Word: lefting
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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That kind of concession displeases conservatives, who say the Soviets should suffer through their economic and political crises without American assistance. The White House dispatched Vice President Dan Quayle to disarm the hard-liners even before Bush left Europe. Quayle uttered anachronistic noises to the Washington Post, including a nostalgic reference to the Soviet Union as a "totalitarian state." If Quayle's partial retraction a few days later -- he changed the description to "authoritarian" -- seemed to blur the Administration's view even more, that was part of the game. Behind the scenes, White House officials reminded conservatives that the overtures...
East Germany's Communist Party granted the ultimate concession when its leader, Egon Krenz, and the other nine members of the Politburo resigned last week, along with the entire 163-member Central Committee. Three days later, Krenz stepped down as head of state, a move that left him stripped of the powers he had inherited only a month and a half earlier from his discredited predecessor, Erich Honecker. Manfred Gerlach, who heads a small party until now bound to the Communists, was named to replace Krenz in the ceremonial post of President. Honecker meanwhile was in quick succession expelled from...
...wholesale dissolution of the party leadership left some members with an uneasy sense that no one was in charge. But Prime Minister Hans Modrow seemed in command as he appealed on national television for calm, and the party hastily threw together a temporary 25-member working group to fill the leadership void. On Thursday the first talks between the Communist Party and the opposition yielded agreements to recommend parliamentary elections for May 6 and to rewrite the constitution. In addition, the foundering party advanced an emergency congress by a week to try to restore order and salvage shreds of credibility...
...Sound. Environmentalists in West Bengal, India, are planning a bicycle procession. Schoolchildren on Mauritius, a tiny island in the Indian Ocean, will plant trees. And a team of climbers from the U.S., the Soviet Union and China intends to reach the summit of Mount Everest and clean up debris left by previous expeditions. If all goes as planned, at least 100 million people will take part in the largest global demonstration in history: Earth...
Conserving water is just as important as saving energy. Only 3% of the world's water is fresh, and 75% of that is locked away in glaciers and the polar ice caps. The scramble for what is left is growing ever more intense, as the water table falls and toxic chemicals make some supplies undrinkable. Saving the precious liquid can be simple: use a water-conserving shower head, which can reduce consumption by more than half. For older-model toilets, put a brick or two in the tank, since they use 7 gal. of water per flush. Better yet, install...