THE TAIL AND THE DOG.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 11026, 14 March 1914, Page 6

THE TAIL AND THE DOG.

Judged by the criteria of noisiness and pertinacity the Social Democrats are really formidable. Numerically they are a negligible quantity. For tactical purposes tho reactionary newspapers ar© treating them with immense a-e----spect. They are pretending that the Social Democrats will be extremely influential in the coming election. The journalists who write in this way are oifcher deceiving themselves or trying to deceive the constituencies. The Social Democrats, as a matter of fact, are a mere speck on the political horizon. Their influence with the average working-clap voter who thinks for himself and votes as his interests dictate is precisely nil. "Without the assistance of the silent voter who in an emergency is prepared to accept a Social Democl'at candidate as the lesser of two evils, that fractious coterie of impossibilists could not return a single candidate to Parliament. If they were wise they would bear this in mind and reconcile themselves to the fact that by thoir present course of action they are alienating the political forces from which they have derived a factitious advantage.

The satisfaction which the Tory Press derives' from the discord which it assumes the Social Democrats arc croa'ting in the ranks of the Progressives should be sufficient to ;wavn the leaders of the movement that they am on the wrong track. It is quito evident,-'how-ever, that they are incapable of benefiting from, the lessons of history. The Tory Press is jubilant in the realisation that it has got the Social Democrats in its bag in the same way that it had the whole Red Fed outfit in its bag at the last general electiou. The only difference is that tile receptacle will not need to be of the same capacity on the nest occasion that the' reactionaries alid the go to the polls together. The lessons of the piist year have riot been entirely lost on the silent, thinking voter.