The Lakeland evening telegram. (Lakeland, Fla.) 1911-1922, 1916-02-10
WAR OR PEACE?

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By Savoyard in Louisville (Ky), Post
Col. Theodore Roosevelt wants the
Republican nomination for President,
and he wants it with all his heart,
soul, mind and strength. He is prac-
teal man, shrewd politician, and he
knows how to play the game. He is
consummate master of it, and looking
round about, Col. Roosevelt discovers
that the Republican party envies,
fears and hates Woodrow Wilson. A
common aversion is far stronger tie
than a common attachment, and If the
colonel should only surpass all others
in his denunciations of the Democratic
President, what is more natural than
that all will be forgiven and the col
onel again become thepride and hope
and the champion Of the G. o. p?
That is what he hungers and thirsts
for and is striving after. All domestic
questions, such as the tariff, the trusts,
theinitiative, the referendum, the re-
call. woman suffrage, prohibition, the
|f'uplift" and the rest are to be con-
signed to the past as matters that are
become minor and trivial American
ism" is to be the chief, the paramount,
the sole issue, and "Americanism" is
defined as everything that Woodrow
Wilson is not The people are to be
persuaded that Mr.. Wilson is all that
is craven, all that is contemplate, all
that is weak, all that is un-American.
That is the game the colonel has set
out to play.
Here is the New York Tribune, as
lpro-British as any paper in London,
complaining that the German ambas-
dor is administering our State De-
partment. Then here is the Father
land New York publication, as pro-
German as any paper published in
| Berlin, protesting that our State De-
partment is run by the British am
bassador. That, l take it, is mighty
:rong certificate of strict neutrality
on the part of the Wilson Administra-
ton Then there is Col. Roosevelt,
who contends that Wilson is coward
because he did not challenge Germany
for the invasion of Belgium, and Col
Bryan, who holds that Wilson is a
lingo for resenting the sinking of the
Lusitania. Wilson is somewhere
midway between these two, and who
can wish for or hope for better evil
dence of recitude and wisdom of pol
icy than that? Where is the unreason
able arbiter who would ask for more
convincing testimony?
The colonel declares that the United
States has not a friend in the world
that thepresent administration has be
haved, as regards Mexico, in way te
make every decent American hang
his head, that the country's conduct
has secured for 1t the contempt o.
every one of the great civilized ma
lions of mankind.
These are samples of the invectives
the former President hurls agains
the present President. But his motive
is transparent. What he is after ant
all he is after is to regain the affec
tons of the Standpatters, whose sub
servient henchman he was every me
ment he was President of the Unite'
States. The colonel is gone a-court
ing and he hoped to remarry the Re
publican party from whose bed an
, board he divorced himself in 1912
And it will be strange If he does no
, succeed. His rivals are not equippe
with that very desirable quality in
lover, pulchritude, politically speaking
There is no Adonis among them. The
are a varied lot-Standpatters, Stant
: pat-Progressives, Progressives an
, ssive-Standpatters.
No one of 'em from Weeks to Boral
from Cummins to Fairbanks, can hol
candle to the colonel when it come
to cussing, and the one who can Gus
}. Wilcon theloudest, the longest, wit
most vigor and most emphasis, is mos
!. likely to get the nomination. The CO
|. onel is the man.
e Upon the election of Woodrow Wi
: son the American people are to
/, congratulated or commiserated as
: man thinks. One thing is certain,
e has kept us out of war, and it is equa
). ly certain that had Roosevelt bee
v President he would have conquere
/. Mexico, spoilated it and annexed
$ the first year of his administrato
and ere that big war in Europe hs
: emerged from it's first sixty days "
> would have been a party to it also
. Nobody questions that.
Then it is up to the American Peep
l. TO say which they prefer-peace I
= war. AS for that Mexican business, Il
90 uT;Ioan,s ,r;f;oc &c ~