Word: trigger
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...peace, typically stimulates huge demand for goods and services. That didn't happen this time, in part because this war was fought mostly with stockpiled off-the-shelf weapons and munitions. Now a growing number of economists and businesspeople are predicting, suggesting, hoping -- praying -- that the cease-fire will trigger an improvement in the economy by boosting consumer confidence and spending. "Peace is a jump-starter," says John Tuccillo, chief economist of the National Association of Realtors. "This is the catalyst that can get the thing cooking. It's not the whole story, but it is a spark, and that...
...East was too vital to American strategic and economic interests to allow a ruthless dictator to run roughshod through the region. The U.S. had to stop Saddam. We had to prevent him from gaining a stranglehold on the region's oil supplies. We had to eliminate his power to trigger devastating chemical or even nuclear wars. Most important, we had to send a clear message to Saddam and to future Saddams that wanton aggression in the Middle East would be met forcefully...
Child-custody disputes are often the trigger for youngsters' unwitting lies. Suspicions can cause parents to launch what legal scholar Douglas Besharov of Washington's American Enterprise Institute calls "the atomic bomb of child- custody fights, the charge of sex abuse." In these stressful situations, children quickly discover what adults want to hear and can offer lies or distortions in order to please an anxious parent or social worker. A study conducted by the American Academy of Child Psychiatry found that in custody disputes involving charges of sex abuse, as many as 36% of the allegations were later proved...
...body's immune response -- caused, for instance, by severe burns, chemotherapy or major abdominal surgery -- allows these rod-shaped bacteria to multiply out of control and invade other parts of the body, eventually entering the bloodstream. Once there, one part of the bacterial cell wall called endotoxin can trigger a cascade of lethal effects, culminating in multiple organ failure and death, sometimes within hours...
...immediate trigger for the plan was a gift of more than $13 million--enough for seven houses--by Edward S. Harkness, a 1897 graduate of Yale. When Harkness appeared in Lowell's office with the offer, it is said that it took Lowell about 10 seconds to accept...