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Show I irawrengmryi Tl BLOWING BUBBLES : IN PERSmNG SQUARE j PERSHING SQUARE IN LOS : ANGELES, like Trafalgar Square : in London, is a soap boxer's Mecca. It was in Pershing Square, a quar- ; ter of a century ago, that I first : heard a soap box orator expound- ing the virtues of "Production for Use" as opposed to what he said : was production for profit. I Only a few years later Upton Sin- : clair sought the governorship of : California on a "Production for Use" platform, and came near being elected. Just at the close of the last presidential presi-dential campaign I listened, on a national na-tional radio hook-up, to the Socialist-Labor Socialist-Labor candidate for the presidency of the United States solicit the support sup-port of the voters for the program ! of "Production for Use." $ It Is a far cry frcm the soap box I orator in Pershing Square to a candidate for the presidency appealing appeal-ing to America over a national radio hook-up. When I heard the soap boxer my curiosity was aroused to the extent of wondering just what it meant, and the details of its application appli-cation to the American people. The enthused orator did not, or could not, satisfy my curiosity. When In California during the heat and excitement ex-citement of the Sinclair campaign I had tried to obtain the meaning and the working details of "Production "Produc-tion for Use," but without success. Either they are too complicated to be explainable or my kindergarten mind is not capable of understanding. understand-ing. I can get that part of the proposed pro-posed program of the workers taking over and operating the factories, and the expulsion of all capital interest in Industry. How this is to be done, unless by confiscation, I do not understand. Nor do I understand how the man who makes shoes is to get food, a house, clothes, an automobile auto-mobile and the other things he may want, or bow he is to get the leather from which to make shoes. The general picture, as it is presented, might be enticing if I could but understand how H could be made to work. 1 am so dumb I cannot fathom just how the presidential salary of that man who wanted to be president, would have been paid had he been elected. Many, to me, unexplainable theories the-ories have been expounded by the J soap boxers of Pershing Square. ' Anything, short of the violence of anarchy, is permissible. Out of California Cali-fornia came the Dr. Townsend plan of $200 a month for those over 60; the "ham and eggs" program; the $30 every Thursday and the last one, $60 at 60. One after another they have been voted down, but the something for nothing idea keeps coming back in a new guise, and will probably continue to do so. That something for nothing idea has developed among the American people since 1920. For a time we tried to get it out of the stock mar -ket with the resulting explosion of 1929. Then we had years of doles, of WPA, CCC. NYA, AAA and others. oth-ers. Possibly in time, we may learn that the sure way to get ahead is to get out and hustle for what we want, and to save for the rainy days. In the meantime the soap boxers are still blowing bubbles in Pershing Square. |