Good Night and Good Luck is an American drama film based on true events that occurred in the early 1950s in the United States. This film portrays the anti-communist hysteria of the McCarthy era and its threats to press freedom. The film, Good Night, and Good Luck, is about the major conflict between Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin and the CBS News staff. This conflict was due to McCarthy's anti-communist actions with the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. McCarthy accused various people of being involved in communism. Due to minimal media coverage, these allegations have made it nearly impossible for “blacklisted” people to find work and destroyed their quality of life to the point that many have committed suicide (Sasanow, 1). Through the CBS investigation of Senator McCarthy, the staff faced various consequences. Some staff were accused of being communists. Dan Hollenbeck was accused in the press and later committed suicide. The film made it seem like the suicide was directly influenced by him being blacklisted. Edward R. Murrow, the lead reporter, was accused of having been a member of the left-wing union: Industrial Workers of the World, however he stated that this accusation was incorrect. One major consequence of the attack on Senator McCarthy was that CBS might lose its broadcast license. There was a conversation in the movie discussing the fact that the people Murrow was attacking on air are the same people they are fighting to keep their license. The role of the media in a democracy is to defend the public and act as a "watchdog". for the public interest. This is played, in the film, by Murrow defending Milo Radulovich. Milo was about to be discharged from the United States... middle of paper... lest we over-romanticize the significance of these tools because being able to publish and being heard are not the same thing (Sasanow, 3)." "Murrow , McCarthy and the Media Frontier Analyzed” also discusses how “we, as a country, went into the Iraq war without the media doing their job… It may be an official blacklist or it may not, but the deception it is equally possible today in different forms (Sasanow, 3).”The type of media we saw in the McCarthy era still exists today in political media. Journalists like Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, and Keith Olbermann keep Murrow's attitude toward public service very much alive. Works Cited Sasanow, A. (2010, April 19). Murrow, McCarthy and the media frontier analyzed. Daily tufts. Retrieved March 13, 2014, from http://www.tuftsdaily.com/murrow-mccarthy-and-the-media-frontier-analyzed-1.2226577?compArticle=yes#.UyIjC8JOXIU