News for the week ending on November 2, 1975. An insane week (aren't they all?), capped with the latest salvo fired by the Ford Administration to the people of New York, or as it was characterized "words by Archie Bunker, music by Herbert Hoover". Another fun week full of nail biting.
But then it wasn't Beirut, who were getting upfront and personal with street battles raging in the Hotel district. The latest siege taking place at a Holiday Inn with Lebanese rebels running roughshod over the lobby. Advice from the U.S. Embassy: GTFO! - even UN Secretary General Kurt Waldheim appealed for some semblance of calm. To no avail.
And the sound of explosions wasn't the exclusive property of Beirut this week - a fashionable Italian restaurant in the middle of London was site of a terrorist bombing that claimed 18 injuries.
Meanwhile, over on Capitol Hill - Egypt's Anwar Sadat made his first State visit, actually the first State Visit of any Egyptian President. Ever. Warmly received and later addressed the United Nations, Sadat made feelers at a possible peace settlement between Israel and the Palestinians. At the time of running it up the flagpole, no one was saluting. But it got the ball rolling.
In another part of the Hill - hearings were underway with the Senate's investigation of the Intelligence community and allegations of domestic spying and bugging of transatlantic telephone calls and cables.
The question of Busing came back into the picture with calls for a Constitutional Amendment against forced busing. And Karen Ann Quinlan, the woman once referred to by National Lampoon as New Jersey's State Vegetable was the subject of another appeal by her parents to pull the plug since all signs of life seemed to be missing. Lawyers for the doctors treating Quinlan said it was tantamount to murder (one wonders if they were thinking of Quinlan or their bank accounts) and the controversy continued.
And Spain's lifelong dictator Gen. Francisco Franco was hovering at deaths door this week and subsequently appointed Prince Juan Carlos to assume role as Head of State. The Dark Endless Chapter was about to come to an end.
And that's how it landed in our lap, that week ending on November 2nd in 1975 via ABC Radio's World News This Week. Curiously we survived and, in some cases, flourished. Those of us jaundice-eyed from the goings on of that week peered cautiously at the days to come and wondered if it would always be that nuts.
And the truth came back, yes.
