The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1927-12-16
Money Writes

graphed the district superintendent,
and this worthy had notified the con-
ductor of the train and all the station
agents on the line, so that hospitality
might not cease during any hour of
the day or night. The steward of the
dining-car brought pots of steaming
coffee, and the butcher" brought
baskets of fruit, and the train con-
ductor brought real Scotch, or so he
said, and the Pullman conductor con-
jured magical mint-julip, and at
every stop there was a local deputa-
ton, with flowers and brass bands
and beautiful smiling maidens; in
short, it was exactly like a presiden-
tial campaign tour, except that the
victim would rather have been read
ing book. His china-blue eyes
twinkled with mischief and his rosy
face grew apoplectic as he pictured
the efforts of weary editor to clos.
his eyes in slumber while the outside
air rang with Hail to the Chief"
and the door of the compartment had
the varnish worn off by tapping
knuckles.
The eminent editor had written
that he was coming to see me; and
| had mentioned the matter to friends,
never dreaming the risk l was run
ming. One day the story exploded
like a bomb-shell in the newspapers,
and after that my telephone was
never STILL One newspaper announced
that l had announced that Mencken
was going to address the local Bah
bits; and then it printed an inter-
view with the secretary of the local
Rabbits, saying that Mr.. Mencken
wasn't going to address them, and
who was Mr.. Mencken anyhow? An
other paper announced that | was
going to make a socialist out of
Mencken, and then came an interview
with Mencken en- route, saying that
it was mistake, he was going to
make a drunkard out Of me. All the
newspaper men I know begged for a
seat at that fight when it came off.
But it was a poor show; you don't
argue with Niagara, and you don't
interrupt a circus.
Mencken is in a Berserk rage
against stupidity, dullness and sham;
he is a whole army, horse, foot, ar
tillery, aviation and general staff all
-. i,,
enemies. He has a spy bureau all
over the country, which collects for
him illustrations of the absurdities of
democracy, and he sorts them out by
states, and once month they appear
between the arsenical green covers,
and once year they make book,
americana, 1927" If you ask Men
cken what is the remedy for these
horrors, he will tell you they are the
natural and inevitable manifestations
| of the boobus Americans. If you
ask him why then labor so monstrous-
ly, he will say that it is for his own
enjoyment, he is so constituted that
he finds his recreation in laughing at
his fellow boobs. But watch him a
while, and you will see the light of
hilarity die out of his eyes, and you
will note lines of tiredness in his
face, and lines of not quite perfect
health, and you will realize that he
is lying to himself and to you; he is
new-style crusader, a Christian
Anti-Christ, a tireless propagandist
of no-propaganda.
Once 1 got him to be serious, and
he told me the real basis of his faith
which is liberty; he wishes to abolish
every restriction upon thought and
expression, and to reduce restrictions
upon action to the absolute minimum
those things which are obviously and
Immediately harmful. When / sug-
Igest that man who takes alcohol
Iinto his system destroys his hepatic
CELLS, Mencken says to hell with his