Most Recent Additions

The calendar will be a regular FIFTH ESTATE feature. We know that there is more happening in the Detroit and Ann Arbor areas than what we have listed, so we need your help. Send us information about what your group is doing or just anything you hear about. We think the items listed below disprove the contention that “nothing ever happens in Detroit.” The deadlines for the calendar are the 8^th and 23^rd of each month.

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Special to the Fifth Estate from Satyrday Publications, Toronto

Toronto—as well as most large Canadian cities—is becoming a haven for youthful Americans who, for reasons of their own, don’t want any part of U.S. President Johnson’s war on the Vietnamese people.

“It’s not that I’m scared to fight... I just don’t believe in killing people for the phony cause that our leaders tell us we’re fighting for,” one U.S. draft-dodger told Satyrday magazine recently. He preferred to remain anonymous because Federal Bureau of Investigation officers, hand-in-hand with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (Canada’s FBI), are trying to keep tabs on draft-dodgers.

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That Artists’ Workshop Public Notice in your last issue — Public Notice for more members — I found somewhat amusing [see FE #18, November 15–30, 1966]. Especially where it said “There is no hierarchy, no exclusiveness, no formal structure ...”

Reminds me of the Holy Roman Empire — which was neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire.

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The best advice I can give anyone about the ARMY and the U.S. GOV’T in general is not to get involved with these maniacs in the first place. This however is becoming increasingly difficult to do unless you leave the country altogether.

Chances are that you’ll get a letter as I did saying “Y’all come on down for a physical.” This was particularly traumatic for me as I had successfully avoided these people for 27 years.

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I concluded last issue by saying that, whereas in previous ages, nonconformists were able to “escape” society by taking refuge in an agrarian life, etc.; nonconformists in the interdependent society cannot escape. They can only rebel. And their rebellion demonstrates the absolute contradiction between the Social System and the Human Id (as a symbol of human freedom and satisfaction).

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a review of

Vietnam! Vietnam! by Felix Greene, Fulton Publishing Co Hardcover $5.50, Softcover $2.95.

“Whatever the military outcome of the war in Vietnam, its moral outcome has already been decided...America has the ignominious role, whether she wins or loses.”

—Arnold Toynbee

In war-time, it is easy to forget about human beings. In the case of the war in Vietnam, this seems to be especially true. For those who sympathize with the war, pictures of torture and cruelty become commonplace (after all, war is hell). For those involved in opposing the war, heated arguments about slogans and feverish planning for mechanical demonstrations too often take precedence. We have all forgotten the Vietnamese and their humanity.

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American heoroes, the Fort Hood Three: (l. to rt.) Mora, Samas, Johnson

PFC James Johnson, Pvt. David Samas, and Pvt. Dennis Mora, three antiwar GIs court-martialed two months ago refusing to go to Vietnam have been transferred from Ft. Meade, Md., to the federal military prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

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Rainbow

Can you float through the universe of

your body and not lose your way?

Can you lie quietly

engulfed

in the slippery union

of male and female?

Warm wet dance of generation?

Endless ecstasies of couples?

Can you offer your stamen trembling in

the meadow for the electric penetration of pollen

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Andy Warhol, slightly built with frosted blond on his hair and perpetually with shades, doesn’t grind out the pop culture he’s noted for.

It flits forth from his head instead.

Warhol, the man who started the whole pop art movement with his painting of a Campbell’s soup can, who filmed the epic kiss, who swathed the under-round in velvet, and brought the nation’s first wedding in a happening to this midwestern town, is thinking of following Leary into the Village Theater in New York with his own religion.

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The Image was there, the sacrifices and the paid assassin, the screaming mobs of idiot droolers, the expressionless expressions passing for cool, the magic gimmicks and trickery, the grey recorders and their cynicism who will later let everyone know what “really” happened via the tube; all there in a building that once flourished better when it was full of cows. The midwest may never learn.

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Mod came to the Midwest Nov. 20^th as two young Detroiters were united in the bonds of holy matrimony in the nation’s first mod wedding ceremony.

A capacity crowd of Teeny-boppers in miniskirts and bell-bottom trousers jammed the Michigan State Fairgrounds Coliseum to watch Randy Rossi, 19, a go-go girl and Gary Norris, 25, a free-lance artist, take their traditional vows. However, that was about the only link with tradition in this free — wheeling improvisional ceremony.

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From the “Action Line” column, Detroit Free Press, Wednesday, November 23, 1966:

I saw a bumper sticker on a car that read: “Stamp Out Reality.” Any idea where I could get one?

