Obama, Republicans Spar Over Taxes

 WHITE HOUSE — President Barack Obama and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt¹ Romney, Obama's probable Republican opponent in November's presidential election, are campaigning on economic issues.  The president campaigned Tuesday in the Midwestern state of Iowa, a likely battleground state in this year's election. President Obama went to Cedar² Rapids, Iowa to reconnect with voters who gave him his first victory in the 2008 campaign - a win in the Iowa caucuses³.

“This was a state that gave me a chance when nobody else would,” he said.

Public opinion surveys in this year’s race show the president and Mitt Romney virtually even.  But with unemployment at 8.2 percent, the majority of voters polled say they are unhappy with Obama’s performance on the economy.

Cedar Rapids was the president’s first campaign stop after challenging Congress to extend middle-class tax cuts for another year. “For us to give a trillion dollars’ worth of tax breaks to folks who do not need it - folks who do not need it and are not even asking for it - that does not make sense,” he said.

Obama wants to extend the tax cuts enacted⁴ during President George W. Bush's administration, but only for families earning up to $250,000 a year. Romney and other Republicans want the cuts extended for all taxpayers⁵.  The former Massachusetts governor campaigned Tuesday in the Western city of Grand Junction⁶, Colorado.

“Small businesses and entrepreneurs will be able to keep more of their money to build their business, which is what I want to have done because, for me, it is all about jobs," he said. "It is creating good jobs for the American people, so I want to bring those tax rates down.”

The president’s version of the tax cuts is almost certain to be voted down in the Republican-led House of Representatives, which will vote later this month on extending all of the Bush-era tax cuts.

House Speaker John Boehner condemned⁷ the Obama plan Tuesday in a speech to a convention of building contractors⁸ here in Washington.  He called it "class warfare⁹."“The president cannot run on his record because his policies, his economic policies, have failed," he said. "They have made things worse.  And as a result, he has turned to the politics of envy and division.  That is what this is about, nothing but pure politics.”

President Obama is portraying¹⁰ himself to voters as an advocate for middle-class Americans.  Mitt Romney has been highlighting his experience running a business and creating jobs.

1 mitt   

n.棒球手套，拳击手套，无指手套；vt.铐住，握手

参考例句：

• I gave him a baseball mitt for his birthday.为祝贺他的生日，我送给他一只棒球手套。
• Tom squeezed a mitt and a glove into the bag.汤姆把棒球手套和手套都塞进袋子里。

2 cedar   

n.雪松，香柏(木)

参考例句：

• The cedar was about five feet high and very shapely.那棵雪松约有五尺高,风姿优美。
• She struck the snow from the branches of an old cedar with gray lichen.她把长有灰色地衣的老雪松树枝上的雪打了下来。

3 caucuses   

n.（政党决定政策或推举竞选人的）核心成员( caucus的名词复数 )；决策干部；决策委员会；秘密会议

参考例句：

• Republican caucuses will happen in about 410 towns across Maine. 共和党团会议选举将在缅因州的约410个城镇进行。 来自互联网

4 enacted   

制定（法律），通过（法案）( enact的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• legislation enacted by parliament 由议会通过的法律
• Outside in the little lobby another scene was begin enacted. 外面的小休息室里又是另一番景象。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹

5 taxpayers   

纳税人，纳税的机构( taxpayer的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Finance for education comes from taxpayers. 教育经费来自纳税人。
• She was declaiming against the waste of the taxpayers' money. 她慷慨陈词猛烈抨击对纳税人金钱的浪费。

6 junction   

n.连接，接合；交叉点，接合处，枢纽站

参考例句：

• There's a bridge at the junction of the two rivers.两河的汇合处有座桥。
• You must give way when you come to this junction.你到了这个路口必须让路。

7 condemned   

adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• He condemned the hypocrisy of those politicians who do one thing and say another. 他谴责了那些说一套做一套的政客的虚伪。
• The policy has been condemned as a regressive step. 这项政策被认为是一种倒退而受到谴责。

8 contractors   

n.（建筑、监造中的）承包人( contractor的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• We got estimates from three different contractors before accepting the lowest. 我们得到3个承包商的报价后，接受了最低的报价。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Contractors winning construction jobs had to kick back 2 per cent of the contract price to the mafia. 赢得建筑工作的承包商得抽出合同价格的百分之二的回扣给黑手党。 来自《简明英汉词典》

9 warfare   

n.战争(状态)；斗争；冲突

参考例句：

• He addressed the audience on the subject of atomic warfare.他向听众演讲有关原子战争的问题。
• Their struggle consists mainly in peasant guerrilla warfare.他们的斗争主要是农民游击战。

10 portraying   

v.画像( portray的现在分词 )；描述；描绘；描画

参考例句：

• The artist has succeeded in portraying my father to the life. 那位画家把我的父亲画得惟妙惟肖。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Ding Ling was good at portraying figures through careful and refined description of human psychology. 《莎菲女士的日记》是丁玲的成名作，曾引起强烈的社会反响。 来自汉英文学 - 中国现代小说