Houston home journal. (Perry, Houston County, Ga.) 1924-1994, October 24, 1946, Image 6

Houston home journal., October 24, 1946, Image 6

About Houston home journal. (Perry, Houston County, Ga.) 1924-1994 | View Entire Issue (Oct. 24, 1946)

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Newspaper Page TextPEARS ahi Is^Vrri REDS CONVERT NAZIS WASHINGTON. U. S. intelli gence officials have sent the White House a highly important report on Soviet operations in Germany show ing how the Russians have convert ed large segments of the old Ger man army to the Communist ban ner. Nucleus of the new Red-Nazi army is the old German Libera tion committee, organized by the Russians when they captured sev eral thousand Nazis at Stalingrad. Field Marshal Frederich Von Paul us, who surrendered at Stalingrad, was chairman of this committee and appealed by radio to the Nazi army in Germany during the war, urging them to desert Hitler and come over to the Russians. Today thousands of Von Paulus’s men and officers have been put through Russian indoctrination schools designed to sell them on sympathy for the Soviet and are ready to govern the Soviet zone of Germany. Here are other salient points in the U. S. intelligence report: 1. The Russian zone is now more than twice as efficient as a produc tive unit as the American zone and three times as productive as the British zone. 2. The Russians are prepared to set up a government of their own in Germany if the Americans and the British set up an autonomous German government in the western part of the Reich. It will be under Von Paulus. 3. The Russians are not retaining Germans for slave labor, as gener ally expected. They have already sent a million and a half captured Nazis from Russia to the Soviet zone of Germany, where each has completed one year’s schooling under Soviet and German Commu nist instructors. Only a half million Germans still are being used in la bor battalions in Russia. These are the leading Nazis whom the Rus sians know they can't either con vert or trust. The U. S. intelligence report strongly recommends against an autonomous German government in the Anglo-American zone, as pro posed by Secretary Byrnes, and urges instead agreement with the Russians on the control of Germany. It points out that unless agreement is reached, Germany again will be the source of a new world war in the not too distant future. (• • * LA GUARDIA SEES STALIN When UNRRA Director La Guardia and aides visited Mos cow on their recent tour of Eu rope, the entire party was eager to sec Stalin. The Kremlin in vitation, however, permitted only La Guardia and tw r o other UNRRA officials to call on the top Soviet leader. La Guardia, therefore, sug gested to his aide, Joseph Lilly, that he divert the rest of the party by taking them to Lenin’s tomb, where the body of the fa- - ther of the Russian revolution is still perfectly preserved. I.ate that night, the party re assembled, and Lilly eagerly asked La Guardia what he had learned from Stalin. Replied Fiorello: “I got as much out of Stalin as you did out of Lenin.” • • « NO MONEY FOR FINLAND Finland has been known to Amer- as the little country which al ways paid its debts. Now, howev er, the U. S. is getting the repu tation among Finns as a country which breaks its financial promises. What happened is that a year ago Finland sent a trade delegation here to arrange for a 70 million dollar loan from the Export-Import bank. The loan was promised, and on the basis of this promise, the Finns made purchases amounting to 35 million dollars in the United States, with partial commitments for the remaining 35 million dollars. Part of the deal was that Finland was to secure coal from this coun try, which in turn would help in crease her newsprint production. Many American newspapers made arrangements to buy this extra newsprint. However, something has caused the state department to reverse it self. The Export-Import bank loan to Finland has been held up. Actual, although unannounced reason for the reversal is the fact that Finland is now in the Soviet sphere of influence and it’s feared that any financial help indirectly would aid Russia. However, there is considerable difference of opinion regarding this. So far, however, Finns still are waiting. ♦ • * ADMIRAL HALSEY GETS BORED Admiral William (Bull) Halsey is beginning to fidget in his new job on the President’s super-advisory board of five-star army-navy offi cers. Since his semi-diplomatic mis sion to South America, Halsey has had little to do. Privately, the tough little skipper hankers to take that job as vice president of Pan Amer lean airways, which is still open to him. He isn’t interested in the ex tra money. His sparkplug tempera ment craves action, in or out of the navy. GREEK TRAGEDY OF THE WAR . . . One of the most tragic ironies of the war through which the world Has just passed is the condition in which the Italians left Greece. Today Greece is in worse shape than the nations of the vanquished. Former prosperous farmers‘an; without buildings, few have cattle. One out of every five schools in Greece was