Word: harshest
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...their own concerns are being eclipsed by the Arab bloc sticking to its guns over the language condemning Israel. Although many African governments sympathize with the plight of the Palestinians, they're uncomfortable with the Arab bloc's apparent willingness to scuttle the whole conference by insisting that the harshest possible language on Israel remain in the final document - because the conference declaration must be adopted by consensus, the impasse over Israel and Zionism threatens to derail the entire enterprise. That prompted the Africans and Europeans to work hard on finding a compromise text, but when a Norwegian-authored text...
...means goddess. All right, the word is as goofily overblown for a female vocal star as "artist" is for any punk with a record contract. But as a job description, "diva" carries certain burdens. One must not only sing one's heart out; one must expose it to the harshest elements. What becomes a legend most? Suffering. A childhood of deprivation; liaisons with powerful, possibly dangerous men; career triumph soured by personal despair. A life of melodrama makes the diva more human, thus more godlike, to her fans. A catchy moniker helps: Callas...Garland...Lady Day...Whitney. The singer...
They are pathetic, aren't they? Even on the harshest days, you can find them huddled in the doorways of every office building in America, sucking in those sweet and deadly toxins. What do you say to people who engage in this relentless act of self-destruction...
...Communist Party's harshest and most ingenious weapon has been its "responsibility system." For each believer who reaches Beijing to carry out a protest?and some have come vast distances from the countryside?"all levels of government leaders, police, neighborhood cadres, work units and family members must receive punishment," according to a Communist Party document seen by TIME. This lets the party evade a simple arithmetic problem: it never had enough jails or police to handle the tens of millions of people who are claimed to have once practiced Falun Gong. Instead, it enlists ordinary people to help find practitioners...
...people, people like us, hurt people. He has the craft to ensure they do so instructively and entertainingly. The play wouldn't work as seductively as it does-the set-up, the darkening, the climactic switcheroo-without four beguiling actors who make their characters plausible at the sweetest and harshest of moments. (Rudd is especially adroit at suggesting Adam's metamorphosis from nerd to hunk.) Only at the end do we realize exactly who has been manipulated by a clever artist. We have...