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Show Washington j Comment Washington is gradually becoming becom-ing accostomed to midnight ; alarms, thanks to Mr. Hitler and '. the some six-hour difference in ; time between here and Europe. It ! seems as though bad news from Europe' unfailingly breaks over us in that darkest period before dawn when resistance is lowest. I Mr. Roi sevelt and Secretary Hull must think so, for they have again maintained a virgil while Nazi troops were descending on hapless countries this time, Holland, Hol-land, Belgium and poor little Luxembourg, the latter cf which had only recently, after many years, sent a diplomatic representative repre-sentative to this country. When the fresh war news broke, Secretary Secre-tary of State Hull was out of bed ami at his desk in the state department de-partment in the twinkling of an eye, and Undersecretary Sumner Welles, scarcely rested from his European mission, was at his side. An alert, but dead-for-B'leep press passed the chill spring night at the White House, where the president presi-dent kept the vigil with the rest. Mr. Roosevelt looked Ibired the next day. The general impression is that he is lacking a good bit of his usual, verve and insouciance lately. late-ly. It may be due to his recent flu attack, or tO' the gravity of the intelrnational situation; then ngain it may be that a sort of Sword of Damocles, in the form of a third-term third-term decision, hangs heavy over his head. It would over most presidential aspirants, the world being what it is today, and what it is more likely to be tomorrow. Simultaneously with the enforcement enforce-ment of the neutrality measure to include" the npw combatants, congress con-gress begins to squawk against the sentiment to extend credit to the Allies in the buying of war supplies, but there is a. great rush toward the hitherto rejected idea that we should prepare by sea, land and air against future catastrophe. catas-trophe. In fact, new demands for national defense funds have) assumed as-sumed top position in congress, which has been all tied up previously previ-ously withtthe CAA reorganization, reorganiza-tion, the Walter-LO'gan bills and relief needs. The call for from $300,000,000 to $500,000,000 for additional defense measures, which will be under committee con; sideration this week, will, of course, if successful, send the national na-tional debt well above the $45,-000,000,000 $45,-000,000,000 limit. A small backfire from the European Euro-pean war was felt by the senate last week when it was asked, through a bill introduced by Senator Sena-tor Guffey, to pay our ambassador ambassa-dor to Poland, Anthony Biddle, $243,361 for antique furniture, paintings and other personal property pro-perty lost in the invasion of Poland. Po-land. While war rages in Europe, we go merrily along with preparations prepara-tions for our own November battle bat-tle for the presidency, with detours de-tours and plenty of fireworks by way of Philadelphia and Chicago. Philly being only a brief jaunt from Washington, it seems a-s if half the D. C . residents were (Continued from first page) 1V1 Washington Comment (Continued on last pazs-) planning a day or two at the Republican Re-publican convention just by way of a picnic party and a little excitement. ex-citement. The morbid-minded among us are ghoulishly interest-: interest-: ed, because the G. O. P. seems to be flouting superstition at a great rate. You remember that some time back when a convention city had not yet been selected and Chicago was a. possibility, we mentioned that Republican candidates candi-dates nominated at Chicago, had all died in office. So Philadelphia was chosen, but here a new "jinx" crops up, because 'the presiding officer will be Representative Martin and he hails from Massachusetts. Massa-chusetts. Just listen to this 1 grisley record. A Massachusetts Massachu-setts man presided when Lin-1 Lin-1 coin was nominated in IStiO (he was assassinated, remember) ; 20 ; years later, a Massachusetts gentleman was in the chair when Garfield was nominated, and he fell from an assassain's bullet in the Washington railway station; j another 20 years produced another 'Massachusetts chairman ajnd ' another presidential martyr Mc-:Kinley; Mc-:Kinley; the nextt Massachusetts- ian before Representative Mar- tin to preside at a Republican ' presidential convention in 1920 saw the delegates chtaose Harding, Hard-ing, who, though escaping a violent vio-lent death,' nevertheless succumbed succumb-ed in office. Is that a record, or is that a record? The height of gallantry: Last week, the British patent experts t:ok time oijf from the war to cable congratulations to the United Unit-ed States patent office on its 150th anniversary. |