【渝粤题库】陕西师范大学200601 英语报刊阅读_visitors to india independence

《报刊阅读》作业

Translate the following words into Chinese

1.International Herald Tribune
2.Secretary of State
3.Justice Department
4.Cult
5.Catholic Church
6.Bosnia
7.The Netherlands
8.EU
9.FBI
10.UNESCO
11.The Commonwealth
12.Speaker
13.constitutional monarchy
14.royal family
15.electoral vote
16.The Capitol
17.spokesman
18.The House of
Representatives
19.joint venture
20.Christian Church
21.Stealth aircraft
22.Ivy Leaguers
23.New York Times
24.congress
25.Sinopec
26.botel
27.newscast
28.debunk
29.ecosphere
30.con
31.Reader’s Digest
32.Senate
33.White House Office
34.Ministers in the Cabinet
35.Wal-Mart Stores
36.Ameriasian
37.memocon
38.filmdom
39.anti-inflation
40.ecocrisis

II.Read the following passages and then choose the right answer to each question
Behrend, 45, obtained a doctoral degree in clinical psychology last spring from Walden University, a respected virtual institution. She says the discussions between student and professor, and among peers, were more rigorous than those she experienced in the two on-campus master’s programs she previously attended. “We needed to cite references for everything we said [in E-mail postings],” explains Behrend. “It wasn’t like the usual chatting in the classroom.”
1.Behrend
A.criticizes distant-degree programs
B.praises distant-degree programs
C.praises on-campus education
D.thinks highly of face-to-face instruction
At the root of the problem is money. As a poor nation, China has few resources left over for cultural conservation after struggling to overhaul its command economy, dampen rising unemployment, take care of an aging population, put in infrastructure and modernize its massive military.
At the same time, precisely because the nation is so poor, local officials have increasingly turned to tourism as a cash cow, often exploiting cultural and natural sites to their limit and threatening sites of inestimable value.
2.What do the words “resources” and “cash cow” underlined mean?
A.land, minerals, or natural energy/an animal that produces milk
B.money/a business that provides a steady income or profit
C.money/resources
D.property/money
The words were pure Oprah, but they proved prophetic. In a matter of weeks, the youngest man in the room— a 26-year-old former national math champion named Shao Yibo—scribbled down a business proposal, sold his belongings and left for Shanghai, where he launched a Chinese version of the Internet auction giant, eBay. On the way, he stopped off for a day in Silicon Valley and persuaded investors to give him $400,000. Weeks later classmate Tan Haiying returned to Shanghai to visit friends before starting an investment-banking job in New York. She never used her return ticket to the United States: Shao persuaded her to join his firm as chief operating officer. Within a year three other members of the clique—Huan Yiming, Renee Chen and Herbert Wang— also returned to launch start-up companies. And Zhang? She landed a business-development job at Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp. in Beijing. She also works overtime pursuing her Oprah dream. Once a week she hosts a popular talk show on Beijing TV that takes on such daring topics as AIDS, drug abuse and —yes—Internet dating.
3.The sentence underlined means that she works hard in order to be
A.a talk-show host. B.an artist.
C. a rich business person D.a movie star.
For some of the Harvard grads, China is still too underdeveloped, especially in the financial sector, to lure them back. “There’s a lot of thunder, but not much rain,” says Peter Chen, a debt specialist with GE Capital in Tokyo. But for others, it is simply that family comes first. Huang Jingsheng, who at 43 is the oldest of the group, is worried about subjecting his wife and two young boys to Beijing’s pollution. For the time being, Huang is living in clear-aired Sacramento, California, where he works as a venture capitalist for Intel Capital, handling occasional China deals. “There are different ways of helping China,” he says. “My classmates have found one way. I’m still figuring out how to do the same thing— and making the right choice for my family.”
4.“A debt specialist” is

A.an expert in money-making.
B.an expert that falls into debt.

C.a person who specializes in debt.
D.a person that specializes in repay his debt.
Even advocates acknowledge that distance education isn’t for everyone—that it takes independence, self-discipline, and a lot of motivation to succeed. Further, the quality of distance-degree programs is uneven. “A majority of universities have entered the distance-learning market rapidly and are not well prepared,” says Vicky Philips, coauthor of The Best Distance Learning Graduate Schools (Princeton Review Publishing, 1999, $20). “Students run the risk of being guinea pigs” Thus, it’s important to consider an array of factors before choosing a school: accreditation, program history, cost, academic field, residency, and technology.
5.What do “guinea pigs” here mean?

A.Pigs raised in Guinea.
