NPR 2011-04-13

House and Senate leaders are working to line up the votes they'll need to pass a budget that funds the rest of the fiscal¹ year. NPR's Audie Cornish reports voting is expected to begin on Thursday.

Conservatives in the House from Tea Party favorites Mike Pence and Michelle Bachmann to the head of the Republican Study Committee Jim Jordan have indicated they will not support the compromise budget deal. Republican Majority Leader Eric Cantor says he expects there will be enough support to pass the bill before the current stopgap measure covering the government's operating expenses runs out this week, but Cantor says he has heard from those who were disappointed.

"I'm frustrated² too, you know. We, the House position was 61 billion. But this is the best deal we could have gotten given the situation that we were served up by the Democrats³ being in charge of the Senate and the White House."

The bill would cut more than $38 billion from this budget year, which ends in September. Audie Cornish, NPR News, the Capitol.

Well, the government's latest snapshot of the US trade deficit⁴ reveals it is shrinking, but NPR's Tamara Keith explains that's not necessarily a good sign for the US economy.

In February, US exports fell, but imports fell by even more. Ben Herzon is a senior economist⁵ at Macroeconomic Advisers⁶. He says these declines were unexpected and helped narrow the trade deficit.

"But the deficit declined a little bit, but, you know, there was weakness exhibited on both the export side and the import side."

This weakness prompted Herzon's firm and several other economic forecasters to lower expectations for economic growth in the first quarter.

"Today's trade report is another indicator⁷ suggesting a temporary lull⁸ in the pace of recovery in the first quarter."

Tomorrow, we'll get another closely watched indicator, retail⁹ sales. Tamara Keith, NPR News, Washington.

US stocks are still in the red, falling as much as 1% earlier today on disappointing earnings¹⁰ from ALCOA and worries about what Japan's nuclear crisis will mean for global markets. Senior economist Hugh Johnson says it's to be expected.

"They basically are saying let's reduce our exposure to stocks, and that's particularly true since everybody, individuals and institutions, have had such good profits in 2009, 2010 and early 2011."

At last check on Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 118 points or nearly 1% at 12,263 in trading of three billion shares, NASDAQ was off 27 again nearly 1% at 2,745, and the S&P 500 off ten at 1,314.

Just a moment ago, we mentioned Japan. Well, Japan is urging people not to panic over the government's decision to raise the rating of its nuclear crisis to 7, the highest level on the international scale. Officials believe the Fukushima Daiichi plant has emitted a lot more radiation than they originally thought since last month's earthquake and tsunami¹¹.

This is NPR News.

The Pentagon is investigating two deaths by friendly fire. A Marine¹² reservist and a Navy medic were killed in southern Afghanistan last week reportedly by a missile from a US drone.

A prominent organization of African-American journalists will not be at the next UNITY¹³ Conference, known to draw an unprecedented¹⁴ number of minority journalists to a single event. It's fueling concerns about the amount of coverage¹⁵ newsrooms planned to dedicate to minority-related issues. NPR's Alex Kellogg reports the latest development follows a recent study that finds that even though the number of journalists in newsrooms has increased overall, the percentages of Black, Asian, Latino and native American journalists are down for a third year in a row.

The National Association of Black Journalists is one of the largest and most powerful journalistic organizations in the country. But this week, it decided¹⁶ to pull out of UNITY. UNITY holds the popular conference every five years. The next is scheduled to occur in Las Vegas in 2012, but NABJ says it won't be there because the conference no longer provides enough revenue. NABJ also claims that it's been prevented from holding positions of power at next year's convention. UNITY was founded in 1994. It brought together journalism¹⁷ organizations representing Asian Americans, Hispanics, native Americans and Blacks. NABJ's decision comes just days after a report found the number of minorities in newsrooms has declined for the third year in a row. Alex Kellogg, NPR News, Washington.

Jury deliberations are over in the case of a white man charged with burning a predominantly black church in Massachusetts within hours of President Obama's election in 2008. Michael Jacques faces several charges, and he could get up to 60 years in prison if convicted.

