29. McCarthy’s Friendship With America’s Drug Czar
Senator Joseph McCarthy was a severe alcoholic who by the early 1950s poured more than a quart of liquor down his throat each and every day. His staffers often worried about what he might say, especially after his highly liquid lunches. The heavy intake of booze explained many of his reckless speeches and assertions made before gathered reporters about an America overrun with communist spies, and that he possessed lists with the names of hundreds of Soviet agents. The wild allegations were often simply the rantings and ravings of a loaded drunk.
The junior Senator from Wisconsin was also addicted to morphine. The fact that he used illegal drugs was well known to Harry J. Anslinger, head of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics, the predecessor of today’s Drug Enforcement Agent (DEA). Anslinger hated drug addicts, and he went on a crusade to destroy blues singer Billie Holiday for her morphine addiction. As such, one might think that he would have felt duty bound to arrest McCarthy. Luckily for the Senator, America’s drug czar was his personal friend. Instead of placing him in handcuffs, he supplied him with drugs.
