Staunton spectator and vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1896-1916, 1909-12-17
A SCREW LOOSE.

The very surprising statement is
made that Argentina is exporting more
wheat than the United States. 1t Is q
consular report, and therefore worthy
of credence. 1t is also predicted that
the time is not distant when Canada
will grow more wheat for export than
our country, all of which would appear
to Vindicate the opinion of Mr.. Jas. ].
Hill, that soon the United States will
be buying breadstuffs from abroad.
That, however, is not likely until the
tariff duty on wheat is materially re-
duced.
Last spring Indian corn was import
ed into New York from British South
Africa, paid the duty, and successfully
competed with corn from Iowa and
Kansas with cents the bushel to
spare. The duty on wheat is 25 cents
the bushel, while the duty on corn is 5
cents less
1t is asserted that in South Africa
there is corn belt equal to that of our
own country, and it is virgin, as are
the wheat belts of Argentina and Can
ada. The prime reason of the extrava-
CANT cost of living in our country is
that political economy we have prac-
tlced, which invites and Incorporates
as part of our population more than
l,0OO, 600 foreigners year. A second
airy and very nearly as potent cause
is the monopolies that fix the prices Of
foods and clothing.
1t is gravely asserted that the cost of
pound of bread in London is one
third what it is in Chicago, which is
yet, perhaps, the greatest grain market
in the world. Grain is meat as well as
bread. For full 100 years this coun-
try produced the cheapest bread and
meat in all the world. That made our
material advancement the wonder and
the despair of all other peoples.
But 1t is so no more. Labor pays
more for food, clothing and shelter in
the United States than it does any
where else, and that is the main thing
that produces strikes and causes ru-
mors of strikes every day in the year.
There is screw loose somewhere.
Thus speaks the Washington Post.
About the same time our friend the
Pocahontas, w. Va, Times thus ru-
inmates:
A farmer came to town the other
day and ate dinner at local restau-
rant. He spread butter from Iowa on
bread grown in the Valley of Virginia;
he put condensed milk from New York
in coffee from South America, sweet
ened with New Orleans sugar. He ate
corn bread from Ohio, and bacon from
Chicago, and ate beans, sweet potatoes,
onions and other vegetables from Vir-
ginia, while the fruit was grown in
California. He sweetened buckwheat
cakes from Upshur county with Indi-
ana corn molasses. By chance the
potatoes had grown in Pocahontas
soil. This, too, in county where
few short years since every article on
many a well laden board, from the su-
gar and substantials to the rye coffee,
were produced at home. AS for the
farmers horse, at a livery stable, he
was fed on Iowa oats and Michigan
hay. Though we send much lumber
and many tat cattle, sheep and fowls
to market, what doth it profit when so
great an amount for food and fodder is
sent to communities not nearly so rich
ly favored by nature.
VIM. T. Stead, the noted English
writer, visited America several years
ago. He supposed, he said, he was in
land of plenty, where the poor lived
like princes, and there was constant
flow of milk and honey. But he said
that the prices for food actually took
his breath. He had never seen any
thing like it, and would never have
believed 1t on hearsay evidence.