Word: ragtag
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...topics studiously avoided by the local media is the plight of the roughly 300,000 Hmong that remain in Laos. Persecuted because of their pro-American, anti-communist stance during the war, many Hmong retreated to remote mountain jungles to avoid further government reprisals. Clashes between government troops and ragtag Hmong forces continue to this day, and refugees have poured into neighboring Thailand. This month, U.S. lawmakers petitioned the Thai King to halt the deportations of 8,000 Hmong living in makeshift settlements along the Thai-Laos border. Many of the refugees claim they are descendants of soldiers who fought...
...Depression, seeking work. He found it in a gas station in Daytona, Fla., a town that loved gas. Soon France was helping organize stock-car races on the beach. After the war, France, 6 ft. 5 in. and with a booming voice, decided to bring order to a ragtag racing scene that sometimes saw promoters skip town without paying the drivers. He founded NASCAR in 1948, built the Daytona superspeedway in the 1950s, banished all dirt tracks from the circuit in 1970 (thus assuring more vroooom) and then handed the operation...
...generated resentment. But the regional and international context of Somalia is quite different from that of Afghanistan a decade ago: The Islamists cannot prevail as long as Ethiopia is willing to lend the beleaguered government its military muscle - well-armed and trained by U.S. advisers, in contrast to the ragtag and mostly teenage light infantry of the Islamists...
MacArthur and his men on the gulf shore were left to rely on a ragtag pack of converted transport ships to fend off Kurita’s assault. For “Doug MacArthur’s navy,” as the fledgling fleet was called, fighting was fierce—and, in many cases, fatal. Perhaps old soldiers never die, but young ones did in droves. In total, 473 Americans—along with more than 12,000 Japanese—perished in the battle...
...still have 46 million uninsured?") But his emphasis is on weaving in his own personal story - the son of Kenyan father and mother from Kansas who rose to be a U.S. Senator - and other stories of people who overcame long odds. He noted how "a group of 13 ragtag colonies" achieved independence; how "rabble-rousers" throughout American history had worked to ensure equality for women and minorities; and" how "at each and every juncture of our history, there's been somebody that has said we can do better." "What's truly audacious is to believe that something different is possible...