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Some Old Story
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EDITORIALS
Never Forget That These Editorials Are The Opinion Of One Man
-And He May Be Wrong
Newark Cruelty
Now, again the most brutal kind of
cruelty is loose in the nation; in Newark,
where anarchy is given license and crim
inally is answered with feeble attempts
at bribery.
There is a terrible, frightening parallel
between these times and those of France
after the revolution, when mobs mistook
liberty for license and finally had to be
brought to their senses by the cannon
of Napoleon.
Today our country hungers, as never
before in its brief history, for discipline
because misguided humanitarianism has
turned the torch of liberty into the torch
of arson.
Today in nearly every major city in
our nation peaceful people are afraid to
’ leave their homes after dark unescorted.
Feeble effort, compounded by unbe
lievable stupidity and cowardice are en
couraging, , rather. than containing the
mob. Imagine: -New Jersey National
Guardsmen sent into combat with blank
ammunition, a fact publicized so that ev
ery kniper and looter iridarsonist'fchew
he had nothing to fear from that inter
vention.
This country is perilously near that
point where that faceless man on horse
back is not only a possibility, but is also
a strong probability.
The processes of the law have been
prostituted by politicians, whose con
tempt for the mob is only exceeded by
their abuse of the mob. Leading officials
have publicly proclaimed that discon
tented segments of the population even
have a “right” to resist laws they feel un
just. Hubert Humphrey is among this
criminal cabal who have issued this in
vitation to anarchy.
And anarchy has accepted the invita
tion, and will continue to march in when
authority, surrenders. And this cowardly
surrender is surely the most cruel curse
that can be wished upon any mob, be
cause ultimately that mob. will have to
be curbed by the sternest force or the
entire nation will be consumed , And
that day is nearer than most.pf us su
speot. .• w.t*. {• j
* In the first 90 days of this year our na
tional capital had 44 murders, 42. forcible
rapes, 717 aggravated assaults, (that is as
sault with a weapon aud inflicting in
jury), 1,333 robberies, 3,636 burglaries
or breakins, 1,497 thefts of more than
$50 and 1,688 automobile theftsi
Consider: murder at the rate of one
every dther day, rape at about the same
rate; over 80 aggravated; assaults a day,
150 robberies a day, over 400 burglaries
and breakins per day, 160 thefts a day
and about 195 cars, stolen per day:
And this is the place where the learn
ed elders sit solemnly trying to run ft*
world, when on the record they cannot
est deliberative body sits in expensive
contemplation just across the street
from the nations highest court; both
affecting a solemnity of purpose and
pose of power although they and their
aides cannot safely walk the streets
day or night. ;
As the Umousines and helicopters
whirl about ami above this ungoverned
set; of people who are so thoroughly
cowed by that small vicious criminal
per cent of the city’s population, those
great makers of policy and politics must
reflect from *imo to time that it is f
to send a man to the moon than to make
".v‘»‘;;-; ■.*> -
Bookkeeping Question
Among the awesome figures of our
times is the national debt, of terrifying
proportion, but how few people have ev
er fried to put this national defef into a
perspective that would reduce it to that
point where it Could be equated with per
sonal finances? /
fe/: ’ »v . : ; -v.•• : •.
Few, we suspeci, so.let’s try.
The natiohal debt is about $380 billion.
: The gross national product is > near
$700 billion.
Which means the nation is less than
ppe half year in debt.
Consider a man with an income of
$10,000 per. year. He would only have to
owe about $4,000 if he were to be in
the same relative position as the govern
ment. If he is buying a home, which a
majority ate; he has an outstanding
balance on that purchase of about $10,
000. If buying, a car there is likely a
balance on that, too. And so is there
on his furniture, appliances, possibly a
boat, and then we come to children.
The day a child is bom the parent is au
tomatically put- in debt about $32,000.
This assumes $1500 per yeaf while the
child is growing up and $5,000 for a col
lege education, and these are conserva
tive figures as any. parent will agree.
But the individual keeps books on a
different basis from the government.
The government has only two items ih
its system of bookkeeping: Cash or cre
dit. It either has money or owes money.
Individuals, including private business
es set up assets against debt. A house,
new office building, machinery, car, boat
are . all listed on the asset side of the
ledger and pointed to with pride.
And so what do we have to show for
governmental investment? Roads,
schools, hospitals, fire trucks, planes, air
ports, ships, canals, harbors, universities,
libraries, parks, dams.
