Word: blame
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Reagan's approach to the political process has stressed appearance more than governance. Never accepting the blame is a cornerpiece of the Reagan political legacy. While the buck always stopped with Harry Truman, Ronald Reagan seems content to feign ignorance and absent-mindedness time and again, letting his hand-picked subordinates resign one after another in disgrace and shame. Politicians in both parties have taken note of this absolute rejection of responsibility and learned...
...military expenditures. In fact, Reagan has mortgaged the future prosperity of America by tripling the gross national debt. While his subordinates would have us believe that Congress is responsible for these deficits, it is the President who has always submitted unbalanced budgets--and he, therefore, who should accept the blame...
...course, the press is not entirely to blame: politicians are overusing the phrases too. Asked how his meeting with Mikhail Gorbachev was going during last month's minisummit, President Reagan replied, "Read our smiles," a line that turned up on the next day's front pages. New York City Mayor Ed Koch, who faces a tough re-election fight, recently promised reporters -- you guessed it -- a "kinder, gentler Ed Koch." But just in case the President- elect is growing tired of his own cliches, help is on the way: Peggy Noonan, the writer who penned his New Orleans speech...
...that the details matter much. At best the seven-volume, 3,000-page document will serve as a starting point in an elaborate budgetary blame game pitting Reagan's successor, George Bush, against his rivals in the Democratic- controlled Congress. Each side is intent on holding the other responsible for the painful and unpopular combination of program cuts and new revenues that will be needed to reduce the projected deficit of $127 billion to the $100 billion mandated under the Gramm-Rudman deficit-reduction law. In a ritual game of budgetary chicken, neither side wants to offer the first specific...
...medical experts acknowledge that Ritalin is being overprescribed. In Georgia, Michigan, Utah and Maryland use of the drug is two or three times the national average. Says Andrew Watry, executive director of Georgia's medical board: "It's seen by some as a quick fix for behavior problems." The blame belongs not only to doctors, who sometimes give little more than cursory examinations before reaching for the prescription pad, and teachers, who want their classrooms to be peaceful. It also rests on parents, who often expect their children to be stellar performers. ADHD is most commonly diagnosed in prosperous suburbs...