Key Terms

Contract with America

a list of eight specific legislative reforms or initiatives that Republicans representatives promised to enact if they gained a majority in Congress in the 1994 midterm elections

gender gap

the statistical differences between the voting preferences of women and men, with women favoring Democratic candidates

Green Party

a political party founded in 1984 that advocates environmentalism and grassroots democracy

Heritage Foundation

a professional organization conducting research and political advocacy on behalf of its values and perspectives

HIV/AIDS

a deadly immune deficiency disorder discovered in 1981, and at first largely ignored by politicians because of its prevalence among gay men

New Right

a loose coalition of American conservatives, consisting primarily of wealthy businesspeople and evangelical Christians, which developed in response to social changes of the 1960s and 1970s

Operation Desert Storm

the U.S. name of the war waged from January to April 1991, by coalition forces against Iraq in reaction to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in August 1990

Reaganomics

Ronald Reagan’s economic policy, which suggested that lowering taxes on the upper income brackets would stimulate investment and economic growth

START

a treaty between the United States and the Soviet Union that limited the number of nuclear warheads, ballistic missiles, and strategic bombers held by both sides

Vietnam Syndrome

reluctance on the part of American politicians to actively engage U.S. forces in a foreign war for fear of suffering a humiliating defeat

war on drugs

a nationwide political campaign to implement harsh sentences for drug crimes, which produced an explosive growth of the prison population