—M.R., Ferndale.

Fifth Estate Book Store on Plum Street is sending you one. They’ve got the most off-beat selection, about 100 messages to choose from. Caution: Some folks might find a few of ‘em offensive. Proceeds go to a left-wing publication. Most popular stickers are anti-Johnson and anti-Vietnam: “God is Alive—He’s in the White House,” “Draft Beer, Not Students.” Other big sellers: “Support Your Local Batman,” “If You Drive, Don’t Drink (You Might Hit a Bump and Spill Some).” For the uncommitted, there’s one that says, “Bumper Sticker ”

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Editor & publisher

Harvey Ovshinsky

Managing Editor

Peter Werbe

News and Political Editors

R. Fleck & F. Joyce

Art & Layout

Gary Grimshaw

Editorial assistant:

Cathy West

Circulation

Wilson Lindsey

Photography

E. Bacilla, Willson Lindsey, Magdaline Sinclair

Travel editor

Sheil Salasnek

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Progress Report: The first reorganizational meeting of the Artists’ Workshop Society took place as scheduled on November 22, with encouraging results. That is to say, enough people expressed working interest in continuing the work of the Society that the Artists’ Workshop will endure—and, hopefully, keep growing.

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When Cecil Taylor spoke at a panel discussion at the University of Pittsburgh prior to his concert there, it apparently came as a shock to his collegiate audience that he and his fellow musicians no longer wish to undergo the demoralizing experience of presenting their music in nightclubs. How could the musicians not want to play in nightclubs? the students wanted to know. What was going to happen to jazz then?

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The American Civil Liberties Union has called on 900 college and university presidents throughout the nation to deny the House Unamerican Activities Committee (HUAC) information concerning the makeup of anti- Viet groups on their campuses.

The civil liberties group’s plea came in the wake of subpoenas of membership lists of anti-war groups at the University of Michigan and the University of California at Berkeley last summer. The ACLU called this “one of the most serious breaches of student academic freedom in recent decades, including the McCarthy era.”

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OUTRAGED! That’s what we are. Consider it. Think of what it means.

London Bridge. The Eifel Tower. The Arch d’ Triumph, the Vatican; even that monument to hypocracy, the Statue of Liberty. What does Detroit have?

A fifty-five foot spark plug at the intersection of Woodward and Eight Mile Rd.; gateway to the suburbs. The World’s largest and ugliest stove gracing the State Fair grounds. A giant grinning cow’s head on the Edsel Ford Freeway. A forty-foot bow tie, badge of a losing politician. The symbol of the city; THE SPIRIT OF DETROIT, in front of the City-County Building; a joke off a can of peas contorted in pain perhaps by something he ate—or something he saw.

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The calendar will be a regular FIFTH ESTATE feature. We know that there is more happening in the Detroit and Ann Arbor areas than what we have listed, so we need your help. Send us information about what your group is doing or just anything you hear about. We think the items listed below disprove the contention that “nothing ever happens in Detroit.” The deadlines for the calendar are the 8^th and 23^rd of each month.

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Dear Great-grandfather [sic],

I am writing to you because I feel that you have an honest desire to understand. You lived in a time of much confusion and you felt the need to seek new solutions to many problems. You sought your own solutions to your own problems so you must realize that you could only find your own answers.

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The article in your last issue—“Playboy’s Tinseled Seductress”—I liked [FE #17, November 1–15, 1966]. The pointing out Playboy’s magnificent superficiality was, I thought, sound and much needed. But the conclusion!—ugh!—that the marriage institution suffers thereby—that “somehow the glow has gone out of marriage.” How sad!

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Scenes from the November Mobilization for Peace, Jobs, and Freedom march held in downtown Detroit, Nov. 5^th. Demonstrations and rallies were also held in over 50 other cities across the nation the same day.

Photos by Emil Bacilla and Wilson Lindsey.

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A drug which is readily available on prescription has been shown to have the same psychic effects as LSD. The current issues of Diseases of the Nervous System and the Archives of General Psychiatry carry articles on the efficacy of Sansert in producing the same effects as LSD.

Sansert is a drug which has been used for the prophylactic treatment of migraine headaches. It’s method of action is the inhibition of serotonin production, a long known effect of L SD.

