Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that fighting continued
between the Greek Army and the Communist guerrillas in the
Konitsa-Ioannina region of Northern Greece. Konitsa, attacked three
times by the guerrillas, was reportedly under a state of siege.
Guerrilla units from Albania had captured the Bourazani Bridge,
scene of the fiercest fighting. An Army communique stated that 96
guerrillas had been killed and 63 taken prisoner during the previous
24 hours. The Government, in response to the attacks, was reportedly
planning to outlaw the Communist Party.
Several members of Congress predicted that the Soviet Union
would increase its pressure on the Athens Government to recognize
the "free state" with undefined borders, declared by
guerrilla leader Markos Vifiades the previous Wednesday.
Representative Richard Nixon of California predicted that the
Administration would thus be prompted to ask for as much as 400
million dollars in additional aid for Greece, supplementing the 300
million already appropriated the previous spring. Other GOP
Congressmen also voiced opinions on the matter.
In Palestine, four Jews and six Arabs were killed in fighting
this date, some of the deaths occurring in a reprisal attack
conducted by Haganah on the Arab village of Silwan. The deaths
brought the total killed in Palestine since partition had been
approved by the U.N. on November 29, to 379 dead, with 500 killed
throughout the Middle East.
The President appointed Secretary of State Marshall to
administer the 522 million dollar winter emergency aid program to
France, Italy, and Austria.
In Warsaw, two underground leaders, convicted of supplying
state and military secrets to American and British diplomats, were
sentenced to death as traitors. Five other defendants were sentenced
to life imprisonment as spies. Two others received 15 and 12-year
sentences.
The Department of Agriculture stated that at least 71
Federal, state, and local jobholders would be included in the next
release of names of speculators in wheat futures, said to be
partially responsible for inflated prices. A new list of 1,240 names
had been released the previous night, involving speculation on the
Chicago market in wheat futures, but no recognizable government
jobholder was included.
In the Philippines, following the worst December typhoon to
hit the country in 30 years, 49 had been killed or were missing, 32
of whom were aboard a sunken vessel. Twenty-nine passengers and crew
had been rescued.
In New England, at least fourteen people had died from the
winter snow storm which hit the area the previous day, dumping over
twenty inches of snow on Connecticut and Western Massachusetts.
Three of the dead were in Massachusetts, all from heart attacks from
over-exertion.
The total number of deaths from the storm had reached 41 in
the Mid-Atlantic states, extending from New York to Washington. New
Jersey suffered 13 deaths and New York, 11.
New York City had been hit with its worst snowfall in city
history, 25.8 inches, and an emergency plan was put into effect to
protect the citizens by clearing streets to enable vital deliveries
of fuel and food. Only eight ambulances were reported available for
use for the 2.7 million population of Brooklyn, and conditions in
Queens were reported to be "bad". The previous record
snowfall was 20.9 inches, occurring in 1888. The storm dropped an
average of 1.8 inches per hour for nearly 16 hours.
Times Square was filled with persons stranded in the city
with little money and time to kill. Workers who normally went home
after work were patronizing the dime beer bars. Some of the larger
nightclubs, however, had more entertainers than patrons, as the
persons able to afford them were also able to pay their way home. A
pair of skiers were seen on Madison Avenue and others were observed
skiing in Central Park. A sleigh brought two passengers to the Savoy
Plaza Hotel. Two detectives used their powers of deduction to dig
out their buried car, before discovering that they had detected the
wrong vehicle, presumably unmarked. Bus companies reported 2,000
vehicles lost, their whereabouts unknown.
We've been telling you about them Martians who landed last
July. Now, maybe you will understand.
At Bear Mountain, officials of the Palisades Interstate Park
were joyful at the snowfall, predicting record crowds for winter
sports—as long as you did not die getting there.
In Brindletown, N.C., near Morganton in Burke County, a
78-year old man burned to death in his home as his daughter and
son-in-law looked on, unable to rescue him. The man's son later
arrived on the scene and also was unable to battle the intense heat
of the blaze to get to his father.
