对于英语听力的练习，关键还是要多听多练!光说不练假把式嘛~下面是出国留学网小编为大家收集整理诗文英语听力材料：我的个性不是你想的那样。和出国留学网小编一起来见识一下地道的英语口语吧!
点击收听音频
Host: Is there integrity in world politics today?
主持人：当今的世界政治有正直可言吗?
Herbert Bush: Much more than you’d believe from the current wisdom: that everybody in politics is selfish, everybody is in there to glorify himself, or herself, that all politicians are corrupt. I’m disturbed by the attack on political figures. The assumption that everyone is guilty until proven innocent is just 180 degrees different than the justice systems ought to be. And I don’t know what it takes to change that. I think the attacks that hurt me the most were not those that differed with me on abortion, or guns, or prayer in school, or on balanced budgets, or on taxes. The ones that hurt the most were those that challenged my character. Didn’t trust my word. And I think there’s an adversarial feeling in the press that “All politicians are going to lie to me, and therefore it’s my obligation to get to the truth.” It’s a very unhealthy view. And some political people do lie all the time, and step over their friend to achieve the objective themselves. But I'm one who believes that one’s word of honor is about one of the most fundamentally important things there is.
赫伯特.布什：比现在大家所认为的正 直要多很多，现在大家认为和政治相关 的人都很自私，都想着给自己贴金，所 有的政治家都很腐败。这些对政治人物 的攻击让我很难过。大家先假定每个人 都是有罪的，然后一旦被证明是清白的，态度就来个180度大转弯，法律体 制不应该是这样的。我不知道要改变这 种状况需要什么。我认为这些攻击最伤 害我的不是那些在堕胎、枪支，在学校 祈祷或者平衡预算和税收方面的不同的 言论。最伤害我的是那些攻击我性格的 言论。不相信我的话。我认为媒体上说 的“所有的政治家都会对我撒谎，因此 我有义务知道事实”有一种矛盾的感 觉。这是不健康的观点。一些政治人物 确实一直撒谎，不惜践踏朋友以达到他 们自己的目的。但是我是那种相信说实 话是最基本、最重要的人。
Host: How about perseverance?
主持人：那么坚忍呢?
Herbert Bush: To achieve, you’re going to have to persevere. And by that I mean that you can’t let a roadblock turn you around. You can’t expect life’s path to be totally smooth. You’re going to have to overcome adversity. Perseverance means having the strength to prevail, to achieve your objective. I think if I were a high-achieving high school kid，privileged to attend meetings like the one I’m attending now in Williamsburg, Virginia, I would say，“You've come a long way. You’re better than your peers，but you're just beginning.” If you really want to make a difference，whether it’s in helping other people, or whether it’s in fighting for your country, or whether it’s in the political arena, or journalism, or physics, you’ve got to persevere. You've got to understand that there are going to be some enormous bumps in the road. They can be personal. You can get hurt badly. You can lose a friend, or a child, or a wife, or a husband. But you’ve got to persevere, you've got to be guided by certain principles and stay the course. If you quit, if you run away when the going gets tough, you won’t really understand what a full life is all about.
赫伯特.布什：要想成功，必须坚忍。 我这么说的意思是你不能让遇到的障碍 阻挡你前进。你不能让生活一马平川， 你必须克服那些困难。坚忍就有了战胜 困难的力量，实现目标的力量。我认为 如果我在高中时成绩很好，有权力像现 在的好学生这样参加如威廉斯堡和弗吉 尼亚的会议，我就会说，“你已经走了 很远。你比你的同辈们做得更好，但是 你才刚开始。”如果你想要与众不同， 不管是要帮助他人，不管是保卫国家，不管是驰骋政界，做记者，还是研究物 理，你都要坚忍。你都要明白你的人生 路上还有很多大的困难需要你克服。这 些困难可能是个人的。你可能会受重 伤。你可能失去朋友、孩子或者妻子、 丈夫。但是你必须坚忍，你要在一些原 则的指引下走下去。如果你退出，如果 你遇困难就逃避，你就不能真正明白完 整生活的意义。
Host: What was the proudest moment of your career?
主持人：你事业上最骄傲的是什么时 候?
Herbert Bush: This may sound like a cliche, but I’ll put it this way. The proudest thing in my life is that my children come home. The proudest moment of my Presidency, domestically, was when I signed a piece of civil rights legislation known as the ADA, doing something for the disabled. A massive piece of civil rights legislation that put disabled people, 50 million of them，into the mainstream, or at least removed legal obstacles to their being in the mainstream. The proudest moment internationally was when we prevailed over a brutal dictator. Formed a coalition that overcame public opinion in this country, cynicism in the press, reluctance in the Congress to do what was right, to say that a country — in this instance Iraq—with the fourth largest army in the world was not going to brutalize its neighbor, take over its neighbor by force. It was proud for me because I was privileged to be the Commander in Chief，but I’m not quite egotistical enough to feel that it was anything but a team effort. A classic victory of young soldiers working together, of sound diplomats doing their best. And of a country coming together to make a profound moral statement: aggression will not stand.
