New Ulm review. (New Ulm, Brown County, Minn.) 1892-1961, 1897-03-31
Ideas of Others.

-- 3. . &c
for continued delay and indecision among
the powers of Europe regarding the
Cretan troubles as follows:
What counts for more than all their
militant braggadocio in this European
scrimmage is the grand and dismal con-
seriousness in the palpitating bosoms OF
the Powers that all and each OF them
are desperately hard-up. If they had a
few dollars to spare for real good
time we should have long ago been Civ
en- a free show of fireworks on an inter-
national scale. Five cents worth Of self
confidence would start a pretty display
at this moment, but it halts for fear of
blowing up the magazine. National
debts are difficult sums to add up. That
of France is too big to be disclosed even
to it's own people, perhaps $500 per
head, by far the heaviest incurred by
any nation. The debts Of Russia, Italy
and Germany average about one hun
dred dollars per head of their popula-
tons. Turkey and Greece are bank
rupt, their nominal national debts being
about eighty dollars PER head in each
country, but, of course, with fewer re-
sources than the former. Each of these
strictly powerless Powers has been over
spending its income for years on instru-
ments Of destruction instead of imple-
ments of construction, and they all
crave for more weapons of murder and
suicide. The sight Of the due bills for
these alone terri6es them into judicious
cowardice.
Col. Henry Watterson has drawn a
picture of the professional politician
which IS highly characteristic of this
distinguished editor. He says:
To give him his deserts, nor do him
intentional wrong, the professional pol
itician, as he is known to us, is neither a
very sinister nor a very dangerous Great
ure Indeed, Jack in oiiicc is hardly so
pcstiferous as Jack -out-of- office. Grant
him his little place, surround him with
his creature comforts, and for ,msall his
buster, he becomes in reality as amiable
Il piece of flabby wortblessness as one
might meet on summers day. Ignor
ant and conceited, he is seldom, very
hard to please. To strut, and tyawp
and yeowl, at Westinghouse strut, and
yawp and yeowl in the state capitols-
is the height Of his ambition, and he
comes and goes like the pillows of 1.-THE
sea, generation upon generation, each
much like Corbett and Fitzsimmons,
without the self-denial they practice in the
training, or their endurance in the fight.
Though poorly paid, he has not the
courage to put his wages at living fig.
ure, because, perhaps, he has the con-
seriousness of earning no more than the
law allows. Uncertain of tenure, lie
makes up the deficiency in bombast and
the affectation OF dignlty;a great man ev-
crywhere except at home. In short, like
Ben Johnson's pig:
"Whilst he lives, he lives in clover;
When he dies, he dies all over"
He has come to believe that he owns
the government he is the govern
ment During easy times this is but a
harmless vanity. Indeed, it has slight
foundation il. fact. Somebody, must
wash the dirty linen of the political
parties, and hew the wood and draw the
water for the official fabric. and, since
better men are engaged in useful pur-
suits, the men who are good for nothing
else are left to ratsle around as states
men. But there is time for all things
and there must he an end of dilly-dally
ing and shilly- shallying, even in politics
There come periods in the public life
when the state cannot afford to be com
placent, when imbecility,| however i'm
posing, must yield to capacity and merit
and when men must supplant the imita
lions OF men whom Dame Fortune, il
her dishabille, allows to go to Washing
ton. That time has at length arrived.
The Louisville Courier j ournal ha
offered the following tribute to the Uni
ted States Senate, brought out by Sena
tor Spooners references to John J. In
gals:
"The Courier Journal is not defend
ing the prize ring. 1t is not denyin:
chat pugilism Is not influential forssevl]
But we do say that the United State
senate for the last few years has been i
no condition to invite a compariso
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