[1010G]Economist阅读帖 by BridgeRain

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第一篇文章  红色表示重点词汇或词组  蓝色表示好的用法

1.We all want to change the world

Dealing with climate change might mean tinkering with（徒劳无益地空忙，小修补） the oceans and the atmosphere. Those who could do so would like the regulations to be clear

Mar 31st 2010 | ASILOMAR | From The Economist print edition

IN 1975 scientists expert in a new and potentially world-changing technology, genetic engineering, gathered at Asilomar, on the Monterey peninsula in California, to ponder the ethics and safety of the course they were embarking on（着手，从事）. The year before, they had imposed on themselves a voluntary moratorium on experiments which involved the transfer of genes from one species to another, amid concerns about the risk to human health and to the environment which such “transgenic” creations might pose. That decision gave the wider world confidence that the emerging field of biotechnology was taking its responsibilities seriously, which meant that the Asilomar conference was able to help shape a safety regime（组织方法） that allowed the moratorium to be lifted. That, in turn, paved the way for the subsequent boom（繁荣昌盛） in molecular biology and biotechnology.

Another bunch of （大量，大批）researchers, accompanied by policy experts, social scientists and journalists, gathered in Asilomar between March 22nd and 26th, hoped for a similar outcome to their deliberations. This time the topic under discussion was not genetic engineering but geoengineering—deliberately rather than accidentally changing the world’s environment.

Geoengineering is an umbrella term for large-scale actions intended to combat（防止，减轻） the climate-changing effects of greenhouse-gas emissions without actually curbing those emissions. Like genetic engineering was in the 1970s, the very idea of geoengineering is controversial（引起争议的）. Most of those who fear climate change would prefer to stop it by reducing greenhouse-gas emissions. Geoengineers argue that this may prove insufficient（不足的） and that ways of tinkering directly with the atmosphere and the oceans need to be studied. Some would like to carry out preliminary experiments, and wish to do so in a clear regulatory framework so that they know what is allowed and what is not.

Ruled in or ruled out?

Like the biotechnology of the 1970s, geoengineering cannot be treated just as science-as-usual. There are, however, important differences between the subjects. One is that in the 1970s it was clear that the ability to move genes between creatures was going to bring about a huge change in the practice of science itself, and biologists were eager for that to happen. Modern climate scientists, by contrast(相比之下), usually see geoengineering research as niche, if not fringe, stuff. Many wish it would go away completely. Another difference is that in the 1970s there was a worry that DNA experiments could in themselves present dangers. With geoengineering the dangers are more likely to be caused by large-scale deployment（调度） than by any individual scientific experiment.

There are two broad approaches to geoengineering. One is to reduce the amount of incoming sunlight that the planet absorbs. The other is to suck carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and put it somewhere else. The second of these approaches is not particularly in need of new regulation. Whether the carbon dioxide is captured by real trees, as some would like, or by artificial devices, environmental problems caused by the process would be local ones at the site of the sucking. Underground storage of the captured carbon would be regulated in the same way that carbon dioxide sequestered from power stations might be—again, for the most part, a local matter. Even the most potentially（潜在的） disturbing suggestion, which involves fertilising the oceans with iron in order to promote the growth of planktonic algae (in the hope that they would sink to the seabed, taking their carbon with them), can be covered by the London Convention on marine pollution, which regulates dumping at sea, and has already addressed itself to research in the area.

Reducing incoming sunlight, by contrast, is fraught with（充满担心） danger. While it is possible to imagine doing so in a way that cancels out the change in average temperature caused by an increase in carbon dioxide, such a reduction would not simply restore the status quo（现状）. Local temperatures would still change in some places, as would ocean currents, rainfall patterns, soil moisture（水分） and photosynthesis（光合作用）. Sunshine reduction, then, clearly needs to be regulated. (It also needs to be renamed: these techniques are currently referred to as “Solar Radiation Management”, a term invented half in jest that has somehow stuck.)

One set of small-scale sunshine-reduction experiments discussed in Asilomar would send plumes of various sulphurous（硫磺） fluids in the stratosphere（平流层） to find out which would best produce a haze of small particles similar to those that cool the planet after a large volcanic eruption. Another would attempt to whiten clouds over the oceans by wafting tiny salt particles up into them. Thus enriched, the clouds would, in theory, tend to have more, smaller droplets in them（注意插入语的使用）. More droplets mean more reflection and less sunshine down below. A team of scientists and engineers that calls itself Silver Lining is working on this idea, with some of its research paid for with money from Bill Gates.

In both cases, the experiments would be tiny compared with what people are already doing. In the week of the Asilomar meeting Science published evidence that more pollutants than previously appreciated, including oxides of（氧化物） sulphur, are getting into the lower stratosphere. Exhaust（排气管） gases from shipping already brighten clouds over various bits of the ocean, and in so doing are thought to cool the Earth appreciably. As new regulations clean up shipping fuels in order to improve air quality in coastal regions, that brightening effect will be reduced, adding to the world’s warming in a sort of inadvertent（粗心大意的, 因疏忽造成的, 非故意的） reverse geoengineering.