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Reprinted by permission from England’s PEACE NEWS: Oct. 7, 1966

Discussed in this article: Rush to Judgment by Mark Lane; Inquest by E.J. Epstein

Somebody once said that “the man on the Clapham omnibus” was the sort of typical figure of average common sense whom judges, juries, lawyers and the like ought to have at the backs of their minds as a point of reference when considering complex and over-technical legal problems. If this anonymous traveller does not have the expert knowledge and confidential sources of information possessed by the police or the pathologists or the psychiatrists, at least, so runs the argument, he may have some degree of intelligent objectivity that can enable him to distinguish wood from trees and thus come a little nearer to a just understanding of the truth. He seems to have been referred to very infrequently during the inquiries concerning the death of President Kennedy on November 22, 1963.

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In 1964, when almost everyone in Greenwich Village was playing an acoustic guitar and singing “folk, there was a red-haired ex-Marine named Tim Hardin who was using an electric guitar and sang a sort of jazz flavored blues. Before Hardin had left New York for Los Angeles he had already made a great impression on people who were later to become The Mommas and the Poppas and the Lovin’ Spoonful. Since then Hardin has developed a unique sound which is something like motown rock, jazz, folk, and blues and is different from all those things at the same time. Tim has sung at the Newport Folk Festival; and one of his songs, “If I were a Carpenter,” has been made a hit by Bobby Darin.

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The other night the ACLU presented the premiere of Paul Stookey’s film THE CULVERT, along with RELAX YOUR MIND by Tom Berman and Chris Frayne, and FIVE SHORT FILMS and L’HISTOIRE DU SOLDAT by George Manupelli. The program was very enjoyable, in fact it was an intriguing way to spend an hour plus.

The first film shown was FIVE SHORT FILMS, which was a collection of experiments with abstract flashes with a soundtrack comprised of various sounds synchronized to the images. The five films were titled: FILM FOR HOODED PROJECTOR: I LOVE YOU, DO NOT BE AFRAID; SAY NOTHING ABOUT THIS TO ANYONE; I MUST SEE YOU CONCERNING A MATTER OF THE UTMOST URGENCY: and IF YOU LEAVE ME I WILL KILL MYSELF. The audience as usually happens with films of this type, tended to become uneasy, but I found that if you just kind of sit there and let the thing overpower you, it can be kind of a strange trip. Although, I’ll have to admit that I too got tired of it after a while. But then maybe I missed the point.

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American heoroes, the Fort Hood Three: (l. to rt.) Mora, Samas, Johnson

The shocking prison treatment of the Fort Hood Three, the three GIs who refused to go to Vietnam, has improved slightly as a result of the publicity of their situation and a flood of letters to government and Army authorities.

The restrictions against the three men speaking have been removed, and at present David Samas and James Johnson are celled with four other prisoners and are permitted to eat meals in the mess hall. Dennis Mora is with three others; however, he is still unable to leave his cell for meals. They still have no library privileges. They must still remain standing from 5 a.m. til 6 p.m. each day. The often promised, and supposedly “regular” exercise periods, are still unavailable.

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The Artists’ Workshop was formed over two years ago by a group of WORKING artists—mainly poets & musicians—who found that by banding together they could accomplish a great deal in terms of getting themselves together and getting their work to their public. Many of the original members of the Workshop have left town, as is natural, but it seems that no younger people have come up to replace them. If there are people in this city who are interested in keeping the Artists’ Workshop a healthy and growing group—that is; people who are ready to WORK at what needs to be done—they need to step forward now and make themselves known.

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Monday, Nov. 7, the Wayne Committee to End the War in Vietnam staged a Teach-In as part of the November Mobilization for Peace, Jobs, and Freedom at Wayne University’s Community Arts Auditorium. Breakthrough, a militant right-wing group, provided a slight pause in the big action at the Teach-In.

Three members of Breakthrough attempted to elbow their way into the auditorium as Joe Mora, brother of Dennis Mora from the Fort Hood Three, was speaking. The Breakthrough group was met by a contingent from the WCEWV who attempted to remove the unruly group from the auditorium. As the two groups scuffled by the entrance, Donald Lob-singer, leader of Breakthrough, was struck solidly on the left cheek by an unidentified man.

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A few weeks ago the New Yorker’s man in jazz, Whitney Balliett, went out to the Coast to catch the Monterey Festival. While he was there he spoke with some of the “workers’ aristocracy” of jazz, the white musicians who make their living primarily from studio gigs.

Like all aristocracies, this one has worked out a complete ideology which “justifies”—in its own collective mind, at least its privileged class position. Thus Balliett:

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Nineteenth century capitalism generated the “true believer” in laissez-faire, and gave rise to a large body of oppressed workers; the condition of which was a contradiction of the justifying principles of capitalism—the “natural rights” of Man.

