrupt switch in position. But most members of the Communist International (i.e. Comintern) dutifully obeyed.

Dalton Trumbo did not leave the Party following the Kremlin’s reversal on fascism and Nazism. Instead, Trumbo publicly voiced his support for fascism and Nazism for two years. While the Hollywood Communists had urged assistance and aid for the victims of fascist and Nazi aggression prior to the Non-Aggression Pact, afterwards the group urged the FDR administration to stay out of World War Two. They were more than happy to allow Hitler and Stalin to carve up Europe as they saw fit.

When Hitler’s armies attacked the Soviet Union in June 1941, the group quickly reverted back to their anti-fascist and anti-Nazi stance. After World War Two, Stalin reverted back to anti-western class warfare.

During the war, the Hollywood Communists began to write screenplays for a raft of movies with a patriotic theme, such as 30 Seconds Over Tokyo, Action in the North Atlantic, Sahara, Pride of the Marines, Destination Tokyo, etc. These were movies that cheered the U.S. war efforts. But the motive driving the men who produced these films wasn’t meant to promote U.S. patriotism, but rather in defense of Stalin’s grip on Russia, since the U.S. and Soviet Russia now had a common enemy in the Nazis. The pro-U.S. stance during the war was only to bolster support for the Soviet Union as an ally against Hitler.

Howard E. Koch (1901 – 1995)

The Hollywood Communists literally gained a stranglehold on the production of any anti-communist movies to the point that they were slowed, and even stopped. The scholar Kenneth Billingsley discovered Dalton Trumbo wrote in the communist publication The Daily Worker about films which he said communist influence in Hollywood had prevented from being made, such as the proposed adaptations of Arthur Koestler’s anti-totalitarian works Darkness at Noon and The Yogi and the Commissar, which described the rise of communism in Russia.

American playwright and screenwriter Howard E. Koch was able to convince a Hollywood studio to pay for a “Soviet advisor” to assist him in writing the script for Mission to Moscow, a 1943 film directed by Michael Curtiz, based on the 1941 book by the former U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union, Joseph E. Davies. The movie was produced in response to a request by Franklin D. Roosevelt.

A scene from the 1943 movie Mission to Moscow.

“I believe, sir, that history will record you as a great builder for the benefit of mankind.”

—Ambassador Joseph E. Davies to Josef Stalin

Koch’s hand-picked Soviet advisor was a KGB agent whose job was to make sure the script was current with the Party line. At a time of famine, the first thing the principals encounter at the Moscow rail station is a throng of happy food vendors selling everything from bread to smoked salmon. Stalin’s show trials are explained as a rooting out of Nazi spies. The Finns are shown attacking the USSR. And this was a Hollywood movie!

After the WWII, the Hollywood Communists dutifully followed Stalin’s lead and began attacking U.S. policies, and denying Soviet atrocities. They even refused to allow the presentation of evidence that the Jews in Russia were being ruthlessly and brutally persecuted by the Stalin regime. Dalton Trumbo audaciously claimed three-and-a-half million Jews were living peacefully in Soviet Russia “under the protection of the laws that ban discrimination of any kind.”

In 1947, the House Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) launched an investigation in Hollywood into the communist influence within the U.S. film industry. The focus of the investigation initially started with a German Communist, Gerhart Eisler, whose brother was involved with movie-making.

Gerhart Eisler, Brunhilda Eisler and Eisler’s attorney Carol Weiss King in February, 1952.

Via Spartacus Educational:

Louis Budenz told the HUAC that Eisler’s role in the Communist Party of the United States was to lay down Comintern discipline to “straying functionaries”. However, the most powerful evidence against Eisler came from his sister, Ruth Fischer. She described her brother as “the perfect terrorist type”. Fischer had not been on speaking terms with her brother since she was expelled from the German Communist Party (KPD) in 1926 after attacking the policies of Joseph Stalin…. She told the HUAC that Eisler had carried out purges in China in 1930 and had been involved in the deaths of numerous comrades, including Nikolay Bukharin.