Researchers in the field fear, though, that despite being much smaller than existing, inadvertent changes, their experiments will nevertheless become a focus for strident opposition unless there is a clear and respectable system of regulation. Without that, each experiment, however harmless, would be forced to serve as a proxy（替代物） for the whole approach—a recipe for strangulation by protest and bureaucracy（红宝词汇）.体会插入语的用法

In retrospect, the Asilomar meeting may come to be seen as a step towards that respectable system, but probably only a small one. The participants（参与者） did not produce clear recommendations, but they generally endorsed（赞同） a set of five overarching principles for the regulation of the field that were presented recently to the British Parliament by Steve Rayner, a professor at the Saïd Business School, in Oxford.

The “Oxford principles”, as they are known, hold that geoengineering should be regulated as a public good, in that, since people cannot opt out（选择）, the whole proceeding has to be in a well-defined public interest; that decisions defining the extent of that interest should be made with public participation; that all attempts at geoengineering research should be made public and their results disseminated（传播）
openly; that there should be an independent assessment of the impacts of any geoengineering research proposal; and that governing arrangements be made clear prior to any actual use of the technologies.

The conference’s organising committee is now working on a further statement of principles, to be released later. Meanwhile Britain’s main scientific academy, the Royal Society, and the Academy of Sciences for the Developing World, which has members from around 90 countries, are planning further discussions that will culminate at（以……告终） a meeting to be held this November.

Producing plausible(声明、争论等)似乎是真的 policies and ways for the public to have a say on them will be hard—harder, perhaps, than the practical problem of coming up with ways to suck up a bit of carbon or reduce incoming sunshine. As Andrew Mathews, an anthropologist at the University of California, Santa Cruz, puts it, it is not just a matter of constructing a switch, it is a matter of constructing a hand you trust to flip it.

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America and the yuan

2.The truth hurts

Will the Treasury（财政部） call China a currency manipulator（操纵者）?

Mar 31st 2010 | WASHINGTON, DC | From The Economist print edition

TO MOST people, to say that China holds down the value of its currency to boost（促进） its exports is to state the obvious. Not, though, to America’s Treasury Department. By law it must report twice a year on which countries fiddle（篡改） their exchange rates at the world’s expense. China was last fingered（告发） in 1994. Ever since then, the Treasury has concluded that the designation would do more harm than good. Speculation is growing that it may decide differently in its next report, due on April 15th.

The mood in America resembles that in 2005, when the Senate（参议院） voted to hit China with tariffs（关税） of 27.5% and the Treasury ratcheted up its rhetoric. China abruptly(意外地) moved to a managed float for the yuan. It was allowed to appreciate（增值） by 20% over the next three years before a halt（暂停） was called during the banking panic of 2008.

China seems more determined to resist pressure this time, though, and can rightly point out that its fiscal stimulus（促进因素） has halved（减半） its current-account surplus(顺差) since 2007. America’s trade deficit（逆差） with China has edged a bit lower (see chart), though further declines seem unlikely, now that its own recovery is under way.

Nonetheless（虽然如此）, the weight of opinion in America is running heavily against China. Unemployment has doubled since 2005 and Barack Obama wants exports to lead the recovery. That will be harder if China sticks to its export-centric（出口导向） yuan policy.

Businesses have also become less reliable defenders of China, rankled by measures such as an edict last autumn which, according to American technology companies, virtually shuts them out of Chinese government procurement（政府采购）. The hacking attacks on Google and the trial of Rio Tinto executives have hardly helped. “A whole slew of（大量的） multinationals（跨国公司） I’ve talked to are increasingly fed up with how they are being dealt with on micro, industry, product-specific stuff,” says Fred Bergsten, director of the Peterson Institute for International Economics, a think-tank（智库）.

Charles Schumer, a Democratic senator（民主党参议员）, and Lindsey Graham, a Republican, authors of the 2005 China tariff bill that probably pushed China to move, have introduced a variant（不同版本） that would force the Treasury to make the designation and then seek redress（补偿） through the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organisation, and unilatera（单方面的） duties. One manufacturing-union group has produced maps showing just how many jobs each congressional district and state has lost to China.

A popular view in Washington is that the Treasury could call China a manipulator to wrest control of the issue from hotheads in Congress. The practical consequences（后果） are small: it requires the United States only to consult with（磋商） the offending country, something the two already do frequently. It would also fulfil（实现） Mr Obama’s promise to use America’s trade enforcement tools more vigorously（频繁地）. But Nicholas Lardy, also of the Peterson Institute, thinks that—far from restraining others—a Treasury designation of China as a manipulator would be “like throwing red meat to the Congress and enhancing（提高） the possibility they pass a currency bill.”

The administration（政府）’s best hope is that China moves of its own accord before events in Congress or elsewhere force a confrontation（冲突）. Tim Geithner, the treasury secretary, is surprisingly confident that China will act. Sander Levin, the usually interventionist（干预）-minded chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee which oversees（监督） trade matters, advocates multilateral rather than unilateral pressure. So perhaps the administration will give China one last chance and seek a multilateral remedy（解决办法） at the G20 in June. If China still fails to respond, the Treasury, by the time of its autumn report, will no longer be able to deny the obvious.