B.Pigs raised by Guineans.

C.Persons used as a subject for experiment.
D.Persons used by Guineans as a subject for experiment.
Unless we spend money to spot and prevent asteroids (小行星) now, one might crash into Earth and destroy life as we know it, say some scientists.
Asteroids are bigger versions of the meteoroids (流星) that race across the night sky. Most orbit the sun far from Earth and don’t threaten us. But there are also thousands of asteroids those orbits put them on a collision course with Earth.
Buy US $50 million worth of new telescopes right now. Then spend US $10 million a year for the next 25 years to locate most of the space rocks. By the time we spot a fatal one, the scientists say, we’ll have a way to change its course.
Some scientists favor pushing asteroids off course with nuclear weapons. But the cost wouldn’t be cheap.
Is it worth it? Two things experts consider when judging any risk are: 1) How likely the event is; and 2) How bad the consequences if the event occurs. Experts think an asteroid big enough to destroy lots of life might strike Earth once every 500,000 years.
Sounds pretty rare— but if one did fall, it would be the end of the world. “If we don’t take care of these big asteroids, they’ll take care of us,” says one scientist. “It’s that simple.”
The cure, though, might be worse than the disease. Do we really want fleets of nuclear weapons sitting around on Earth? “The world has less to fear from doomsday (毁灭性的) rocks than from a great nuclear fleet set against them,” said a New York Times article.
6.What does the passage say about asteroids and meteoroids?
A.They are heavenly bodies different in composition.
B.They are heavenly bodies similar in nature.
C.There are more asteroids than meteoroids.
D.Asteroids are more mysterious than meteoroids.
7.What do scientists say about the collision of an asteroid with Earth?
A.t is very unlikely but the danger exists.
B.Such a collision might occur once every 25 years.
C.Collisions of smaller asteroids with Earth occur more often than expected.
D.It’s still to early to say whether such a collision might occur.
8.What do people think of the suggestion of using nuclear weapons to alter the course of asteroids?
A.It sounds practical but it may not solve the problem.
B.It may create more problems than it might solve.
C.It is a waste of money because a collision of asteroids with Earth is very unlikely.
D.Further research should be done before it is proved applicable.
9.We can conclude from the passage that ______.
A.while pushing asteroids off course nuclear weapons would destroy the world
B.asteroids racing across the night sky are likely to hit Earth in the near future
C.the worry about asteroids can be left to future generations since it is unlikely to happen in our lifetime
D.workable solutions still have to be found to prevent a collision of asteroids with Earth
10.Which of the following best describes the author’s tone in this passage?

A.Optimistic
B.Critical
C.Objective
D.Arbitrary
Some firms, such as one headed by Nancy Reynolds, a friend of the Reagans, and Anne Wexler, a former key aide in the Carter White House, specialize in coalition building and grassroots lobbying. Mounting a drive to get voters to work on members of Congress through letters, telephone calls and personal visits can have enormous impact.
Charls Walker, a leading tax lobbyist, notes: “First, last and always— it’s the people at home that are nearest and dearest to the hearts of congressmen.”
Example: In 1983, banks and savings institutions touched off a flood of 13 million postcards and letters that helped persuade legislators to repeal a law withholding taxes on interest payments. While the maneuver was successful, it angered some members, including Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole of Kansas, who has a reputation for having a long memory.
“For every winner in this business, remember there’s a loser,” says one influential lobbyist. “You just hear a lot more about the winners.”
No 9-to-5 job. Lobbying is a two-way street. When they are not busy trying to sway the views of politicians, the lobbyists are engaged in raising campaign money for those same politicians. It is a rare night in Washington that does not see several fund-raising cocktail parties and other events where lobbyists make up a big share of the donors to incumbents in Congress, Clients, of course, pay most of the tab.
Lobbyists, like members of most professions, have their intramural quarrels. Maurice Rosenblatt, who has lobbied causes for nearly four decades, complains: “The professional lobbyist is being pushed aside by the lawyers.”
Where lobbyists used to avoid notoriety and preferred to work behind the scenes, many today seek publicity as a useful tool. Fred Wertheimer, president of Common Cause and a registered lobbyist, says the Watergate era “put a stop to all the underground games being played, so they came out of the closet.”
Whether they work offstage or in the spotlight, lobbyists promise to continue exerting a powerful influence as long as there’s a Washington.
11.“Work on” here means
A.push on. B. harass.
C.influence. D.touch off.
12.What does “repeal a law” mean?
