美国做过的最糟糕的事情是什么？（二）

Judy Klass
What is Trump’s dumbest move so far?
I’m in a bleak place right now, and I’m going to say that Trump has not made any dumb moves. He has made dumb moves by the normal standards of human behavior and according to the obxtives and criteria that most people use. If you love your country, it’s dumb to run for president when you don’t know anything, and have no coherent vision of where the country needs to go, and lack the ability to concentrate and work hard — and so in that respect, Trump is a disastrous example of the Dunning Kruger effect. But what if you don’t care about your country at all — you only care about yourself? What if all you want is attention and adulation? Then it’s not so dumb. Most people want to be seen as honest and honorable, and so it would be dumb for them to tell transparent lies; to operate despicable scams like Trump University and bribe the Attorney General of Florida not to look into said scam; to have a personal charity that’s a joke and a slush fund, and so on.

到目前为止，特朗普最愚蠢的举动是什么？
我现在很沮丧，我要说的是，特朗普没有做出任何愚蠢的举动。但按照人类行为的正常标准，按照大多数人使用的目标和标准，他做出了愚蠢的举动。如果你爱你的国家，当你什么都不知道，对国家需要走向没有连贯的愿景，缺乏集中精力和努力工作的能力时，竞选总统是愚蠢的，所以在这方面，特朗普是邓宁-克鲁格效应的一个灾难性例子。但如果你根本不关心你的国家——你只关心你自己呢?如果你想要的只是关注和奉承呢?那就没那么蠢了。大多数人都希望被认为是诚实和可敬的，所以对他们来说，说明显的谎言是愚蠢的;经营像特朗普大学这样卑鄙的骗局，并贿赂佛罗里达州总检察长不要调查这些骗局；有一个个人慈善机构，这是一个笑话，还弄了一个贿赂用途的基金，等等。

But — what if you’re shameless and lacking all integrity, and you genuinely cannot distinguish between a truth and a lie — you consider the truth to be whatever is convenient for you in that moment? And what if you have the insight that a sizable portion of the American people don’t care whether you have a sense of honor or not? What if it gives them a frisson and a thrill that you are completely amoral: a hollering, bullying thug? What if you know that you could “shoot a guy in the middle of Fifth Avenue,” and your supporters would continue to worship you? It takes a special kind of genius to understand that huge numbers of people are THAT base, and THAT eager to have a king, a Third World strongman, rather than a US president. Trump has that genius; the rest of us do not.
Trump rode that escalator down and launched his campaign saying of the Mexicans: they’re bringing drugs, they’re rapists, etc. And I watched in disbelief and said: Holy smoke! It’s Hitler! He’s just using Hitler’s tactics from Weimar Germany, blaming the Depression and Germany losing WWI on the Jews. Does he seriously think Hitler tactics will work in the US? And then I saw him sweep the Republican field with those tactics! And then, last November …

但是，如果你无耻、缺乏诚信，而且你真的无法区分真相和谎言，在那一刻对你来说你会认为真相是触手可达的？如果你有一种洞察力，相当一部分美国人并不关心你是否有荣誉感，那该怎么办？如果这让他们觉得你完全没有道德:一个大喊大叫、恃强凌弱的暴徒，那该怎么办?如果你知道你可以“在第五大道中间射杀一个人”，而你的支持者会继续崇拜你呢？需要一种特殊的天才才能理解，大量的人都是这样的基础，渴望有一个国王，一个第三世界的强人，而不是一个美国总统。特朗普有这样的天赋；我们其他人没有。
特朗普坐上自动扶梯，开始了他的竞选活动，他谈到墨西哥人：他们带着毒品，他们是强奸犯，等等。我难以置信地看着，说：天哪！这是希特勒！他只是在使用希特勒在德国魏玛的策略，将大萧条和德国在第一次世界大战中的失败归咎于犹太人。他真的认为希特勒的战术会在美国奏效吗？然后我看到他用这些战术横扫共和党阵营！然后，去年十一月…

He’s a reality show star, and he has turned our national discourse — and international politics — into a reality show, with lots of conflict and drama, all of it stressful, and scary, and empty, and signifying nothing. Every “dumb” and “disqualifying” thing he said earned him limitless air time. Real news and real issues in the campaign were not discussed. Russia was feeding him tidbits from the material they hacked and posted to WikiLeaks during the campaign — but they stopped when he attacked the Khans — a Gold Star family. The Russians concluded at that point that Trump was simply nuts and he could not win. But then — it didn’t seem to bother his supporters at all! And the Russians started feeding the Trump campaign Hillary-bashing non-news stories again. Trump, it turned out, was smarter about how low-down the American people are than Vladimir Putin, his mentor, head Watergate burglar and role model!

