Indianapolis Times, Indianapolis, Marion County, 7 June 1944 — Page 12

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PAGE 12 Wednesday, June 7, 1944

(A SCRIPPS-HOWARD NEWSPAPER)

Price in Marion County, 4 cents a copy; delivered by carner, 18 cents a week.

Mail rates in Indiana, $5 a year; adjoining states, 75 cents a month; others, $1 monthly.

@SP- RILEY 5551

Give Light and the People Will Find Their Own Way

Member of United Press, Scripps-Howard Newspaper Alliance, NEA Serve ice, and Audit Bureau of Circulations.

AMERICA PRAYS

HERE are no atheists in foxholes, the soldiers say. And as the shock and thrills of D-day level off into a sober realization of the magnitude of the task, of the inevitability of severe casualties—no matter how “light” these may be in relation to the massive forces that will be employed— it is natural that the mind and heart of America should turn to Providence. . As a people we have relaxed in recent generations our conformance with the formalities of religion. But beneath the surface there persists, even in those who eschew churchgoing, a heritage from the pilgrims. In time of crisis, of personal need for which there is no mundane solving, instinct turns to prayer. Few Americans today but who have relatives or friends engaged, or about to be engaged, in the historic assault on Europe. They know that the wisdom of our military planners and the magic of our industry and science already have been fully committed to the job. But that, to 4 parent or a wife or sweetheart, falls short. The meteorologists may call the turn on the weather. The high command may choose the soundest strategy. The tacticians may function with a minimum of error and a maximum of smartness. But these things cannot abate the fear that haunts a mother, no matter how gallantly she comports herself. It is to divinity that one turns when ultimate fear clutches at the throat. ‘The President recognized these things in the prayer he spoke last night. Ile has done what he could do. It is not enough. He, like millions of others, bespeaks the shield and solace of the Almighty and with the President we say: “Thy will be done...”

IT ISN'T LUCK

N the general rejoicing over early success in the invasion there is a good deal of talk about luck being with us. We were lucky to catch the Nazis napping on the beaches. We were lucky to get through the off-shore minefields. We were lucky to meet little air defense. We were lucky that the enemy did not bring up reinforcements against our beachheads. Or so it is said.

Actually, however, there was little luck if any in these developments. Most of them were planned that way by Eisenhower. The idea that the enemy is sleepy or stupid is certainly false.

It was not luck that led the allied forces to the softest - gpot on the northern French coast. The Caen area was picked for the initial assault by Eisenhower months ago just because it was least fortified, according to his intelligence reports.

The Nazis could not neglect fortification of the more exposed Calais-Boulogne area and the more important ports of Le Havre and Cherbourg, and they did not have enough materials and manpower to strengthen every spot. This was a case of inherent enemy weakness, and of Eisenhower's ability to discover and exploit that weakness. s 8 s ” » os . IT WAS NOT LUCK that guided our landing craft through minefields and water barriers. Minesweepers and midget submarines cleared and marked the way. Only extraordinary planning and seamanship enabled the 4000 hips and more thousands of smaller craft to put the troops across the channel and on the beaches. Luck did not account for the light air defense. The enemy force of fighting planes had been whittled down during months of attrition by bombing of factories and airfields and by aerial combat—that was a major purpose of the long allied air offensive. That the enemy did not use his reduced fighter force to resist the allied landings, presumably was a matter of saving it for what he considered a more crucial time. Similarly, the enemy’s failure to concentrate armored reinforcements quickly against our beachheads was not due to luck. Allied bombing of communications slows down enemy concentrations.

