NPR 2012-01-18

 At least 11 people are confirmed dead and more than 20 remaining missing from a shipwreck¹ off the coast of Tuscany. Several more bodies were located today aboard the Costa Concordia, the cruise liner that struck rocks last Friday and capsized.

 

Republican presidential candidate Mitt² Romney says he will release his tax records, but not before his 2011 return is completed some time in April. NPR's Scott Horsley reports Romney's been under pressure by fellow Republicans to show his tax records.

 

Romney said in last night's debate he would probably release his tax returns. He's now gone further, saying he will do so, but not for three more months, by which time the primary contest could well be over. Romney acknowledges that his effective tax rate is around 15%, well below the tax rate paid by many middle-class families. That's because Romney makes most of his money from investments, which are taxed at a lower rate than ordinary income.

 

"I got a little bit of income from my book, but I gave that all away, and then I get speaker's fees from time to time, but not very much."

 

Romney has proposed even lower taxes on investment income, but only for families making less than 200,000 dollars a year. Scott Horsley, NPR News, Florence, South Carolina.

 

A grand jury in Washington has handed up an indictment³ of an Idaho man accused of shooting at the White House last November. Details from NPR's Carrie Johnson.

 

Oscar Ramiro Ortega-Hernandez passed a brief psychiatric exam but prosecutors⁴ have raised questions about whether he's mentally fit to stand trial and to help with his defense⁵. A new grand jury indictment says Ortega-Hernandez took shots at the White House November 11th after weeks of escalating⁶ rhetoric⁷ about Mr. Obama. But the president and the first lady were out of town at the time of the incident. Ortega-Hernandez is also charged with weapons offenses⁸ and trying to assault three US officers on duty that day. Authorities captured him in Pennsylvania and he's remained in federal custody⁹ ever since. Carrie Johnson, NPR News, Washington.

 

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell is in Myanmar, also known as Burma. Michael Sullivan reports McConnell says he is impressed with Myanmar's recent reforms but says more needs to be done.

 

McConnell met with President Thein Sein, the principle architect of Myanmar's rapid reforms, after meeting earlier with opposition¹⁰ leader and democracy icon¹¹ Aung San Suu Kyi. Thein Sein heads the military backed government that took office less than a year ago. McConnell says he is impressed with what Myanmar has done since, including last week's release of several hundred political prisoners, but says it's not yet enough to convince the US to lift economic and political sanctions against Myanmar. Better relations between Myanmar's government and its ethnic¹² minorities is at the top of McConnell's wish list. He says the recently announced ceasefire agreement with ethnic Karen rebels is an important step in that direction. For NPR News, I'm Michael Sullivan in Bangkok.

 

At last check on Wall Street, Dow was up 98 points.

 

This is NPR.

 

As losing teams in the National Football League turn their attention to next year's draft, a new study finds racial bias¹³ playing a role in how college quarterbacks are evaluated. We have details from NPR's Shankar Vedantam.

 

The study by two management professors finds that black college quarterbacks are rarely credited for their leadership skills. The researchers looked at games played by 82 white and 31 black quarterbacks. Andrew Carton and Ashleigh Rosette found that when teams headed by black quarterbacks lost games, media accounts blamed the quarterbacks for poor leadership. When the same teams won games, however, the quarterbacks were not credited for their leadership, but for their athletic¹⁴ ability. By contrast, the study in the Academy of Management Journal found that white quarterbacks who won games got credit for their leadership. Shankar Vedantam, NPR News, Washington.

 

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich concedes the race to head off Mitt Romney's campaign could be tough if the frontrunner gets more than 40% of the vote in Saturday's primary. However, Gingrich tells CBS that he is the Republican Party's best chance at defeating President Obama in November. The Georgia Republican brands himself a solid conservative who can stand toe-to-toe with the president in debates.

 

US stocks rising on news of some improvements in Europe's debt markets and China's economy. Debt auctions¹⁵ by Spain, Greece and Europe's bailout fund drew investor¹⁶ support despite a credit rating downgrade. In China, economic growth slowed to 8.9% in the fourth quarter, but still not as much as analysts¹⁷ had predicted.

 

I'm Lakshmi Singh, NPR News, Wahington.

