Word: totalitarianisms
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...children predicted that imminent changes in Russia would lead to the spread of totalitarian, atheist, antihuman regimes throughout the world. To stave off this spread, the children warned, the people of the world must undergo an inner conversion and commit themselves to the selfless act of praying for others...
...collapse of Eastern Europe is indeed a triumph for democratic institiutions and ideals. Hungary has officially renounced communism. Romania has deposed a cruel totalitarian dictator. Six East European governments--all once Soviet satellites--have scheduled free elections, and even the Soviet Union itself is poised to eliminate one-party cmmunist rule...
...totalitarian world of Nineteen Eighty-Four, George Orwell imagined that the Thought Police would rely on a ubiquitous "oblong metal plaque like a dulled mirror" to keep the citizens of Oceania brainwashed and obedient: "The instrument (the television, it was called) could be dimmed, but there was no way of shutting it off completely." That prophecy turned out spectacularly wrong. TV, along with radio, computers, modems, copiers and fax machines, caused big trouble for Big Brother in 1989. Once the more repressive precincts of the global village were wired for glasnost, legions of little brothers whispered subversion in everyone...
True, he recycles the familiar perception of Disneyland as a benign totalitarian community and echoes criticism of the Reform Judaism of his youth as an apology for being a Jew. But Mamet has a fresher approach to the politics of image and empty rhetoric. He equates Ronald Reagan's feeble explanations of the Iran arms-for-hostages deal with the answers of parents whose fogginess hides an implied threat: "If you want to remain a child, if you want to enjoy the privilege of life without fear, do not judge...
...Soviets should suffer through their economic and political crises without American assistance. The White House dispatched Vice President Dan Quayle to disarm the hard-liners even before Bush left Europe. Quayle uttered anachronistic noises to the Washington Post, including a nostalgic reference to the Soviet Union as a "totalitarian state." If Quayle's partial retraction a few days later -- he changed the description to "authoritarian" -- seemed to blur the Administration's view even more, that was part of the game. Behind the scenes, White House officials reminded conservatives that the overtures to the Soviets were extremely popular. "The big question...