手机APP下载

您现在的位置: 首页 > 英语听力 > 英语视频听力 > 美国政治速成小课堂 > 正文

第8课:国会领导制度

来源:可可英语 编辑:Magi   可可英语APP下载 |  可可官方微信:ikekenet

Hi, I'm Craig and this is Crash Course Government and Politics,

嗨,我是克雷格,这是《政府和政治速成课》。
and today we're going to examine the leadership structure of Congress!
今天我们将研究国会的领导结构!
I know, pretty exciting stuff!
我知道,非常令人兴奋的事情!
Now calm down, let me explain.
现在冷静下来,让我解释一下。
Are you ready to talk about Congressional leadership?
你准备好谈论国会领导了吗?
You better be.
你最好准备好了。
So, the Congressional leadership are the Congresspersons with titles like Majority Leader and Minority Whip,
所以,国会领导是国会议员,他们的头衔是多数党领袖和少数党鞭
and they have a lot to do with political parties,
他们和政党有很大关系,
so we're going to talk about what the political parties do in Congress as well.
所以我们也会讨论国会中的政党是如何运作的。
Even if you don't follow politics, you probably have heard of the name and titles, if not the functions, of the various leaders.
即使你不了解政治,你也可能听说过不同领导人的名字和头衔,如果不是他们的职能的话。
I'm going to need some help on this one, so... Let's go the Clone Zone!
我需要一些帮助,所以……让我们去克隆区!
In the Clone Zone today I've got House Clone and Senate Clone to help me explain Congressional leadership.
今天在克隆人区,我有众议院的克隆人和参议院的克隆人来帮助我解释国会的领导权。
House Clone in the house!
屋子里的众议院克隆人!
Take it away.
少来了。
The leader of the House of Representatives is the Speaker of the House, and he or she is the third most powerful person in the country.
众议院领袖是众议院议长,他或她是美国第三大最有权力的人。
The speaker is always elected by whichever party is in the majority.
议长总是由任何一个占多数的政党选出。
These elections take place every two years, because the whole House is elected every two years.
这些选举每两年举行一次,因为整个议院每两年选举一次。
That's a lot of elections!
有很多选举!
At the time of the shooting of the episode the Speaker of the House is John Boehner from Ohio, known for his tan, tears, and tacos.
这一集拍摄时,众议院议长是来自俄亥俄州的约翰·博纳,他以棕褐色皮肤、眼泪和玉米饼闻名。
Yeaah, he's oddly really good at making tacos.
是啊,奇怪的是他真的很擅长做玉米卷。
I had the barbecue pork at his house one time....
我有一次在他家烤肉……
Yeah, I had the beef taco!
是的,我吃了牛肉卷!
He called it la lengua.
他把它叫做la lengua。
Interesting choice.
有趣的选择。
Yeah. The speaker has two assistants to help run the house.
是的。议长有两名助手协助管理众议院。
The Majority Whip has the primary task of counting votes on important pieces of legislation,
多数党党鞭的主要任务是对重要的立法事项进行计票,
and making the party members vote along with their party.
并使党员和他们的党一起投票。
Whipping them into line, I suppose.
我想是把他们捆成一团吧。
The third in line is the House Majority Leader, who helps the majority and probably does other stuff,
排在第三位的是众议院多数党领袖,他帮助大多数人,可能还做其他事情,
but mainly he's chosen by the speaker because he's popular with particular factions within the party.
但他主要是被议长选中的,因为他在党内的特定派系中很受欢迎。
The Minority Party, that's the one with fewer members elected in a term, duh (scoffs), also has a Minority Leader, and a Minority Whip, but no speaker.
少数党,即在一届任期内选出的成员较少的党,也有少数党领袖和少数党党鞭,但没有。
The Minority Leader is the de facto spokesperson for the minority party in the House, which is why you often see him or her on TV, or on your phone, or, your iPad, or your pager.
少数党领袖实际上是众议院少数党议长,这就是为什么你经常在电视、手机、iPad或呼机上看到他或她。
I don't think you can see it on your pager.
我想你在寻呼机上看不到。
Hey, that was some pretty good stuff you said there, House Clone.
嘿,你说的很好,众议院克隆人。
What's the deal with the Senate, Senate Clone?
参议院呢?参议院克隆人。
Things are simpler over in the Senate because we have only 100 august members and not the rabble of 435 to try to “manage”;
在参议院,事情就简单多了,因为我们只有100个威严的议员,而不是435个试图“管理”的乌合之众;
The leader of the Senate is the Majority Leader,
参议院的领袖是多数党领袖,
and he (so far it's always been a he) is elected by the members of his party,
他(到目前为止一直是他)是由他所在政党的成员选举产生的,
which by definition is the majority party, the one with 51 or more members.
根据定义,这个政党是多数党,拥有51个或更多的成员。
There's also a Minority Leader, which, like the Minority Leader in the House, is the party's spokesperson.
还有一个少数党领袖,和众议院的少数党领袖一样,他是少数党议长。
The Vice President presides over the Senate sessions when he doesn't have anything better to do, even though it's one of his few official constitutional duties.
副总统在没有更好的事情可做时主持参议院会议,尽管这是他为数不多的官方宪法职责之一。
When the veep is off at a funeral, or undermining the president with one of his gaffes, the President pro tempore presides.
当副总统在葬礼上缺席,或者失态诋毁总统时,临时总统主持会议。
The President pro tem is a largely ceremonial role that is given to the most senior member of the majority party.
临时总统在很大程度上是一种仪式性的角色,由多数党中最资深的成员担任。
Senior here means longest serving, not necessarily oldest, although it can be the same thing.
这里的长者意味着服务时间最长,不一定是最老的,尽管这可能是同一件事。
No one would want to be a Congressional leader if there was no power involved,
如果没有权力参与,没有人会想成为国会领袖,
so it's important to know what powers these folks have, and how they exercise them.
所以了解这些人拥有哪些权力,以及他们如何行使这些权力是很重要的。
Also, I'm not supposed to do this, but let's go to the Thought Bubble.
另外,我不想这样做,但让我们进入思想泡沫。
I love saying that!
我喜欢这样说!
The primary way that leaders in both the House and Senate exercise power is through committee assignments.
参众两院领导人行使权力的主要方式是通过委员会分配。
By assigning certain members to certain committees, the leadership can ensure that their views will be represented on those committees.
通过向某些委员会指派某些成员,领导层可以确保他们的意见在这些委员会中得到代表。
Also, leaders can reward members with good committee assignments,
此外,领导者还可以用委员会的好任务奖励成员,
usually ones that allow members to connect with their constituents, or stay in the public eye, or punish wayward members with bad committee assignments.
通常是那些允许成员与自己的选民建立联系、或留在公众视线中、或以糟糕的委员会任务惩罚任性的成员的任务。
Like the committee for cleaning the toilets or something.
比如清洁厕所委员会之类的。
The Speaker of the House is especially powerful in his role assigning Congressmen to committees.
众议院议长在任命国会议员加入委员会方面的作用特别大。
Congressional leaders shape the agenda of Congress, having a huge say in which issues get discussed and how that discussion takes place.
国会领导人决定了国会的议程,在讨论问题和讨论如何进行方面有很大的发言权。
The Speaker is very influential here, although how debate happens in the House is actually decided by the House Rules Committee, which makes this a rather powerful committee to be on.
议长在这里很有影响力,尽管众议院的辩论实际上是由众议院规则委员会决定的,这使得这个委员会的影响力相当大。
The Senate doesn't have a rules committee, so there's no rules!
参议院没有规则委员会,所以没有规则!
Aw, yeah!
啊,是啊!
There's rules.
这是规则。
The body as a whole decides how long debate will go on, and whether amendments will be allowed,
作为一个整体,该机构将决定辩论将持续多久,以及修正案是否被允许,
but the Majority Leader, if he can control his party, still has a lot of say in what issues will get discussed.
但如果多数党领袖能够控制自己的政党,他在讨论哪些问题上仍有很大发言权。

