U.S. News & World Report Tumblelog

April 1, 1985: U.S. News examined President Reagan’s options for ridding Nicaragua of the Sandinistas’ rule. ”Nicaragua poses a deepening dilemma for Reagan. If the contras are revitalized by infusions of fresh American money and weapons and become a viable threat, Nicaragua could decide to attack rebel bases in neighboring Honduras, an action that would boost chances of direct U.S. military involvement. But if Congress withholds support to the contras, Managua will have no urgent reason to come to terms with Washington.” The actions that Reagan chose to take would lead to the Iran-contra crisis. (Larry Price–Philadelphia Inquirer/Archive)

January 9, 1984: U.S. News looked into a security increase due to the possibility of a major terrorist attack in the United States. Four major events scheduled during the year–the Los Angeles Summer Olympics, the New Orleans World’s Fair, and the national political conventions in Dallas and San Francisco–were potential targets. The article concluded, ”Throughout a thousand years of politically inspired violence, experts have agreed that one thing holds true: Success breeds imitation. It is a matter of when and where. And that is what has sent America scrambling as never before to protect itself. The year ahead could test whether the effort to batten down the hatches came in time.” (Frank Fournier–Contact)

May 16, 1983: By 1983, the United States had the highest rate of drug abuse of any developed country. In this issue, U.S. News examined the toll this abuse was taking on the United States. ”The epidemic is so extensive that gains in one segment of the population tend to be offset by reversals in another. Example: Even though drug use by teenagers is declining, dope is more pervasive than ever among middle-class adults–the people on whom an industrial society depends for leadership and creative energy.” (Peter Garfield)

July 19, 1982: U.S.News & World Report assessed President Reagan’s decision to send U.S. troops to Lebanon and the impact this would have on the United States. ”Dispatch of a token force of marines to Beirut, it was widely agreed, would involve grave risks of incurring casualties and of becoming bogged down in someone else’s interminable conflict. But Reagan was convinced that failure to act quickly to end the latest Mideast hostilities could lead to even greater dangers for the United States-just as President Eisenhower in 1958 decided to send marines into Lebanon to forestall a threatened collapse.” (AP, UPI)

February 2, 1981: Just after President Reagan’s inauguration, U.S. News examined the challenges ahead for the new president and the sweeping changes he planned to make. ”Sworn in on January 20 amid more inaugural hoopla and glitter than Washington had seen in decades, the new chief executive immediately launched a series of rapid-fire actions aimed at putting his stamp on the government he now heads.” (Winston Townsend for USN&WR, AP)

Dec. 11, 1961 issue of U.S.News makes an appearance on Mad Men.

December 1, 1980: In this issue, U.S.News & World Report examined trends of the 1980s and reported experts’ predictions for the next 20 years. ”In the wings, they see astonishing advances in medicine, space, agriculture, and communications that could vanquish cancer, delay the aging process, provide food for all from the Arctic and the oceans, and whisk huge loads of passengers in space vehicles to all corners of the Earth. Behind that prospect, however, they see another-a world growing hotter, drier, dirtier, more crowded, and more quarrelsome than ever as poverty, famine, and terrorism become routine facts of daily life for billions.” (Richard Waldrep)

December 10, 1979: U.S.News & World Report investigated rising violence in Islamic countries. ”So rapidly has the turmoil widened that President Carter has ordered the evacuation of most U.S. embassy personnel in 14 Islamic countries and urged Americans to avoid them.” (Credit: Alain Mingam–Gamma)

January 30, 1978: U.S.News & World Report looked at President Jimmy Carter’s plans for business and the American economy. ”It is a moderate dose of stimulation that President Carter is prescribing to head off a business slowdown and cut down unemployment.” (Credit: Brian Haviland)

September 12, 1977: ”More Sex, Less Violence,” read the headline from this U.S.News & World Report cover reporting on controversial material on television. ”As the new TV season unfolds, it is clear that a major shift in emphasis is under way in many programs–away from violence and toward sex. A variety of old taboos, from impotence to homosexuality, will be treated with a candor that already has many critics seething and local station managers worried about repercussions.” (Credit: Marion Trikosko for USN&WR)

August 2, 1976: U.S.News & World Report examined the role of the press and its criticisms. ”Critics accuse it of becoming more distant from the public it serves: arrogant in the assumption of power, superficial in its treatment of complex news, and biased in its handling of controversial issues.”

December 8, 1975: The women’s liberation movement was in full swing and U.S.News & World Report investigated the new roles of women and the struggles they faced. ”Harmony is just as elusive as ever. Yet, as many in the women’s movement point out, feminism recovered from its convulsive strife in the last century and went on to major gains. This suggests that women’s liberation will be around for a long time to come as an active force in shaping American society.”(Credit: Jim Pickerell, Ken Regan–Camera 5, USN&WR)

August 12, 1974: Just before Richard Nixon became the first American president to resign, U.S.News & World Report took a look inside the impeachment process and the story surrounding it. U.S. News quoted New York Rep. Barber Conable saying, ”The sands are flowing through the glass and they have almost run out. A lot of people who have had the luxury of indecision are going to have to make a decision. And that in itself is changing the mood in the House. We’re right up against the grisly thing now.”

February 5, 1973: Just days after the cease-fire agreement was signed in Paris, U.S.News & World Report looked at the impact of peace in Vietnam. ”One senator said, ‘There wasn’t a dry eye in the house’ when Mr. Nixon disclosed the cease-fire terms to congressional leaders. Yet the world was not engulfed by an emotional tidal wave. Agreement to silence the weapons of war on Jan. 27, 1973, was what Americans had been awaiting for for more than a decade and to many the terms were anticlimactic.”

December 11, 1972: U.S.News & World Report investigated the winter fuel shortage in an interview with George Lincoln, director of the Office of Emergency Preparedness. Lincoln said, ”We are entering a new era, an energy-deficit era. As we project energy forecasts into the future, the outlook is sobering, but there are actions that we can and must take to brighten that outlook. Our society, our position in the world, our very way of life, its quality and its goals, are dependent on how well we meet this challenge.”