Vol. 4, No. 33 October 28, 1966
A STEP AHEAD FOR "WORLD OUTLOOK"
This issue marks what we consider to be a significant step ahead for World Outlook. As you will have already noted, there is a considerable difference in weight of the paper, size of type, and general appearance. The main aim of these changes is to lower the cost of postage, particularly airmail.
Also, by shifting from the mimeograph to the photo-offset process, we hope to make possible an increase in circulation. For some time we have felt inhibited in circulation-building efforts due to the qualitative difference in amount of labor required in turning out material on a duplicator after a certain point is reached.
From the beginning, World Outlook has been somewhat experimental. We felt that a political need existed for the kind of service we have sought to offer. This judgment has been confirmed beyond our expectations. World Outlook now has an impressive international circulation. Most gratifying has been the way in which many publications utilize the material it offers. In addition we have been both surprised and pleased at the number of individuals who have subscribed. Our attention has been repeatedly called to the fact that those who receive it tend to utilize it for reference and to bind it for permanent use. And we are still getting orders for complete sets of World Outlook, beginning with the first issue. These, we should add, are no longer easily filled. On top of this, biweekly editions are now offered in French and Spanish and we should not be surprised if editions appear in other languages before long.
When World Outlook began in September 1963, we were dubious about the cost.
New York, N. Y. 10010. HPs
subscription, particularly for distant countries where airmail costs would be very high, seemed virtually prohibitive. But without advertisers or financial angels, we had no choice -- if the project was to survive -- but to put it on a self-sustaining basis. This has been held to rigorously so that World Outlook is genuinely a collective enterprise. The most eloquent testimony to its usefulness and the esteem in which it is held is, in our opinion, the checks and money ordérs from far~away countries sent to cover airmail postage. Often this is once again and even three times the subscription cost.
We are turning away from the duplicator not without careful consideration. As old devotees of this process and its variants, we fully appreciate certain advantages which it has that have not yet been superseded. Among its disadvantages, however, is one that we have found to be insuperable despite considerable experimentation on our part. This is the inability of the various brands of machines -- at least the ones we have tried -- to efficiently handle paper of airmail weight.
As you can judge from the current issue, this problem is now solved for us. By combining airmail paper with a certain reduction in the size of type, we are able to compress a full-size regular issue of World Outlook into 24 pages, add an envelope (and a renewal notice!) and still come well under the minimum postal rate. The cost of this process is, of course, higher than mimeographing World Outlook. We are quite confident, however, that this -- with your assistance -- can be met by an increase in circulation.
To those who have sent money to cover airmail postage at the old rates, it will no doubt be welcome news that deposits will be prorated to automatically extend your subscription. And to those who have hesitated to get an airmail subscription, we can report that the cost is in general now about two-thirds of what it was.
For those interested in the technical details, we might add that the present type size is nine and a half point. It is the same size used by certain other publications that feature a type face of this kind. We hope that it will prove to be perfectly legible and that you will not have to invest in a magnifying glass.
As to our editorial policy, this of course remains unchanged. Our aim will continue to be to offer political analysis and interpretation of events from a genuinely revolutionary Marxist point of view.
ANTIWAR PICKETS GREET JOHNSON IN NEW ZEALAND AND AUSTRALIA
The American capitalist press, which knows its politicians very well, has aptly described Johnson's trip to the Far East as a "barnstorming" tour; i.e., the customary ritualistic show put on in precincts and hamlets where the office-seeker wears a fixed smile, pumps hands, pats children, kisses babies and stands beside local dignitaries. The most dramatic bits, naturally, are dutifully recorded by press and television cameras for the benefit of history. Johnson carried this so far that it was reported he was suffering from a "painfully sore right hand" when he arrived in Australia after his triumph in New Zealand. The nails of some of his teen-age New Zealand girl admirers were, it seems, unusually sharp.
The tour was timed to come on the eve of the elections in the United States with Johnson playing the role of "peacemonger" in hope of counteracting the adverse effects of his escalation of the war in Vietnam. It was also intended to give his "allies," prime ministers Keith J. Holyoake of New Zealand and Harold E. Holt of Australia, a boost in their own election campaigns which come at the end of November. Both of them are in trouble because of the way they have backed Johnson's war in Vietnam.
