Pa

MY FRIEND AND | WILL BE BACK
AT THE SAME TIME TOMORROW

AN ORGANIZER’S VOTE

(The day he died Charles Weir
voted in Toronto election)

EXCESS BAGGAGE

h ith the passing of the years
ve come to see that the
“velopment of good relations

| een individuals and na-

| °Ns is usually hampered by
Prejudices and preconceived
Stions. There can be no mu-
lal respect between nations
Mil the Augean stables of
'Sjudice are cleaned out. | do
ot pretend to be a saint, for
n | first went to the Soviet
nN. |-too'carried with me a
iSful of: deép-seated preju- .
Ses. “Butt *triedto-get rid of
ia en route so as not to take
18m back with me. | recall
°W as the Moscow train pulled
|)Mt of the Helsinki station a
12d crash suddenly sounded
ide, My companion, also a
Mnish writer, rushed over to
© window.

iinet was that noise?” he
‘Don't be alarmed,” | said,
®nchalantly lighting a cigar-
€, “| just dropped my preju-
Ses out of the window...”

An organizer.

Charles Weir, the man.

Taught in great comradely love

Lenin’s plan:

“Build well, dear comrade,

Socialism’s victory is not remote,

I rise on these points of
privilege

And thereby cast my vote.”

—Jerry Morse.
Toronto, Dec. 1, 1969.

~Finnish writer Martti Larni.

FLIGHT NOTED

For the record, we note that
ia’ United States has treated
~ world to another moon
| ‘ight, in its insatiable drive to
Nquer space.

Nce our attention is more
pupied with such prosaic
9S as poverty, jobs, preju-
8, illiteracy, housing and
“ger, we have no_ further
"ment.

~Amsterdam News, U.S.A.-

Ooo

Editor—TOM McEWEN Associate Editor—MAURICE RUSH
Published weekly at Ford Bidg., Mezzanine No. 3, 193 E. Hastings St., {
Vancouver 4, B.C. Phone 685-5288. :

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il registration number 1560, Z
acaaaie Sabie a ecesn oteban aceinrencaceceeceor

Sditeital Comme

Basic issue is people

The capitalist press claims that the
meeting of the provincial premiers with
the federal government in Ottawa is a
real gloves-off “confrontation” in a
struggle for the rights of the provinces.
The refusal of the Trudeau government
to agree to French-Canadian sover-

eignty, with all the implications that:

has for Federal-Provincial relations, is
being used to deny all Canadians much-
needed reforms.

The question of constitutional rights
is not one to be shrugged off easily.
However, the basis to judge progress
on the subject is how much the stan-
dard and quality of life of all Cana-
dians will be improved as a result of
its work. Abstract constitutional rights
standing above that are a fiction.

A rule-of-thumb judgment of the out-
come of the conference can be made by
whether or not all who work are guar-
anteed equal standards of life — not
equality at the lowest level, but at the
level this rich land of ours is capable
of providing for everyone. .

If there is a guaranteed annual in-
come—and that must be—it should be
the same from coast to coast, and ade-
quate — not at the poverty-level mini-
mum. Every child and young person in
Canada should have equal educational,
recreational, medical and job opportu-
nities, no matter where he or she is
living.

The constitutional rights battle going
on at Ottawa is a sham. The federal

* government has no constitutional right
‘to maintain vrofits by deliberately de-

priving people of work. That is an im-
moral and criminal act. Constitutional
rights must guarantee the right of
every Canadian to a job and a full life.

It should be made unconstitutional
for any government to sell the owner-
ship of our natural resources to foreign
monopolies, endangering Canada’s sov-
reignty and limiting job opportunities
for young Canadians.

These are just some of the basic “con-
stitutional rights” that are in the inter-
ests of the working class. The govern-
ment representatives meeting in Otta-
wa do not speak for the rights of the
workers and farmers. Their interests
will be championed when the workers
and farmers movements take indepen-
dent political action to struggle for
those rights, and send working-class
premiers to such conferences.

Nixon the dissembler

The peace movement faces a chal-
lenge to both widen and step up its
activities. President Nixon’s press in-
terview appearance on TV was a cold-
blooded performance, designed to put
over the idea that he is an open-minded,
reasonable guy, prepared to face facts

squarely and fairly. :

It was a typical Tricky Dick perform-

ance for which Bob Hope might recom-
mend him-for an Oscar.

According to the President the wan-
ton slaughter of the Vietnamese is a
deplorable, but isolated incident. No
one believes that these widespread cri-

< AACA ase : ese

minal acts were unknown in top U.S.
circles. They were deliberate. The U.S.
soldiers who perpetrated them would
not have done so had they not been
brutalized and corrupted by a deliber-
ate policy emanating from the top.

The real criminals — the munitions
barons who thrive on war, the top of-
ficers of the Pentagon and members of

' the United States government — should

be standing beside the officers charged
with the crime.

Nixon dashed hopes for peace in
Vietnam. The clues to his thinking are
iven by Dr. Herman Kahn in a
Toronto Star article “How the U.S.
Can Win In Vietnam.” Kahn claims
there is an “enormous change in both
eneral policies and political tactics”
y the Nixon administration, which are
not appreciated. The “hard line” adopt-
ed_by Nixon, he says, means that Nixon
is saying that “time bought (at the cost
of lives) is worth buying because it is
possible to win this war.”

This means, says Kahn, that the num-
ber of American troops in Vietnam will
be reduced “to 100,000 or less by the
end of 1971” and (the sugar coating to
the pill) there will be a reduction of
American costs. He proposes increas-
ing the South Vietnamese police force
from 13,000 to 100,000 and the crea-

-tion of a South Vietnamese army of

3,000,000 men. The taxpayers in the
U.S. will no doubt pay their wages.

Kahn says that the president should
have explained that the U.S. has to
continue the war because it has a “re-
sponsibility to prevent the massacre
of what might well be millions of peo-
ple.” ues a farce, in the light of the
facts!

All this “clever talk ” can’t conceal
the continuation of U.S. imperialist po-
licy in the Far East — a challenge to
Canadians to redouble efforts for peace.

Wheat sales mean jobs

Canada is currently negotiating a
wheat sale with the Soviet Union. If
successful, it will put several hundred
million dollars into the farmers’ pock-
ets, to generate Canadian jobs through
expansion of retail, manufacturing and
transportation.

One wonders just what would be the
effect on the negotiations if the two
most recent issues of Canadian maga-
zine, with its anti-Soviet poison, were
dropped onto the conference table.
Siueiy the Soviet negotiators would
have every reason to be antagonized
and angry.

It is a tribute to the sober and deter-.
mined efforts of the Soviet Union for
peaceful, mutually advantageous trade
relations with Canada, that it has re-
fused to be side-tracked by the yellow
journalism of the capitalist press.

No doubt there are big business in-
terests, especially those who want to
turn us into a 5l1st state of the U.S.A,
who have inspired these irresponsible
articles, just at this time. The people of
Canada are stronger than the Cana-
dian Magazine. Its effort to poison re-
lations between Canada and the Soviet
Union is not in their interests, and we
are confident they will reject it.

of ens PAGIFIC TRIBUNE=+DECEMBER'12, 1 969—Page oe ag

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