Word: one
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Some citizens seemed determined to take matters into their own hands. In one incident, about 100 people halted a man who was leaving an East Berlin office of the dreaded Stasi (secret police) with two suitcases in tow. When the man was handed over to the police, they discovered currency worth hundreds of thousands of dollars that was believed to be intended for party officials. Two days later the man was found hanged in his jail cell. The 25,000-man Stasi, meanwhile, was partly defanged by the dismissal of its directorate and the reassignment of some 7,000 agents...
...one point, the government seemed intent on depicting a mood of impending breakdown, as if trying to ensure its survival by convincing people that only the present leaders could keep blood from flowing in the streets. In a statement issued through the state-run ADN news agency last Wednesday, the government reported "growing indications of stormings of facilities and installations of the National People's Army." But no mention was made of where the assaults took place. In a separate appeal, from the army, generals warned that they would not permit disturbances at military installations and called on soldiers...
...One formidable contrarian is Bruce Ames, a biochemist at the University of California, Berkeley. He contends that obsessive concern with cancer-causing chemicals in foods, pesticides and toxic wastes has produced a regulatory tangle at EPA and a superfluous Superfund to clean dump sites. Government restrictions on man-made chemicals are absurdly stringent in proportion to ; their risk, says Ames. He notes that while the public panicked last spring because of trace amounts of the synthetic growth regulator Alar found on apples, many fruits contain natural carcinogens in concentrations 1,000 times as great. Observes Ames: "Eating vegetables and lowering...
...into the air when they heat homes with oil or natural gas, or use electricity that comes from burning fossil fuels. Household conservation tips should be familiar: close off unused rooms, seal up cracks and openings, and insulate roofs. Look at the energy-efficiency rating when buying appliances. And one more idea that few people know about: replace ordinary incandescent light bulbs with "compact-fluorescent" models sold by major light-bulb manufacturers. They can give off the light of a 60-watt bulb while using only 15 watts of electricity. These fluorescent bulbs cost at least $10, but they last...
Another simple but vitally important move would be to reinvigorate the U.S. commitment to family planning at home and abroad. Peter Raven, director of the Missouri Botanical Garden, points out that humanity consumes or wastes 40% of the total amount of energy stored by photosynthesis in terrestrial vegetation. No one knows how much more people can devour before they begin to exhaust resources and crowd out vital ecosystems. Lester Brown of the Worldwatch Institute argues that global annual food production already falls short of human consumption and that environmental degradation reduces yields 1% annually at a time when world population...