Word: ersatz
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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BOOM! sounded the cannons. Crack! went the rifles. As the smoke settled over the calm greensward of New Market, Va., a ragged gray line of ersatz Confederates marched on the Yankee guns. In accordance with the script, the Bluebellies died in a heap of splendid tragedy. As one mock Union soldier put it: "I'm a Confederate. But there weren't enough real Yankees to man the cannon...
...imagination to propel its whimsy, no language to give it breath. Goldman is a dealer in used ideas ("The Bible has it wrong-Earth is Eden!" cries Justin). Scott continues to act with impatient power, but his messages all seem self-addressed. Woodward's real sweetness becomes ersatz and saccharine...
...booze and beaming blondes who are a soft touch for hard currency. West Germans are so obviously affluent that Poles ask one another sarcastically which of the two nations lost World War II. Never rapier-sharp at best, Polish humor has been improving on a diet of meatless Mondays, ersatz coffee and phantom slabs of butter. "I don't worry when my wife is missing for several hours," goes one story. "She has neither been in an accident nor meeting her boy friend nor spending money wildly. She is only standing in line for coffee and vegetables...
...goods declined. The price tags on television sets went down 13%, on washing machines 17%, and on vacuum cleaners 15%. At the same time, however, food prices were drastically increased. Beef went up 19%, assuming that one could find it, flour 16% and salted herring 19%. The cost of ersatz coffee nearly doubled. The government also announced that wages would be frozen...
Last month an ersatz congressional election was held in which the pro-government party, ARENA, won 70% of the 310 seats in the Chamber of Deputies. ARENA'S victory against tame, regime-approved opposition candidates was not surprising, but neither was it convincing. A terrorist plea for the casting of blank ballots as a protest gesture, meanwhile, was totally ignored. Brazil's 30 million voters seemed determined to turn thumbs down on the terrorists, if not quite thumbs up for the generals...