时代周刊:揭秘拯救2020年大选的"影子运动秘史"(5)

He spent months pondering scenarios¹ and talking to experts.

他花了几个月的时间考虑各种方案并与专家交谈。

It wasn't hard to find liberals who saw Trump² as a dangerous dictator, but Podhorzer was careful to steer³ clear of hysteria.

在自由派看来，把特朗普视为危险的独裁者并不难，但波德霍泽小心翼翼地避免歇斯底里。

What he wanted to know was not how American democracy was dying but how it might be kept alive.

他想知道的不是美国民主是如何消亡的，而是如何让它继续存在下去。

The chief difference between the U.S. and countries that lost their grip on democracy, he concluded, was that America's decentralized election system couldn't be rigged in one fell swoop⁴.

他总结道，美国与那些失去了对民主的控制的国家之间的主要区别在于，美国分散的选举制度不可能一下子就被操纵。

That presented an opportunity to shore it up.

这提供了一个支持它的机会。

On March 3, Podhorzer drafted a three-page confidential⁵ memo⁶ titled "Threats to the 2020 Election."

3月3日，Podhorzer起草了一份名为“对2020年选举的威胁”的三页机密备忘录。

"Trump has made it clear that this will not be a fair election, and that he will reject anything but his own re-election as 'fake' and rigged," he wrote.

“特朗普已经明确表示这将不是一场公平的选举，他会拒绝任何东西，除了他自己的连任，认为这是‘假的’和被操纵的，”他写道。

"On Nov. 3, should the media report otherwise, he will use the right-wing information system to establish his narrative⁷ and incite⁸ his supporters to protest."

“11月3日，如果媒体报道不是这样，他就会利用右翼信息系统来建立自己的叙事，煽动支持者抗议。”

The memo laid out four categories of challenges: attacks on voters, attacks on election administration, attacks on Trump's political opponents and "efforts to reverse the results of the election."

备忘录列出了四类挑战：对选民的攻击、对选举管理部门的攻击、对特朗普的政治对手的攻击以及“扭转选举结果的努力”。

Then COVID-19 erupted at the height of the primary-election season.

随后，2019冠状病毒病(COVID-19)在初选季的高潮爆发。

Normal methods of voting were no longer safe for voters or the mostly elderly volunteers who normally staff polling places.

一般的投票方式对选民或通常在投票地点工作的以长者为主的志愿人员已不再安全。

But political disagreements, intensified⁹ by Trump's crusade against mail voting, prevented some states from making it easier to vote absentee and for jurisdictions¹⁰ to count those votes in a timely manner.

但是，由于特朗普反对邮寄投票的运动加剧了政治分歧，一些州无法让缺席投票变得更容易，也无法让司法管辖区及时统计这些选票。

Chaos¹¹ ensued. Ohio shut down in-person voting for its primary, leading to minuscule¹² turnout.

混乱接踵而至。俄亥俄州关闭了初选的亲自投票，导致投票率非常低。

A poll-worker shortage in Milwaukee—where Wisconsin's heavily Democratic Black population is concentrated—left just five open polling places, down from 182. In New York, vote counting took more than a month.

在威斯康辛州民主党黑人人口集中的密尔瓦基，由于投票站工作人员短缺，只剩下5个开放的投票站，从182个下降到5个。在纽约，计票工作耗时一个多月。

Suddenly, the potential for a November meltdown was obvious. In his apartment in the D.C. suburbs, Podhorzer began working from his laptop at his kitchen table,

突然间，11月核反应堆熔毁的可能性显而易见。在他位于华盛顿郊区的公寓里，波德霍泽开始在厨房的桌子上用笔记本电脑工作，

holding back-to-back Zoom¹³ meetings for hours a day with his network of contacts across the progressive universe: the labor¹⁴ movement;

每天和他在进步领域的人脉网络连续几个小时开Zoom会议：劳工运动；

the institutional left, like Planned Parenthood and Greenpeace; resistance groups like Indivisible and MoveOn;

制度上的左派，如计划生育和绿色和平组织；像“不可分割”和“移动”等抵抗组织；

progressive data geeks and strategists, representatives of donors¹⁵ and foundations, state-level grassroots organizers, racial-justice activists¹⁶ and others.