In Western industrial societies (as is well known) workers and capitalists coalesced and perpetrated a conspiratorial revolution, giving rise to synthesis unexpected by social critics—the modern corporational society of profit sharing, fringe benefits, and governmental protectionism.

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Hardly louder than the wet snow that was falling over the assembled marchers, Al Harrison softly said “All right brothers, lock your elbows and let’s march for peace and freedom,” as he and members of the Afro-Americans For Peace led the Mass March held Saturday, November 5, as part of the November Mobilization for Peace, Jobs, and Freedom.

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The Gran-de Ballroom gets better and better every week, and it’s my own opinion that anyone who doesn’t go out there at least one night a week is just crazy. Frank Fox says so too. Likewise the MC5 keeps taking off for further spaces—this is the best thing that could have happened to them. Any band that is based on human principles rather than strictly musical ones, i.e. any group of musicians who are concerned with exploiting their own possibilities for expression as human beings with instruments and not just as guys playing “tunes,” have to have the opportunity to work together over an extended period of time, and in front of a sympathetic audience too.

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The nation’s first Mod Wedding will be held at the Michigan State Fairgrounds on Sunday, November 20^th, 1966. Pop-artist Andy Warhol will take the traditional role of father, and give the bride away.

Warhol, The Velvet Underground along with Nico (girl of the year) and Gerard Malanga, “the superstar” will be making their first appearance in Detroit to attend and film the wedding as part of the three day Carnaby Street Fun Festival which opens at the Fairgrounds on Friday, November 18^th, 1966 at 12:00 p.m.

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The calendar will be a regular FIFTH ESTATE feature. We know that there is more happening in the Detroit and Ann Arbor areas than what we have listed, so we need your help. Send us information about what your group is doing or just anything you hear about. We think the items listed below disprove the contention that “nothing ever happens in Detroit.” The deadlines for the calendar are the 8^th and 23^rd of each month.

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First Letter: ‘In The House of the Hanged, One Does Not Speak of the Hemp.’

Today there’s a great deal of preaching to young people. One can hear the tongue clicking of sophisticated adults worrying about what is happening to the younger generation. There’s also the thoughtless embracing of the superficial fads of youth today by those adults who wish to appear to be “with it.” I don’t feel I’ve suffered from any generation gap, at least, this is how you have always treated me, so let’s get to the heart of some of the important things that bother all of us, Young and old, today. I have never worshipped at any shrine and I know that you, at least, will not mind the irreverence that I might express. After all, one of the things I want to warn you about is not to accept a man’s words except as you learn from them, but judge him by his deeds as you see him.

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“Where were the police and how could such a thing happen” were the questions asked by a stunned audience at the Art Institute on Friday, Oct. 21. They had come for an evening of beautiful music, superbly played by the Moscow Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Rudolf Barshai.

Outside the hall were about 20 police vehicles to protect concert-goers from the Breakthrough picket line. Yet within the auditorium there was insufficient surveillance. Known members of Breakthrough were allowed in the lobby to create minor disturbances; others were seen to be seated in the hall. The concert proceeded. The first selection was played and as the ovation burst forth, four men sprang onto the stage, from the wings, with two huge insulting signs. Police arrived to quell the disturbance some minutes after some of the audience had taken their own action.

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A bizarre chiller which gives Rock Hudson a chance at drama, for a change, provides an evening of unusual entertainment in the John Frankenheimer film, “Seconds,” now appearing at the Studio New Center Theatre.

A fantastic organization, equally amazing in its efficiency and pose, offers Mr. Hudson a second chance at life. Excellent photography and a good performance by Rock brings you to a startling climax which is certainly not meant for weak hearts. Gagged and bound, Mr. Hudson has never looked nor sounded so convincing before.

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“Conscience is a costly thing, and I am paying dearly for the rights to my mind. Five years a cement wall and cold iron bars... is the price I am paying for real freedom. If it must be this way, I accept it gladly, knowing that the satisfaction, the pride and the honor I am feeling because of my actions will bring me through, whatever punishment my master’s hand down on me.”

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Reprinted from The Daily Collegian, Thursday, October 27, 1966, Vartan Knpelian, Editor-in-Chief. Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan

Against New Tabloid

It is always interesting to observe the machinations of the New Left. Therefore, it would seem to be even more interesting to observe their latest innovation designed to spread their particular form of radicalism.