Congressional Leadership.jpg

Agenda setting is often a negative power, which means that it is exercised by keeping items off the agenda rather than putting them on.

议程设置通常是一种消极的力量,这意味着它是通过不把项目放在议程上,而不是把它们放在议程上来执行的。
It's much easier to keep something from being debated at all than to manage the debate once it's started,
让某件事不被讨论要比在辩论一开始就做好准备容易得多,
and it's also rather difficult for the media to discuss an issue that's never brought up, no matter how much the public might ask;
而且对于媒体来说,讨论一个从未被提及的问题也相当困难,不管公众可能会问多少问题:
But why don't you talk about this thing that matters a lot to me?;
但你为什么不谈这件对我很重要的事?
Thanks, Thought Bubble.
谢谢,思想泡泡。
Speaking of the media, Congressional leaders can also wield power because they have greater access to the press and especially TV.
说到媒体,国会领导人也可以行使权力,因为他们有更多的机会接触媒体,特别是电视。
That's the thing people used to watch.
那是人们过去常看的东西。
Instead of YouTube.
而不是YouTube。
This is largely a matter of efficiency.
这在很大程度上是效率问题。
Media outlets have only so many reporters, and they aren't going to waste resources on the first-term Congressman from some district in upstate New York.
媒体只有这么多的记者,他们不会把资源浪费在纽约州北部某个地区的第一任国会议员身上。
No one even goes to upstate New York.
甚至没有人去纽约州北部。
Is there anyone in upstate New York?
纽约北部有人吗?
Has anyone ever gone to upstate New York?
有人去过纽约北部吗?
When the Speaker calls a press conference reporters show up, and the Majority Leader can usually get on the Sunday talk shows if he wants.
当演讲者召开记者招待会时,如果多数党领袖愿意,他通常可以参加周日的脱口秀节目。
Media access is a pretty handy way to set an agenda for the public.
媒体访问是为公众设定议程的一种非常方便的方式。
Finally, Congressional leaders exercise a lot of power through their ability to raise money and to funnel it into their colleague's campaign.
最后,国会领导人通过筹集资金并将其注入同事的竞选活动中来行使大量权力。
I want colleagues like that.
我想要这样的同事。
Each House of Congress has a special campaign committee
每个国会众议院都有一个特别的竞选委员会,
and whoever chairs it has the ability to shift campaign funds to the race that needs it most, or to the Congressperson he or she most wants to influence.
无论谁担任主席,都有能力将竞选资金转移到最需要的种族,或者转移到他或她最想影响的国会议员手中。
The official leadership has little trouble raising money since donors want to give to proven winners who have a lot of power, and get the most bang for their buck.
官方领导层在筹集资金方面没有什么困难,因为捐赠者希望把钱给那些实力雄厚、能得到最大回报的成功人士。
Since the leaders usually win their races easily, this is more true in the House than the Senate.
由于领导人通常很容易赢得他们的竞选,这在众议院比在参议院更真实。
They frequently have extra campaign money to give.
他们经常有额外的竞选资金可以捐赠。
Often the donations are given to political action committees, or PACs, which we'll talk about in another episode.
通常这些捐款是给政治行动委员会,或者叫PACs,我们会在另一集里讲到。
We're going to spend a lot of time talking about political parties, and probably having parties of our own in later episodes, especially their role in elections,
我们会花很多时间来讨论政党,可能在后面的章节中会有我们自己的政党,特别是他们在选举中的角色,
but they are really important once Congress is in office too.
但是一旦国会上台,他们也很重要。
One way that parties matter is incredibly obvious if you stop to think about it.
如果你停下来想一想,政党的重要性就会变得非常明显。
It's contained in the phrase “majority rules”.
它包含在短语“多数决定原则”中。
This is especially true in the House, where the majority party chooses the Speaker, but it's also the case in the Senate.
在众议院尤其如此,多数党选择议长,但在参议院也是如此。
This is why ultimately political parties organize and raise so much money to win elections:
这就是为什么各政党组织起来,筹集了这么多资金来赢得选举:
if one of the parties controls both houses and the presidency, as the Democrats did in 2008 through 2009, that party is much more likely to actually get things done.
如果其中一个政党控制了众议院和总统职位,就像民主党在2008年到2009年所做的那样,那么这个政党就更有可能真正地把事情做好。