Time Magazine reported: “One of the witnesses who denounced him was his sister, sharp-chinned, black-haired ex-German Communist Ruth Fischer, the person who hates him most. In the beginning, as children of a poverty-stricken Viennese scholar, they had adored each other. Ruth, the older, became a Communist first. Gerhart, who won five decorations as an officer of the Austrian Army in World War I, joined the party in the fevered days of 1918. They worked together. When Ruth, then a bundle of sex appeal and intellectual fire, went to Berlin, Gerhart followed. She became a leader of the German Communist Party, and a member of the Reichstag. But Gerhart took a different ideological tack, began to covet power for himself. He applauded when Ruth was banished from the party by the Stalinist clique.”

The HUAC investigators were approached by a number of anti-communist screenwriters, producers and movie stars who were victims of the Hollywood Communists’ stranglehold on the American film industry. It was the anti-communists who were the victims of blacklisting, not the other way around.

Originally, 19 unfriendly people were called before the House committee, before being whittled down to ten. The list of the “Hollywood Ten” includes Alvah Bessie, Herbert Biberman, Lester Cole, Edward Dmytryk, Ring Lardner Jr., John Howard Lawson, Albert Maltz, Samuel Ornitz, Adrian Scott and Dalton Trumbo. The ten remained uncooperative throughout the entire HUAC investigation. But the House committee produced indisputable proof that each was a member of the Communist Party.

Contrary to the well-established myth that it was HUAC who blacklisted the Hollywood Ten and barred them from work within the film industry, it was, in fact, the motion picture executives at the time who banned the Hollywood Ten. The blacklist resulted from a meeting of fifty top officials with the Motion Picture Association of America, the Association of Motion Picture Producers and the Society of Motion Picture Producers held at the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York City, in 1947.

Eric Johntson, who was head of the Motion Picture Producers Association at the time, spoke on behalf of the industry, stating, “We will not knowingly employ a Communist or a member of any party or group which advocates the overthrow of the government of the United States by force of by any illegal or unconstitutional methods.”

On June 5, 1947, while speaking to the Screen Writers Guild, Johnston went on to say:

“I don’t like American Communists. Bluntly, I think they are treasonable and subversive. They are potential foreign agents — they are dopes and suckers for the 14 men who sit in the Kremlin and pull the strings which make Communists toe the party line everywhere. Let me make it clear that I do not mean to imply that an American citizen has no right to advocate a collectivist form of society in America if he so desires. That’s his privilege under the Constitution. But there is no Constitutional immunity for sedition, subversion or treason. I want to see it become a joke to be a Communist in America. I want it to be fashionable to radiate conviction and pride in our democratic capitalism.

“We ought to ridicule the so-called intellectuals who have made a good living denouncing those who believe in the American system as having economic halitosis and political b.o. [i.e. ‘body oder’] Hollywood can take the lead.”

Another common myth associated with the blacklisting of the Hollywood Ten is that it was perpetrated by Senator Joseph McCarthy. Joe McCarthy was not part of the House committee. McCarthy’s committee ran from 1953 to 1954. Besides, he was a senator. McCarthy was chairman of the Senate Internal Security Committee. He had nothing to do with investigating Communists in Hollywood. The blacklisting of the Hollywood Ten was not done by HUAC, or Sen. Joseph McCarthy, but by executives within their own industry!

Many of the Hollywood Communists lost their jobs, or were sent to jail. But many continued to their work under an assumed name, or going abroad to work. They eventually returned to Hollywood, and have practically been deified by the Hollywood set. Of the ten, only Edward Dmytryk expressed any misgivings. He wrote a big book about his experience entitled Odd Man Out.

(Credit: Amazon.com)

In the 1990s, Dalton Trumbo snickered, “Yeah, we were Communists … so what?” He never regretted his rejection of Americanism, or his support for totalitarianism, or his glorification of Josef Stalin.

The blacklist was broken in the 1960s. The Hollywood Ten started to use their real names. In the 80s and 90s several films were produced—such as Legacy of the Hollywood Blacklist (1987) and Guilt by Suspicion (1991)—glorifying the Hollywood Ten, and portraying them as virtual “heroes.”