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Unrest（动乱） in China's cities
3.Minor explosions
The simmering（即将爆发的） anger of urban China
Mar 31st 2010 | BEIJING | From The Economist print edition

ALTERCATIONS(争辩) between unlicensed street vendors（小贩） and law-enforcement（执法） officers are commonplace in China. Sometimes they escalate into(升级) scuffles or riots（暴乱）. But a night-time rampage by hundreds of citizens in the southern city of Kunming, capital of Yunnan province, on March 26th-27th has aroused(引起) fresh concerns about a malaise（隐忧）
in Chinese cities.

The violence in Kunming reportedly left dozens injured. Ten government vehicles（车辆） were overturned and some set on fire by crowds enraged by rumours（传言） that a vendor had been killed by an officer of Kunming’s “City Administration and Law Enforcement Bureau”. This agency, commonly known by its Chinese abbreviation chengguan, is a junior cousin to the police force. It is responsible for matters such as clearing the streets of illegal pedlars（小贩） and supervising house demolitions（拆迁）. Chengguan officers are renowned for their thuggish（暗杀的）, fine-gouging ways.

The vendor, as it turned out, had not been killed. But the rioters could be forgiven for assuming the worst. In the past couple of years even some state-controlled newspapers have made common cause with critics of chengguan activities across the country. In January 2008 a man in the central province of Hubei was beaten to death when he attempted to film（拍摄） officers trying to stop a protest by villagers against a dump for urban waste. “Another citizen has fallen. When will we stand up and restrain the chengguan system?” wrote a newspaper columnist（专栏作家） at the time.

The Chinese press has reported others having fallen to the chengguan since: a pedlar left severely brain-damaged after a mauling（虐待） in Shanghai last July; a man beaten to death in Beijing in October after being accused of illegally using his motorcycle as a taxi. One case prompted a letter to China’s legislature（立法机关）. A woman in the province of Sichuan died last November after setting herself on fire in protest when officers burst into her home to enforce a demolition order. In response, a group of Beijing law professors wrote proposing tighter controls on demolition procedures.

Protests triggered by（触发） chengguan brutality have rattled（使紧张） the authorities, hypersensitive as they are to any urban unrest that might turn against the government. Last May hundreds of university students protested in the eastern city of Nanjing against the alleged beating of a classmate. The following month police rescued several chengguan who were captured by rioters in a town in the southern province of Guangdong. In Kunming last October protesters put the corpse（尸体） of a pedicab-driver, who had allegedly been killed by chengguan, on a gurney and wheeled it to a chengguan office where they burned paper as a traditional funeral offering (the authorities said he had died naturally). That same month a Shanghai man became famous when he chopped off（切掉）
part of a finger in protest at what he said was an attempt to frame（诬告） him as an illegal taxi-driver.

The latest flare-up in Kunming has also attracted considerable（相当多的） press attention. One newspaper website described the eruption as symptomatic of public resentment against local officialdom that could blow up like “a bomb at any time”. Another newspaper attacked the Kunming authorities for releasing only bare details and not taking questions at a press briefing（新闻发布会） on the incident. A third suggested the official version of events, that the vendor had simply fallen over, might be a “lie” (a word even used in the headline). It quoted witnesses saying an officer had pushed over her pedicab, pinning（压住） the woman under it. A gas canister（金属罐） had then rolled on top of her, knocking her unconscious.

In recent weeks, a speech on social unrest by a prominent Chinese scholar, Yu Jianrong, has been widely circulated on the internet in China. In it Mr Yu describes the emergence in recent years of a new type of social unrest, which he calls “venting incidents”: brief, unorganised outbursts of public rage against the authorities or the wealthy. China’s efforts to enforce “rigid stability”, he argues, were not sustainable and could result in “massive social catastrophe（大灾难）”. Even government officials, he notes, are giving warning in private of worse to come.

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America and central Europe

4.Guess who's coming to dinner?
Barack Obama tries to fix damaged relations with central European allies（同盟）
Apr 9th 2010 | From The Economist online

THE Obama administration’s closest European allies are oddly（古怪地） tricky（复杂的） to please. An invitation to the leaders of the 11 ex-communist members of NATO to dine with（与……共进晚餐） the president in Prague on April 8th was meant to repair a relationship both cherished（珍视）
and moaned（抱怨） about.

