Word: rafts
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...With campaigning intensifying and public anger over the fires fading, Karamanlis has gone on the offensive, ordering quick handouts of more than $4000 to fire victims and pledging a raft of measures, including higher pensions and tax breaks, in an attempt to entice disgruntled conservatives back to the party fold. He has also threatened to take Greeks on a fresh trip to the polls if his New Democracy party fails to win an outright majority. "I understand there is bitterness," Karamanlis told an election rally in northern Greece. "But this in not the time for a negative vote...
Pressed for posterity between two slabs of cardboard--on stationery the color of New England clam chowder--was a handwritten fan letter from the President of the United States. I was touched and flattered--my ego swelled like a self-inflating raft. But more important, the letter has served in the months since as a Rorschach test for everyone who reads it: a minireferendum on the presidency, a war in Iraq writ tiny--but legibly, and even grammatically, with impeccable spelling...
...start of the season. Blazes continued to rage in all corners of the country, razing thousands of crops, scores of livestock and a number of homes. Hordes of tourists were forced to evacuate hotels and holiday resorts, fleeing Greece as local governors declared states of emergency in a raft of districts and islands. Bewildered by the crisis, Prime Minister Kostas Karamanlis purportedly scrapped plans for an early election, turning instead to Russian President Vladimir Putin for urgent firefighting assistance (a fleet of water-bombers, helicopters and amphibious planes). Retinues of state officials were also dispatched to blaze-hit regions...
...since 2001, about 1.7 million new health-care industry jobs have been created. Perhaps the new jobs will be in nanotechnology, or in green engineering because of China's need to clean up its water and air. Many in the U.S. believe that growing income inequality will create a raft of service jobs to cater to the growing ranks of the rich-high-end hairdressers, personal trainers and closet designers, for instance-none of which are likely to be moved offshore...
...Chavez, who has used his petro-largesse to build a raft of global alliances, now exploiting the big screen to spread propaganda for his socialist revolution? Chavez critics in Washington, like Florida congressman Connie Mack, are blasting Glover for cutting "a sweetheart movie deal" with Chavez, whom they denounce as a protege of Cuba's communist comandante, Fidel Castro...