Word: american
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...also led to a vicious cycle. Once factory owners realized that time was money--a notion that led to the first so-called efficiency experts in the 1920s--the idea of making every second count began to spread through society. Result: efficiency became an American virtue. Today every conceivable business is open around the clock; we multitask frantically, applying makeup or talking on the phone while driving; we cram our kids' lives with team sports and lessons. Children don't play anymore: they schedule play dates. "We are," says author Gleick, "driven by time...
...closest thing to a red-blooded, extroverted American youth Schulz created was a beagle. Not coincidentally, Peanuts hit superstardom after Snoopy adopted his World War I flying-ace persona, zooming into the lucrative blue yonder of endorsements and licensing. Snoopy electric toothbrushes and snack cakes--there's a little Woodstock in every Pikachu under your tree this year. And yet Schulz's Christmas special is a plea against commercialism, in which Charlie Brown nurses a desiccated Christmas tree (twig, really) to health...
...goals in some 30 areas where the networks can improve opportunities for minorities. For example, it requires each network to establish a recruitment program for minority managers and writers; to "make every effort to increase its promotional spending for minority shows"; and to appoint at least one new African American to its board of directors by Sept. 1, 2000. Some of the goals are vague and difficult to enforce, like a provision that the networks "cease any practice of ghettoizing 'black shows' whereby they are scheduled together on nights without white programming." That flies in the face of longtime programming...
Still, the diversity campaign has already achieved a good deal by highlighting a problem that grew too blatant to ignore this season. Of the 26 new fall shows announced by the networks, none featured an African American, Latino or Asian American in a leading role. When the N.A.A.C.P. complained, the network honchos admitted the problem and began scrambling to add minority roles. NBC's ER brought on a black woman doctor and an Asian medical student, for example, while CBS's new series Judging Amy tossed in a black bailiff...
Last week's handover of the Panama Canal neatly brackets the American Century. It begins with Theodore Roosevelt conceiving the canal and, with it, America ascending to the rank of Great Power. It ends with America so great a power, so serenely dominant in the world, that it can give away T.R.'s strategic jewel with hardly a notice...