THE KISSING'S OVER
SIR,—Some time ago the Spectator printed a memor- able cartoon in which a leading member of Her Majesty's Government, as a latter-day Hieronimo, attempted to demonstrate just how easily familiar his party is with newer currents of thought among the people. Hieronimo, you will remember, had purposes of his own to conceal. And now Mr. Rees . . . who is sufficiently au fait to know that with the great British public the Beatles have superseded CND.
What he doesn't know, of course, is that the Beatles arc simply a fiendishly clever decoy for the secret and anti-democratic nihilism going on behind them. In- csedibly sinister as it may seem, the TGWU must have deliberately concealed from Mr. Greer and Mr. Rees • the vital information about its annual confer- ence. That the deliberations of such allegedly public bodies should go on under cloak of secrecy has im- plications for democracy that . . . unless, of course, Mr. Greer and Mr. Rees don't know what everybody else does, Unthinkable. And the Post Office, no less, must have blocked Mr. Rees's efforts to communicate with CND and verify, or otherwise, its continued existence. The newspapers, especially that known sub- versive, the Guardian, must send him specially made up copies, expunging all reference to disarmament organisations. Lift up those ubiquitous Beatic cuts, and what will he find? Anti-democratic Beards! It is tragic to see so much well-meant research frustrated by these and similar near-treasonable acti- vities. What is worse—much, much worse-- is that the actual party in power (as on a few fairly well- documented other matters, like RSGs, Civil Defence,
and air estimates) has been less than perfectly frank with Mr. Rees. For instance, he hasn't been told that, meanwhile, Central Office has been seriously enough concerned about CND to issue a set of orthodox answers to CND questions, for the use of those par- liamentary candidates who are not quite sure what the answers are. The Labour Party has done like- wise. Recently a regional Civil Defence memorandum admitted that local CD officers would have to concede much of the criticism CND embodied in its Fa11X 63 project. (Maybe you noticed the difference in the ads.)
All these people, thousands of them, officially and undoubtedly know that CND exists. The political specialists among them should even understand what its aims and policies are. Why has Mr. Rees been kept in the dark?
And why, after all, since CND exists, has an excel- lent information service, and publishes three journals, doesn't the Spectator make use of these facilities? RACHEL POW ELL .L London Regional Executixe, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, 5 Caledonian Road, NI
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