A. Draft a law. B.Enact a law.
C. Put an official end to a law. D. Go to law.
13. What do you think is meant by “No 9-to-5 job”?
A.It is a regular working-hour job.
B.It is an easy job.
C. One doesn’t have to work overtime.
D. One has to work overtime.
14. What does “a two-way street” here mean?
A.Mutual loss. B. Mutual benefit.
C. A broad street. D. A busy street.
15. “Offstage” is synonymous with
A.Behind the scene. B.Behind the scenes.
C.Out of shadow. D.Out of the closet.
The fact that the general literature on interviewing does not deal with the journalistic interview seems to be surprising for two reasons. First, it seems likely that most people in modern Western societies are more familiar, at least in a positive manner, with journalistic interviewing than with any other form of interviewing. Most of us are probably somewhat familiar with the clinical interview, such as that conducted by physicians and psychologists. It these situations the professional person or interviewer is interested in getting information necessary for the diagnosis and treatment of the person seeking help. Another familiar situation is the job interview.
16. Who is the interviewee in a clinical interview?
A. The patient. B. The physician.
C. The journalist. D. The psychologist.
As one professor observed, “Teaching is important, we are told, and yet faculty know that research and publication matter most.” Not surprisingly, over the last twenty years colleges and universities have failed to graduate half of their four-year degree candidates. Faculty members who dedicated themselves to teaching soon discover that they will not be granted tenure, promotion, or substantial salary increases. Yet 4 percent of all faculties say their interests lie more in teaching than in research. Additionally, a frequent complaint among young scholars is that “There is pressure to publish, although there is virtually no interest among administrators or colleagues in the content of the publications.”
17. American colleges and universities failed to graduate half of their four-year degree candidates because_______.
A.most of them lack high-quality faculties
B.the interests of most faculty members lie in research
C.there are not enough incentives for students to study hard
D.they attach greater importance to research and publication than to teaching
Cardiologists (心脏病学家) divided us into two types, according to how our personality affects our heart. Type A individuals are highly competitive, innately hostile, fast eating and rapid talking, whilst B type drown in the milk of human kindness and are sublimely indifferent to the of time. It is an uncomfortable fact that A’s die twice as frequently from heart disease as B’s, even when the risks of cigarettes, alcohol and cream buns are taken into account. Obviously, it is neither practical nor desirable that all A-youngsters change into B’s. The world needs A-types, and schools have an important duty to try to fit a child’s personality to his possible future employment. It is top management.
18. According to the passage, A-type individuals are usually_______.
A.impatient B.considerate C. aggressive D.agreeable
An education that aims at getting a student a certain kind of job is a technical education justified for reasons radically different from why education is universally required by law. It is not simply to raise everyone’s job prospects that all children are legally required to attend school into their teens. Rather, we have a certain conception of the American citizen, a character who is incomplete if he cannot competently assess how his livelihood and happiness are affected by things outside of himself. But this was not always the case; before it was legally required for all children to attend school until a certain age, it was widely accepted that some were just not equipped by nature to pursue this kind of education. With optimism characteristic of all industrialized countries, we came to accept that everyone is fit to be educated. Computer education advocates forsake this optimistic notion for a pessimism that betrays their otherwise cheery outlook. Banking on the confusion between educational and vocational reasons for bringing computers into schools, computered advocates often emphasize the job prospects of graduates over their educational achievement.
19. The belief that education is indispensable to all children_______.
A.is indicative of a pessimism in disguise
B. came into being along with the arrival of computers
C. is deeply rooted in the minds of computered advocates
D.originated from the optimistic attitude of industrialized countries
Despite the defeat of the Nazis and their allies and the setting up of the United Nations Organization in 1945, racism continues to haunt the world today. Men are denied employment, housing and educational opportunities because of their skin color; some rich countries still have racial immigration laws to keep out immigrants from poorer and hungrier lands; political leaders are imprisoned for life for demanding that all races should have the same political rights; and even in the cities of the affluent Western world the Negro ghettoes burn, signaling to the world the blank despair of their inhabitants.
20. The passage states that victims of racism include_______.
A.immigrants from other lands
B.Nazi and their allies
C. inhabitants in the affluent Western world
D. urban people in the Negro ghettoes
The English tea trade flooded China with opium. Does the British library get the story right?