进步的数据极客和战略家，捐赠者和基金会的代表，州级草根组织者，种族正义活动家等。

1 scenarios   

n.[意]情节；剧本；事态；脚本

参考例句：

• Further, graphite cores may be safer than non-graphite cores under some accident scenarios. 再者，根据一些事故解说，石墨堆芯可比非石墨堆芯更安全一些。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法
• Again, scenarios should make it clear which modes are acceptable to users in various contexts. 同样，我们可以运用场景剧本来搞清楚在不同情境下哪些模式可被用户接受。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓

2 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。

3 steer   

vt.驾驶，为…操舵；引导；vi.驾驶

参考例句：

• If you push the car, I'll steer it.如果你来推车，我就来驾车。
• It's no use trying to steer the boy into a course of action that suits you.想说服这孩子按你的方式行事是徒劳的。

4 swoop   

n.俯冲，攫取；v.抓取，突然袭击

参考例句：

• The plane made a swoop over the city.那架飞机突然向这座城市猛降下来。
• We decided to swoop down upon the enemy there.我们决定突袭驻在那里的敌人。

5 confidential   

adj.秘（机）密的，表示信任的，担任机密工作的

参考例句：

• He refused to allow his secretary to handle confidential letters.他不让秘书处理机密文件。
• We have a confidential exchange of views.我们推心置腹地交换意见。

6 memo   

n.照会，备忘录；便笺；通知书；规章

参考例句：

• Do you want me to send the memo out?您要我把这份备忘录分发出去吗？
• Can you type a memo for me?您能帮我打一份备忘录吗？

7 narrative   

n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的

参考例句：

• He was a writer of great narrative power.他是一位颇有记述能力的作家。
• Neither author was very strong on narrative.两个作者都不是很善于讲故事。

8 incite   

v.引起，激动，煽动

参考例句：

• I wanted to point out he was a very good speaker, and could incite a crowd.我想说明他曾是一个非常出色的演讲家，非常会调动群众的情绪。
• Just a few words will incite him into action.他只需几句话一将，就会干。

9 intensified   

v.（使）增强， （使）加剧( intensify的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Violence intensified during the night. 在夜间暴力活动加剧了。
• The drought has intensified. 旱情加剧了。 来自《简明英汉词典》

10 jurisdictions   

司法权( jurisdiction的名词复数 )； 裁判权； 管辖区域； 管辖范围

参考例句：

• Butler entreated him to remember the act abolishing the heritable jurisdictions. 巴特勒提醒他注意废除世袭审判权的国会法令。
• James I personally adjudicated between the two jurisdictions. 詹姆士一世亲自裁定双方纠纷。

11 chaos   

n.混乱，无秩序

参考例句：

• After the failure of electricity supply the city was in chaos.停电后，城市一片混乱。
• The typhoon left chaos behind it.台风后一片混乱。

12 minuscule   

adj.非常小的；极不重要的

参考例句：

• The human race only a minuscule portion of the earth's history.人类只有占有极小部分地球历史。
• As things stand,Hong Kong's renminbi banking system is minuscule.就目前的情况而言，香港的人民币银行体系可谓微不足道。

13 zoom   

n.急速上升；v.突然扩大，急速上升

参考例句：

• The airplane's zoom carried it above the clouds.飞机的陡直上升使它飞到云层之上。
• I live near an airport and the zoom of passing planes can be heard night and day.我住在一个飞机场附近，昼夜都能听到飞机飞过的嗡嗡声。

14 labor   

n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦

参考例句：

• We are never late in satisfying him for his labor.我们从不延误付给他劳动报酬。
• He was completely spent after two weeks of hard labor.艰苦劳动两周后，他已经疲惫不堪了。

15 donors   

n.捐赠者( donor的名词复数 )；献血者；捐血者；器官捐献者

参考例句：

• Please email us to be removed from our active list of blood donors. 假如你想把自己的名字从献血联系人名单中删去，请给我们发电子邮件。
• About half this amount comes from individual donors and bequests. 这笔钱大约有一半来自个人捐赠及遗赠。 来自《简明英汉词典》

16 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》