THE CRIMSON FENCE

Like Janus, the two-faced god of the Romans, the Crimson is looking in both directions during the period proceeding its straw vote. On Tuesdays, Thursday, and Saturdays, until October fourteenth, editorials will appear by Helianthus and Mulus, two Crimson editorial writers of opposing political views. The former tends to look in the general direction of Kansas; the latter veers toward Washington.

When the friends of Governor Landon devote a large share of their time and energy to an attempt to prove the "red Sympathies" of President Roosevelt, that tacitly admit that they have no issue in the present campaign and no platform fit to be discussed in front of the American electorate.

Men like Colonel Knox and Chairmen Hamilton cannot be accused of the naivete of Hearst, and their irresponsible impeachments must be taken soley as a screen to hide their own mediocrity. The importance placed by the National Chairman upon David Dubinsky's position as an elector for the President is a Republican jest even funnier than most when one considers what the American eletoral college has long since become.

On a lower plane is the latest effort to link the White House and the Kremlin. Here Elliott Roosevelt is accused of taking exhorbitant commissions from the Fokker company for the sale of aircraft to Russia. It should interest American voters to learn that while a relative of the President is guilty of treason if he sells airplanes to the Russian government, the owners of the Liberty League, the DuPonts, may be partners in German munitions plants without being one degree less patriotic than usual.

A search for Marxian measures in the acts of the New Deal bears no fruit. Just where are these ghastly deeds which made Al Smith choose between Washington and Moscow last week? Surely not the N.R.A., which was not only drawn up by the Chamber of Commerce and big business, but by any standard of judgement must be pronounced Fascist rather than Communist. The Republicans are walking on equally thin ice when they attack the the A.A.A. For if what Governor Landon is promising is not an A.A.A., it is a reasonably exact facsimile. The "class hatred" bogey has been used with spirit, but it was the Republican Theodore Roosevelt who started the march and coined the phrase, "malefactors of great wealth."

If President Roosevelt had the support of the Socialists and Communists, as charged, there would be no Thomas or Browder running for President. Then the People's Front would be as real in America as it is in France. The only force which draws the redicals to Mr. Roosevelt is their detestation of governor Landon and his reactionary supporters. In this they are joined by a growing number of thoughtful voters of the most moderate economic and political views.