The history of modern drug addiction might be said to start, innocuously enough, with a cup of tea. London diarist Samuel Pegys recorded his first taste of “tee (a China Drink)” in 1660; by the early 1700s, as cheap sugar to sweeten the brew poured in from the West Indies, the entire nation was on its way to becoming hooked. Some Englishmen were soon knocking back 50 cups a day. The English East India Company, which held the monopoly on all Eastern imports, saw its tea sales grow from 97,000 kg in 1713 to 14.5 million in 1813, making tea its cash cow. The government, too, came to rely on Britain’s new thirst. At one point, a third of the members of Parliament owned shares in the East India Company, and taxes on its tea produced up to 10% of the Treasury’s revenues. Clearly, it would be worth doing almost anything to keep such a business growing.
What the East India Company did was to become a global narcotics cartel. To get the silver that paid for the Chinese caffeine fix, the company turned to dealing a far more sinister drug—opium. Company ships never brought opium into China, but its rich Bengal plantations fed the demand. Millions of Chinese would ultimately die as a result of addiction, and the trade set the stage for the Opium Wars in which China lost Hong Kong. This nasty bit of history s recounted near the very end of “Trading Places: The East India Company and Asia,” a tantalizing, if slightly frustrating, new exhibition at the British Library in London.
The show—a collection of artifacts and images of 234 years of Eastern trade—has raised hackles among British Chinese activists. A small but well-aimed campaign even convinced the library to tweak the exhibit’s panel text to better reflect the dark side of the Company’s activities in China. “The Opium Wars marked a turning point in history,” says campaign organizer Steve Lau, who runs the Web site . “Chinese refer to the next century as the ‘hundred years of shame.’” The library seems blindsided by the controversy: it hadn’t actually ignored the East India Company’s opium trade, and the company was all but dead by the time the Opium Wars began. And who would have guessed economic history could arouse such passions?
Considering that the “Honorable Company” virtually created British India and the Empire, what’s really surprising is that only the Chinese have chimed in. In the mid-1700s the company also ran a robust trade in Indian textiles, with a private army to defend its bases. “All this happened with Asian permission and Asian partnership,” says curator Anthony Farrington. “And Asian complicity in the business of making money.” But the balance of power tilted after the military exploits of Company man Robert Clive transformed the firm into a territorial power. From private trading rights and “presents” from the locals, Company employees became rich while bleeding the Bengal economy. But the cost of expansion also nearly put the Company out of business, drawing the British government into India.
You could miss some of this if you walk too briskly through “Trading Places”, which goes easy on the geopolitics and focuses instead on the trade itself and how it shaped British and Asian taste and culture. Portraits of Company men comfortably set up in their new eastern homes—one poses with his Indian lover and their children— and the exotic chintz, porcelain, and tea sets snapped up by fashionable Brits all testify to the discomforting link between warm-and-fuzzy multiculturalism and hungry global capital. The trouble is, the Company can occasionally come off as nothing more threatening—or awe-inspiring—than an international plate collectors’ club. What’s missing from “Trading Places” isn’t a medicinal dose of political correctness, but the full drama of early capitalism and conquest.
21. According to the passage, we got to know both the British government and parliament members came to rely much more on the East India Company because of the increasing taxes on its tea sale and its shares owned by Parliament members, so______.
A. the East India Company had the monopoly on all eastern imports except for the textiles
B. the East India Company could do almost anything, even the deal of drug-opium, to keep its business growing
C.the East India Company satisfactorily met the strong growing desire of the British people for Chinese tea
D. the East India Company made an adequate profit only from the tea trade
22. To get more profit, the East India Company changed its business from tea trade to drug dealing and became a global drug dealing company cartel by _______.
A. sending its ships loaded with caffeine from Britain into China
B. planting opium in Britain and then bringing it into China by its ships
C. planting opium in Bengal and then sending it directly into China by its ships
D. collecting opium from the rich Bengal plantations and then feeding the demand of the Bengalese
23. The author thought it was because of the dirty drug-opium dealing that millions of Chinese died and that the Opium War broke out in which China lost Hong Kong, but ________.
A.the British Library ignored this nasty bit of history at all in the exhibition
B. the British Library gave a detailed account of this part of history in its exhibition
C. the British Library only recounted the nasty bit of history at the ending part “ Trading Places: The East India Company and China”
D. no one could ignore this nasty bit of history—the Opium War
24. Did the British library accept the advice given by a small but well-aimed group of people?
A.Yes, it accepted their advice and tried its best to show the true historical events.
B. No, it paid little attention to the advice by saying the company’s opium trade was mentioned, but the company was dead when the War began.
C. Yes, it welcomed the suggestions and advices of all the visitors in order to reflect better historical events.
D. No, it refused to accept any suggestions from all the visitors.
25. The head of the British Library said, in history what had happened was all with the permissions of Asian countries, and Asian countries were the East India Company’ s partners. But the fact is that _______.
