Word: racketeer
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Whenever the moaning started, Sebastián picked his daughter up and moved her to the common room couch, where he normally sleeps. There he waited, lights off, listening for the amorous racket to die down. It’s nights like these when he wondered (and still wonders) whether the Ph.D. is really worth it. Whether it’s selfish of him to put her through this. Whether he should just e-mail the House, his lab, everyone to say that he’s had it. She’ll never be six again...
...blower, you might expect his anger to be pointed at the Ponzi king. In fact, the unrelenting Markopolos aims it at the Securities and Exchange Commission. For 10 years, the author, a quantitative analyst, tried unsuccessfully to convince the agency that Madoff was a crook. When the latter's racket was revealed in 2008, says Markopolos, "it was exactly as I had warned the government of the United States approximately $55 billion earlier...
There's something especially loathsome about torturing helpless creatures for fun and profit. And evidence of torture is what investigators found on July 8, when federal and local authorities working in teams across eight states staged the largest raid in history against the underground dogfighting racket. Twenty-six people were arrested (five of whom are scheduled to be sentenced to as much as five years in prison on Dec. 8 in St. Louis, Mo.), and more than 500 dogs were rescued, most of them pit bull terriers...
...homecomings on boredom, nostalgia or an indomitable drive to compete ("I got the itch," Favre reportedly told former teammate Al Harris during his first return, in 2008). But not all comebacks are success stories. Just ask Bjorn Borg, who left tennis in 1983 and un-retired in 1991, wooden racket in hand. He didn't win a single match that year. And Jordan was hardly magic during his brief stint with the Washington Wizards from 2001 to 2003, as injuries limited his playing time. Indeed, Favre's first comeback, with the New York Jets, fell apart down the stretch...
...music players sold in the country at 100. But some devices are able to play as high as 120 decibels - a noise level equivalent to that generated by an airplane takeoff. So why is the E.U., like your nosy next-door neighbor, trying to force you turn down that racket? (See the 100 best albums of all time...