Word: grip
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...many Hamas officials, however, dealing with Israel isn't so critical as focusing on domestic issues like fighting graft and getting a grip on the many Palestinian security organizations. "The international community wants to know what Hamas thinks about Israel and the U.S., but Hamas wants to work to its own timetable," says Abdul Sattar Kasim, a political scientist at An-Najah National University in Nablus. "They want to build a new Palestinian society. They're not going to talk about the road map. They're going to talk about the rights of Palestinian refugees. They're not going...
Even before DeLay's announcement that he would abdicate his leadership post, top Bush advisers tell TIME, the President's inner circle always treated DeLay as a necessary burden. He may have had an unmatched grip on the House and Washington lobbyists, but DeLay is not the kind of guy?in background and temperament?the President feels comfortable with. Of the former exterminator, a Republican close to the President's inner circle says, "They have always seen him as beneath them, more blue collar. He's seen as a useful servant, not someone you would want to vacation with...
...center platform of taxation, gun control and same-sex marriage (he doesn't like any of them) until recently seemed to place him well outside the Canadian mainstream. Why the turnabout? Because Canada is having a nationwide attack of virtue. Corruption scandals have steadily eroded the government's grip on power - in direct proportion to its impressive longevity. Canada, famous for hockey, waggish comedians and an unforgiving Arctic climate, is also home to one of the world's longest-ruling political parties. Canada's Liberals have reigned over the landmass stretching from the 49th parallel to the Arctic Ocean since...
...will be giving him the benefit of the doubt after the dramatic resignation of his economic adviser, the outspoken liberal reformer Andrei Illarionov, 44. The economist, a Kremlin maverick, fought to curb state interference in the economy, particularly in the energy sector. But with Moscow tightening its grip on oil and natural gas, Illarionov was recently stripped of a key post with the G-8 and had his staff cut. Illarionov implies he had been under pressure to keep quiet. "I chose to resign instead," he tells TIME. His exit came as Moscow sparred with Ukraine over natural-gas prices...
...Russia's largest auto manufacturer, the formerly privatized AvtoVAZ. The combination of such reassertion of state control and the opening up of a portion of state firms to private investors enables Putin to argue that he is introducing market reforms into the economy even as he tightens his grip elsewhere. The media has long been muzzled, the judiciary controlled; regional governors are now appointed by Putin rather than elected; and the activities of political parties have been harshly curtailed. "The trends that have been long accumulating," Illarionov says, "found their completion and finally shaped up in 2005." Lilia Shevtsova, senior...