The US in 1974

“You’re under arrest, sugah!” – Teresa Graves of “Get Christie Love!” on the cover of TV Guide, November 30th 1974.

So far 2019 most reminds me of 1974 (stuff I did not know at the time is in italics):

“I’m not a crook!” – when the US president has to say stuff like this, you know it is bad. MAD magazine mocked President Nixon as a liar.

subpoena – Congress issued subpoenas to require President Nixon, under law, to turn over the:

Watergate tapes – sound recordings of Nixon talking to top advisers in the White House. John Dean, the former White House Counsel (Nixon’s Don McGahn), said they would prove Nixon tried to cover up the break-in at the Watergate hotel (to steal files from Democratic headquarters, the DNC).

follow the money – said no one. That phrase was invented two years later by Hollywood screenwriters for “All the President’s Men” (1976).

articles of impeachment – drawn up by Congress charging the president with “Treason, Bribery, or other High Crimes and Misdemeanours”. The Democrats had the votes in the House of Representatives to impeach the president, but not the votes in the Senate to convict (find guilty). That did not stop them. They said:

no man is above the law – not even the president is allowed to break the law. He has to obey subpoenas just like everyone else.

obstruction of justice – was one of the charges in the articles of impeachment because Nixon defied subpoenas to turn over the tapes. The other two charges were abuse of power and contempt of Congress.

executive privilege – the reason Nixon gave for not handing over the tapes – he said they were private conversations! The Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, forced him to hand over all the tapes.

smoking gun – the tape where Nixon ordered the cover-up was called the “smoking gun”, a phrase that has meant damning evidence ever since. Nixon resigned.

Boston busing crisis – grown White people throwing rocks at busloads of Black schoolchildren – even though the courts said they could come to their schools. More lawlessness!

energy crisis – Arab countries had shut off oil to the US. There were long lines at gasoline stations. You were not suppose to drive faster than 55 mph (90 kph) or heat your home above 68 F (20 C). Knit tops were in. So were Japanese cars.

stagflation – both prices and unemployment were going up at the same time, breaking the known laws of economics in what was called:

The worst recession since the Great Depression – a title later claimed by the Great Recession of 2008.

disaster films – like “Earthquake” and “Towering Inferno” (with “Jaws” on the way) fit the mood of the times. So did books like “Limits to Growth” (1972), “The Late, Great Planet Earth” (1970), and “Famine 1975!” (1967). The US was under constant threat of being destroyed by Russia’s atom bombs. End-of-times (apocalyptic) thinking came easy. It was right in the Bible!

nostalgia – “The Way We Were” by Barbra Streisand was the #1 song. “Happy Days”, set in the 1950s, was a new television show. Notice what the title said about the 1970s.

Women’s Lib – what 2019 calls second-wave feminism.

– Abagond, 2019.

See also:

• The US in 1949
• How to remove a US president
• Nixon
  • Watergate
  • All the President’s Men
  • The Time of Illusion – Watergate and that nuclear annihilation thing were not entirely separate
• Barbra Streisand: The Way We Were
• Boston busing riots
• American school resegregation
• The future that kind of never was

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