Word: new
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Oval Office on Friday, May 8, for a hastily called meeting, the normally placid Obama was visibly unhappy. "I don't like my options," the President said. Craig told the President his lawyers had concluded there was no alternative to releasing the photos. Obama sent Craig scrambling for a new way out. Three days later, Craig had found a loophole: instead of releasing the photos, Obama would buy time by fighting their release all the way to the Supreme Court...
...Avuncular and white-maned, Craig had at one time imagined he might steer foreign policy in the new Administration, possibly as National Security Adviser. Instead, he was named Obama's top lawyer. Craig lost no time creating one of the largest White House counsel's offices ever, with dozens of high-powered lawyers, compared with only a handful who served under Bush in early 2001. Staffed with brainy graduates of Yale and Harvard law schools, Craig's office was an instant power center in the White House, able to produce answers, memos and ideas seemingly overnight while other parts...
...explain these moves, Obama turned to a device he often uses to transcend political divisions: a major speech. Delivered at the National Archives on May 21, Obama's address struck a new equilibrium between security and civil liberties - a stark contrast to the security-at-any-cost approach advocated by Cheney, but also a departure from his direction at the start of 2009. The President pointed out that he had ended "enhanced interrogation" and closed the CIA's secret prisons. But he also pledged to "use all elements of our power to defeat" al-Qaeda...
...Wednesday, four would-be pirates in a skiff approached the Maersk Alabama some 650 miles off Somalia. This time, however, the crew aboard the Maersk Alabama had a brand new line of defense: a Long Range Acoustic Device (LRAD). It's a $30,000 loudspeaker that is used to first verbally warn an approaching vessel that it is getting too close. If the intruder continues towards the ship, the LRAD can be cranked up, generating a painful high-pitched screech that can be aimed at the approaching vessel.(See photos of dramatic pirate-hostage rescues...
Despite the expensive new weapon, the pirate skiff plowed right through sound waves that should have sent the privateers scurrying in the opposite direction. Ultimately it took gunshots fired by a four-member security team to drive the pirates away after they came within 300 yards of the Maersk Alabama. The lesson: lead still beats loud...