What's the difference between specter and spook?

Specter


Definition:

  • (n.) Alt. of Spectre

Example Sentences:

  • (1) The "graying" of America has riveted the attention of policy makers in the United States on the potential specter of an excess population of sick, poor, disabled, aged Americans.
  • (2) State officials there have said a pharmacy supplying execution drugs received an email in January that raised the specter of the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed more than 160 people.
  • (3) 'The things about him that I wish ...' Specter goes on, a little awkwardly.
  • (4) Perhaps more significantly, after the slight summer wobble that had raised the specter of last year’s collapse on the run-in, the Sounders have secured a playoff spot, and could achieve a further boost to their long-term ambitions when they play Philadelphia in the US Open Cup final this week – giving them a possible early route back to the Champions League.
  • (5) In-hospital resuscitation focuses on an aggressive team approach, raising the specter that some patients who have little chance of survival may receive protracted, but futile, resuscitation efforts.
  • (6) Unilateral hearing loss raises the specter of acoustic neuroma.
  • (7) With just over four months left before Americans heads to the polls, the specter of the general election hung heavily over the summit.
  • (8) That raised the specter of the intelligence committee, which is charged with overseeing the NSA, withholding information from members elected in the 2010 election, when many libertarian and Tea Party Republicans uncomfortable with government power – like Amash – won office.
  • (9) Clinically, these cases demonstrated signs or symptoms of autoimmune dysfunction, raising the specter of primary cerebral vasculopathy as a cause of cerebral infarction, in contrast to recurrent cerebral emboli.
  • (10) I tell Specter how proudly Remnick told me of his triumph in the Hackathlon, and that I wondered afterwards what he meant by extolling such bare-faced bad writing.
  • (11) On a conscious level, these patients may have pessimistic views of the future, including the specter of imminent death, which, for some, is a real possibility.
  • (12) The combined changes (specters of isoenzymes of intracellular and extracellular pectatelyase, protein composition of periplasm and outer membrane) in the cells of E. chrysanthemi ENA49 from the periodical culture growing on the inducer containing medium have been studied.
  • (13) (Specter and Gladwell are both old friends of Remnick's from the Washington Post, and both now colleagues at the New Yorker.)
  • (14) How far have the courts in these cases extended the Tarasoff duty to protect and is the specter of strict liability real or imagined?
  • (15) That line becomes the unstated mantra of season two, in which Penny Dreadful streamlines into a surprisingly heartfelt meditation on remorse, solitude, personal demons and the remote, hazy specter of deliverance.
  • (16) Not a single Republican in either chamber voted for it – and neither did the Republican defector Specter.
  • (17) To quote Grantland's Charles Pierce's "A Commissioner's Legacy," a necessary corrective to some of the warmer and fuzzier reactions to Stern's departure: The specter of the days when the NBA was thought to be “too black” never has been far from his decision to knuckle Allen Iverson about rap music and to create and enforce a silly dress code that was applauded by great swaths of the nation’s boring people, and to make a buck off the softer side of hip-hop culture while remaining terrified of its tougher precincts.
  • (18) Boehner and his staff gamely tried to fend off both the specter of a shutdown and a leadership challenge from his caucus’ more belligerent culture warriors – as late as yesterday, a Boehner spokesman was assuring the press that the battle-tested speaker “wasn’t going anywhere.” No doubt, however, that a cursory look at the long train of sober spiritual leaders in his caucus lining up to deliver pointless CSPAN tantrums over the outrages of science prompted the longtime Ohio Congressman to mutter some variant of Good Lord, not this again together with a few well-chosen profanities for good measure.
  • (19) Trump also warned of the specter of voter fraud without evidence, revisiting accusations he first made in August that there would be voter fraud in “certain areas” of Pennsylvania, a statement that was a clear dog-whistle about African American areas of Philadelphia.
  • (20) The picks ultimately raise the specter that Trump’s administration could be more conventional than many had anticipated, following Trump’s repeated pledges to “drain the swamp.” In fact, Puzder has even been attacked by a number of Trump allies, including Breitbart, for his past support of immigration reform.

Spook


Definition:

  • (n.) A spirit; a ghost; an apparition; a hobgoblin.
  • (n.) The chimaera.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Top Gear, Robin Hood, Doctor Who, Primeval and Spooks were the company's top five highest-grossing shows sold internationally.
  • (2) Turning on the community suggests they are spooked by the growing support to protect our national treasures.
  • (3) But political corruption and the implacable opposition of the spooks and military to progressive change are the traditional forms of anti-democratic politics, in Britain, as elsewhere.
  • (4) Two witnesses said they thought the gorilla was trying to protect the boy at first, before getting spooked by the screams of onlookers.
  • (5) Backing the spooks against a left-leaning newspaper is, for a Tory prime minister, a no-brainer.
  • (6) Investors were also spooked by a chequered sales performance as breakneck growth stuttered at home and abroad.
  • (7) In the latest CIA coup, America's leading spooks have sent the Twittersphere into a frenzy with their chucklesome debut on social media: "We can neither confirm nor deny that this is our first tweet."
  • (8) She is, therefore, basically the Ruth Evershed (from Spooks) of the ancient world.
  • (9) The 'judge-led inquiry' that never was is shut down and investigating kidnap and torture in freedom's name will be left to a watchdog that never barks and which exonerated the spooks six years ago."
  • (10) If the only black people they see are the "looky looky" men on the beach selling fake watches then the idea of a black holidaymaker might spook them.
  • (11) "She has reinvented family drama in Doctor Who, Robin Hood and Merlin and launched acclaimed contemporary series such as Spooks and Life on Mars as well as Cranford.
  • (12) Any list of the decade's most memorable shows would be dominated by series that began in its early years: The Office, Spooks, Peep Show, The Thick of It, Shameless.
  • (13) Greece spooked investors for a third day running on Thursday as the Athens stock exchange fell 7.35% amid fears over the debt-stricken country’s future in the eurozone.
  • (14) If the desertion of some of their juniors has spooked Egypt's generals, they are being careful not to show it.
  • (15) In the technology world, a still-young and rapidly expanding business posting losses isn't unusual, and it's unlikely to spook many investors.
  • (16) The Daily Mail and the Spectator apparently don't care much if spooks routinely capture and comb all our emails and phone traffic.
  • (17) After our daughter left, my wife would sometimes go to her room – pictures of Spooks, etc – and cry.
  • (18) He is said to have entered the Hatton Garden Safe Deposit premises on 3 April and walked away on 5 April, spooked by the discovery that the fire escape door they had previously used had been locked in the interim.
  • (19) As the debate in ancient Westminster Hall wound on and the libertarians (security must not undermine basic freedoms) proved the better-briefed side, the spook faction got a bit dirty, as is their patriotic duty.
  • (20) That’s how Mussolini got in, that’s how Hitler got in: they took advantage of a situation, a problem perhaps, which humanity was going through at the time, after an economic crisis.” Peña Nieto’s pronouncements are the most forceful so far against Trump, whose rise to the top of the Republican primary races has spooked Mexicans of all social strata.

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