Moreover, Marshal Von Rundstedt naturally would not

concentrate his forces for defense of the Caen area until he felt sure that was the major threat rather than one of many scattered landings. Even when he counter-attacks in Normandy, as he is expected to do soon, he doubtless will keep his main forces in reserve for a week or maybe a month. 8 = 8 = ” s

REMEMBER ANZIO! There too we “surprised” the enemy, established a beachhead with light losses, and met little opposition for several days. But it turned out later ‘that the enemy was waiting for us all the time, and made us pay a high price in the end. So the talk about luck misses the two main points about the invéision. One is the genius of our commanders and the valor of our fighting men. The other is the fact that the enemy is withholding his air power and ground forces until the battle develops. i There has been a large element of luck in this, as in all battles, but so far it has been against us. The weather, of course. First it delayed the invasion 24 hours. Then it provided choppy seas and high wind, which might have wrecked the invasion in any less expert hands. And early reports today indicate the weather is getting worse. Eisenhower and Montgomery have proved they are not ~ dependent on luck. But they should have better luck coming to them in fair weather during the next fateful days.

AND HIS EYE ON THE BALL

- A FELLOW has to be something of contortionist to get = by these days, observes the house organ put out by Jack Heintz of Cleveland: | “First of all, he’s got to keep his back to the wall and ear to the ground. Then he’s expected to put his shoulto the wheel, his nose to the grindstone, keep a level both feet on the ground. And at the same time, ilver lining with his head in the clouds.” Ww LRP CS

By Westbrook Pegler

NEW YORK, June 7.—It is not my purpose to attack a condition with a theory but, freely granting that many persons are tearing up money in New York these nights for the metallic yowling and the tom-tom sounds which pass for entertainment, and for hootch, rare viands and exotic delicacies, I still would like to know who they are and where they get it.

because such people are not beyond the rye-high and fried-chicken stage of their social development; they frequent gritty little taverns of no renown in the city streets and leafy outskirts of Passaic, Long Island and Bridgeport where a Saturday night sport who lifts a tab for $20 is still a live one. Nor prominent executives of soulless corporations, because times are grim and the spectre of a penniless old age haunts men lately about town who used to sign tabs with a gesture known as a nonchalant flourish and settle accounts by check at the end of the month.

‘Growing Elderly and Need Their Sleep’

MOREOVER, THE prominent executives are growing elderly and need their sleep to fit them for the morrow’s fray with the bargaineers of labor, the renegotiation men, the treasury, their lawyers and

operating details once managed by subordinates now vanished to the war. As for the rest of the old guard, once as much at

White House, the income tax has set them into a losing race with faltering hearts and weary on a treadmill which gains agdinst them day by day. If alimony is deductible from taxable income it is still a dead loss, too; and some earnest seekers of happiness are paying double and still experimenting bravely with new partners on net incomes which are only pallid phantoms of the gross. There is, in fact, very little frivolous money left out of any large income nowadays, for with the rise of taxes there has been no compensating fall in personal commitments, including off-premises dependents, insurarfce and a minimum of front... A New York merchant prince confided lately in a restaurant strictly on the quaint and seamy side that his accountants had told him he must gait himself to a maximum of $23,000 a year for all purposes, including apartment and country house, servants, upkeep and repairs, alcoholic beverages and such helling-around the town as in these conditions, he felt he could afford.

'Futile Waste of Ready Repartee'

ANOTHER BOURGEOISE, with a weakness for suburban life and lilacs in the spring and an undivided 20 acres of God’s great outdoors, when tackled for a raise to $250 by a ravenous pair of underprivileged but not over-competent in-servants, tried to counter with the proposition that even then, at $220 a month, plus quarters, heat, light and food, they were making more than he was, net. “But,” said the female of the species who had been chosen as bargaining agent, “you live in a very expensive house.” “And so do you,” said he. repartee. Lucius Beebe, a recognized authority on gin mills, has hinted that refugees may be setting the killing pace which drives the melancholy native to Joe's Lunch and the hot-dog counters, but I fault him peremptorily on an incident in which, he said, a refugee from France bought a drink at Pierre's with a $100 bill, and bade the barman never mind the change. Mr. Beebe will be stoutly disbelieved because no Frenchman ever told anyone to keep any change and no Frenchman ever bought a drink.

