1972 Year in Review

Announcer: In Australia, support of the U.S. Vietnam policy was an election issue, and Gough Whitlam's Labor Party ousted Prime Minister McMahon's government. Whitlam promptly ended the draft.

Billy Brandt fared better. West German voters gave his Ostpolitik a vote of confidence and his government a new majority in the Bundestag.

The opposite was true for candidates Pierre Elliott Trudeau. His margin was cut, but he stayed on.

Unknown Speaker: "The voters of Canada have sent to Parliament a new House of Commons. It is now our responsibility to make that House of Commons work. Whether it will work depends on all members of -- and all parties, for no single party has nearly enough support in the House to exercise its will without the cooperation of others."

Ed Karrins: Once recounts were finished, Trudeau's liberals again had more seats in Parliament than any opponent, and his prospects improved.

North and South Korea moved toward reunification in 1972. Juan Perأ³n returned to Argentina. Clifford Irving went to jail for his Howard Hughes' biography hoax; the millionaire recluse popped out of hiding and just as quickly disappeared again.

The ordinary American wage earner found his paycheck disappearing, too, and faster than ever, despite optimistic reports on inflation, as the cost of living kept reaching new peaks. On Wall Street the Dow Jones Industrial Average finally closed above the almost-mystical thousand level.