THE PEOPLE'S FORUM
THE PEOPLE'S FORUM Hester's Correctives Dear Sirs: Hugh B. Hester—it is hard to believe he is a general—has contributed most valuable facts, interpretations, and suggestions in his article in the...
...The perversion of the Marshall Plan to destroy its humane value through becoming an adjunct of the militarization of reluctant countries...
...Please, understand that I am not taking sides, but that I am merely trying to find a solution most in keeping with the principles of The Progressive as a liberal magazine and which will also help to increase your number of readers...
...A clean bomb peedl The word bomb itself can never be Em since its intent is for the destruction | human life...
...Judging by his writing, Milton Mayer hates people...
...You have been too busy kicking a fallen giant...
...Now for a long time I have been trying to pick holes in Mayer, but I really can't...
...Mayer a Genius Dear Sirs: In the June issue People's Forum Gene Antley wonders if Milton Mayer is "an idiotic genius or an ingenious idiot...
...Dulles, you tried to two-time and double-talk them, you would be beaten every time...
...Did it save us from the H-bomb, the cold war, the Hungarian atrocities, or any of the other things they hoped it would save us from...
...We pray that at last the governments of the world will come to their senses and harness the evil of the hydrogen bomb lest many of us perish—quickly in the event of nuclear war...
...When will the pacifists abandon their ideological approach (for that is what it is) and begin basing their thinking upon actual historic facts...
...As it is, one gains the impression that the editors are stubbornly ignoring numerous readers' requests by publishing his articles month after month, year after year...
...We are impatient at the slowness of agreement on such a ban, and fearful that rigidity of the governments involved may make agreement impossible, but we fervently hope that Mr...
...Whatever contemptible little pygmies may say against Adlai Stevenson, he is a man of unusual distinction and integrity...
...Wise people and nations know there are neutral corners and take them...
...Imagine our dismay on the eve of this near hope to read the announcement of President Eisenhower of United States' achievement of a "clean" nuclear bomb, and his hope that we might share the technical knowledge of how to produce a "dean" bomb with the U.S.S.R...
...He does not make "Quaker sounds," which are kind and gentle, reconciling and constructive...
...Yet would the pacifists have been any less vociferous in denouncing such action then than now...
...Joy C. Guze St...
...attacks made on the dictators of Latin 4aer-ica: Trujillo of the Dominican Repatdic, Batista of Cuba, Somoza of Nicaragua, and Jimenez of Venezuela...
...According to the Scriptures, acts of omission are equally as reprehensible as acts of commission, and certainly the "silence" Miss Smith alludes to, in the face of the grave assaults on basic rights of the individual in our own age, indicate the moral depravity into which our generation has sunk...
...Eleanor Powell Cornwall, N. Y. Spiritual Cynicism Dear Sirs: I hope the graduates of Atlanta University were as deeply impressed with the wisdom and thoughtfulness contained in Miss Lil-lion Smith's commencement address as I was...
...Theodore B. Dufur Los Angeles, Calif...
...And can anybody in his right mind maintain that Chancellor Konrad Adenauer is worse than Hitler or the present democratic ruling group in Japan worse than the military clique of the 1950s and '40s...
...Our hearts sink when we are informed of lack of success of the Disarmament Conference in London...
...Let me assure him that Mayer is just straight 100 per cent genius...
...Carleton Beals Guilford, Conn...
...Common experience of Americans then in Russia was that if you played fair with them, you could trust them...
...More Than Mayer Dear Sirs: For about six years I have been reading what Milton Mayer writes in The Progressive...
...the destruction of some myths of the cold war and the placing of large blame for it upon our own shoulders, and the factual presentation of Soviet attitudes all are splendid correctives of the vicious propaganda with which we have been deluged by the Pentagon and its cohorts...
...General Hester's article supports the findings of Morris Rubin on Russia reported in The Progressive last fall, and both accord with my own knowledge and experience...
...Another friend was machine-gunned in the stomach at the door of his apartment in New York City by agents of the Trujillo government...
...It was like this: I was going through a huge stack of back Progressives, taking out all the Mayer articles to keep, separating the gold from the dross, as it were...
...Nothing short of this will bring se-jiiity in the atomic era...
...Paul Brinkman, Jr...
...I agreed with him 100 per cent on Adlai...
...I missed him in the August issue...
...THE PEOPLE'S FORUM Hester's Correctives Dear Sirs: Hugh B. Hester—it is hard to believe he is a general—has contributed most valuable facts, interpretations, and suggestions in his article in the July issue, "The Question Nobody Asks...
...That igle mistake—the greatest blunder ever ramitted by any nation in all history— l» cost us more than $200,000,000,000 in arm-nent, a disastrous war in Korea, a mad id suicidal atomic arms race, the sabotage the United Nations, the disappearance of he-third of mankind behind the Iron Cur-p, and a legacy of fear, hatred, and in-jcurity which has done much to undermine [>r free institutions...
