Word: banana
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...death of caudillos, the commercial film industry produces only infrequent glimpses of Latin America--usually more harmful than helpful. Perhaps many people in this country, when they think of Latin America, picture Woody Allen blowing off his hand with a grenade as a bungling guerrilla in a banana republic, where revolutions are such regular happenings that Howard Cosell interviews the deposed leader as he dies on the palace steps...
...dogged Dale joined a touring music-hall company as a fifth-banana comic. "I was no good, but I learned a lot," says Jim. He adds rather chillingly: "There is something about walking offstage with no one clapping that forces you to think...
...inferiority as a matter of course. Olmsted, a New Yorker, traveled in the South but stoutly asserted that slaves did a third to a half as much work as "the commonest, stupidest Irish domestic drudges at the North." Opined Cassius Clay: "God made them for the sun and the banana...
...banana republics claim that they need extra revenue partly to pay the higher oil prices posted by the petroleum cartel. The export price of bananas has remained flat for two decades at about 80 per Ib., while retail prices have climbed steadily, mostly to the benefit of three U.S.-owned companies that grow, ship and market the fruit: United Brands, Del Monte and Standard Fruit & Steamship. Acting singly, the growing countries could not get a bigger slice of the banana pie. Unlike petroleum, bananas cannot be stockpiled; in fact, they must be eaten within twelve days of being picked...
Fragile Unity. When the banana exporters bunched together, the three companies indicated that they would pay the proposed tax. Yet the banana growers already are having trouble holding ranks. World demand for bananas is not rising appreciably, and General Guillermo Rodriguez Lara, President of Ecuador, the most prolific banana producer (90 million boxes last year), fears consumer resistance if prices rise too rapidly. He pulled his country out of the cartel almost as soon as it was formed and announced that he would not raise export taxes. If he sticks to his plan, the banana republics may wind up illustrating...