华盛顿邮报 美国会两党强硬派都对债务上限协议不满(1)

 

    Yeas are 314. The nays¹ are 117. The bill is passed.

    314票赞成。117票反对。法案通过。

    You could watch the House floor yesterday and say, "Wow. This is a bill that was brokered² by negotiations³ on both sides. It's getting bipartisan support. It's going to pass the Senate. This is a good day for American democracy."你昨天可以看着众议院说，“哇。这是一项由双方协商促成的法案。该法案得到了两党的支持，将在参议院获得通过。这是美国民主的好日子。”

    Rachel Siegel is an economics reporter for The Post.

    雷切尔·西格尔是《华盛顿邮报》的经济记者。

    And for the last couple of weeks, she's been on the Hill, and that's because of the debt-ceiling negotiations that nearly brought the global economy to its knees.

    由于几乎使全球经济陷入瘫痪的债务上限谈判，她在过去几周里一直守在国会山。

    So, yes, Rachel says, this could be seen as a good day for democracy. But, also...

    是的，雷切尔表示，这可以视为民主的好日子。但是, 还…There was negotiating over the debt ceiling in the first place, which a lot of people argued should never have been the case. And this is something that is just a part of governing.

    首先是关于债务上限的谈判，很多人认为根本不应该发生这样的事。这只是治理的一部分。

    But in divided government, we, of course, cannot allow the perfect to be the enemy of the good.

    但政府存在分歧，我们当然不能让完美成为优秀的敌人。

    This deal fails. Fails completely. And that's why these members and others will be absolutely opposed to the deal, and we will do everything in our power to stop it.

    这项协议很失败。彻底地失败。这就是这些成员和其他成员绝对反对这项协议的原因，我们将竭尽所能阻止协议。

    There were a lot of really sour feelings about why we were even there in the first place and what it signals about where things are in Washington.

    对于我们一开始为啥出现这个问题的原因，以及华盛顿各种事情表明的情况，真的有很多不满的情绪。

    Neither side got what they wanted, but leadership of both parties are still claiming victory.

    双方都没有得到他们想要的，但两党领导人仍在宣称胜利。

    It's amazing and really a bit of a head-scratcher.

    这太令人诧异了，真的有点令人费解。

    For months, and especially the last couple of weeks, the two sides, the House GOP and the White House, were on such opposite ends of these negotiations.

    几个月来，特别是最近几周，双方，众议院共和党与白宫，在这些谈判中分歧很大。

    And we really only saw some members on the far-right side of the GOP and some members on the progressive side of the Democratic Party saying that they couldn't support this bill.

    我们看到，共和党极右翼的一些成员和民主党进步派的一些成员称他们不会支持这项法案。

    Today, we unpack⁴ what exactly ended up in this deal, and we talk about how negotiating on the debt ceiling at all could hurt our global reputation.

    今天，我们将揭开这项协议到底是如何收场的，以及讨论债务上限谈判是如何损害我们的全球声誉的。

    Now ,the text is 99 pages long. I'm sure there's a lot of things in there. But, Rachel, what are some of the key points out of there that stood out to you? What exactly is in this bill?

    协议文本有99页长。我肯定协议里包含很多东西。但是，雷切尔，有哪些关键点让你印象深刻呢? 这份法案的具体内容是什么？

    So, that final 99-page bill that finally got released over the weekend includes a couple of main bullet points.

    上周末最终公布的99页法案包含了几个要点。

    First, it suspends the debt limit until 2025. That helps us get out of this immediate⁵ deadline that we were staring down on June 5th.

    首先，该法案将债务上限延缓至2025年。这有助于我们摆脱6月5日这个我们死盯着、马上到来的截止日期。

    It also does something for Democrats⁶, which basically puts this off until after the 2024 election.

    这也为民主党人做了一些事，基本上是把这件事推迟到2024年大选之后。

    So that's one key thing that both resolves the current problem and kicks things a little further down the road.

    这是一个关键之举，既解决了当前的问题，又把事情推得更远了些。

    Then there are other things that were more priorities for Republicans. For example, the bill cuts some IRS funding.

    对共和党人来说，还有其他更重要的事情。例如，该法案削减了美国国税局的一些资金。

1 nays   

n.反对票，投反对票者( nay的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The tally was two ayes and three nays. 投票结果是两票赞成，三票反对。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The tally was three yeas and two nays, so the yeas have it. 投票结果是三票赞成两票反对，投赞成票者胜利。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

2 brokered   

adj.由权力经纪人安排（或控制）的v.做掮客（或中人等）( broker的过去式和过去分词 )；作为权力经纪人进行谈判；以中间人等身份安排…

参考例句：

• a peace plan brokered by the UN 由联合国出面协商的和平计划
• Your husband brokered the deal to go in, transfrer the assets and get our man out. 你丈夫后来插了一脚，把生意都抢了过去，我们的人也被挤了出来。 来自电影对白

3 negotiations   

协商( negotiation的名词复数 )； 谈判； 完成（难事）； 通过

参考例句：

• negotiations for a durable peace 为持久和平而进行的谈判
• Negotiations have failed to establish any middle ground. 谈判未能达成任何妥协。

4 unpack   

vt.打开包裹（或行李），卸货

参考例句：

• I must unpack before dinner.我得在饭前把行李打开。
• She said she would unpack the items later.她说以后再把箱子里的东西拿出来。

5 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。

6 democrats   

n.民主主义者，民主人士( democrat的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The Democrats held a pep rally on Capitol Hill yesterday. 民主党昨天在国会山召开了竞选誓师大会。
• The democrats organize a filibuster in the senate. 民主党党员组织了阻挠议事。 来自《简明英汉词典》