美国国家公共电台 NPR--In Ireland, Biden is on a diplomatic and deeply personal mission

In Ireland, Biden is on a diplomatic and deeply personal mission

Transcript¹

This may be hyperbole, but the only thing President Biden quotes more than the great Irish poets is the wisdom of his Irish American mother.

"Today, I'm Catherine Eugenia Finnegan Biden's son," Biden said at a 2022 St. Patrick's Day event. "That's who I am."

Many modern American presidents have claimed Irish ancestry² — from John Fitzgerald Kennedy to Barack Obama (or should we say "O'Bama"?), who has Irish relatives on his mom's side. But none has been quite as forward about it as Biden. The nation's second Irish-Catholic president will go to Belfast, Northern Ireland, on Tuesday and to the Republic of Ireland on Wednesday. He heads back to the U.S. on Friday.

The trip is part diplomacy³ and part homecoming.

"As we Irish say, that's no malarkey," Biden said last year during an Ohio factory tour. "That's a fact."

It's not entirely⁴ a fact that "malarkey" — one of Biden's frequently used terms — is Irish, but Biden attributes many features of his personality to being Irish-American.

Biden will tour his ancestral land

Biden's family hails from County Mayo and County Louth, both of which he will visit. Biden's ancestors came to the U.S. from Ireland in the mid-1800s. They lived through the Irish potato famine, and like so many others over the centuries came to the U.S. in search of opportunity.

Biden will likely talk about that universal experience in remarks outside St. Muredach's Cathedral later this week. According to the White House, Biden's great-great-great grandfather Edward Blewitt sold 27,000 bricks that helped build that County Mayo cathedral, and used the money to bring his family on a ship to America.

Biden will also visit County Louth where — as Biden told an audience at the Friends of Ireland Caucus⁵ lunch last month — "there's still a place called Finnegan's pub, which is related to my family."

It's not clear whether a stop into the pub is in the plans, but grabbing a pint⁶ of beer is not. "I'm the only Irishman, though, you've ever met who's never had a drink," said Biden, who like his predecessor⁷ doesn't drink alcohol.

Biden's Irish identity overlaps⁸ with his political image

Brendan O'Leary, a political science professor at the University of Pennsylvania, has a bold claim: "I think there's no doubt that Joe Biden is the most Irish of Irish American presidents."

Yes — he said Biden is even more overtly⁹ Irish than JFK, whose visit to Ireland in 1963 was a significant event, complete with live coverage¹⁰ and a play-by-play of the landing of Air Force One.

Kennedy's election was a breakthrough. Biden, on the other hand, is free to wear his heritage on his sleeve, O'Leary said, since electing an Irish Catholic to the highest office in the land is no longer a taboo¹¹.

"Indeed, I'd say he's much more visibly an Ordinary Joe, an average Irish American, than was his predecessor, John Fitzgerald Kennedy," said O'Leary, who points out Kennedy attended an elite¹² private boarding school and then Harvard, making his lived experience much more Anglophile.

That Working Class Joe image is an important part of Biden's political identity and his outreach to voters.

The president will encourage peace

On the policy side, Biden's trip starts in Northern Ireland where he will deliver a message about ongoing¹³ U.S. support for the Good Friday Agreement, signed 25 years ago. That agreement, which the U.S. was pivotal in negotiating, brought an end to decades of sectarian violence in Northern Ireland known as The Troubles.

"This was a ... huge deal," said Max Bergmann at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He expects Biden to hold up the Good Friday Agreement as "an example 25 years later where active U.S. engagement really made a difference."

But Brexit has tested the peace accord. The United Kingdom's move to withdraw from the European Union created new tensions over trade and risked stoking disputes over borders. A new agreement called the Windsor Framework aims to ease those tensions, but the political situation in Northern Ireland remains¹⁴ difficult.

With that in mind, O'Leary said he expects Biden's message in Belfast to focus on the economic opportunity that comes from peace and stability.

"America is not trying to interfere¹⁵ in the management of the power sharing arrangements within Northern Ireland," O'Leary said. "But it is very clearly giving a signal that if those work, well, then there will be encouragement from the United States for foreign and direct investment."

While personally connecting to his roots is important to Biden, politically so is building strong relationships between the U.S. and its European allies.

1 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

2 ancestry   

n.祖先，家世

参考例句：

• Their ancestry settled the land in 1856.他们的祖辈1856年在这块土地上定居下来。
• He is an American of French ancestry.他是法国血统的美国人。

3 diplomacy   

n.外交；外交手腕，交际手腕

参考例句：

• The talks have now gone into a stage of quiet diplomacy.会谈现在已经进入了“温和外交”阶段。
• This was done through the skill in diplomacy. 这是通过外交手腕才做到的。

4 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。

5 caucus   

n.秘密会议；干部会议；v.（参加）干部开会议

参考例句：

• This multi-staged caucus takes several months.这个多级会议常常历时好几个月。
• It kept the Democratic caucus from fragmenting.它也使得民主党的核心小组避免了土崩瓦解的危险。

6 pint   

n.品脱

参考例句：

• I'll have a pint of beer and a packet of crisps, please.我要一品脱啤酒和一袋炸马铃薯片。
• In the old days you could get a pint of beer for a shilling.从前，花一先令就可以买到一品脱啤酒。

7 predecessor   

n.前辈，前任

参考例句：

• It will share the fate of its predecessor.它将遭受与前者同样的命运。
• The new ambassador is more mature than his predecessor.新大使比他的前任更成熟一些。

8 overlaps   

v.部分重叠( overlap的第三人称单数 )；（物体）部份重叠；交叠；（时间上）部份重叠

参考例句：

• The style in these two books largely overlaps. 这两本书的文体有许多处是一致的。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• The new office overlaps the functions of the one already in existence. 新机构的职能与那个现存机构的职能部分重叠。 来自辞典例句

9 overtly   

ad.公开地

参考例句：

• There were some overtly erotic scenes in the film. 影片中有一些公开色情场面。
• Nietzsche rejected God's law and wrote some overtly blasphemous things. 尼采拒绝上帝的律法，并且写了一些渎神的作品。

10 coverage   

n.报导，保险范围，保险额，范围，覆盖

参考例句：

• There's little coverage of foreign news in the newspaper.报纸上几乎没有国外新闻报道。
• This is an insurance policy with extensive coverage.这是一项承保范围广泛的保险。

11 taboo   

n.禁忌，禁止接近，禁止使用；adj.禁忌的；v.禁忌，禁制，禁止

参考例句：

• The rude words are taboo in ordinary conversation.这些粗野的字眼在日常谈话中是禁忌的。
• Is there a taboo against sex before marriage in your society?在你们的社会里，婚前的性行为犯禁吗？

12 elite   

n.精英阶层；实力集团；adj.杰出的，卓越的

参考例句：

• The power elite inside the government is controlling foreign policy.政府内部的一群握有实权的精英控制着对外政策。
• We have a political elite in this country.我们国家有一群政治精英。

13 ongoing   

adj.进行中的，前进的

参考例句：

• The problem is ongoing.这个问题尚未解决。
• The issues raised in the report relate directly to Age Concern's ongoing work in this area.报告中提出的问题与“关心老人”组织在这方面正在做的工作有直接的关系。

14 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

15 interfere   

v.(in)干涉，干预；(with)妨碍，打扰

参考例句：

• If we interfere, it may do more harm than good.如果我们干预的话，可能弊多利少。
• When others interfere in the affair,it always makes troubles. 别人一卷入这一事件，棘手的事情就来了。