THE NOME NUGGET
Published Monday, Wednesday and Friday by The
NOME PUBLISHING CO.
Nome, Alaska
Telephone: Main 125 P. O. Box 618
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W. A. and EMILY BOUCHER.Editors
Entered as second class matter October 14, 1943, at the postoffice at
Nome, Alaska, under the Act of March 3, 1879.
Friday, February 8,1946
ONE MAN’S OPINION
(By WALTER KIERNAN)
* We have a new dive bomber and a new proposal for
disarmament. Now we are practically £et for any event
uality including peace. . . . But that’s the way we do
things these days. As soon as the meatmen went back to
work in New York the specialty bakers voted to go out.
One week it’s let ’em eat cake” and the next week it’s
“Let ’em eat steak.” . . . My neighborhood chiropodist
is the only happy man I know. His books for January
jshow 300 bunions converted into bonds and the pros
pects for callouses never were better. . . . Nylon lines
alone have brought in the gibbest corn crop since the
worlds fair. And corns are any chiropodist’s bread and
butter. . . . There doesn’t seem to be any pleasing some
people—Senor Peron gave everybody in Argentina a
wage increase and came within 30 per cent of losing his
life. . . . There is one bright note in the news—Senator
Taft says there is a 3-billion-dollar item in the budget
not explained and this is the first time in years that
anything under 10 billion has been questioned. . *. . In
Chicago, Harry Bridges has lost in the CIO to organize
mail order employees and Sewell Avery has relaxed
his grip on the arms of his chair.
MR. BEVIN GETS TOUGH
(Seattle Post-Intelligencer)
Foreign Minister Bevin of Great Britain, defending
the British policy in Greece against Russian criticism
before the United Nations Security Council, was quick
to see the incongruity of the Russian position.
The substance of the Russian charge against Britain,
as presented by Vice Commissar Vishinsky, was that
the maintenance of British troops in Greece imperiled
world security. •
Mr. Bevin acidly inquired if the Russian pattern of
armed occupation in other European countries was of
fered as a better example.
He recalled that it was Vishinsky himself who had
administered the Russian occupation of Romania, for in
stance, and that the result had been the establishment
of a puppet regime bound body and soul to Russia—the
Romanian people having had no opportunity whatever
for self-expression or self-determination .
“We could have done (in Grecee) what Vishinsky did
in Romania// said Mr. Bevin.
“We could have put a minority government in—we
had the power.
“But we did not.
(We let the Greeks have their own government.
“We believe that democracy must come from the bot
tom up, not from the top.”
Moreover, Mr. Bevin was further provoked to
say, while there is indeed a real danger to world
peace, there is only one nation in the world respon
sible and accountable for that danger—and that
one nation is Soviet Russia.
The greatest menace to peace and security extant in
the world today is the continuous and persistent and
ruthless and unscrupulous dissemination of “Moscow
and Communist party propaganda,” as Mr. Bevin said.
Throughout all the peace loving and peace seeking
nations of the world, he reminded the security council,
“there is an incessant propaganda from Moscow.”
The world-wide dissemination of this Russian propa
ganda, he charged, is conducted “with no sign of friend
rship.”
It is the product of suspicion and it incites and pro
vokes suspicion and it deliberately and designedly util
RECRUIT_
I
izes and creates suspicion among all peoples and against
all peoples, and “this incessant suspicion is the danger,’’
j he observed.
If the only service to the peaceful aspirations of the
civilized world the United Nations Organization ever
performs is the provoking of Mr. Bevin into telling the
blunt and tough truth about Russia, it will still have a
good service to its credit.
—
INFLUENZA VACCINE READY FOR CIVILIANS
(Science Digest)
Influenza vaccine of the kind now being given to all
Army personnel will be available for civilian use this
winter.
The vaccine is effective against Types A and B influ
enza. These are the types which have caused epidemics
in recent years. Other types of influenza virus exist.
Authorities do no tknow whether the world-wide influ
enza epidemic in 1917-1918 was due to A or B virus or
to some other type.
Army studies, prior to the general vaccination order,
showed that about 75% of those vaccinated were pro
tected against influenza during outbreaks which oc
curred soon after the vaccination. How long the immun
ity; or protection, lasts is not definitely known.
