CNN 2011-12-03

 It’s the end of November, the start of the new day at CNN news, hello, I’m CZ. For today we are looking at the tension between three countries. And those are Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the United States.  

They are connected by the war on terror, but that’s also what’s causing the tension between them. There have been accusations¹ for months. Pakistan says Afghanistan is allowing militant² fighters to leave there. Afghanistan says Pakistan is supporting terrorists who launch attacks against Afghan forces. One official said the two countries could end up in a military conflict. The relationship between Pakistan and the United States is pretty rough right now too. The countries have fought together against al-Qaida, but the head of the terrorist group, Osama Bin³ Laden⁴ was found inside Pakistan. And Pakistan is still angry about the US raid inside its borders to kill Bin Laden. Pakistan is also upset about a NATO air strike last week that killed two dozen of Pakistani troops. US commanders are investigating what happened, Pakistan responded by boycotting⁵ a conference on the future of Afghanistan. Other officials said that decision would hurt efforts to try to create stability in this region. 

What’s the word? It’s a financial term that describes the business they can’t pay its debts. Bankrupt, that’s the word. 

Well now that word can be used to describe American airlines. It filed for bankruptcy⁶ yesterday. It doesn’t mean the company is going out of business, certain kinds of bankruptcy let companies reorganize and that’s what American airline is planning to do. During that time, the airline says it will honor all of its tickets and reservations and it plans to run a normal flights schedule. If you have a trip book on the American airlines, you should be affected⁷. American is one of the last major US airlines that actually hadn’t filed for bankruptcy. But the company officials said they weren’t able to compete with other airlines. That can spend less money because they have already gone through bankruptcy reorganizations. 

Congress says a busy few weeks ahead as the year winds down. This week lawmakers are considering whether or not to extend the couple things. A payroll⁸ tax cut, less money has been taking out of American workers’ paycheck which means more money in their pockets. If congress doesn’t extend it, it would be like rising taxes. But the extension would cause around 115 billion dollars, and that money would have to come from somewhere. Congress is also considering an extension of long term unappointed benefits. There sets run out for more than 2 million Americans to start at 22. The federal government has been helping⁹ paid to keep them going, but the price tag for extending nose is around 55 billion dollars. 

 

Well there’s a new study about head injuries and sports. You might be thinking football, this one is about soccer. It’s just a small study, just 39 players, so the results will need to be seen in other players before they can be considered conclusive¹⁰. The research says players who hit the ball with their heads too much could cause damage to their brains. The study looked at how water molecules¹¹ move through the white matter in the player’s brains. In healthy brains, there’s a solid pattern, in injured brains, the molecules move more randomly¹². So how many headers is too many? The study says if you take more than around 1300 headers per year, that’s when you could be causing some damage. To affect the similar head injuries in football, you can see it on this animation¹³. When the head is hit, the brain swells¹⁴ up. In the soccer study, scientists said the damage seem to be connected with memory problems and how quickly players’ brains could process information. Doctor S says the sport is what matters here.

The big issue is how the brain is affected.

Keep in mind. A lot of our focus has been on football specifically, we have been a lot reporting on this. But the thing to keep the mind when you think of the brain, it’s the brain movement within the score. That’s the bigger issue, even more so related to the brute¹⁵ force served in these impacts. So how the brain reacts to the force.

We want you to send us your I-report. You could do it on practically any digital camera, we did this on a phone. Tell us in 20 seconds or less “what are you looking forward to in 2012”. It could be graduation, getting a driver’s license¹⁶ or voting, the only thing is you gotta be at least 13 years old, and we only want hear you talking. So no music or anything like that. The deadline for this is Tuesday, December 8th. Send your I-report in this spot section at CNN student news.com. 

