Site Ed. Note: The front page reports that in Greece, 1,500
guerrillas, most of whom had come from Albania, had attacked the
Greek Army south of Ioannina, cutting off the Army supply line at
Epirus. The previous day, attacks had been launched at Konitza, but
an Army communique stated that the guerrillas were repulsed with
heavy losses. The forces were fighting against the Government in
Athens pursuant to the decree by their leader, General Markos
Vifiades, of a free, independent state in Northern Greece, though
remaining undefined as to its borders. Army leaders wanted the
opposing commander to define his territory that they might find and
trap him.
In Palestine, more violence took place, with a Jewish Agency
official having been killed along with four other Jews during
attacks on two truck convoys carrying supplies. Earlier, a stray
bullet fired by a sniper killed a three-year old Jewish girl and a
70-year old woman. Five others were also killed in Palestine. The
deaths brought the total number in Palestine since November 29, when
the U.N. approved partition, to 359.
Dr. Erwin Nourse, chairman of the President's Council of
Economic Advisers, predicted that 1948 would have record-breaking
production and that inflation would stop rising.
The President, according to press secretary Charles G. Ross,
intended to act by Monday or soon thereafter on the voluntary anti-inflation measure passed by
Congress.
Senator Wayne Morse of Oregon voiced his opposition to the
measure, supporting instead limited controls such as those advocated
by the President.
In Saugus, Mass., a father was distraught after discovering
that he had not rescued his two-year old son from a house fire. He
had put the child in a blanket and then slung it over his shoulder
to descend a ladder, but discovered after reaching the ground that
his son had slipped out. The boy died in the fire. The rest of the
family, including four other children, made it to safety.
In Washington, scientists had isolated and grown the cold
germ associated with sinus colds. They had taken a culture from the
nose of an infected scientist and grown it within the albumen of
hens' eggs. Then the eggs were fed to inmates at a reformatory who
were volunteers for the experiment. Of 60 subjects, 57 contracted a
sinus cold.
The scientists had not ascertained the exact nature of the
germ but hypothesized that it was a virus.
The scientists considered the work a significant step in
producing a vaccine.
A couple more years, and no more colds.
We understand that those of you under about 65 or so probably don't know what a "cold" is. It was a terrible thing, in which the infected person would turn green and, often, break out in large maroon spots. Sometimes, too, the head would balloon to four or five times normal size. It was not fatal, but many wished they could die during its throes. Well, better that it is long in the past.
A typhoon hit the Philippines, leaving 56 persons dead or
missing, 46 from a Danish ship which sank off of Samar. The official
death toll in Manila stood at five.
A snowstorm off the Atlantic Ocean hit the Middle Atlantic
states, predicted to accumulate to ten inches. Eight inches had
fallen in New York City prior to noon. Atlantic City had six inches.
It had already snowed the previous Tuesday between four and fifteen
inches.
In Concord, N.C., Marvin Scott and his eight-piece orchestra
provided music for a Christmas party sponsored by the Junior Chamber
of Commerce.
You probably missed that. That is your problem.
On the editorial page, "Boom Fever Reaches Its Peak"
tells of economist Roger Babson having predicted that 1948 would be
the last year in the ensuing decade through 1955 in which there
would be an easy economy. He warned against expansion of small
business and not to change jobs.
Mr. Babson, an eccentric, had been a doomsayer for some time.
But his opinion reflected that of many in the American business
community. It was a self-fulfilling prophecy, however, as the
pessimistic outlook was fueled by the speculators and gray
marketeers perpetuating inflation, seeking to cash in on the boom
while it lasted.
The effort to denigrate a controlled economy caused the
country to forget the success of OPA during the war. And the
predicted slump was likely to occur only because of the refusal of
the Congress to enact needed control measures.
"A League of Honest Men" remarks of the Christmas
message of Pope Pius XII, recommending such a league to establish a
lasting peace, but finds the Pontiff to have failed to explain how
such a league would be formed and what criteria would be used. While
he directed his message at the Soviets, he could not have
realistically hoped that it would have any impact, as the Soviets
would see it only as more Western propaganda.
There was no doubt that such a league was necessary but it
had to be started in the Western world, outside Russia. It would
help matters if there were candid admissions by Western diplomats
that the West was not always correct. It would have the effect of
urging steps to correct mistakes and strengthen the West in its
competition with Russia.
The piece suggests that a good starting point would be to
admit that Spain was not a democratic country.
"There Were No Empty Stockings" tells of the
success of the annual drive sponsored by The News to provide
Christmas to needy families, delivering presents to 3,500 families
in 1947, a third more than the previous year. It thanks the many
contributors to the effort, raising $7,700.
A piece from the Washington Post, titled "Broken
Homes", discusses a pamphlet by George Thorman, titled Broken
Homes, studying the divorce problem in the country, three times
higher than 50 years earlier, for the Public Affairs Committee,
Inc., a non-profit educational organization.
