Word: moment
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...months after the defining moment of the Nagano Winter Olympics--Tara Lipinski's dramatic victory over Michelle Kwan, in which the two athletes skated as if they had, respectively, nothing and everything to lose--the rivalry continues, at least in the endorsement arena. Unfortunately, since Lipinski retired from competitive skating shortly after the Olympics, the pair has yet to meet again on the ice with anything at stake, though they both appeared together this summer on an exhibition tour of 50-plus cities. Still defined by the rivalry, they are friendly, but not genuine friends...
...gainsay Mark McGwire. Nor could we have invented him: he was that close to perfect. He assaulted the most textured record in the most apposite sport--the sport closest to the American bone and yet most in need of a rehabilitation of the spirit. McGwire built steadily toward his moment, through 11 seasons marked by astonishing accomplishment and devastating failure. He remained at once focused on his goal and joyful in its pursuit, during which he embraced his closest rival. He never bragged, never proclaimed that he was the great white hope or the straw that stirred the drink...
Unquestionably, McGwire's feats of 1998 were granted a deeper dimension by the presence of his confederate, the ecstatic Sammy Sosa. Here was a joyous, ebullient counterpoint to McGwire's more sedate self. From the moment in midspring that Sosa launched a sudden torrent of home runs like none ever seen in baseball history--he hit 20 in June alone--the two men were flawlessly scripted antagonists cast in the same play. This was rapture vs. gravity, spontaneity vs. self-restraint, Latin brio vs. California cool. Their collision seemed inevitable; yet what ensued was less a crash than...
...Marises, whose father had been resented for breaking Babe Ruth's record without a Babe Ruth career. McGwire spoke of Maris to the press, making sure his predecessor, on whom he probably only recently got briefed, finally got his due in memoriam. McGwire was making sure, even in his moment of pure exultation and relief, that he did the right thing. Hug son, hug teammates, hug ex-wife, hug Marises and, oh, yeah, touch first base...
...abuse of power for giving dismissive or evasive answers to some of the 81 questions put to him by the House Judiciary Committee, was rejected by a vote of 285 to 148. That was the climax of an incomparably tumultuous and unnerving week. Surreal was the word of the moment for a three-day period in which the President was impeached over lies about sex, the incoming Speaker of the House, Bob Livingston, resigned on the House floor because of his own adulteries, and the air over Baghdad exploded. So did the air over Washington, where the constant outcry over...