CNN 2010-04-30

Lucky to be alive, a mother, her son and his friends survived a tornado¹ strike on a home in Darlington, South Carolina. Twister picked up a house, flipped² it, and it was only with a little warning.

‘Power cut off, and if it wouldn’t have, I would have never heard the tornado and I told you, I must say it’s something like a Mack truck sound. I jumped up and looked out the bathroom window and I’ve seen a piece of tin about 100 feet in the air. I knew, I knew some wasn’t right.’

‘I looked and I said get in the hall. So we sat down in the hall and just held each other. And then we were sitting on top of all that when it was over.’

Well, the family plans to rebuild with help from friends and neighbors.

This is the house Jack³ bought, Jack Booken, an Aberdeen, New Jersey⁴ heating repairman. Jack fell behind on his mortgage. So far behind that he lost the house to a foreclosure. On Monday, it was put up for auction⁵ at the Monmouth County Hall of Records.

‘Thank you for inviting⁶ me to appear today.’

This is hedge fund manager John Paulson. He bet that Jack and thousands of other Americans would not be able to pay their mortgages. Paulson bet right and made a billion dollars. This is Goldman Sachs, the nation’s most prestigious⁷ investment firm. Goldman Sachs set up the bet for John Paulson. Jack’s house was one of the cards and Goldman Sachs was supposed to be shuffling⁸ the deck. German Bank IKB bet that Jack and thousands of other home owners could pay their mortgages. IKB bet wrong and lost 115 million. This is the US Securities and Exchange Commission. It says Goldman Sachs committed fraud by letting Paulson pick the cards at the gambling⁹ table without telling IKB.

‘Allegations against Goldman Sachs are that they sort of loaded the dice¹⁰, stacked the deck by designing a portfolio¹¹ that was weaker than average.’

The SEC says IKB was a victim. But IKB is not considered to victim in King County, Washington, home to Seattle. King County bought one of the investments IKB was selling. It lost more than 20 million dollars. And these are King County’s libraries, also victims of that losing bet.

‘I did have to scale back the operation of the library system and to look more carefully at all the things that we are doing.’
 

1 tornado   

n.飓风，龙卷风

参考例句：

• A tornado whirled into the town last week.龙卷风上周袭击了这座城市。
• The approaching tornado struck awe in our hearts.正在逼近的龙卷风使我们惊恐万分。

2 flipped   

轻弹( flip的过去式和过去分词 )； 按（开关）； 快速翻转； 急挥

参考例句：

• The plane flipped and crashed. 飞机猛地翻转，撞毁了。
• The carter flipped at the horse with his whip. 赶大车的人扬鞭朝着马轻轻地抽打。

3 jack   

n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克

参考例句：

• I am looking for the headphone jack.我正在找寻头戴式耳机插孔。
• He lifted the car with a jack to change the flat tyre.他用千斤顶把车顶起来换下瘪轮胎。

4 jersey   

n.运动衫

参考例句：

• He wears a cotton jersey when he plays football.他穿运动衫踢足球。
• They were dressed alike in blue jersey and knickers.他们穿着一致，都是蓝色的运动衫和灯笼短裤。

5 auction   

n.拍卖；拍卖会；vt.拍卖

参考例句：

• They've put the contents of their house up for auction.他们把房子里的东西全都拿去拍卖了。
• They bought a new minibus with the proceeds from the auction.他们用拍卖得来的钱买了一辆新面包车。

6 inviting   

adj.诱人的，引人注目的

参考例句：

• An inviting smell of coffee wafted into the room.一股诱人的咖啡香味飘进了房间。
• The kitchen smelled warm and inviting and blessedly familiar.这间厨房的味道温暖诱人，使人感到亲切温馨。

7 prestigious   

adj.有威望的，有声望的，受尊敬的

参考例句：

• The young man graduated from a prestigious university.这个年轻人毕业于一所名牌大学。
• You may even join a prestigious magazine as a contributing editor.甚至可能会加入一个知名杂志做编辑。

8 shuffling   

adj. 慢慢移动的, 滑移的 动词shuffle的现在分词形式

参考例句：

• Don't go shuffling along as if you were dead. 别像个死人似地拖着脚走。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹
• Some one was shuffling by on the sidewalk. 外面的人行道上有人拖着脚走过。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹

9 gambling   

n.赌博；投机

参考例句：

• They have won a lot of money through gambling.他们赌博赢了很多钱。
• The men have been gambling away all night.那些人赌了整整一夜。

10 dice   

n.骰子；vt.把（食物）切成小方块，冒险

参考例句：

• They were playing dice.他们在玩掷骰子游戏。
• A dice is a cube.骰子是立方体。

11 portfolio   

n.公事包；文件夹；大臣及部长职位

参考例句：

• He remembered her because she was carrying a large portfolio.他因为她带着一个大公文包而记住了她。
• He resigned his portfolio.他辞去了大臣职务。