Word: litmus
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...issue: it sets up a false dichotomy and thereby excludes alternative programs from consideration. Yet in the heat of political campaigns such specious reasoning is surprisingly effective; millions of Americans who had never heard of, much less read, the Humphrey-Hawkins bill were persuaded to accept it as a litmus test of a candidate's commitment to full employment...
...support George McGovern in his fight to kill the B-1 bomber. He has had misgivings about both busing and the Humphrey-Hawkins full-employment bill. Like Carter, he has moral reservations about abortion, though he accepts the Supreme Court decision legalizing it. On the overriding liberal litmus test of Viet Nam, Mondale was late (1968) in swinging over to the antiwar side. Carter obviously feels politically compatible with Mondale. In many ways, it is difficult to say which of them is more liberal or which more conservative...
...other issue of very special concern to American Jews is, of course, Israel-which has become something of an automatic litmus by which every national politician is tested. While Carter has long been a firm supporter of Israel, he most clearly enunciated his views on the Middle East in his prepared address last week in Elizabeth. There he declared, to enthusiastic applause, that "the survival of Israel is not a political issue. It is a moral imperative." He sharply criticized Secretary of State Henry Kissinger's penchant for personalized and secret handling of foreign affairs, including the shuttle, step...
Rome is history's eternal litmus aper. Dipped in the perceptions f an era or an individual, it changes color-republican white, imperial purple, Christian gold-indicating the nature of those perceptions and their changes from one century to the next. Comparing Giovanni Battista Piranesi's etchings and Herschel Levit's photographs of Rome, exhibited together in the MFA, is a fascinating study in perceptive, historical or otherwise When the 18th century Italian looks at these imperial Roman monuments he sees a totally different structure than the 20th century New Yorker does. One wonders which has changed more; Rome...
...literary" for wide appeal. But literary it is not. Poorly constructed, too prone to phrases like "our mouths melted like liquid," it has a shapeless, self-indulgent plot and weak characterizations, especially of the men. But Isadora obviously has wide appeal. Says her creator: "Fear of Flying is a litmus test for everybody's mishegoss [Yiddish for craziness]." Warren Farrell, a spokesman for the men's liberation movement, feels that Fear of Flying will help free both sexes. As women take more initiative and responsibility for their sex lives, he believes, "some of the pressure will be removed...