In Charlotte, a delivery boy was arrested for hit-and-run on
a motorcycle after he was spotted carrying a replacement windshield
for the bike. The motorcyclist had hit a man from Detroit on
Christmas morning.
That's no way to treat an out-of-towner in the "Friendly
City", especially on Christmas morning.
In London, pursuant to a report from a man who had purchased
four pairs of suspenders made under Government decree limiting the
elastic to three inches at the back, finding then that the
suspenders had broken within three months, the Times
editorialized: "The four freedoms are a hollow mockery if our
braces are going to be bursting all the time. No nation can be
expected to hold up its head if it is also required to hold up its
trousers."
On the editorial page, "Fuel Oil Crisis a Scandal"
discusses the local fuel oil shortage. According to industry
representatives, it stemmed from distribution problems. But Mayor
Herbert Baxter had been able to find precious little available
anywhere in the country.
The Administration had taken no action to dip into Government
reserves or speed transportation. The only action to alleviate the
crisis had been an agreement between the local distributors and the
City Council and that had proved far from adequate. Drastic
conservation measures appeared the only hope to ameliorate the
crisis, which the piece finds scandalous.
"'Colossus of the North'" suggests that Panama, for
the sake of its wounded pride, was holding the U.S. over a barrel in
not approving the leases of 14 wartime bases desired by the U.S. to
protect the country and the Canal Zone. It called attention to the
fact that the U.S. was not universally adored or trusted in the
Western Hemisphere. Panama reflected a growing sentiment in Latin
America against the notion of Yankee imperialism and dollar
diplomacy of the turn of the century, revived during and since the
war.
Without the bases, the U.S. could not properly protect the
Canal, jeopardizing the defense system of the entire Western
Hemisphere. While building a new canal in Nicaragua, Colombia, or in
Mexico had been discussed, it was not clear how feasible such a
project would be. The Panamanian situation thus needed to be
rectified through diplomacy.
"Three Forecasts for the New Year" tells of Senator
Wayne Morse of Oregon predicting that his fellow Republicans would
reverse themselves on the voluntary control measure passed in the
special session and authorize limited controls on wages and prices
while also allowing the President to impose rationing. He believed
it would come after the GOP members returned from their homes and
heard public sentiment from their constituents.
The piece says that it reluctantly was prepared to venture
that Senator Morse's prediction was unlikely to come true. His
constituents in Oregon were not representative of most GOP
constituencies and the Republicans had determined to run in 1948 as
the party of non-regimentation. Furthermore, the report from the
President's Council of Economic Advisers had indicated that 1948
would see a relaxation in inflation, provided it would be a good
crop year.
So, it concludes, it fit the GOP faith in Providence that
the goddess of harvests favored Senator Taft.
A piece from the Christian Science Monitor, titled
"What Would Panchito Say?" wonders what the Tepexpan
Man—as distinguished from Teflon Man—, estimated to be 10,000 to
15,000 years old, the remains of whom had been recently discovered
in the Valley of Mexico, would state about modern man running the
world. He was the only known exemplar of man in the Americas in
ancient times, sharing his world with now extinct bison, mammoths,
and other mammals.
The piece wonders whether he would not find the modern instruments of
war barbaric and the methods of diplomacy worthy of the Stone Age.
As "wars begin in the minds of men", as the preamble to
UNESCO had stated it, "it is in the minds of men that the
defenses of peace must be constructed."
Gustav Svensson, substituting for Drew Pearson, whose column
was not received in time for press, tells of the 40-year reign of
King Gustaf V of Sweden.
You can read all about it. We're on holiday, too.
A piece from the Congressional Quarterly examines the
record of the 80th Congress in its first session and special session
in 1947, the first Republican-majority House and Senate in 16 years.
