Word: crackpot
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...grown a new pacifism, also rejecting the use of force, but on other, more American grounds. The grounds are pragmatic; the appeal is to prudence; and the theory is that force is to be abjured because, ultimately, it is futile. The new pacifism is not the practice of a crackpot cult. It represents a strongly felt, but almost invisible current of contemporary American thought. Invisible, because its most serious manifestation is not the antinuclear movement, which is neither particularly new (it is as old as its twin, the Bomb) nor necessarily pacifist, since one need not be a pacifist...
Even the album's freshest song, "Crackpot History and the Right to Live," gets its energy from the combination of two old approaches: Aggressive, shouting disco and a psychedelic, stretched-out chorus that doesn't make sense...
...working in marble, it is not wise to doodle, or use the chisel impulsively. But precisely because the chances of succeeding with an amendment are remote, there has always been something satisfyingly theatrical and essentially safe about proposing amendments to enshrine various panaceas, transcendent gripes, noble urges and crackpot illuminations. The process is a little like the custom of nominating obscure favorite sons at political conventions, not because they have any chance of being nominated or elected. God forbid. It is just nice to hear the name boom in the hall, to have the transient thrill, something to tell...
...Best Defense catalogues the 43-year-old professor's most intriguing courtroom battles, emphasizing his suspicion that he has suffered several key setbacks because judges resented his aggressive legal tactics and clever machinations. On the home front, style has also cost Dershowitz points. Much of Harvard considers him a crackpot genius. Pronouncements like last spring's out-of-the-blue challenge to Redgrave don't help...
...IGNITED the selling spree, Joseph Ensign Granville, appears something of a crackpot. The 57-year-old son of a Yonkers market player who lost it all in the last big crash, Granville ran an investment advice service for those who dealt in postage stamps during the 1950s. He moved up to play with the big boys in the '60s, working for E.F. Hutton until his brash unorthodoxy began to clash with the fundamentalist corporate ethic of the firm...