The Waterbury Democrat., 1936-10-17
RY DREW PEARsON bod kOBksE

candidate for any office thiI
 But he is right up in front of the presidential picture just the same.
 If you are Fzoosier you are not merely for Roosevelt or Lan- don. You are also for or against Governor Paul McNull That's the kind of a man he is.
 ROOtin' TOOtin' New Dealer
 McNutt is an ardently pro- fessed New Dealer, rootin' tootin' Roosevelt shouter. But there are thousands of Hoosier New Dealers who are violently anti-McNutt. And that includes democratic leaders as well as rank-and-file voters.
 Senator Frederick Van Nuys, sincere but unspectacular liberal, is at open swords points with McNutt. Senator Sherman Min- ton, on the surface, has patched up their differences. But every one knows that privately the two men regard one another like a couple of strange cats.
 McNutt is very much in a great many peoples hair-including Big Jim Farley's and President Roosevelt's, though of course they would not say so publicly. If you are running for president you do not slap the state boss of your party in the face. But-how they would like to!
 Weird Paradox
 Big, platinum haired, able, well-educated and 8 brilliant har- anguer, McNutt is one of the strangest paradoxes in American public life.
 He has been one of the most efficient and socially minded state executives in the country. He has reorganized and modernized the state government, put through a number of enlightened acts. His administration has been clean and economical.
 But it has also been ruthless and grimly dictatorial.
 McNutt, an overseas veteran and former national comman- der of the American Legion, has 8 mania for military display. He is crazy about uniforms, Is passiohately fond of parading behind . brass band. On the slightest pretext he orders out the National Guard. Labor, which has felt his mailed fist i'm 2 number of bitter struggles, hates him with 3 viruIent fury.
 McNutt, also, has very pro- nounced views about the freedom of the press. He is against 1t. If he should ever attain the national power he so craves and endleSsly dreams about, woe betide the newspaper and newsmen who dared speak out against him. Heads, indeed, would roll in the sand.
 Man On Horseback
 McNutt has 8 full-blown Man on Horseback fixation. He is firmly convinced that he is a man of destiny, that the finger of Providence is on him, that he is going to be President of the United States. From that point on-LET YOUR IMAGINATION BE YOUR GUIDE.
 If this sounds fantastic, 1t is no more than the man himself. McNutt is no buffon like Cover nor Gene Talmadge, he is no comic like the late Kingfish Huey Long. He is highly intelligent well schooled.
 Graduate of Harvard, he was professor of law and dean of the Law School of the University of Indiana. He is a man of culture, great charm and personal dis- tinction. And he is also @ FULL PLEDGED WOULD-BE DICTA- TOR.
 That is why Indianans, who have had four years of his rule as an iron-fisted governor, are SO wrought up about him. That also is why, with McNutt beating the drums for the New Deal and for Roosevelt, he is an import ant factor in the political race. Resentment
 The republicans, cannily, are capitalizing this strong under current of resentment and fear.
 They are tying him up in the popular mind with the President. That it will cost Roosevelt votes is certain. Whether the loss will be sufficient to weigh the balance in Landon's favor is doubtful.
 The President has strong personal strength in Indiana. Labor, which hates McNutt
 ven0mously, is overwhelmingly for Roosevelt. The poorer farmers in the southern half of
 the state, who benefited heavily
 from AAA checks and who will