The Charlotte News
Saturday, August 1, 1959
THREE EDITORIALS
Site Ed. Note: The front page reports from Geneva that, according to top Western diplomats this date, the U.S. had sounded out allied governments on their reaction to a possible invitation from the President to Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev to visit the U.S. The informants said that the feasibility had been discussed of a Western summit meeting in advance of the prospect of bilateral talks between the President and Premier Khrushchev. The development had been announced as the Big Four foreign ministers conference neared its completion, scheduled for Wednesday, with negotiations on the Berlin crisis stalled and hope for any East-West agreement virtually abandoned. In diplomatic quarters in Geneva, the impression had prevailed this date that an invitation from the President to Mr. Khrushchev would be announced within the ensuing few days. Vice-President Nixon, who had been touring Russia, was scheduled to depart from Moscow the following day for Warsaw. At the Moscow Airport this date, Mr. Khrushchev had inspected the jet airliners which had taken Mr. Nixon and a company of newsmen to Moscow and said that he would like to fly to the U.S. in one of those planes "or some other one". British Foreign Secretary Selwyn Lloyd was reported to have told Secretary of State Christian Herter that the British Government would welcome an Eisenhower-Khrushchev talk and felt that it could be useful. The West German Government of Chancellor Konrad Adenauer was also reported to raise no objection, but rather to have taken the view that the meeting could be useful. It was understood that Chancellor Adenauer was one of those who wanted to see a Western summit meeting. If such a meeting were arranged, the thinking in diplomatic quarters in Geneva was that it might be as early as the end of August, with Mr. Khrushchev visiting Washington afterward, possibly in September. Secretary Herter's office maintained silence on such speculation this date and directed all inquiries to the White House. Within the framework of the stalled foreign ministers conference regarding the Berlin crisis, a bilateral meeting between the two leaders was regarded as an alternative to an early summit conference, one which might help in the long run to pave the way to a summit conference toward the end of 1959 or sometime in 1960.
In Moscow, it was reported that Vice-President Nixon had warned Mr. Khrushchev this date of an "era of fear, suspicion and tension" should Russia try to communize foreign countries. In a farewell speech broadcast by radio and television, Mr. Nixon had called for a "just peace based on mutual respect rather than the peace of surrender or dictation by either side." He had spoken in blunt terms, indicating that he welcomed a visit by Mr. Khrushchev to the U.S., but stopped short of saying that he would recommend it to the President when he returned to Washington. He said: "Putting it bluntly, both of our peoples want peace but both of us also possess great strength and, much as we want peace, neither of us can or will tolerate being pushed around. We should explore ways of increasing contacts of this type," referring to his own visit and the visits of Deputy Premiers Anastas Mikoyan and Frol Kozlov recently to the U.S. He pledged that the U.S. would strive unceasingly for peace even though Mr. Khrushchev and U.S. leaders "disagreed sharply" regarding key world problems. His speech had been carried on a television network extending to a radius of about 200 miles around Moscow, where there were several million viewers, and on a radio network stretching throughout the Soviet Union, making it impossible to estimate the total number of viewers and listeners. He proposed certain steps toward building better Soviet-U.S. understanding, including that the President and Premier Khrushchev ought agree to talk directly to each other's peoples in "regular radio and television broadcasts", that all of the President's foreign policy speeches ought be printed in the Soviet Union in return for printing all such pieces by Mr. Khrushchev in the U.S., that a new "sharply expanded" exchange of persons ought be agreed upon along with more cultural exchanges, and that the Soviet Union ought stop jamming Voice of America broadcasts to allow the Soviet people to hear American views, and to agree to allow more American magazines and publications into the country. He stated: "Through this greater exchange of information between our two peoples, we not only learn from each other and improve our way of life but we reduce the suspicion, the mistrust, the fear and misunderstanding and assure the understanding and friendship which will lead to the peace we all want." The Vice-President's speech was scheduled for re-broadcast over three local radio stations in Charlotte this date, at varying times.
