News stories from Sunday October 29, 1978
Summaries of the stories the major media outlets considered to be of particular importance on this date:
- The new director of President Carter's anti-inflation program said that fighting inflation cannot be the only goal of U.S. society and must take a second priority to other values. Alfred Kahn, chairman of the Council on Wage and Price Stability, said: "I do not think it is desirable, even if my main job is to control inflation, to hold oil prices down at a price that in effect subsidizes imports." [Chicago Tribune]
- Gasoline costs less this year than in 1977 when computed on a cents-per-mile basis, but that is the only bit of good news for car owners from a study by Hertz Corp.'s car leasing division. The study shows that it cost 10 percent more to own and operate a car in 1978 than in 1977 and 64 percent more since the 1973 Arab oil embargo. [Chicago Tribune]
- The dizzying fall of the U.S. dollar has left international money markets in a shambles and has government and banking officials oversells groping for explanations. West German officials cite psychological reasons for the dollar's plunge but also are critical of the Carter administration's energy, anti-inflation, and fiscal programs.
Grumman Corp., once a premier supplier of Navy planes, is attempting a risky diversification away from military aircraft and space exploration as those markets fade. The target is for non-military commercial products to account for half of profits within five years. If Grumman succeeds, it likely means new prosperity; if it fails, it could mean severe economic headaches.
[Chicago Tribune] - A blind Korean War veteran won a $275,000 slot-machine jackpot in Las Vegas, and the casino said it was the world's largest slot machine payoff. James Schelicia, 43, of Washington, Mo., hit the jackpot after playing for about one hour early this morning. A companion informed him he had lined up five sevens on the bottom row of the slot machine. [Chicago Tribune]
- At least a third of the nation's children have not been fully immunized against serious infectious diseases, federal health officials warn. The Carter administration has set a goal of immunizing 20 million children under 14 who have not been protected against measles, rubella, diphtheria, mumps, tetanus, polio and whooping cough. Measles cases in the U.S. rose by 34 percent last year because of lax immunization programs, administration sources said. [Chicago Tribune]
- Farmers wiped out by Michigan's PBB contamination disaster vowed to press their damage claims, despite a judge's ruling that low levels of the toxic chemical are harmless. Farmers and others throughout the state's "PBB belt" [poly-brominated biphenyl] expressed disbelief that Wexford County Circuit Judge William Peterson could say the five-year furor in the state was mostly a waste of time and money. [Chicago Tribune]
- Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin drafted a letter to President Carter, outlining and defending Israel's policy of Jewish settlements in the occupied Jordanian West Bank. The letter, the contents of which were not revealed, was a reply to Carter's sharply worded message deploring the strengthening of Jewish settlements in Arab territory. [Chicago Tribune]
- Former Prime Minister Golda Meir entered Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem over the weekend. Although Mrs. Meir is receiving treatment in the hematology ward of the hospital, a spokesman has denied rumors that she has leukemia. The national radio network said she was hospitalized for a check-up. [Chicago Tribune]
- A mysterious brain-attacking virus has swept northern India and killed 480 people in the last month alone, the official All India radio reported. The virus. suspected of being a type of encephalitis or disease marked by an inflammation of the brain, killed 445 persons in Uttar Pradesh, India's most populous state, the radio said. [Chicago Tribune]
- The health of Soviet President Leonid Brezhnev has become a prime consideration in the U.S.-Soviet strategic arms limitation talks, Brezhnev, 71, a crucial backer of a new SALT pact, is known to be suffering various ailments, possibly including emphysema, circulatory troubles, and deafness. [Chicago Tribune]
- Pope John Paul II tried to avoid causing traffic jams by taking a helicopter to an isolated sanctuary Sunday, but thousands of people hoping to see him snarled traffic for 10 miles. In the first helicopter ride of his pontificate, the 58-year-old Pope flew for 21 minutes to the La Mentorella sanctuary, 24 miles east of Rome. [Chicago Tribune]
- The Philippine government reported that Typhoon Rita killed 109 persons, left another 155 missing, drove nearly 650,000 from their homes, and caused about $50 million in damage in its sweep across central Luzon Island last week. It said Rita was the strongest typhoon to hit the Philippines in eight years. [Chicago Tribune]
- Albert Speer, the former Nazi war production chief, says only Adolf Hitler's hypnotic powers held his henchmen together through the rise and fall of Nazi Germany. "If Hitler had a friend, I was it," said the 73-year-old Speer, who served a 20-year sentence in Spandau prison for war crimes. Speer, in newly published memoirs, called Hitler hypnotic, pedantic, petty, and "irrational until the end." [Chicago Tribune]