Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 24 September 1942 — Page 16

Editor, in U. 8. Service

WALTER SBOERONE

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> RILEY 8581

(Give Light end the People Will Find Their Own Woy

er Allignoce, NEA e, and Audit Bue

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 34, 143

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R old congress! Poor old fumbling, scared congress, blindly throwing away its great opportunity to prove “that it can do its duty to the nation at war!

It is a tragic spectacle. The country needs an effective law to stop the onrush of price inflation. The propér function of congress is to write that law—to order a firm ceiling on farm prices and firm ceiling on industrial wages, these being the two ele‘ments which have been climbing on éach other's shoulders to force all prices upward. " | But congress, terrified by an army of farm-organization lobbyists and an avalanche of letters and telegrams from arm-organization members, is running in the opposite ‘sedirection. | Last night by a vote of 205 to 172 the house adopted

‘ A majority in the senate apparently is determined to adopt a similar amendment,

8 a 8° ss 8 8 : HE president, according to his spokesmen in congress, ~~ will veto any bill that comes to him with such an amend“ment in it. It is hard to see how he ‘could do otherwise. ..For if agriculture is thus specially favored, if the present “rubber ceilings on farm prices are made even more elastic, there can be no stopping of inflation. : It is pointless now to argue, though it is true, that “tender treatment of organized labor by the president has wigiven force to the farm bloc’s demand for more tender treatment of agriculture by congress. The one point worth making now is this: That tender treatment of these groups ¥ thas placed the whole country—these groups with it—in ; “danger. »' The country wants that danger ended. Every poll of “public opinion indicates that. The country wants congress to do its full share of the job, that share being to “write the necessary law. The country, we are convinced, _ does not want the president to have to take over the function of congress, does not want the legislative relegated to the status of a rubber stamp for appropriations instead ‘sof an equal and co-ordinate branch of government bearing “its full responsibility for sound national policies. But the bill passed yesterday by the house, and the bill which the senate seems bent on passing, are invitations to the president to do just that. Congress is kicking itself out of the place it should occupy in the American democracy.

PRESIDENT AND POPE et THERE is probably a good deal more to the RooseveltVatican negotiations than meets the eye. The president would hardly have sent Myron Taylor to talk at such length with the Pope on routine matters. And Mussolini doubtless would have refused transit to the Roosevelt envoy if . he had thought it to his interest to do so. fh 1 According to Vatican circles, Mr. Taylor is discussing the president’s war aims and postwar plans with His Holiness. According to diplomatic circles, the president is asking the Pope to make a formal denunciation of Nazi barbarism, particularly the civilian deportations and terror. Whatever the discussions are about—and they probbly cover a very wide range indeed—we think they are all to the good. : The very exittence of organized religion is threatened by Hitler, at least in Europe. Because Hitler is the enemy of the church on one hand, and of political democracy on the other, it is to the mutual advantage of the pope and president to work together now. "

THAT JAP SCRAP

“Why all this ballyhoo about collecting scrap iron and steel? There would be plenty in this country if the profit grabhers hadn't sold it to Japan ~—From a reader's letter. :

ELL, let's see. From 1930 to 1940, when an’ embargo was imposed, the United States exported not quite 10,000,000 tons of iron and steel scrap to Japan. A lot of scrap. We'd be glad to have it now. But it was only about one-thirty:seventh as much scrap as was

used in the United States in that same period. It repre- ||

sented, then, a surplus for which there was no market at ome. And if we did have it now it would supply our steel mills for less than 10 weeks at the present rate of consumption.

~Maybe it was a mistake to sell this s¢rap to Japan. It

it was a mistake for which our government shared reponsibility with the alleged “profit grabbers.” The governnt permitted and encouraged exports to Japan, not only | scrap but of many other things. And perhaps it wasn't such a big mistake, after all. Japs didn’t have to buy our scrap to make steel. They have used the money to build blast furnaces for prog pig iron, to be used instead of scrap. They have all raw materials. But qualified observers believe that, we allowed them to depend on us for scrap, they

Y go nearly as far as they might have gone in building | furnaces, and so aren't as self-sufficient as they might |

been today. Anyway, mistake or not, we can’t do anything about

ratively small amount of scrap that was sold] s. What we can do, and must do, is to gather up. in 8 much greater amount of our own serap—to) =

t the Japs.

who showed decency, dignity and ability, bu him down in fear that Tammany would bi to power. over the air the foul language which La Guardia used deliberately and repeatedly in a comment which he infended for the press concerning a respectable citizen during that campaign, O'Dwyer probably would have beaten him, for the mayor's obscenity bespoke a filthy mind. Most of these who heard what La Guardia said were then convinced, if they had not realized before, that he was unfit for office, but his language was so disgusting that It could not ‘be used even against him. Lately, La Guardia urged New York children,

come dirty little snitches, after the manner of Nazi

"This Hammy Drama Was Phony"

