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(In case you were getting all dewey-eyed for the 70s)

Before George P. Schultz landed in the Reagan Administration as Secretary of State, he served for a while as Treasury Secretary under Richard Nixon, right during the fabled Energy Crisis of the 1970s.

Granted, we hadn't gone through this kind of thing before. It was 1973 and we were about to be distracted in a big way by Watergate, but the thought of skyrocketing gas prices, panic buying at the pumps and oil companies raking in massive profits just hadn't happened this way before or to this extent.

And so everyone, including Schultz was busy scratching their heads wondering what to do as is evidence by this exchange during his appearance on Meet The Press from December 2, 1973.

Irving R. Levine (NBC News): “Would not higher prices for gasoline favor higher income groups to the disadvantage of lower paid people?”

Schultz: “Not necessarily. The . . obviously you have a family budget with so much purchase of gasoline and fuel oil, and to the extent that lower income groups use proportionate to their income a little bit more than higher income groups, it has some of that effect. But I don’t think it’s a major problem in the family budget.”

Levine: “ But would not a lower . . .

Schultz: “It’s much more of a problem than if we don’t pay the price that is necessary and we don’t have any fuel.”

Levine: “But would not a person with a big income feel free to buy whatever amount of gas is necessary to do the driving that he wishes to do, where a lower income person would not be able to?”

Schultz: “That is true of all kinds of things that are reflected in the buying power of people at different incomes.”

Levine: “ Do You oppose rationing entirely, even as a last resort?

Schultz: “Well I said it should be the absolute last resort, and I’m not really sure that it is a genuine alternative in the sense of being really a workable type of system. Of course there are various kinds of rationing, and depending on how its designed it could work better or worse. I think it is worth remembering that toward the end of World War Two we had patriotic fervor and so on, we had six thousand people in OPA, enforcing . .getting after people in the black market, which I think gives you an idea the difficulties of a rationing system.”

Okay, no simple answer. But the disconnect associated with "well, only higher income people drive" strikes me as typical Republican response. Even during the course of the interview, Schultz offers a few snide asides about higher and lower economic brackets. And of course, he was very much in favor of letting the marketplace go insane.

Remember the definition of insanity - doing the same thing over and over expecting different results - or as a friend put it, doing the same thing over and over and knowing what the results are going to be.

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(Le Orme` - roughly translated "The Footprints"- makes perfect sense)

The main reason most bands from the Prog-Rock era didn't become household names was the language barrier. There were a lot of bands doing really incredible things from Italy, France, Sweden, Germany, Spain, Hungary, Japan - literally all over the world. The trouble was, most all of them sang in their own languages and that was a tough sell to the majority of English speaking record companies and impossible to get airplay on just about every American radio station (unless you were either a college station or a public station with a very progressive Music Director). So hearing about what new bands were happening in Italy was pretty much either by word of mouth, or by one of the two import companies supplying very limited quantities of albums from overseas to the U.S. market - Jem Records or Peters International. Outside of that, you were on your own.

Probably of all the countries most heavily involved in the Prog scene, the Italians were far and away the busiest. From the late 1960's to the mid-1970's there seemed like an avalanche of new and interesting bands popping up.

One of those, and certainly one of the main groups to gain worldwide recognition was Le Orme` (pronounced Lay Ormay). Literally translated as "The Footprints". They were a three piece band; keyboards, bass and drums and, together with bands like PFM and Banco did more to further the cause of Progressive Rock to the rest of the world than anyone outside the UK.

Le Orme have had a long career, one that's still going strong, although personnel and direction changes over the years have altered their sound, they are still extremely popular throughout Europe.

They did have one foray into the English language market. During a brief stint with Charisma (through the recommendations of Genesis and Peter Hamill of Van der Graaf who often toured with them in Italy), they re-recorded vocals for an English version of their 1973 album "Felona e Sorona". It wasn't terribly successful and didn't stay in print for very long,and was certainly never issued in the States. But the original Italian version was a great success and has been reissued numerous times and has been considered some of their best work.

So . . .with best feet forward, if you aren't familiar with them - here is the first track off the original Italian version of Felona, "Sospesi nell'Incredibile".

In the words of Adlai Stevenson: "don't wait for the translation - yes or no."

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(The Jackson 5 - with Michael in front. Before it all got very complicated)

With the tragic death of Michael Jackson, and the reverberations of his passing echoing around the world, I ran across an interview Michael and his brothers did in 1973. They had just arrived in New York on the third leg of a world tour - they were playing Madison Square Garden that particular night - the night being July 22, 1973. It was a sold out concert, as so many of them were. The Jackson 5 were at the pinnacle of their success - the world in many ways was still their oyster. Michael was the wise old age of 13.

So this hour, recorded at radio station WWRL in New York features Michael all the brothers talking and joking - optimistic about the future, with that cocky assurance everything is possible, before it all got very serious and very out of control.

Before it all changed.

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(The Eternal Feeding Frenzy)

"I think that certainly there is an effort on the part of those in power to control what the press has to say about them."

- Brit Hume - February 22, 1973.

Oh, how times have changed. During several weeks in early 1973, the Senate staged hearings under the banner "Peoples Right To Be Informed". The question whether or not confidential sources were subject to subpoena was raised, certainly in light of Watergate, whose hearings would begin only a few months later. Senator Sam Ervin was Chairman and testifying during this session was none other than Brit Hume and Joel M. Gora of the ACLU. Hume was an investigative reporter working for print media at the time, and during the course of questioning was asked if the government was applying undo pressure on the media in presenting positive spin. Hume's response, as well as referring to it as propaganda, was rather interesting considering where he has gone in recent years.

And maybe how far the mighty have fallen. Or is there a checkbook involved in all this?

Gora and Hume's testimony as it was broadcast on February 22, 1973 - the morning session.