A.the company finally tuned into a power with territory ambitions and the economy of Asian countries was greatly damaged
B.the British government got a lot of benefits from the East India Company’s trade in Asia
C.the British government was nearly drawn into India because of its expansion
D.the company finally had to pay the cost of its expansion and military exploits
III.Read the following article and then answer the questions
A
Beijing Dreams of 2008
A Finalist, City Is Running Hard for Olympics
By Elisabeth Rosenthal
New York Times Service
BEIJING—It seems recently that all of Beijing is flushed with Olympic fever, busy making preparations.
The posters are up at Beijing International Airport. Commemorative stamps have been issued. Taxi drivers are learning English to prepare for the influx of foreign guests. The logo is cropping up on key chains and bumper stickers.
Sydney? Oh no, not that Olympics. Not the one that begins Sept, 15 in Australia.
We’re talking the Summer Olympiad 2008, the games to which Beijing desperately, desperately wants to play host—although the International Olympic Committee will not choose a site for about another year.
“Holding the Olympics in 2008 is the common wish of all Chinese,” said Beijing’s deputy mayor, Liu Jingmin, who is chief of the bid committee. “We are confident and full of hope that they will be held there.”
Last week, the bid effort got a big push when the International Olympic Committee announced that Beijing was one of five finalists for 2008, along with Paris, Toronto, Istanbul and Osaka, Japan.
Mr. Liu, speaking at the space-age command center that has been constructed to mastermind the bid—an entire floor of a hotel—walks with determination past Olympic statues decked with Beijing’s newly designed Olympic logo and huge pictures of stadiums, real and yet to be built.
Teams of engineers pore over designs from international architects for a new Olympic village in northern Beijing.
But to understand why this teeming city with so many day-to-day problems is investing so much in pursuit of a distant dream, rewind history a bit: seven years ago, Beijing lost to Sydney by the slimmest of margins in an effort to hold the Olympics this year. (In 2004, the site will be Athens.)
To the Chinese it was a huge loss of face, the big fish that got away. And watching Australia basking in Olympic glory has no doubt left them itching with desire, determined that no price is too high to get the Games this time, no flaw too small to expunge in order to win.
“Last time we only lost by two votes and there was really no loser, we were just unlucky,” Mr. Liu said. “But our wish of holding an Olympics never faded. And compared to 1993, Beijing is much more competitive now.”
As Mr. Liu points out, Beijing has enjoyed strong economic growth and vast amounts of public construction since 1993, and China has become far more engaged internationally, moving from a pariah state to a growing economic powerhouse that is about to enter the World Trade Organization.
And to get the Olympics, Beijing has already essentially promised to speed up remodeling of the city, building three new subway lines and a new highway to ease the city’s horrible traffic. It will also turn 495 hectares (1,235acres) of bare earth into green space and shoo factories out of the city to improve its now mostly gray environment and clean up its foul air.
The Bid Committee’s Web site () lists reasons of choosing Beijing, among them:
●China, which has one-fifth of the world’s population, has never held the event.
●China ranked fourth and third in gold medals at the past two Summer Olympics.
●Stable politics and a low crime rate.
●Independent surveys show that 94.6 percent of Beijing’s residents want the Olympics there.
●“Of course I support the bid,” said Lin Xuezhu, 36, a cab driver waiting for a customer outside a luxury hotel. “The roads will be improved, it will make Beijing more famous and for me it means more customers—there’s nothing bad.”
Last month, the Beijing city government began an English-speaking campaign whose goal is to teach half of all Beijngers 100 English phrases to prepare for the Olympics.
With the city government’s Olympic obsession mounting, everything is now evaluated in terms of how it will affect the bid.
Radio talk shows advise people on what they can do to support the effort: Drivers must not overcharge, by even a penny. Industry managers must make sure company vans do not pollute. People should not spit on the ground, a still widespread habit.
But not everyone in this city of 15 million gets excited about an event eight years away that will require billions in government outlays.
“Sure it’s great for the country, but it’s bad for me,” said a scraggly laid-off worker named Wang who was sitting nearby, hoping to find a customer for his Pedi cab.
“Already they’re telling us you can’t drive on this road and that road—you look too bad.” Mr. Wang said. “If we get the Olympics, they’ll totally shut us out.” (International Herald Tribune, September 7, 2000)
Questions
1.What is Beijing running for?
2.Is Beijing more competitive now compared to 1993? In what ways?
3.What promises has Beijing always made to better the present condition?
4.What are the reasons listed by the Bid Committee of Beijing for choosing it for the 2008 games?