In Idaho Falls, Ida., it was reported that the paralyzing poison in a jar of home-canned beets had claimed a second victim on Friday night and that of the four who had survived, one was near death and two were in serious condition with the last possibly out of danger. All six had been felled by botulism, a nerve-attacking poison produced by bacteria growing in improperly cooked food. A doctor called it one of the most deadly poison substances known to man. A 15-year old girl had died in an iron long on Friday evening and early on Thursday, a 74-year old farmer had also died. A new shipment of rare botulism antitoxin had been expected during the morning as doctors fought to save the survivors. In the gravest condition among the survivors had been the 15-year old girl's father, 45, of Kansas City, Mo., who was, according to the doctor, in a coma, with his nerves controlling his breathing muscles completely paralyzed. He and his wife were both in iron lungs, and another lung stood by in case it was needed by his elderly mother. A four-year old girl, another daughter, was under treatment, but the doctor said that she might not have eaten as much of the deadly beets as had the others, as her condition appeared satisfactory. The family had arrived on vacation on Monday and had eaten the beets on Tuesday. The firm which made the botulism antitoxin in the country had rounded up more than half a million units from its offices around the country for shipment to Idaho Falls, and another shipment of 400,000 units was dispatched from New York on Friday night.
In Howard, R.I., it was reported that two tough criminals and a mental patient this date had scaled a wall at State Prison, and ordered a guard to drive them to Providence, then escaped in an awaiting automobile. Authorities identified one prisoner as a 38-year old man serving 20 years for attempting to kill a police officer, and the other as a 28-year old man serving life for the rape-killing of an 88-year old school teacher. The third escapee had been identified as a 19-year old, who had been transferred to the prison hospital from the State mental institution because of tendencies toward violence. The three had captured a 23-year old guard at the point of a screwdriver after leaping from the 20-foot wall. The head of the Rhode Island Correctional Services said that the break had been planned and executed with precision, that all three had been in their cells at the prison hospital, two of them present for observation, when they had escaped in an as yet unexplained manner. They crossed the 40-yard prison yard, climbed the wall with a long rope and leaped to freedom, taking the guard as hostage in his own car. The break had not been discovered until the guard had called police at 1:15 a.m.
In Beckley, W. Va., it was reported that five persons had been killed in a head-on collision of two cars on the West Virginia Turnpike, about 15 miles north of Beckley, with five others hospitalized. A State police lieutenant said that the accident had happened at milepost 53, near the Mossy Interchange. Involved in the wreck had been six soldiers from Fort Bragg, N.C., in one car, and four persons from Troy, O., in the other. He said that one car been on the wrong side of the road, but that the two cars had been so demolished that it was impossible to tell which had been the offender. The accident had occurred at around 2:30 a.m. One soldier said that he had been sleeping in the back seat at the time of the accident and that the first thing he knew,"I was picking myself up from the turnpike." Parts of the vehicles were scattered all over the highway. It was the worst accident in the history of the 88-mile toll road, which had been opened in 1954. Two years earlier, four high school youths, celebrating graduation, had been killed on the turnpike. That, undoubtedly, is not what he had in mind, when he wrote, "Take me home, country roads." Drive safely.
In Asheville, N.C., it was reported that a young coed, 22, from Cleveland, O., had been charged with a disfiguring hatchet attack upon a sleeping classmate and was ordered confined to the State mental institution in Raleigh on Friday. She was charged with first-degree burglary after the May 20 attack on her female classmate of Guilford College, N.C., while asleep in her dormitory room at Warren Wilson College near Asheville. The classmate had recovered, though she had been in critical condition for several days.
In Charlotte, it was reported that one man had been killed and another wounded in a late morning shooting this date. Police identified the victim, who was thought to live at the scene of the shooting, with officers indicating he had been shot twice in the head and was dead on their arrival at the scene during the late morning. Also shot was a 33-year old man, officials at the Good Samaritan Hospital having listed his condition as fair, having been shot in the left side. No warrant had yet been filed against a man taken into custody in the shootings. From witness accounts, police said that a fight had preceded the shootings, with one witness indicating that he, the arrested man and another man had been standing on the street at around 10:00 a.m. with three or four girls, when a man had walked by and the arrested man had hit the man walking by, prompting the man to slap the arrested man in the face and then proceed. Then, the arrested man and the other man with him had returned and the arrested man had a gun.
