Word: traction
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...lights flashed in the Middle East and South America last summer when treads began to peel off Ford Explorers sold in Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. Ford initially blamed the problem on the tendency of some Saudi drivers to underinflate their tires to get better traction when driving across the desert. But that scarcely explained the rash of similar failures on the other side of the globe in desert-free Venezuela...
...wears off? Evolving beyond the battlefield will demand geopolitical finesse--a tough requirement for any political group, to say nothing of holy warriors. U.S. diplomats say they regard Nasrallah's protestations of moderation with a very wary eye, and if the slippery rapprochement between Washington and Tehran ever gets traction, Iran might start writing smaller checks to the group. Deprived of that largesse, Hizballah would find its intra-Shi'ite rivalry tougher going against Amal, whose support from Syria, with its 30,000 troops in Lebanon, has helped it seat twice as many M.P.s as Hizballah. If Syria and Lebanon...
Meanwhile, it has not escaped notice on Capitol Hill that McCain's approach of using the surplus to pay down the debt, rather than spending it on huge tax cuts, is gaining traction with voters, including conservative Republicans. "Bush can't sell a tax cut, because it's wildly unpopular," says one who has been involved in G.O.P. strategy discussions. "Debt reduction would be much smarter...