Dear Editor
DEAR EDITOR The New Leader welcomes comment and criticism on any of its features, but letters should not exceed 300 words. ROCHE The answer to John P. Roche's article. "Can a Free Society Fight a...
...Perhaps this is the lesson to be learned from the Nazi experience...
...I had the opportunity to hear him spreak in Connecticut last week and was impressed by his courageous attempts to counter the "backlash" sentiments of white workers with a progressive statement of his plans to create a more humane capitalism, and to provide guaranteed, important jobs in the public sector for all willing to accept them...
...a desperate general economic situation, epitomized by a frightening unemployment rate...
...Unlike the British, who in almost all their colonial wars used a limited number of professional soldiers, Johnson gradually built up our armed forces in Vietnam to half a million men...
...Philadelphia, Pa...
...October 21), is Yes, but not the kind of war in which Lyndon Johnson involved us...
...Walter R. Storey LIBERAL CRISIS Although I basically agree with Gus Tyler's trenchant analysis of the liberal situation ("The Liberal Crisis—Now," NL, October 7), I have two serious reservations which I suppose amount to the same ultimate objection to Tyler's line of thought: He is crossing the fine border line between analyst of political trends and prophet of doom...
...Talk with a Polish Poet...
...New York City Thomas E. Goldstein Assistant Professor of History, City College of New York I have just read Gus Tyler's analysis of the "Liberal Crisis—Now" and found it a fine evaluation of the dangers of the current situation, as well as a forthright call to action...
...Comparisons with Germany on the eve of the Third Reich are often bandied around too freely in the American political debate...
...Cambridge, Mass...
...New York City Peter B. Kenen Chairman, Department of Economics Columbia University RASMINSKY VS...
...As Julian Mazor's editor, I am the last to be impartial, but I think it only fair that your readers know what Geoffrey Wolff, a fairly regular New Leader reviewer, said of Washington and Baltimore elsewhere: "He writes about some of the ways whites and Negroes respond to one another . . . the prejudice black and white men, with the best will in the world, seem unable to evade . . . Mr...
...New York City Robert Adler...
...New York City Michael Magzis Alfred A. Knopf, Inc...
...but there are perceptible differences—and they ought to be understood...
...However, some of us find an investment of close to $30 billion a year in this war as being in conflict with our urgent needs for the war on poverty, the urban crisis, more low-income housing, modern mass transportation, etc...
...That is not true, of course...
...Berlin, Germany Zbigniew Herbert COLUMBIA Paul Starr has developed a rather mistaken conception of the grievances of student protesters at Columbia ("Report Card on Columbia," NL, October 7...
...MAZOR I can only wonder if Judith Sklar Rasmin-sky has chosen to use the occasion of publication of Washington and Baltimore by Julian Mazor to vent an astonishing amount of spleen...
...Why didn't they foresee he would make the war "politically unjustifiable" in this country as he has made the 1946-54 war with France...
...And how can he justify the President's sending a few more American boys to Vietnam time after time with the promise that one more contingent would bring the proper pressure on the enemy...
...New York City Peter Rockwell If Paul Starr and I were asked for our opinions on issues at Columbia, past and present, we would disagree on many points...
...3. The administration (Truman-Deane) proposals for restructuring are certainly more cautious than other plans for a new University Senate, but are somewhat more liberal than many plans—and the Interim Rules—on matters of discipline...
...These replaced and liberalized the ban on indoor demonstrations opposed so bitterly last year...
...For neither the radical nor the reform-oriented students was acceptance of the ultimate authority of the Joint Committee on Disciplinary Affairs "one of the thorniest sources of friction...
...It may be the peculiar heritage of those of us who are refugees from Nazi Germany to appreciate any true elements of freedom wherever they can be found, and to utilize them rather than throw up our hands in despair: to use the vote to try to keep out Nixon or Wallace (even if Humphrey is not the most ideal alternative): to work for improvements wherever there is an opportunity...
...In a similar vein, the position of liberals under a Nixon Presidency would be difficult (and their tasks steep...
...Tyler is perceptive in comparing the present American situation with that of Germany in the early '30s...
...as to the New Left, a mixture of ideology and masochism seems to govern their thinking...
...a particularly virulent form of nationalism, the result of many cumulative historical experiences...
...This increasing enthusiasm for the Humphrey candidacy, and my increasing optimism about his chances for a victory, have led me to write this letter...
...The palpable differences in the American scene, in my judgment, amount to the elementary fact that despite its enormous problems American liberalism stands on incomparably sturdier ground...
...NL...
...Otherwise, Starr's is one of the best accounts of recent developments I have been able to find...
...Roche fails to explain why our military and political experts never seemed to expect Ho Chi Minh to declare total war on us...
...Although in my ignorance as a private citizen I originally supported our Vietnam adventure, I can view it now only as a disaster...
...self-righteous abstention at this time can only aid the forces of reaction who will, in any event, gain the allegiance of some three-fifths of the American electorate...
...a generous man...
...The Liberal party platform includes a statement on the war and the bombing question which, as Tyler has rightly pointed out, could have easily carried the day and united the Democratic party at Chicago...
...In this I seem to imply that there is no censorship in Poland...
...I suppose not even the most vulgar propagandist would be able to defend this falsehood...
...Just as Justice Abe Fortas' zealous critics concentrate upon everything about him they don't like without mentioning the central thing, that he is a Jew, so the New Left claims it is attacking Zionism, not Judaism...
...Incidentally, American military advisers in the Greek civil war of the 1940s have told me how ineffective air power is against an enemy using mule trails and primitive transportation...
...His stories are honest, and his accomplishments impressive...
...Henry D. Fetter HERBERT I recently came upon The New Leader o{ August 26, which contained Stephen Stepanchev's interview with me...