In Grand Canyon, Ariz., it was reported that a teenage Georgia boy, hungry, blistered by the sun, scratched and cut by boulders, had this date told in a soft, Southern accent his story of his six-day fight for life in the wilds of the canyon. The 15-year old from Savannah had been found Friday lying on a sandbar along the Colorado River, but his two companions on a hiking trip had perished. He was brought by Army helicopter from the canyon to a hospital on the rim. There, from his bed, in between sips of orange juice, he related his story of courage, determination and death. He told how a 30-year old priest and a 16-year old friend, both of Savannah, had lost their bids for survival and how he had survived. He said that they had departed on Friday, July 23, that the "padre" had said that 15 years earlier, when he was a little boy, he had found a silver mine down the trail and the two younger boys had talked him into taking them. They had taken three bottles of water, a snake-bite kit, a first-aid kit and some food. All of the water had been exhausted the first day and then they lost the trail at night. They could not sleep because of their thirst and early the following morning, they had walked along a cliff for what seemed like miles and did not find any more food, starting to eat cactus pulp. The boy had started yelling and "some joker on the other side started yelling like an ape or something. Somebody else hollered, 'Do you really need help.'" He had hollered back that they did. Then they decided to go back to the river to get water and came to a cliff which was slick and steep. They started down the cliff and the padre had slipped, turned about eight times and hit his head, bounced a couple of times and landed on his back. His young friend had gone into hysterics and he wanted to help the padre but they could not make it down the cliff. He said he knew at that point that the padre was dead. They started back to the river and about 1.5 miles from it, his friend had become exhausted and sat down on a rock. When he asked him whether he was coming, he just sat there, and it was the last time he had seen him. The boy's body had been discovered on Sunday near where the survivor had left him. He said that when he reached the river, he drank, swam, and drank some more, built a raft of logs and his elastic belt, left three notes in the sand, one indicating that he was heading down the river to the bridge, another indicating that his friend was okay the last time he had seen him in the ravine, and the third indicating that the padre was probably dead after falling about 150 feet. He started downstream and prayed every minute of every day, never having prayed so much in his life. He hit rapids and almost drowned, continuing to pray. "The water was like a washing machine. The raft turned over and I went under. I made it to the bank. I decided to get to the other side. There was no vegetation on this side. I chickened." He then told himself that he was not a man unless he could do it and so he jumped in and swam to the sandbar. One day he found an empty can of spiced ham and that night dreamed that a diesel truck of spiced ham had come into the canyon, that he climbed into the truck and eaten that "good old ham." He built a windbreak out of something and later dreamed that the padre was there with him and had said, "That's the way to use your head, boy." He ate some mesquite beans, having to search for food on his hands and knees while his feet were sore. Then, the previous day, he had made a sign by piling rocks, determined that searchers might see his sign, as they had apparently not seen the others he had left. This time they did see his sign. "I never gave up hope. I only thought of death once and that's when I flipped over in the rapids. I prayed, that's what helped me." A park ranger said that the boy's escape from death had been a miracle, and that for a 15-year old, he had shown tremendous assurance. "He is a man now."
In Halifax, Nova Scotia, it was reported that Queen Elizabeth was winding up her 45-day visit to Canada this date with a glittering state dinner after meeting with the federal Cabinet and presenting new colors to the Canadian Navy.
On the editorial page, "The Scapegoat's in the Nearest Mirror" indicates that outraged squawks about the shortage of Salk polio vaccine "at the very time we need it most" had a suspiciously hollow ring. It finds that if a scapegoat was what North Carolinians wanted, they should look into the nearest mirror.
