It was a party, even though most of us only watched it on TV. I was in college, too, and it was vastly exciting and *very* surprising. The sort of thing to make people laugh and cry at the same time. It seemed like the whole world changed, but in a good way.
Lois is roughly my age, so she'd have been in college then too -- so I can see she'd have *wanted* to go be part of it, but whether she could swing the finances would be the sticking point.
Hey, maybe she schemed her way over there, wrote up a fabulous freelance article, and used that in her interview w/Perry White?
As for the feds/intelligence/IFF types -- I'm pretty sure they were taken completely by surprise. The CIA's gained a fabulous reputation for getting everything wrong. For instance, I remember reading that they were certain the Soviet Union would keep on going strong for another hundred years or so. I don't think you get into espionage if you're the optimistic type. In short -- Lee would be cynical enough to think the wall would be there forever, but Amanda might have seen it coming, just by a little bit.
PJ