"Town Is Crowded to the Curbs’

STILL, SOMEBODY must be spending it for the town is crowded to the curbs at night and not even the late George Lamaze, that audacious fry-cook who introduced the four-dollar omelette to the etherized elite of Palm Beach, Park Avenue, and finally, Chi= cago, in the prosperous day of Calvin Coolidge, ever had the gall to use the bat as heavily. To speak of a $30 check for a modest lunch for two is to exaggerate slightly, for a lady and gent can bail out for $20, but $100 is not too much for a night of mild rejoicing and the prices of the lesser joints are such that a first lieutenant and his girl are wise to consider, a spot on the curb with a can of Spam, a box of crackers and a bottle of beer between them. Enlisted men are just Tommy Atkins reborn. My sources among the saloonkeepers tell me that the refugee has been given a false reputation. He does not get around but, true to the ancient faith of Europeans, and particularly Frenchmen, he is unfamiliar with American money, doesn’t want to be rude and grab for the check and therefore is a guest forever. Who then? War contractors from out of town, mostly strangers around here, whose expense accounts, for conferences of vital importance in New York, are added to the cost of arming and providing the brave lads in Italy and France and eventually will be paid by them along with other costs when they come back and, for the rest of their lives, pay for their own war.

We The People

By Ruth Millett

IF A COOK, maid, or cleaning woman has stayed in domestic service through the war when other types of jobs are open, she'll likely depend on domestic serice for a livelihood after the war fo is over. 5 z If so, the ones who are pulling § Se all kinds of temperamental antics ee : today are just cutting their own h A A throats. For after putting up with a succession of undependable, and high hat maids, a lot of women are now trying to get along without help. And theyre finding it easier on their dispositions to do all their own work than to keep tempermental help happy. . If enough women who can afford to hire their work done get used to doing it themselves and dis-

A futile waste of ready

selves—there are going to be fewer good domestic Jobs open when the war is over than there were before it started.

Short-Sighted Behavior :

MOST WOMEN who have tried getting along without help after having it for years agree there are distinct advantages to running their houses alone. They can invite guests in on the spur of the moment without worrying about a maid's getting sore. They can serve meals any old time they and their family please. They needn’t censor their conversation for listening ears. They never are in the maddening situation of having a maid walk out in an emergency, when they had counted on her help. And they aren't under the: constant strain of trying to keep another woman happy in the house. So the household workers who are acting temperamental today just because they know that if they get fired from one job they can get another are being awfully short-sighted. Their value lies in keeping women dependent on them—not in letting women find out that they can manage all right, and sometimes even better, alone.

civilian telephone sets this year.

lever, is a Limit on the time you

No war-factory workers, surely, |

home in the grand saloons as Harry Hopkins in the.

cover the advantages to having their houses to them- |

| which the mechanics of radio originally called for,

“HE IS NOT INFALLIBLE” By George F. Lee, 4050 Cornelius ave.

In the Forum of recent date have appeared a few articles in which the writers have encouraged and advocated the abolishment of elections for the duration, Of all the menacing and anti-American ideas, that is just about the worst yet! There is a certain class of characters in this country that would actually gloat over the scrapping of the Constitution and all that goes with" it. They would callously seek to undermine and destroy every principle for which the boys are offering and giving the last drop of their life's blood on foreign soil.

But it is an immeasureable satisfaction to know that our Constitution is safe and secure as long as the Republican party and the Old Line Democrats can do anything about it. President Roosevelt is an

unusually competent executive, but]

he is not infallible. Nor is he in the same rank with George Washington. The Father of Our Country has no equal in statesmanship and military ability. He was tops because he was a great stickler for common sense. And a little plain common sense will go a lot farther today than it did then.

