Word: vacuum
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Pearl says she hopes the review "will place the assembly in a position of direct involvement in decision-making." The current problem, she observes, "is that when the assembly passes a resolution, it is in a complete vacuum--no one has to listen. We should be involved in the meetings where decisions are made, not just be stuck reacting to those decisions with resolutions...
...such attitudes were perceived in an individual, he would be exported to the lunatic fringe of whatever society he sought to live in. Feverish, volcanic, he would appear to be emotionally out of this world, existing in something very close to a social vacuum, in which his personal or political cause may mature and fester until it is both ripe and rotten for some terrible act. Love and respect are probably beyond his reach; he merely wishes to be noticed. If society should notice him by putting him away, his dreams would be both dead and complete...
When a government proves to function in a social vacuum, the process of putting it away is more of a problem. Short of war there are words of protest, but in the middle distance the assassin has free rein. The rein might be shortened considerably if the words of protest were harsher or more frequent, or, better still, if they were attached to an economic quarantine. To treat killer governments as pariahs would only be fair, after all, and the purpose of a quarantine is to prevent contagion. To date, however, the world seems to be going on the hope...
...afternoon field to the Post, he was hired to help liven up the paper. Felker bridles at suggestions that he took the Tonight job so he could "zap Murdoch." He says he just wants to put out a solid afternoon paper "for people who have been in a news vacuum...
...weak mayor system of government leaves a vacuum--someone has to run the city day to day. For the last 40 years, that person has been the city manager. Under Cambridge's "Plan E" charter, the manager hires and fires--the city council can only appropriate and recommend. But the councilors can fire one person--the city manager. If you understand what that authority means, you can recognize a balance of power when...