Word: blinds
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...prism through which police conduct in this story appears anything but deplorable. Two of the men dispatched to investigate Hurley were friends of his and dined with him the night after he was interviewed. Through their union, police exhibited little interest in the pursuit of truth, more a blind and vociferous loyalty to a colleague in strife. Between the inquest and the trial, Hooper observed their righteous fury at a Brisbane meeting whose purpose, she writes, "was to establish that the police were the victims. This was real-life über-Australia up against insipid, politically correct, bullshit Australia...
...continent to finally embrace southern Africa in the 1980s and early '90s. For many liberation leaders, the struggle continued to define them long after it was won, and this tendency to see the future in the terms of the past has led even the most revered down some blind alleys. In South Africa, for example, President Nelson Mandela once allowed memories of imperialism to color his views on his country's rampant violent crime, the "encouragement and commission" of which he blamed on white supremacists. In Zimbabwe, Mugabe's impatience with the slow pace of land redistribution...
...ruthlessness and savagery of Mugabe have given rise to two basic reactions in Africa and around the world: fruitless hand-wringing by committed multilateralists who want to solve the problem through "constructive engagement," and consequence-blind militarism by zealous moralists who call for regime change by force. Neither approach offers realistic hope for the people of Zimbabwe. Ending the Mugabe nightmare is still possible, but it will require a more radical diplomatic strategy than the world has tried...
...backroom poker player, on the other hand, is more cautious and self-absorbed. Card games may be social, but they are played in solitude. No need for drama. The quiet card counter is king, and only a novice banks on luck. In this game, a good bluff trumps blind faith, and the studied observer beats the showman. So it is fitting that the presumptive Democratic nominee, Barack Obama, raked in so many pots in his late-night games with political friends...
Patriotism should be proud but not blind, critical yet loving. And liberals and conservatives should agree that if patriotism entails no sacrifice, if it is all faith and no works, then something has gone wrong. The American who volunteers to fight in Iraq and the American who protests the war both express a truer patriotism than the American who treats it as a distant spectacle with no claim on his talents or conscience...