Related:

Reds in Hollywood Making a Comeback

Hollywood-Trumbo-726x1024

hollywood-traitors-ryskind

h/t: Trevor Loudon

11/16/15

Breaking Red: Bryan Cranston Sells Communism in”Trumbo”

By: Cliff Kincaid
America’s Survival

Bryan Cranston is famous for his role as meth cook “Walter White” on the AMC drama series, “Breaking Bad.” He is playing the role of Stalinist Communist and Hitler apologist Dalton Trumbo in the new film, “Trumbo.” Allan H. Ryskind, author of the book, Hollywood Traitors, says the film “Trumbo” celebrates Dalton Trumbo, a major Hollywood Ten figure and longtime Communist enthusiast. Ryskind, the son of famous Hollywood screenwriter Morrie Ryskind, reports that Trumbo was a full-fledged Stalinist who had the distinction of siding with three of the most barbarous dictators in the 20th century: Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler and North Korea’s Kim-Il Sung. The film portrays communism, from Trumbo’s viewpoint, as a philosophy of “sharing,” not mass murder. The film also attacks anti-communists in Hollywood such as John Wayne.

02/22/15

“America’s Enemies in Hollywood Then and Now” – UPDATED

By: Cliff Kincaid
America’s Survival

Actor Bryan Cranston (right) plays Soviet/Nazi agent
of influence Dalton Trumbo in the upcoming film “Trumbo

A press conference on “America’s Enemies in Hollywood Then and Now” will be held on February 24 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. to offer commentary on the direction of the Academy Awards and the politics of Hollywood.

Sponsored by America’s Survival, Inc. (ASI), a public policy organization, the event will also explore whether Congress should reinstate a committee on un-American activities and internal security – the same kind that led to the exposure and “blacklist” of Stalinist Communists in Hollywood. Copies of the new book, Blood on His Hands: The True Story of Edward Snowden, will be available. The book analyzes the Snowden espionage operation and how Hollywood is working to glorify the illegal leaker and traitor.

Reds in Hollywood Making a Comeback

By: Cliff Kincaid
Accuracy in Media

Bryan Cranston is famous for his role as meth cook “Walter White” on the AMC drama series, “Breaking Bad.” He may become infamous for something else later this year. He is playing the role of Stalinist Communist and Hitler apologist Dalton Trumbo in the new film, “Trumbo.”

The film is said to be in its “post-production” phase, and Cranston may not have known what he was getting into. It’s hard to believe he would have played this role had he known the facts about Trumbo’s service to the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. Once the facts get out, his role could derail what looked like a promising career.

Allan H. Ryskind, author of the new book, Hollywood Traitors, anticipates that the film “Trumbo” will be “celebrating Dalton Trumbo, a major Hollywood Ten figure and longtime Communist enthusiast…” He notes that the advance publicity for the film says that Trumbo bravely took a “stand against the Communist-witch-hunt at the height of the Cold War” and was “punished for his principled stand for free speech and the Constitution.”

Indeed, the conventional wisdom is that Trumbo and all other members of the “Hollywood Ten were innocent victims of a ‘blacklist.’” The facts show something very different. Trumbo was in fact a Soviet/Nazi agent of influence in Hollywood. All of the “Ten” were communists but Trumbo was one of the worst.

Ryskind, the son of famous Hollywood screenwriter Morrie Ryskind, reports that “Trumbo, in truth, was a full-fledged Stalinist who had the distinction of siding with three of the most barbarous dictators in the 20th century: Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler and North Korea’s Kim-Il Sung.”

Ryskind, a long-time editor of the newspaper Human Events, worked on this book for many years and combed through Trumbo’s papers at the Wisconsin Historical Society in Madison. He goes on to write, “Like so many of his comrades, he [Trumbo] became a Hitler apologist after Stalin joined Hitler in that 1939 pact. In order to poison the well against Hitler’s enemies, he demonized the Fuehrer’s foes. England was no democracy, he argued in his 1941 novel, The Remarkable Andrew, because it had a ‘king.’ FDR was guilty of ‘treason’ and ‘black treason’ for his pro-England policy. No drop of American blood should be risked or spilled for the selfish and deceitful British.”

On the matter of Trumbo’s support for the communist North Korean regime, Ryskind notes, “When North Korea waged war against South Korea in 1950, where did Dalton stand? In an unpublished movie script dedicated to several Hollywood Ten figures, he has the heroine declare that North Korea’s invasion was perfectly justifiable, for this is “Korea’s fight for independence, just as we had to fight for our own independence in 1776.”

