Evening star., 1951-01-28
SeesInertio Endongering
Financial Structure
Writer Says Waste Of Money
Is National Peril
By Fronk R. Kent

What kind of people are we, anyhow?
Are we largely Nation of nitWits who
supinely permit the perils that threaten
us abroad to be needlessly enhanced by
the idiocy and cowardice of our rulers
at home? We smugly listen to the
political and journalistic demagogues
spout that old stuff about the "funda-
mental intelligence of the great Amer
lean people" but, actually, are we not
conglomeration of fools without the
gumption to avoid falling into the same
pits out of which. at great COST we have
twice had to dig ourselves?
strong case for an affirmative
answer to the last two questions can
be made. For example. look at the fiscal
facts as they now exist Regardless Of
party. all men OF wisdom and experience
agree that unchecked debts and deficits
ultimately lead to financial disaster.
Yet for nearly twenty years we have
steadily piled up the one and deepened
the other until at the beginning of the
present fiscal year both had reached
undreamed-of heights and depths Then,
last summer we were catapulted into
Korea and the realization driven homo
that in Russia we had a powerful,
potential enemy whose aggressions
threaten our very existence.
The urgency of arming ourselves led
to presidential pronouncements and
congressional action. The country was
responsive. All it wanted was leader
ship. 1t was pointed out that we must
not repeat the mistakes of the last two
wars: That delay in the regulation Of
wages, profits and prices in World War
II had cost US $100 billion and pro-
longed the conflict by six months; that
the only way to control imitation is to
control it at the start Everybody agreed
about this. Nevertheless, nothing was
done and for months there was a con-
tinuous spiral of wage and price raises
until the cost of living attained heights
never before approached and imitation
reached vast and menacing propor-
tions
The reason for this costly and danger
Gus delay is perfectly clear. Chiefly, 1t
was the savage opposition of the labor
unions to any controls until after they
had gotten their fourth wave of wage
increases through. This the administra-
ton, closely linked with them politically,
permitted. This will always remain an
indefensible attitude which has greatly
damaged the national interests. AS a
vanced and the. cost of all materials
greatly increased. The freezing of wages
and prices now ordered by Eric john
ston, Director of Economic Sterilization
comes after long months of terribly ex-
pensive inaction. This is not Mr.. john
ston's fault. The fault is Mr.. Trumans.
Here is the administration asking ap-
preparations totaling many billions of
dollars and urging Congress to levy an
additional SIG billion in taxes. Con-
servative estimates fix the deficit for the
next fiscal year at the unbelievable figure
of S25 billion. When you combine
these astronomical figures with an astro-
nomical debt of $275 billion, one
does not have to be a mathematical
genius to grasp the fact that they involve
grave fiscal peril; that they preclude All
possibility of a pay-aS-We-go policy or
balanced budget; that they mean Fed
eral finances have become almost un-
manageable: that we really are threat
ened with governmental financial COL
lapse that would cripple our defense ef-
fort. create condition of chaos. If that
happens-and it can happen-Russia
could win the war without the loss of a
soldier.
LII SuCll SltudGlOIl IL Is Impossible 70
conceive of an excuse for spending a
needless dollar on non defense activities
II there is any other way than rigid
economy to keep the Federal financial
structure from crumbling. no one has
suggested it. The President himself has
often spoken of the necessity for rigid
economy" Yet he has taken no real
step toward that goal. Time and again
it has been pointed out that Congress
cannot make the essential reductions Dy
itself. Any real reduction can only be
achieved under presidential leadership.
That leadership Mr. Truman distinctly
has not provided
Not only has Mr.. Truman exhibited no
desire to lead but in his recent message
to Congress, by advocating various non-
essential and highly costly projects to
which he committed himself in 1948, he
made it clear he has no intention of sup
plying that kind of leadership. In light
of these facts the inertia of the Ameri-
can people is shocking.