RANDOM SHOTS

Auckland Star, Volume LXII, Issue 2, 3 January 1931, Page 2 (Supplement)

RANDOM SHOTS

This is the time of the year when it is difficult to believe that there is much else going on besides horse racing and motor accidents. "It is reported that more than one Sydney racecourse is closing down before lo'ng." Now. at last one can believe that Australia i 3 depressed. "New Zealanders have arrived at the peculiar stage when everybody wants everybody else to go on the land." Everybody, that is, except "foreigners," who are often quite willing to oblige. ."Referring to the deficit of approximately £9,375,000 Signor Mussolini said that it was impossible to increase taxation, therefore it .must be met by a reduction in taxation." Well, he won't meet with opposition there. Every now and then some fullyemployed person advises the unemployed that there is much money to be made by reaping cocksfoot on the roadside. The idea seems to be that the unemployed, having found and cut their cocksfoot, should drive out in their care and carry it to a market. According to the calculations of research men, the average cost of production of wool in the period 1920-30 was 1/3 per lb, but the average price received was 1/2J, so that in that period a loss was experienced. But if the farmers, in five years, did not realise they were losing, was there indeed a loss ? Deploring what he termed the "tendency toward femininity" in New Zealand boys, a school committeeman said that "he would like to see the spirit New Zealanders displayed on the football field more in evidence in the wider fields of commerce and industry." But isn't it because many young men have no opportunity of displaying spirit at their work that they display it so brilliantly on the football field? In a Rugby game decision and action bring their own reward, probably in half a minute. In the "field" of industry similar enterprise may not be rewarded in half a year. And then someone else may get the reward. The Takapuna beach inspector, if he has doubt as to the decency of any costume worn on the beaches, "is to ask the opinion of at least two sensiblelooking people." As the inspector approaches a group of people on the beach he will no doubt observe some strange facial changes among them, as all try to look sensible. A point that may interest the bathers is whether the inspector, having questioned two sensible-looking people, and received a negative answer, will conclude that they were not, after all, sensible, and go on until he finds two others to agree with him.

"There was a Queen of England who said that the name 'Calais' would be found graven on her heart," says the retiring Mayor of Dcvonport. "I think that such names as Cheltenham and Stanley Bay will be found on mine." This thing must not be carried too far. There is a wistful sound about "Calais," and Cheltenham is at least soft (although it is long, so that a large heart would .be needed to accommodate the engraving). But if the Mayor of Sitting Bull, or the leading citizen of Whakarewarewa or of Paekakariki were to express similar sentiments, he would have difficulty in persuading his audience to believe him.

" . . . and the meeting proceeded to pass resolutions." It was a farmers' meeting, and farmers from all over Taranaki attended it, arriving in the morning and staying until "milking timo" approached in the afternoon. Yet one wonders how efficacious these meetings and the inevitable resolutions can be. What a small percentage of those farmers went to the meeting with any ideas of their own on the subjects to be discussed; how few felt disposed to move resolutions of their own; how few would have had the moral courage to stand up and voice their hostile opinions, if any.' (This was a farmers' meeting, but a meeting of city people is just the same in character.) Would not the same purpose be served if every farmer "listened in" to a broadcast of the speeches and the resolutions? It might even be arranged that the farmers should listen in while engaged in superintending the milking. But perhaps that way would be dangerous for the farmers' leaders, for how should they know that their sentiments were approved? Silence would not imply consent, but rather the inability of the listener to interject. And every speaker would have the uncomfortable feeling that his strongest points were not being appreciated because in some far distant cowshed some cow had just kicked over the bucket.