The president was in Prague to sign a new nuclear disarmament agreement with Russia. Even the twitchiest ex-communist countries don’t mind that. The choice of a key American ally as the signing location was meant to signal America’s continued commitment to the region’s security（地区安全）. Mr Obama could have simply headed home after the ceremony, or travelled on to a meeting with one big ally. Instead, he chose to invite, admittedly at short notice, all of his ex-communist allies to talk.（注意体会插入语的用法）

Yet indigestion preceded the meal. Some queried（怀疑） the mixture of presidents and prime ministers. Others said the invitation to the ex-communist leaders as a group reinforced（加强） Donald Rumsfeld’s pre-Iraq war division of “new Europe” (Atlanticist, hawkish) and the peaceniks of “old Europe”. Some western European politicians lamented（为……惋惜） the fact that no EU representative was asked to attend. The Lithuanian president, Dalia Grybauskaite, reinforced her reputation for unpredictable behaviour by turning down（拒绝） the invitation. One of her advisers explained that the dinner would involve “no decision-making”, that it was organised by junior officials, that its outcome was unclear and that she would have only two minutes to talk one-on-one with Mr Obama. She would prefer to meet him properly in Washington, DC. Coming from a country roughly one-hundredth America’s size, that showed a startling（令人震惊的） self-confidence, even by Lithuanian standards.

The people running the event also struggled to contain（控制） the damage caused by a remark by a “senior US official” quoted in the New York Times, who claimed that the president would “seek to impress upon regional leaders a new attitude toward Russia in which the outmoded fears of Russians hiding under the bed are a thing of the past”. If true, that would have set nerves jangling from the Baltic to the Black sea: the ex-communist countries do not think that their worries about Russian mischief-making are outdated. A phalanx of other senior US officials categorically（明确地） denied that any such thinking lay behind the dinner.

Mr Obama had plenty of time to enjoy his scallops（扇贝）, prime rib of beef and strawberry mousse as the assembled（组合的） leaders introduced themselves. Nobody said anything controversial. The ex-communist countries want to be seen as helpful, not troublesome. Despite some gaffes（出丑） last year, the administration is proving popular and effective in the region. It maintains supervision of the western Balkans. Where the Bush administration did little on NATO contingency plans for the Baltic states, the alliance’s most vulnerable members, Mr Obama has demanded, publicly, that they be drawn up. That prompted a spectacular German flip-flop. The new missile defence scheme (if it gets built) should be bigger and better than the one it ditched in September last year.

Yet the real problem in the US relationship with central Europe is in the ingredients（原料）, not the cooking. The days of instinctive（本能的） Atlanticism in the region are over, as Ms Grybauskaite’s haughty stance—which would once have been inconceivable—demonstrates. The ex-communist allies’ contribution to solving most of America’s problems is marginal（微小的）, at best. Europe itself is divided and lacks credibility in the eyes of busy Americans. The failure of the EU and NATO to work together on European security is particularly damaging. Such problems do not disappear over dinner.

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American politics

5.Democracy in America
Barack Obama and the Supreme Court（最高法庭）
The contenders

Apr 10th 2010, 3:26 by R.M. | WASHINGTON


NOMINATIONS（提名） to the Supreme Court are fraught with（充满着） risk and opportunity. Ronald Reagan put his mark on the court by appointing three able justices in Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia and Anthony Kennedy. But many will only remember his failed nomination of Robert Bork, whose ugly confirmation battle set the tone for all those to follow. Mr Reagan's successor(继任者), George Bush, disappointed conservatives with the nomination of David Souter, which tipped the court to the left（作为里根的继任者，乔治布什令人失望地提名大卫Souter，导致法庭出现左倾，激进）. In an effort to（为了） repent（表示懊悔）
he chose Clarence Thomas with his next appointment（任期）, resulting in tumultuous（嘈杂的） hearings that featured allegations of sexual improprieties. Mr Bush's son also faced difficulty selling one of his favoured nominees: Harriet Miers, his underqualified（构词法，不合格的）
legal counsel（顾问）. But after withdrawing her nomination he tipped the court back to the right by replacing Sandra Day O'Connor, a swing vote, with Samuel Alito, a more conservative jurist.

With the retirement of John Paul Stevens, Barack Obama now has a second opportunity to shape the court, though his ability to alter the body's ideological（意识形态） make-up is limited. Mr Stevens is the leader of the court's left wing (despite being appointed by Gerald Ford) and Mr Obama is expected to choose a justice in his mould. But Mr Stevens has been an understated（沉默寡言的） leader, and Mr Obama may choose to rein fuse the court with some of the liberal passion that past jurists, like William Brennan and Thurgood Marshal, displayed during their time on the bench.

There have been rumblings（余热？） of Mr Stevens's departure for weeks, so the White House was prepared for his announcement. Mr Obama has said that he hopes to announce a nominee soon. Here is a look at some of the top contenders（竞争者） for the seat:

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Elana Kagan

Age: 49
Current job: Solicitor General (confirmed by a 61-31 vote in March 2009)
Education: Princeton University, 1981 | Harvard Law School, 1986

Why she works: She has never been a judge. That might not sound like a qualification, but it means she has no judicial record for Republicans to pore over（吹毛求疵）. In fact, she doesn't have much of a record at all. As Tom Goldstein of ScotusBlog points out: "I don’t know anyone who has had a conversation with her in which she expressed a personal conviction（个人信仰）
on a question of constitutional law in the past decade." Add to that a successful stint as dean（院长） of Harvard Law School, where she hired many conservative as well as liberal professors, and support from some prominent Republican lawyers, and you have yourself a prohibitive favourite.
（补充一点，作为一个成功的哈佛法学院院长，曾同时聘用保守和激进的律师，而且被一些著名的共和党律师支持，你会发现她是一个不可抗拒的选择。）(Oh, also, we predicted this back in January 2009.)

