美国有线新闻 CNN 2013-01-02

 We begin tonight with breaking news about your paycheck, your unemployment check, your defense¹ job, the entire economy, you name it, all of it is at stake if the country goes over that fiscal² cliff. It's a cliff that lawmakers built, they set the Tuesday deadline, they've known it was coming for more than a year. But until now, even now, they've done precious little to agree on a package of tax increases and spending cuts by that time.

Keeping them honest, the people in this building have know what's coming on Tuesday. Yet they are only returning to this building to get back to work just now. Senators came back yesterday, House members, well, they won't be back until Sunday. This afternoon, House and Senate leaders met with president Obama at the White House, they talked for about an hour. Afterwards, president Obama said he was modestly optimistic by passing House Speaker John Boehner who's had trouble getting his fellow Republicans to agree to anything. The president called on Senate majority and minority leaders Harry³ Reid and Mitch McConnell to work out a deal, then presented it to the House. He also laid out a scaled down mini-deal if they can't manage it.

"If we don't see an agreement between the two leaders in the Senate, I expect a bill to go on the floor and I've asked Senator Reid to do this. Put a bill on the floor that make sure that taxes on middle class families don't go up, that unemployment insurance is still available for two million people, and that lays the groundwork then for additional deficit⁴ reduction and economic growth steps that we can take in the New Year. But let's not miss this deadline."

As for the two Senate leaders, they spoke⁵ shortly after the meeting, and they sounded a bit more hopeful than the president. 

"But I think it was a very positive meeting, there was not a lot of hilarity⁶ in the meeting. Everyone knows how important it is, it's a very serious meeting and it took an extended period of time as you all know,waiting for us..."

"I share the view of the majority leader, we had a good meeting down at the White House. We're engaged in discussions, the majority leader, myself and the White House, in the hopes that we can come forward as early as Sunday and have a recommendation. That I can make to my conference and majority leader can make to his conference. And so we will be working hard to try to see if we can get there in the next 24 hours, and so I'm hopeful and optimistic."

Sounds good but also sounds familiar, right? Senate Reid says a vote could happen on Monday. But people have heard so much talk about the crisis, but seen precious little action. The president tonight echoing that frustration⁷.

"The American are watching what we do here. obviously their patience is already thin, this is deja vu all over again, America wonders why it is that in this town for some reason you can't get stuff done, in an organized timetable, why everything always has to wait to the last minute. Well, we are now at the last minute, and the American people are not going to have any patience for a politically self-inflicted wound to our economy."

1 defense   

n.防御，保卫；[pl.]防务工事；辩护，答辩

参考例句：

• The accused has the right to defense.被告人有权获得辩护。
• The war has impacted the area with military and defense workers.战争使那个地区挤满了军队和防御工程人员。

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 harry   

vt.掠夺，蹂躏，使苦恼

参考例句：

• Today,people feel more hurried and harried.今天，人们感到更加忙碌和苦恼。
• Obama harried business by Healthcare Reform plan.奥巴马用医改掠夺了商界。

4 deficit   

n.亏空，亏损；赤字，逆差

参考例句：

• The directors have reported a deficit of 2.5 million dollars.董事们报告赤字为250万美元。
• We have a great deficit this year.我们今年有很大亏损。

5 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

6 hilarity   

n.欢乐；热闹

参考例句：

• The announcement was greeted with much hilarity and mirth.这一项宣布引起了热烈的欢呼声。
• Wine gives not light hilarity,but noisy merriment.酒不给人以轻松的欢乐，而给人以嚣嚷的狂欢。

7 frustration   

n.挫折，失败，失效，落空

参考例句：

• He had to fight back tears of frustration.他不得不强忍住失意的泪水。
• He beat his hands on the steering wheel in frustration.他沮丧地用手打了几下方向盘。