THE ADMINISTRATION: What Have I Got to Lose?

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The tubby, baby-faced little man, smoking a long cigar, pattered into the dining room of the National Press Club one day last week, ate a lunch of roast beef, carrots & peas with obvious zest, and sat back to hear himself introduced. Then Price Stabilizer Michael Vincent Di Salle got to his feet—an act which added little to his height—and glanced over his shoulder. "I still can't get used to people getting up when I'm introduced," he began. "I always look behind me to see if a bishop has walked in." He paused professionally to let the laughter run.

"I have made a few speeches around the country," Di Salle went on, deadpan, "and been gratified by the crowds which attended. Afterwards I find out they are all looking for jobs." (More laughter.) "I managed to bring quite a few people down here from back home. Matter of fact, it's getting so when you meet someone going down the street, you ask whether he's from Independence or Toledo." (Guffaws.) "Before making my formal talk, I'd like to extend my apologies to you fellows who lost money betting on whether I'd be here for three months or not. Bets are on for the next three months, and the odds are still good." (Appreciative haws.)

For another 25 minutes, he kept the newsmen and their guests holding their sides and choking with appreciative laughter. When he finished, Washington's toughest, most jaded audience gave him a standing ovation.

Pooh with Alterations. Casual, wisecracking Michael Di Salle, 43, does not give off those portentous creaking sounds that Washingtonians expect from a big wheel in the Government. He does not look much like one, either. He looks more like a jolly caricature—a real-life Winnie-the-Pooh, with slight alterations made at Walt Disney's drawing board. He does not reach quite high enough (5 ft. 5% in.); he weighs too much (215 Ibs.); he balloons out too far at the middle (44-in. waist). A bashful mustache perches below his nose. His mouth, always ready to smile, surrounds a small boy's teeth, with the necessary aperture in the center for whistling and spitting. Elfin ears peek selfconsciously around his rosy Pooh cheeks. He dresses in department-store suits, noisy ties and unshined shoes.

Mike Di Salle seems simply too happy, too exuberant, too relaxed and too candid to be a front-line general in the nation's fight against inflation. On top of that, he is not an economist and not a prominent businessman; he is not even listed in Who's Who. When President Truman asked him last fall to head the Office of Price Stabilization, he was just the mayor of Toledo, an unpretentious lawyer and oft-defeated Democratic politician. But there he was last week, perched precariously on one of the hottest seats in town, like a beach ball on a trained seal's nose.