每日外刊 | 0306-乔·拜登的国情咨文没有给人留下深刻印象

考研英语时事阅读 · 公众号 · 考研 · 2022-03-06 07:30

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Joe Biden’s state-of-the-union address fails to impress

乔·拜登的国情咨文没有给人留下深刻印象

Every would-be president daydreams of the moment: the very first state-of-the-union address to Congress, the chance to be at the centre of the annual American pageant. After 50 years in Washington, and having attended a fair few of the spectacles himself, President Joe Biden will have fantasised about his turn at speechmaking more than most. The reality, however, was hardly triumphant.

每一个想成为总统的人都梦想着这样一个时刻：向国会发表第一份国情咨文，有机会成为一年一度的美国盛会的中心人物。在华盛顿生活了50年，自己也参加过不少这样的活动，乔·拜登总统比大多数人都更渴望能有机会发表演讲。然而，现实并非如此。

After a little more than one year in office, Mr Biden is in a slump. Setback has piled atop setback. After months of agonising negotiations, the signature legislative agenda of the administration—a gargantuan safety-net and climate-change spending package called Build Back Better—is in effect dead. High inflation, exacerbated by the large fiscal stimulus that Mr Biden signed, has wrecked his standing as an economic steward. Having promised to manage the pandemic better than his predecessor, Mr Biden has found himself at the mercy of Covid-19 variants. And his supposed core competence in foreign policy has looked questionable since the chaotic withdrawal of American forces from Afghanistan. A fresh crisis in Ukraine now demands his attention.

任职一年多后，拜登陷入了低谷。挫折一个接一个。经过数月痛苦的谈判，拜登政府标志性的立法议程，一个名为“更好地重建”的庞大安全网和气候变化支出计划，但实际上已经夭折。拜登签署的大规模财政刺激计划加剧了高通胀，这破坏了他作为经济管家的地位。拜登曾承诺要比前任更好地应对新冠疫情，但他发现自己对新冠病毒变体无能为力。而且自从美军从阿富汗混乱的撤军后，他在外交政策方面的核心能力看上去也有问题。乌克兰的一场新危机现在也需要他的关注。