The public's apathy, not that of the manufacturer, had been to blame for the current shortage. Too many North Carolinians had simply ignored the threat of the crippling disease, having been dangerously indifferent to the promise of the Salk vaccine. Memories were unfortunately short as the 1948 polio epidemic had provided a frightening page to North Carolina's history books. The discovery of the vaccine had offered genuine hope that such a thing would never occur again.
The state had a compulsory vaccine law for all children between the ages of two months and six years, but for the most part, adults had carelessly disregarded the threat to their own health. Now, with polio cases on the rise in the state, there had been a run on the available vaccine and the fact that many adults had been stricken, with some having died, had heightened the sudden sense of urgency.
Plenty of the vaccine had been produced, but manufacturers actually had to throw some of it away when the number of people applying for polio shots declined sharply before the recent outbreaks. The vaccine had an effective life of only six months and would not keep. Rather than let other supplies spoil, the manufacturers had begun shipping it abroad in large quantities. Leftover vaccine was also sent to Kansas, Oklahoma and Iowa where there were major outbreaks reported, with the consequence that North Carolina now had to wait its turn again. Such had been the price of apathy.
"There is a grim lesson here and it ought to be heeded. Polio has not been wiped out. It is going to turn up again and again. It is ridiculous to wait until an area is in the midst of a blazing epidemic to take precautions which should have been taken well in advance."
Polio was now rarer during the winter months and the headlines were fewer, but, as the National Foundation had tried to teach, a stitch in time was not only the best personal policy but the only one which offered real protection. Most North Carolinians had ignored that advice in the past and it urges that they had better learn it at present and remember it into the future.
Regarding vaccines, generally, it is good to remind, especially amid the current Administration, with its irresponsible, politically motivated "vaccines optional" rhetoric, tending to absolve the undereducated from their responsibilities, not only to their own families and their own children to get them vaccinated before going to school, but also to the population generally which is then exposed to unvaccinated children, with the prospect then of becoming ill as a result of carriers of a certain virus, that all vaccines are based on injecting inert forms of a given virus into the recipient of the vaccine. The key word is "inert", meaning that the form of the virus is inactive and thus, with the possible exception of a practically infinitesimal number of cases, there is no danger of contracting the virus, itself, from the vaccine, designed to form antibodies to inhibit the virus. That is the basis for all vaccines. It is basic science. It is not new, as some people seem to believe.
And, don't let anyone try to sell you the stupid, unfounded nonsense that there is any relationship whatsoever between vaccines and autism. There simply is no responsible medical literature which supports such a positive correlation.
We respected and admired greatly the present Health and Human Services Secretary's uncle and father, but we do not admire or follow the Secretary's advice at all, lest we wind up in another hell, as we did during the first Trump Administration, when there were silly, stupid daily announcements by El Presidente, who knows about as much about science, obviously, as a two-year old child, maybe less, resulting in the deaths of thousands from his unsound and conflicting advice, Trump's, not Dr. Fauci's.
Listen to the Trump Administration on disease at your own peril. You will not only likely wind up dead or in serious consequence to your health, but you will also imperil that of your own family and those around you. If you want to be a walking tree of poison, just skip all the vaccines and walk around like a goddamned nut, naked and free, like a chimp in a tree.
We say that, after having just gotten over a four-day flu, which is by far the worst we have suffered in some 35 years. We attribute it to the total irresponsibility of the Trump Administration in making vaccines "optional" for children. That is the most stupid, goddamned irresponsible policy that has ever been enunciated by any Administration in this country's history, certainly since the Roosevelt Administration.
Get your goddamn facts straight and
stop trying to appeal to the lowest common denominator with
anti-intellectual, anti-science bullshit which is for dogs—damn,
dirty dogs. Catch snakes
Sorry, but we did not like running a degree or two of temperature intermittently for four straight days, for the first time in roughly 35 years. There is no other variable but your goddamned dumbass, irresponsible statements, designed to appeal to goddamned dumbasses for the sake of currying their goddamned dumbass political favor.
What the hell are you people trying to do, kill off the older population, those of us who still remember, in favor of the drunks, druggies and dummies who don't?
