Word: amends
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...which creatures to save and which to consign to the deepening waters. He turns away the pests, the serpents and other species he deems useless to man or too costly to take along. If such a vision strains the imagination, consider the call by some Bush Administration officials to amend the Endangered Species Act. Their aim is to expand greatly the powers of a committee of political appointees that already can exempt species from the protection of the act when man's economic interests so dictate. The committee is commonly known as the "God Squad," not for its collective wisdom...
Some state judges go so far as to argue that their high courts are better instruments of democracy than the federal bench because voters can remove state judges and can amend state constitutions more easily than they can change the federal charter. But even some liberals, including New York Governor Mario Cuomo, are uneasy about the revival of state judicial influence. They see it as a warning sign that the federal system as a whole has abdicated responsibility for setting national standards of justice. Declared Cuomo: "I do not believe the fundamental liberties and rights of members of our national...
...minded wrangling among filmmakers, movie reviewers and the Hollywood establishment. When Xs were handed out to such distinguished foreign films as Pedro Almodovar's Tie Me Up! Tie Me Down! and Peter Greenaway's The Cook the Thief His Wife & Her Lover, critics and directors petitioned the M.P.A.A. to amend its system and classify certain serious fare with an A (adult) rating. Publicly, M.P.A.A. president Jack Valenti opposed any alteration, while in private he helped hammer out the compromise. This week the first NC-17 film will be released: Philip Kaufman's love quadrangle Henry & June...
...same time, environmentalists accused Bush of caving in to the timber industry. "It's a throwback to the Reagan-era environmental politics," said George Frampton, head of the Wilderness Society. "It's 100% politics, 0% science." He may have a point. The Administration wants to amend the Endangered Species Act, expanding the role of the "God Squad" -- a body of mostly political appointees who can carve out exemptions under the act for economic and other considerations. For owls, and other creatures, that is a precarious perch indeed...
Suddenly, however, the President and much of Congress have found a problem they are willing -- no, eager -- to tackle, a threat apparently so dire they are scrambling to amend the Bill of Rights to stop it: the possibility that a handful of fringe showboats might desecrate the American flag. It is the paradigm of the age of escapist politics. No painful economic choices need be confronted. Considerations more complex than a sound bite can be dismissed. And it lends itself to the manipulation of what are in fact the deep and sincere values of a patriotic majority understandably repulsed...