他是一位真人秀明星，他把我们的国家论述和国际政治变成了一个真人秀节目，有很多冲突和戏剧性，所有这些都是紧张、可怕、空洞的，毫无意义。他说的每一句“愚蠢”和“不合格”的话都为他赢得了无限的播放时间。竞选活动中的真实新闻和真实问题没有得到讨论。俄罗斯一直在向他提供他们窃取并发布到维基解密上的材料中的花边新闻，但当他攻击可汗一家——一个金星家族时，他们停止了行动。俄罗斯人当时得出的结论是，特朗普简直疯了，他不可能获胜。但是，他的支持者一点也不介意！俄罗斯人又开始为特朗普竞选团队提供抨击希拉里的非新闻报道。事实证明，特朗普比他的导师、水门事件的头号窃贼和榜样弗拉基米尔·普京(Vladimir Putin)更清楚美国人民有多卑鄙!

I look at how Germany and Italy went fascist in the 1920s and 1930s — how two European democracies willingly committed suicide and became tyrannies. I look at how Augustus in ancient Rome claimed to have restored the Roman Republic when he had done nothing of the kind — he was just a military dictator. And so was every Caesar after him. I look at what Vladimir Putin did to Russia’s chance to become a democracy — and how much of Russia’s wealth he and his gangster friends have pocketed, (Putin may be the richest man in the world), and how popular Putin is with many Russians. I look at what Erdogan is doing to Turkey and what El-Sisi is doing to Egypt, and what Duterte is doing to the Philippines … These dictators may not have the genuine support of the majority of the people in their countries, but they could not have debased/degraded/destroyed democracy without the tacit consent of huge numbers of people; a sizable part of the population in each of these countries is willing to lose civil liberties and follow a demagogue who says “Only I can fix it.”

我研究了德国和意大利在20世纪20年代和30年代是如何走向法西斯主义的——两个欧洲民主国家是如何自愿自杀并成为暴君的。我看了古罗马的奥古斯都是如何声称恢复了罗马共和国，但他什么也没做——他只是一个军事独裁者。他之后的凯撒也是如此。我看到了弗拉基米尔·普京对俄罗斯成为民主国家的机会所做的一切——以及他和他的黑帮朋友们私吞了多少俄罗斯财富(普京可能是世界上最富有的人)，以及普京在许多俄罗斯人中有多受欢迎。我看了埃尔多安对土耳其的所作所为，塞西对埃及的所作所为，杜特尔特对菲律宾的所作所为……这些独裁者可能没有得到本国大多数人的真正支持，但如果没有大量人民的默许，他们不可能贬低/分解/摧毁民主；这些国家中都有相当一部分人愿意失去公民自由，并追随一个说“只有我能解决”的煽动者。

And I’d think: of course, that could never happen in the United States of America! Donald Trump knows better. Our Constitution may turn out to be too strong for him to triumph over in the end, but he has come much farther and closer thus far than I could have dreamed possible, and there is a good 30 - 40% of our population who wouldn’t mind a bit if he declared martial law, said we were in some kind of national state of emergency, and suspended the Constitution — especially the First Amendment. In that regard, Trump is much smarter than I am. We are in a kind of lull now, as we were during the first eight months of W’s presidency. We knew he was shallow and ignorant, and couldn’t talk in a coherent sentence, and was putting people in charge of departments they hated, in order to destroy those programs. We weren’t happy, but we got on with our lives. He’d do stuff like go on vacation for the whole month of August in 2001 and we’d think: well, that doesn’t seem like a good idea, but it’ll probably turn out okay …
Then, a few weeks after his first month-long vacation, 9/11 happened. And he was able to spin that into a way to launch a lying war of choice in Iraq, and consolidate power, and earn re-election. Would Trump be able to do the same if his inattentiveness, incompetence and lack of adequate staffing leave us vulnerable and something equally disastrous happens? Or if he causes something disastrous to happen as a distraction from the “Russia thing” and as a pretext to consolidate power? I’ve worried about that a lot:

