Admonitions from the EU to curb government spending, reconsider tax cuts, moderate wage rises, and try harder to improve productivity have been falling on Portugal almost as unremittingly as the rain.
The president has been sharply criticised for going too slow, being too gentle in his admonitions, too quick to give way.
These protests will not fade, whatever the temperature or the admonitions from a nonplussed government.
This is still generous, compared with what other public services will receive, but after so many fat years it will feel like famine for the NHS.With money tight, Mr Brown's main strategy for retrieving Labour's reputation on health care will be to try to regain the trust of doctors and nurses, who have been upset and infuriated by the "command-and-control" regime of targets and admonitions.
But such admonitions come at an awkward moment.
Parents inculcated it with admonitions and rewards, and perhaps even policymakers, by reforming welfare or the tax code, could help it along a little.
The ever-optimistic Mr Gore claimed that Li Peng, China's stony-faced prime minister, had been "receptive" to admonitions about human rights.
The number of convictions before military commissions, on the other hand, is just seven.Mr Obama properly rebuffed calls to declare Mr Tsarnaev an enemy combatant, but he has exploited, with considerable latitude, a loophole that permits certain suspects to be questioned before receiving the familiar admonitions Mr Tsarnaev heard in his hospital-room interrogation on Monday.
However, he notes:The PIC needs to decide what it is prepared to do to back up its recommendations, demands and admonitions.
Thanks to a potent combination of science, Hurricane Katrina, a heatwave in Europe, Al Gore's admonitions and starving polar bears, the fight against global warming has acquired the force of a religion enhanced by celebrity endorsement.
Such admonitions can frighten voters, an especially pertinent concern seven months before an election.Yet Germany may in reality have little choice.
