POTASH AND PERLMUTTER ON LORDNORTHCLIFFING VERSUS COLONELHOUSING
While Lord Northcliff is colonelhousing over here, Colonel House is lordnorthcliffing over in England, and the main point about their being where they are is that they ain't where the people are which sent them there.
"Well, I see where President Wilson says that women should have the right to vote the same like shipping-clerks and bartenders, Mawruss," Abe said, "which it's a funny thing to me the way some people claims they never could see that two and two make four till the war comes along and gives them a brand-new point of view."
"At that, you've got to give President Wilson credit that it only took a war like this here European war to bring him to his senses," Morris Perlmutter said, "whereas with Eli U. Root, Abe, it's got to happen yet another war twice as big as this one, three more revolutions in Russland, and a couple of earthquakes doch; before he is even going to say, 'Maybe you're right, but that's my opinion and I stick to it.'"
"In a way, Mawruss, Eli U. Root ain't as unreasonable as he looks," Abe said. "He says that if the women gets the vote, y'understand, they would—"
"Listen, Abe," Morris interrupted, "I don't want to hear what this here Root has got to say about if women voted in America, y'understand, because over four million women does vote in America, and some of them has been voting for years already, and when it comes to talking about ifs, Abe, if Eli U. Root 'ain't noticed that four million women vote in this country where Eli U. Root is supposed to understand the language as well as speak it, understand me, what did Mr. Root notice over in Russland, where he neither spoke Russian nor understood it, neither?"
"Don't kid yourself, Mawruss," Abe said. "That feller knows just so good as you do that there's four million women voting in America; also he knows that the women of Colorado, where women vote, don't act no different from the women of Pennsylvania, where women don't vote, but that's an argument in favor of women voting, whereas Root is arguing against it."
"That ain't an argument," Morris protested; "it's a fact."
Abe shrugged his shoulders despairingly.
"What does a first-class A-number-one lawyer like Root care about facts if they ain't in his favor?" he asked. "Also, Mawruss, if Mr. Root now comes out in favor of women voting, y'understand, that would be a case of changing his mind, and you know as well as I do, Mawruss, the real brainy fellers of the world never changes their mind."