1.   As anyone who has complained to the bureau can tell you, lodging a complaint there is more often than not a futile exercise motivated by desperation.

2.   A futile exercise, yes, but someone will be trying to judge, as will people in schools across the country.

3.   But he quickly added that a failed prediction does not mean a futile exercise.

4.   Encouraging a popular rebellion by beaming American radio broadcasts into Iraq would seem a futile exercise.

5.   Hanan Ashrawi, a Palestinian Authority minister who was not present at the talks, dismissed them as a futile exercise.

6.   In a gesture to his Muslim majority, however, he has condemned the war as a futile exercise that is killing innocent civilians.

7.   In the final analysis, establishing the truth in these debates is a futile exercise.

8.   That set up a power play, which looked like a futile exercise for a while.

9.   The Patriots tried to run but again found it a futile exercise as Robert Edwards found no room.

10.   Tonight at midnight, this futile exercise continues.