The Wilmington morning star., 1947-10-11
AS Pegler Sees It
BY WESTBROOK PEGLER
Copyright, 1947, by King Features
Syndicate, Inc,)

Copyright, 1947, by King Features
Syndicate, Inc.)
NEW YORK, Oct. 1O.-The Russian gov
eminent had a definite purpose which they
believed worthwhile in starting their cam
paign Of personal slurs against President
Truman. The calculated purpose of this
nastiness was to provoke repartee from
our side. Recent experience in similar sit
uations with Hitler and Mussolini may
have had no influence toward our involve
ment in the war, but the odds are that it
did. They ribbed us and we ribbed them
back. Then the row got louder and roWdier
and there was just no hope of a hand
shake until the usual proceedings had been
had in the cellar of the saloon or out be-
hind the s%ignboard. When that happened,
we just didn't know our own strength. So
we knocked the buns dead and now find
ourselves tempted by our charitable ma
ture to support their wives and children
indefinitely. Our charitable nature is likely
to be the ruin of us yet. But what would
they be doing for steak and potatoes if
there were no such nation as the United
States? If we didn't exist, what then?
There never was a sucker like us on earth
before.
Russia can't insult the United States.
They might get our goat, but you are not
insulted by something offensive on you
shoe. You, are disguised and annoyed but
not insulted. If we do let them get our
goat, they win the inning or heat because
that plainly is their purpose IN running
this program. Then we have allowed them
to move us into position for the next poke
If we keep our temper, however, we out
score them. First, we deny them the eff
feet that they have tried for. And, more
over, at last, we have made them commit
themselves in a way that cannot be Gin
terpreted" harmlessly even by Eleanor the
Great, who now ought to get out of public
life, having done harm enough in graft
fication of any selfish individuals vanity.
The Russian government has led at us
with gratuitous declarations of hostility to
the people of the United States, who can
not be distinguished apart from their gov
because we are it. That is not
exactly a comfort to any of us and it is
least pleasant to the mothers of American
boys between the ages of twelve and Is.
This was the age bracket of most of the
American fighters of the second great war
at the time that Eleanor's husband sent to
Germany a seedy and mlsanthropic old
mediocrity named William E. Dodd, who
did his satanic damnedest to see that those
children must fight on Russia's side
against the Germans, and finally had his
way. 1t is not a comfort to know beyond
any false reinsurance that Russia has
singled us out as the great enemy in the
next world war. But it is better to know
this than continue to escort Russian sci
entists and technicians through our plants,
showing them everything, while they sheer
in our faces and refuse to show us. so
much as a screWdriver in their country.
1t is better to know this and be warned
than to continue to let Eleanor the Great
give imperious orders to rat-gray flunkeys
in our State department to admit Commu-
mist enemies to our country in the gulse
of friends and prosecuted refugees.
We have never quite faced the monstros-
ity of this old lady's arrogant gall in this
conduct. Who ever authorized her to give
orders in our government What post was
she ever elected to?
Now there is something to be gained
from the Russian swipes at President Tru-
man and our national intentions.
Practically all that Stain said, through
a journalist called Boris Gorbatov, which
may be a house name used by a dozen
hacks on the staff of the Literary gazette
of Moscow, was either quite true or within
a shade of the truth. 1t was nasty but
true. If you speak of Harry Truman's bow
tie and his high-water pants with a smile,
harm is done, although l would like to
stipulate that I never thought he looked at
all short in the pants. All that about Tru-
I1du anu IlNC SdSt WdS tAuC, wv, oAAo !
have written it just as mean myself. Mr..
can blame himself for any hurt
he suffers for this now.
All that was written about the sordid
and cynical corruption OF the Wanted
democratic process" at the Roosevelt
convention of 1914 is true, sparing mac
which make the whole no more
shameful. It was a disgraceful proceeding
and the worse for it's enactment by a lot
of knocking takers who made a fool OF
the common man and fooled him so last
that even today millions of him would
fight you in defense of Roosevelt's name
against the slightest imputation. And when
the Russian wrote about our new imperi-
a1ism in Europe he was, God help us, alb
solutely right. We had imperial moments
before and we did cool off for a long time,
but the feeling of bigness, Importance and
power in the world is now costing us lives
in war and millions of lifetimes of work,
education and personal achievement
our spending on prestige and DOW
err and trying to buy good will.
A Swiss or a Costa Rican may live a
happy life. He doesn't have to live up to
bigness.
An American who works one day each
week to pay his Federal taxes works 20
per cent of his life for the government. IT,
for a rough figure, half OF the money goes
for prestige. power and good will, he
snends three entire years in involuntary
servitude, or slavery, to foreign countries,
in a working career of 80 years. He never
or intended this to be so, even
for the purpose of saving the Bessarabians,
Macedonians or Poles from starvation,
Communism or any other fate. Any Rus
sian propaganda who brings this unsus-
nected but dramatic fact home to the
American citizen does him an unintention-
al favor. This salvation may be a laudable
project but it isn't legal with us nor, as
far as we know, feasible.
The most emotional salvationist among