in a kind of wise-guy way, i said to him, quoting heraclitus "you cannot step into the same river twicee retorted, "yes, you can if it's frozen," which is the best joke i remember mr. nixon making. we need action that will stop the rise in meat prices. i have ordered the cost of living council to impose a ceiling on prices of beef, pork, and lamb. the price control gamble was based on the hope that the underlying price factors would hold still. the odds almost always favor change. this time, the change was wheat. huge shipments were going overseas because of the surpluses but then a drought in the southwest destroyed much of the winter wheat crop. cattlemen saw their feed prices, which were not controlled, push higher and higher while their beef prices remained locked in a vise. farmers are a pretty independent group and the first thing they tried to do was withhold their animals from markets. that had the effect of tightening up on supplies and putting real pressure on the whole system. here was the government trying to hold down prices at a time when farmers were withholding marketing