OBITER DICTA.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 19120, 1 October 1927, Page 14

OBITER DICTA.

[By K.J

The Prime Minister, when he-ex-presses Jin opinion, is as liable to err as any of us, but when he mentions sometiifng as a fact that lie knows to be a fact, even Mr Ted Howard will believe him. Therefore I believe, without an effort, that it is perfectly true that some of our politicians have mortgaged their homes iti order to have monoy enough to stay in politics and to serve the democracy. This appears to me to be less a reason for repenting of the nasty things one has thought about the politicians than a reason for starting a Back to the Home movement 'for these mistaken spouters. Mr Sidey is having a penny collection made for him in recognition of his invention of a Bill to enable his constituents to get into the drizzle earlier and quit it sooner. This seems to be a silly way of spending pennies when so many of our politicians are homeless/ Mr Coates's idea is that the salaries of members . ought to be increased, in order that their families may not be left starving while father talks. My. idea is a better one, but a better one still is the examination of our members by some competent alienist. It would be best of all, perhaps, to discharge the Mortgaged Patriots from their Parliamentary duties, present them with transmitting radio sets, and leave them to disseminate their views night and day. Radio will thus* become of practical benefit. Not, indeed, that it has not lately revealed its {usefulness to mankind. A hundred "veal's ago two bruisers might meet in some English meadow, and thump each other thoroughly for hours, and nobody j might know anything about it until years afterwards. But when Jack Dempsey and Gene Tunnev climbed into the ring last week every listenerin on earth heard the fight as it progressed. Science is wonderful. Generations of scientists, have worked and lived and died in the study of electricity—coral insects building their reef. As the decades passed the level of knowledge rose, until the ether came under man's control, and at last out of the tangle of wires and batteries and guesses and luc£y hits there emerged the machine which enabled the bed-ridden widow in Constantinople, the lonely settler in Rhodesia, the Prime Minister of Australia, and the lighthouse-keeper in the. Bay of Whales, to hear the grunt as Gene Tunney's left hook 'connected with his Solar plexus. Such is the flower that has bloomed> at last on this greatest of the achievements of Science, and such always, or almost always, .those flowers have been and will be.

The progress of civilisation is, in fact, ODMA'A—M standing for mouse: "Parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus." But Science is not the only mountaimin Labour,.nor the most obviously absurd one. It is in politics and war that the final result is. the funniest. An American poet, Stoddard King, in his little book "What the Queen Said," says, of America, what is true of any country on earth, from Czecho-Slovakia to Honduras:

The ragged Continentals stood Against the tyrant George; " . They shot to kill at Bunker HiU, They "froze at Valley Forge. Terrific hardships they endured, The benefits of peace abjured, That wo, their sons, might be assured: The initiative and referendum, free seeds, La. Follette, and the Insterstate Commerce Commission, # * *

Our men responded to tho call To end the Cuban row And some were slain by troops from Spain, But more bv army chow. They swept the Spaniards from the map, After a short but lively scrip— And now our country has on tap: The committee of 48, the collected diplomatic addresses of Colonel George Harvey. and the League for Philippine Independence.

It seems as if 'twere yesterday We sent our boys to France, To pay the debt of Lafayette And check the Huns' advance. No selfish gain our legions sought, But altruistically fought, And with their sacrifices bought: The income-tax, the Bighteenth Amendment, the Ku Klux Klan, several billion German marts, and the farm bloc.

Nothing, however, can detct tojj from fighting and investigating, i and discovering, and talking 'jj t be goes. They have even holding a "World Population Con. fcrence in Geneva—a conference, j i have read, " rendered necessary by the amazing growth of population during; the last century. Biologists, stafe. ticians, socifclogists, and economists i>f all schools of thought will meet fro® every part of the globe to read pagers / and discuss and criticise."' Amongst the work to be criticised was a mass of research into the pedigrees of thi people in the East End of "London. These are valuable, it appears, as amounting to "a demonstration of the relative values of nurture ami notige in determining the qualities of and " the social stratification into biological types and classes which it constantly going on in our midst.* " Other subjects to be discussed in. elude the danger of wars duo to ex. pansion of population, the right peopling of the vacant spaees that exist, and even the eventual filling up of the world." The particulars of the discussions have not yet come by mail, but nobody who believes in Science and talje will doubt that there will have been a large accretion to the valuable store of Useless Knowledge the possession of which is not the least important of the marks which distinguish man from the olephant, the bee, and the dairy cow. It is fortunate for man that he alone of created tilings holds conferences and finds out what is good for him by taking a vote. If the dairy cows held conferences eoncerning diet and vitamin ec, butter would very soon come to possess the qualities of much of our social and political philosophy.

And now, to return to the politicians, and the Labour victory in Raglan. Labour is entitled to hold a stop-work meeting of rejoicing, for although its versatile candidate —he appears to be or have been almost everything - polled a minority of the votes, Kb polled more than any other candidate. But why are the Liberals at the trouble of appearing to rejoice? Mr Coates can say the Reform vote was the lairg- . est Party vote; Mr Holland can say his Party's vote! was almost as large; th« Country Party can say nothing except that it wants rain. The Liberals can say only that their man, backed abii benediGted by all the various branches of the Liberal Party, demonstrated | that that dear old Party is deader than ! ever. Sir Joseph Ward, however, I affects cheerfulness, but his confidence | is only that o£ the farmd* who undertook to stack all the hay bis three sons could fork to him. He struggled, bard*, but the deluge of hay overcame hint As it rose.ftbove him, he kept ori shooing, "More' hay!" More hay; The hay kept'on homing, and hdried the farmer deep, and deeper, until lie > was out of sight. His shouts grew fainter, but when all the hay was forked, and the pile was still, there • came, very, very faintly from 'the bottom of the heap, a final whisper, " More liayl" The truth of the matter ; is that Liberalism is the Canterbury ■ lamb of politics, destined to nourish the other two Parties. I may reprint i here a three-year-old diagnosis (in the ; "Observer") of the condition, of y Liberalism: I

The critical elector turns to thf Liberal Party and is still less at* tracted by that dwindling relief of a magnificent tradition. The traditional* of an ecclesiastical strength. ImagijW ation working on memory creates. W some tne pathetic fidelity of martyrs,; in some again the ecstasy of aspirants, in others the last shifts of opportune calculation, in most the solemn bt» ridiculous conviction of superior lit' telligence and righteousness.

In politics* of course, almost anything ~ may happen, and the Liberal Party may revive, just as Nicaragua may „ surprise us all by conquering the worlfL ,