美国国家公共电台 NPR NPR/Ipsos Poll: Half Of Americans Don't Trust Trump On North Korea

 

MARY LOUISE KELLY, HOST:

How to deal with North Korea? That's a question that'll be front and center when the U.N. General Assembly meets in New York this week. President Trump¹ will be there along with dozens of other world leaders. After the latest missile launch by North Korea last Friday, Trump told troops the U.S. and its allies will not be intimidated².

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PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: We will defend our people, our nations and our civilization from all who dare to threaten our way of life. This includes the regime of North Korea, which has once again shown its utter contempt for its neighbors and for the entire world community.

KELLY: Well, today the U.S. carried out bombing drills with the South Korean military in a show of force over the Korean Peninsula. Let's step back for a minute now and consider a new NPR/Ipsos poll on North Korea. It finds a narrow majority of Americans do not trust the president to handle North Korea and its nuclear threat. NPR's Scott Horsley is here now to talk about that. Hey, Scott.

SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE³: Good morning, Mary Louise.

KELLY: Good morning. So let me lay out these numbers. The poll finds 51 percent of those surveyed say they do not trust President Trump when it comes to North Korea, and of those, 40 percent say they feel strongly about that. So what does this tell us?

HORSLEY: Those are net figures, Mary Louise. Among Republicans, a large majority do trust the president. Among Democrats⁴, a large majority do not. With independents, it's a narrow majorities who say they do not trust the president. So some of this is just the sort of background partisan⁵-polarization we often see on issues like this. But with North Korea specifically, this may also reflect some concern about Trump's more bellicose⁶ tweets - you know, locked and loaded, and fire and fury.

Lynn Siegfred (ph) is a registered Republican who lives outside Milwaukee, and she has some concerns about Trump when it comes to dealing⁷ with Pyongyang.

LYNN SIEGFRED: Just based on how he's reacted to other world situations, it's really hard to say what he'll do. I mean, he's a bit unpredictable. I think that's the only way you can look at it.

HORSLEY: And that's deliberate on Trump's part. He sees it as a positive to keep America's adversaries⁸ guessing about what he might do. But as our polls suggest, that unpredictability also makes a lot of Americans a little nervous.

KELLY: Now, the poll also focused on the question of the president's authority to order a nuclear strike and found a lot of confusion here.

HORSLEY: Yeah. Most Americans don't believe the U.S. should ever use nuclear weapons, but we asked, what would it take if the president decided⁹ to launch a nuclear strike? And Ipsos' Vice¹⁰ President Chris Jackson says most people got the answer wrong.

CHRIS JACKSON: The real answer is he just orders it. There's no other check to him ordering a nuclear attack. But the majority of Americans, a large majority of Americans, three-quarters, think that there is some sort of check - that either he has to get approval from Congress or he has to coordinate¹¹ with the secretary of defense¹² or he has to get confirmation¹³ from the Joint¹⁴ Chiefs.

HORSLEY: Now, Cokie Roberts addressed this in one of our Ask Cokie segments just last month, and we may need to...

KELLY: I remember that.

HORSLEY: ...Might need to replay that segment because just 24 percent of the people in our survey knew the president can order a nuclear strike on his own authority.

KELLY: Well, that is a stunning¹⁵ thing to consider, any one person is invested with that kind of power. Just very quickly, Scott, one other point the poll addressed, and that was what responsibility the U.S. bears for defending allies - Japan, South Korea. What'd it find?

HORSLEY: Yeah. A large majority, 74 percent, say the U.S. has an obligation to protect those allies in East Asia. And here there was very little partisan divide. We saw similar responses from Republicans, Democrats and independents.

KELLY: All right. Thank you Scott.

HORSLEY: You're welcome.

KELLY: NPR's Scott Horsley.

1 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。

2 intimidated   

v.恐吓；威胁adj.害怕的；受到威胁的

参考例句：

• We try to make sure children don't feel intimidated on their first day at school. 我们努力确保孩子们在上学的第一天不胆怯。
• The thief intimidated the boy into not telling the police. 这个贼恫吓那男孩使他不敢向警察报告。 来自《简明英汉词典》

3 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。

4 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》

5 partisan   

adj.党派性的；游击队的；n.游击队员；党徒

参考例句：

• In their anger they forget all the partisan quarrels.愤怒之中，他们忘掉一切党派之争。
• The numerous newly created partisan detachments began working slowly towards that region.许多新建的游击队都开始慢慢地向那里移动。

6 bellicose   

adj.好战的；好争吵的

参考例句：

• He expressed alarm about the government's increasingly bellicose statements.他对政府越来越具挑衅性的声明表示担忧。
• Some irresponsible politicians made a bellicose remarks.一些不负责任的政客说出一些好战的话语。

7 dealing   

n.经商方法，待人态度

参考例句：

• This store has an excellent reputation for fair dealing.该商店因买卖公道而享有极高的声誉。
• His fair dealing earned our confidence.他的诚实的行为获得我们的信任。

8 adversaries   

n.对手，敌手( adversary的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• That would cause potential adversaries to recoil from a challenge. 这会迫使潜在的敌人在挑战面前退缩。 来自辞典例句
• Every adversaries are more comfortable with a predictable, coherent America. 就连敌人也会因有可以预料的，始终一致的美国而感到舒服得多。 来自辞典例句

9 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。

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 coordinate   

adj.同等的，协调的；n.同等者；vt.协作，协调

参考例句：

• You must coordinate what you said with what you did.你必须使你的言行一致。
• Maybe we can coordinate the relation of them.或许我们可以调和他们之间的关系。

12 defense   

n.防御，保卫；[pl.]防务工事；辩护，答辩

参考例句：

• The accused has the right to defense.被告人有权获得辩护。
• The war has impacted the area with military and defense workers.战争使那个地区挤满了军队和防御工程人员。

13 confirmation   

n.证实，确认，批准

参考例句：

• We are waiting for confirmation of the news.我们正在等待证实那个消息。
• We need confirmation in writing before we can send your order out.给你们发送订购的货物之前，我们需要书面确认。

14 joint   

adj.联合的，共同的；n.关节，接合处；v.连接，贴合

参考例句：

• I had a bad fall,which put my shoulder out of joint.我重重地摔了一跤，肩膀脫臼了。
• We wrote a letter in joint names.我们联名写了封信。

15 stunning   

adj.极好的；使人晕倒的

参考例句：

• His plays are distinguished only by their stunning mediocrity.他的戏剧与众不同之处就是平凡得出奇。
• The finished effect was absolutely stunning.完工后的效果非常美。