At the end of the Welch-McCarthy showdown, you can almost see McCarthy desperately trying to salvage his career.

Mr. Jenkins, the thing that I think we must remember is that this is a war which a brutalitarian force has won to a greater extent than any brutalitarian force has won a war in the history of the world before. For example, Christianity, which has been in existence for 2,000 years, has not converted, convinced nearly as many people as this Communist brutalitarianism has enslaved in 106 years, and they are not going to stop. I know that many of my good friends seem to feel that this is a sort of a game you can play, that you can talk about communism as though it is something 10,000 miles away. (McCarthy.106)

McCarthy justifies his actions, again, not with facts to support his insinuations about Fisher. Instead, he leans on the existential threat of Communism, and invents a whole new word (brutalitarian) to describe it. The implication is that it doesn't matter if McCarthy callously ruined a young man's life. Fighting Communism is more important than any one person's reputation.

Still, Shmoop likes the word "brutalitarianism" almost as much as we like "refudiate."