CHIDED WITH more gentleness than he deserved for this shocking attempt to invede the family, La Guardia spurned the chance to let the matter slide as an impulsive mistake and came back on the air with an incredibly corny plea to some anonymous letter writer, who had threatened to commit suicide in despair over racing losses, and repeated his invitation to the children. The hammy drama of his appeal to the bum sport who was willing to win on the races but contemplated self-destruction because he couldn’t win for losing, was so phony that it was laughable, but at the same time humiliating and frightening. “Don’t do it; don’t do it,” he hammed, and then begged the unknown and probably fictitious correspondent to come and see him and get saved. Of course, the man, if there was such a person, was under no compulsion to bet and the statement in the letter that he just couldn't break himself of the habit was more deserving of a kick in the pants than sympathy, hecause there is nothing narcotic about gambling and the man, if he exists at all outside La Guardia’s imagination, wasn’t really squawking about the habit of gambling but against his inability to pick winners.

"Union Agents Under His Protection"

IT WAS HUMILIATING to hear such hysterical nonsense over the air from the war mayor of - the biggest city in the country and frightening to realize that this unreliable personality would be in charge in any crisis that might occur. Nor was it reassuring to read that he had ordered a graduating class of young policemen to beat up on sight anyone whom they might suspect of being a

_tinhorn gambler or a punk. These are inexperienced

young policemen who might be excused for taking a sock at the mayor, himself, under the terms of this advice, but it must be noted that he long ago complicated the life and work of his veteran police force by forbidding the use of rough stuff in the handling of Communists or in dealing with union gorillas. "In one case a policeman had a very good line on a slugger who bent a blackjack over an old woman's head and left her paralyzed because in her business she handled goods produced by a manufacturer who happened to be under a union boycott. But the cop refrained from bunting the suspect around because he was a union agent and thus under La Guardia’s special protection, and the case never was broken, although the policemah knows who did it.

"Got Away With Pose a Long Time"

HE DELIGHTS to bully good men by virtue of his official authority and when people who are not his official subordinates, such as the reporters, stand up to him he, gets hysterical. Always a great hand at creating personal publicity, La Guardia got away with his pose a long time ere he found that there were some people whom he couldn’t push around and began to make a spectacle of himself. There was a clique of class-anglers in the press gallery when he was in the house of representatives in Washington who built him up as a great liberal and when he lost that job and was hanging around New York, looking for something to do, he was a natural to lick Tammany after the smelly scandals of the Jimmy Welker regime. He owes his job to the decent press of New York which he now hates because he can’t suppress news of his own absurdities. He is foul-mouthed, highly emotional, inconsistent, noisy and a bulldozer and the only thing that can be said for him is that he doesn’t steal money. The papers have tried to coddle and placate him and cover up his alarming instability, but it is doubtful that in thus seeking to maintain public confidence in an undeserving public officer in a major post they are performing a public service.

Undersea Carriers By Major Al Williams.

NEW YORK, Sept. 24.—A Japanese seaplane and sub are reported to have operated jointly in an attempt to set Oregon forests on fire. At-least, a Jap ‘sub was ' bombed with indeterminate 'results off -the west coast, and a little later fragments of what apparently was a Jap incendiary bomb was found in a forest area, « where they must have been dropped by a plane. ie Since the Jap air base nearest Oregon is well beyond the range of any known Jap plane, it is reason able to assume that the plane which dropped the

sub. ® One of the first navies to sxperiment with this idea of launching planes from submarines was our-own. Whether, our navy has continued this work 1 do not know, and would not say if I did. ;

Why Not Ask Simon Lake? | THREE NAVIES Dave persisted 1a 5 wipetisentel

subs—the German, the Freach and the Japanese—

If it had been possible to print or express’

whose fathers lose money betting on the races, to be--

and Russian children, who were encouraged to tattle } on their parents to the secret police, and squeal to him.

_ |dreadful part of my job is trying to.

thinking I might have been wrong,

incendiary bomb may have taken off from the Jap |

work of housing collapsible folding-wing planes in’

Nazi Manpower: By Wiliam Philip Simms

o

omrol Sept.” 24, — Rea

ports from France indicate that the

war in Russia, plus Nazi losses in -——

western Europe, North Africa, the Atlantic and other areas, is putting ; a dangerous strain on Germah mane \ Lk power That is the secret behind the decree of Pierre Laval conscripting French workers—women as well as men—for jobs wherever the authorities see fit to send them “in the higher interests of the nation,” This high-sounding phrase means that Laval can now compel French labor to work for Hitler, including unmarried women from 21 to 35 and men from 18 to 50. Nothing so humiliating is knowfi to modern his« tory. It even surpasses Laval’s earlier bargain with the Fuehrer whereby he agreed to send three healthy French workers into Nazi slavery in exchange for one sick or half-starved prisoner of war. After having publicly and officially taken the stand that “the higher interests of the nation” require a German victory, Laval has now been told by his Nazi boss that such a victory requires the help of French workers,

