Word: dire
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Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' decision not to stand for re-election in January casts a pall over U.S. hopes to broker a two-state peace agreement with Israel. But it could also have dire consequences for the security situation in the West Bank. That's because Abbas' possible resignation threatens the future of the U.S.-funded Palestinian security forces that have begun to play a key role in preventing militants from launching attacks on Israel...
...debts will be tempted to inflate its way out by printing money to pay creditors. Printing more dollars (the process actually involves the Federal Reserve's purchasing government securities with dollars it conjures out of thin air) reduces the value of existing dollars. And a government in truly dire fiscal straits - Germany in the 1920s is the most famous example - may print so much currency that it makes the stuff effectively worthless. Our fiscal straits aren't that dire just yet. But chronic deficits during George W. Bush's Administration, even bigger deficits brought on by the financial crisis...
...trouble than anticipated. For its annual actuarial review, which the agency delivered to Congress on Nov. 12, the FHA asked its outside auditor to run a series of doom-and-gloom scenarios - including one that assumes house prices continue to slide and unemployment hits 12.5%. Only in the most dire, and unlikely, of such simulations does the FHA run out of money to cover its losses, which is why FHA commissioner David Stevens has repeatedly said the agency will not need to ask Congress for money...
...deadly strain, Plasmodium falciparum. For six decades, malaria drugs like chloroquine and mefloquine have fallen impotent in this Southeast Asian border area, allowing stronger strains to spread to Burma, India and Africa. But this time there's no new wonder drug waiting in the wings. "It would be unspeakably dire if resistance formed to artemisinin," says Amir Attaran, a professor of law and medicine at the University of Ottawa who has written extensively on malaria issues...
However, the process of creating the legislation Pelosi worked so hard to pass is less than perfect and in dire need of reform. The fact that few legislators had actually read the contents of the House bill prior to its passage and the sheer haste of the bill’s composition are detrimental to our system of governance. Legislation that as impactful and permanent as this ought to be carefully deliberated upon and debated, not hastily patched together to meet artificial deadlines...