5.What is the goal of the English –speaking drive in Beijing?
B
The President
A).The Powers of the President
The President of the United States is the chief executive of the government. He has definite and important powers over both international and national affairs. His chief powers can be seen in the following six aspects:
(1) As head of the nation and its administration: He has authority to appoint all the heads (Secretaries) of the federal departments and other principal federal officials with the approval of the Senate. All the heads of the executive departments are members of the President’s Cabinet assisting the President in dealing with all sorts of problems of the country. They must act both as the President’s advisers and as the heads of the departments to which they are appointed.
As chief executive of the nation, the President must see to it that the Federal laws and treaties are properly enforced. He thus has authority to issue necessary orders and instructions and even to proclaim a state of emergency throughout the country.
(2) As foreign policy leader: He has authority to carry on official business with foreign countries such as recognizing or refusing to recognize a nation; to negotiate and enter into treaties with other nations with the approval of the Senate. However, he can make executive agreements with foreign countries without Senate approval.
It is he who has the right to appoint ambassadors and other diplomats to foreign countries with the approval of the Senate. He can also send his personal representatives and special envoys on diplomatic missions without its approval.
(3) As a law maker: He has the right to veto or sign any bills passed by Congress. He may call Congress into a special session and recommend some legislation to solve a particular problem. If it does not respond to him, he may call upon the people directly for support through the press, radio and television. His annual “State of the Union Message” and other special messages to Congress have often become the basis of legislative activities.
(4) As a person with some judicial authority: He appoints judges of the Supreme Court and other federal courts with the approval of the Senate. He can grant reprieves to persons, except governmental officials who have been convicted in federal courts, but not in state courts.
(5) As Commander-in-Chief: He can call into Federal service the state units of the National Guard and he may send the US armed forces to any part of the world. He had the right to appoint and dismiss all the top-ranking military officers. He may make undeclared wars for a period of 60 days without congressional approval. Further more, he is the only person who has the authority to order the use of nuclear weapons.
(6) As the party leader: Being a leader of his party, he may use his personal influence and prestige with his party members in elections.
B).To be elected a President
Over the years, the presidency has grown in power and gained prestige. Thus the executive has become the paramount branch of government. Many people desire to become presidents, but who can be elected? The constitution states the qualifications. A person running for President should first of all be a natural born citizen of the U.S., at least 35 years of age, and a resident of the U.S. for at least 14 years. The matter is of course not as easy as these qualifications suggest. Actually he must usually be able to serve the interests of his party, the moneyed classes; he must also have money to run the campaign which is astonishingly expensive.
C).The electoral system
The constitution also declares that the President should be elected by electors through the Electoral College. This is quite peculiar to the United States.
The citizens of a state vote for President and Vice President on the first Tuesday after the first Monday in November, known as the Election Day. In effect, they do not vote directly for them. Instead, they select a slate of electors, equal to the number of Senators and Representatives each state has in Congress. Each state can either list the names of the electors on the ballot or print the names of the candidates for president or vice president at the top of it. The ballots are for the selection of electors who are neither Congressmen nor people holding federal office. With the Presidential candidates’ names in mind, the voters are hardly aware that they are choosing a group of electors only. As the nation has practiced a two-party system, the electors of either one party receiving the highest number of votes are elected, and their party wins all the electoral votes of the state. Therefore, the result is known throughout the country on the night of the Election Day after the popular votes are counted in all the states.
Technically, the President and Vice-President are elected by the electors of each state. The electors chosen then meet in their state capitals on the first Monday after the second Wednesday in December to vote for President and Vice President. The results must be certified and sealed and then sent to the Senate to be counted in the presence of both Houses on January 6. The chairman on that day is the President of the Senate. If no candidate receives a majority of the votes, the House of Representatives chooses the President from among the top three candidates. In this case, each state and the District of Columbia has only one vote each.
Congress
Congress is the legislative branch of the U.S. government. It is composed of two houses: the Senate and the House of Representatives. According to the Constitution, each state must have two Senators to represent the people. They must be at least 30 years of age, citizens of the U.S. for at least nine years, and residents of the state from which they are chosen. Once they are selected, they serve a six-year term. With one-third of the members elected every two years, the Senate does not select its members at the same time. Nominally, the Vice President presides over the Senate; he has, however, no part in its deliberations and no vote either except when there is a tie. With such a minor role, the Vice President does not like to attend the routine sessions very much. Thus the presiding role of the Senate is played by an officer called the president pro tempore chosen by the majority of the Senator.
