The government used to be keen on overhauling education but it has run out of puff.

ECONOMIST: The state of Britain

The extravagantly far-right demagogue, Vladimir Zhirinovsky, has run out of puff.

ECONOMIST: Boris Yeltsin��s unruly brood

The older manappeared to be out of puff.

BBC: M25 stab victim's 'shock'

The fight against corruption is also out of puff: it was made clear this week that self-exiled Bettino Craxi, a former prime minister hitherto wanted on several charges, would face none if he came home.

ECONOMIST: Unchanging Italy

Besides, the baroness herself ran out of puff after her industrial privatisations: she never seriously tried to prise the welfare state out of public hands, and only just succeeded in slowing the growth of overall state spending.

ECONOMIST: Something for the kitchen table

Chinese tour boats take you past Sinuiju's decaying factories whose smokestacks, locals say, haven't let out a puff of smoke in years.

NPR: Unequal, Uneasy: Life on the China-Korea Border

When she speaks, she says she literally runs of out puff after a few minutes and needs to take a moment to recover with a few deep breaths.

BBC: Baroness makes a little bit of history

You simply sweep your whole pile of chips into old-economy stocks, then puff on a cigar and wait out the coming convergence of valuations.

FORBES: Digital Rules