destroyed by the invaders. VEST POCKET WEISSMULLER . . . Duncan Richardson, born in Louisville, Ky., the son of Lt. and Mrs. Marshall Paul Richardson, is now in Hollywood. Duncan could scarcely be more at home in the water if he had been born with fins. At four years of age, Duncan is a natatorial natural. He not only has excellent form, but also can do all kinds of intricate dives, swims the crawl, back stroke, breast stroke and butterfly. He can swim the length of the average pool under water—and he enjoys every minute he is in the water. I - ■, - > ft>- < * *&* v^twb VETERANS’ PARADISE . . . Hunter college, New York City, largest women’s college in the world, broke a 75-year precedent by opening enrollment to men. One thousand G.l.s enrolled. Here’s Gil Alexander, Jamaica, L. 1., N, Y,, carries a load of books for some of the girl students—and doesn’t seem to mind the job. SHAKE HANDS AND GO IN FIGHTING . . . Joe Cronin, manager of the Boston Red Sox, and Eddie Dyer, manager of the St. Louis Cardi nals, right, shake hands before the first game of the 1946 world series got under way—and again as it ended. Both managers were proud of their teams, winners in the National and American leagues, and both were popular with their teams as well as the fans who attended the world series at St. Louis and Bostc THE HOUSTON HOME JOURNAL, PERRY. GEORGIA THEY FED PLAYMATES . . . These three young Vlachos chil dren have made an international name for themselves as musical prodigies. George Jr., 8, Mad eleine, 10 and Shophie Vlachos, 12. RUGGED HERMIT . . . Living a rough and rugged life in a truck with white rats, guinea pigs, pup i pies, skunk and pet coyote. Willis ! R. Willey, 66, of Spokane, Wash., ! was arrested by Boston police be -1 cause his pet coyote bit a girl. President of the U. S. Has Biggest Job in the World By BAUKHAGE News Analyst and Commentator. WNU Service, 1616 Eye Street, N.W., Washington, D. C. WASHINGTON, D. C.—Once more events bring up the so far unan- problem^ istrative set-up. Baukhage Tew people real ize the extent of his functions, most of which aren’t even suggested in the constitution, and few laws de fine them. They have grown like Topsy. We are reminded of the scope of the presidential duties by Willard Kiplinger in his “Washington Is Like That.’’ He points out that the Pres ident as leader of his party runs the party policies through the na tional committee. Some times the party line isn’t working. You re call the stew over meat? A meet ing of Democratic party leaders, at the moment when the President was preparing to announce at a news conference that he opposed remov ing the controls on meat prices, passed a resolution asking Chair man Hannegan to confer with ad ministrative officials concerning the removal of such controls. The President, as the top execu tive, heads the executive set-up and he appoints the men who run the executive machinery. He can’t talk to each one every day. When there is friction a hot-box often develops. There are plenty of examples in history from Ickes and Wallace, back to Lincoln and Seward, and before. Chief Executive’s Task Never Ends The President issues “executive orders”—which someone has to write for him but which have the force of law and the President must see that they are properly in terpreted. Again there is trouble if these decrees tread on congression al prerogatives. He has to get bills which he fa vors, passed. Frequently he writes the first drafts of such bills with the help of his legal advisors. He is expected, if necessary, to “put the heat on” to get them through con gress. This means a lot of work in conference with congressional leaders on the phone and through his personal agents. A tactless agent can easily upset the apple cart. Remember how Tommy Cor coran used to get under the skin of congress? Many others, well inten tioned and otherwise, who came and went, might be named. The President has to make up the budget, with the help of the budget director. If the director makes mis takes or asks for too much or too little, it is the White House that takes the rap. This involves billions. He appoints the Justices of the Su preme court and federal judges. A bad choice may be fatal, and yet one person can’t know the personal history of every likely candidate. In this sense the President forms the legal thinking of his era. He is not only his own and his party’s but also the nation’s chief publicity man. A slip of the tongue not only can lose an election, but also could start a war. If war comes, he has to run it, for the strategy in the field is based on broad objectives decided at home. It was by no means merely mili tary opinion which decided when and where the invasion of Europe took place. These are only a few of the things a President has to think about. We have omitted mention of many mi nor but time-consuming matters such as whether the architectural beauty of the White House shall be altered with a new wing, or where some visiting potentate shall sit at the table. All full of dynamite. It was the death of Woodrow Wil son which brought the presidential workload