Word: distracter
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...amount of commercialized, patriotic one-upmanship—from features sensationalizing the tragedy and profiting from ratings to an “American Idol” singing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial—should distract us from taking the necessary time to pause, in silence, and remember. Today is for the janitors and investment bankers, the foreign nationals and American firefighters, for all those who lost their lives...
What is everyone looking at?" Hilary asked Maureen Farrington on the morning of Sept. 12. Friends and relatives had descended on her house, and Farrington volunteered to distract Hilary with a day at the beach. Farrington, a peppy, blond social worker, assured Hilary that people were probably gawking, as they very often did, at her adopted Korean daughter Elizabeth, 2. But Hilary wasn't buying it; she kept wondering aloud why anyone might have reason to watch her. The rest of the time, she blithely skipped about the beach and collected shells with Elizabeth...
...putting on a happy face. What keeps you going is stubbornness and righteous anger: at ugly buildings, SUVs, background music, the eminence of nonentities, at cravenness and cruelty in general and the shamelessness of this government--leading the lynching of a few corporate scapegoats to distract the mob from your own sins--the naked hypocrisy of it! If you're not brave enough to have morals when you're 72% popular, what hope is there for you? Give the bastards a hard time: that's how you get to be old. But why am I telling you, bubby? Grow...
...dozen Tokyo commuters, dire prophecy came true. On a sunny March morning in 1995, Aum members, in an apparent attempt to create mayhem and distract a police investigation into their operations, used the tips of umbrellas to puncture plastic bags filled with liquid sarin, which they left behind on five subway trains. A poisonous, invisible cloud spread through the carriages and stations. Thousands of people were made sick, and 12 died...
...nations proved that Asia had finally earned its place on the world pitch, especially South Korea, which became the first Asian side ever to make it to the semifinals. The teams' bold performances filled Asians with a pride that football has never before afforded them, and did much to distract them from their countries' stuttering economies and tiresome politics. Yet many of the World Cup's promised boons?not least, millions of extra tourist dollars?have failed to materialize. Now, Koreans and Japanese alike are beginning to ask if the psychological rewards of hosting the Cup were worth the cost...