A wider aim of Johnson's tour is to provide a smokescreen of "peace efforts" for the next step in escalating the war in Vietnam. The Manila conference will provide the finale for this. At the same time, the conference will be utilized by the accompanying staffs of diplomats and military men to put the finishing touches on coordinating the puppets and satellites for the next move.
This was perfectly obvious to the government of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, the immediate target in Johnson's war. President Ho Chi Minh said October 22
that Washington had called the Manila conference "to broaden the war and bring it to a still higher degree of fierceness." He forecast that the Americans would "intensify their intelligence and spying activities, increase their psychological warfare and smuggle more spy commandos into north Vietnam."
The entourage of correspondents reported "huge and enthusiastic" crowds from the day of Johnson's appearance in Wellington October 20. The curiosity is understandable. The American president's special bullet-proof, bubble-top limousine was brought along for the sake of the show. When the car stops, and Johnson gets out like a spider crawling out of a bottle, a shout goes up from the crowd. As Max Frankel of the New York Times describes it:
"'He's stopped!' someone shrieks and hundreds rush toward the spot like iron filings to a magnet. Young fingers clutch at the large, freckled hands, often nipping the flesh with long nails."
Others found a different kind of attraction in the president. In Wellington pickets carried placards welcoming him with such phrases as "Lyndon B. Johnwater" and "Lyndon B. God." (See story on page 12.]
In Canberra, 3,000 pickets assembled outside the Rex Hotel where they waited three hours for the great man to show up. As reported by a New York Post correspondent, "They were drinking beer and singing songs and exchanging good-natured banter with the cops and asking the milling reporters what the hell had happened to the bloody cowboy."
"'T think we've scared the bloke off,' said Keith Heatherington, a 43-year-old laborer. He was standing in front of a blizzard of signs, all of them blue-white in the lights from the TV cameras. Among the choicer items: "We're Not Cattle And This Is Not Your Ranch," "Go Home and Fight Your Own Election," "The King Is A Fink," “Welcome President of Australia," "None Of The Way With LBJ."
The Post correspondent reported Robert Salaggi as saying: "We don't hate Americans here. But we just feel we haven't been consulted. There's been a terrible row over the draft. A lot of us came here to get away from the bloody conscription laws. Now they are saying that not only can you be drafted but they can send you overseas if they like. That means Viet Nam and that's not our fight, mate."
In Melbourne, too, antiwar pickets showed up with their placards and banners denouncing Johnson and his war in Vietnam. Typical ones read: "All Astray with L.B.J.," "Hands Off Australia," and "Tomorrow's Hitler Today's Johnson."
At Melbourne University demonstrators planned to lie down in the street in front of Johnson's bubble-top car. When the police learned. about this, they hastily rerouted the motorcade.
It was in Melbourne that demonstrators managed to do a paint job on the famous automobile. Two plastic bags, one filled with green paint, the other with red, landed on the car. The windshield was drenched. One bodyguard was almost covered with green paint, two others with red. The paint was water-based and washed off easily.
In Sydney, likewise, a considerable sector of the crowds proved to be openly hostile to the "bloody cowboy." In the Hyde Park area they shouted antiwar slogans and carried banners denouncing Johnson and his role in Vietnam. In the Paddington district a dense throng of antiwar pickets barred the way. Their banners denounced Johnson aS a war criminal and demanded an end to the war in Vietnam. The police called in mounted officers and charged the crowd to clear the way for the distinguished visitor from the U.S. Near the University of New South Wales, the motorcade was again detoured by police to avoid student demonstrators. In one place a woman hurled herself at the president's car but missed and fell to the pavement.
The Columbia Broadcasting System told the American TV audience that the pickets and their slogans were so familiar to the correspondents accompanying the presidential party that they seemed to be "Made in America." They forgot to mention that the war being protested by the demonstrators was also "Made in America." If the banners echoed those to be seen in the U.S., it is simply a case of hands across the sea in opposing a course pointing to the doom of all of humanity in a nuclear catastrophe.