1 shipwreck   

n.船舶失事，海难

参考例句：

• He walked away from the shipwreck.他船难中平安地脱险了。
• The shipwreck was a harrowing experience.那次船难是一个惨痛的经历。

2 mitt   

n.棒球手套，拳击手套，无指手套；vt.铐住，握手

参考例句：

• I gave him a baseball mitt for his birthday.为祝贺他的生日，我送给他一只棒球手套。
• Tom squeezed a mitt and a glove into the bag.汤姆把棒球手套和手套都塞进袋子里。

3 indictment   

n.起诉；诉状

参考例句：

• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。
• They issued an indictment against them.他们起诉了他们。

4 prosecutors   

检举人( prosecutor的名词复数 )； 告发人； 起诉人； 公诉人

参考例句：

• In some places,public prosecutors are elected rather than appointed. 在有些地方，检察官是经选举而非任命产生的。 来自口语例句
• You've been summoned to the Prosecutors' Office, 2 days later. 你在两天以后被宣到了检察官的办公室。

5 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。

6 escalating   

v.（使）逐步升级( escalate的现在分词 )；（使）逐步扩大；（使）更高；（使）更大

参考例句：

• The cost of living is escalating. 生活费用在迅速上涨。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The cost of living is escalating in the country. 这个国家的生活费用在上涨。 来自辞典例句

7 rhetoric   

n.修辞学，浮夸之言语

参考例句：

• Do you know something about rhetoric?你懂点修辞学吗？
• Behind all the rhetoric,his relations with the army are dangerously poised.在冠冕堂皇的言辞背后，他和军队的关系岌岌可危。

8 offenses   

n.进攻( offense的名词复数 )；（球队的）前锋；进攻方法；攻势

参考例句：

• It's wrong of you to take the child to task for such trifling offenses. 因这类小毛病责备那孩子是你的不对。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Thus, Congress cannot remove an executive official except for impeachable offenses. 因此，除非有可弹劾的行为，否则国会不能罢免行政官员。 来自英汉非文学 - 行政法

9 custody   

n.监护，照看，羁押，拘留

参考例句：

• He spent a week in custody on remand awaiting sentence.等候判决期间他被还押候审一个星期。
• He was taken into custody immediately after the robbery.抢劫案发生后，他立即被押了起来。

10 opposition   

n.反对，敌对

参考例句：

• The party leader is facing opposition in his own backyard.该党领袖在自己的党內遇到了反对。
• The police tried to break down the prisoner's opposition.警察设法制住了那个囚犯的反抗。

11 icon   

n.偶像，崇拜的对象，画像

参考例句：

• They found an icon in the monastery.他们在修道院中发现了一个圣像。
• Click on this icon to align or justify text.点击这个图标使文本排齐。

12 ethnic   

adj.人种的，种族的，异教徒的

参考例句：

• This music would sound more ethnic if you played it in steel drums.如果你用钢鼓演奏，这首乐曲将更具民族特色。
• The plan is likely only to aggravate ethnic frictions.这一方案很有可能只会加剧种族冲突。

13 bias   

n.偏见，偏心，偏袒；vt.使有偏见

参考例句：

• They are accusing the teacher of political bias in his marking.他们在指控那名教师打分数有政治偏见。
• He had a bias toward the plan.他对这项计划有偏见。

14 athletic   

adj.擅长运动的，强健的；活跃的，体格健壮的

参考例句：

• This area has been marked off for athletic practice.这块地方被划出来供体育训练之用。
• He is an athletic star.他是一个运动明星。

15 auctions   

n.拍卖，拍卖方式( auction的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• They picked up most of the furniture at auctions in country towns. 他们大部分的家具都是在乡村镇上的拍卖处买的。 来自辞典例句
• Our dealers didn't want these cars, so we had to dump them at auctions. 我们的承销商都不要这些车子，因此我们只好贱价拍卖。 来自辞典例句

16 investor   

n.投资者，投资人

参考例句：

• My nephew is a cautious investor.我侄子是个小心谨慎的投资者。
• The investor believes that his investment will pay off handsomely soon.这个投资者相信他的投资不久会有相当大的收益。

17 analysts   

分析家，化验员( analyst的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• City analysts forecast huge profits this year. 伦敦金融分析家预测今年的利润非常丰厚。
• I was impressed by the high calibre of the researchers and analysts. 研究人员和分析人员的高素质给我留下了深刻印象。