Imperial Valley press., 1943-01-22
CAPITAL TALKS
by
Peter
Edison


consumption has now brancheC
cut into so many different forms
~ ou,d hardly recogn1b IT. Oh
course it isn't supposed to be pro-
o,agande. the way che United
States puts it out. Propaganda Is
only the nasty stuff put out By the
Nazis. Faseists and Japs. what
the us. puts out is purely educa-
tjonal material designed TO tell
other people tho truth on what the
American war effort is all about.
Not much has been heard about
this American counter-propa-
| ganda show. The short wave
radio broadcasts beamed in many
languages and to many lands
have been publioized. But radio
l. only une phase. Movies are
used. and the printed WORD.
Some of these printing jobs would
knock your eye out, and they're
published in two. three and four
eolors and i'm languages such rs
Arabic. Chinese and Afrikaans,
as well as the familiar Spanish,
Portugu ase. German and Eng
lish.
Most pretentious of the publica-
ton Jobs is the new magazine VIC
tory. It's big picture-magazine
lob of the Life, Golfers, Look and
Sateyepost size. Vol. l No. / was
put out as a trial few months
ago. Issue No. 2 is now on the
press. and No. 3, edited and pub
l.shed by Crowell-Collier's under
direction of the office Of War In
formation overseas branch, will be
out in February or March.
This issue No. 3 will contain PAID
advertising, solicited from Amer
lean business houses i'll foreign
trade. The magazine will be placed
on the newsstands in foreign coun-
tries and it will be for sale. The
idea here is to make it compete with
q German propaganda magazine
called Signal, which has been dls-
tributed all over the world for the
past three years and by perhaps 70
million copies to make the Ger
man cause look good in the eyes
OIL aN~A'
conquered countries.
ROCKEFELLER BROKE THE ICE
First effort to knock Signal off
the foreign newsstands was made
ty Nelson Rockefellers Office OF
the Coordinator of Inter- American
Affairs, which published a maga-
zine called En- Guardia, or On
Guard, in Spain and Portuguese
for South American consumption
Ell Guardia clicked, SO this pattern
was adopted for other countries,
ana a certain unconscious rivalry
has perhaps developed between the
Rockefeller boys and the Elmer
Davis Owl boys as to who is put
ting out the best magazine,
Either way the German Signal
is sh0ddy and sorry job by
comparison. Signal is decidedly
second rate. Fuzzy paper and
not so good printing. There's
nothing cheap about the Ameri-
can magazine, however. Slick
paper, beautiful illustrations, ele-
CANT typography, tint blocks and
full color on some pages.
Aside from the difference in |
quality, there is a marked con-
trast in content, too. The German
sl.eet portrays the gay and smiling /
faces of the inhabitants OF occu-
pied countries, the tears of graft
tude as the Czechs, Poles, Ukrain-
ians and such people were delivered |
to the tender Nazi Saviors from |
stern rule of oppression In other |
words, hooey.
The American magazines. on the
other hand lay off all blatant con-'
demnation OF our enemies and try !
to present a carefully documented |
picture-story of just what life in |
the United States really is and |
what the American war effort is
shooting at.