Why she doesn't work: David Souter. Mr Souter was the last "stealth（秘密的） nominee" and what a disappointment he has been for conservatives. One of the reasons Ms Kagan looks easy to confirm is because she is a blank slate（无经验的候选人）. But can Mr Obama be confident that she holds a judicial philosophy in line with（与……一致） his own view of the law? Ms Kagan served under Bill Clinton, first as associate（非正式） White House counsel then in two domestic-policy positions. So one imagines any hints（迹象） of a conservative disposition would have been
sniffed out
by now.

Ms Kagan is also likely to face criticism from Republicans over her effort to bar military recruiters from Harvard's campus in protest of the "don't ask, don't tell" policy. (In fact, she already has.) She joined an amicus（法律顾问） brief on the issue which was rejected by the Supreme Court in an 8-0 decision. Still, don't be surprised if liberal groups also express disappointment over a Kagan nomination (which might be politically useful). They will be upset by her arguments as solicitor general for broad executive powers to fight the war on terror, and would prefer to see our next contender nominated.

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Diane Wood

Age: 59
Current job: Judge, US Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit in Chicago (confirmed unanimously in June 1995)
Education: University of Texas at Austin, 1971 | University of Texas Law School, 1975

Why she works: She is a moderately（适度地） liberal judge who is as articulate（口齿清晰的） as she is bright. Mr Goldstein of ScotusBlog says that at a hearing she "would be no less impressive than was Chief Justice Roberts." She may be the most respected jurist on the left today—she was the first person interviewed by Mr Obama after Mr Souter retired. She has a record of standing up to（对抗）
her conservative colleagues (Justices Richard Posner and Frank Easterbrook) and ruling in line with liberal thinking on divisive issues like abortion. She believes in a dynamic constitution, making her the perfect counterweight to the court's conservatives. And, for what it's worth, she is Protestant（新教徒）.

Why she doesn't work: She has a track record（记录） that could fill up conservative press releases and lead to a confirmation battle much more intense than the one over Sonia Sotomayor last summer. Stuart Taylor notes, "Some conservatives have assailed（攻击） her as a hard-left judicial culture warrior whose passion for abortion rights is so strong that (they contend) she has disregarded（构词法，无视） Supreme Court precedents; and whose writings suggest that she might indeed strip 'under God' from the Pledge of Allegiance（GRE，忠诚） and make same-sex marriage a constitutional right." If she is nominated you will hear about the case of Scheidler v National Organization for Women, in which Ms Wood ruled RICO laws were properly applied against abortion protesters who were trying to block access to clinics. By an 8-1 vote the Supreme Court reversed（倒转） the decision (with only Mr Stevens dissenting), but ScotusBlog notes that "Wood’s opinion was a judgment primarily about injunctive relief and the breadth of the racketeering statute, not on the right to provide an abortion or to protest."

Is Mr Obama looking for a fight? With a 59-vote majority and the mid-terms fast approaching, perhaps not. On the other hand, Ms Wood is the most impressive candidate on his list and would likely be confirmed eventually. One last point against her: she's ten years older than Ms Kagan, which could mean ten fewer years of liberal influence on the court.
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Merrick Garland

Age: 57
Current job: Judge, US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit (confirmed by a 76-23 vote in March 1997)
Education: Harvard College, 1974 | Harvard Law School, 1977

Why he works: Mr Garland is another bright and articulate judge. He is more moderate than Mr Stevens and has earned the respect of many Republicans. He has even received praise from Orrin Hatch, the Republican senator（参议员） from Utah who sits on the Judiciary Committee. (Mr Hatch has already warned the president to pick a bipartisan（代表两党的） candidate.) Considered a consensus builder, he has worked well with conservative colleagues and his track record is relatively free of potential Republican talking points.

Mr Garland has an interesting resume（履历）. He left the law firm of Arnold & Porter, where he was a partner, to serve as an assistant US attorney（律师） for the District of Columbia in 1989. Prior to（在……之前）
becoming a judge he also worked on criminal matters in Bill Clinton's Justice Department, where he supervised（监督）
the prosecution of Timothy McVeigh and Theodore Kaczynski, the "Unabomber". Mr Garland would have a relatively easy time getting confirmed.

Why he doesn't work: He is a white male and the court already has five of those. He is an ivy-league law-school graduate and the court already has eight of those. He is an appellate judge and, guess what, so was everyone else on the court. A Garland nomination would also not sit well with liberals, who would bristle（被激怒） at his moderation.