s a al “FED UP WITH TERRIBLE MUDDLING” By Thinking, Indianapolis

Mrs. Haggerty brings forth to this city another article. This time it is in condemnation of Mr. Avery and the honorable Judge Niblack. As for the eviction of Mr. Avery from Montgomery Ward, this is unquestionably unprecedented ignorance on the part of the attorney general. Undoubtedly he forced “through his executive order” the soldiers to do a nasty job. If Mr. Avery violated the law, the Constitution or the Bill of Rights, why was he not legally processed? And, if a violation of a constituted law was not committed, by what right or on what ground was he evicted? I would not condone Mr. Avery for his unwillingness to degl with representatives of his employees’ choosing; neither would I condone high public officials for stooping to dirty little tricks. Now for Judge Niblack: I do not know this man, but I have a lot of respect for his abilities and great capacity for work in the interest of

(Times readers are invited their these columns, religious con-

to express views in troversies excluded. Because of the volume received, letters should be limited to 250 Letters be

signed. Opinions set forth

words. must here are those of the writers, and publication in no way implies agreement with those opinions by The Times. The Times assumes no responsibility for the return of manuscripts and cannot enter correspondence regarding them.)

he conducts his court. I need not praise him further, but don't you think that his article furnished a great deal of food for thought and that it should start a lot of people

thinking? Perhaps this wouldn't help you, as I read several of your articles and they lacked that be-tween-the-line intelligence. They're going to hold an election this fall. I know you don't like that. A lot of new ones are going in and old ones are coming out. You see, most sound thinking people are just fed up with the terrible muddling that has been forced upon them through bureaucrats. Regardless, of who is elected, it won't give us a Utopian representation in any branch of the government, but it will be a start in the elimination of the un-American way that has made businessmen docile, labor unions egotistical and politicians crooked. I'm going to put my vote behind the people that represent good sound thinking. As for the men in service, I'm going to buy bonds, pay taxes and work like hell because I don't know what their reaction will be when they return. It is within my opinion they may not like this bureaucratic boondoggling and, who knows, may straighten it out.

” » “WHY AND HOW, AND WHO?” By J. E. K,, Indianapolis Today's Times (June 1) contains

(two articles pertaining to the muthe public and the manner in which!

nicipal music concerts sponsored

Side Glances—By Galbraith

land paid for by the city and the city park board. Article No. 1 carries “the outline of the plan, where-the concerts are! to be given, the oragnizations par-, ticipating and mention of the Citzens Music committee headed by Mrs. Jane Johnson Burroughs and! Mr. George Newton. { Article No. 2, however (carefully tucked away on the inside of Page | 8), states “Music Committee Quits"! | This article states that Mayor Tyn-! dall’s entire 20-member committee quits en masse because it was not consulted in the park board arrangement of the summer's expansive music program. Now, between the two articles in today’s Times lies a story of great interest of why, and how and who? The Citizens Committee has functioned for several years, nonpartisan, without pay and very efficiently too. The writer of this letter served one other vear and knows just briefly some of the workings of the committee. Lately, however, some force has come into being that has ignored | the committee and the wishes of many private sponsors and tax-| payers, taken the matter into its| own superior hands and is going to! give the city what is good for them | whether they like it or not. All the citizens need to do is pay for it, shut up about it and like it. Maybe a lot more will develop on this matter in a few days? Maybe Mayor Tyndall will inquire as to why his 20-citizen non-partisan committee quit en masse? Maybe the park board will hear about this latest political “high-jacking” and do something about it, too. It's about time.

= = = “YEP, OLD KID, WE'LL PROTEST”

By U. 8. M. C. Pharmacist's Mate 1-¢ A. L. Kendall of Indianapolis and Five Other Marines in the Pacific Area

