Word: disdainful
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...than in defending Iraq's borders. The same ethnic tensions that make Iraq tough to govern should make it easier to push Saddam and his defenders into Baghdad. The Kurds have virtual autonomy in northern Iraq. In the south, U.S. troops face an uncertain reception. While Shi'ite Muslims disdain Saddam's Sunni-led government, they are also wary of a coalition that allowed Saddam to crush a 1991 Shi'ite uprising at the end of the Gulf War. The western reaches of Iraq are mostly empty desert...
...President of the U.S. would challenge our oldest allies to a public showdown is quite remarkable. (Presidents usually do the precise opposite: they struggle to avoid any appearance of disunity.) This is a breathtaking gamble, and the question arises: Is it witting or not? Is the Administration's disdain for diplomatic precedent a strategy--a conscious effort to challenge the institutions and arrangements of the past 50 years--or merely a matter of presidential pique? The flattery, handholding and creative fudgery that are at the heart of diplomacy are the very sort of fancy-pants flummeries that the President abhors...
...sovereignty-based UN system, and even such close allies as the British may have trouble selling their electorate a war on that basis. But some of the key architects of the administration's war plans, such as Vice President Cheney and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld never hid their disdain for the UN disarmament process, insisting over the past six months that Saddam is an incorrigible threat that can be eliminated only through regime-change...
When it comes to the war and everything else, our disdain is not enough. We have to accept the moment on its own terms. This doesn’t mean lying down in the flow of history and letting it wash over us like so much toxic waste from a munitions factory; but rather recognizing our part in it and doing what’s necessary to stop the war at home and abroad. And even though it feels a little grandiose, the actions required...
...must confess I am drawn to their neat packaging, their cover art, their portability, their character. I also like to think of myself as a humanitarian, clothing and feeding the poor indie artists of America. I have no moral qualms with downloading music. Rather, like my disdain for “Friends,” my resistance is but a stubborn attempt at nonconformity...