赫伯特?布什：听起来可能是老调重谈 了，这么说吧。我生命中最骄傲的时刻 是我的孩子们回家。我当总统的时候， 在国内的问题上，我最骄傲的时刻是签 署叫做ADA的民权法案，是致力于帮 助残疾人的法案。这个法案的签署使得 5000万残疾人重回正常人生活，或者 说，至少是为他们回归正常人的生活扫除了法律上的障碍。国际问题上来说， 最骄傲的时刻是我们战胜了残暴的统治 者。我们克服了这个 国家的社会舆论、媒 体讽刺和国会的不情 愿，形成了联盟，做 正确的事情。以伊拉克为例，我们派遣世界上第四大军队迫使 他们停止侵略邻国， 或者通过武力占领邻 国。我骄傲因为我有 权成为国家的总指挥 官，但是我不会自负 到认为那是我的胜 利，那是我们团队的胜利。是年轻士兵们团结合作，外交人 员出色发挥的一场经典胜利。那是一个 国家团结一心，作出的一个深刻的道德 声明：侵略不会长久。
Host: What were the biggest disappointments in your career?
主持人：那你事业上最失望的是什么时候?
Herbert Bush: Nobody likes to lose. I used to call home when I was a 14 year-old soccer player away at school and tell my mother, “I got three goals today.” And she’d shake me off over the long distance phone and say, “It doesn’t matter, how did the team do?” When I lost a race for the United States Senate, I thought the world was going to end for me politically, and 18 years later I was elected President of the United States. The biggest disappointment was that I wasn’t able to communicate properly to the American people — with the proper conviction and the proper ability — where the country really stood. The pessimists, the naysayers, the change-wan ters overwhelmed me, and I wasn’t good enough. I wasn't articulate enough to have the country understand that we weren’t in a recession, that we were in a rather booming economy in the last half of my Presidency. That was a personal shortcoming, a failure on my path. My predecessor could handle it pretty well, Ronald Reagan. Let me say this, and I don’t want to put a bitter note on the press, but there’s an unaccountability. The charge that got me the most was against my character. It was alleged that I went to Paris to meet with Iranians in 1988，to talk them into holding Americans hostage until after the Presidential election. I fought for my country. The fact that this charge could be given credence by the press got right to my soul. The fact that it caused the Congress to spend $2 million running down this outrageous charge against my very soul really, really affected me. It still does, and it will till the day I die. I fought for my country, and to suggest that I would make an insidious deal like that with the Iranians so that Ronald Reagan and I could win an election was horrible. I fault the press for that. I fault them for unaccountable charges that were subsequently shown to be totally false. I fought the Congress from pursuing this outrageous allegation against my character. Good friends on the Democratic side, insisted on the hearing. In a sense, I’m glad they did, because there was total vindication and these charges were shown to be totally erroneous, but it hurt，because it transcended politics for me. It got to what I am. Would I do that? I went to a Missing in Action POW meeting just before the election. Some idiot got up and started yelling at me that I knew there were live Americans in Vietnam, and I was unwilling to bring them home. That had nothing to do with Vietnam prisoners. What it had to do with was character. Would an American President, would I，who fought for my country and did my level best, leave an American incarcerated, knowing that we could do something about it? And the answer was, no. It’s the attack on character, it’s the attack on your very fiber，your being, that hurts. And who’s guilty? Well, I think to some degree the press is much more unaccountable and ferociously adversarial. And I think there’s some that have accepted the view that, well, this might well be true, the man doesn’t have the character. And I did. I made mistakes, screwed things up real bad on a lot of things. Couldn’t get things done the way I wanted, but it wasn’t because I was a couple of quarts low on character.
