美联社新闻一分钟 2007-04-20

（单词翻译）

1. Virginia Tech gunman Cho Seung-Hui was picked on, pushed around and laughed at while attending a northern Virginia high school. Classmates say Cho almost never opened his mouth because of speech difficulties.

2. A long day in the witness chair for Attorney General Alberto Gonzales appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee. He fought off calls for his resignation over the firing of eight prosecutors². Gonzales's saying he did nothing improper³.

3. A jury is deliberating the fate of Mary Winkler, a Tennessee preacher's wife accused of shooting her husband. During the trial, Winkler said a shotgun went off by accident, but her marriage was allegedly troubled with physical and sexual abuse.

4. There's a newest sensation at an Australian zoo - a pair of two-week old Sumatran tiger cubs⁴, the rare breed weighing in at five and a half pounds. There are only 205 Sumatran cubs born in Asia and Australia in the past decade.

WORDS IN THE NEWS

1. pick on: phrase
If someone picks on you, they deliberately⁵ criticize you unfairly or treat you unkindly. (INFORMAL)

2. push around: phrase
If someone pushes you around, they give you orders in a rude and insulting way. (INFORMAL)

3. fight off: phrase
If you fight off something, for example an illness or an unpleasant thing, you succeed in getting rid of it and in not letting it overcome you.

4. prosecutor¹: n-count
In someone countries, a prosecutor is a lawyer or official who brings charges against someone or tries to prove in a trial that they are guilty.

5. weigh in: phrase
If someone weighs in at a particular weight, for example before competition a sports competition, their weight is measured at that amount. (JOURNALISM)