Straws: Brummagen Ware. (1941)

The Straws Column from the November 1941 issue of the Socialist Standard

Brummagen Ware.

The Bishop of Birmingham, on Sunday, September 28th, opened his mouth and taught them, saying: “The destruction of wealth would make the whole community poorer.” If the last war is any guide, there will still be an ample share of surplus value produced to provide high living (not in the “spiritual” sense, My Lord) for the privileged few. The dear Bishop then solemnly announced that in the present war “workers were becoming small capitalists.”

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Cant and Cantor.

Dr. E. W. Barnes often manages to be merely silly; he should take a refresher course from the Archbishop of Canterbury to learn the ignoble art of bowing in the House of Rimmon, and apologising for it in specious phrases. “We may well be proud of our new Ally. . . . We have something to learn from Russia . . . they have something to learn from us” (6.10.41). How does he square this with the “orthodox” religious view that the present conflict is essentially to fight for Christian ideals ?

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Soviet “Equality”

The reverend dodger must be well aware that Soviet “planning of economic resources for the good of the whole community” has not obviated the great gulf in material conditions between peasant and proletarian on the one hand and “high-ups” of the Communist Party ruling caste on the other. The S.P.G.B. will be pleased to furnish irreproachable evidence on the point should His Grace desire information. Sez you !

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Oliver and Bumble.

Compare the following statements occurring in the same issue of the Daily Herald (17.10.41): “Beaverbrook cannot make the tanks himself. That only the workers can do; it is on the workers and their constant eagerness of toil that he relies.”

“Almost impossible to contemplate.” Sir Walter Womersley’s reply to demand for flat rate increase in Service men’s allowances. “Impossible even to contemplate,” when the worker in field, factory, or ghastly battle area asks (all too modestly, alas) for an extra allowance of the skilly ladled out to him by National Bums and Bumbles.

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War Tipsters.

Lord Acton’s historical essays are always worth reading; they are studded with common sense remarks, as, for instance, “there is an undefinable quantity in military genius which makes the event uncertain.” An excellent piece of implied advice to war tipsters of all shades and all parties.

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Golden Nobs and Clay Feet.

Harold Laski is a knowing card; his eulogy of our “beloved leader” in Reynold’s of October 19th beats the ordinary method of “damning with faint praise” by sizable lengths. “Of Mr. Churchill’s immense popularity there can be no question.” He has paid tribute to the Prime Minister’s “eloquence,” etc., etc. But “the conviction is growing that he does not grasp the economic and social issues of the time,” and much more in the same key.

Augustus Snellgrove