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Show Washington Social Hours: Cold Turkey, Hot Gossip - By BAUKIIAGE Netvi Analyst and Commentator. WASHINGTON. Washington cocktail parties and other social gatherings have been widely publicized as makers and breakers of reputations, national candidacies and international interna-tional policies. Not all of these affairs may forge or fracture the destiny of nations, but many often bring together as great a variety of human ingredients as are to be found at any one place at any one time, anywhere. For example I have just returned from lunch. I probably should say : r"': ' J I .A : i i !'; 1 ' "a "luncheon" considering con-sidering what it must have cost my red-headed college mate host whose excuse for giving it was the fact that he was celebrating his 55th birthday but whose real reasons rea-sons lay beyond distant frontiers. The bearded Italian Ital-ian scientist on his left reminded him that the occasion was unique because be-cause it was hard- BAUKIIAGE e ily, had outlived the Japanese occupation, oc-cupation, and with his sister, had participated in the effective Philippine Philip-pine underground, memories of which made this day's current tragedy trag-edy of the Philippines the eruption of Hibokhibok volcano on Camiquin island a decidedly minor concern. On my left was a prominent Washington Wash-ington lawyer. During a lull in the discussion of International, if not cosmic affairs, he suddenly asked: "What was your mother's maider name?" "Alice Blood," I replied. "Yes," he nodded In satisfaction, satisfac-tion, "My aunt, Clara Brown, often told me about your mother. moth-er. They were classmates (Ingham (Ing-ham university '78), and she was a bridesmaid at your mother's wedding in La Salle, Illinois." Skipping your correspondent around the table, we an ve at a famous scientist. We exchanged reminiscences too, for he also was a graduate of the same college. As we talked, I remembered an anecdote anec-dote about him I had heard from a mutual college friend. A Check by Any Other Name . . . Not many years after his graduation, gradua-tion, this scientist and his young wife arrived in the city where our mutual friend was in business, and called on him. The businessman recognized the scientist's face immediately im-mediately but for the life of him, couldn't remember the man's name. During their lunch, the scientist remarked that he was going on an extended trip into Canada and had unfortunately run out of money. He wondered could he get a check cashed at the businessman's bank. The businessman gladly acquiesced, thinking that when he saw the signature sig-nature on the check, he would recognize rec-ognize the scientist's name. Together Togeth-er they went to the bank, the scientist scien-tist wrote the check, and the two men went to the cashier's window. But as the scientist handed in the check, all the businessman could read was the name of a bank in a very distant city and the amount five hundred dollars. He had already said to the cashier, cash-ier, "I want you to meet my friend ..." but could get no further. Terribly Ter-ribly embarrassed, he turned to the scientist and said: "I'm sorry, but I can't recall your name." Of course the cashier overheard over-heard this remark and with the " natural caution of the banker, said to the businessman: "This will be fine, Mr. X, but will yon please endorse this?" Mr. X turned it over, noted the name but did not recognize it, trembled trem-bled to think of what would happen hap-pen to his bank account if it bounced (and he was sure it would) , and signed. Farewells were spoken, the scientist departed. de-parted. Day after day the businessman busi-nessman awaited the call from the bank. In fact, he told me he had picked out a space on the wall where he intended to frame the paper so that he could call attention to it casually casu-ally should some other vaguely identified caller request a similar favor. Nothing happened. A month or so later, another college col-lege friend came to town. The businessman busi-nessman related the story, describing describ-ing the scientist and his occupatior. Unaccountably his listener burs into laughter. "Didn't you know," he said between be-tween gasps, "That man's technical tech-nical as well as scientific information infor-mation which he acquired at school along with his Ars Mag-ister Mag-ister made him a cool million the year after he was graduated?" gradu-ated?" At the luncheon there was also a Chinese oil expert who merely listened lis-tened and an ERP representative who left early. And now back to my red-headed host. He related the adventure of I one of the guests who had been un-l able to appear. It seems this gen-: tleman had formed a corporation called "World Development, Inc."i or something very similar. When my host heard his glowing prospectus, pros-pectus, he said, "Aren't you covering cover-ing a lot of ground." "Oh, no," said the promoter who since had acquired considerable influence in-fluence in international affairs, "this is just a subsidiary of the Inter-Planetary corporation." Then I had to go, so I never knew what master-plan for the rebuilding and exploiting of the nation, the: world or the sidereal spaces were discussed or consummated. But I have no doubt you can go a lonj way in Washington starting with cold turkey. ly likely he would celebrate a similar simi-lar occasion 55 years hence. A little macabre, I thought, but no one seemed to take it that way least of all the fellow-citizen of Dante who was enjoying himself immensely over his cold smoked turkey and doubtless became lyric over the lira and other important transalpine institutions before we were through. On the bearded one's left was a representative of the state department depart-ment who gave me a disappointingly disappointing-ly eye-witness and unsensational account ac-count of the recent parliament session ses-sion of one of our South American neighbors a session which I had judged from previous dispatches, would be punctuated by revolver shots. We had heard rumors of mysterious mys-terious shootings there which were supposed to have made up in political significance what they lacked in marksmanship. Also there had been hints of cabinet changes due not only to mistakes in policy, but to hasty burials. I asked my fellow guest about it. "Oh, no," he said, "there were no cabinet changes." "But what about these terrible rumors of graft and corruption?" "Well, the President in his address ad-dress did make particular reference to the evils of political corruption and to the importance of selfless loyalty on the part of the servants of the state." "But was that all?" I persisted. "No names, addresses, or telephone numbers?" "That was all," he insisted, "It was a very quiet session. Furthermore Further-more there was none of the protocol proto-col we observe at a joint session of the two houses of the American congress. con-gress. This parliament was called to order, the President came in, spoke his piece, and went out." At this point, my host broke in. He insisted that I repeat the story of the opening of this summer's sum-mer's special "turnip" session of congress which nobody outside of a few million radio listeners who happened to be tuned in had heard before. Legislative Faux Pas, De Luxe Style This July 26 when a very angry house of representatives was called to order, it was known that the regular regu-lar chaplain could not appear. So, when a stranger took the rostrum, the less-somnolent members rose, bowed their heads, as is the custom, to listen to the prayer. The first words they heard resounding through the chamber were": "Whereas "Where-as the public interest requires that the congress of the United States should be convened at 12 o'clock noon on Monday, the twenty-sixth of July, 1948, to receive such communication communi-cation as may be made by the Executive; Ex-ecutive; Now, therefore, I, Harry S. Truman, President of the United states . . ." and so on. . . . Gradually the members realized real-ized that the man addressing them was not the substitute for the absent chaplain of the house, but the substitute for the equally-absent reading clerk whose duty it is to read bills and official offi-cial communications. It was most embarrassing. The voice they were hearing was not the voice of a man repeating the word of God; It was the voice of the substitute sub-stitute clerk repeating the proclamation procla-mation of the man at whom they were maddest. The members didn't like to make public admission of their error by sitting down, and so they had to stand through the painful pain-ful 114-word pronouncement which had torn them from the bosom of family and constituency, and brought them back to heat-ridden Washington. Washing-ton. Next to the state department official offi-cial who had unwittingly provided the excuse for my anecdote was the consul-general of the Philippine republic re-public who happens to be the son of another college classmate of mine. He, like the rest of his fam- |