The potters herald. [volume] (East Liverpool, Ohio) 1899-1982, 1944-03-09

When the JapS hit Pearl HarDof we
got pretty much the whole story right
hot off the griddle. The devastation
was hardly completed by the hated
Nips before the radios of the nation
were blaring forth the awful truth.
| Army censorship hadn't hit its
stride; Navy censorship didn't yet
know how to sit on the lid and the
Office of Censorship hadn't been Gre
ated.
The result was that the American
people went blue mad over the whole
thing and the war against Japan mas
been hating war ever since.
The people knew the full truth,
assessed it's meaning and made up
their minds what had to be done.
Maybe that's why most Americans
do their hating in that direction-that
is, they hate harder and more deeply.
They got the full blast of truth at the
outset, while the guns were still
smoking.
Then censorship stepped in and we
got our news late and we got lot
of it toned down. Bad news came
especially late.
Victories of small size were played
up; losses were played down.
Only in the field of labor relations
is the bad news played up.
If there's strike we get the news
quickly and we get it just as bad as
| it can be made to look.
Censorship is perhaps getting more
| intelligent than it was. There's been
a running fight on to get the truth
| through to the people without more
than necessary delay.
But we still are getting too much
water in the milk of our news-and
too much delay.
! 1t remains pretty much for the COM
mentators, the columnists, the maga-
zine writer's and the book writer's to
give us the full picture of our war.
Ernie Pyle probably has given us
more truth, more earthly facts, about
the war than we have had from the
| straight news"
Now, however much we thank Ernie
and others of his tribe, we still have
| Il kick against news handling that
makes this condition possible.
| We have kick against news
handling that plays strikes up out of
all proportion to their Importance and
that doesn't, meanwhile, give us the
cheering picture of the enormous job
| that has been the marvel of the whole
| world.
If strikes are inexcusable, that is no
| reason for a shameless distortion of
either their nature or their numbers.
| 1t is probable that Byron Price, as
chief of censorship, is as good as could
be got. 1t is probable that Elmer
Davis, of OWL, is as good as could
be got.
The best of them seem unable to
break through the wall of military
bureaucracy.
| Every now and then we get wire
stuff straight from the battle field.
| Such incidents are refreshing. They
relate us directly to the war itself.
When we know about the war as it
moves along daily we feel closer to it;
| we feel more intimate and command
ing responsibility.
We get mad about the enemy.
! Stale news never gets anybody very
mad. CrusadeS are not borne on the
heavy wings of late and uninSpired
reporting, muZzled by cenSors whose
main interest seems too often to lie in
keeping secrets under their hats.
The Anzio beach head is a case in
point against dopey censorship.
The more fully we get the truth
while it is hot and on fire, the better
will we fight this war, abroad and at
home and the more intelligently we
will act about the peace which some
day must follow war.
The American people have enough
brains to maintain Il democracy; they
| have enough brains to know what to
| do about the facts of war-IF they
can get them.-CMW