The party that's the majority in each house is also the majority on all of that house's committees,
在每个议院中占多数的政党同时也是众议院所有委员会的多数党,
or at least the important ones, and, as we saw in the last episode, committees are where most of the legislative work in Congress gets done.
或者至少是重要委员会的多数党,正如我们在上节课看到的,委员会是国会大部分立法工作完成的地方。
Gets did.
明白了
As you probably figured out, the majority party chooses the committee chairs, too, so it's really got a lock on that sweet legislative agenda.
正如你可能知道的那样,多数党也会选择委员会主席,所以它确实锁定了甜蜜的立法议程。
Parties also can make Congress more efficient by providing a framework for cooperation.
各党派还可以通过提供合作框架来提高国会的效率。
The party provides a common set of values,
共和党提供了一套共同的价值观,
so a Republican from Florida and one from Wyoming will have something in common, even if their constituents don't.
因此一个来自佛罗里达州的共和党人和一个来自怀俄明州的共和党人会有一些共同之处,即使他们的选民没有。
These common values can be the basis of legislation. Sometimes.
这些共同的价值观可以成为立法的基础。有时。
But sometimes, that happens.
但有时,这种情况会发生。
Political parties also provide discipline in the process.
政党也在这个过程中提供纪律。
When a party is more unified it's easier for the leader to set an agenda and get the membership to stick to it.
当一个政党更加团结的时候,领导人就更容易制定一个议程,让党员们遵守它。
Right? Unified.
对吧?统一。
Lack of party unity can make it difficult for the leadership.
缺乏党的团结可能会使领导困难。
In 2011 a large group of very conservative newbie Congressmen associated with the Tea Party Movement made it difficult for Speaker Boehner to put forward an agenda.
2011年,一大批与茶党运动有关的非常保守的新议员让博纳议长难以提出议程。
The Tea Party caucus felt Boehner compromised too much with the Democrats, even though his agenda was, by some standards, pretty conservative.
茶党核心小组认为,博纳与民主党的妥协太多了,尽管以某些标准来看,他的议程相当保守。
As a result, Congress wasn't able to get much done, except make itself unpopular.
结果,国会没能做多少事情,除了让自己不受欢迎。
So, if you combine all this with the stuff we learned about Congressional committees, you should have a pretty good understanding of how Congress actually works.
所以,如果你把这些和我们从国会委员会学到的东西结合起来,你就会对国会的运作有一个很好的了解。
Yay! Understanding!
耶!理解万岁!
As this course progresses and you fall in love with politics,
随着课程的进展,你会爱上政治,
and myself, be on the lookout for how the leadership sets the agenda and pay attention to what issues might be floating around that aren't getting discussed in Congress.
和我,会注意领导层是如何制定议程的,会注意到有哪些问题是国会不会讨论的。
Understanding who the Congressional leaders are, and knowing their motivations, can give you a sense of why things do and don't get done by the government.
了解国会领导人是谁,了解他们的动机,可以让你明白为什么政府能做什么,不能做什么。
And, if you're lucky, you live in a district represented by a member of leadership.
如果你幸运的话,你住在一个由领导阶层代表的地区。
In that case, the person you vote for will be in the news all the time, which is kind of satisfying, I guess.
在这种情况下,你投票给的人会一直出现在新闻上,我想这是一种令人满意的方式。
Yeah, I voted for that guy! Yeah!
是啊,我投了那个家伙的票!是啊!
And now he's on the TV! Yeah!
现在他上了电视!是啊!
Thanks for watching.
谢谢收看。
We'll see you next week.
下周见。
What do you think, can we be unified?
你认为我们能统一吗?
Can we get things done?
我们能把事情做好吗?
We can't.
我们不能。
Crash Course Government and Politics is produced in association with PBS Digital Studios.
政府与政治速成班是与PBS数字工作室联合制作的。
Support for Crash Course US Government comes from Voqal.
美国政府对速成课程的支持来自Voqal。
Voqal supports non-profits that use technology and media to advance social equity.
Voqal支持利用技术和媒体促进社会公平的非营利组织。
Learn more about their mission and initiatives at voqal.org.
在voqal.org了解更多关于他们的使命和倡议。
Crash Course was made by all of these nice people.
速成班是所有这些善良的人做的。
Thanks for watching.
感谢收看。
Someday, maybe the eagle and I will get along.
也许有一天,我和老鹰会和睦相处。
Not today. Not today.
不是今天。不是今天。