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The others: Some of the other names that have surfaced as possible nominees include Janet Napolitano, who was a more realistic candidate before her gaffes (see here and here) as secretary of Homeland Security, and Hillary Clinton, who has settled in at State. Jennifer Granholm, Michigan's impressive governor, and Amy Klobaucher, a senator from Minnesota, are sometimes mentioned as possibilities, but when was the last time an elected politician was nominated for the court? (Ms O'Connor had been a state legislator.) In today's political environment, a politician's record of votes and legislation（法规
） is seen as nothing but ammunition for the other side. (That means Deval Patrick, the governor of Massachusetts, is also an unlikely choice.) Cass Sunstein would be the most interesting pick for the court, but his writings on almost everything would make his confirmation hearings a free-for-all. There has been light chatter about other liberal jurists, but most are not considered serious candidates. Having said that, Mr Obama could surprise everyone and this list will be updated when new information is revealed or when new candidates are considered by the administration.

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Earthquake in China

6.Fault lines（错误台词？）

Earthquakes in China's Qinghai province kill hundreds of people

Apr 14th 2010 | BEIJING | From The Economist online

POWERFUL earthquakes on the Tibetan plateau（高原） have killed hundreds of people and injured many thousands of others. The disaster presents the Chinese authorities（当局） with the challenge of another large-scale relief effort following an earthquake in neighbouring（邻近的） Sichuan province in May 2008 that killed more than 80,000 people. The remoteness（远离） of the affected area will make it all the harder.

The earthquakes, the strongest of which been reported as magnitude（震级） 6.9 or 7.1, began to strike early in the morning of Wednesday April 14th. They were centred on Yushu county in Qinghai province near the border（边界） of the Tibet Autonomous Region. Most of the buildings in the county seat, Jiegu, were damaged or destroyed. Yushu has a population of around 100,000, many of them Tibetan herders（牧民）. A teacher in the adjacent（毗邻，临近） county of Golog some 350 km (220m) to the north-east says he has been trying to console（慰问） his weeping students since they learned that relatives in Yushu had been buried in rubble. He says Tibetan monks（僧侣） in Golog have been praying for the dead.

“The biggest problem now is that we lack tents, we lack medical equipment, medicine and medical workers” a local spokesman was quoted as saying by China’s state-run news agency, Xinhua. Overnight temperatures in the area are below freezing. Xinhua said three military（军事） transport aircraft had been deployed to ferry supplies and relief workers. Hundreds of troops have been mobilised（动员）.

In 2008 the authorities won praise from around the world for their quick response to the Sichuan earthquake and their unusual decision to give journalists free rein to visit the affected area. Foreign assistance helped to defuse（减缓） tensions between China and Western countries caused by the government’s handling of widespread unrest（动乱） in Tibetan areas in March that year.

The authorities are likely this time to pull out all the stops again, not least in order to show their concern for the welfare of Tibetans despite continuing harsh repression of Tibetan dissent. They will be somewhat relieved（宽慰） that the disaster did not happen in the Tibet Autonomous Region, given that this would have hugely complicated their handling of press coverage. Unlike Qinghai (most of which is regarded as part of traditional Tibet by the Dalai Lama and his followers), the autonomous region is off-limits（禁止进入）
to foreign journalists except for rare, supervised visits.

The government will be nervous of any news from Qinghai’s disaster that could give further ammunition（证据） to domestic critics of the shoddy construction of schools in Sichuan that was widely blamed for the deaths of thousands of children in the 2008 earthquake. Since late last year two activists who campaigned on behalf of the children’s parents have been jailed for three and five years respectively. The sentences sent a clear message that the government, for all its openness in the immediate aftermath of the Sichuan earthquake, still lashes out at those who cause it embarrassment（尴尬）.

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China's currency

7.Bending, not bowing
The Chinese case for a stronger, suppler（灵活的） currency
Apr 7th 2010 | HONG KONG | From The Economist print edition


CHINA’S trade with America is notoriously（臭名昭著） skewed（歪曲）. But diplomatic（外交上） exchanges between the two countries are more finely balanced. On April 3rd Tim Geithner, America’s treasury secretary, tactfully（机智地） postponed（推迟） a report due this month that might have condemned China for manipulating(控制) its currency, keeping it weak to favour its exporters. Mr Geithner, who made an unscheduled(构词法) trip to Beijing this week, said he would rather press America’s case at its regular “Strategic and Economic Dialogue” with China in May and at the G20 summit（峰会） in Canada in June. The delay puts America’s diplomatic account with China briefly in surplus（顺差）. What will China offer to clear the balance?

The immediate quid pro quo is the presence of China’s president, Hu Jintao, at a summit on nuclear proliferation（核扩散） in Washington, DC, on April 12th-13th. There is also talk of allowing the yuan to wobble（浮动） a little more in daily trading with the dollar. In time it is expected to resume the slow crawl upwards（缓慢升值） that ended in July 2008.

America’s Treasury is willing to bide its time. But its patience is not shared by members of Congress. Last month 130 of them wrote to Mr Geithner urging tougher action against China. After the currency report was postponed, Chuck Schumer, a New York senator, said he would push his bill to slap（制止） anti-dumping duties（反倾销关税） on some Chinese goods and countervailing tariffs（贸易补贴） on all of them if China does not allow its currency to strengthen.