Ryskind provides more details in a special report that accompanies the release of his book. He says, “Communist Dalton Trumbo, a prominent screenwriter, a Hollywood Ten figure and a Hollywood icon, led the fight in America to ease Hitler’s burden of conquest. He did this by demonizing Hitler’s enemies, assailing Great Britain as deceptive and dishonorable and suggesting it was unworthy of assistance because it was a monarchy not a democracy. England, he also noted, had declared war against Hitler, not the other way around, and he accused FDR, previously a Communist Party favorite, of being guilty of ‘treason’ and ‘black treason’ for giving England military assistance. Trumbo vigorously presented his views in speeches and in writing, and laid out his case most explicitly in his 1941 novel, The Remarkable Andrew.”

The rest of the story is also provided by Ryskind: “The Hollywood Communist contingent, including Trumbo, quickly turned against Hitler after the Fuehrer betrayed Stalin in June of 1941, launching a massive invasion of the Soviet Union. Then, and only then, did the radical screenwriters switch sides again, now demanding America give massive assistance to the Soviet Union to combat fascism and help it survive the Nazi onslaught. Only after Hitler invaded the USSR did the Communist screenwriters become ‘patriotic,’ since they believed US assistance was crucial to the Soviet Union’s survival.”

After examining the historical record, including Trumbo’s papers, Ryskind concludes, “…I’ve never found a paragraph, or even a phrase, where he ever publicly or privately condemns Stalin’s Soviet Union in a meaningful way, certainly not when the Caligula in the Kremlin was dispatching his own citizens by the millions, egging Hitler on as he invaded the Western democracies, cheering Goering’s air force as it rained death and destruction on London and eagerly devouring Eastern Europe in the post-World War II era. Not a peep of protest or regret from a man whom Hollywood longs to lionize.”

It may be the case that Cranston was not aware of the facts about Trumbo’s service to the Soviet Union and Hitler’s Germany. That is why I recently sent him a letter setting forth the facts contained in this column. If he was deceived about Trumbo’s true character, he has the right to raise hell.

Whatever the ultimate fate of the film and Cranston’s role in it, Ryskind’s book about the days when communists were trying to dominate Hollywood has suddenly taken on more importance.

02/10/15

“America’s Enemies in Hollywood Then and Now”

By: Cliff Kincaid
America’s Survival

Actor Bryan Cranston (right) plays Soviet/Nazi agent
of influence Dalton Trumbo in the upcoming film “Trumbo

Sponsored by America’s Survival, Inc. (ASI), a public policy organization, the event will also explore whether Congress should reinstate a committee on un-American activities and internal security – the same kind that led to the exposure and “blacklist” of Stalinist Communists in Hollywood. The news conference will examine how the Muslim Brotherhood lobby has been manipulating Hollywood’s portrayal of Islamic terrorism in recent years.

Date: February 24, 2015 (two days after the Oscars are announced).

Location: Zenger Room, National Press Club,
529 14th Street Northwest, Washington, D.C.

Time: 1:00 p.m. – 3:00 p.m. Open to the press and the public.

Hosted by Cliff Kincaid, President, America’s Survival, Inc., the event will feature:

Allan H. Ryskind, author, Hollywood Traitors; editor-at-large, Human Events. Allan Ryskind is the son of Hollywood screenwriter Morrie Ryskind, who co-wrote many screenplays on the Marx Brothers and many Broadway musicals. His father, along with Ronald Reagan, John Wayne, Walt Disney, and many others, led the charge against the Communist movement in Hollywood.
Trevor Loudon, author, The Enemies Within: Communists, Socialists and Progressives in the U.S. Congress. Loudon has called for Congressional hearings into internal subversive activities.
Deborah Weiss, Esq. is a contributing author to the book, Saudi Arabia and the Global Islamic Terrorist Network, and is the primary writer and researcher for the book, Council on American-Islamic Relations: Its Use of Lawfare and Intimidation.

Copies of the new book, Hollywood Traitors, will be available for signing by the author. For more information, please go to: www.usasurvival.org 443-964-8208