赫伯特.布什：没有人喜欢失败。当我 14岁时，我是校足球队的队员，我常打 电话告诉妈妈，“我今天进了 3个球。” 妈妈隔着千里电话线打击我说，“那无 关紧要，你们队怎么样?”当我在美国 议院竞选中失败时，我当时觉得我的政 治生涯结束了，但是18年后，我当选 了美国总统。我最失望的是我没有能够 和美国人民合理地沟通，没有用坚定的 信念和适当的努力来使国家真正地站起 来。悲观的人、沉默的人和妄想改变的 人战胜了我，我不够好。我的□才不够 好，没有让这个国家明白我们的经济没 有衰退，我任期的后半段，经济其实是 在上升的。那是我个人的缺点，也是我 人生路上的失败。我的前任里根总统做 得就很好。我这么说吧，我不想挖苦媒 体，但是媒体有不可信的东西。伤害我 最深的就是媒体指责我的人格。他们控 告我1988年去巴黎会见伊朗人，和他 们讨论美国人质事件，人质劫持要一直 持续到总统选举结束。我为我的国家而 战。事实是媒体的指控直接刺向我的灵 魂。事实上国会花200万美元来操作的 这场令人愤怒的指控真的影响了我。现 在还是痛苦，或许会一直持续到我死。 我为我的国家而战，他们却暗示我是为 了让里根和我臝得大选而作出的肮脏的 交易。我认为是媒体的错。我指责他们 这些不可信的控告，这些控告后来被证实完全错了。我为国会相信这个侮辱我 人格的指控而愤怒。民主党的朋友们， 坚持听我解释。从这个意义上说，我很 高兴他们听了，因为我有充分的证据证 实这些指控完全错了。但是这确实伤害 了我，因为指控超出了政治范畴，直指 我的人格。我会那样做吗?我在大选前 参加了一个战俘失踪会议。某个笨蛋站 起来开始冲我大叫，说我知道越南有活 着的美国人，但是我却不愿意把他们带 回国。这和越南犯人完全无关。这是和 人格有关的。作为一个美国总统，作为 全力为国家而战的我来说，会在知道能 做些什么的时候，任由美国人被扣留吗?答案是不会。这是对人格的攻击， 这是对你的品质，你这个人的攻击。很 伤人。那么谁的错?我认为从某种程度 上说，媒体更不可信，是更加残忍的敌 人。我想有一些人接受这个观点，这也 可能，这个人没有那种品行。但是我 是。我犯过 错，把很多事 情搞砸过，不 能让事情按照 我想要的方向 发展，但是这 不是因为我品 行不端。
Host: All public figures are subject to criticism attacks. How do you respond to attacks?
主持人：所有 的公众人物都会受到批评攻击。你怎么回应这些攻击?
Herbert Bush: If you're attacked personally you have | to basically ignore it. You’ve got to go back in history and recognize that there’s nothing new here. It’s more vindictive, more outrageous，more unaccountable. The | way that Franklin Roosevelt was treated in the Presidency by the press is entirely different than the way President Clinton, or me, or President Reagan were treated. There’s been an evolution of incivility. But that isn’t to say that there weren’t, in our history, ferociously nasty editorials and charges and counter-charges that weren’t true. You have to have a really thick skin, you’ve got to turn the other cheek. You’ve got to try to do what your little kids i in high schools do, make friends, and go the extra mile to see that the critic knows where you’re coming from. But it can be ugly. There’s a pack mentality today. And one hound gets out in front and the rest of the pack are i baying at the heels of whoever it is that’s being pursued, i That’s not a good thing. And so, what do you do when you’re under fire? Try to tell the truth. Try to give it your best shot. Don't take it too personally, and get on with your life.
赫伯特?布什：如果是攻击个人，就基本上忽略。翻开历史看，就会看到那些批评都是滥调陈词。只不过更加没有依据，更加让你愤怒，更加不可信。富兰 克林?罗斯福当总统的时候，媒体对 待他的方式和现在对待克林顿或者我或 者里根的方式是不一样的。不文明是逐 渐演变而来的。但是这并不是说，历史 中他们没有过下流的社论或者假指控。 必须得厚脸皮，还得伸出你另一半脸 (当别人打你右脸时你要也把另一半脸 伸出让人打——出自《圣经》译者注)。 必须努力做你的孩子在高中时做的事， 交朋友，多做些事让那些批评家知道你 不是好惹的。但是这也可能很丑陋。今 天是群起而攻之的时代。一只狗在出现 在前面，其他狗就会朝着正被追的狗狂 吠，甭管是谁。这不是好事。所以，你 惹火上身的时候该怎么办呢?尽量说实 话。尽量拿出自己的本事。不要太把它 当作针对你个人的指责，要继续自己的 生活。
Host: It helps if you believe in this vision?
主持人：如果你相信这个远见就会有用 吗?
Herbert Bush: I think it helps. I don’t want to be called a senior citizen, I feel like a spring colt. I don’t want to | be called a has-been, because there’s things I want to do in life. But, I’ve been there and I’d say, “Don’t let the bastards get you down.” And they don’t anymore, I don’t | talk to them anymore, so they don’t get me down. I’ve got my family, and I’ve got so many blessings that I don’t think I’ve earned, that I’m a very happy man. I can’t wait | for the next day.
赫伯特.布什：我认为有用。我不想被 称为老人，我感觉自己就像春天的小马 驹一样。我不想被说做曾经怎样，因为 我生命中还有想要做的事情。但是作为 过来人，我会说“别为混蛋生气。”我不 再为他们生气，我再也不会跟他们说话 了，所以他们也就不会让我生气。我有 我的家人，我得到了这么多的祝福，我 认为我都不能相信我得到了，我是幸福 的。我对明天充满信心。
四六级英语栏目推荐阅读：