The tussle（争执） in America between a cautious Treasury and slap-happy senators is mirrored by subtle divisions within China. Its policymakers and economists are, of course, united in their distaste（反感） for America’s tariff-talk. Many can scarcely（绝不） believe that a country so indebted（受恩惠） to China would try to intimidate（恐吓） it. (Mr Schumer points out that if the Chinese were to dump their dollar holdings（抛售美元外汇）, they would only depress their value, thereby（由此） “cutting off their nose to spite their face”.) But the noisy dispute between the two countries is drowning out an interesting debate within China on the virtues of their inflexible（坚定不移的） currency.

On one side of the discussion is the People’s Bank of China (PBOC), the country’s central bank. Its chairman, Zhou Xiaochuan, suggested last month that keeping the yuan stable against the dollar was a crisis measure, which would be withdrawn “sooner or later”. With China’s recovery well advanced, the central bank is keen to get a grip（紧握）
on bank lending and keep a lid on inflationary（通货膨胀） pressures. A stronger yuan would cut import prices; a suppler one would give the central bank a freer hand to raise interest rates, without worrying about the capital inflows such rates might attract despite China’s capital controls.

On the other side of the debate is China’s Commerce Ministry（商务部）
and some members of its National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC)（发改委）, which formulates the country’s long-term economic strategy. Beyond the PBOC, Chinese policymakers do not see the yuan as a tool to manage inflation. They see it instead as a “tool” to “maximise export employment”, says Stephen Green of Standard Chartered Bank. And it is a tool they are not yet ready to relinquish（交出）. Although China’s output grew by over 10% in the year to the fourth quarter, its policymakers believe they have done a better job of shoring up（支撑住） GDP than of shoring up employment, according to Eswar Prasad of the Brookings Institution, a think-tank. The World Bank says that rural wages (outside farms) fell by a fifth between 2007 and 2009 as migrant workers fled back to their villages in search of jobs.

What accounts for this jobless recovery? Much of China’s epic stimulus was channelled through its banks. But in doling out credit Chinese banks still follow a “political pecking order”, as Yasheng Huang of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has put it. They reserve the first and biggest bites for large state-owned enterprises. These firms in turn favour（有利于） capital-intensive investment projects, which add more to the output figures than to the payrolls. As a result China’s policymakers still count on the country’s exporters to create jobs, Mr Prasad argues. They are reluctant to do anything to jeopardise（损害）
their prospects.

How much damage might a stronger yuan inflict? Several studies suggest that China’s exports fall by about 1.5% when its trade-weighted exchange rate, adjusted for inflation, strengthens by 1%. But if the yuan did move against the dollar, the currencies of China’s neighbours and rivals（竞争对手） might rise in sympathy, limiting the damage to its competitiveness. And China’s coastal workshops have staged an impressive recovery from the worst days of the crisis, when factories closed and container ships idled（闲置）
in the ports. Exports in February were 8% higher than two years earlier. A few more months of robust（富有活力的） figures may reassure policymakers that the country’s exporters are back on their feet.

Some of China’s rulers, it is true, see no benefit to China from a stronger yuan. But they are also the ones most determined to resist foreign pressure. They would, therefore, back down only if American tariffs inflicted real pain. And theirs are not the only voices in the government. The PBOC recently appointed three scholars to advise it, two of whom, David Daokui Li and Xia Bin, have advocated（主张） currency reform. Whether they can overcome the Commerce Ministry and its allies remains to be seen. But their efforts to sell their ideas will come to nought（零） if they are crowded out by imported arguments from America.

BridgeRainUID: 2761345

China, America and the yuan

8.Yuan to stay cool
The best thing American politicians can do to encourage a stronger Chinese currency is keep calm
Mar 11th 2010 | From The Economist print edition


ONE of the few good things about the Great Recession（经济大衰退） of 2008-09 was a merciful absence of complaints from America’s Congress about China’s currency. The yuan’s gradual appreciation（缓慢增值） stopped in July 2008, and China has since kept its currency tightly pegged（挂钩） to the dollar. But even as America suffered its worst downturn in the post-war period, its legislators（议员） steered clear of ranting against China.

That restraint（遏制） was driven partly by fear. At the depths of the crisis even the most myopic（近视的） Congressmen worried about a descent into 1930s-style protectionism（贸易保护主义）. And it was driven partly by the facts. As investors’ flight to safety strengthened the dollar in late 2008, the yuan rose along with it. With America’s imports slumping（萧条期）
it was hard to blame Chinese workers for American joblessness. And thanks to its huge domestic stimulus（国内刺激） China added to global demand last year, as its current-account surplus shrank sharply.

Now things have, unfortunately, gone into reverse. As policymakers in both countries shift from cushioning recession to managing recovery, the rigidity of the yuan is, once again, becoming a source of tension—one that a still-fragile global recovery can ill afford.

