Word: ragtag
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...devilish mischief, a race of robots has zapped twelve of the 13 planets harboring the human race. Led by a human renegade called Count Baltar, a first cousin to Darth Vader, the robots take off in hot pursuit of the survivors of the dozen planets, who are manning a ragtag fleet hovering around the "battlestar" Galactica. The humans are desperately searching for the 13th planet, a lost, legendary human colony called Earth. Lorne Greene is the wise old man in charge, and Dirk Benedict and Richard Hatch play Han Solo and Luke Skywalker . . . oops, Lieut. Starbuck and Captain Apollo. Galactica...
...footprints in countless African battles in the past 23 years. As foretold, Denard was accompanied by a German shepherd dog. Within a few hours, Denard and his gang had shot up Soilih's bodyguard, put the dictator under arrest and accepted the surrender of the Comoran army, a ragtag force of 200 men who had not fired a shot. The coup touched off a week of celebration that grew still more frenzied with the announcement that Soilih had died while "trying to escape...
Neto's most dangerous opposition is in the south, where UNITA not only fights on but even seems to be gaining a little under the bearded Savimbi, 43, a onetime philosophy student at Switzerland's University of Lausanne. He commands a ragtag army of 5,000 regulars and 12,000 auxiliary bushfighters that includes women and boys barely in their teens. Supported by the Ovimbundu tribe, which makes up about 40% of Angola's population of 6.2 million, Savimbi's forces now control a third of the country. They have gained an advantage by staging successful hit-and-run raids...
...echoes of Angola are unmistakable: a prolonged and bitter civil war, a Soviet airlift of arms in support of an unstable military regime, increasing numbers of Russian and Cuban advisers, ragtag battalions of tribesmen bloodying each other with modern weapons supplied by outside powers. Now the battlefield is Ethiopia and the high-stakes pawn is the strategic Horn of Africa, which commands the shipping routes through the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean...
Though gone from the papers, many of Capp's creations will live on. Li'l Abner and Daisy Mae long ago slipped into American language and folklore, together with the other denizens of Capp's hillbilly heaven, where Mammy Yokum defended her ragtag family and shaky log cabin against the likes of zoot-suited Evil-Eye Fleegle and his triple whammy. Joe Btfsplk and his perpetual cloud rained down bad luck on almost everyone, and the unluckiest ended up in the hands of Freddie the undertaker. The shmoos rolled over dead and oven ready for hungry hoomins...