Word: dampen
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...Some intrepid souls used surfboards to negotiate flooded streets. Others sandbagged their homes. Cleanup crews frantically cleared tree limbs and tried to keep drains open, but even as the week's fourth major rainstorm was spending itself, forecasters were warning of more bad weather. Still, little seemed to dampen the spirits of fans attending Sunday's Super Bowl game in Pasadena, though city officials had to do a lot of scrambling. Because the golf course usually reserved for parking at the Rose Bowl was too soggy to use, for instance, they had to convert streets surrounding the stadium...
...late 1978 OPEC announced its second major price increase, and less than a year later the U.S. Federal Reserve moved to dampen U.S. inflation by restricting the money supply. Tighter credit in the U.S. boosted world interest rates to new postwar highs, while declining inflation in the U.S. and a rush of foreign money into the country strengthened the dollar. No longer could loans be paid off with ever less expensive greenbacks. Quite the contrary. Moreover, since the biggest borrowers-Argentina, Brazil, Mexico and South Korea-carried floating interest-rate tags (which change with prevailing rates) on most of their...
...device is the airbag, a hidden cushion that inflates upon impact to dampen the shock of an automobile collision. Unlike seat belts, airbags require no active effort by riders, and cause no inconvenience. Because airbags work automatically, they provide constant protection: seat belts, by comparison, protect only those ten percent of all riders who bother to strap themselves in. The airbag has proven its effectiveness in millions of miles of road tests, and even a foe of government regulation like Yale economist William Nordhaus estimates that an airbag law would save, in addition to thousands of invaluable lives. $30 billion...
...excess, movie-star biography can dampen the spirit not because it fails to reveal, but because it succeeds all too well in revealing what film actors are really like. The truth is that the events of an actor's offstage life are usually just as banal and repetitious as the events of ordinary lives. The big difference-even if there is nothing new under the sun-is that what would be garden-variety problems for most people become much harder to handle when they happen to a star. Not only are they painted with the flamboyance of their milieu...
...Salvadoran rebels. Haig downplayed Mexico's role. Said he: "The U.S. will present and receive proposals on its own behalf." One of the main reasons for the Haig-Castaneda meetings, U.S. officials said, was simply to "massage the Mexican ego a little." In addition, the talks might dampen domestic liberal criticism of the Administration's hard-line approach...