Perhaps the First Minister is looking down the tracks and seeing a much bigger pincer coming his way.
Both on the external and the home fronts, then, a menacing pincer attack on the recovery appears under way.
In the high stakes game, Amazon has played a pincer move, where they win no matter the move of the opposition.
FORBES: Amazon Parks A Musical Monster Truck On Apple's Lawn
Analysts now talk about a pincer movement, of Sun's being caught between IBM above and Wintel (Microsoft, Intel, Dell, Compaq, etc.) below.
But Dell has been decimated by pincer movements from above and below.
While over 5, 000 Colombian troops operate in that country's Choco and Uraba regions, 200-400 paramilitaries are closing the other arm of the pincer inside Panama.
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Labour faces a pincer attack from Kadima on its right flank and from a reinvigorated Meretz, the most peace-minded of the mainstream parties, on its left.
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The Conservatives lost a seat to Labour for the first time in 15 years in part as they were squeezed by a pincer movement from Labour and UKIP.
Nowadays Barack Obama is boxed in by a pincer movement of political correctness: his race on one flank, his squeaky-clean image as the torch-bearer of hope and change on the other.
But AOL is caught in a pincer movement: It must roll out broadband access rapidly (only 550, 000 Time Warner homes now have it) while staving off price erosion in its core narrowband business.
I've been caught in the pincer of what the BBC is calling "Crunch Christmas" - a week of pieces looking at inflation, unemployment and retail price figures that will, I suspect, tell you what you've worked out already: times are tough.
ECONOMIST: With the euro under siege, is this the time for more Europe?
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