News stories from Tuesday October 17, 1972

Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:

Search operations continue for the small plane which disappeared on a flight from Anchorage to Juneau. Rep. Hale Boggs was in Alaska campaigning for the re-election of Rep. Nick Begich when their plane disappeared in a rain storm. No signs of the plane have been reported, and bad weather is hampering the search. [CBS] Henry Kissinger is returning to Paris for another meeting with North Vietnam's Xuan Thuy, then will go to Saigon to confer with President Thieu. [CBS] Enemy troops overran six villages and a base in the Central Highlands. South Vietnam recaptured the base and one village, but the struggle to regain hamlets near Saigon has been costly and bitter. South Vietnamese air and artillery strikes pounded the North Vietnam-held village of Xom Suoi, which has now been reduced to rubble. South Vietnam rooted the North Vietnamese out, but the Communists have showed that no part of South Vietnam is completely safe from attack. [CBS] South Korea was placed under martial law by President Park. [CBS] East and West Germany signed a treaty to ease travel restrictions between them. [CBS] The House and Senate accepted the Social Security and Medicare bill; welfare reform was omitted from the bill after a three-year study. President Nixon first proposed welfare reform in 1969. His Family Assistance Plan called for a guaranteed income and work incentives, required registration for job training, and child-care centers. Welfare reform, though widely approved by the public, has died in Congress. Health, Education and Welfare secretary Elliot Richardson fought for the Nixon plan, and he blames Senators Ribicoff and Long for the bill's failure. Senator Russell Long takes credit for helping kill the plan; Senator Abraham Ribicoff said that the President should have worked harder for the bill's passage.The bill did not reach the Senate floor until September. Presidential aide John Ehrlichman said that Senate Finance Committee chairman Long had promised it for March. Long's committee radically changed the measure, making it more conservative. Ribicoff favored the liberal version, while some held to the President's original plan. Ribicoff and Richardson reached a compromise which Labor Secretary Hodgson reported to the President, but the President rejected the recommendation. Ribicoff claims that the President killed welfare reform because he felt that the political climate had changed and it was no longer advantageous. Long says that the President was misled on welfare reform, and did not like it when he finally saw it. Ehrlichman stated that the President pushed for welfare reform until the very end; President Nixon vowed that if he is re-elected, he'll try again. [CBS] The Price Commission granted Chrysler and American Motors permission to raise car prices to cover the cost of required safety and pollution equipment. [CBS]

Stock Market Report

Dow Jones Industrial Average: 926.48 (+4.82, +0.52%)
S&P Composite: 107.50 (+0.73, +0.68%)
Arms Index: 0.67

	Issues	Volume*
Advances	813	7.83
Declines	574	3.73
Unchanged	378	1.85
Total Volume		13.41

* in millions of shares

Arms Index is the ratio of volume per declining issue to volume per advancing issue; a figure below 1.0 is bullish.

Market Index Trends
Date	DJIA	S&P	Volume*
October 16, 1972	921.66	106.77	10.94
October 13, 1972	930.46	107.92	12.87
October 12, 1972	937.46	108.60	13.13
October 11, 1972	946.42	109.50	11.90
October 10, 1972	951.84	109.99	13.31
October 9, 1972	948.75	109.90	7.94
October 6, 1972	945.36	109.62	16.63
October 5, 1972	941.30	108.89	17.73
October 4, 1972	951.31	110.09	16.64
October 3, 1972	954.47	110.30	13.09