Show We Cant Can't Understand IfT It If T THE SENA SENATE E military affairs committee is considering legislation authorizing federal requisitioning of private automobiles and tires fires and has heard pleas of government officials that some such action be taken All this talk of requisitioning the used cars carsIn carsIn carsin in the hands of the motoring public just a af afew f few fw w weeks ago Senator Downey of California came out with a proposal to have the government government govern govern- ment seize and store private cars is a little incomprehensible to us It would seem that almost overnight a great crisis in rubber and motor cars has developed developed developed de de- de- de I in the nation It wasn't there three or four weeks ago when car dealers all over the nation were crying and the office of price administration echoed the cry because our stock of new cars ars wasn't being sold fast enough Furthermore we have hundreds of thousands of used cars in the hands of dealers all aU over the nation nation and and they arent aren't being sold to any great extent There certainly is no present shortage of cars There are more than half a million brand new cars now available There are acres and acres acres of them stacked out in the open pen near automobile plants in addition to those in the hands of dealers There are acres of unsold used cars parked in lots all over the country These cars arent aren't getting any better standing out in the open Standing idle doesn't do their tires fires any good If ir were we're hard up for cars or tires why not use these idle ones first NOW first NOW and cut our losses from deterioration rather than havethe havethe have havethe the government take over hundreds of thousands thousands thousands thou thou- sands of cars from private owners This scheme for seizing private automobiles just sounds plain silly silly silly-as as if some government government government govern govern- ment official h had d a bad dream and wanted to share his hysteria with the rest of the nation Certainly theres there's a rubber shortage Certainly Certainly Car Car- we have to save our our tires Certainly we have to persuade motorists to conserve their cars and tires fires so they will last as long as possible But requisitioning millions of cars to store them in idleness until the tires rot off the wheels isn't going to solve the rubber shortage or save tires And if you want to persuade motorists to conserve cars and tires the worst possible way to do it is to convince them that next week or next month the governments government's going to take their cars anyway so they might as well get some fun and use out of them while they still have them It looks to us as if some wild-eyed wild patriot back in Washington thinks the American people people peo peo- pie need to be scared into going out all for victory They dont don't need to be scared into doIng doing doing do do- ing that that all all they need is to be told plainly and frankly what the score is and they'll do whatever is necessary But first of all they'd like Jike to see a lot more out all-out war effort among the politicians and the bureaucrats back in Washington and considerably more commonsense common commonsense commonsense sense and efficiency in the direction of our war effort |