Word: summiteer
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...gloss being put on the Moscow summit is that it is an intimate human drama, an Aquarius-Pisces encounter. Skeptics rightly fret at the danger in personalizing relations between the two powers: personal rapport is not the same as shared national interests. Yet Reagan is far more comfortable addressing human issues than abstract interests, and Gorbachev is certainly willing to try to manipulate that inclination. When Gorbachev got the President alone in Reykjavik's cramped Hofdi House in October 1986, they spun off toward the stratosphere of abolishing nuclear weapons before crashing back to earth. When they wander off after...
...better or worse, there are limits to what the two leaders can do. A summit is not just an encounter between two personalities; it is an interaction between two nations. Without a fundamental change in the clashing values and strategic interests of the U.S. and the U.S.S.R., things can get only so chummy, even in a dacha. Conversely, and fortunately, the shared threat of nuclear annihilation restrains how bad relations...
Likewise, Soviet officialdom is warming toward American values. Michael Jackson's Pepsi ads are on the air, McDonald's is opening 20 restaurants in Moscow featuring "Bolshoi Maks," and the TASS news agency has entered into a joint venture with an American firm to produce souvenir summit T shirts with the TASS TOP 20 music logo on the back...
Such bouts of good feeling have been seen before -- and dashed before. Alone, they have little more significance than smiles at a summit, and they can be just as deceptive and dangerous. But to the extent that the new attitudes reflect real reforms in Soviet society that shrink the basic differences between the two nations, they could mark a historic turning point in the cold war. That would be far more important than anything Reagan and Gorbachev might conjure up at a crowded conference table, or inside a cozy dacha...
...agreed that Mars is a tantalizing target for exploration. Fragmentary data suggest that the planet may once have possessed a denser atmosphere, a warmer climate and even bodies of water. Many questions about life on Mars remain unanswered. So when Mikhail Gorbachev again declared only days before the Moscow summit that the U.S. and Soviet Union should "cooperate on a flight to Mars," ears perked up in labs and offices from Los Angeles to Moscow. Even the Reagan Administration, which has balked at similar Soviet overtures, was at pains not to dismiss out of hand Gorbachev's conciliatory-sounding proposal...