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Show Wswgfffii fGD;Jup KA I A pREWPEARSON FRANK'S G. O. P. PLATFORM If you have been following the campaign speeches of the Republican Republi-can candidates, you probably have been struck by this interesting coincidence: co-incidence: That on all major issues their views are practically identical; and that all these views are strikingly similar to the ideas expressed in the report of the Glenn Frank Program Pro-gram committee. As one Republican veteran on Capitol Hill sagely observed, "The boys apparently are writing their speeches with a Thesaurus in one hand and the Frank report in the other." This quiet borrowing from the Frank report is particularly evident on the farm issue. The Frank committee, com-mittee, in effect, approved the AAA but criticized allegedly inefficient and bureaucratic administration. ! . V I GLENN FRANK No platform intended. Also it advocated that the emphasis on benefit payments should be on "soil conservation" rather than on the New Deal's "crop control." The Frank "farm plank" unquestionably unques-tionably scored in the crucial grain belt. It was widely republished and enthusiastically endorsed by many prominent local Republicans. This was not lost on the three leading G. O. P. candidates, Dewey, Taft and Vandenberg. Since publication of the report they have followed its "farm plank" very closely. In his Omaha speech, Dewey practically echoed the plank; Taft, who last December in Des Moines took a poke at farm subsidies, subsi-dies, sang a more Frank-like tune in his second try at the farm issue at Springfield, 111. And Vanden-berg's Vanden-berg's senate declamations on the subject also have been along the lines of the Frank report. Liberal Gospel. This attitude of the candidates is very significant. The Frank report is a lot more liberal than the views held by certain cer-tain powerful eastern G. O. P. leaders, lead-ers, who will have a great deal to say behind the scenes at the Philadelphia Phila-delphia convention. That the candidates can-didates nevertheless are echoing the doctrines enunciated by the report indicates clearly that they deem this liberalism necessary to win public favor. It also is a good tipoff that when the G. O. P. platform emerges it will read very much like the Frank report. In his preface, Dr. Frank stated that it was not the intention of his committee to write a platform. plat-form. But party insiders will give you odds that that is just what he did. F. D. R. and the Lenses. Remarked Tony Muto, newsreel impresario, of the President of the United States: "That guy could wear a gunny sack and nobody would know it. He's got a personality that steals the show. His facial mannerisms are dramatic, and nobody sees anything any-thing else." Roosevelt was not wearing a gunny sack, but a black velvet smoking jacket when he and Henry Wallace were broadcasting from the "radio room" of the White House the other evening. The occasion ! was the AAA dinners for farmers throughout the country, and the President, a veteran in such matters, mat-ters, was offering his Secretary of Agriculture a little good humored t coaching before they began to speak. He explained to Henry that the newsreels would use three lenses during each talk a small lens for a distance shot, the larger lens for middle range, and finally a big lens for a closeup. "That's the lens you've got to watch, Henry," said the President. "That big one is the boudoir-Icns; it shows up all the blemishes!" . Stamp Collectors. Collectors, who have had a field day under Jim Farley's variegated stamp regime, are complaining bitterly bit-terly that the latest federal stamps cannot be had for love or money. They can be bought only by people on relief. The office of Federal Surplus commodities, com-modities, which operates the food stamp plan, has received indignant letters from philatelists demanding to know why they cannot buy food stamps for their collections. But they get no satisfaction. |