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had this visit with you, though, I'll read your magazine every week,
trying to guess which of those things in the front you wrote."
"I'm
never
wishy-washy," said the girl, laughing. "But is
your wife radical?"
"Good Lord, no! She calls herself a liberal, but actually I'm
more of a radical than Leonie is."
"How do you mean?"
"Well, you take the election. I'm going to vote for Landon
because it's expected of me, and my vote won't put him in."
"But you're really for Roosevelt?"
"No," said the man, a little impatiently. "I don't like Roose–
velt either. I don't like a man that's always hedging his bets.
Roosevelt's an old woman. Look at the way he's handling these
CIO strikes. He doesn't have the guts to stick up for Lewis, and he
doesn't have the sense to stay out of the whole business." He
leaned across the table and added, almost in a whisper, "You know
who I'd like to vote for?"
The girl shook her head.
"Norman Thomas!"
"But you're a steel man!" said the girl.
The man nodded.
"Nobody knows how I feel, not even Leonie." He paused to
think. "I was in the last war," he said finally, "and I had a grand
time. I was in the cavalry and there weren't any horses. I was the
youngest American major in the World War, and after the armis–
tice we were stationed in Cologne, and we got hold of a Renault
and every weekend we'd drive all night so we could have a day on
the Riviera." He chuckled to himself. "But the way I look at it,
there's a new war coming and it isn't going to be like that. God
Almighty, we didn't hate the Germans!"
"And now?"
"You wait," he said. "Last time it was supposed to be what
you people call an ideological war-for democracy and all that.
But it wasn't. That was just advertising. You liberals have all of
a sudden found out that it was Mr. Morgan's war. You think that's
terrible. But let me tell you that Mr. Morgan's war was a hell of
a lot nicer to fight than this new one will be. Because this (1ne will
be ideological, and it'll be too damned serious. You'll wish that
you had the
internation~l
bankers and munitions men to stop the
