Word: claptrap
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...frontespiece of the Spectator, for example, is a column written by editor R. Emmett Tyrell and titled "The Continuing Crisis," which diagnoses the grave illnesses of America by pointing to symptoms. This month, Tyrell dislikes Bill Walton ("tiresome proponent of New Age claptrap," "Marxist-Leninist thumper for health food"), liberation theologists, and the Washington press corps (who need a "manual on the fundamentals of courtesy"). There are signs of recovery, though; President Reagan has restored "dignity to realms where there recently had been mawkishness and amateurism unsurpassed in American history," and Secretary of State Alexander Haig has refused Soviet ambassador...