NOTES AND COMMENTS

Feilding Star, Volume XVI, Issue 4019, 8 June 1920, Page 2

NOTES AND COMMENTS

The German Elections. The latest figures received thismorning of the results of the general elections in Germany do not indicate that the Fatherland is securing fixture of government. The seven different elements that entered into the contest make a remarkable mixture, with the result that in the new Reiphstag confusion will be worse confounded. Tlie Liberals have 23 seats, the Conservatives 15, and the Centre Party (Catholics) have 13 seats. Can these three fuse? Hardly. Then there are the Socialists, the Democrats, the Independent Socialists, and the Communists—and they are even less likely to fuse than their opponents of the settled political parties. Fuse or refuse —fusion or confusion! That seems j>o be the total result of the German elections.

Well Done, R.S.A. At the instance of the Auckland body, the New Zealand Conference of the U.S.A., among its last business transacted,, decided unanimously to recognise and admit to full membership the veterans hi any war in which New Zealariders have talten part as Britons. Hitherto membership in the R.S.A. lias been confined to those who took part in the Great War of 1914----19. To admit the the .Mutiny, of the Crimea— I a mere hanHful nowaday—and especially of the Boer AVar, as Comrades All shows a fine fraternal spirit, and worthy of all. commendation. We know that the men who served in South Africa early in this century will be delighted with the privileges of joining up with the boys who beat the Boche. '

Unblessed Mesopotamia. Over in Bagdad the ancient a deputation has been asking the pertinent question: Why can't we lose the mililary in the civil rule? And the.., British Consul made the one and only wise ■ reply wheii he pointed out. that for over 400 years the tribes of Mesopotamia generally and the people of Bagdad particularly had been under the heel of an alien (the Turk), and was ifr to be expected that the habits of 400 years were to be reorganised in a year or two? Britain, .whilst putting down border warfare with a firm hand, was fully desirous <jf estab-" lishing home rule in the country. To that end the sooner the people helped towards a. settlement of disorders the sooner, they would see the British get out of the country aiid leave the government to the Arabs and other Mesopotamians. That was" a fine note to strikb—typically' (British— anil should spur the patriots to clean up the mess of Turkish and German and Bolshevik intrigue, and stop' the entry of undesirables . into , iWsia,wliich is the Ireland of the ,East so far as unsatisfying unrest is concerned. The British Government may be expected to guard the back door, to India, 'and that is Mesopotamia and Persia. .