Word: vicious
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...Yugoslav republic. Even short of a Desert Storm-scale operation, how can the deployment of multinational firepower be justified here and now when other peoples are also in mortal peril -- starving Somalis, say, or junta-persecuted Burmese? And if intrusion is justified, what force could conceivably sort out a vicious blood feud among hill folk who have helped write the book on guerrilla warfare...
What he learned bore out his suspicions. Says Hull: " 'Dropping the flag,' or quitting, is considered almost a capital offense." Every gang has a de- initiation ceremony that usually involves a vicious ritual beating -- occasionally to the point of death. Ex-members who stay in the neighborhood -- and few can afford to leave -- are subject to repeat beatings by their former comrades and by rival gang members who don't know or care that they've quit. "It takes an unbelievable amount of courage to walk out," says Hull...
Morrissey used to possess the singular ability to make his obsessive self-pity entertaining. He moaned so pathetically and bemoaned his loveless fate with such vicious, sarcastic glee, that even the most navel-gazing songs retained a sense of humor. Since his split with the inspired Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr, he's relied more and more on this lyrical inventiveness...
...arrested men, who were identified from a television news videotape, are described by police as criminals linked to a vicious South Central gang known as the 8-Trey Gangster Crips. But supporters see the defendants as five young black men being scapegoated by a racist legal system that will not give them a fair trial. Says Compton City Councillor Patricia Moore: "The greatest fears we have are not of gangs, but of the criminal justice system." With 25% of all black men between 20 and 29 years old in prison, on parole or on probation, Moore is convinced the five...
Policymakers have an awesome capacity to intone that "things can't go on this way" for months or years -- while things do go on the same way. In the rapidly disappearing republic of Bosnia-Herzegovina, though, the vicious fighting that has raged since February might really end soon. Not primarily because of the cease-fire announced in London last week; no one yet knows whether it will become fully effective, let alone last any longer than an eyeblink. Nor will any thanks be due to the American and European statesmen who have almost daily proclaimed that the bloodshed must stop...