Word: seriousness
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...people may think I am joking, but I am totally serious with my choice. He is Claude Ryan, the Liberal leader in the province of Quebec. Ryan has had to face the pressure of separatism, which threatened to break up one of the most politically stable countries in the world. If Canada stays together, it can thank Claude Ryan...
...White House. Through those first thousand days, Carter had stumbled and tripped, scored some victories, but lost his way many times. Under his Administration, the economy had worsened, with inflation moving to levels higher than any since the end of World War II and with the threat of a serious recession growing more real each week...
Though sophisticates have long sneered at him, Norman Vin cent Peale, who said that "you do not need to be a victim of worry," was not entirely wrong. Thinkers more serious than Peale have construed a fearful attitude as a danger in itself. Jesus of Nazareth advised against fretting even about tomorrow. Psychologist William James saw life itself as a process of risk taking and thought it was debilitating to take risks too much to heart He urged people to will themselves to be confident of survival, to pretend confidence if necessary, allowing not even the "sweet' cautions...
There are drawbacks to this unbudgeable stubbornness, of course. Despite the inventiveness that it accompanies, it is at its roots a resistance to change. And the changes that the society has shown itself willing to make so far are small ones. They do not inconvenience in serious ways. Yes to insulation, no to public transportation. Write to the nice people at Vermont Castings for a Defiant wood stove brochure, set aside, for the moment, the necessity to think through a profound unease about nuclear power and a disbelief in the quick fix of synthetic fuels. Get through the winter...
...will be resolved. Meanwhile, another suit to halt exploration has been brought by several local parties, including the Alaskan town of Kaktovik, a coastal hamlet populated by 175 Eskimos. Since bowhead meat is a staple of the villagers' diet, their lawyers argue, the Eskimos could be afflicted with "serious mental and emotional anxiety" if they felt that the drilling was disturbing the whales...