Word: prone
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Some politicians are already talking about extending the 2002 farm bill for another year, but there's going to be heavy bipartisan pressure to pass a new bill with new goodies. Politicians from disaster-prone states like the Dakotas and Montana won't want to give up the $5 billion "permanent disaster fund" they tucked into the Senate bill to protect marginal farms. And the corresponding House bill includes scads of new money for nutrition, conservation, fruit and vegetable farms, organic certification, and other programs desired by various interest groups. That's why even the National Wildlife Federation sent...
...comes not only from the need to make noise but more deeply, I suspect, from a misplaced faith in the inevitability of progress. Americans have always been constitutionally prone to unwarranted optimism, but especially this generation, which, perched atop the long century that saw outrageous economic growth as well as the inclusion of women, blacks, and gays into the public sphere, now behave as if progress were inevitable...
...Yale their second (or eighth) choice school and will be applying to Harvard in the spring, regardless of what you offer them. But alas, come spring, over 1,000 naïve high school students will still make the mistake of matriculating at Yale. Of course, since only people prone to make bad decisions would ever go to Yale, this cycle of mistake-making is self-perpetuating. Every year we make fun of these and any of the other countless mistakes made in New Haven. But so what if you chose to go to Yale? Everyone makes mistakes! Today...
...sheer arrogance of the article about California's fires was astounding. So we should not live in fire-prone areas? Perhaps people in New England shouldn't live in snow-prone areas, people in the Midwest shouldn't live in tornado-prone areas, and people in the Southeast shouldn't live in hurricane-prone areas. Storms in other parts of the U.S. cause far more deaths, injuries and economic losses every year than the relatively infrequent major fires in California do. Perhaps you can suggest a spot on the planet where we can all live free of risk. Joseph Leaser...
...Brick and masonry homes with metal framing do not burn. Wood is the culprit - the fuel for fire. Building-permit rules should disallow the use of wood in all new construction. Communities in fire-prone areas should also think about stocking forested and undeveloped lands with goats. These creatures could devour the underbrush that dries and fuels firestorms. Firefighters could better spend their time tending the goats than periodically risking their lives on uncontrolled fires. The goats could become part of the firefighters' arsenal, as important as trucks, hoses and protective gear. Incentives from insurance companies could help defray...