If the bookkeeping of the government
were put on the same basis as private
books, and the government assets of to
day were compared with those of 40
years ago, those assets would offset the
national debt to a far greater degree
than comparable figures for General
Motors for the same period.
Not Well Publicized
The daily press in most instances is
so heavily burdened by its obsession
with a misguided humanitarianism that
it frequently sidetracks its objectivity.
Not the least of these sidetrackings has
to do with the much slandered John
Birch Society, whose principal sin has
been its fierce Americanism; something
that is apologized for by most of the
pseudo-intellectuals of our time.
In California after a two-year investiga
tion a committee of the state senate has
found, "No evidence that the society is
secret;. Fascist, anti-Semitic or un-Ameri
can.” This was reported in the Los Ange
les Times, which Signifies itself with the
masthead claim that it is one of the
world’s great newspapers! Few of its
great Sister papers bothered td' repeat
its report, or the findings of the commit
tee. ’ ■ ■■■ ■ ,
'The. worst tping 4he committee could
find after taro years of study to say
abqut.thie John ftirch Society is that it is
a “right, anti-Conununist, fundamentalist
organization.”
- The. committee reported that it has
sent, representatives to Birch Society
chapter meeiings and had obtained
names of members without difficulty.”
The committee father reported, “We
have found the average member to have
been concerned about the advances of
fist
PERSONAL
PARAGRAPHS
ay
JACK RI&HR
There are times in the life of every
columnist when a little' polite plagiarism
is good for his soul, once it helps to fill
up' space when press time is approach*
ing. This is just such a time.
From the Pensacola Journal via “Trqde
Wipds” of Saturday Review; “A sailor
struggled up the shore ramp was stopped
by a customs agent, who asked, ‘You got
any pornographic materials in that sea
bag?’ and the sweaty sailor replied, “fifo
sir, I ain’t even got a pomograph.”
Also from “Trade Winds” Eldon Bar
rett of Seattle is credited with, “Show
me a clam without a bed and I’ll show
you a tramp steamer.” That one takes a
couple,of seconds to sink in.
From New South Magazine via State
Magazine, “New Attorney-General Ram
sey Clark says he’s against capital
punishment. That’s probably why he
lives in a Virginia surburb.”
Also from Saturday Review’s “Top of
My Head”^ by Goodman Ace, whose
column this week has to do with paper
clothing: “There was one department I
wasn’t able to find at this new (paper)
dress shop. I think they have overlooked
a good bet in a paper maternity dress.
Certainly a gown not too often worn by
a woman or for too long. Unless she hap
pens to be Ethel Kennedy.”
Via Tom Johnson from Montgomery,
Alabama: “The Jewish beer baron, who
gave The Pope a million bucks, and
wanted one little favor: Two words add
ed to the prayer . . . ‘give us our daily
bread, and beer’ ... Who was tossed out
by the Pope’s Swiss Guard, but not be
fore the little one got in the last parting
question: ‘How much’did the bread man
pay you?”’
Laugh of the week: Mayor of Newark
blaming the Negro riots on the lack of
gun laws. Bitterest joke of the week:
New Jersey governor sending National
Guardsmen into combat with blank am
munition. Saddest journalistic scoop of
the week: Negro reporter standing by
and watching negro mob beat a white
policeman’s brains out with a grocery
basket.
Best forgotten words, also from
“Trade Winds”, as unearthed by Her
bert Mayes; quoting Lord Rothmere in
1928: “There can be no doubt as to the
verdict of our age. Mussolini will prob
ably dominate the Twentieth Century as
Napoleon dominated the ' early nine
teenth.” „■
And finally, my own scqtunehts but
expressed better about Pear Arthur, by
Bill Sharpe in,.“The State Jjagazine”:
Arthur Schlesinger Jr., Harvard’s con
tribution to the. Kennedy Administration,
gained some notoriety by declaring A
iherica was suffering from too much reli
gion and too much, patriotism.
. , .,.— ■- y
.“Now he confirms'his repugnance to
• things. American in a book review, in
-■ which he describes General Douglas Mac
. Arthur as “wearing his patriotism on his
sleeve,” charging him with “messianism
, and paranoia’^ and contemptuously re
fers to his “ham eloquence”, and “over
written Confederate prose.” ?*•;
World War Two far from the battlefields
his sorryjJde.
kee irresponsibility, arrogance add su
perciliousness.” Amen, Bill: I couldn’t
said it without cuss words.