Word: swatters
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Mafia Hot Line. Detective fiction has it that the .22-cal. pistol with its tiny one-ounce slug is a gnat swatter, at its worst a woman's weapon snatched from a purse to dispatch an errant lover. No self-respecting all-pro killer would carry one. The facts, however, are otherwise. The CIA has long preferred the .22. The agency's predecessor, the Office of Strategic Services, developed a silencer-equipped Hi-Standard .22-cal. automatic pistol during World War II. It turned out to be the only production-model handgun that can be effectively silenced...
Carter once proposed a $15 billion cut but subsequently scaled it down to between $5 billion and $7 billion. Next day, Ford said that Carter "wants to speak loudly and carry a fly swatter." Carter denied ever proposing a $15 billion cut, despite at least two newspaper articles quoting him as having made the recommendation in Beverly Hills, Calif., in March...
...What makes Richard Nixon such a fascinating figure is his beelike ability to avoid the swatter and still deliver the sting. Virtually against the full weight of public opinion, he has often outmaneuvered his opponents and preserved the appearance of bona fide leadership. But he is a flawed and faulted figure today because he does not understand the American society of the '70s. He has failed to perceive that the turbulence of the preceding decade ushered in a new era of public accountability in which previous standards of political conduct are no longer acceptable...
...director has cleverly devised a visual image to particularize the main action of the drama. At the beginning of the first hospital scene, the nurse slowly raises a fly-swatter, viciously slams it down on top of her desk, and then grins, as she wipes the swatter against the desk's legs. The verbal re-enactment of this violence becomes the driving force of the play. Each character fights another--and the only response is that which is generated by frustration and hatred...
...national consciousness." Hoover's constant warnings against Soviet espionage in the U.S. are right off "an old line . . . and its success year after year is a tribute to the trance into which his sermons throw Americans, not excepting Congressmen. Mr. Hoover is, after all, our official spy swatter. In these persistent reports about espionage and sabotage, is he delicately telling us that he isn't up to the job, that Red spies are running loose despite his best efforts? If in fact we are as infested with these rascals as Mr. Hoover intimates, it might occur to many...