...In 1960, Liberal votes carried the day for John Kennedy in New York and the nation...
...Former supporters of McCarthy could vote for Humphrey as a Liberal, and thereby cast a vote against reaction and for necessary social progress while at the same time registering their dissent with current Administration policy...
...Some people in the command echelons blundered on the military and psychological fronts...
...Mazor is a gentle man...
...Yes, Germany suffered from a growing polarization of the extremes and the resulting erosion of the "middle ground," as Tyler points out...
...And our massive effort has continued for over three years, with no end in sight at this time...
...Why our military men and their superiors could not learn from this experience and apply to Vietnam is something Roche fails to explain...
...the economic destruction of the German middle class through inflation, depression and the burden of the lost war...
...In his article, Tyler touched on the role of the Liberal party in this election year...
...The White House seemed to have no understanding of American psychology and of the public's tenacious memory of promises, promises...
...the kind of constructive social and educational reform program that will bring tangible step-by-step improvements to the American Negro, based on the indispensable cooperation between black and white...
...not only is her attack on them malicious and gratuitous, but she herself is quite as guilty of a cliche as she accuses the author of being, for her review ("Too Black and White," NL, October 7) is as pretty an example of knee jerk liberalism as I've ever seen...
...STYLISH ANTI-ZIONISM I want to thank you for Harold Fisch's incisive review of Maurice Samuel's Light on Israel ("Missing Israel's New Tide," NL, August 26...
...The struggle for the freedom of the word in Central and Eastern Europe has become part of the traditional task of the writer...
...In fact, since the Joint Committee was selected entirely by the outgoing Kirk administration?to administer rules in the creation of which students played no part—the Joint Committee has been largely ignored by both groups of striking students...
...With Fortas' critics, the motive is anti-Semitism, plain and simple...
...Roche's brilliant and often frank article doesn't name the culprits...
...In any case, Fisch simply and decisively states the facts in a refreshing way...
...One can be philosophical and view our Vietnam effort as "not a big war" because, as Roche contends, only 3-4 per cent of our Gross National Product has been committed to it...
...but it should not be portrayed as hopeless from the start...
...The propaganda machine that condemns Israel for protecting itself has gotten into gear again, creating an atmosphere of stylish anti-Zionism that had abated somewhat during the Six Days War...
...In 1968, the Liberal line could fulfill a similar decisive role...
...I am sorry that at a moment when Czechoslovakia is the center of this struggle, my interview might give the impression that I do not stand by my literary colleagues in Prague and Bratislava...
...Even in the (not exactly unlikely) event of a Nixon victory, I do not think American liberals would have to feel that the "night of fascism" has descended upon them...
...But in each instance the attack has no real ground in reason, and therefore must have a deeper, more irrational basis...
...I believe that the Liberal party might hold the key to a Humphrey victory in New York, a victory vital to his chances in the nation...
...One might even add that a comparable historical constellation was behind these political phenomena—a dizzying tempo of the internal evolution...
...Rather than merely isolating the radical "provos" from the liberal core, as Tyler suggests, liberals would have to learn—or re-learn—the art of effective political action as distinct from the dramatic but futile radical exercise: the kind of student movement that achieves real and needed academic reforms...
...They would have to learn to re-group, to overcome excessive internal divisions, to unite in a common (and effective) opposition against dangerous government policies, to develop real leadership?hopefully of the caliber of JFK...
...She seems ?deliberately ?to have misunderstood the nature and intention of Mazor"s stories...
...Further...
...Can a Free Society Fight a Limited War...
...This misunderstanding, rather painful for me, I fear has resulted from my insufficient knowledge of the English language...
...It is, therefore, a tribute to his skill and integrity as a journalist that I can find so little to criticize in his account of the situation...
...the kind of dynamic, imaginative foreign policy programs which will represent superior alterna-Continued on next page DEAR EDITOR tives to the official course pursued by the government...
...But the "middle position" had been unmercifully ground down by other powerful forces, notoriously absent from the American scene today...
...Fisch's point is simple: Israel's claim is "stronger in fact, in law, and in history," and Israel is not going to place its fate in anyone else's hands, or argue about the justice of its existence and its fervent quest for peace even as it is forced to defend itself in war...
...Once in a while, the much-abused administration gets out in front of the "liberal" faculty and most of the students...
...2. The faculty and administration have since moved to organize campus-wide elections for the student and faculty membership of several key bodies, including the Joint Committee on Disciplinary Affairs, the Executive Committee of the Faculty, and interim rule-making bodies...
...But three points should be made: 1. At the same faculty meeting in September that voted against amnesty, the faculty approved so-called "Interim Rules" for the conduct of future demonstrations and for administration of discipline...
...and, of course, the virtual absence of any effective experience in democratic government...
...Whatever his very real limitations, Hubert Humphrey represents the only possible choice for concerned and compassionate voters...
...and above all not to cry "Establishment," "fascism," "Gestapo tactics"—and squander ourselves in fatalistic protests—as long as any avenues for effective action are still at hand...
...This sort of over-dramatization may help to get out the vote against Nixon and Wallace, but it does not help a sober assessment of the situation in which we find ourselves now...
...Perhaps we can't expect him to be a Zola, but one is desperately needed...
...in Germany's case a headlong plunge of the country into the threatening uncertainties of the modern world, which left large segments frightened and restless, and placed unbearable strains on the traditional institutions and mental habits of the German people...
...All efforts should be made to convince supporters of Senator McCarthy—now unwilling to support a Humphrey so similar (in their view) to the "new" Nixon—to vote for Humphrey on the Liberal line...
...Yet Humphrey's chance for victory is real and growing steadily...
Vol. 51 • November 1968 • No. 21