1 fiscal   

adj.财政的，会计的，国库的，国库岁入的

参考例句：

• The increase of taxation is an important fiscal policy.增税是一项重要的财政政策。
• The government has two basic strategies of fiscal policy available.政府有两个可行的财政政策基本战略。

2 frustrated   

adj.挫败的，失意的，泄气的v.使不成功( frustrate的过去式和过去分词 )；挫败；使受挫折；令人沮丧

参考例句：

• It's very easy to get frustrated in this job. 这个工作很容易令人懊恼。
• The bad weather frustrated all our hopes of going out. 恶劣的天气破坏了我们出行的愿望。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 democrats   

n.民主主义者，民主人士( democrat的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The Democrats held a pep rally on Capitol Hill yesterday. 民主党昨天在国会山召开了竞选誓师大会。
• The democrats organize a filibuster in the senate. 民主党党员组织了阻挠议事。 来自《简明英汉词典》

4 deficit   

n.亏空，亏损；赤字，逆差

参考例句：

• The directors have reported a deficit of 2.5 million dollars.董事们报告赤字为250万美元。
• We have a great deficit this year.我们今年有很大亏损。

5 economist   

n.经济学家，经济专家，节俭的人

参考例句：

• He cast a professional economist's eyes on the problem.他以经济学行家的眼光审视这个问题。
• He's an economist who thinks he knows all the answers.他是个经济学家，自以为什么都懂。

6 advisers   

顾问，劝告者( adviser的名词复数 )； （指导大学新生学科问题等的）指导教授

参考例句：

• a member of the President's favoured circle of advisers 总统宠爱的顾问班子中的一员
• She withdrew to confer with her advisers before announcing a decision. 她先去请教顾问然后再宣布决定。

7 indicator   

n.指标；指示物，指示者；指示器

参考例句：

• Gold prices are often seen as an indicator of inflation.黃金价格常常被看作是通货膨胀的指标。
• His left-hand indicator is flashing.他左手边的转向灯正在闪亮。

8 lull   

v.使安静，使入睡，缓和，哄骗；n.暂停，间歇

参考例句：

• The drug put Simpson in a lull for thirty minutes.药物使辛普森安静了30分钟。
• Ground fighting flared up again after a two-week lull.经过两个星期的平静之后，地面战又突然爆发了。

9 retail   

v./n.零售；adv.以零售价格

参考例句：

• In this shop they retail tobacco and sweets.这家铺子零售香烟和糖果。
• These shoes retail at 10 yuan a pair.这些鞋子零卖10元一双。

10 earnings   

n.工资收人；利润，利益，所得

参考例句：

• That old man lives on the earnings of his daughter.那个老人靠他女儿的收入维持生活。
• Last year there was a 20% decrease in his earnings.去年他的收入减少了20%。

11 tsunami   

n.海啸

参考例句：

• Powerful quake sparks tsunami warning in Japan.大地震触发了日本的海啸预警。
• Coastlines all around the Indian Ocean inundated by a huge tsunami.大海啸把印度洋沿岸地区都淹没了。

12 marine   

adj.海的；海生的；航海的；海事的；n.水兵

参考例句：

• Marine creatures are those which live in the sea. 海洋生物是生存在海里的生物。
• When the war broke out,he volunteered for the Marine Corps.战争爆发时，他自愿参加了海军陆战队。

13 unity   

n.团结，联合，统一；和睦，协调

参考例句：

• When we speak of unity,we do not mean unprincipled peace.所谓团结，并非一团和气。
• We must strengthen our unity in the face of powerful enemies.大敌当前，我们必须加强团结。

14 unprecedented   

adj.无前例的，新奇的

参考例句：

• The air crash caused an unprecedented number of deaths.这次空难的死亡人数是空前的。
• A flood of this sort is really unprecedented.这样大的洪水真是十年九不遇。

15 coverage   

n.报导，保险范围，保险额，范围，覆盖

参考例句：

• There's little coverage of foreign news in the newspaper.报纸上几乎没有国外新闻报道。
• This is an insurance policy with extensive coverage.这是一项承保范围广泛的保险。

16 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

17 journalism   

n.新闻工作，报业

参考例句：

• He's a teacher but he does some journalism on the side.他是教师，可还兼职做一些新闻工作。
• He had an aptitude for journalism.他有从事新闻工作的才能。