More Forgotten Moments of the 1970's

By John Saleeby
Missed the first batch? Go here!
04/15/02

• By the end of the Ford Administration the Office of the President has been so cheapened that Jimmy Carter is clod hoppin' around the Oval Office trying to find the phone number of the man who can feed all the poor people. Dean Martin was almost going to be President until Sinatra told him Sammy Davis Junior had to be Vice President and Dino told him to go fuck himself.
  
  
• KISS gets a big hit single with "Beth", unfortunately a ballad - Not even a power ballad! - with strings about missing your wife while working in the studio with a band instead of a fast noisy rocker about chasing under age whores while you're on the road with a band.
  
  Beth I know you're lonely
  And I hope you'll be allright
  But me and the boys are watching
  A teenage lesbian catfight
  Ah hahhhhh . . .
  
  They shoulda let Paul Stanley write it.
  
  

• "Mott The Hoople?" says a record company executive "What the fuck kind of a name for a band is that? From now on you idiots are called . . . uh . . . The Door Knobs! That's it! The Door Knobs!". By 1980 The 'Knobs are one of the best selling bands in the world. 'KNOBS RULE!!!
  
  

• Jerry Ford occasionally falls down so Chevy Chase could become a big star doing "Jerry Ford Falling Down" jokes. As years pass people forgot all asbout Jerry Ford falling down and what was so funny about Chevy Chase in the first place. The only guy who made it big by making Jimmy Carter look stupid was Ronald Reagan and he's already forgotten about us before we could forget about him - What a cool guy!
  
  
• As you've all seen on "That Seventies Show", every teenage guy in America during the Seventies had an incedibly beautiful big nasty redhead living right next store to make out with - An idea Henry Kissinger had while going down on Jill St. John. Whatever happened to all of those wonderful redheads? Just wait until next season when "That Seventies Show" presents the Very Special One Hour "Eric Has A Psychotic Fit While On Acid And Cuts Donna's Head Off" Episode. Now we all dig Jackie.
  
  
• Suzanne Somers became a big star on "Three's Company" and the strange fact that she has become something of an international joke is only further proof of The International Homosexual Conspiracy. Yeah, yeah, yeah, Suzanne looked kind of silly selling that Thighmaster thing, but exactly how many of those things do you think you'd be able to sell with, I dunno, Diane Keaton or Candice Freakin' Bergen on the goddam commercial? Suzanne is the prettiest girl that ever lived and I don't care what anybody says, God Damn It!
  
  
• Pattie Hearst is kidnapped by The Symbionese Liberation Army and is brainwashed into joining her captors in all kinds of zany antics including bank robbery, drug abuse, and group sex. Thousands of young Americans pack up and wander the globe searching for "that really fun sounding Symbionesia place".
  
  
• "Jonathon Livingston Seagull" becomes a huge internayional best seller, presumably through the mail because very few seafulls are seen in the bookstores. Ha ha ha. I wrote that when I was twelve.
  
  
• "The Exorcist" starring Linda Blair as a young girl possessed by a demon, is a gigantic success. Blair never does appear in another successful film, although she does develop one of the most amazing set of tits the world is too busy looking at Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino to see. Did I spell those guy's names right? I'm not sure, I don't even know what they look like.
  
  
• America is bewildered by the appearance of Bruce Springsteen on the covers of both "Time" and "Newsweek" at the same time, even though his current record "Born To Run" is never that big a hit. Springsteen devotes his life to playing the kind of culturally significant music that could justify that kind of attention and becomes about as entertaining as Spiro Agnew, Walter Mondale, and Natalie Merchant.
  
  
• Farrah Fawcett sells millions of posters and if you don't understand why you've either never seen Farrah Fawcett or . . . uh . . . No, that won't work - Even gay guys love Farrah Fawcett, what's YOUR goddam problem? What the hell were you decorating your room with back in the Seventies if you didn't have a Farrah poster? The mummified heads of teenage runaways dangling from the ceiling by their intestines? Hell, even that picture of Patty Hearst posing with a machine gun in front of the SLA poster - If she had moved a couple of feet to the right she would have been in front of a Farrah poster and then the SLA would have conquered the world.
  
  
• The Vietnam War finally ends, suddenly leaving millions of Americans without anything to bitch and moan and carry on about until the Music Industry is kind enough to give them Disco. Yes, Bill Clinton was against Vietnam - But where did he stand on Disco? George W Bush supported the war - But does he have a liesure suit in his closet? Al Gore was in the war although he was against the wat and if that isn't the kind of moral ambiguity that gave us the Village People not only will I eat my hat but I'll also eat the Indian Chief's feathered hat and the Construction Worker's metal hat. But not Al Gore's hat.
  
  
• Richard Pryor is dismayed to find that he has signed an agreement to star in a weekly comedy series for NBC. Even though he actually did sign the contract, Hollywood sleazeballs have hit on a way to trick the drug addled loonie into doing things against his will.
  "What? Did I really sign an agreement to make a movie with Gene Wilder?"
  "Yep, this is your signature right here, Richard. See?"
  "Uh . . . Okay."
  And a little bit later -
  "Damn! I signed another agreement to be in another movie with that fuckin' Gene Wilder?!? Shit!"
  
  
• The soundtrack to "The Sting" features ragtime musician Scott Joplin's classic "That Goddam Old Piano Thing They Won't Stop Playing On The Radio Or TV" which becomes a huge hit single. Record stores all over the USA are overrun by mobs of people hollering "You got that goddam old piano thing they won't stop playing on the radio or TV?" and tearing the place apart. To this day no one can quite remember the actual name of Joplin's tune, but no one will ever be able to ever forget the burning searing rage that possessed us all every time we heard THAT GODDAM OLD PIANO THING THEY WOULD'NT STOP PLAYING ON THE RADIO OR TV. "The Sting" is a really good movie, although when you rent it make sure you get the new version with "We're An American Band" by Grand Funk Railroad on it instead of "That Goddam Old Piano Thing They Wouldn't Stop Playing On The Radio Or TV".
  
  
• The international success of "Walking Tall", a low budget tale of redneck vigilante justice, scares the daylights out of sensitive liberals. Buford Pusser, a small town sherriff who refruses to allow the Bill Of Rights to get in the way of smackin' crooks in the head with a great big ol' hunk o' pine, was played by . . . uh . . . Wait a minute . . . I don't remember the name of the guy who starred in "Walking Tall". Gosh, I haven't seen him in years! Haven't seen "Walking Tall" in God only knows how long either, now that I think of it. Hhhhhmmmm, maybe them liberals weren't so powerless, after all. Remember what an example they made out of Andrew Dice Clay? And how come Howard Stern never got to make another movie? Oh, man! Where is Buford Pusser now that we really need him? We put up with eight years of Ronald Reagan for this? Bummer.

John Saleeby wrote for The National Lampoon while he was in high school, was a stand up comic in New York, and has contributed to the net humor zines Schmuck.com, Campaign Central, and the legendary American Jerk. He's on medication now so he's probably a little nicer now than he was when you met him earlier.
Email - jacksaleeby1@hotmail.com