Letters, Feb. 28, 1949

Wow!

$7,000,000 to overhaul the White House [TIME, Feb. 7]. Wow! . . .

THOMAS L. STUART Big Timber, Mont.

. . I suppose $7,000,000 is not much mon ey as government spending goes, but it seems ike a lot to someone who longs for a nice $8,000 house but can't afford to pay $20,000 for it.

(MRS.) KEMP JOHNSON

Dallas, Tex.

Chinese Slogan

Sir:

Can you translate the Chinese slogan on the Mao Tse-tung cover [TIME, Feb. 7] as either UNIFY DEMOCRACY or CONTROL DEMOCRACY ?

PM BAYNE

Wolfville, N.S., Canada

The former (exact translation: " Uni ty and Democracy") — but the latter may be more exact in meaning. — ED.

Justice for Rundstedt

Sir:

. . . Anyone offering a defense of Germans runs the chance of being considered a Nazi sympathizer, but since the forthcoming trial of German Field Marshal von Rundstedt appears to me to have some significance . . .

I will take the risk.

As I understand it, Rundstedt and other generals have been in close confinement since the end of the war. Judging from the writings of Captain Liddell Hart, Rundstedt, at least, was primarily a military man, unlike Keitel, Jodl, etc. If this be the case, the treatment given and in store for him appears to lack justice. All that is necessary to illustrate this point is enough imagination to contemplate a defeat for this country at some time, whereupon the then Marshall, Eisenhower, Patton and Hodges would promptly find themselves "war criminals" . . .

At a time when the world is desperately striving for some evidence of reason and good faith, it seems foolish to encourage this sort of thing . . .

MASON LAWRENCE

Springfield, Mass.

Microscopic Animalcules

Sir:

Jackson Pollock's painting Number Eleven, pictured in the Art section of TIME [Feb. 7], interpreted by Sam Hunter of the New York Times as "cathartic disintegration," is nothing of the sort. Any biologist will tell him that Mr. Pollock made a subconscious endeavor to paint a jumble of spermatozoa, probably of bovine origin. He must have seen these animalcules under the microscope or in a picture at one time. That past experience in the subconscious mind of the artist has forced him to splurge them on canvas at a moment of "high tension." If there has been any disintegration, it has been in the painting of many abnormal forms, microcephalic (small-headed), acephalic (headless), atrichous (tailless) spermatozoa with a few typical specimens.

D. A. BERBERIAN, M.D.

Loudonville, N.Y.

Twinsburg in Turmoil

Sir:

"Trouble in Twinsburg" [TIME, Jan. 10] gives readers a most inaccurate picture of this unfortunate school situation . . .

The Board of Education of this community ... is elected by the vote of the people. This school board is directly responsible to the citizens . . .

Superintendent Glen L. Powell has always had the unanimous support of the Board of Education . . . Mr. Powell in his 14 years as a school administrator has demonstrated his ability to initiate a progressive program of school activities both academic and extracurricular.