The Western news. [volume] (Libby, Mont.) 1933-current, 1942-01-08

Just StroIling
Round the Town !.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
BY THE OBSERVER

Mems minds are apt to dwell on
thoughts of war these days-a naY--
ural thing Mine wandered back
the other day TO the year just after
the first World War | was visiting
with a young man who had recent
" returned from fighting in France.
He had been badly wounded. A
Boche bullet had torn through the
base of his neck During our con-
versation, he rolled back his shirt
collar and showed me the wound,
which had been healed by that
time. The bullet had torn out a
big piece of flesh and muscle as it
left his back Had it been a half
inch farther to one side it would
have cut his. spine in two. The
skin had been puckered and drawn
in the healing, leaving a scar about
as large as the palm of mans
hand.
. Ilsat in a Libby audience the 9TH
er night. As | sat there my eyes
fell on a fine, outstanding young
man-stalwart. fine looking, lead
er in high school and in athletics.
Within year or two he will be
just the type the army wants |
thought of a bullet crashing and
tearing through that young mans
law and possibly leaving him a
bloody, battered mass on the
ground, sacrifice to the senselesS-
ness of war.
Men must fight and die for the
liberties that are more precious than
life. They must fight and die as
long as there are other men in the
world who glory in war But when
this CHASTITY fighting is ended there
will remain one further job that
must most certainly be finished
and that is peace that will make
impossible repetition of the pres
ent crime against humanity Re-
ports coming out of Germany say
there is no enthusiasm there for
this war. The same thing is true of
Italy. Russia desired peace. as did
the suffering millions of China And
to be sure. no one here in America
wants war Yet a few men in shigh
places throughout the world have
the power to throw millions of fine
young boys into killing each other,
into death and destruction and
agony and horror. That is the thing
that must be made impossible, if it
is humanity possible to do 50.
John Myers thinks this newspa-
per ought to start fight against
something or somebody. He was not
very explicit. He seemed to like the
/ criticisms the late Mr.. Cuff
launched against the failure to re-
duce radio interference and his
shots at the condition of city streets
have never looked into johns
ancestry but there must be strain
of the Fighting Irish somewhere in
his blood stream Because evidently
he enjoys to sit on the sidelines lsnd
enjoy fight
It's a lot of fun for some people
to watch newspaper battle it out
with someone in worthy or even
an unworthy cause. That is, it is
fun for everyone except the persons
under attack. And they generally
don't like it little bit. In this
connection I should say there are
two extremes every good neWspa-
per should seek to avoid. One is not
to become too placid and easy 60
ing; the other is not to carry a chip
on its shoulder all the time. Both
are equally obnoxious. I recall a
statement frequently heard few
years ago, which was to the effect
that the best way to convert a So
hcialist is to endow him with some
wealth. The best way, some say,
TO stop certain type of criticism
is to name the fault finder on a
committee to correct the thing OBJ
jected to- 1T has been tried.