Word: pork
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...halcyon days when there was more than enough federal pork to go around, closing an outmoded military base was a rather simple operation. Between 1961 and 1977, for example, the Pentagon disposed of hundreds of military installations by executive fiat. But in 1975 the Air Force made the mistake of trying to shut down its Loring base in northern Maine. The state's Republican Congressman, William Cohen (now a Senator), joined then House Majority Leader Tip O'Neill to require the Pentagon to submit costly and time-consuming environmental impact studies before any base could be shuttered. Loring was saved...
...market, children learn, is where one goes to buy a fat pig. Grownups call it pork belly, but rarely come home with the bacon. Instead, they hold a slip of computer-generated paper that represents a bet on the future price of the commodity. Not having to handle the meat makes it much easier for traders. They have time to think up creative ways of profitably shuffling their paper ^ or, as the case is today, manipulating numbers on a computer. The game can now be as bewildering as three-dimensional chess played internationally at the speed of light...
...examples is gambling on where Standard & Poor's 500 stocks are going. A successful bet that the index will fall could offset losses in declining stocks. Stock-index futures are traded much like any other commodity, except that they do not represent anything real, such as wheat, tin or pork bellies...
...dozen years has the Pentagon been able to close a major military base, even though some of the installations it operates -- at a cost of billions to the taxpayers -- were built to help fend off marauding Indians or troublemaking Redcoats. The reason? Not Pentagon profligacy, for once, but political pork...
...afford the corn and soybean meal to feed their herds. At the same time, much of the pastureland their cows normally graze has been scorched. As a result, ranchers are slaughtering many more of their cattle than usual. As the meat comes to market, retail prices for beef and pork should decline for the next few months. But by next spring the herds will be reduced, and prices are likely to increase as much as 10% from their current levels. The calf herd is expected to drop below 39 million head next year, the lowest since...