We, the undersigned, are about to protest. We haven't as yet decided to what authorities, but protest we will. Yes, we agree with poor, poor “Disollusioned,” who wrote so piteously to" the Forum on March 18. We'll review this splendid type's grievances against the world, the government and his thoughtless employers, and then we'll tell you why we feel that our protest must follow (hoping we'll do the poor guy and others like him some good). Imagine, he can't get tires or sufficient gas! His employer, the meanie, just won't make showers available to wash off his honest sweat, nor adequate facilities for his changing from his good clothes into work clothes! Tsk, tsk, poor fellow, and only $35 a week, too! Do you blame us for sympathizing, for being almost in tears about his plight? Just what are we fighting for but to protect him from such injustices? Just why must we put up with incessant, devitalizing, tropical heat, hordes of dive-bomb-ing mosquitoes, pants-crawling ants and icky sticky gooey mud? Oh, yes, and Japs, too! And why do we bathe only when it rains or out of a steel helmet with rationed water? Why are we foregoing 99 per cent of the amenities of civilization in these nasty forward areas for months and months at a time? Dear readers: Aren't we justified in thinking this world unfair? Here we are, risking our very lives so that poor, luckless “Disillusioned” and all his brethren can get those very things that “Disillusioned,” their spokesman, is grieving about. Here we thought that we were doing our little parts to make this world a lovelier place for our old WPA pals! How mistaken we were! Yep, old kid, we'll protest. Let's see what good it'll do.

DAILY THOUGHTS

Fret now thyself because of evil men, neither be thou envious at the wicked; for there shall be no

! would have liked to obey that impulse and pull the

The Hoosier Forum

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

or type. And so could the senator who introduced the bill very well say for himself. Because speech and type and senatorial oratory aren't limited by broadcast bands, licensing of all

i ‘| opinion isn’t involved in this—or is it, if such a trend

as the senator's proposal really gets a start? >

Bureaus Grow by What They Feed On

WHEN RADIO came in, it was obvious that some sort of police force should be set up or there would

be bedlam on the air—the number of wave lengths 5

being restricted. So there was born a regulatory system which is now what we have in F. C. C. - Since all bureaus grow on what they feed on, and since human beings love power, there has evolved a control which goes way beyond the police power

Gradually that power extended itself into the substance of what was being said, rather than the mere

mechanics of transmission. And so it has come to

pass that a senator of the United States, Johnson (D. Colo.) would now put radio commentators under

license and lay down for them a “code of ethics™” 4

written by congress.

Now licenses, simply defined, means that the power * 5

to license is the power to destroy. “The Lord giveth’ and the Lord taketh away.” He who comments by license stands on a rug that can be pulled from ° under him by the whim of the licensor. The licensee can not be a free agent. His expression is restricted by the fear of obliteration. That's all you can make of it. Extend licensing to all means of expression and you have wiped out democracy.

'We Know the Long-Haul Consequences’

NOW THERE have been times when we, momentarily, listening to some radio commentators and reading some writers with whom we did not agree,

rug. But only momentarily, Because we know the long-haul consequences. And we believe Senator Johnson, who’ has exhibited many evidences of being a statesman, will, when he thinks this thing through, pull the rug from : under his own bill. Just as his colleague, Senator

Burton K. Wheeler, who too has been irritated by -

commentators to a point where he has been pecking around at a similar idea of suppression, has decided to drop it. To change the figure of speech, they both have - wanted to burn the barn to kill the rats. Voltaire said it: “I wholly disagree with what you

5 i

say but will defend to the death your right to say it.”

In Washington

By Peter Edson

WASHINGTON, June When Smaller War Plants Corporation Chairman Maury Maverick _ let go his blast at meaningless gobbledygook language used by guv'ment bureaucrats in their official orders and memoranda, he

ing civilian reader another favor if he had included in his target

jargon of alphabetism and numerology which now clutters up the news of the war and the news of war production. - How would you like it, for instance, if the news of the invasion had come at you like this:

a lot of the naval and military

might have done the long-suffer- .

“The first wave of marines debarked from LCI's: | and, supported by M-3 tanks which rolled off the : LST's, they quickly established the beachhead. From ~~

the air they were aided by SBD5's. In the second wave came army troops, debarking from LCIL’s supported by LSM's, which disgorged M-4 tanks under the air protection furnished by P-47's and A-20-A's.” And so on. " No situation would ever develop lke that and heaven knows no reporter in his right mind would ever write it that way. But this gives an idea of how this trick technical lingo is developing, and it's high time » it was stopped, inasmuch ‘as it's likely this war will be . around for quite a while.

