美国国会达成预算协议

 　　美国国会达成预算协议

　　WASHINGTON, Dec. 10 (Xinhua) -- Chief budget negotiators in the U.S. Congress said Tuesday that they have struck a two-year deal to avoid a government shutdown on Jan. 15.

　　Senate Budget Committee Chairman Patty Murray and House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan, the top lawmakers on budgetary issues in their respective chambers¹, announced the deal at a news conference on Capitol Hill.

　　The deal, though falling short of a long-sought grand bargain to solve the overarching fiscal² issues, would set the spending levels for the federal government over the next two years and turn off part of the automatic spending cuts, known as the sequester³.

　　It sets a spending level of about 1.012 trillion U.S. dollars for discretionary spending in the 2014 fiscal year, and 1.014 trillion dollars for the 2015 fiscal year, providing about 63 billion dollars in relief to the sequester over the next two years.

　　It leaves the entitlement programs and the tax code untouched and would not extend the federal unemployment benefits program, which is set to expire at the end of December.

　　"This agreement makes sure that we don't have a government shutdown scenario⁴ in January. It makes sure we don't have another government shutdown scenario in October. It makes sure that we don't lurch⁵ from crisis to crisis," said Ryan as he introduced the agreement.

　　"This deal doesn't solve all of our problems, but I think it is an important step in helping⁶ heal some of the wounds here in Congress," said Murray.

　　A 29-member bipartisan congressional panel, led by Murray and Ryan, have been meeting for weeks to try to forge an agreement to fund the government after Jan. 15 and replace sharp automatic spending cuts. Its task was mandated⁷ in a budget deal reached in October to end the 16-day partial government shutdown and raise the debt limit.

　　The panel has a Dec. 13 deadline to produce a plan.

1 chambers   

n.房间( chamber的名词复数 )；（议会的）议院；卧室；会议厅

参考例句：

• The body will be removed into one of the cold storage chambers. 尸体将被移到一个冷冻间里。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Mr Chambers's readable book concentrates on the middle passage: the time Ransome spent in Russia. Chambers先生的这本值得一看的书重点在中间：Ransome在俄国的那几年。 来自互联网

2 fiscal   

adj.财政的，会计的，国库的，国库岁入的

参考例句：

• The increase of taxation is an important fiscal policy.增税是一项重要的财政政策。
• The government has two basic strategies of fiscal policy available.政府有两个可行的财政政策基本战略。

3 sequester   

vt.使退隐，使隔绝

参考例句：

• Everything he owned was sequestered.他的所有财产都被扣押了。
• This jury is expected to be sequestered for at least two months.预计这个陪审团将至少被隔离两个月。

4 scenario   

n.剧本，脚本；概要

参考例句：

• But the birth scenario is not completely accurate.然而分娩脚本并非完全准确的。
• This is a totally different scenario.这是完全不同的剧本。

5 lurch   

n.突然向前或旁边倒；v.蹒跚而行

参考例句：

• It has been suggested that the ground movements were a form of lurch movements.地震的地面运动曾被认为是一种突然倾斜的运动形式。
• He walked with a lurch.他步履蹒跚。

6 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

7 mandated   

adj. 委托统治的

参考例句：

• Mandated desegregation of public schools. 命令解除公立学校中的种族隔离
• Britain was mandated to govern the former colony of German East Africa. 英国受权代管德国在东非的前殖民地。