Word: pretexts
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Wagged His Tail (Continental). Once upon a time in Brooklyn there was a mean old slumlord (Peter Ustinov). Golly, was he mean. He raised the rent on any pretext, lowered the boom at the first late payment, embezzled the savings of his ignorant tenants, and screamed at them just to stay in abad humor. When beggars knocked at his door, he screwed up his face till he looked like a huge, ferocious dog, and snarled and barked to frighten them away...
...week's end, Fidel Castro was still cockily unconcerned. He passed the Electra's disposition to the United Nations, claiming that otherwise the U.S. would use the incident as a pretext for invasion. "But let them come if they want to," he said. "If our destiny is to be a bloody one, let them come...
...pleas that the dispute should be settled between themselves, Bourguiba demanded an emergency session of the U.N. Security Council, where Tunisia accused France of "premeditated aggression." France's U.N. Ambassador Armand Bérard retorted that the Tunisian events were "tragic and regrettable," but that "a minor pretext was used by the government of Tunisia-some minor work, involving two or three meters of terrain to facilitate the landing of planes...
...government decree, perpetrated on the shabby pretext that production and efficiency must be improved, laid down new early hours for nearly every phase of Spanish life. Beginning June 1, shops must close at 7 p.m., groceries by 8. Theaters and cinemas will let out at 11:30 p.m.-just when most patrons in late-running Spain are puffing down the aisle to their seats. And, as if no indignity is too much for the burdened Spaniard to bear, the government has ordered restaurants and cafes to pull down their iron shutters at the afternoonish hour of midnight. Wondered an incredulous...
...much more challenging experience for both patient and volunteer can come through serious conversations. This, of course, raises many new problems--differences in age, sex, or social background may make it impossible to get a conversation started, and the volunteer usually must find a pretext for talking with a patient who is suspicious of his motives and sees little need to converse...