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Show em Washington, D. C. NEW FAR EASTERN DRIVE It now seems certain that we will concentrate on the Far East to a much greater degree than most people peo-ple expected. U. S. naval officials had been privately pri-vately skeptical of British co-opera- tion In the Far East and never expected ex-pected Churchill to come through. However, he and Roosevelt both agreed that the time had arrived for vigorous operations to stop the Japs before they dug in so deeply on the PaciBc islands that it would take years to dislodge them. The British have now given definite def-inite commitments regarding certain cer-tain operations. This is important. It so happens that the British do not promise easily. Our own top strategists strate-gists are inclined to make promises quickly, but sometimes have to explain ex-plain them away when conditions change and it is obvious they -cannot be kept." But the British, though awfully hard to pin down, have absolutely ab-solutely kept their agreements when once made. What these commitments are remain re-main a military secret. However, certain moves which are known to all, including the Japs, should give Tokyo plenty to worry about. For it is no accident that Admiral Nim-itz, Nim-itz, commander in the Pacific, has been recalled for conferences; or that the insatiable Australian prime minister has now said he was satisfied; satis-fied; or that Attu was taken. All these straws in the wind point to hitting Japan from many different directions Alaska, Australia, Burma Bur-ma and the Central Pacific. This offensive in the Far East may , be one substitute for a second front in western Europe. It may no1 knock Hitler out of the war quite . so soon, but it may make the twe wars in Europe and Asia finish a' 1 1 tlTTlA :nuie iieeiiij. uic SAVING UNCLE SAM'S SHEKELS Here is a simple suggestion which would save the governmentmillions: As the law stands, a man coming into the government cannot be hired for the figure of $5,000 or $6,000, but must get one or another of the fixed government ratings, such as $4,600 or $5,600 or $6,500. Many a man has come to Washington Washing-ton from the business world in the last few years, willing to work for $5,000. But there is no government rating at that figure, so he is offered of-fered $4,600, and if he won't take that, he must be paid $5,600. Likewise, if he is a $7,000 man, willing to work for that figure but not for less, he must be given $8,000. . Literally hundreds of men have come into the War Production at salaries $50Q or $1,000 more than they would have accepted, simply because the Reclassification Act of 1923 establishes the figures of $4,600, $5,600 and $6,500 with no elasticity. The same waste results in the field of promotion. To keep good men these days, government agencies are obliged to give promotions without with-out waiting for the 2 year period required by Civil Service. So the agencies resort to evasion. eva-sion. They reclassify the employee by writing up a new job for him at a higher salary level. He might ; be satisfied with a $500 raise, but reclassification means that he gets , at least $900 niore, or even $1,500 i more. A simple change in the law would i save hundreds of dollars in thousands thou-sands of cases. AMERICAN TAXI-DRIVERS Some political prognosticators say rou can predict the outcome of U. S. Sections by the reaction of taxi-irivers. taxi-irivers. However, the character of taxi-drivers may go even further and be an index of the general honesty hon-esty and temperament of the American Amer-ican people. OWI's Katherine C. Blackburn struck a hopping mad taxi-driver in New York the other day. He had just found $1,200 in war savings stamps which somebody had left in his cab. When he traced the "fare" and returned the stamps, all he got was congratulations on his honesty and a 25-cent tip. "I'll never be honest again!" he declared grimly. This brought him and Miss Blackburn Black-burn to the Ritz Carlton. She got out, paid her fare, and tripped into the hoteL While she. was still in the lobby, somebody tapped her on the elbow. "Excuse me, miss," said a voice, "but you left your furs in my taxi!" C. On the average of once a day, somebody with a screw loose tries to see Secretary of State Hull. One such, called to explain to Hull his method of stopping torpedoes. He was stopped by a secretary. COLLEGES AND CONGRESSMEN Harvard, Yale and Princeton may be well represented in the state department, de-partment, but when it comes to congress, con-gress, a grab-bag selection of names turns up such colleges as John Carroll Car-roll university (Congressman Michael Mi-chael A. Feighan of Ohio) . . . Bald, win Wallace college (Congressman Henderson H. Carson of Ohio) . . Creighton university (Congressman Frank A. Barrett of Wyoming) . . . Marshall college (Congressman Hubert Hu-bert S. Ellis of West Virginia). |