The other chamber of congress is the House of Representatives. Different from Senators, the Representatives can be younger. They must be at least twenty-five years old, citizens of the U.S. for at least seven years, and residents of the states from which they are elected. The number of each state’s Representatives is calculated according to the state’s population. However small the population of a state may be, it must have at least one Representative. Also different from Senators, each Representative serves a two-year term of office. He can continue if he is re-elected. There are now 438 members in the House of Representatives among who three are from the District of Columbia.
Because all the Representatives and one-third of the Senators are elected every two years, the life of a congress lasts for only two years.
Questions
1.Who are the members of the President’s Cabinet in the U.S.?
2.What right does the President have as a lawmaker?
3.When is the presidential election held in the U.S.?
4.Can we say that the U.S. president is directly elected by voters? Why?
5.How many Houses is the Congress made up of in the U.S.? What are they?
C
Social responsibility is no longer the enemy of good business: Increasing numbers of mutual funds are adding “social screens” to their investment criteria, such as whether the fund invests in business that are committed to workforce diversity or to improving the environment. Though most business journals continue to trumpet the most profitable corporations, Business Ethics spotlights the best corporate citizens.
The top honor for 2001 goes to Procter and Gamble, which moved up from number four in 2000, Business Ethics reports in its March-April 2001 issue. The giant consumer products company scored high in the category of “service to international stakeholders,” a measure of how well the company behaves in the 44 countries outside of the United States in which it does business. P&G “has been generous in international grants and gifts in these communities, including earthquake relief in Turkey, community building projects in Japan, plus contributions for schools in China, school computers in Romania, special education in Malaysia, and shore protection in France,” according to the magazine.
Following P&G in the top 10 are Hewlett-Packard, Fannie Mae, Motorola, IBM, Sun Microsystems, Herman Miller, Polaroid, The St. Paul Companies, and Freddie Mac.
“The term ‘corporate citizenship’ is coming into broader use these days, as awareness grows that business has responsibilities beyond profits,” write Business Ethics editor Marjorie Kelly and management professors Sandra Waddock and Samuel Graves. “There is no single indicator of good citizenship. It must be measured through lenses representing various viewpoints.”
The magazine has been ranking corporate citizenship for five years, at first using data collected in-house, then in 2000 adding data from Kinder, Lydenberg, Domini & Co. (KLD), a social-research firm in Boston whose data serves as the basis for the Domini 400 Social Index. For 2001, Business Ethics further refined its rating system, adding the environment, minorities, and non-U.S. stakeholders to the previous list of stakeholders: stockowners, customers, employees, and the community.
“In addition to stockholders, other stakeholders also make investments in companies,” the authors note. “Employees invest their time and their intellectual capital. Customers invest their… trust and repeated business. Communities provide infrastructure and education of future employees, in addition to more direct investments of tax supports, And so on.”
All of the companies of the Standard & Poor 500, plus 150 other publicly owned companies, are ranked on a standardized scale measuring the various stakeholder ratings. And to further ensure that only good corporate citizens make it onto the list, the magazine did a scandal scan: “We did a search of the Lexis database of news sources on each company to look for scandals or improprieties not detected in the KLD data. As a last check, we submitted the rankings to a board of experts for review.” Among the companies dropped from the list during this process were Ben & Jerry’s, which had been acquired by Unilever; Xerox, due to allegations of misstated financial information; and Microsoft, due to its antitrust conviction.
“What corporate citizenship is about is progress toward better treatment of stakeholders,” the authors conclude. “We publish this list not to certify companies as unblemished but to push the envelope on what it means to be a good corporate citizen, and to move corporations toward ever-better practices in stakeholder relations.”
Notes:
1.data collected in-house: (in-house: within the company, from the company itself) 从公司内部搜集的数据， 公司自己提供的数据
2. Kinder, Lydenberg, Domini& Co. (KLD): 即KLD Research & Analytics, Inc.，总部设在波士顿， 为世界主要的投资机构提供研究、基准尺度、 (benchmarks) 、
咨询等服务。KLD 拥有全面的网上社会研究数据库和DSI、BMSI、LCSI等社会指数。
3. Domini 400 Social Index: 简称DSI，是已确立的衡量社会审查对企业、公司财政行为的作用的基准。 此指数于1990年开始使用， 是为社会投资者提供的审查股票证券的第一个基准尺度。
4. infrastructure: subordinate parts forming the basis of an enterprise, such as communication, transportation, and power etc. 基础结构
5. Standard & Poor 500: Standard & Poor’s 创建于1860年， 主要为评估公司业绩、投资等提供独立的分析数据，Standard & Poor 500 是世界通用的社会指数之一。 此公司于1966年被1888年创建的McGraw-Hill Inc. 公司兼并， 成为其一个分支。
6. make it: be successful
7.push the envelope on: decide
Questions
1.What is the social responsibility for a good company?