...I am wondering if he has not been a regular contributor for a long enough time to ask him to write for only, say, every second or third issue...
...We must not only be honest, we must be above all suspicion of falsity...
...Dear Sirs: Am I nuts or are Benjamin D. Segal and Joyce L. Kornbluh nuts...
...Even when I don't agree with him he makes me think...
...Necessary Evil...
...Yone U. Stafford West Springfield, Mass...
...He is concerned about the preservation of friendship Kith the countries of the South...
...One of the reasons we have progressively lost the friendship of the peoples of Latin America is precisely because we have given such spport to the dictators who are abusing and killing their people...
...Since I cannot imagine that Senator Wiley is either naive or ignorant of what goes on in Latin America, I am reduced to the conclusion that his statement represents complete moral bankruptcy...
...The instant The Progressive reaches my mailbox I drop what I'm doing immediately, muzzle anyone who is talking, and read what Mayer has to say, and what readers have to say about what he has to say...
...But there is little likelihood that war would have resulted...
...Ban Nuclear Weapons Dear Sirs: If living in the atomic age is not enough to convince us of existing world-wide neurosis, surely a glance at the headlines will do so...
...James Lindley Rank Frostburg...
...They are the enemies of everything for which the United States is supposed to stand...
...As the situation stands, many readers wouldn't do without him, and many readers can't do with him...
...The only way to establish decent relationships with them, and with all the eastern peoples, is on a basis of unequivocal, forthright honesty...
...And I couldn't believe it: I discovered that The Progressive actually includes other interesting articles besides Mayer's, and I was very impressed by three or four of theml So you can see, but for Mayer, I would have made this important discovery long ago...
...and other nations K'nuclear weapons so that, should HEkWU occur, those of us (perhaps Bk58» survive will not suffer from harm-Ejjfecft o£ radioactive fall-out...
...Mayer's "Poor Taste" Dear Sirs: Upon concluding a reading of Milton Mayer's "Deep in the Heart" article, in the Jtlly Progressive, I could not help but think that it was written in poor taste...
...But, perhaps the fault is basic to the age in which we live—the scientific-materialistic outlook which unconsciously contaminates our psychological perspective...
...Grace Iltis Madison, Wis...
...asic Problem Fear Sin: Lson H. Keyserling's comprehensive an-(ysis in "Cracks in the National Economy" pggests to my mind "The Crack in the fational Economy...
...A dozen friends of mine have been killed by the Batista regime in the most horrible manner...
...slowly and more insidiously from the dangers of atomic fall-out...
...In my opinion and in the opinions of many others he is the greatest living American...
...Elaine Shapiro New York, N. Y. Wiley's Moral Bankrupted Dear Sirs: Senator Alexander Wiley of Wiscojnm, ranking Republican member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, deplore...
...and if it had, it would have been infinitely easier and safer to wage than now...
...Mayer Less Frequently Dear Sirs: I have been reading with concern the pro and con letters regarding Milton Mayer's articles in The Progressive...
...We label the Renaissance, "sentimental...
...With the greatest spending power, thirty-two billion dollars this year, of any group in all history, we must expect the military to cling to their might by every device they can muster of fear-raising and misrepresenting...
...Pygmies vs...
...Neatest Blunder Dear Sin: Your editorial, "Failure in the Far East," i the July Progressive omitted the most im-Jrtant reason of all: our failure to have an •mediate showdown with Russia over omic inspection and control in 1945...
...Florence Brown Hamden, Conn...
...As thinking people, we all agree with the statement attributed to Abraham Lincoln, "One man with G-od is a majority," but exceeding few of us have the spiritual stamina to follow it through...
...Well, we followed their advice, and what did it do for us...
...And, answering Jacob Levin in the same issue, Mayer, being a genius, knows that the thousands of years the Jews and Judaism's offsprings, Christianity, Mohammedanism, and recently Marxism, have warred or killed only bring more hate and more violence into a world which must renounce violence if it is to continue...
...Perhaps one of the lore plausible answers might be something Bee this: while the experts and master me-pania are tinkering with the machinery of pis economy, the driver of the car is almost [No amount of fixing, tinkering, stream-ling, etc., of the economic car can with-ind the misuse to which it is subjected by B "drivers" (namely, ourselves...
...They state in then-August issue article, "The Insecurities of our Security Program," that the industrial personnel security program is a necessary evil...
...Marcaret Hofmann Austin, Tex...
...jCan any unbiased person deny that most ! the troubles of the postwar era have rented from our failure to do to Russia what Idid to the Axis powers...
...I think Mr...
...Stassen's proposal will meet with success...
...If this is pie, then let us wage peace and prepare for tact—not prepare for war and possibly Bge it...
...Elsie Lindeman Philadelphia, Pa...
...but if, like the ineffable Mr...
...Jacob Levin Chino, Calif...
...We have nearly always thrown obstacles in the way of governments that represented the people...
...Stevenson I am glad to get rid of The Progressive and Milton Mayer at the same time...
...Louis, Mo...
...Just where is it necessary...