Just Haven't Got Sex Appeal

EVEN WHEN spelled out, too many of these names’ still read like something out of a manufacturer's cata-, logue instead of words that make small boys want to” emulate the deeds of a Commando Kelly. A “Land-

ing Craft, Infantry, Large,” is useful in invasion, but .

it’s still a lousy name without sex appeal or glamour" for a gal who wants to brag to her playmates about

what kind of a warship her sweetie is sailing on. Also>

song writers and poetasters can get no inspiration out" of such stuff. What kind of tune could be written . about a couplet that went: My sailor boy ain't got much rank, But he commands a Landing Ship, Tank! % And what in the world can you find to rhyme with-. an LSM, even when you spell out the M for medium. Maybe a lot of these things are too new to haveacquired much tradition or the rich and racy nieke names which soldier and sailor and leatherneck slangin time bestow on all articles of war, sacred and profane. It took four years or more to break down official army and navy conservatism at the top and get. colorful names approved and adopted for aircraft. But when once the barriers were removed, how much’ more drama in a “Thunderbolt” than a P-47, how" much more of a lift to the spirit of a pilot flying a “Havoc” instead of an A-20, how much more of a buildup for the morale of the folks at home to know that their dive bombers were called “Dauntless” ine stead of having to bear up under the cold pork gravy design of an SBD,

Navy Behind the Times

THE ARMY has been way ahead of the navy in this naming business as a morale builder, particularly in allowing the pilot and crew of an aircraft to give their own plane a pet name and to doll it up with 8 little loud paint, Think what Chennault’s “Flying Tigers” did to the Japs. There are thousands of B-17's, but there will be only one “Memphis Belle,” only one “Wabbit Twacks,” one one “We Should Do This More Often”—names that will go down in history. Why the navy gold braiders haven't come down off their high sea horses and permitted the pilots and the skippers of its thousands of small landing craft to have a little fun in naming their birds and barges is a mystery. The navy has a long tradition of naming things—battleships for states, cruisers for cities, submarines for fish, detroyers for naval heroes and 50 on. But it's still against regulations to name planes and small craft and the boys in the Pacific who have begun to .tag their unofficially. The navy

at the police s At Mr. Blue's

Inc. charged w milk to patient torium, and aj Foundation, ch: ing a nuisance rooming houses

MES, 10 LODE

Mrs. Evelyn . ton ave, has ¢ for an Instn Lambda, a natic with the Supre circle. Mrs. Joyce, @ Jota chapter, w May Beaver, a state manager

662 T

Diplomas wil Technical hig! commencement

board, will pr and the prog torch ceremon ment of senio Roy E. Muelle cation and ber

Graduates a

Betty J. Abel Charles E. Abe! B. Jeanne Abney Mildred L. Adam Virginia Lee Agn Mitzi Ann Airhar Thelma M. Alber Betty L. Alberts Esther L. Aldricl Joanna M. Alexan Porothy A. Alibri George E Allee Jo Ann Allison Edward A. Altha W. R. Ammermas Harry A. Amos Robert BE. Amos B. Janice Anders Paul R. Angrick ; M.

Nima L. Arnold Mary Elizabeth A Bertha M. Aspul Joan Atkins Norma Jean Ault Pauline J. Baile WwW. H

rd D. Balla Mildred Barnett Robert W. Barn Lillian Barron

Earl J. Baxter Margaret 1. Be G. Beh!

June M. Bigelos Carol June Bist Ralph E. Black Virginia G. Bl D. M. Blackbur: E. Gayle Blake Mildred IL. Bles 5 1. Bockweg

Lester W. Boese Fonda 8. Bolin Doris J. Bolles

James G. Bovar Patricia J. Boy ER ————————