2.What did Procter and Gamble do to win the top honor for 2001?
3.How is the corporate citizenship evaluated?
4.Why are stakeholders very important to evaluate a company?
5.What is the list of good company published for?
D
Who Owns You?
A mock trial explores the intersection of patents and genetic-property rights
By GARY STIX
A man named Salvador Dolly gives blood for a routine genetic test to determine his fitness to father a child. The testing company, Advanced Genetic Testing Company (AGTC), then sells the remains of the sample to NuGenEra, a biotechnology company. NuGenEra discovers that Dolly’s genes make him resistant to HIV.
The company responds to this discovery by taking out a patent on both Dolly’s genome and a series of gene sequences that confer resistance. When NuGenEra informs Dolly that his genes guard against the deadly virus, he decides to set up a business to market his blood to research institutions. To protect its patent, NuGenEra sues Dolly for patent infringement, saying that it owns his genome.
Does the patent mean that Dolly must forgo any rights to his own genome? Does it violate his privacy or property rights? Should these rights be balanced against society’s need for the tests and therapies for HIV that might be derived from NuGenEra’s research on Dolly’s genome? These issues were highlighted last November in a mock trial at the California Institute of Technology as part of the school’s Program for Law and Technology, in collaboration with Loyola Law School.
During arguments made by students from both schools, Judge Marilyn Hall Patel, who presided over the Napster copyright case, had to decide whether to invalidate the NuGenEra patent and throw out the company’s suit against Dolly for violating the patent on his own genes. Many of the arguments centered on the usefulness of Dolly’s genes—utility being one of the principal criteria for granting a patent. In its patent, NuGenEra claimed that both Dolly’s entire genome and 10 genes within it, called the P sequences, could be employed to create diagnostic tests for determining resistance to HIV and to produce gene therapies to cure the disease.
Dolly’s attorneys argued that the genome—and even the P sequences—consisted of DNA for which the specific genes that conferred resistance had not yet been identified, a lack of utility that meant the patent should be declared invalid. They also contended that the patent violated Dolly’s rights to privacy, property and personal autonomy.
In her decision, Patel allowed the mock case to move forward to a jury trial (see http:// techlaw. lls.edu/ atc3/ order. pdf). In doing so, she affirmed that the P sequences had a legitimate use as a diagnostic tool to ascertain HIV resistance. But she invalidated the part of NuGenEra’s patent that covered Dolly’s whole genome because of a lack of any clear-cut applications.
Acknowledging an aversion to judge-made law, Patel would not embrace privacy or other public policy arguments made by Dolly’s attorneys, citing the absence of legislation and case law to guide her. But she did seem inclined to find some means of suggesting protection for genetic property within the bounds of existing law. The judge noted that genetic material is unique to each individual. Thus, Dolly may have the right to sue in California for misuse of his likeness for commercial purposes.
The case illustrates how the genomics era may affect existing patent law. “I think that if this were a real opinion and it carried weight, it would mean that the patent laws are going to be aggressively pursued irrespective of these countervailing social policy issues,” says Karl Manheim, who directs the law and technology program at Loyola. So if NuGenEra v. Salvador Dolly is any portent, whatever part of one’s self that is locked up in the genetic code may be eligible to be owned and bottled by someone else.
Notes:

1. a routine genetic test to determine his fitness to father a child: 确定他是否适合生孩子的一次常规基因测试
2. Should these rights be balanced against society’s need…
   这些权利是否应该根据社会需要来平衡
3. mock trial: 模拟审判
4. “I think that if this were a real opinion and it carried weight, it would mean that the patent laws are going to be aggressively pursued irrespective of these countervailing social policy issues,” 如果这一观点是真实而具影响的话，那便意味着专利法将会受到猛烈的冲击，而不考虑那些相抵消的社会政策问题。
5. NuGenEra v. Salvador Dolly: NuGenEra 起诉Salvador Dolly (v.: vs.)
   Questions
   1.What does this article mainly talk about?
   2.What is the main argument in the mock trial at the California Institute of Technology?
   3.Why does the Judge refuse the privacy or other public policy arguments made by Dolly’s attorneys?
   4.Who owns Dolly’s gene according to the mock trial?
   5.What does the case of NuGenEra v. Salvador Dolly indicate