美国国家公共电台 NPR Coal Miners Hope Trump Will Help Struggling Industry

 

MICHEL MARTIN, HOST: 

The inauguration¹ of President-Elect Donald Trump² is just 19 days away, and coal miners nationwide are waiting to see if Mr. Trump keeps election promises he made of new jobs through reopened mines. Reid Frazier of The Allegheny Front spoke³ to coal miners who say they don't expect miracles, but they do want results.

REID FRAZIER, BYLINE⁴: It's been over a year since the coal mine Dave Hathaway worked in closed. He spent most of 2016 sending out resumes, looking for work. The search gained urgency when his son Deacon was born in August.

DAVE HATHAWAY: I like when he gets milk drunk and just passes back out (laughter). Little coma⁵.

FRAZIER: On Election Day, Hathaway made a choice he hopes will help his long-term job prospects⁶.

HATHAWAY: I voted for Trump. I mean, a coal miner would be stupid not to.

FRAZIER: Hathaway has had a hard time finding a job to replace the $80,000 dollars he made in the coal mines under Greene County, Pa., a few miles from the West Virginia border. He just got hired at a nearby mine. He thinks the election of Donald Trump means he'll have a better shot at keeping this job even though he didn't really like a lot of the things Trump had to say during the campaign.

HATHAWAY: He is a wacko. He still - I mean, he's never going to stop being a wacko. You know what I mean? But, I mean, the things that he did say, the good stuff, was good for the coal mining community. But we'll see what happens.

FRAZIER: Trump won over coal country voters like Hathaway by promising⁷ to slash⁸ environmental regulations. That message clearly resonated in Greene County, where over the last four years a third of the coal mining jobs like Dave Hathaway's disappeared. Trump won the county by 40 points eight years after Barack Obama basically tied John McCain here. Tom Crooks⁹ witnessed the decline in coal firsthand. He's a vice¹⁰ president at R.G. Johnson, a construction firm that builds mine shafts¹¹.

TOM CROOKS: Two years ago this week we had 145 employees, and right now we have 22.

FRAZIER: Crooks doesn't use the phrase war on coal, but he does think federal regulations mounted by Obama's EPA have weighed down his industry. One example - the EPA's Clean Power Plan. That rule, which Trump has pledged to eliminate, limits the amount of carbon dioxide from coal-fired power plants. Instead, Crooks wants to see more government research into making coal as clean as possible.

CROOKS: And really what's happened over the last eight years is the smart people stopped working on coal, in part because of the way the federal government and the state governments looked at us. We just want them to start looking to coal as an option.

FRAZIER: Trump's promise of bringing the coal industry back has attracted interest from at least one Democratic lawmaker in this corner of Pennsylvania. Pam Snyder is a state representative in Greene County. Snyder invited the president-elect to visit her district to tell coal miners his specific plan to help them, but she has yet to hear back from him. Snyder won't say who she voted for, but she does think Trump can help the industry by rolling back environmental regulations.

PAM SNYDER: I care deeply about the environment. But there's a social environment, too, that I have to care deeply about. And when a big chunk¹² of my constituency is thrown into the unemployment lines, what about that social environment?

FRAZIER: Snyder acknowledges what many here know - there's only so much Donald Trump can do to bring back coal. Probably the biggest factor in coal's decline has been the low price of natural gas, some of it produced in gas wells right here in Greene County. Even though she doesn't expect Trump to return coal to the position it once held here, at this point she'll take a modest rebound¹³ over none at all. For NPR News, I'm Reid Frazier in Waynesburg, Pa.

1 inauguration   

n.开幕、就职典礼

参考例句：

• The inauguration of a President of the United States takes place on January 20.美国总统的就职典礼于一月二十日举行。
• Three celebrated tenors sang at the president's inauguration.3位著名的男高音歌手在总统就职仪式上演唱。

2 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

3 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

4 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

5 coma   

n.昏迷，昏迷状态

参考例句：

• The patient rallied from the coma.病人从昏迷中苏醒过来。
• She went into a coma after swallowing a whole bottle of sleeping pills.她吃了一整瓶安眠药后就昏迷过去了。

6 prospects   

n.希望，前途(恒为复数)

参考例句：

• There is a mood of pessimism in the company about future job prospects. 公司中有一种对工作前景悲观的情绪。
• They are less sanguine about the company's long-term prospects. 他们对公司的远景不那么乐观。

7 promising   

adj.有希望的，有前途的

参考例句：

• The results of the experiments are very promising.实验的结果充满了希望。
• We're trying to bring along one or two promising young swimmers.我们正设法培养出一两名有前途的年轻游泳选手。

8 slash   

vi.大幅度削减；vt.猛砍，尖锐抨击，大幅减少；n.猛砍，斜线，长切口，衣衩

参考例句：

• The shop plans to slash fur prices after Spring Festival.该店计划在春节之后把皮货降价。
• Don't slash your horse in that cruel way.不要那样残忍地鞭打你的马。

9 crooks   

n.骗子( crook的名词复数 )；罪犯；弯曲部分；（牧羊人或主教用的）弯拐杖v.弯成钩形( crook的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• The police are getting after the crooks in the city. 警察在城里追捕小偷。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The cops got the crooks. 警察捉到了那些罪犯。 来自《简明英汉词典》

10 vice   

n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的

参考例句：

• He guarded himself against vice.他避免染上坏习惯。
• They are sunk in the depth of vice.他们堕入了罪恶的深渊。

11 shafts   

n.轴( shaft的名词复数 )；（箭、高尔夫球棒等的）杆；通风井；一阵（疼痛、害怕等）

参考例句：

• He deliberately jerked the shafts to rock him a bit. 他故意的上下颠动车把，摇这个老猴子几下。 来自汉英文学 - 骆驼祥子
• Shafts were sunk, with tunnels dug laterally. 竖井已经打下，并且挖有横向矿道。 来自辞典例句

12 chunk   

n.厚片，大块，相当大的部分（数量）

参考例句：

• They had to be careful of floating chunks of ice.他们必须当心大块浮冰。
• The company owns a chunk of farmland near Gatwick Airport.该公司拥有盖特威克机场周边的大片农田。

13 rebound   

v.弹回；n.弹回，跳回

参考例句：

• The vibrations accompanying the rebound are the earth quake.伴随这种回弹的振动就是地震。
• Our evil example will rebound upon ourselves.我们的坏榜样会回到我们自己头上的。