GOVERNMENT: Jim's Overnight Task Force

Next door to the White House, in the stately old Executive Office Building, a nine-man ad hoc team held its first meeting last week. In Washington, task forces and special committees bloom and die like cherryblossoms —and often make about as much impact on policy—but this group is different. Its boss is James Schlesinger, 48, he of the omnivorous intellect and encyclopedic résumé, the man chosen by Jimmy Carter to take charge of the nation's energy problems. The group's goal: to produce a 50-page document outlining, as the President put it in...