Word: public
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...scene to investigate, said that Gates reacted belligerently and refused to identify himself when asked, but Gates said that he cooperated fully and that officers had targeted him because he is black. The alleged line "ya, I'll speak with your mama outside" has even made its public rounds. Even though the "disorderly conduct" charge was quickly dropped, the controversy continued to grow, fanned by Obama's nationally televised remarks that police had "acted stupidly" in arresting the professor. Obama later acknowledged that he had erred in his choice of words and brought Gates and Crowley to the White House...
...decades, residents of U.S. cities would synchronize their pocketwatches using a giant globe that would descend from a pole in a public space to mark the exact hour. Ochs conceived of an ornate "time ball" that would descend just before midnight to mark the exact end of the year. The first ball to drop - an illuminated 400-pound iron-and-wood orb - was lowered from a flagpole. Tradition took root and the ball has heralded a new beginning almost every year since - in 1942 and 1943, during World War II, the ball was temporarily put out of commission...
...wake of an event like the attempted bombing of Flight 253, Washington often reacts simply to calm a jittery public. That's what led to initial dubious orders to keep airline passengers in their seats for the final hour of flight. Now the Administration is assessing the wisdom of various military strikes on supposed al-Qaeda training sites inside Yemen. But there are few good options. Obama doesn't want to end up like Bill Clinton, whose futile 1998 cruise missile "retaliation" for the East Africa embassy bombings did al-Qaeda more good than harm. Given the partisan sniping already...
...been two weeks since Silvio Berlusconi has shown his face in public, as he recovers from a brutal attack by a deranged man at a political rally in Milan. The prime minister says we won't see him again until Jan. 7. That would mark the longest period Berlusconi has kept himself out of the public eye since his winter hibernation six years ago, from which he emerged smiling tightly, as the first sitting world leader to ever admit to a facelift...
...paradoxical shifts in opinions provide a fitting close to what has been the most tumultuous year of the prime minister's political career. There were the public gaffes: calling President Obama "well-tanned"; getting scolded by the Queen after raising his voice at a London photo op; making German Chancellor Angela Merkel wait on the red carpet while he spoke on his cell phone. Then there was his private life: his wife of 20 years filing for divorce; her accusations that he "frequents underage females"; a Bari prostitute revealing details of several encounters at his Rome residence.(Read "Hoq Silvio...