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My answers to the first question Shaunak posted, and further thoughts

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Why do Americans hate "Communism"?
It is ironic that Communism is posed as "that which is not pro-Capitalism", or more precisely, "that which is against everything within a Capitalist society, including YOU!" largely by the fact that it was on the wrong side of the iron curtain.
For Marx, Capitalism is not only the object, but also a prerequisite for the communist revolution, as he pointed out at the end of the Principles of Communism, "it is in the interest of the communists to help the bourgeoisie to power as soon as possible in order the sooner to be able to overthrow it." If we look at his historical materialism theory closely, then it is clear that Capitalism is one step in the overall upward moving trend of human social evolution, it is incidental that we, as Marx observed, was positioned in the era when Capitalist arrangement of production was/was going to be no longer fit for the productivity level.
It is not true that Communism is set to destroy all that there is in a Capitalist society/nation, and certainly not in the way that "1984" works. Why, then, do the Americans (bourgeois and proletarians) hate Communism?
It is fallacious to make the argument that McCarthyism was a people's movement, a popular obsession with the "vices" of Communism. What happened was that "(d)uring the late 1940s and 1950s, almost every agency became involved in the anti-Communist crusade." (Schrecker, 1994) By posing Soviet Russia as biggest threat and charging internal communist members and labor leaders and Russian spies (Alger Hiss and the Rosenbergs) and industrial sabotages, the judicial system successfully infuse the image of communists as enemies and criminals. What is worth noting here is that the theme for federal government's anti-Communist agenda is none other than "national security", which rings an ominously familiar tone.

Schrecker, E. (1994). The State Steps In: Setting the Anti-Communist Agenda. THE AGE OF MCCARTHYISM: A BRIEF HISTORY WITH DOCUMENTS. Boston: St. Martin's Press.

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