美国国家公共电台 NPR Trump Is Another Republican Striking A Blow For The Way Things Used To Be

Trump¹ Is Another Republican Striking A Blow For The Way Things Used To Be

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Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, and the margin³ may well grow in the days and weeks ahead as more votes are counted. That won't matter, though, because those many thousands of votes won't alter the Electoral College count. In the end, that's the only count that matters. NPR's Ron Elving has looked at all the numbers and heard all the speeches, but he's thinking about it from a different perspective - from the great height of history.

Welcome, Ron.

RON ELVING, BYLINE⁴: Good morning, Renee.

MONTAGNE: Now, you've written a piece for NPR this morning. In it, you say President-elect Donald Trump might be disruptive, but in one way, he's restoring a tradition. What tradition would that be?

ELVING: It's our tendency to react to one presidency⁵, especially an eight-year presidency, by seeking out someone distinctly different to be the next president, usually someone from the other major party who's been a critic or opponent of the outgoing president, maybe even a nemesis⁶, as in the case of Mr. Trump.

MONTAGNE: But, I mean, Obama - doesn't he have a high level of approval right now? So I mean, why seek out the opposite?

ELVING: You know, it is high relative to where it's been. He's over 50 percent. And it's also high among other presidents in their eighth year as they're leaving office. But that doesn't seem to matter all that much historically. Bill Clinton's approval level was even higher when he had to turn over the keys to George W. Bush 16 years ago.

So it's not just a matter of a president's personal popularity. It's more like we have limits on our national inclinations⁷. We may want to go progressive for several years, maybe most of a decade. And then the national body rhythm seems to want something different - something restorative, if you will - something sometimes very different.

MONTAGNE: And - OK. The parties you could see, understandably, might want to take turns - right? In a sense, voters might want to do that. But there's more to this than that, right?

ELVING: That's right. It's more than just product rotation⁸ or a change of scene. But it also seems we want to follow our national journey a certain distance in one direction and then often a distance in quite a different, or even opposite, direction - just seems to be what we have done.

MONTAGNE: So traditionally, Democrats⁹, let's say, come in, push the country down some kind of path of policy, and then Republicans stand by waiting for the country to react. And then they grab it.

ELVING: You know, it's true that they just stand by and then grab it. But they don't just stand by. They take an active role in helping¹⁰ the country react against whatever the Democrats might do, say, Obamacare as an example. Every single Republican in Congress opposed it at the time, and they have been working quite actively¹¹ to repeal¹² it ever since. And now it would seem they will get that chance.

MONTAGNE: So Donald Trump has four more years - obviously, for sure. Are you suggesting or predicting that we'll have eight years of Donald Trump and then a backlash?

ELVING: You know, Trump is already 70. So he may be content to make America great again in just one term. But he has a Republican Congress and excellent odds¹³ of keeping it Republican through the 2018 midterms.

So he can change a lot of things, undo¹⁴ a lot of what Obama has already done. And the more that he does of that - the more he restores things to the way they were before Obama or maybe even well before Obama - maybe back to the 1950s, as he said, was a time when he thinks America was great - the more people are going to notice that change and the more it may energize¹⁵ people on the other side, including those who didn't turn out to vote this week.

MONTAGNE: NPR's senior editor Ron Elving.

Thanks very much.

ELVING: Thank you, Renee.

1 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

2 browser   

n.浏览者

参考例句：

• View edits in a web browser.在浏览器中看编辑的效果。
• I think my browser has a list of shareware links.我想在浏览器中会有一系列的共享软件链接。

3 margin   

n.页边空白；差额；余地，余裕；边，边缘

参考例句：

• We allowed a margin of 20 minutes in catching the train.我们有20分钟的余地赶火车。
• The village is situated at the margin of a forest.村子位于森林的边缘。

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 presidency   

n.总统(校长，总经理)的职位(任期)

参考例句：

• Roosevelt was elected four times to the presidency of the United States.罗斯福连续当选四届美国总统。
• Two candidates are emerging as contestants for the presidency.两位候选人最终成为总统职位竞争者。

6 nemesis   

n.给以报应者，复仇者，难以对付的敌手

参考例句：

• Uncritical trust is my nemesis.盲目的相信一切害了我自己。
• Inward suffering is the worst of Nemesis.内心的痛苦是最厉害的惩罚。

7 inclinations   

倾向( inclination的名词复数 )； 倾斜； 爱好； 斜坡

参考例句：

• She has artistic inclinations. 她有艺术爱好。
• I've no inclinations towards life as a doctor. 我的志趣不是行医。

8 rotation   

n.旋转；循环，轮流

参考例句：

• Crop rotation helps prevent soil erosion.农作物轮作有助于防止水土流失。
• The workers in this workshop do day and night shifts in weekly rotation.这个车间的工人上白班和上夜班每周轮换一次。

9 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》

10 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

11 actively   

adv.积极地，勤奋地

参考例句：

• During this period all the students were actively participating.在这节课中所有的学生都积极参加。
• We are actively intervening to settle a quarrel.我们正在积极调解争执。

12 repeal   

n.废止，撤消；v.废止，撤消

参考例句：

• He plans to repeal a number of current policies.他计划废除一些当前的政策。
• He has made out a strong case for the repeal of the law.他提出强有力的理由，赞成废除该法令。

13 odds   

n.让步，机率，可能性，比率；胜败优劣之别

参考例句：

• The odds are 5 to 1 that she will win.她获胜的机会是五比一。
• Do you know the odds of winning the lottery once?你知道赢得一次彩票的几率多大吗？

14 undo   

vt.解开，松开；取消，撤销

参考例句：

• His pride will undo him some day.他的傲慢总有一天会毁了他。
• I managed secretly to undo a corner of the parcel.我悄悄地设法解开了包裹的一角。

15 energize   

vt.给予(某人或某物)精力、能量

参考例句：

• It is used to energize the city.它的作用是为城市供给能量。
• This is a great way to energize yourself and give yourself more power!这种方法非常棒，可以激活你的能量，让你有更多的活力！