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Hokitika Guardian, 8 September 1930, Page 8

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MR, HEARST AND FR ANCE. The official intimation to Mr W. R. Hearst, the American newspaper magnate, that his presence in France was not viewed favourably by the Government of that country shows that France is still very “touchy” on matters of • international politics. The •‘touchlines,” however, does not arise solely from the incident, mentioned in the cable message, in which the Paris correspondent of the Hearst group of newspapers, Mr Harold Horan, secured a copy of a secret document and published the, text of it. The correspondent himself suffered expulsion for that offence. It is probably because of the general editorial attitude of his •newspapers that Mr Hearst has been received coldly in France, an attitude not unnaturally interpreted ns one of definite hostility to French aims. There is a difference between the French and the British reactions in such matters. Mr Hearst’s journals used to he violently and even virulently anti-British, blit Britain did not on that account refuse him hospitality.

AN ANGLO-AMERICAN PACT. Mr Hearst’s views on the international situation have undergone a marked change in recent years. He is ~ now an ardent advocate ,of AngloAmerican co-operation, He thinks that the entrance of the United States into the League of Nations would be “suicidal,” and that an agreement with the British Empire would be natural policy. He. advocates a naval agreement of the English-speaking peoples in which each would build as big a navy as it wanted, the only conditions being that the combined fleets should be bigger than any possible hostile combination, and that they should bp used for defence, not offence. The leagues and pacts under discussion in Europe are to his mind designed solely to “secure: foreign nations in the forceful, possession of the spoils of war.”

A NEiW TERROR. The peace of the world is menaced by a new giant- loud-speaker, said to have been perfected by a, great German engineering firm. This invention does not talk, it shouts, and the reproduction is capable of flooding a whole city with sound at once, overpowering everything else within reach. The firm recommends it strongly for advertising purposes, since a stationary balloon equipped with this menace could control the air for many square miles. A whole fleet, a whole army, not to mention a whole city, it is claimed, can be controlled by a, whisper into a microphone, and no other receiving apparatus is necessary than the human ear. Thus whatever sounds it is desired to transmit, of whatever nature, will penetrate everywhere, and an unfortunate populace will he unable to avoid them. If given full scope for development it appears as if this loudspeaking machine will add a new terror , to life.

MODERN YOUTH. Criticism levelled against the youth of to-day is not so concerned with the fortunately comparatively small section that, in its amusements, competes in stupidity and in defiance of theconventions of respectability, as it is with the general attitude of the young people of life. Addressing a company ol over a thousand at Uppingham Speech Day in England, Mr Justice Acton said that this “age bowed down by mechanisation” was making rapid and relentless progress in every direction, with the inevitable result of a mechanisation of the mind and spirit of youth. There was a strange decline, he said, in young enthusiasms so potent in the Victorian age, and while youth was naturally mixed up with silliness and sentimentality, those who had lived long and were able to make comparison with the past, could discern in the youth of to-day a lack of backbone in facing the problems of life. Too many youths to-day, he regretted to sav. were interested only in Uie sordid, inhuman and unclean. Of “’loll were some of the modern intelligentsia