. together

- Satisfaction.

You can count Us out, Senator Neuberger

PURE AL iM

The new ‘Manifest Destiny’

By HAL GRIFFIN

HE. people of Vancouver play-
ed unwilling host last week to

.a latter day exponent of “Mani-

fest Destiny,” a gentleman, to
beggar the term, named Richard

. Neuberger, and his supercilious
“wife, Maurine. at

_ Mrs. Neuberger’s disdainful ref-
€rence to ‘“drably dressed Cana-
dian women who wear rump-
Sprung suits” may be dismissed

as merely another of the fatuous

Observations with which some
Americans try to convince us of
their superiority and leave us

' astounded at their own illiteracy.

Neuberger, however, must be
taken more seriously. His state-
ment that Canadians are. “silly”
to oppose political union with the
United States when their coun-
try is already an economic part
‘of America ,cannot so easily be
dismissed. *It bears too close an
affinity to remarks made. by
Stuart Keate, publisher of the
Victoria Times, at a Pacific North-
West Trade Association conference
in Missoula, Montana, on Septem-
ber 19. Keate contented himself
with an observation about the
“inevitability” of Canada and the
United States being drawn close
“against the ominous
pattern of world events.” But
there is*no question that Neu-
berger, an American, and Keate,
a Canadian, were expressing the

* Same thought in different terms,

and Canadians who bridle at Neu-
berger’s insolence should be the
more incensed by Keate’ s servili-
ty.

bers of Vancouver Board of Trade
who brought the Neubergers here

to insult us were demonstrating
the far greater’ humiliations to

‘which they would subject us in
their pursuit of the American
‘dollar.

The visit arose out of an article

written by Bruce Hutchinson, of

Victoria, Winnipeg, and points
east to Parliament Hill, entitled
“The Trouble With You Ameri-
cang Is...” Not to be outdone,
Neuberger came to Vancouver to
tell us “The Trouble With You
Canadians Is...” Whatever else

_ the visit accomplished, apart from
garnering some ‘cheap publicity

for Neuberger, it provided noth-
ing from which the U.S. State
Department could derive the least
This was not Neu-
berger’s intention, of course, but
the consequence of his own arro-

8ance and self-delusion.

At home, in the state of Oregon,

Where he would be well-advised

to stay in future, Richard L. Neu-

-berger is a state senator and his
(Wife a state representative, both
“of them Democrats of the Tru-

Man stamp. We may commiser-
ate with the good people of Ore-

Zon who must. work for real.

American-Canadian friendship un-
der such a legislative handicap,
but that is no reason for having

_ foisted on us what they have thus
far been unable to dispose of

themselves.

Senator Neuberger boasts that
he has “seen more of Canada

than 99 percent of her people.”

Tt is his one reasonably accurate
Statement and it helps to Se ee

his purpose.

During the Second World War.
he was aide to Brig. General J.
A. O'Connor and‘ assistant chief

_ 9f public relations for the U.S.
- Northwest Service Command, em-

bracing the Canadian Northwest

from Edmonton to the Yukon-

It is apparent that those mem- ~

This picture was taken in Germany, but it could have been in
Britain or France or Iceland.. The words on the banner are being
echoed in a score of languages as the fight against American domination
and dictation rises throughout the world.

Alaska border. There, like so
many other American of his type,
he deluded himself with the idea
that only the United States could’
have built the Alaska Highway
and made himself thoroughly, if
less publicly, unpopular with Can-
adians who considered that only
‘the U.S. would ‘have squandered
such quantities of machinery and
money in building a road.

Here too, he had an opportuni-—

ty to assess Canada’s great natur-
al resources and to develop his
own concept of “Manifest Des-
tiny” for which American ex-
ploitation of these resources by
economic penetration is too slow;
he wants us to commit national

suicide by annexing ourselves vol- _

untarily to the U.S.
e :

I was referred to Neuberger in
Ottawa during the war when I
was trying to get a permit to
travel over the Alaska Highway.

It galled me as a Canadian, ask- .

‘ing nothing more than the right

to travel-in my own country, to .

find that I had to get the permit
from Washington,

As befitted a politician in uni-
form, Neuberger shrewdly asked
what I did in private life. I told
him I was a writer for labor
papers.

“Oh,” he said, “then I suppose
you know some of the oe lead-
ers?”

I assured him, quite truthfully,
that I did, omitting only to men-
tion that I had parted company
with them at the beginning of
the Spanish Civil War because,
of those around CCF provincial
headquarters at the time, I alone
was willing to stump B.C. in
support of a Spanish people’s
front government that included
both Socialists and Communists.

After that, Neuberger was quite
willing to introduce me at Wash-
ington, a decision, I am sure, he
must have regretted later when

he had made a few inquiries in

Vancouver.
I learned afterwards that he

had arrived in Whitehorse a scant
few hours after I had left for
Fairbanks. From the Alaskan
city Russian pilots, many of them
Communists, were ferrying Am-
erican-built fighter planes to the
eastern front, some of .them to
die a hero’s death and give Am-
ericans a better chance of sur-
vival. But Neuberger was con-
cerned about other things.

Did General O'Connor know
that he had been entertaining a
dangerous person in his midst,
a Communist, no less, who would
probably say some very uncom-
plimentary things about Ameri-
cans in the book he was writing?
Why hadn’t G2-investigated him?
But G2, it transpired, had» been
too busy investigating.a testy
old Pathe News photographer
who felt that aS an American he
had,.the right to say uncompli-

; mentary things about his fellow

Americans and had picked on
the colonel in charge of G2.