America sounds increasingly determined to push its exports, and its attitude to China has hardened. Mr Obama has set a goal of doubling exports in five years (see article) and has promised to “get much tougher” over what it regards as unfair competition from China. Speculation（思索） is rising in Washington, DC, that the Treasury will brand China a currency “manipulator” in its next exchange-rate report. With America’s unemployment at 9.7% and the mid-term elections approaching, the appeal of China-bashing is rising in Congress, too. Several senators recently revived（再次提出） a mothballed(后备的) demand that the Commerce Department should investigate China’s currency regime（政策） as an unfair trade subsidy.

Beijing, in turn, shows little sign of budging on the yuan, even though the latest figures show surprisingly strong export growth and higher-than-expected inflation. Zhou Xiaochuan, the head of China’s central bank, caused a brief flurry in currency markets when he argued on March 6th that keeping the yuan stable against the dollar was “part of our package（一揽子交易） of policies for dealing with the global financial crisis” from which China would exit “sooner or later”. But he made it quite clear that China would be cautious（谨慎的） and gave no hint that sudden exit was imminent. In recent days various other Chinese officials have put even more emphasis（强调） on the stability of the currency, bristled at outside pressure to hurry up and denounced American “politicisation” of the exchange-rate issue.

A speedy end to the dollar peg makes economic sense for China as well as for the world. A stronger, more flexible（灵活） currency would make it easier for China to control inflation and asset bubbles（资产泡沫）. A dearer yuan would also help rebalance China’s economy towards domestic spending by boosting Chinese consumers’ purchasing power, discouraging excessive investment in manufacturing（制造业） and squeezing corporate profits. That would put the global recovery on a steadier（稳步的） footing, especially if a stronger yuan were mirrored by appreciation of the currencies of other Asian emerging economies. And China would gain politically by helping to diffuse protectionist pressure from abroad.

But it would not be a magic bullet, either within China or outside. Rebalancing China’s economy will require big structural reforms, from tax to corporate governance, as well as a stronger currency. A stronger yuan would not suddenly bring back millions of jobs to America. Since America no longer makes most of the products it imports from China, a stronger yuan would initially act more like a tax on consumers.

Soft-soaping, not sabre-rattling
Will the administration’s new tough talk move things in the right direction? Those who argue in favour of sabre-rattling do so on two grounds: first, that it is likely to shift China’s position, and second, that a stronger stance against China’s currency from the White House will diffuse protectionist sentiment in Congress. Both are dubious（可疑的）. China’s reactions so far suggest that American complaints make an imminent currency shift less, not more, likely. And a row could spur rather than diffuse anti-China action in Congress.

Rather than raising a bilateral ruckus（双边争吵）, America would be far better off convincing other big economies in the G20 to press together for a yuan appreciation as part of the world’s exit strategy from the crisis. Cool and calm multilateral leadership will achieve more, with fewer risks, than a Sino-American currency spat（争端）.

BridgeRainUID: 2761345

Chinese tax breaks

9.Bankers' heaven
A lesson in regressive taxation
Mar 31st 2010 | SHANGHAI | From The Economist print edition

AS AMERICA and Europe plan new ways to claw back money from high earners in finance, China is going the other way. When the Communist Party decided to transform Shanghai into a financial centre, it gave a great deal of thought to personal-tax incentives（诱因）. A ruling put out at the end of 2008 by the city’s Pudong district is the most regressive form of taxation imaginable.

Ordinarily, China imposes（推行） one of the highest top marginal income-tax rates in the world, 45%. There are few complaints about this from locals: nothing good is likely to come from provoking the authorities’ attention. But it is a turn-off for employees of companies that Shanghai wants to attract to the skyscrapers（摩天大楼） popping up（突然出现）
on the western bank of the Huangpu River.

Chinese law specifically bans local governments from offering personal tax breaks, but there is a way around this constraint（约束）. Typically taxes are divided into two pools, with 60% going to the national government in Beijing and the remaining 40% retained locally. The most competitive local governments collect their share and then send it straight back to the lucky taxpayer—technically a reimbursement（补偿）, but in reality a big tax break.

The ruling by Pudong’s district government—Circular 301, as it is officially called—allows these subsidies（津贴） to be paid to “qualified financial talents working at qualified financial institutions”. Upon approval by regulators, senior managers can receive a reimbursement of 40% of their taxes, plus a housing subsidy. That pushes their tax rate down to 27%, still higher than Hong Kong’s 15% and Singapore’s 20% but well below what a banker would pay in New York (44%) or London (soon to be 50%) or for that matter Tokyo (50%) or Seoul (35%).

Bankers who are not quite so important get a not-so-grand tax break, roughly half as large. More junior staff get nothing. The same system of targeted personal-tax breaks for senior executives was apparently（表面上） successfully used in Beijing to entice financial firms to move from one side of the Forbidden City to the other, to an area called Financial Street. Once the leading global firms had moved their offices, the tax rebates were allowed to lapse（失效）. The same will probably happen in Shanghai. But for now, if you’re a, capitalist-roader（走资派）, the people’s party is pretty hard to beat.