...Mayer's Bitterness Dear Sirs: I have just read Milton Mayer'i "Box Office Quakers" in the June Progressive...
...historians of the future, if future foe JSe, will look back on this second half Fit Twentieth Century with amazement I the igjtdunations of mankind to wipe it-fef off die face of the earth...
...representative to the Conference that our government proposes a temporary ban on the testing of nuclear weapons as a step toward universal disarmament...
...He writes for and is understood by people who don't sit in comfortable arm chairs...
...One was burned alive in his car by Batista's police...
...Just where is our thinking gone, so shifted over the past twenty years that even our liberals have to give some cloak of responsibility under the guise of necessity to this shabby process that is corroding the very basis of our democracy—that it is a nuuVs right to make a living for himself and bis family...
...To say that this WW have bred more hatred and war is to fly in the face of the most patent evidence...
...Mayer should take a rest until he can become more adjusted to society and men...
...I shall never read your magazine again...
...And, Mr...
...If we examine ourselves objectively, with the cold eye of truth, we must admit that we—those of us who have "sold out" not only the victims of injustice and outrage, but our own integrity as well—have contributed mightily in bringing about the so-called "decline of the West...
...Maybe man doesn't live by bread alone but try living without it...
...President Eisenhower has said that %eie is no alternative to peace...
...As enlightened, intelligent people dedi-Lted to the furtherance of a good life for U, can we not see that should an atomic iji occur, civilization as we know it cannot arrive...
...However, we are cheered by Harold Stassen's statement as U.S...
...must go...
...Distorted Concept Dear Sirs: The articles by Milton Mayer reveal a distorted concept of people and events that do not conform to the high caliber of other material in The Progressive...
...What system can survive human greed...
...the Victorian Era, "hypocritical," but will not "spiritual cynicism" and "moral ineptitude" be just epithets in today's crucial contest in which "the winner names the age...
...Certainly General Hester's first-hand experience of the Russians squares completely with our own in 1929-30 when my husband was engineer in charge of building 780 miles of highway in the city and province of Moscow...
...I hope this talented and good-intentioned man will someday resolve his bitterness and know the satisfaction of making some serious contributions toward the peace and brotherhood he now simply "squawks" about...
...Rubin, if you ever drop Milton Mayer, another bit of me will die, leaving those lovely liberals to confuse the pee-pul further...
...Her words touched a central artery of human frailty—our fear to be the individual, the iconoclast, the man alone—in a society which castigates the idealist and derides his standards...
...It seems to me that he could have said his piece well in half the space had he left out the drivel and gone right to the heart...
...Let us urge our government to press 5r a ban of nuclear weapons testing * a first step toward easing world tensions, fed then let us continue our efforts award achieving universal, total disarm-jnent...
...The old law, "An eye for an eye...
...I like his articles, they suit me to a T. But something happened recently that gives me a real grudge, and I think you should fire Mayer...
...And when The Progressive stops publishing his articles I'll stop taking it...
...Is our industry so full of saboteurs that we must risk destroying our democracy to curb them...
...My suggestion of asking Milton Mayer to contribute occasionally instead of regularly (in order to keep both sides happy) will also serve another purpose: You will gain space to fill with the writings of other contributors, thus assuring your readers of your broad range of interests, o£ the fact that there are many writers anxious to contribute to The Progressive, and you will also prove that you have no tendency to grow stale...
...Mrs...
...Johanna Hensoldt Washington, D. C. Only One Mayer Dear Sirs: In response to Gertrude Collison's letter in the July Progressive calling for "many more Adlai Stevensons and fewer rattlebrained Milton Mayers," let me say that the world is full of Adlai Stevensons, but there is only one Milton Mayer...
...I do not for a minute believe that Senator Wiley was paid off, but he cannot be unaware of the fact that such men as Somoza, Trujillo, and Batista stand for brutalities that are destructive of everything represented by the words "free Americas" and have committed crimes as bad as those in Hungary or Communist China...
...There was far less hatred against the West in Germany and Japan one year after their defeat in armed conflict than there is in India today fifteen years after her victory through non-violent resistance...
...Recently Senator Wiley visited the Dominican Republic and came back singing the praises of a ruler whose bloodthirsty exploits make Al Capone a white angel by comparison...
...Are we so advanced that these secrets in industry are unknown to the Russians...
...In fact, } economy is foolproof from corruption, id perhaps that is one of our basic prob B8...
...It is not that I dispute Mayer's brief on the discrepancies between practices and preachings of so-called liberals, but why was it necessary for him to resort to a ridiculously paternalistic and "cute" atmosphere to make his point...
...How could anyone mistake anyone so hostile as Milton Mayer for a Quakerl The most characteristic thing about Quakers is their love for all men...
...Portland, Ore...
...As long as the same writers contribute to issue after issue, there is certainly this danger which, in my opinion, a liberal magazine can ill afford...
...Roo Scott Bethlehem, Pa...
Vol. 21 • September 1957 • No. 9
