Word: confounded
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George Bush was under fire as "the environmentalist" President in campaign pledge only. But last week he managed to confound his critics. He broke a decade-long impasse by proposing major steps to reduce acid rain, smog caused by auto exhaust and toxic chemicals discharged into the air. In a political tour de force, he managed to draw at least grudging acceptance from almost all sides. Environmentalists were pleased that the plan met their minimum goals. Industry grumbled about heavy costs: $14 billion to $19 billion annually by the end of the year 2000. But utility executives sighed with relief...
Some findings confound expectations. For example, Patricia Gwartney-Gibbs, a sociology professor at the University of Oregon, has found that women are just as likely, if not more likely, to engage in lower-level violence. Many researchers hypothesize that women's acts of aggression are often in self- defense. Yet men, because of their greater strength, inflict more injuries. "When you are talking about severe violence, it's a man's court," says David Sugarman, a professor of psychology at Rhode Island College. Researchers have also discovered that the longer couples stay together, the more probable it is that violence...
...classical form cannot digest. In his male nudes, mostly of black men, the genitals present themselves with a frankness that explodes the composition. In his pictures of female Body Builder Lisa Lyon, the photographic conventions that ordinarily apply to the male anatomy -- flexed muscles, sculptural lighting -- are used to confound every expectation of female form. A picture like Thomas, 1986, a variation on Leonardo's image of a man inscribed within a circle, could be an emblem of Mapplethorpe's work: vital force straining against formal bounds...
...Ephraim Fischbach measured a weak force he called "hypercharge" and theorized that it caused objects of different composition to fall at different rates. Since Fischbach's finding, as many as 45 experiments have sprung up in search of the mystery force, and so far each has served only to confound rather than clarify the issue...
...fourth-place finishes. How they must envy Dukakis, who has raised $11 million and will go on to New Hampshire with a home-field advantage. Simon, who has demonstrated surprising staying power, is confronted with the same question as Dole: If not Iowa, where? Conversely, a Simon victory could confound the race. As University of New Hampshire Political Scientist David Moore argues, "The momentum associated with the Iowa results could very well mean victory for Simon and Dole in New Hampshire if they win in Iowa...