Russia Was the Miscalculation

HITLER'S MISCALCULATION on manpower was due to his attack on Russia. He had overrun Poland in less than three weeks. The conquest of Norway, Denmark, Holland, Belgium and France had likewise been rapid. Thus, when he invaded Russia in June, 1941, he is said to have been confident that victory would be his before frost. Up to that time, Hitler had not needed many soldiers. Most of the fighting had been in the air and on the sea, after France and the Low Countries. The real job of winning the war, as he saw it, was in the factories and on the farms. In the factories, there~ fore, where 4,000,000 Germans of military age and training while in the fields were other Germans, plus prisoners of war. But Russia changed the picture. The Russian army made the Nazis pay dearly for every mile gained. Unexpectedly, the eastern front swallowed up |

Nl | vast numbers of soldiers. Italy, Hungary, Rumania

The Hoosier Forum:

1 wholly disagree with what you say, but will defend to the death your right to say it.—Voltaire.

“BARNYARDS HAVE SCRAP IRON LYING ALL AROUND” By Semon Fredericks, Julietta I am writing this to tell you what] I have found out about a lot of people’s interest in helping the scrap campaign. I have looked over five barnyards out on he east side of Marion county adjacent to road 52. Everyone of them has scrap iron ly=ing all round and no effort is made

to do a thing about it. For God's sake, see what you can do about it.

2 n=» “ST. CAR CO. AND DRIVERS OUGHT TO GET TOGETHER”

By R. B., Indianapolis. . «+ I work on Kentucky ave. in the 500 block and until the railroad company decided to tear up their side of the street, never had troli-

ble with trolley operators. I used to work days and when I got off I waited where I was supposed to wait and always caught my car, Now I work nights and the only

get home in the mornings at 8 o'clock. The first morning 1 stood where I always had. ... When the trolley car had approached to within a hundred feet or’ more of where I was standing, it stopped and let]. some girls off. I didn’t know but that probably the fellow who was operating the ‘trolley was making a courteous gesture to the girls, but| I do now. He went by me about 50 feet and stopped. I went running up to where he was and boarded the car ‘with no malice in my mind, but was very promptly and rudely informed that the trolley this man operated would not stop there any more. To which I replied I thought he was supposed to stop there. Nothing more was said until I had seated myseif and then the operator turned 'to a young lady leaning on his seat and made a remark about the situation that burned me. up. However, the next ' morning, I waited at the spot where girls had alighted the. previous morning, but guess what. Yep, you're right, I'm This man told me and in a little better tone of voice to wait where I had the morning

| weeks, during which I think I've

(Times readers are invited to express their views in these columns, religious controversies excluded. Make your letters short, so all can have a chance. Letters must

be signed.)

the steel into those things that should come first. In order to maintain present production, the steel mills need scrap— every ton that they can get their hands on. If 20 million families could each locate “209 pounds of scrap” and then, ‘instead of quibbling about it, would start it on its way to the mills, steel production would be very greatly helped. The allocation problems will be

and he couldn’t understand the other man stopping where he had. Well, if I wasn’t tired when I get off work this might be a joke, but this has been going on for three

been in the right spot twice, hut I'm not sure. In the meantime I've

‘solved if we make the steel to allocate. The scrap and the steel and everybody’s effort to help comes first.. Brilliant men are working on the allocation problem and they are doubtless aware of how many “flying boxcars” they can build if they abandon a few 45-thousand-ton ve| battleships, and you can depend on

stopped in ‘at the little booth on | these men to solve the problem if

Illinois st. and asked them what to do. ' One man didn’t know, but the other twp thought I was waiting in the right place but evidently could not convince the operators. This morning we were waiting where we thought we should, and in the rain, too. Along came a trolley and didn’t even hesitate, driven by the sume operator who gave me h- -- the first day. . « « The management of the Indianapolis Railways would be doing us a favor if they, would come to some kind of understanding with their operators. . . .

