Word: turnabout
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...nice turnabout, but sympathizing with Snow's dilemma is difficult. The jacket blurb describes him as "Hawthornesque"; and indeed he is an energetic scruple collector. But unlike Hawthorne's eloquent slaves to conscience, Snow is neither articulate nor even very bright, and finally he saps the novel of the considerable drama it might have...
Still, the turnabout was not total. Sales of costly and particularly sophisticated items like McDonnell-Douglas' $4,000,000 Phantom jet are still embargoed. In addition, Congress may be reluctant to approve the sale of eight Lockheed antisubmarine planes to Brazil because they might be used to apprehend U.S. fishing vessels inside the 200-mile territorial limit just proclaimed by the Brazilian government. But Administration staffers have made clear that were it not for fear of an explosive reaction in Congress, the arms lid would be off altogether. Meanwhile Latin American countries can buy most basic U.S. military equipment...
...broader sense, Ellsberg's turnabout from confident hawk to disillusioned dove parallels the Viet Nam sentiments of millions of Americans. That sure feeling of the early '60s that a quick application of U.S. manpower and machines would speedily hurl back the insurgent Communists and assure survival of an independent South Viet Nam faded years ago. The stalemate and suffering, My Lai and drugs, now make it all seem disastrous to many. If all the plans had worked, of course, there would have been no Pentagon paper revelations, no Ellsberg on TV, little talk about the immorality...
...East Germany's Eighth Party Congress got under way one morning last week, the 9 a.m. newscast from East Berlin reported that Walter Ulbricht was at that moment delivering the first address. In fact, Ulbricht was nowhere in sight. In a last-minute turnabout, a stand-in had been called on to read the speech for the man who symbolized East Germany for a quarter century and was replaced only last month as Communist Party chief by Erich Honecker. A half hour later, the East Germans somewhat lamely announced that Ulbricht was ill. Oddly enough, he had looked spry...
Since the Burger Court includes seven holdovers from the Warren Court, how has the turnabout taken place? The obvious answer is that the old court was so sharply divided (5-to-4 votes were common) that a minor change has produced a major shift. With the appointments of Chief Justice Warren Burger and Justice Harry Blackmun, both the vote and the psychological advantage have shifted to the side of restraint. Explains one close court observer: "The substitution of X for Y in the makeup of the court changes the personality of the entire group. Somebody who was affirmative because...