Debating Iraq
Vocabulary

Vocabulary Exercise 1 - Choosing Synonyms

Read the following excerpts from the NewsHour report. Based on the context of the sentences, write synonyms for the underlined vocabulary words.

1. SEC. KOFI ANNAN: "I urge Iraq to comply with its obligations - for the sake of its own people, and for the sake of world order. If Iraq's defiance continues, the Security Council must face its responsibilities."

2. SEC. KOFI ANNAN: "Individual states may defend themselves, by striking back at terrorist groups and the countries that harbor or support them. But only concerted vigilance and cooperation among all states, with constant, systematic exchange of information, offers any real hope of denying terrorists their opportunities."

3. PRESIDENT BUSH: "And our greatest fear is that terrorists will find a shortcut to their mad ambitions when an outlaw regime supplies them with the technologies to kill on a massive scale."

4. PRESIDENT BUSH: "Last year, the U.N. Commission on Human Rights found that Iraq continues to commit extremely grave violations of human rights and that the regime's repression is all-pervasive."

5. JIM LEHRER: "Secretary Brown, how you would describe the bottom-line message of what the president was saying today?"

6. DONALD McHENRY: "I think the president did a very good job of telling us what we know. And that is, that Saddam Hussein is a pretty unsavory character, has been in the past, is now -- likely to be in the future."

Vocabulary Exercise 2 - Matching
Match the following vocabulary words or expressions with definitions below.
1. vigilance _____
2. to comply (compliance) _____
3. to defy (defiance) _____
4. to harbor _____
5. pervasive _____
6. indispensable _____
7. sake _____
8. outlaw _____
9. "paper tiger" _____
10. grave _____
11. reckless _____
12. prelude _____
13. bottom line _____
14. to invoke _____
15. unsavory _____
16. to grapple with _____

Definitions
A. to call for with earnest desire
B. absolutely necessary
C. criminal
D. to protect or shelter
E. to adhere to; to observe
F. spreading through every part of; all-encompassing
G. a person or object that appears threatening and powerful but is neither (translation from Chinese tsuh lao fu)
H. watchfulness; alertness
I. benefit
J. unpleasant; distasteful
K. to renounce faith in; to refuse boldly
L. to wrestle with
M. the essential point or end result
N. introduction; groundwork
O. solemn; serious
P. negligent

Vocabulary Exercise 3 - Write your own sentences using the vocabulary words/expressions.