Vaccines, especially for children, are not "optional". They are your responsibility as an adult to obtain for your children to protect everyone else, as children, because of their attending school with other children daily, as well as engaging in close personal contact through sports and other activities, are the most likely carriers infecting others, including adults who in turn become carriers, taking it into the supermarkets where people buy their food.
Get your heads out of your asses and stop trying to live in the Nineteeth Century with Bobby and Ozzie.
No one has the right to use their own personal beliefs, religion-based or not, to lord over the rest of us and communicate disease. If you don't want your children vaccinated, then lock them at home in the basement and don't let them out, ever.
Any questions?
"Tenth District Surprises Mr. Jonas" indicates that by his own admission, Representative Charles Jonas was "surprised" by answers to a personally conducted poll regarding key national issues. He had mailed 40,000 questionnaires to constituents and had received 4,000 replies, learning that "the people of my district are certainly not hidebound reactionaries, and are less conservative than generally supposed."
He had found that 77 percent of those answering the questionnaire supported mutual security, that is foreign aid. Mr. Jonas, along with the other North Carolina Representatives, had voted against the bill when it came before the House. Another result had shown that although Tenth District voters were concerned about the possible dangers of "spending", they did not regard a balanced budget as more important than adequate expenditure for national defense. Only 13.4 percent of those who responded to the questionnaires agreed that economy in government was the supreme political issue at present, and 50.4 percent said that they would prefer higher taxes, if necessary, to balance a larger budget, should it be required for national security.
The total results of the poll showed that the Tenth District voters had a lively and not dogmatic interest in more creativity in government than the Republican Administration presently advocated. The immense political popularity of Mr. Jonas in the district had marked him as a Congressman with a lively sense of the mood of the district. While straw polls were subject to error, and changes in the political temper of a constituency could ebb and flow as rapidly as the seasons, there was a note of warning in having a Congressman of fabulous electoral success "surprised" by the views of his constituents. Elected representatives could never afford to become too complacent in the interpretation of the views of the people they represented, particularly at a time when such political analysts as Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., detected deep and fast-moving currents in the popular mood. State Representative Watts Hill, Jr., when speaking of the political leadership at the state level, had been hinting at the same danger when he had warned that on some issues "the leaders may be falling behind the people."
Members of Congress were not elected to be puppets and such issues as how the country was to approach economic assistance to other nations, balance the budget or spend, and taxation, were as subtle as they were pressing. But if the informal poll which Mr. Jonas had taken was accurate at all, its lesson was that an official could never afford to be smug about what the voters thought.
"Tin Pan Alley and the Beat for 1960" indicates that on the day when Louis Armstrong had beguiled "them diplomatic cats" in Geneva with hot jazz, the unlikely marriage of music and politics had been announced. It had come as no surprise to it that history, which was only politics looking backward, had joined the other two and comprised a triangle.
One Tin Pan Alley jingle celebrated
the triumph of "Old Hickory"
Still another celebrated the Battle of Cowpens, which had
taken place during the Revolution very close to the heart of
Mecklenburg County, in South Carolina. (It neglects
"The Battle of New Orleans"
"If Tin Pan Alley has gone historical and political, surely it will not be long before one of its foot-patting, root-tooting scribes writes a ditty about the upcoming election of 1960, complete with 'Nixon-O' and even 'Paul Butler-O.' We'll be waiting to see what they come up with. It may be a waltz or a fox-trot, we guess. But as of the moment, the more likely prospect seems rock-'n-roll."
Folk—you have forgotten the
new trend toward folk and its broadsides, reprising the broadsides of
the past
A piece from the New York Times, titled "The Light of Summer", indicates that the light had already begun to change, as one could observe at midday as well as at dusk, and at dawn if one were an early riser. It was still the light of summer, but the shadows lay a little differently than they had a month earlier. "The distance has a feel, if not an actual look, of gathering haze. The sunset loses its June clarity, tends now toward brassy color. The dazzle of rain-washed air is more pronounced now after a shower."