It had authorized the Truman Doctrine aid to Greece and
Turkey, ratified the peace treaties with Italy, Hungary, Bulgaria,
and Rumania, ratified the Inter-American Treaty negotiated at Rio in
August, proposed the Amendment to the Constitution, which would
later be ratified, limiting the President to two terms in office,
outlawed suits for portal-to-portal pay, passed the Taft-Hartley
Act, removed controls on construction which had allocated resources,
removed controls on rents, allowing 15 percent increases in rents
based on written leases through 1948, unified the armed forces under
a Defense Department, authorized 350 million dollars for foreign
relief in occupation zones, appropriated 540 million dollars in
emergency aid for Austria, Italy, and France, and passed the
voluntary inflation control measure, still not yet signed by the
President.
Throughout most of the regular and special sessions, the
Congress behaved under the shadow of the impending 1948 elections.
The Republicans had come to power as the party of fiscal
responsibility, to reel in unnecessary spending under the New Deal,
but had fallen far short of the goals it had set for savings. The
final reductions thus far amounted to 2.9 billion dollars against an
amount set at six billion in the House bill and 4.5 billion in the
Senate version, the two figures never having been reconciled in
joint committee.
Twice during the session, the Republicans had sought to
reduce taxes and twice the President had vetoed the bills, both
times sustained. The two bills were essentially identical, save for
the effective dates. Democrats criticized the tax cut for favoring
only the higher brackets.
The Congress adjourned without acting on long-term housing
and the anti-inflation measure was severely criticize by Democrats
as inadequate.
Barnet Nover predicts that ERP might undergo heavy sledding
in the regular session of Congress, judging from the problems
encountered in getting only the emergency aid passed in the special
session. But it was unlikely that no recovery program would be
passed. Even those members as Senator Taft, who feared that it would
wreck the American economy, likely would vote for some measure in
the end. For rejecting it would lend tacit affirmation to the
Soviets and their plans to expand Communism into Western Europe. But
there was no assurance that the ERP to be passed would be that
proposed by the President and Secretary of State Marshall.
During the emergency aid debate, there were consistent
refrains that there was no need to have a long-range commitment, but
rather only an annual appropriation to be reassessed each year. The
naysayers would continue to argue that the aid would be wasted, as
prior aid had been, and that the gravity of the situation in Western
Europe had been over-dramatized.
Still other opponents contended that there was no way to save
Western Europe from Communism and that it was of no moment, in any
event, vis-à-vis
the U.S.
But such new isolationism had few followers. Most disfavored
ERP, if at all, for its presumed adverse economic consequences.
The program would involve a sacrifice even if it only
amounted to three percent of national income, as calculated by the
Administration. The plan might cost more than estimated, as the
estimates were the result of progressive watering down of the
program to accommodate political opposition and make it more
palatable to the public pocketbook.
Mr. Nover concludes that if the job was worth doing, then the
country could not object to the cost.
Samuel Grafton tells of a book which he endorses, What Is
Life? by Erwin Schrodinger, published in 1946, regarding
chromosome behavior, where the normal laws of physics appeared not
to apply. The professor combined atomic physics with biology to look
at the chromosome, which he regarded as determining individual
qualities through molecular interaction. At body temperature,
chromosomes could remain stable through centuries, thus passing
behavioral characteristics generationally. But under heat or the
effect of X-rays, they could suddenly change to produce a mutation.
Professor Schrodinger had performed experiments on the fruit
fly with X-rays precisely targeting certain chromosomes to produce
such changes. "Precision" meant hitting the chromosomal
structure within a billionth of a meter.
Mr. Grafton compares the thus explained precision of science
with the imprecision of public discourse, that some believed in
shooting everyone who disagreed with them, that others believed that
the Marshall Plan would bankrupt the country. An editor had opined
that there ought be Federal censorship of movies.
He finds a possible explanation for the disparity between
exactitude in science and that in public debate, that offered
solutions to problems were no more than reflections of fears in a
modern age, in which disorganization superseded any form.
He recommends Professor Schrodinger's book as a contrast with
such ephemera as characterized the typical public discussion of
political and economic issues.
Happy third day of Christmas: Nearly three feet of snow in
the North, and three nations grateful for winter aid, and, somewhere
swirling through the otherwise unknown and untrammeled stretches of
the Universe, three Martians, tickled greener by their causation of chaos on Earth.