POLITICAL CATCH CRIES

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22066, 23 September 1933, Page 9

POLITICAL CATCH CRIES

TO THE EDITOB. Sib, —When I penned my previous letter I little thought that it would attract attention from bo many of your readers. Now I fear I have not made my meaning clear to all of them. One writer has said that we are the only reasonable race as apart from other creatures. We think almost solely in words; and can we think of a thought which —not using words—is not the kind of thought we use when we think? The question is a pleasant puzzle, Words underlie our whole life. So, different individuals express their thoughts in words about ray reference to the Lyttelton by-election. One characterises my statements a s a eulogy of Labour, and another as Tory propaganda. The same statements, mark you, are construed differently bv Mr Thomson, “Farmer, and * Omega.” I like that word “ Omega ” —the last word, the last letter in Greek—and so far as the average man is concerned “ Omega ” is just as difficult to understand as Greek itself. “ Omega ” is a student of emotions to be aroused in others by the use of words. While I name over a few words think of the effect on yourself—Aladdin, Julius Caesar, the Crusaders, Napoleon, Waterloo, Nazareth, Calvary. Each one arouses a different sentiment, grave or gay. Take another group ot words such os Kurow, Plato, “ Omega,” and think what they convey to you. They arc three words that appear very frequently in the columns of the press to-day. They are writers of words, and their catch cries are “ Money barons,” “ Moneymongers," “ Tories,” “Financial Gamblers.” Their language is not that of reasonable men, but of fanatics. They refer to certain catch cries—“ Coates and confidence,” “ Seventy Millions." “ Coalition," and “ New Zealand Legion.” Should they not also add Mr Holland’s “Twenty-five million bait at last election”? I note that this bait has been conveniently dropped from the revised policy of the Labour Party, and here I wish to thank “ Omega ” for sending me a copy. It may be well, too, to remind readers that I made no reference to the Labour Party’s policy, and “Omega’s” outburst of abuse proves very conclusively that the warning I gave is very necessary. I need not repeat my warning again, but refer only to the last clause: “Coming members may not all stand on so high a plane of integrity and moral worth as does Mrs B. R. M'Combs, M.P. for Lyttelton.” "Omega” may be a type of intellectual extremist that is riding on the back of Labour, hoping thereby to reach the destination he so desires. This is the type against which the country must be warned—the type that, while living on the fat of the land, uses the poor down-trodden worker as a hack to carry him along life's journey.—l am, etc., Observer. Oamaru, September 21.