CNN 2009-05-10

Desperate homeowners are hoping an army of firefighters can save their homes. The fires are burning in Santa Barbara California off the coast from Los Angeles. Here is a map of it. A huge part of the community has been forced to flee and we have seen dozens of homes like this engulfed¹ in flames. Just look at that. As many as 80 have burned so far,  just hard to watch them just come crumbling² down and there are many more in an immediate³ danger right now.

Well, you probably saw this coming. You knew somebody was probably gonna lose a job over this. And yes, some has. Fallout at the White House now over that ill-advised photo op flyover⁴, they low fly over in New York City were over a week ago. Yeah, you remember this because we saw people running out on the streets when the Presidential 747 flew over at low altitude. Well, here is the picture. Beautiful shot, right? The White House released the picture that they took on that mission. You see Air Force One there and then the Statue of Liberty. Well, nice shot, but probably not worth the fear and anger that spread throughout the city. Even President Obama, said he was quote “furious”. Now he has accepted the resignation of the guy who planned that flyover, Louis Caldera, the head of the White House Military Office said his blunder had become a distraction⁵ to the president, so he decided⁶ to step down.

We’ve got down new unemployment numbers for the month of April. More than a half million jobs were lost. However, some are pointing to that as a bit of good news because at least the jobs that were lost were less than what analysts⁷ expected, greeted fairly warmly on Wall Street as well. And here are the numbers. Overall unemployment rate is now at 8.9%. That’s up from 8.5% last month, 8.1% the month before. Employers cut 539, 000 jobs in April. That is actually down quite a bit from the number of 600, 000 we saw in March and it ends a string of six straight months of increases, so some pointing that as some good news. Now highlight a few groups here have been hard hit. Unemployment for African-Americans went up nearly 2% to 15%, but adult women, up just one point, eh, 1% I should say, to 7.1%. Also teenagers still that having the hardest time out there, the highest unemployment rate of any group at 21.5%. That’s actually down, however, slightly from the month before. The unemployment rate for Hispanics dropped slightly to 11.3%.

1 engulfed   

v.吞没，包住( engulf的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He was engulfed by a crowd of reporters. 他被一群记者团团围住。
• The little boat was engulfed by the waves. 小船被波浪吞没了。 来自《简明英汉词典》

2 crumbling   

adj.摇摇欲坠的

参考例句：

• an old house with crumbling plaster and a leaking roof 一所灰泥剥落、屋顶漏水的老房子
• The boat was tied up alongside a crumbling limestone jetty. 这条船停泊在一个摇摇欲坠的石灰岩码头边。

3 immediate   

adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的

参考例句：

• His immediate neighbours felt it their duty to call.他的近邻认为他们有责任去拜访。
• We declared ourselves for the immediate convocation of the meeting.我们主张立即召开这个会议。

4 flyover   

n.立交桥，天桥

参考例句：

• It took workers more than one year to build this flyover.建造这座立交桥破费工人一年多时间。
• All that came to his bakery should go over a flyover first.所有来他店的人都必须先经过一座立交桥。

5 distraction   

n.精神涣散，精神不集中，消遣，娱乐

参考例句：

• Total concentration is required with no distractions.要全神贯注，不能有丝毫分神。
• Their national distraction is going to the disco.他们的全民消遣就是去蹦迪。

6 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

7 analysts   

分析家，化验员( analyst的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• City analysts forecast huge profits this year. 伦敦金融分析家预测今年的利润非常丰厚。
• I was impressed by the high calibre of the researchers and analysts. 研究人员和分析人员的高素质给我留下了深刻印象。