Mr. Thorman concluded that stricter divorce laws would not
eliminate the problems. For it grew out of psychological and
physical problems of adjustment between the married couple. He
recommended bringing the combined efforts of doctors, psychiatrists,
educators, ministers and social workers to provide more premarital
education, marriage counseling, and more research on why marriages
failed and how to avoid the pitfalls.
Drew Pearson, back in Washington after his trip to Paris to
accompany the "Friend Ship" to its destination, tells of
the President and Cabinet members having, for the most part,
remained in Washington during Christmas. Secretary of State Marshall
had slipped away, to be with family in Pinehurst, N.C. Secretary of
Commerce Averell Harriman had gone to Florida to be with his wife.
Attorney General Tom Clark got the prognosis on the Sugar Bowl, in
which Texas would vie with Alabama, from his son, future Attorney
General Ramsey Clark, a student at the time at the University of
Texas. Mr. Pearson proceeds to relate how each of the other Cabinet
officers spent the holidays.
Most Senators and Congressmen went home for Christmas.
Senators Taft and Vandenberg, however, remained in the capital.
GOP Representative James Auchincloss of New Jersey collected
match books for his two young grandchildren and recently had
obtained a pair from the White House. The President had given them
out to all visitors on hand after another Congressman presented to
the President a box of matches with books advertising TVA. Mr.
Auchincloss asked for two and the President obliged. Then everyone
present began to chuckle when they saw what was printed on the back
of each book: "I swiped these from Harry S. Truman".
Barnet Nover discusses the recent report on China submitted
to the Senate Appropriations Committee by Lt. General Albert
Wedemeyer. The report had been maintained under tight wraps, without
the usual Washington leaks regarding its contents. Nevertheless, assumptions had been
made about it, including that it had been suppressed for its harsh
assessment of the Chiang Kai-Shek Nationalist Government. Other
rumors had it that the General recommended a large amount of aid to
China and that had been the reason for the State Department
preventing its release to the public. The truth probably lay in
between.
The General found that the Chinese internal situation had
deteriorated since he had served as commander of U.S. forces in
China and as chief of staff to Chiang. Corruption was more
widespread than in the past and few of the promised reforms had been
carried into effect.
General Wedemeyer had told the Committee that all possible
aid should be given to China to contain the Communist threat. He did
not assign a dollar figure to the aid and because of the fact that
European aid took precedence, the State Department determined it
imprudent to have the report revealed, to prevent Congress from
reducing the European aid or even refusing to pass it at all.
Victor Riesel relates that the CIO PAC would be eschewing the
glamour to which it had resorted in 1944 and instead would work to
appeal to the average American in their hometowns during the 1948
campaign. They would use a million of the six million CIO members to
cover one block each in every city and town. They would employ block
captains, preferably women, to organize the block socially, not
politically, then be ready with cars on election day to get the
residents to the polls. The practice had been utilized in Paterson,
N.J., recently to enable election of a G.I. over a Republican city
official.
The CIO PAC would be especially active in Senator Taft's home
turf in Cincinnati. Mr. Riesel injects that he thought it poor
politics for the PAC to call Mr. Taft "R.A.T."
The PAC, he says, was busy orchestrating the foundations of
this form of block-by-block campaign. The advice to the block
captains was to "try to be helpful—but not nosy."
Joseph Alsop discusses Secretary of State Marshall's
prescription for emerging from the "zone of war", into
which the recalcitrance of the Soviet Union had placed the world,
that being through a "genuine settlement" which could then
be reflected in a "paper agreement". The way set forth to
achieve it was through filling the political and economic vacuum
left in Europe by the war through rebuilding it. The way to achieve
the latter goal had to be through U.S. aid. The prospect of the aid
had emboldened the anti-Communists in Italy and France and so it was
folly to assume that the recent turns away from Communism in those
countries would have occurred were the Plan not on the table, along
with the emergency aid measure just passed by the Congress in the
special session and signed by the President.
But the recent strikes in Italy and France had made the
economic situation worse, and without the aid from the U.S., those
economies would soon flounder, leading to acceptance of
totalitarianism of the right or left. Thus, the Marshall Plan was
the key to a stable future for Europe.
The Soviet satellites had known more freedom and a a higher
standard of living than extant in Russia. But each of those
countries, once absorbed into the Soviet sphere completely, would
wind up enjoying no more than the Russian level of economy and
freedom.
The West planned to counter with comparisons between life in
Western Europe and that in the East. A change of power balance to
favor the West over the East was that to which Secretary Marshall
referred in his statement of the requisite "genuine
settlement".
The stress on rebuilding Europe was thus explained, as it
afforded the best opportunity for the West to turn back Soviet
expansion. But the Soviets had the better opportunity in the Middle
East, the Eastern Mediterranean, and the Far East. So it was also
necessary to aid Turkey and Greece in the Mediterranean, China and
Korea in the Far East, and Iran and Iraq in the Middle East, as well
any other points into which the Soviets might seek to expand.
A letter from the director of the Mint Museum of Art Association in Charlotte thanks the newspaper for publicizing the Museum during the year.
Happy Boxing Day and second day of Christmas. Two wildcats lobstering.