to public attention. He died, as much from overwork as from his disappointment over repu diation of the League of Nations. Serious study of the problem of fur nishing a means to lighten the presi dential burden began shortly there after, but it was not until 1939 that a specific plan was drawn up and BARBS . . j A Holland-American liner depart- ( ed recently with more than three and a half million eggs aboard— first egg cargo of its size since shells ceased bursting. * ♦ * Government statisticians are leav ing Washington in hordes, says Business Week. Maybe the political situation is so hot they think there isn’t safety in numbers. submitted to congress. Among oth er suggestions for various depart mental reorganizations, the pl an created a presidential staff of “ex ecutive assistants.” About all the public knows about this corps of assistants is that they are supposed to possess a “passion for anonymity.” The other thing about them, which isn’t usually a( j. mitted, is that they have never func tioned properly. That, at least. i s the private opinion of one insider who has watched them come and go from the beginning. The reason is simple; people who expect a deci sion on an important matter won’t take it from anyone but the Presi dent himself. Must Keep Close Check on Aides A pitiful example of the break down of the White House machinery was the recent Wallace ruckus. The President never need have been placed in the position he was. It is not a President’s job to read over every document submitted to him. No head of a business as big as the government would dream of trying to do that. But somebody should have read both the Wallace memorandum on foreign policy and the Wallace speech and apprised the President of what they contained and implied. Whether it is the Pres ident’s fault that he didn’t have properly experienced hired help, is another matter. That his hired help didn’t function, caused the damage. An explanation, if not an excuse, has been offered in this case. The job of reading over public state ments of administration men bers to see that they didn’t conflict was handled by the OWI during the war. Before that the White House machinery had always taken care of such matters. That machin ery had not been again set in mo tion when OWI ceased to function. The fault was not that the Presi dent didn’t prevent the Wallace- Byrnes clash, but that he was not prevented from preventing it. I can think of only one similar bad mistake made by President Roose velt which parallels the Wallace mix-up and it was due to a similar but not the same cause. It involved the highly technical question of the public debt. An “assistant,” sup posed to be an expert, furnished the figures on which the President based an important public statement. The eagle-eyed financial writers caught it. The “expert” was called to ac count; he furnished new figures, was wrong again and caught again. The President was forced to make a second public correction. The duties of a President are sim ply too great for any one man. So Presidents have always had person al advisors, some times they were given an office, some times they had no official title—like Colonel House in the Wilson regime. To day we hear little about presidential “administrative assistants” but we hear a great deal about a group of “advisors” who have failed to func tion properly in spite of the fact that, unlike the executive assistants they lack authority. These advisors are too “close” to the President. And they have been criticized by other members of the administration for standing between department heads, the congressional and party leaders. They are all old, close, personal friends of the President. They are inexperienced in government. Whether President Truman’s little circle of “cronies” has helped or hindered him is beside the question. No one can dispute the fact that they were chosen because of their loyalty rather than because of their experience. The question is wheth er presidential duties, as they exist today, can be delegated even to a well-trained, highly capable staff. They can, is the answer, IF such a staff is not blocked by higher au thorities who, from motives of love, hate, politics, religion, tempera ment, taste or previous condition of servitude, use such authority, oth er than in the public good. • * * When Oscar, pet seal of the Cali fornia Academy of Science, died, it was found that he had swallowed $7.54 in pennies, nickels and dimes, plus a Canadian penny and an amusement token. But it was the pennies which were fatal— the zinc ones developed poison. ♦ • ♦ A Russian engineer claims he has perfected ballbearings so small that 50,000 can be placed in a match box. But will that make it any easier to roll your own? , by B aukhage , Plenty of meat after the elections, says Chester Bowles. Will there ba any gravy? And if so, for whom? Discords come from Russia, where critics claim Shostakovitch’s ninth symphony doesn’t follow the party lines. The point is that the coun terpoint is counter-revolutionary and some of the semi-demi-quavers quaver with reactionary overtones.