A leftist hero assumes room temperature...

The senile old gray lady has This Story:

.
Wilkinson, Defiant Figure of Red Scare, Dies at 91 

By RICK LYMAN

Published: January 4, 2006

 

Frank Wilkinson, a Los Angeles housing official who lost his job in the Red Scare of the early 1950's and later became one of the last two people jailed for refusing to tell the House Un-American Activities Committee whether he was a Communist, died Monday in Los Angeles. He was 91.

Isn't it something how Rick Lyman manages to toss in this zinger, a la Wellstone Memorial:

Mr. Wilkinson, whose experiences inspired a half-century campaign against government spying (emphases added), had been ill for several months and was recovering from surgery and a fall, said Donna Wilkinson, his wife of 40 years. "It was just the complications of old age, " Mrs. Wilkinson said.

Nope... no agenda there... move along.

The NYT apparently can't help themselves in their quest to resucitate their trite NSA straw man "spy story", even when honoring the death of one of their own. BTW, lest you think that Frank Wilkinson was merely an innocent standing on principle:

Mr. Wilkinson consistently refused to testify about his political beliefs. He had, in fact, joined the Communist Party in 1942, according to "First Amendment Felon," a 2005 biography by Robert Sherrill. He left the party in 1975.

(Filed under The Fifth Column)