1 accusations   

n.指责( accusation的名词复数 )；指控；控告；（被告发、控告的）罪名

参考例句：

• There were accusations of plagiarism. 曾有过关于剽窃的指控。
• He remained unruffled by their accusations. 对于他们的指控他处之泰然。

2 militant   

adj.激进的，好斗的；n.激进分子，斗士

参考例句：

• Some militant leaders want to merge with white radicals.一些好斗的领导人要和白人中的激进派联合。
• He is a militant in the movement.他在那次运动中是个激进人物。

3 bin   

n.箱柜；vt.放入箱内；[计算机] DOS文件名:二进制目标文件

参考例句：

• He emptied several bags of rice into a bin.他把几袋米倒进大箱里。
• He threw the empty bottles in the bin.他把空瓶子扔进垃圾箱。

4 laden   

adj.装满了的；充满了的；负了重担的；苦恼的

参考例句：

• He is laden with heavy responsibility.他肩负重任。
• Dragging the fully laden boat across the sand dunes was no mean feat.将满载货物的船拖过沙丘是一件了不起的事。

5 boycotting   

抵制，拒绝参加( boycott的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• They're boycotting the shop because the people there are on strike. 他们抵制那家商店，因为那里的店员在罢工。
• The main opposition parties are boycotting the elections. 主要反对党都抵制此次选举。

6 bankruptcy   

n.破产；无偿付能力

参考例句：

• You will have to pull in if you want to escape bankruptcy.如果你想避免破产，就必须节省开支。
• His firm is just on thin ice of bankruptcy.他的商号正面临破产的危险。

7 affected   

adj.不自然的，假装的

参考例句：

• She showed an affected interest in our subject.她假装对我们的课题感到兴趣。
• His manners are affected.他的态度不自然。

8 payroll   

n.工资表，在职人员名单，工薪总额

参考例句：

• His yearly payroll is $1.2 million.他的年薪是120万美元。
• I can't wait to get my payroll check.我真等不及拿到我的工资单了。

9 helping   

n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的

参考例句：

• The poor children regularly pony up for a second helping of my hamburger. 那些可怜的孩子们总是要求我把我的汉堡包再给他们一份。
• By doing this, they may at times be helping to restore competition. 这样一来, 他在某些时候,有助于竞争的加强。

10 conclusive   

adj.最后的，结论的；确凿的，消除怀疑的

参考例句：

• They produced some fairly conclusive evidence.他们提供了一些相当确凿的证据。
• Franklin did not believe that the French tests were conclusive.富兰克林不相信这个法国人的实验是结论性的。

11 molecules   

分子( molecule的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The structure of molecules can be seen under an electron microscope. 分子的结构可在电子显微镜下观察到。
• Inside the reactor the large molecules are cracked into smaller molecules. 在反应堆里，大分子裂变为小分子。

12 randomly   

adv.随便地，未加计划地

参考例句：

• Within the hot gas chamber, molecules are moving randomly in all directions. 在灼热的气体燃烧室内，分子在各个方向上作无规运动。 来自辞典例句
• Transformed cells are loosely attached, rounded and randomly oriented. 转化细胞则不大贴壁、圆缩并呈杂乱分布。 来自辞典例句

13 animation   

n.活泼，兴奋，卡通片／动画片的制作

参考例句：

• They are full of animation as they talked about their childhood.当他们谈及童年的往事时都非常兴奋。
• The animation of China made a great progress.中国的卡通片制作取得很大发展。

14 swells   

增强( swell的第三人称单数 )； 肿胀； （使）凸出； 充满（激情）

参考例句：

• The waters were heaving up in great swells. 河水正在急剧上升。
• A barrel swells in the middle. 水桶中部隆起。

15 brute   

n.野兽，兽性

参考例句：

• The aggressor troops are not many degrees removed from the brute.侵略军简直象一群野兽。
• That dog is a dangerous brute.It bites people.那条狗是危险的畜牲，它咬人。

16 license   

n.执照，许可证，特许；v.许可，特许

参考例句：

• The foreign guest has a license on the person.这个外国客人随身携带执照。
• The driver was arrested for having false license plates on his car.司机由于使用假车牌而被捕。