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Show Washington, D. C. F. D. R. VIEWS AID TO yOUra During the week before bis Cant, bean cruise, the President held a series of private conferences which we e of prime Importance in con-Section con-Section w'ith his plan. .for the , new congress. In them he disclosed that het doing a lot of thinking about domestic problems along two lines- 1. Youth. 2. Old-age pensions. Democracy can resist subversive .singles, the President held, only by convincing youth that it does have a stake and a future in the existing system. The President indicated that he had no particular program in mind. In fact, he asked for suggestions and ideas. . On old-age pensions, Roosevelt disclosed that he lias made up his mind as to what he wants. His idea is to change the existing system sys-tem of widely divergent state contributions con-tributions to one of uniform federal pensions, beginning at a lower age than the present 65. Roosevelt also voiced sharp criticism criti-cism of the moguls of the social security board who have so vigorously vigor-ously opposed liberalization of the law. He declared that they have been a big obstruction to reform and that the time had come to overrule over-rule them. It was significant that the President had not discussed his plans with them and was proceeding proceed-ing independently. Note Since January 1, when the amended law became operative, 190,000 applications for old-age pensions pen-sions have been approved by the social security board for a total outlay out-lay of $4,109,000 a month. With the $7,048,000 paid out In lump sum claims to survivors, the total old-age old-age pension outlay so far Is around $28,000,000. The average pension is $22 a month. In his conferences, Roosevelt talked of placing 5,000,000 oldsters on federal pensions within a year. NO MASS PRODUCTION One of the big complaints of defense de-fense chiefs is lack of machine-tool facilities. Yet there are many small plants of this type around the country coun-try that have been literally begging for orders and not getting them. One company with 150 lathes has been advertising for business in trade journals for months. Also there is strong evidence of a lack of vision or initiative or both in making the best use of mass production facilities. The blame for this goes right back to high defense quarters. The gigantic resources of the auto Industry, for example, have been practically untouched for defense output. New plants have been ordered or-dered that will take months to build, when by a co-ordination of the great auto factories, parts of planes, tanks, guns, etc., could be turned out In carload lots daily and assembled assem-bled at central points. William Reuther, young official of the United Auto Workers, long ago proposed such a plan for a daily output out-put of 500 all-metal pursuit planes of the most powerful type in the world, and at one-third their present pres-ent cost. But the matter is still "being discussed." Other Industries could be used in the same way for similar shortcuts short-cuts on other armament needs, but they are not. Meanwhile, defense output drags along, and precious weeks and months flit by. BRITISH DAMAGE Confidential military estimates of Nazi bombing damage to Great Britain are that British Industrial production has fallen off about 30 per cent. While this is a very serious crimp in the output of British planes, antiaircraft anti-aircraft guns and shells, it is not as bad as the pictures of shattered Bristol, Coventry, and Southampton would indicate. Reason damage to British industrial indus-trial production has not been greater great-er is (1) that the British more than a year ago began scattering their plants In small units throughout Scotland and northern England which are hard to locate and hard to hit after they are located; (2) that those big plants which do remain re-main are protected with a virtual forest of anti-aircraft guns Far more serious Is the damage to British navy yards. These cannot can-not be broken up into small units and they have been so heavily damaged dam-aged that the repair of British shipping ship-ping is very materially retarded. In many cases, British warships have been repaired at sea This, plus the tremendous increase in-crease in the sinking of merchant vessels, ,s what make, the British sh.pp.ng plight so dcsperate at prs CAPITAL CHAFF Irony of diplomatic rntc is when Mussolini marched into Al- 1st "ril Cndoncd 't- Instead of reg- enng a protest as in the cn.e of gsrccrs sis 'and, Holland Ct,h",,,ov"'". l' |