Word: commissars
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...COMMISSAR...
...sensible, so . . . Phil Donahue -- and the sublimely silly uses to which he put them. Phrases like "Well, excuuuuuse me!" and "Naaaah!" became schoolyard mantras, and his concerts were eliciting rock-idol squeals. "He was performing to audiences of up to 20,000," recalls David Letterman, the late-night commissar of '80s comedy. "I think that's a record for a stand-up comedian in peacetime." In 1978 Martin recorded a gag disco tune called King Tut; it sold more than a million copies. The next year he published a slim volume of short stories, Cruel Shoes; it topped the best...
Well, what could please Commissar Abramski more than a war in Central America? What better way to arm communists in the region, or to destabilize its fragile governments, than to create a war that is sure to destroy much industry and agriculture, to radicalize and embitter the peasantry and to make Soviet allies ever more dependent on aid and military support from Moscow...
Hence, in the Soviet Union, the mentality of the spy is part and parcel of the mentality of the commissar and, beyond that, of the citizen. The relationship between an agent and his source, between a secret policeman and his informer, is not only an honorable estate but an essential...
Reagan and Gonzalez seemed to establish an instant rapport, and even traded anti-Communist jokes over lunch. Reagan told an old one about a Soviet farmer who claims his potato crop is so abundant "it reaches to the foot of God." When a visiting commissar reminds the farmer that "there is no God," the local replies, "There aren't any potatoes either." Gonzalez responded with the one about Karl Marx returning from the grave and going on TV in Moscow to say, "Workers of the world--forgive me!" The First Lady let her hair down as well. During a visit...