The vaccine is given by hypod^mic injection of a
single dose of one cubic centimeter (about one-fourth of
a teaspoonful).
The vaccine is made from influenza virus grown on
chick embryo. The following firms have been manufac
turing the vaccine: Lederle, Squibb, Sharp and Dohme,
Lilly, Pitman-Moore and Parke-Davis. Some manufac
turers have already applied to the National Institute of
, Health for licenses to manufacture the vaccine for civil
| ian use. It is expected that firms which have not yet
j made the vaccine may do so in the future.
i
. LOOKING
f AHEAD
yn GEORGE 1 BENSON
k PraideHt—Mardltf idkgi
■ Sarqr. Jritmtm
i
PLUNDER
Wars are wasteful and every
body knows it. An emotional plea
for national defense is all it takes
to raise money from patriotic peo
ple. Men and women will sacrifice,
will give until it hurts when their
sons are at war. A young man, far
from home, living (?) under condi
tions new to him and unknown to
his parents, is the unfailing com
bination to the family’s treasure
chest.
Whether parents be rich or poor,
they will buy their son's passage
from a foreign war every day un
til he comes, so long as they can
find the money, and nobody
blames them. They will do it, even
if they fear that the money they
offer is imprudently spent, or that
part of it is diverted into selfish
channels. But hostilities have
ceased now. Things are different.
Frugality Revives
People of the United States have
begun watching where their tax
money goes and wondering if it is
being wisely spent. It is small
wonder that Congress bristles at
every suggestion 10 continue com
modity price controls until thi
middle of 1946. Holding the pric<
line costs something, and does no
seem half as important to a war
weary people as it did before th<
last foreign beach-head was taken
Evidences keep, coming to ligh
that taxpayers’ money has beer
wasted by men in positions ol
trust. A recent public statement bj
Senator Harry F. Byrd of Virginu
said more than three and one-hall
million civilians were on federa
payrolls last November 1, com
pared with less than one million
in August 1939; or 917,760 when
the shooting stopped at the end ol
World War I.
Needless Expense
There is an element in govern
ment today, seeking not merely tc
continue the life of the OPA bu1
to expand its functions. Already
our government’s price-fi xinj
“mechanics” have started making
arbitrary adjustments in margins
to be earned by wholesalers and
distributing agencies, an activitj
not even thought-about for the
OPA at the time it was created.
It would be unfair to allege tha1
this enormous bureau’s entire war
time activity was useless. Price
controls have done some good, as
arbitrary shields against abnormal
dangers. They have also done some
harm. A retail merchant, whom 1
have known since I was a boy,
told me recently that he made
more net gain selling under war
time Drice ceilings than he had
made during his previous 25 years
in business.
Controlling Prices
Questioned for more detail, my
retailer friend acknowledged to
me that price controls placed on
him by government during the
war were much more lenient than
price controls placed on him by
competitors all his business life.
And I am sure it is no more true
in his case than it would be with
such institutions as Ford, Chrys
ler and General Motors. Competi
tion is the correct brake on prices.
Regardless of what name it may
wear: Price Control, Federal Aid
to Education or Socialized Medi
c:ne, centralization of power is un
democratic. It is paying a power
hungry ruler for doing something
that would happen naturally if
he would only step aside. It is
someone climbing to power by
learning what neoole want and
devising a way to keep them from
getting it, while making them
tvink he is trying to get it for
them.
Army Carrying Out Speedy
Demobilization Program
Headouarters Alaskan Depart
ment, Feb. 4—More than half of
the Army’s 86 combat divisions
and 6 of the 17 Army Air Forces
have already been inactivated as
part of the speedy demobilization
program, an Army News Service
dispatch stated today.
The rate of demobilization is ex
pected to accelerate as additional
divisions and Air Forces return
from the theaters. So far, the
names of five divisions have been
mentioned as part of the strategic
reserve, the Regular Army organ
ization (the 2nd, 4th, and 5th in
fantry, the 82nd airborne and the
2nd armored). It is assumed that
more divisions will be designated
as post-war planning progresses,
the ANS dispatch said.