金融時報:愛槍者，美國選民

愛槍者，美國選民

愛槍的是美國選民，而且他們越來越愛槍，即使康州慘案發(fā)生后，控槍也是最不受歡迎的措施之一。FT專欄作家考德威爾(Christopher Caldwell)指出，是美國選民，而不是NRA，阻止政客控槍。

測試中可能遇到的詞匯和知識：

carnage ['kɑ?n?d?] n.大屠殺

Seung-Hui Cho 韓國學生趙承熙，由于精神不穩(wěn)定，于2007年4月16日在弗吉尼亞理工大學槍殺了包括自己在內(nèi)的33人。

foie gras ['fwɑ:'ɡrɑ:] n.鵝肝醬

constituency[k?n'st?tj??ns?] n.選民

disgruntled [d?s'gr?nt(?)ld] adj.不滿的；不高興的

It’s US voters who really love weapons (824 words)

Paul Helmke, president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, told a reporter at the National Journal: “This level of carnage is something that the elected officials aren’t going to be able to ignore.”

Mr Helmke’s words sound correct, as the US continues to reel from the murder of 20 six and seven-year-olds in a school in Newtown, Connecticut, in mid-December. Then again, his words also seemed correct when he first uttered them, which was back in April 2007, just after a disturbed undergraduate, Seung-Hui Cho, massacred 32 people on the campus of Virginia Polytechnic University before turning his weapons on himself. Elected officials have proved quite capable of ignoring Cho’s rampage, not to mention several more since then. There is no guarantee the outrage over Newtown will spur them to action, either.

In seeking to prevent the next massacre, it is natural and right to focus on mass gun ownership, American’s modern-day peculiar institution. There may be a quarter of a billion guns in private hands in the US, and yet the government regulates them less stringently than it does foie gras, tobacco or office humour.

President Barack Obama has called for the revival of a ban on so-called assault weapons that was in place for a decade after 1994. On Wednesday he put Vice-President Joe Biden in charge of a task force on gun violence. But Mr Biden will have little scope for action. The lobbying power of the National Rifle Association is part of the problem, but only a small part. The constituency for serious gun control in the US is shrinking.

We know where Mr Obama’s heart is on guns. He doesn’t like them. He would sincerely like to regulate them. To a roomful of rich San Francisco donors in 2008 he described disgruntled workers who “cling to guns and religion”. And yet it is hardly an exaggeration to say that gun control is a topic that the president has, until now, never discussed in public, except to describe himself as a defender of the second amendment, which protects “the right of the people to keep and bear arms”.

The problem for Mr Obama is that his party’s smartest political consultants decided several elections ago that hostility to guns was killing the Democratic party, and they have been proved right in almost every election since. Forty-seven per cent of Americans have guns in their homes.

After Bill Clinton signed his ban on assault weapons, Democrats lost the congressional majority they had held for four decades. Al Gore might have been elected president in 2000 had he not sought to paint himself as more liberal on guns than Bill Bradley, his Democratic primary challenger. Democrats won the Senate back in 2006 when they recruited gun-enthusiasts as candidates (Jim Webb in Virginia, Jon Tester in Montana, Bob Casey Jr in Pennsylvania), enforced a candidates’ vow of silence on gun control and then put the chamber under the control of a gun-friendly majority leader, Harry Reid.

This alliance has had consequences. Senators reportedly agreed to alter their landmark 2010 health reform to prevent insurers from charging higher premiums to gun owners.

It is voters, not the NRA, who are intimidating Democrats. For reasons no one has fully explained, Americans are getting fonder and fonder of firearms. In the 1950s, 60 per cent of Americans said they would support a ban on handguns, according to Gallup; in 2011, 73 per cent said they would oppose one. Even in the immediate aftermath of the Connecticut shootings, gun control strikes voters as among the least appealing remedies. This week Gallup showed 42 per cent felt gun bans would be effective, well behind beefing up the police (53 per cent), doing better mental-health screening (50 per cent) and cracking down on violent video games (47 per cent). After mass shootings, gun purchases soar as potential gun buyers decide to act before the law changes to stop them. After last summer’s slaughter (12 dead, 58 wounded) at a cinema complex in Aurora, Colorado, the state saw a 41 per cent rise in firearms background checks from one weekend to the next.

