POLITICAL NOTES: Secretary of Eats

“A Mayor should give himself time to do his job properly,” said Dictator Bernard J. Newman of Philadelphia’s Housing Association, last week. “There should be: 1) a Secretary of Eats to at-tend all dinners for the Mayor; 2) a Secretary of Speak to utter all the usual bombast expected from a Mayor; 3) a Secretary of Handshakes to give the glad hand to visiting delegations; 4) a Secretary of Poses to satisfy the craving to see the Mayor’s picture; 5) a Secretary of Travel to go about the country for the Mayor.”

Obvious objection to the Newman proposal: banquets, speeches, handshaking, press pictures and trips have a political value which no jobholder can ignore if he seeks reelection. Hidden away behind five such secretaries, the Mayor would quickly become an incorporeal myth.