重点单词   查看全部解释    
influential [.influ'enʃəl]

想一想再看

adj. 有权势的,有影响的
n. 有影响力的

 
district ['distrikt]

想一想再看

n. 区,地区,行政区
vt. 把 ... 划

 
constitutional [.kɔnsti'tju:ʃənl]

想一想再看

adj. 宪法的,合乎宪法的,体质的,组成的 n. 散步

 
wield [wi:ld]

想一想再看

vt. 行使,运用,支配,挥舞,使用(武器等)

联想记忆
equity ['ekwəti]

想一想再看

n. 权益,产权,(无固定利息的)股票,衡平法

联想记忆
efficiency [i'fiʃənsi]

想一想再看

n. 效率,功率

联想记忆
issue ['iʃju:]

想一想再看

n. 发行物,期刊号,争论点
vi. & vt

 
particular [pə'tikjulə]

想一想再看

adj. 特殊的,特别的,特定的,挑剔的
n.

联想记忆
buck [bʌk]

想一想再看

n. (美元)块钱 n. 钱,鹿皮,(鹿皮等)制物,小伙

联想记忆
unified

想一想再看

adj. 统一的;一致标准的 v. 统一;使一致(uni

 

    阅读本文的人还阅读了:
  • 第6课:国会选举 2018-08-24
  • 第7课:国会委员会 2018-09-10
  • 第9课:法案如何成为法律 2018-09-25
  • 第10课:国会的决定 2018-10-01
  • 第11课:总统权力(1) 2018-10-18
  • 发布评论我来说2句

      最新文章

      可可英语官方微信(微信号:ikekenet)

      每天向大家推送短小精悍的英语学习资料.

      添加方式1.扫描上方可可官方微信二维码。
      添加方式2.搜索微信号ikekenet添加即可。