﻿Warn of Cannon Fodder Shortage For War of 1960 
By T-BONE SLIM 
 
Official spokesmen close to hind quarters intimate that if the folks don’t get busy right now and produce boy-children, the polticians won’t be able to rig up a war in 1960-65— unless they adopt foreign children. 
Adopting foreign children is out, because foreigners expect to sacrifice their children in the present fracas. (Thanks, professors, for the info.) 
Scientists have already prepared a formula whereby parents can determine the sex of prospective offspring as much as a year and a half in advance. Now isn’t that nice? 
Doting parents can bend the column-gossip’s ear and whisper at the top of their lungs, “I’ve got a soldier on the way.” Or a Red Cross nurse, as the case may be. 
The beauty of this arrangement is that if the birthrate of nurse-maids oustrips that of armor-bearers, the doctors can switch signs on the bottles. 
Is that goose-stepping or mere duck-waddle? 

A University of Iowa professor asked the heavenly coeds how much they would require a prospective husband to be earning before marrying. 
Eighty-five per cent of the coeds cooed $2,500. 
“Well,” said the professor, “less than 15 per cent of Americans receive $2,500 a year. So about 85 out of 100 coeds expect to be old maids.” 
Many of the maids are reducing their figures and trotting $1,200 to the altar, more than halving their expectations. 
There’s no need to do that. Just tell the prospects to join the IWW and correct the disgrace that is their earning power. 
(Note: The author does not rate $2,500 a minimum affluence; it’s the girls’ figure. The author feels that in view of the girls’ run-down condition, high cost of able-bodied vitamins and cosmetics, cigarettes, etc., $3,500—$10 a day—should be counted as the extreme low. 
“Quick British Victory Predicted.” 
Good, if it happens before American aid arrives. Thereafter it is an American victory. Britain has had almost two years in which to claim that victory. 
War in Europe and Asia can be likened to a jurisdictional dispute. World trade must and will suffer, maybe beyond repair, as a consequence. 
Not that I am greatly concerned. Hitler’s success in the Balkans did not get us down or leave a dark brown taste of defeatism in our gullet, because we feel—O how we feel!—that we have our hands full defending our own millionaires and their concessions. We are willing, however, to weep for Britain’s moneybags. 
This war can be improved with less shooting and more shouting; raising of rafters more and raising of hell less. 
Reading between the lines, I see Britain is preparing to use gas. Morrison (March 27) denies Britain will use it first. 
What difference does it make? Are they going to have dated gas? 

USA jumped the gun and froze $50,000,000 of Jugoslav funds in this country upon the signing of the Jugoslav-Axis pact. That was kind of jittery-like. Then Sumner Welles got hot and bothered about thawing-out those funds in the interest of selling Jugoslavia a bill of goods when she switched positions. And now what? 
That’s the hell of these war moves; you’re either too fast or too slow. 

It would be well to save that St. Lawrence Seaway job for the slump that is to be in 1943. 

Before sticking our necks too far out we should consider the sorrow that overtook a pugnacious black bass when it got its nose tangled up in a cluster of fish hooks that didn’t even have bait on ‘em—only feather, glitter and steel.