Word: start
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Dates: during 1990-1990
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...havoc wrought in East Berlin. In hindsight it is clear that the fall of the Berlin Wall was due not to strategic planning, but to a sudden loss of nerve. A single ambiguous sentence uttered at a press conference, a mere slip of the tongue, was enough to start an avalanche. The unification of Germany was set off not by grand design but by a blunder...
...very soon the euphoria subsided and the outlook palled. From the very start there had been portents that had escaped the West German government's notice: a conspicuous absence of rousing meetings in the streets of Frankfurt and Cologne, a strange lack of passion, a suspicion of second thoughts. No amount of force-feeding on the part of the media had managed to intoxicate the West German populace. Faced with a flood of newcomers from the East, it began to worry about the cost of unity, about jobs, housing problems and rising interest rates. In the opinion polls, more than...
...frenzied haggling about the rate at which the flimsy East German currency, popularly known as aluminum chips, would be exchanged against the bullish deutsche mark. In the event, both sides felt vaguely cheated. The day after an agreement was finally signed, a Munich paper ran the headline, A NICE START: EAST GERMAN GOVERNMENT SWINDLING US FOR 7.5 BILLION...
...checker shovels your purchases toward you while you try to stuff them into a bag. Don't forget your market basket either, else you'll have to buy a plastic bag -- or several, since each sack only holds approximately 2.3 items. Meanwhile, the people in line behind you start to grumble and push...
Everything depends on how the East German economy responds to a free-market jump start. Pohl points out that "no one can subsidize uneconomic jobs in the G.D.R. forever." Elmar Pieroth, a prominent West Berlin politician and businessman who advises the G.D.R government, insists, "The spirit of entrepreneurship is reappearing, and people are eager to take advantage of the possibilities." That was the kind of spirit that created the Wirtschaftswunder...