Word: figurehead
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...shown me what a commissioner can do that a chief can't do," Walsh ways. "All the title will do is provide the illusion of having a more capable figurehead--and the people will believe it. But the officers won't. They will want to answer to a superior officer...
Seven months after a series of bloody riots persuaded him to agree to end 30 years of one-man rule, King Birendra Shah of Nepal last week promulgated a new constitution that reduces him to a mainly symbolic monarch. Like a British ruler, Birendra would serve as a figurehead who could act only with the approval of a council and Prime Minister. But he could still declare a national emergency following foreign aggression, deep economic crisis or armed revolt...
Ever since, Kohl's guiding principle has been to preserve and enlarge his own personal power. Competitors within his own party, such as Kurt Biedenkopf, former General Secretary Heiner Geissler, and the President of the Bundestag Rita Sussmuth were either demoted or "promoted" to figurehead positions. Now, his Christian Democrats are in the lamentable state of lacking any leadership figure besides Kohl...
Locked away in jail, where he could not speak publicly or even have his picture published, Mandela was an ethereal inspiration to continued resistance against apartheid. To some South African blacks, however, Mandela out of prison has become an irrelevant figurehead, a dignified gentleman with utopian socialist ideas that have little to do with their daily lives...
...enough to accommodate supporters of abortion rights. But pro-choice job applicants will not find the same warm welcome at the Department of Health and Human Services, the agency with the heaviest responsibility for health care and family-policy issues. HHS Secretary Louis Sullivan has become a virtual figurehead, hemmed in by Administration pro- lifers who have made opposition to abortion a litmus test in hiring and policy decisions...