THE NOME NUGGET
Published Monday, Wednesday and Friday by the
NOME PUBLISHING CO.
NOME. ALASKA
Telephone: Main 125 P. O. Box 618
$1.50 PER MONTH $16.00 A YEAR
W. A. Boucher .Owner-Publisher
Entered as second class matter October 14. 1943, at the postoffice
•t Nome, Alaska, under the Act of March 3, 1879.
Nome, Alaska, Monday, February 20, 1950
WHAT IS COMMUNISM? By George Peck
Communism kills all initiative, all incentive. Why
should a worker try to do a better job; why should he
work harder if his reward is only to be equal to that of
another worker who has less ability and does not apply
himself so diligently? In America, under capitalism, the
skilled and industrious worker gets an equitable reward
plus the opportunity to advance to an executive posi
tion. As proof of this latter, take a look at the thousands
of men now holding key positions in American industry
I who started at the bench.
Communism is an idealistic but thoroughly impracti
cal and unworkable theory. This will be true just as long
as human beings are human. To aspire to better things;
the ambition to outstrip one’s fellows is but human. In
the earlier days of mankind it was the fellow with the
strongest muscle, and who exercised it, who became the
| “boss man.” Since then civilization has marched on until
1 today it is the fellow with the strongest brain, and who
exercises it, who works his way to the top of the heap.
There is an aristocracy of brains and such a hierarchy
will not stomach Communism. Either it must operate
; under a Republic, or sit in the saddle of a Dictatorship.
The greatest benefit for material welfare of mankind
comes not from placing control of wealth in a few hands,
as under Communism, but from encouraging a wide dis
tribution of wealth, with special incentive rewards for
those creating it, as under Capitalism. Living standards
of any peopld can rise only in proportion to the wealth
created. Wherever Capitalism operates, with govern*
ment umpiring but not controlling, a maximum of wealth
is created. But wherever Communism has operated,
wealth has been cut down to an irreducible minimum.
OPPOSITE NUMBERS IN BRITISH ELECTION —
</P) Newsfeatures
WINSTON CHURCHILL and CLEMENT ATTLEE, leaders of
the opposing parties in the British election, February 23, come
from similar social classes. Attlee, a lawyer and son of a lawyer,
might be called upper middle class. Churchill, the grandson of
I
duke, is an aristocrat. Both attended England’s privileged public
schools. Each was a leader in his party at an early age and
held various cabinet posts when his party was in power. But
here the similarity ends.
CHURCHILL has been the dashing soldier, trained at Sand
hurst Military Acamedy. He is the brilliant writer and orator who
has command of the telling phrase. He is the Conservative who
backs the idea of empire.
At 75, he is more than eight years older than his opponent.
Paunchy, with heavy jowls and a rugged jaw, he symbolizes John
Bull.
As a soldier, he helped Spain quell rebels in Cuba in 1895,
fought on India's frontier iml897. He was on the Nile in 1898 and
in the Boer war in 1899-1900. He first went to parliament in 1900.
He was first lord of the Admiralty in 1911-15. And he was an offi
cer in World War I, fighting for part of 1915 and 1916. Then he
went back to the government in 1917.
In World War II he became the leader and symbol of his coun
try's fight to defeat Hitler. As the days of appeasement drew to
a close he again became first lord of the Admiralty. When war
came he was called as prime minister.
His coalition government drew all groups of the nation to
gether. His flaming oratory kept the confidence of the people and
stirred his future Allies.
After the fall of France, he grimly kept Britain and the empire
in the fight alone.
He has close ties with President Roosevelt and later worked
with Joseph Stalin.
"I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat," he said
when he became prime minister. Ond after Dunkerque: "We shall
fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we
shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the
hills, we shall never surrender."
But when Germany had been beaten, he lost the election to
Attlee, the Socialist who has been his deputy prime minister. The
people, observers agreed, rejected the Conservative, not the war
leader.
Churchill, his cigar still clamped in his teeth, his pudgy fingers
still making the V for victory sign, joined the opposition. He
slashed at Labor programs, scoffed at moves which, he said, broke
up the empire.
Still the Conservative, he fight for a comeback against the tide
ot socialism.
ATTLEE is the scholar who took honors at Oxford. As a
young man he joined the Socialist Party when it was "not quite
respectable." He went into the London slums to see how work
ingmen lived and himself worked for a time on the docks. Then
he went into social work.