It indicates that the light of July and August was the "day's dazzle, hot light, with the season's dust slowly accumulating and making the sky we see a giant silvered reflector. In spring the sky was a bowl of blue, in the fall it will be a turquoise dome. Now it is a shimmering tent, ripped in vast gashes from time to time by an afternoon thunderstorm, briefly clean and blue, then that smothering tent again. August, tending toward September; hot summer, tending toward autumn. You see it even in the shadows—warm, gray-green shadows."
Drew Pearson indicates that former Colorado Senator Ed Johnson, who had once fired locomotives on the Union Pacific Railroad between western Kansas and Denver, had taken an airplane to Washington from New York recently to testify against a baseball monopoly. He felt right at home returning to Washington after spending 18 years in the Senate, about the same amount of time he had spent as a railroad laborer, then telegrapher, then train dispatcher and locomotive fireman. He had also felt at home in the State House in Denver after having served two terms as Governor and four terms in the Colorado Legislature.
Airplanes had revolutionized baseball, Mr. Johnson had confided to Mr. Pearson, and it was one reason he was crusading for another baseball league. Even when "Big Ed" served in the Senate, he had been president of the Western Baseball League, and now that he was retired from active politics at 75, he was devoting all of his time to baseball. He explained: "San Juan, Puerto Rico, is baseball crazy. And they want to be part of our new big league. With airplane transportation, you can get to San Juan just as easy as Los Angeles and San Francisco. The major ball teams have their own airplanes now. But our chief problem is the baseball monopoly. That's why I'm going to Washington to testify before Senator [Estes] Kefauver's anti-monopoly committee. The two major leagues don't want a rival, and especially the major ball clubs don't want to give up their monopoly on players they don't need. Some of the clubs have 400 players under contract, each. Every May 20, they cut down their actual team to 25 men, but they keep 400 under contract just to keep them from getting into the hands of other rival clubs."
Mr. Johnson had pulled out a rule book regarding the major leagues and turned to Rule 2, which read: "Since the supply of skilled players is not equal to the demand, the major league clubs shall not have title to more than 40 player contracts at any time." He said that it was their rule but they did not live up to it, and when they kept 400 players under contract to prevent other clubs from using them, it was a monopoly. Mr. Pearson had asked him how many players the Washington Senators had under contract and he responded that it was one of the poor clubs, with their owner, Clark Griffith, having about 150, but that the St. Louis Cardinals at present had 435 players under contract. When Mr. Pearson asked him what had happened to his Western Baseball League, he responded: "The majors put us out of business. They just told us we couldn't have any more players, and that was that. We can't operate anymore. However, I believe Estes Kefauver now has 'em on the run and the prospect of a third major league will break up the player monopoly."
Walter Lippmann indicates that there was a certain amount of talk, which the President was now encouraging, regarding an invitation to Nikita Khrushchev to come to Washington. Some who favored it believed that while the exchange of visits by Deputy Premiers Anastas Mikoyan and Frol Kozlov to the U.S. and Vice-President Nixon to Russia could do something to make Mr. Khrushchev understand the U.S. and its attitude, it was one thing to understand a distant and unfamiliar land and another to realize what it was. There was no substitute, they believed, for seeing the sights and hearing the voices first-hand and so to put flesh and blood where there were only shadows and abstractions. They believed that a personal visit was the only way to make "Mr. K." realize the size and vitality of the country, its determination not to abandon West Berlin and its will to peace.
There were a few others, more sophisticated in power politics, who wanted to see a meeting between the President and the Russian Premier because they had come to believe that it was the quickest and most likely way to reach a tolerable compromise arrangement. The argument was that on the Soviet side, only Mr. Khrushchev could or would make the exchanges of concessions which would seal a bargain, and that he was more likely to do so in a bilateral meeting than in the more complicated Big Four summit talks. On the Western side, the argument was that negotiation was difficult and clumsy between Russia acting alone and the three powers, which actually became four, including West Germany, which needed to be consulted at every stage and thus was virtually present.