“WE GET ALONG ALL RIGHT ‘WITHOUT GOLD, DON'T WE?” By Voice in the Crowd, Indianapolis There is one thing about the steel “shortage” that is widely overlooked and that is that the shortage exists simply because we have at least temporarily outbalanced our steel production by greatly increased facilities tor shaping the steel into finished products for war. Billions of dollars have been spent on buildings and machine tools for the purpose of making the thousands of war items from steel. We can now use steel faster than we can make it and we are making it at. a mate that has never been attained before. The problem is exactly opposite to the “rubber shortage’ wherein with an ever diminishing usage we still have ‘a diminishing supply. The earliest solution to the steel problem lies in first maintaining our

before, I told him of my experience

Side Glances=By Galbraith

steel production and then making

you help them! by turning in your scrap. The only manner in which “steel shortage” resembles the “ibe ber shortage” is that the civilian cannot have any. What's the difference, we get along all right without gold, don’t we? td # 2 “DOING A DUTY IN POINTING OUT EVILS OF OUR ORDER”

By Another Unemployed Educator, Tipton County

Concerning the letter in Hoosier Forum by “Unemployed,” Bloomington, I should like to report a similar experience. My education and training are comparable to his. I attended normal and college more than six ears. . . . I hold a state high

have ‘taught in high schools and colleges. In July, when the SOS call for teachers came I began to look for a position. . . . When I contacted county superintendents and principals I was told that I was licensed in too many subjects or that I was too old. I am 54 years old and at my best so far as work is concerned. I feel that school officials should realize - that: the best trained and experienced teachers should be hired in these hectic times, and that people should get to do the work for which they are best fitted. . . . I-feel that some of the school officials: who turned us down because we had too much training and education will soon be in the armed forces, since they are young enough. “Then the 808 call will Mr. Unemployed and I are doing a patriotic duty in pointing out some of the evils of our own social order. It is high time for us to ask some of these young mediocre principals and county superintendents what they are doing for their country in its hour of peril. -

4 a #” tJ “GEY MAD ENOUGH TO SCRAP ALL OUR SCRAP ,..” By James Van Zandi, 316 N. Blacicford st. “Dally Thought — Indianapolis

and other puppet states helped, but net enough, Hitler was forced to take the 4,000,000 workers out of the war industries and send them to the front.

The Figure Is Going Up

THAT TORE A BIG HOLE in German produce tion precisely when it was most needed. So Hitler called on all the occupied countries to come across, According to the Frankfurter Zeitung, the nume ber of foreign workers exceeded 2,100,000 by the end of September, 1941." Included, writes Dr, Karl Brandt, now. of Stanford university, but formerly of the Unie versity of Berlin, in the October Foreign Affairs, were 29,000 Danes, 93,000 Dutch, 122,000 Belgians, 220,000 Bohemians .and 49,000 French-——a very small number of French, population considered. Vichy was not “cole laborating” as Hitler wanted. But, serious as Hitler's manpower situation une doubtedly is, warns Dr. Brandt, the United Nations would be making a mistake to count on anything like a collapse. He cites figures to show that by February of this year the number of foreign workers in’ Ger« many already had increased by several hundred thousand, and suggests that eventually the figure might go as high as five’ and a half million or even more, Moreover, says Dr. Brandt, Germany is really bete ter off for manpower in this war than in the last. In the first world war, production dropped as thé conflict progressed, whereas in this war it has not done so over a protracted period.. On the contrary,

This, he says, is due to the efficient way in which Germany handles her available supply of labor.

Marshal Joffre said the first world war ‘would be won by the side with the last man. Of this one the experts are saying it will be won by the side with the last machine, q J

Peter Edson

on vacation.

school license in 15 subjects and|]

| ot xyes . A Woman's Viewpoint By Mrs. Walter Ferguson

»

BIG THINGS are best de~ scribed with little words. So says Dr. Gilbert Murray of Oxford, whe reminds us that the constant use of superlatives finally takes away their punch. The mind becomes worn out grappling with them. and sooner or later their meaning is lost. Because we have fallen into the error of overdoing the use of big words, he thinks, the public may be losing its grasp on the vastness of the war and its consequences. This criticism would ‘apply to platform and radio speakers and the printed page. But it should also be pointed out that the same bad effects’ come from motion pictures, Audiences fed constantly with scenes of bombings and battles, for example, are lia« ble to discount their horrors and in time to ignore them altogether. - “ “If our boys are going through that sort of thing T want to see what it’s like,” said a movie companion to me, when I expressed dislike for the feature.

Have You a Movie Mentality?

BUT, AFTER the first little flush of shame had passed—for to her I must have sounded like a softie— I came right back to my original point of view. How CAN we sit in cushioned chairs in comfort able air-cooled theaters being “ENTERTAINED” by the sight of men dying? ‘Are we so calloused that even the tenderest-hearted women get a kick out of the sight? It would seem so. How else do you ac count for the pcpularity of these news reels which thousands of pecple appear to enjoy daily? Maybe we've developed a movie mentality. Havihg been fed so long on fake horrors, perhaps we no longer have the ability to distinguish between the true and

have. lively ‘imaginations—or we'd all go with vicarious suffering. ‘The sight of so nifttch film violence, from

Or maybe Fim just nuts, because 1 worries me. m———— BAIter's Notes 5s ses cord 17 smn i 00 newspaper sre their own. They are necessarily those 38. 7h Tadlasapelia, Then. vt NL adsamanlly vi

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5] m Questions and Answers

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