Washington standard. [volume] (Olympia, Wash. Territory) 1860-1921, 1914-12-04
DISCUSSING A ToUCHY SUBJECT.

Taking The Seattle Times to task for its sea
lamity bowling. the Kittitas Spokesman speaks
right out in mnetin " about certain conditions
and the causes which ii believes produced them
laying the blame for whatever Of business slack
ruiug there is in the Northwest to the over-boom-
n- Of the past. and in its issue for the week
the Douglas County Press voices similar opinions
upon the particular subject Of the dilemma of the
Eastern Washington apple growers.
such comments are appearing freely
in the sta. press than they did some time back.
We seem to be Weakening up to the situation it
actually is and what caused it and we are be,
ginning to tell each other about it. We are for
getting the palaver and the promises and the al
Turing pictures and we are getting down to the
facts in the
SO it is that the Kittitas Spokesman finds it i'm
possible to reconcile the Times statement that
Seattle is in 33 13 per cent better condition than
any other section with the same newspaper ale
CATION that the numbering industry Seattle S chief
resource has been ruined, and the Spokesman
proceeds to comments
THE condition of the Northwest, and particu-
lary Seattle is due to cause entirely removed
from the Democratic party or the tariff, free
is due to cause which the Times and other
Sound papers choose to ignore. 1t is due to years
of persistent OVERLOOKING by real estate men,
from whose lurid advertisements the Times has
reaped fat harvest. 1t is due to persistent over
statement and the consequent imitation of land
values which brought in the 100000 men who the
Times mournfully declares are out of a job. The
man from the Wenatchee valley, the Yakima
other over-boomed sections will tell you that in.
fated values and high rents the result of
booming, are the cause of whatever depression
may exist-not the Democratic party. 1t is not
the tariff, but the 500 lot purchased for 81 600
that makes business depression; not the Demo
cratic party, but Punkville's advertising that her
industries will support MANIFOLD greater popu
lation that fills the state with unemployed labor"
Right along the same line the Douglas County
Press says:
''Apple show week drew crowd to Spokane
and helped the vendors in the city, whether it did
any good for the fruit men not. Whether they
have learned to make dollars grow on trees just
like it was pictured to them by the boosters de-
poneth sayeth not. The fact is the apple man is
the victim of the booster and it is problem how
to undo the wrong that has been committed
against him. The booster sold him gold brick
and left him to realize on it. Now he is up against
the proposition of trying to make the gold brick,
which he paid gold price for, turn to real gold
In other words, the booster put little water on
sand and sold the water and the victim has
to realize on it. 1t is the same old watered stock
proposition. The victim gets it in the neck every
time, while the vender goes off on pleasure trip
leaving the victim the gold brick to hold In other
words, the booster watered up the value of apple
land and unloaded it on the victims. The apple
show may have plan of realizing On the watered
stock, but it never appeared in any of the apple
show programs
Is there not good deal Of truth in what these
newspapers sayf