The Lincoln Times

Above The Hullabaloo
By LYTEL HULL

So many of those Americans who
have lived abroad--especially in
England--during the war, and who
come over here for business or other
reasons, manage to say the wrong
thing at just precisely the right
time.

In a recent conversation a visiting
expatriate American lady made the
remark--and repeated it several times
—that "you don't know over here
that there's a war going on." There
was an Englishman present whose
time has been about equally divided
between this country and his own for
the last five years. Everyone took
the remark passively for the first two
times; but at the last repetition, just
as tempers were about to replace
good manners, the Englishman interrupted the expatriate American's flow of
gibberish by remarking - "Mrs.
Snooks, there are about 10,000,000
American mothers whose 12,000,000
children are serving in the armed
forces of the United States. That is
a far larger number than the British
Empire has been able to muster.
These mothers and their husbands.
and their other children, at least suspect that there is a war going on!

"Don't misunderstand me, Mrs.
Snooks! I'm not belittling the efforts of my country and the British
Empire. There are only 75,000,000
to 80,000,000 members of the Empire
whom we can count on in this sort
of emergency. The others are the peoples of parts of India, Africa, etc.
whom no one could expect to have the
same interest as have the British,
the Canadians, South Africans, Australians, New Zealanders and a few
others. America, on the other hand,
has 135,000,000 souls who are directly involved in the event of war. We
have done our full share and more;
and so has America, God knows!

"It doesn't signify anything because Americans complain at every
opportunity. They would be miserable unless they could do that. If the
butter looks a bit pale they want to
fire every member of the OPA. If
they have to forego meat for one
meal on Thursday they believe the
President is personally trying to
starve them to death. But when the
real blow strikes, you funny people
take it--and shut your mouths. If
it 'changes your stride' it isn't observable: Maybe—when you are alone
in the bosom of your family--but
certainly not otherwise.

"Perhaps, Mrs. Snooks, you have
been away so long that you are out
of touch with the American people.
You think because they haven't had
bombs land upon them, and have not
had to pull in their belts as much as
have those abroad, and don't complain about things which have occurred--that they don't know there
is a war going on.' Well, Mrs. Snooks,
I can only suggest--in the vernacular of your erstwhile country--that
you guess again'--and maybe study
a few statistics."