Word: secularized
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...four women chatting at an outdoor restaurant in an old cobblestone courtyard would draw little notice in Tehran, perhaps, or Beirut or Amman. But with their heads wrapped in tight scarves, concealing every strand of hair, they stand out against the secular traditions of modern Sarajevo. Friends since childhood, the four women, all 23, laugh when asked how their mothers reacted after they became intensely religious and began wearing head scarves. "It was very strange for them," says Saudina Husic, a student of Arabic and Persian, her legs covered by a pea-green robe that matches her veil. "But they...
...Kremlin is absolutely powerless," says Alexei Malashenko, a scholar-in-residence at Moscow's Carnegie Institute. "They brought this situation on themselves by letting the local élite rule." After the fall of communism, Moscow, knowing that a secular or Orthodox Christian government would have little influence over the region's Muslim population, struck an informal deal with the republics: Moscow would appoint a governor who would be loyal to the Kremlin and, in return, that governor would remain in power provided no large-scale conflicts erupted...
...Michael Grunwald's analysis of the sorry state of the Republican Party is the best of many I have read. But he assigns insufficient blame to the figurehead of the party for eight years, Bush, whose faith-based leadership alienated many who believe in secular government. His obstinacy in the face of evolving public opinion in favor of stem-cell research, equality for same-sex couples and women's reproductive rights underscored his failure to feel the pulse of modern America. Most of all, his my-way-or-the-highway foreign policy made the U.S. a global pariah. Bill Gottdenker...
...Super Sweet Sixteen, is shown in hotel rooms and via satellite dishes that are readily available throughout the country (though not officially permitted). Mai Yamani, a Saudi scholar who is the daughter of former Oil Minister Ahmed Zaki Yamani, describes an ongoing political tension within the government between more secular reformists and traditionalists, for which there is no clear resolution. "Abdullah's strategy is one of political appeasement," Yamani wrote in a recent article on the nation's political situation, "to make just enough concessions to appease Saudi Arabia's subordinated and disheartened peoples and relieve pressure for reform...
Part of this has to do with Obama, who came like a healing balm to soothe our collective hurt. Entering from stage left, the secular savior trounced a “maverick” opposition with his calming rhetoric and confident stoicism. His most celebrated campaign poster Photoshopped him down to a few clean strokes and the reassuring hues of red, white, and blue; beneath his portrait, in bold block letters, was inscribed a single word—“HOPE.” It was simple, but it was enough. That one word, transmitted across the nation from...