Advocates of a bilateral meeting, such as the London Economist, had gone so far as to think of it "as an alternative to the summit." From the American point of view, there was, amid all the subtlety and pitfalls of the question, one clear and certain rule of conduct, that the U.S. could not appoint itself to negotiate with Mr. Khrushchev on behalf of the Western world, and even an intimation that it was considering a bilateral meeting as an alternative to a summit would be resisted by West Germany and by France. A visit by Mr. Khrushchev to Washington had its advantages and its dangers. But if it took place, it would follow and not precede a summit conference in which Premier Charles de Gaulle was present personally and West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer was present by proxy. It was not certain that anything substantial could be accomplished at such a summit meeting, but the Western allies were committed to the idea that it was the right way to negotiate substantial things and that it was the only way they could accept. That correct way was by four-power negotiation with West Germany constituting essentially a five-power negotiation.
That method would have to be tested by the U.S. in good faith at another summit meeting. It was required, as with the present Geneva foreign ministers conference, that the four Western powers had to be unanimous, not only in the final results but also in advance of each of the moves during the bargaining process, and the U.S. had to adhere loyally to that procedure through another summit meeting.
It was not the only conceivable way to negotiate with the Soviet Union. It was conceivable that the U.S. could negotiate directly with the Soviets, consulting in advance, consulting whenever the negotiations arrived at some tentative but substantial point of agreement and making no final agreement without the consent of the Western allies. There was more sentiment in Europe for that type of negotiation than presently appeared on the surface.
There was also the problem of an American visit by Mr. Khrushchev. Mr. Lippmann indicates that his view was that it would be imprudent until and unless there was a decided improvement in the general atmosphere, an improvement which could come only if there was a provisional agreement regarding West Berlin, one arrived at by the foreign ministers or at a summit meeting later in Europe. Mr. Khrushchev ought not visit Washington until there had been eliminated the threat of a blockade of Berlin and the risk of the West having to resist that blockade and retaliate.
There did not have to be a solution of the whole German problem before Mr. Khrushchev would visit the U.S., but he ought not come while West Berlin was in such a dangerous position. He indicates that he did not mean to suggest that an agreement on West Berlin ought be marked as the price of an invitation or that an invitation ought be treated as a reward for good behavior, as that approach was beneath the dignity of both countries. His reason for saying that the visit ought to follow an agreement on West Berlin was that in that event, there would be a good chance of it being useful to both sides, as only when the threat of war had been eliminated could the U.S. successfully explore the chance of greater cultural and economic exchange.
Also, as long as the war clouds hung over Berlin, the U.S. could not protect Mr. Khrushchev completely against unfriendly demonstrations in the U.S. Mr. Lippmann indicates that he had found in Moscow that the problem was not well understood, as they found it hard to believe that any government could not keep perfect order if it wanted to do so. The Soviets, with their police and docile population, could control completely the behavior of crowds during a visit such as that of Mr. Nixon. The U.S. could not do the same for Mr. Khrushchev, as he had too many passionate and organized enemies in the U.S., and while they were minorities, they could make effective demonstrations if the great mass of Americans were themselves unfriendly. "So let us begin to open the door to a visit, and to prepare for it. But let us not rush things. Let us prepare without being hurried and with frank explanation as we go along explaining why and when and how the visit, when it comes, will do the most good and the least harm."
A letter writer from Gaffney, S.C., comments on the book by Richard Rovere, Senator Joe McCarthy, recently reviewed by the newspaper, wondering why so many people had been upset by the book, indicating that it was a bit too frank for some, but that he had found it interesting, that the "McCarthy fiasco was a disgusting episode in our country's history, and Rovere's blunt appraisal of McCarthyism points up one of the basic faults of the American people—their almost fanatical readiness to accept as pure gospel the words of any political opportunist with a slick tongue and no scruples. The fact that McCarthy used communism as his 'big booger in the woods' does not mean a damned thing. In another era, he would have used fascism; in Cotton Mather's time, it would have been witchcraft. Whatever the era, whatever the alleged reasons, this country can do without the Joe McCarthys and advocates of McCarthyistic persecution."
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