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In contrast to the Dearborn decision on a Vietnam referendum, Highland Park’s City Council voted, 4 to 1, on Oct. 17, not to place the issue on the November ballot. The vote was surprising in a community which is more urban, more sophisticated than Dearborn, with a high percentage of Negroes, active in civic affairs.

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American heoroes, the Fort Hood Three: (l. to rt.) Mora, Samas, Johnson

Although I am being held in solitary confinement, the prisoners and guards find occasion to speak with me. I was ordered to remove the name tags from my uniforms and from above my cage door. I now exist as the man without a country or a name; this plus instructions for no one to speak with me entices the prisoners and guards to find out my story.

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The American Civil Liberties Union will challenge the court-martial conviction of an Army lieutenant for participating in a demonstration against US policy in Vietnam, arguing that the articles of the Uniform Code of Military Justice under which he was convicted violate freedom and are unconstitutionally vague.

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I remember that there was a time not too long ago when yours truly sat in one of Detroit’s few coffee houses wanting so badly to have a good time and hear some good music that I actually applauded the second-rate “musicians” folking off onstage. These performers were the product of a very small and very sick music scene in the city. There was very little of anything exciting attracting customers to hear live music. Consequently, there was very little money for the musicians playing in this city. There was, as a result, very little competition, creativity, or excitement going on in the coffee houses. A vicious circle.

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On September 16 charges of Inciting to Riot against Moses Wedlow and James Roberts were dismissed in Recorder’s Court by visiting Judge John Seiler. The charges grew out of the August 9–12 “Policeman’s Field Days” on Kercheval on Detroit’s East Side. Three additional charges of rioting, conspiracy to disturb the peace and possession of a bomb against the two men had previously been dropped for lack of evidence.

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Floyd McKissick, National Director of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), will be speaking in Detroit on Monday, November 7. The Detroit Committee to End the War in Vietnam and the Wayne Committee to End the War in Vietnam have announced that McKissick will be one of the main speakers at a teach-in which is scheduled for that day on the Wayne State University campus.

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Carl Campbell is 23 years old and a veteran of the Vietnam war, where he served in the United States Marine Corps. He is presently a student at Wayne State University. His interview with the Fifth Estate follows below.

FE: Carl, why did you join the Marines?

Carl Campbell: I was 19 years of age, a high school graduate, I didn’t have enough money to go to college, I felt somewhat patriotic and soldiering is the logical action of anyone who is patriotic. I had also decided if you were going to be a soldier, you might as well be a good one. At that time I had no doubt that the Marines were good soldiers.

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Well you see it was something like this. Larry Weiner (formerly mentioned in this column), Detroit film-maker, has finally gotten everything together for his long planned sequence for his long in the making film. The sequence involves some junior executive types walking through the Fisher Building, through the tunnel, in and out of the General Motors Building, dressed in turtle shells.

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(Reprin

ted from the Toronto Star) The Cartoon panels show a middle aged chubby woman gesturing with her hands and body as she speaks, clasping hands, putting them in front of her, away from her body, close to her body. She says:

1. “His father talked to him. He said ‘Let the GOVERNMENT worry about RESPONSIBILITY! All YOU have to do is drop the bombs!’ But it was no use. He’d just start yelling about WARSAW.

2. “I talked to him. I said ‘Let the GOVERNMENT worry about MORALITY! All YOU have to do is burn the villages!’ But he wouldn’t listen. He’d just start yelling about HITLER.

3. “His teacher talked to him. He said ‘Let the GOVERNMENT worry about NATIONAL GUILT! All YOU have to do is gun down the silly peasants!’ But he paid no attention. He’d just start yelling about BELSEN.

4. “Our minister talked to him. He said ‘Let the GOVERNMENT worry about HUMAN DIGNITY! All YOU have to do is NAPALM the women and children!’ But it had no effect. He’d just start yelling about NUREMBERG.

5. “So the day his draft card arrived he left for CANADA! He’s living there now in some place called YORTVILLE or something! I didn’t raise my boy to be a Canadian!”

Maybe you dug the San Francisco Mime Troupe doing their blackface minstrel show jamming black-white reality back in your face, but the Denver cops certainly didn’t. Charges of indecent acts and indecent language were filed against three members of the Troupe when they played Denver’s Phipps Auditorium last week.

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from The Rag (UPS) — One of the brighter aspects of the sexual revolution is that it offers this generation whole new levels of personal manipulation. Instead of the older concept of “nice girls” being virgins upon marriage, the liberated standards offer people the chance to express their deepest feelings to one another in a natural way. Marriage counselors often say that successful marriages are built upon compatible interests, liking one another, and a satisfactory sex life.

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