administration is soft on communism and you know it. >> it's very hard to imagine barry goldwater getting the nomination in 1964 without something like the john birch society. ♪ in your heart you know these rights ♪ >> his anticommunist fervor thrilled the birchers. >> the only enemy of peace in the world is communism. >> but he had been urged by establishment republicans to denounce robert welch and the deranged conspiracies promulgated by the society. unlike today republican leaders back then felt morally obligated to call out what they knew were lies. goldwater called out welch himself but was careful in his criticism of the society. >> we've never been attacked as the birch society has been attacked. i am far more fearful about the radical members of the left than the birch society. >> this was the beginning of a calculated, two-faced dance by