Show V fals 0 series of contradictions marks political campaign by BAUKHAGE news analyst and commentator washington political currents and cross currents are running high wide and deep along the potomac these days the wave ot of popularity stirred up by stassen supporters is not pleas ant tor for regular republicans to contemplate some of the non professionals however particularly those in the taft comer are very bitter about it not because they think that stassen will get in but because of the way he has served to block the taft efforts despite de spite the tact fact that those efforts have been la belled rightly or wrongly futile from the beginning Dewey ites don t admit they are worrying but I 1 talked to one of the taft men recently what makes me sick he said is the way the people who have done their I 1 best to break down j taft are full of praise for him now that they think he is beaten they describe his efficiency his knowledge h his I 1 s frankness his grasp of the sub ejects he discusses and they talk a about b a u t stassen s dx I 1 vagueness and in ability to answer tafts charges and these he wound up are the same people who have been shoot ing at taft ever since he started bis his presidential campaign there is something in what this man says you would be surprised how many liberals how many dem even praise tatt taft privately would really like to see him elected but either they cant can t quite come out openly in his favor or they take for granted he can t win anyhow then there is the great group of republicans who are going to vote for dewey but act as it if they were gritting their teeth in the process what have you got against dewey I 1 ask them some are vague others say the new york governor is a strad dier an opportunist never comes out for an issue until he sees a gallup poll on it but I 1 suppose he 11 win can hea since the stassen hurricane the old timers are talking a little d f terentiy terent ferent ly about dewey some of them who have predicted right along that dewey would win nov are saying that stassen has undermined him so thoroughly that now dewey has no more chance than taft and all the time the tide is rising but here s an inter est ng thing way back in febra ary some very canny observers were saying that speaker joe mar tin tm of the house of representatives had the best chance of anyone for the republican presidential nomma nomina tion in case of the expected taft dewey deadlock at the time many people were surprised at that opinion but it wasn gasn t long before we began to see mention of martin here and there then finally insiders accepted him as probably the best bet of the sev eral republican dark horses I 1 know I 1 could feel his popularity growing Rs 63 I 1 travelled around the country but then came the surprise move when martin was credited with bringing about settlement of the coal miners pension row the appointment of 0 sen styles bridges of new hampshire las neutral trustee on the pension board with john lewis and ezra van horn and the agreement that was reached between bridges and lewis at first the settlement put martin in a favorable light with the pub lie then some of the conservative republicans who hate lewis ex pressed their disapproval there were hints of a deal that had been reached between bridges and lewis before bridges was appointed dem charged that martin was poll ticking horn representing the op orators appealed to the court courts to declare the pension agreement in valid martin s stock dropped and the mers began to say his chances for the presidential nomination were slim not so much because of the pension deal itself but paradoxical ly and this is one of the accepted paradoxes of politics because his intervention in the row was taken as a public avowal of his candidacy martin martin ceased to be a dark horse and aa as a light horse he wasn gasn t con nearly as much of a favor ite the paradox applies to senator j the michigan sen ator star constantly and consistently has disavowed any desire or in of being a candidate for the republican nomination if according to this paradoxical political rule the old timers cay say he were thrust into the limelight his cause would suffer too at thi this writing seems t to stand as the no 1 bet Stas however claim that this paradox is all old hat that times and political thinking have changed one of the first black mark marks which the republican old guard checked against stassen was the th e fact that he came right out as a candidate way ahead of time the traditional thing is to be oh so coy about it it but some observers feel as news week magazine expressed it some time ago stassen s forthright quest for votes may end much of the traill dional coyness of aspirants in the future it s tl ought that tha t more can dilates will frankly announce their intentions well in advance of elec tion well maybe there Is plenty of old line resent ment against stassen not only be cause he began an open campaign so early but also because of the efficient powerful highly organized and aggressive machine he has built up A right wing republican I 1 spoke to recently seemed especial ly resentful grumbling about the big money backing minnesota s ex governor and the new york banking interests that wanted in senator taft was reported so furious over stassen s invasion of ohio that it was thought that he might forget his rivalry with dewey and throw his support to the new yorker earlier in the convention if the deadlock was certain all ali this talk AGAINST candidates Is interesting psychologically you always hear tar far more rea sons for voting AGAINST a candi date than you hear for voting FOR one its it s a very good thing that no candidate Is ever quite so bad as his opponents claim he is other wise the government would fall fail apart regularly every four years manroe doctrine Is on charles street in the sleepy little town of fredericksburg va in the first floor office of a story and a half brick house you can see it if you obey the parking s gns agns and stop there a beautiful brass bound mahogany desk art handiwork of the french cab net makers of the early century VC it is an historic piece of furni ture for on its surface years ago there was signed a document which reactivated today necomes Je comes at once the challenge and the hope of free free men throughout the world that desk carefully carried across the seas as a precious heirloom found its way into the great empty rooms of the white house newly rebuilt after the destructive fire set iet by an enemy torch in the war of 1812 turn back the pages to december of the year 1823 at this desk sits a man in a stiffly starched stock his broad forehead is wrinkled wi with th thought his wide eyes look down at the document he is about to sign it is his message to the con gress of the united states but it embodies the sp nt rit and is couched in the phrases which his sors have used before him espres sing the intent and the obligations of the young republic of which he james monroe is the president two years before the czar of all the russians had uttered a ukase that no foreigner must approach within miles of the american coastline north of the parallel russia then had a firm foothold on the northwestern of the western hemisphere the iron cur tain had descended plus ca change plus ca reste lax meme chose we could not view any interposition for the purpose of oppressing them the free countries of the americas by any european power in any other light than as the manifestation of an friend im ly disposition toward the united states one hundred and twenty five years pass today the united stata state in a world that has shrunk until moscow is nearer to washington than bos ton was in monroe s time cates its resources to help free peoples to maintain their free insel and their national integrity against aggressive movements that seek to impose upon them total tarlan regimes the words are president tra tru man mans s but the spirit is the same as that breathed in the monroe doctrine america carries on polysyllabically john L lewis and gen douglas macarthur have something in common perhaps lewis should run as macarthur s vice president think of all the sonorous on orous f five I 1 v e syllable word state ments they could get out in president lincoln Lincol ns s time most of the speeches were made in the open air without benefit of public address system or microphone now all you really need is a few friends who can make themselves heard in a smoke filled room |