Word: tinhorn
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...this vestige of Yankee imperialism. Wrong-headed as it is, Reagan's jingoism on the canal has apparently struck a nerve among parts of the electorate, arousing post-Viet Nam sentiments that the U.S. should not be pushed around in its own hemisphere by, in Reagan's words, "a tinhorn dictator." Insists Reagan: "The Latin American countries have a respect for macho. I think if the United States reacts with firmness and fairness, we might not earn their love, but we would earn their respect...
Reagan attacked Ford for cutting back on military bases and post offices while continuing to subsidize the United Nations. The U.S. contribution should be reduced at once, said Reagan. He also accused the President of planning to give away the Panama Canal to a "tinhorn dictator friend of Fidel Castro's. Personally, I would tell this jerk we bought it, we paid for it, and we are going to keep it." Ford replied that he had no intention of "giving away" the canal...
...consequences if their rhetoric is translated into policy. Time after time in Texas last week, Ronald Reagan thundered about the canal: "We bought it. We paid for it. We built it. And we are going to keep it." As President, Reagan vowed, he would say just that to any "tinhorn dictator" in Panama who sought to gain control over the waterway. The Reagan theatrics, designed to win him support in his dead-even showdown with Gerald Ford in the Texas primary on May 1, drew strong applause...
Naturally, American liberals were disillusioned. For most of them, both the real alternatives in Vietnam--the victory of the National Liberation Front, and the continuance of what liberals were beginning to call a "tinhorn dictatorship"--were still unacceptable. But the United States, after all, had no compelling interest in Vietnam...
...Soviets-and most other U.N. delegations, for that matter-the cause célèbre of the week was not China, but a cowardly sniper attack on a roomful of Russian children, apparently perpetrated by an adherent of the tinhorn terrorist Jewish Defense League. One evening at midweek, four rifle bullets crashed through an eleventh-floor bedroom window in the massive East Side Manhattan building that houses the large Soviet mission to the U.N. The shots were not heard by the 700 guests attending a lively reception on the lower floors, but they narrowly missed four embassy children...