Word: norms
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Bill Clinton at war has the disquieting countenance of Bill Clinton at peace: few principles seem inviolate; indiscipline and incoherence are the norm; careful planning falls to last-minute improvisation; steadfastness is only a tactic. At home that is not so remarkable. Political reality routinely demands compromise. And to be sure, Clinton has shown flashes of political courage and persistence, most notably in winning passage of NAFTA. But in the exercise of military power, and especially when one leads the world's lone superpower, retreat is contemptible. Consider the two other showcases of horror Clinton pledged to redress before Haiti...
...Crimson entirely broke from the norm with eight boxes of slightly stale Dunkin' Donuts, although the first-years left an entire box of jellies untouched...
...antiwelfare rhetoric are women, and not only the poor. Going after upscale women can still be a political faux pas, as Dan Quayle discovered. But the welfare mother makes an ideal scapegoat for the imagined sins of womankind in general. She's officially manless, in defiance of the patriarchal norm, just like any brazen executive-class single mother by choice. At the same time, she's irritatingly "dependent," like the old- fashioned, cookie-baking mom. But unlike her more upscale sisters, the welfare mom is too poor and despised to mount a defense. And unlike Anita Hill, she has hardly...
Likewise, the political situation shows even less deviation from the Carribean norm. Throughout the 20th century, the area has been volatile, with regular cup d'etats infrequently interrupted by fair elections. Since 1986, coups and countercoups have rocked Haiti, culminating in the September 1991 ouster of firebrand President Jean-Bertrand Aristide by a military junta...
Hanks is a TV type who made a big splash in movies (first in Splash, then in Big). He is a throwback to old Hollywood, when everybody went to the movies, when movies were the world's TV, when the norm was more ... normal. Back then, quiet types like Henry Fonda and Gary Cooper played the extraordinary ordinary man. That's Hanks. Offscreen, apparently, he leads a calm, happy life. Onscreen, he is less likely to explode than to simmer and smile. With his suburban niceness and elusive, rubberized features -- any photo of him is bound to look smudged...