The Charlotte News

Tuesday, July 15, 1941

THREE EDITORIALS

Site Ed. Note: Returning for a moment to Cash's death, we note again that the Juarez Hospital where Cash's body was examined after his death, as noted on the death certificate--and where supposedly the autopsy was performed, if one was in fact performed--collapsed, trapping hundreds of patients, in the calamitous 7.8 magnitude earthquake of September 18, 1985 which killed upwards of 10,000 people and destroyed large numbers of buildings in Mexico City. So, if there ever was an autopsy report, we have our doubts that it survived that earthquake, that it wasn't lost amid the rubble. But, perhaps a copy was maintained elsewhere?

Candidly we doubt there was such a report; we doubt there ever was an autopsy. That is why, we think, the cremation was done as it was, without proper permission, and against the stated wishes of Cash's parents. For, it stands to reason, the evidence of murder at the time was likely quite obvious, but, for the reasons we have suggested, also necessary for the time to cover up.

The question remains, however, as to why any such necessity persisted after the war, to as late as 1967, indeed, even unto today. Why?

"Over 40 Years" tells the passage of time in society since the turn of the century by way of recounting the rather pedestrian history of the American Trust Company. It is worth a read for its quick snapshot of the first forty years of the last century.

We are inclined to ask whether the editorial column in these days was slowly slipping into the downy security of matters safe from discussion of war, thinking that by ignoring it for awhile, it might go away? Had too much talk stimulated as much war as it had prevented? But ignoring it did not cause it to go away. Hitler still rampaged; the Japanese still wanted rubber, tin, oil, scrap iron and the other necessities of war to forge empire.

Raymond Clapper's piece provides further insight into Hitler's gamble in Russia, as well as clues as to why ultimately he needed Japan to undertake its move south in the Pacific, despite the foregone conclusion that attacking Pearl Harbor likely would bring America into the war: Hitler needed access to the Atlantic for trading routes. And besides, even if America was drawn into the war, it would be on two oceans with a damaged Pacific Fleet, thus diluting the ability to aid the British in the Atlantic. Hitler, however, underestimated Rosie the Riveter.

As Clapper points out, control of Russia could have given Hitler control of the Mediterranean, north Africa, and, though he doesn't mention it, not incidentally, the bulk of the Middle East. With that in his arsenal, Hitler could have done more than merely live, as Clapper suggests. With control of the bulk of the world's supply of oil at his disposal, he could have strangled the West into submission, curtailing the oil exports to the West causing the cost of oil to skyrocket on the world market, except for Germania; he could have waged a war of attrition with ample supply to maintain bombing pressure on Great Britain until it crumbled, even without an invasion. Meanwhile, he continued to build his secret rockets and doomsday weapon which would draw the West to its knees. The Wave of the Future might very well have been his, had Russia crumbled beneath the panzer onslaught. Even so, Hitler underestimated the scientists working steadily at Los Alamos. Had the war in Europe, without Russia's eastern pincer to ensnare Berlin, lasted another four months, would the first atomic bombs have been used instead on Berlin, on Hamburg? Would the United States have remained free long enough to bring the Manhattan Project to fruition?

One thing is clear: had not the stout British held their ground in the blitz of 1940-41, had not the stout Russians held their ground in the blitz of 1941-42, had not Roosevelt provided the necessary leadership in 1941 to start America on the road to preparation for war in the name of providing aid to preserve Britain, the world likely would have been a very different place for the half century after 1945, one where all speech, all thought, all reading material, all association, all religious practice were carefully regulated and prescribed, where no privacy, no right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures existed, where demand of warnings of rights upon arrest would have been laughed at by the police, where society was turned into one large hellish concentration camp and ghetto, where knocks on the door in the middle of the night to carry away one's parents to places unknown, never to be heard from again, for the crime of writing subversive material, of speaking out of turn, of being Jewish, of being Communist, of merely being something other than that acceptable to the local administrator for the Nazi Party, of having been denounced as a traitor by a loyal Party member, would become the rule.

Remember it, next time you think you have cause to knock a liberal.

In Nazi Germany, everyone had to struggle, for the entertainment of the Fuehrer, for he had to struggle. And the end game of that struggle for many, for most, was death, just as for the Fuehrer.

Popeye looks in the mirror to see why he might resemble Mrs. Jones's son. Is a scandal brewing? Pati the cop gives the tip on why the competitor is getting all the business: it's that ROC Cola. One thing about Pati, though. He shure can't spell worth a darn. Or, maybe he was promoting phonograph needles at the same time as the ROC Cola.

Say what you will about the problems and pitfalls of democracy, but at least in a democracy one can say and read and think whatever one wants--at least until some Nazi tries to stop you.