Word: wonks
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1990-1999
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...Sullivan's version, the man mistaken for an inspector is actually a computer wonk turned would-be actor. Aggressively talentless, he is nonetheless welcomed into the panicky troupe and cast as the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. The play's finale, a catastrophic Christmas Carol that is the funniest scene on any American stage this year, echoes the uproarious mangling of Romeo and Juliet in Nicholas Nickleby. Props and gimmicks fail. The set collapses. One actor forgets all his lines in terror. And Tiny Tim, played all through rehearsals by a plump pubescent brat who has held the role...
...flight attendant announced, "The flying time to Little Rock is . . ." Cheers filled the plane. Then she corrected, "I'm sorry, it's Albuquerque." In the front of the plane, Clinton, the late-night policy wonk, was actually talking to aides about converting cars to natural...
Carter and Clinton, both of whom ran as mixtures of policy wonk and spiritual redeemer, were obscure governors of Southern states before launching their equally improbable bids for the presidency...
...sense early not only that economics would dominate the race but also that voters longed for a candidate who had thought long enough about the problems to formulate detailed plans and talk specifics. (The campaign thus marked a rare convergence of man and moment: Clinton is a born policy wonk who spawns 5- and 6-point plans as instinctively as other pols reach out for hands to shake.) Sheer dogged persistence kept him slogging past low points at which many another campaigner would have given up. In New Hampshire, when the Governor's campaign looked like a collapsing balloon...
...part, Gore was long criticized for being stiff-necked and arrogant, a policy wonk without humility or a sense of proportion. His brief and unsuccessful run for President in 1988 was seen by some as an example of overweening ambition. Gore's recent book, Earth in the Balance, an environmentalist manifesto and call to arms that includes the idea of banishing the internal-combustion engine "in, say, 25 years," has been blasted by Republicans as elitist nonsense. Quayle told a group of produce farmers in Fresno, California, last week that "with Clinton and Gore, you can say goodbye to water...