During a 1945 Duke Ellington radio broadcast included on
The Treasury Shows, Vol. 3, the announcer provides this astonishingly aggressive sales pitch:
And now, ladies and gentlemen, let's talk about waste for a moment or two. The Duke's music is much too good to waste. You know that. Anything good is too precious to be wasted. And important things like courage and lives certainly must not be wasted. Still, you in your safe homes can be guilty of wasting American lives.
Ask yourself: Isn't it true that if a man loses his life or a limb because he didn't have that extra bullet that would have killed the Jap who got him, it's somebody's fault that that bullet wasn't there?
[pause]
You've got to admit that.
Now, who can we pin that on? On you perhaps?
Because every piece of equipment in this war starts on its way to the fighting fronts from the United States Treasury. If the Treasury doesn't have the money, someone doesn't get that extra bullet. If the Treasury doesn't have the money, perhaps someone didn't buy that extra war bond. Perhaps that someone is you.
