Word: brush
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...talks pictured in Workers '80 wore on, the government representatives grew ever more feeble, ever more dominated. By the end, eager to sign an agreement,Jagielski tried to brush aside the dissident question with vague promises of inquiry. Rather than initial the document, Walesa said, "Why don't we take a ten-minute break?" "No, we're so close, let's sign," Jagielski responded. "Perhaps a 20-minute break would be in order," was Walesa's reply. Half an hour later, Jagielski delivered the goods on the jailed dissidents, and the pact was announced...
...these shortcomings combined to make the AWACS deal a nightmarish brush with disaster. The story began in a way, in 1978, when President Jimmy Carter pushed through a reluctant Congress the sale of the 60 F-15 fighters to Saudi Arabia. He did so. with arguments remarkably similar to those that Reagan was to use three years later, chiefly that the U.S. had to increase its influence in the Middle East by helping moderate Arab states to defend themselves. Harold Brown, then Secretary of Defense, had to pledge that Saudi Arabia's F-15s would not be equipped with such...
...pans. It's a rather solitary job in an otherwise hectic environment. There's nobody to hassle with except for the waitresses who scream to get their trays filled. A certain rhythm develops, an implicit harmony between the dishwasher and his dishes and the uneaten food he must brush off the plates...
...After all these years of rehearsal, he ought to have his act together. "Cortés and Montezuma are walking, down by the docks. Little green flies fill the air. Corées and Montezuma are holding hands; from time to time one of them disengages a hand to brush away a fly." No byline is needed; the spooky confluence of matter-of-fact observation (those green flies) and dreamlike lunacy (the handholding strollers) identify the paragraph as Barthelme...
...next week, he will behave like most governments and do essentially nothing. Moreover, he will do it for 28 days, as he rides Jeep and horse about his 688 craggy acres in the Santa Ynez Mountains, his Rancho del Cielo, 2,200 ft. into the cielo, splitting firewood, clearing brush, ogling stars. A pleasant image for the public to dwell on, but it also raises some questions and a bit of a stir: Is so long a holiday fitting and proper for a President, the leader of the free world? Can Washington survive without being the center of Government...