General O’Connor did not have
to worry. The friendship of the
Canadian and American peoples
was @ precious thing in those
days of the common war against
fascism, as it is now in the fight
for peace against the war policies
of both our governments. Then,
criticisms that might have been
made were left unsaid and we
suffered the arrogance of men like
Neuberger in silence. Where
Neuberger errs is in thinking we
are equally willing to put up with
his arrogance today.

®.. ws ,
Neuberger thinks that we Can-
adians have an “inferiority com-
plex.” It might more properly
be said that Americans who re-

flect Neuberger’s thinking have |

a “superiority complex.” But in
one sense, Neuberger is right.
Canadian working people are
becoming tired of being forced to
accept the inferiority of a horse-

“meat diet while Canadian beef

is sent to the U.S. We don’t like
the inferiority of having our iron
ore and our logs shipped to the
U.S. for manufacturing when they
should be used to develop Can-
adian industries and give work
to Canadians. And we know ‘tiat
if we were ever so foolish as to
accede to Neuberger’s proposal
for political union, al obst cles

to this plundering of our natural
resources would be rezaoved and
American monopolists word fist-
en our “inferiority” upon us no
less ruthlessly than they have up-
on their own  poverty-ridden
Scuth.

We do have a warning from an
American whose voice men like
Neuberger are trying ty silence,
William L. Foster, who writes in
his Outline Political History of
the Americas:

“To get hold of Canada, how-
everf is an ‘ingrained and long-

established idea that the United

‘States ruling class has never re-

linquished.. In our own days this
class is working more busily and
more successfully than ever’ to-
words the realization of its long-
time Canadian dream.”

A century ago, Neuberger’s poli-
tical ancestors were talking’ of a
“Manifest Destiny” that envisag-

ed not only the annexation of

Canada but American seizure >3f
Latin America as far south as
Brazil. Today, that “Manifest
Destiny” has been expanded to
include the world. Still clad in
the threadbare rags of its erst-
while revolutionary democracy, it
now wears underneath the full
accoutrements of fascism.
There is, however, one decisive
element Neuberger and his fel-
low imperialists, open or covert,
overlook. The term Yankee in
Canada is coming to denote all

. the hatred that Yanqui, its Latin
American counterpart, has long —

done. The more Canadians are
exposed to the strident arrogance
of Wall Street’s spokesmen, the
more they are subjected to’ the
American imperialist treatment of
an “inferior” people, the more
they become aware of those Can-
adians in high places who are
playing the American game, the
stronger becomes their own na-
tional consciousness.

It is precisely in the struggle
against these things, in their fight
to follow their own desires for
peace and throw off the American
war policies being imposed upon
them, that the Canadian people
will realize their own national
salvation.

What was the origin of the earth?

By MICHAEL SEATON

HE ORIGIN of the Earth is
one of the most baffling prob-
lems of science.

Many people still believe the
theory of Sir James Jeans. One
reason for this is that Jeans was
a good popular writer and based
much of his writings on his own

- theories, which were quite often

very far from fact.

The central idea of the Jeans
theory was that the material of
the earth was torn from the sun
by a passing star. This theory

-was demolished by the American

astronomer, Henry Norris Rus-
sell.
Russell pointed out that the
material torn from the sun could
‘not give rise to the rapid rota-

tion of the earth and planets ©

about the sun.

It was left to the Russian as-
‘tronomer Pariiskii to prove the
mathematical theorems which
were needed to confirm Russell's
view. :

ANOTHER THEORY has been

put forward by the Russian
Academician O. Y. Schmidt. This
has been widely discussed in the
Soviet Union, and a great deal of
scientific work has been done to
see whether it works. But it is
not at all well Known in this
country, even among professionai
astronomers. °

The sun is known to be moving

“among the stars of the Milky

Way. Schmidt believes that the
“sun once passed close to a cloud
of interstellar matter, composed
of gas, smoke and meteors.

He believes that the sun “cap-
tured” this cloud by the pull of
its force of gravity, and that the
cloud started to rotate around
the sun, and eventually condensed
“into the earth and planets.

There are a number of difficul-
ties in this idea.

* * *

AT ONE TIME, mathemati-
cians believed that such a capture
was not possible, but Schmidt
pointed out that in the real uni-

verse things might be more com-
plicated than in the simplified
schemes of the mathematicians.

When a theory of the origin of
the earth has been put forward,
it is necessary to follow up all
its consequences and see if it
agrees with known facts.

A great deal of painstaking
work of this sort has been done
by Schmidt and his colleagues.,

It is found that in many respects

the agreement is very dae
The age of the earth’ is esti-
mated to be 8,000 million years.
The age of the surface rocks of
the earth is about 3,000 million
years. This is known from study-

ing radioactive substances...

Schmidt considers this reasonable,
since the surface rocks are
younger than the earth ag a whole.

. Schmidt does not believe that

~ the earth was ever a ball of fiery

liquid. He thinks that it has al-
ways been at about its present
temperature.

One result of this is that it

- gives a lot more time for the

?

development of life on the earth.

It is sometimes said that vol-
canoes show that the earth must
have once been hot, but the
Schmidt theory suggests that vol-
canoes are due to radioactive
materials beneath the earth’s sur-
face.

* * *

IN FACT, if one considers the

amount of heat produced by
radioactive substances, it is not
easy to see how a hot earth could
have cooled at all.
_ Academician Schmidt is not at
all dogmatic about his views. In-
deed the Soviet Union encourages
sO much criticism and discussion
of scientific theories that. it
would be hard for any scientist
to be dogmatic.

Scientist jwill probably go on |

arguing about the origin of the
earth for a long time yet, but it
is very encouraging to see the
thorough and energetic way in
which Soviet science is tackling

' this problem, which has baffled

science for generations.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE — OCTOBER 12, 1951 — PAGE 5