Along about mid-February, the furor over "domestic spying" broke out and the heavy artillery was aimed point blank at the CIA and FBI. The press and Congress raised seamy revelations about the FBI's alleged abuse of tactics and the information it gathered. It was learned that under the late J. Edgar Hoover's direction, the FBI planted several "bugs" in Washington D. C. brothels to catch foreign diplomats in "negotiating situations." The usage of these bugs were not made clear, but one top authority said it was to twist the arms of foreign diplomats.
House Ways and Means chairman Wilbur Mills, 65, made news with the famous Tidal Basin incident late one night in Washington. According to sources, Mills had been out on the town with several "friends" and after being pulled over by a policeman, a young lady was seen taking a nose dive into the famed Tidal Basin. Police pulled her out and her name
became a household work, Fannie Foxe, the Argentine Firecracker. Seen at various sleezy nightspots, Mills lost credidation in Congress almost instantly. Admitted to having a drinking problem, Mills sank into oblivion.
Inflation and recession was nothing new to Americans, but what was new was Americans had never experienced both simultaniously. Bad weather and poor planning drove food prices sky high. Oil price hikes pushed everything up from steel to plastics. Productivity went down and 6.5 percent of the
labor force stood in unemployment lines. The poor and elderly suffered most while others felt a pang when the stock market declined. Governement was afraid to nip recession for fear of adding to inflation. Some industries, oil and sugar, were making record profits. Some suffering people believed they hadn't seen the worst of it yet.
While the oil and sugar business rolled in the cash, the automobile business was out in the cold. People just weren't buying new cars. This meant decreased profits for Ford, GM, and American Motors. And with this came massive layoffs, both definite and indefinite. To remedy the situation, the Big Three started offering rebates to new car buyers. The rebates eased the situation somewhat, butjstill new cars sat idle.
While the Arabs bathed in the "black gold," Americans found themselves bogged down in an economic crises that was considered the
worst in 30 years. From the celebrated and mush talked about Arab oil embargo of February 1974, to the easing of tensions, the US still found itself importing a third of all the oil it consumed. But the federal government was out to change that with its Project Independence, which called for self-sufficiency in energy by the early 1980's. Work finally began on the trans-Alaska pipeline after six years of delay. According to sources, when the pipeline is completed  scheduled for 1977  it will deliver up to two million barrels of oil a day
Scenes of hunger and starvation were made evident in the famine-wrecked areas of Africa and Asia, where millions and millions of people starved to death. Situations such as drought, flooding, fertilizer shortages brought on by the price of oil aided in causing people to starve to death. Representatives of 130 nations met in Rome to talk about it, but still nothing was done.
In the past year, the world saw 27 governments change leaders,.
When Constantine Caramanlis was premier years ago, the Greeks had a bad view of his method of politics. While in exile in Paris, Greece was immaturely governed by generals. When they fell from power in July over the Cyprus "debacle," Caramanlis became premier again.
While scandal rocked the US, scandal also made the front pages of Willy Brandt's West Germany. The Nobel Peace Prize winner found
himself losing power when a close aide named Gunter Guillaume was found to be a Communist spy. In an unprecedented uproar, Willy Brandt resigned. His successor was sharp-tongued 56-year-old Helmut Schmidt. By last November, Japan's zooming
(Continued on pg. 462)
BACKGROUND: Rebates made new cars hot items. CENTER, SEQUENCE: Those needing jobs checked the want ads daily; the oil embargo caused a great disturbance: Watergate cartoons were displayed in the Student Center; Nixon's resignation made headlines in 144 point type.
STOP....INFLATION.... STOP.... RECESSION
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