The anti-gun lobby is as well organised as the pro-gun lobby, even if it is not quite so big. It will not need much thinking or study to produce a programme of legislation. A likely purpose of the Biden “task force” will be to plot political strategy and to protect the president against accusations that he is exploiting a tragedy to pass the wish list of his political allies.

One unusual factor, though, is working in favour of fresh gun laws: never has there been a mass killing this far from the next congressional election. Representatives casting votes now will have 22 or 23 months to make gun owners forget. Any legislation they get through will probably be limited, partisan and resented. The alternative is no legislation at all.

請根據(jù)你所讀到的文章內(nèi)容，完成以下自測題目：

1."There is no guarantee the outrage over Newtown will spur them to action···"

Who is them?

A. Schools and universities.

B. Elected officials.

C. Pro-gun organizations.

D. National media.

答案(1)

2.What about President Obama?

A. He doesn't like guns.

B. He likes the disgruntled workers who favor guns.

C. He paints himself as a gun-enthusiast.

D. He believes that being friendly to guns is killing Democrats.

答案(2)

3.Which of the following can support this argument:

It is voters, not the NRA, who are intimidating Democrats.

A. Even immediately after the Connecticut shootings, gun control is among the least appealing.

B. Democrats chose a gun-friendly Senate leader Harry Reid.

C. After Clinton signed his ban on assault weapons, his party lost congressional majority.

D. All of above.

答案(3)

4.What can we learn from this article, about US society and politics?

A. US government regulates foei gras, tobacco and office humour.

B. "Liberal on guns" means "pro-gun".

C. You can buy guns without being background-checked in Colorado.

D. US Representatives are being elected every 4 years.

答案(4)

* * *

(1) 答案：B.Elected officials.

解釋：文章開頭，控槍團體人士認為：這個級別的慘案，是民選官員們無法忽視的。但是在第二段中，作者說，Elected officials have proved quite capable of ignoring Cho’s rampage··.因為反對控槍甚至禁槍的是美國的選民，所以，人們不能保證這一次能通過什么重要的立法。

(2) 答案：A.He doesn't like guns.

解釋：A是正確的。奧巴馬本人是不喜歡槍，并希望控槍的，甚至公開抱怨過熱愛槍支和宗教的工人。但是，民主黨的高參們早就敏銳地發(fā)現(xiàn)，對槍有敵意的話會讓選民拋棄民主黨，于是奧巴馬在這個問題上一直低調(diào)地將自己描述為a defender of the second amendment.

(3) 答案：D.All of above.

解釋：ABC都是正確答案。正反兩方面的經(jīng)驗教訓讓民主黨不愿控槍，而且越來越不愿。

(4) 答案：A.US government regulates foei gras, tobacco and office humour.

解釋：A是正確答案。美國政府對槍支的管控還不如對鵝肝醬（不符合健康飲食）、煙草，和辦公室幽默（不能有歧視色彩或性騷擾）的力度大。 BC與事實相反，liberal在美國的語境下常不是字面意思，它往往與傾向民主黨、傾向政府干預是同義詞，其反義詞conservative才是pro-gun的。

在科羅拉多州槍擊慘案發(fā)生后，購槍者背景調(diào)查數(shù)猛增，這說明這個經(jīng)常出現(xiàn)在西部片中的州也有背景調(diào)查要求，有犯罪前科和精神疾病的人不能隨便買槍。“眾議員們有22到23個月的時間讓人來淡忘他們的所為”，也就是說眾議員每兩年改選一次，下一次是2014的“中期選舉”。