Word: grasping
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Unfashionable Phrases. So went the parries and thrusts, the President displaying anew his ability to retain detail, his satisfaction in intercepting a debater's point, his grasp of the theorems of foreign policy discourse. Yet the conversational format seemed nonetheless ill-suited to the Nixon style and personality, which fit more easily into the brisk, orderly one-shot answer of the mass press conference...
...table in a chamber as big as the British Museum reading room. Samuel Richardson with Henry James (for "tremulous nobility"); H.G. Wells with Charles Dickens (as "humorists and visualizers"). Forster in his various aspects could be paired with many in that room. With James, because he had James' grasp of the profound moral and emotional stakes that can change hands in outwardly frivolous situations; with Jane Austen, because he shared her skill at domestic comedy; with D.H. Lawrence, because in his own way he proclaimed the importance of passion...
...Fours. There is no doubt that Zelda loved Scott after her fashion. Yet from the beginning her grasp of any emotion except jealousy seemed tentative. "I like men to be just incidents in books so I can imagine their characters," she wrote. The pitiful fact was that she could neither understand nor relate to much of anything outside herself...
That sums up the principal complaint against the entire palace guard that surrounds Nixon. It is true enough that the loudest complainers are those whom Nixon does not see. but it can well be argued that their differing views are precisely what he needs to hear in order to grasp reality firsthand. What some have called "the triumph of the advance men" has left many open wounds all over town. Says one Nixon aide: "When you come into the White House after eight years on the other side, you bring in people who are bright but not experienced in Government?...
...attacks or support engaged troops. But when there is time for congressional debate, the critics contend the military and diplomatic inconveniences of delay are small enough prices to pay for ensuring that the U.S. will not be drawn into risky involvements until the nation has had a chance to grasp what is at stake...