Word: givens
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...historical counterpoint is perfect: 50 years almost to the day after Nazi tanks roared across the border into Poland, that long-suffering nation has given birth to a freely elected, non-Communist government. No metaphor better symbolizes the triumph of democracy over totalitarianism. Even the horrific memory of the bloodstains in Tiananmen Square cannot eradicate the impression that most of the world is emulating the Western form of government -- or wants to desperately, even to the point of death. Not only the Communist bloc is awash in democratic ferment; nine Latin American nations have held or are scheduled to hold...
...blessed by the gods not so much with talent as with the insatiable drive to win. A competitor stubborn enough to play long beyond his prime -- and until he could break Ty Cobb's batting record -- a rookie who ran to first base when he was given a walk, a bruiser who plowed so hard into an opposing catcher during an All-Star game that he separated the man's shoulder, Rose was too vain and too arrogant to beg for mercy from a former Ivy League classics scholar like Giamatti...
Extraordinary? Yes. Unexpected? Hardly. These days, events in Eastern Europe are so topsy-turvy that bloc uniformity seems to have given way to a breathless rush of uneven developments. In Hungary, where a multiparty system is in the works, Communist Party chief Karoly Grosz reportedly announced that < he was prepared to step down, a move that was interpreted as a victory for reformers. In East Germany the government sought to rid itself of malcontents by handing out unprecedented numbers of exit permits, while thousands of other unhappy citizens simply fled over the Hungarian border. In Poland the Communist Party Politburo...
...many are believed to have been gunned down to settle private accounts and labeled collaborators posthumously. Nonetheless, many Palestinians are appalled by the brutality, prompting an appeal in the latest leaflet from the uprising "not to eliminate collaborators without a decision by the leadership, and not before he is given a chance to repent...
...that suffering, new ideas had been born, from the technologies of radar, sulfa drugs, jet aircraft and nuclear energy to the concepts of collective security, the Atlantic alliance and the United Nations. New horrors, almost beyond description, now had to be given names: fire storm, radiation, holocaust. But other terms suggested rays of hope: jeep, airlift and the symbol of three dots and a dash: V for victory...