Word: bushel
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Says Tip O'Neill: "He was a flame under a bushel basket...
Until Maury Wills started stealing bases by the bushel for the 1962 Dodgers, everyone in baseball thought Ty Cobb's modern record of 96 thefts in a single season was untouchable. Now anyone who assumes that Wills' mark of 104 is beyond reach must count again. Last week, not quite halfway through the season, St. Louis Cardinal Leftfielder Lou Brock stole his 50th base, putting him 28 games ahead of Wills' 1962 pace. As if that were not enough, Brock has collected those steals in only 56 attempts, for an astonishing success rate...
Wholesale prices received by farmers for some key products have dropped sharply since last winter (see chart); between February and May, wheat fell from $5.52 a bushel to $3.52, and corn from $2.76 to $2.45. Food processors and retailers have by no means passed the full decline along to consumers as yet. In fact, retail food prices overall rose .9% in May, but meat, poultry and egg prices went down...
Primaries are the tarot cards of politics, but experts who try to read them in this roiled year are having problems of perception. The voters have been re-nominating incumbent Congressmen by the bushel while rejecting some other experienced officeholders out of hand. Last week's California primary was probably the most revealing so far. With gubernatorial races in both parties and an anticorruption referendum of unprecedented scope and complexity, Californians seemed to be saying that they are standoffish toward all candidates. At the same time, the voters are enthusiastic about fundamental political reform...
Moneymen are also cheered by a recent sharp plunge in some commodity prices. Wheat, for example, dropped from $6.11 per bushel in February to $3.62 last week, beef cattle from $46.25 per hundredweight to $38.90, and steel scrap from $115 per ton to $100. If these drops continue, economists believe, corporations will stop scrambling to borrow in order to stockpile raw materials. Indeed, they may sell off some of their present inventories and start repaying their loans...