With a brush mustache, Attlee is slight. He smokes a pipe in
contrast to the Churchill cigar. His speaking voice is thin and
halting. Some observers say he is not brilliant. But they also
speak of his clear thinking. ,
As a young men he worked in settlement houses, talked on
street corners, taught in Sacialist schools. He said he was a
pacifist, but he enlisted in World War I and became a captain
in 1915. When war was over he went into politics.
He worked closely with the Labor Party when it was the oppo
sition. And when it took over the government in the 1920s he held
a series of vital posts.
When the coalition government took power at the start of Word
War II, he was one of the first Laborites asked to join it. Soon, he
was deputy prime minister. As such he often appeared in the
shadow of the brilliant Churchill. He worked loyally to help win
the war. But once Germany was beaten his party got an election
and won full control.
The Socialist program started with the nationalisation of the
Bank of England. It went on to take over fuel and transport.
A cradle-to-grave welfare program included free health service.
Other sectors of the economy was marked out for taking over.
Attlee worked quietly to push the plans through.
He found England facing trouble because the cost of war had
wrecked vital parts of the economy. His ministers made austerity
the rule. In some instances, rations were lower than they had
been during the war. But Attlee was grim in his drive to make the
new England a Socialist country.
Critics were bitter. Attlee had no drama of war with which to
answer them. He had no genius for oratory to present his ideas.
He stuck to his logic and his quiet work. Things got done, but
critics talked on. The date at which an election would have to be
held was near. Attlee set the date.
Today ha fights to hold powar. Ha stands on his record and tha
ideas ha found in tha Limahousa slum district in early life.
B-36 Survivors
To Aid In Search
For Missing Five
(Continued from Page One)
cials said the trio, still tired from
their experiences, would remain
here to study photographs of the
area over which they jumped.
Knowing the order in which the
men left the plane, it was hoped
that Barry and his two fellow
crewmembers might be able to
pinpoint the spots where their
lost comrades landed.
Before leaving Texas, however,
Barry and Gerhart said they be
lieved the missing men might be
on Ashdown Island, a tiny strip
adjacent to Princess Royal.
Search crews from the Canadi
an destroyer Cayuga and four U.
S. coast guard cutters crss-crossed
the tiny island Saturday without
success.
Meanwhile, rescue officials had
nothing but praise for the conduct
of Lt. Charles G. Pooler, Beloit,
Kas., the twelfth member of the
crew to be brought out safely.
He was returned to McChord
Air Force Base, near Tacoma,
Wash., last night in a flight C 4th
Rescue Squadron C-47 from Port
Hardy, B. C.
Pooler is in remarksDiy good
condiiton,” said Col. Hervey Por
ter, air force doctor, after an ex
amination of the injured man.
“He has a simple fracture of the
right ankle and a mild case of
frostbite o fthe right ankle.”
Although too tired to be inter
viewed, Pooler’s story was pieced
together from other participants
in the now seven-day-old search
who accompanied him back.
“He did everything just right,”
they declared.
They gave this account of his
experiences:
When the 36-year-old engineer
plummeted into the darkness, his
parachute snagged on a tree and
left him swinging 40 feet in the
air. It was believed that his an
kle was broken then when he cut
himself down.
After sizing up his condition
and location, Pooler cut his three
chocolate bars into 18 pieces—
one piece for each day and night
of the nine days he figured it
take him to hobble on his broken
ankle through knee-deep snows
to the island coast.
He kept to this schedule for two
days and nights until, on the third
day, he heard ground parties
beating the brush about a quarter
mile on each side of him.
Summoning his strength, he
started yelling. His calls were
heard by searchers from the Ca
nadian destroyer Cayuga who fi
nally reached him.
FEDERAL INCOME TAX
AGENT HERE
James G. Manning, agent of the
Internal Revenue Department ar
rived yesterday with Pan Ameri
can.
Mr. Manning will be located in
the Federal Building until March
15th, to assist people with their •
problems on income tax.
SENIOR OFFICERS VISIT
MARKS AIR FORCE BASE
Eighteen senior officers of the
army, navy and air force visited
Marks Air Force Base on Thurs
day of last week and remained
overnight on an Arctic Orienta
tion Tour.
This week 13 officers and three
civilians are expected on a medi
cal research survey. In the party
will be Major General Harry G.
Armstrong, Surgeon General who
was recently appointed. The party
will remain overnight.