我想：这在美利坚合众国当然是不可能发生的！唐纳德·特朗普更清楚。我们的宪法可能太强大了，以至于他最终无法获胜。但到目前为止，他走得比我想象的要远得多，也比我想象的要近得多。如果他宣布戒严令，说我们国家处于某种紧急状态，暂停实施宪法——尤其是第一修正案，我们有30 - 40%的人一点也不介意。在这方面，特朗普比我聪明得多。我们现在处于一种平静状态，就像小布什担任总统的前八个月一样。我们知道他浅薄无知，不能用连贯的句子说话，他让人负责他们讨厌的部门，以破坏这些项目。我们并不快乐，但我们继续过着我们的生活。他会做一些事情，比如在2001年的整个8月去度假，我们会想：好吧，这似乎不是个好主意，但结果可能还行……
然后，就在他第一个月假期的几周后，911发生了。他能够利用这一点在伊拉克发动一场谎言战争，巩固权力，赢得连任。如果特朗普的漫不经心、无能和人手不足让我们变得脆弱，发生了同样灾难性的事情，他还能做到同样的事情吗？或者，他会不会为了分散人们对“俄罗斯事件”的注意力，并以此为借口，导致一些灾难性的事情发生?我一直很担心这个问题:

Sometimes I think America would see through him . I go back and forth about whether he could do it or not. But it is always a mistake to underestimate him.
He has the brilliant insight that many Americans are happy for our democracy to commit suicide, and it never would have occurred to me that such numbers of citizens could value our Constitution so little! Every time he lies, it batters democracy. Every time he obfuscates, every time he attacks the press, every time he creates a false equivalency between partisan media without fact-checkers and the legitimate media that feature a separation of news articles and editorials and have real fact-checkers on the pay-roll — we move closer to becoming a failed democracy and a Third World country. And his supporters go right along with him. He’s smart enough to know they don’t give a rat’s ass about a separation of powers, a system of checks and balances and the ideals of the Enlightenment that our system of government stems from; I’m dumb enough to be surprised by their behavior, day after day.

有时候我觉得美国人会看穿他。关于他是否能做这件事，我一直在反复考虑。但低估他总是错误的。
他很有洞察力，许多美国人都乐于看到我们的民主自取灭亡，我从来没有想到这么多的公民会如此不重视我们的宪法！他每一次说谎，都是对民主的打击。每次他混淆视听，每次他攻击媒体，每次他在没有事实核查员的党派媒体和合法媒体之间制造虚假的对等关系，合法的媒体，其特点是新闻文章和社论分开，并在薪酬名单上有真正的事实核查员，我们越来越接近成为一个失败的民主国家和第三世界国家。他的支持者和他站在一起。他很聪明，知道他们根本不关心三权分立、权力制衡体系以及启蒙运动的理念，而启蒙运动正是我们政府体系的根源；我愚蠢到对他们日复一日的行为感到惊讶。

So, he didn’t fire Flynn, for weeks, though he knew Flynn lied. And he attacks his own Justice Department for the revised, bigoted Travel Ban he signed, and he makes nonsense of their case before the Supreme Court. And he doesn’t bother to hide that he’s trying to make money off of the office he holds and so is his family, and he could care less about the emoluments clause. And he says the House Republican healthcare bill is the best bill ever. And he leans on Comey about Flynn and himself, and he fires Comey and tells Lester Holt, and the Russians in the Oval Office, that he did it because of the Russian investigation. Only if he wanted to govern effectively. He doesn’t care about that — he can’t even conceive of what that means. He wants attention. He’s exposing himself as corrupt and as obstructing justice, but he doesn’t care about that, either. It makes for exciting reality TV! The talking heads are buzzing about it. It drives up ratings. Impeachable offenses emerge … and he knows that McConnell and Ryan and the rest of the Republicans will do NOTHING about them. They all care about the “truth,” and whether he is a Russian Manchurian candidate who has destroyed our national security and national sovereignty, about as much as Devin Nunes does. They’ll turn a blind eye to every sign of treason and colluding with an enemy power, and every impeachable, Constitution-degrading offense. Eventually, he’ll probably fire Mueller — and Republicans will turn a blind eye to that, too. Trump is trashing our system, but he doesn’t care about our system or our Constitution. Trump has the wisdom of a psychopath to know that if you violate all norms and operate without a conscience, that very ruthlessness frees you in many situations, and gives you an edge over foolish, naively thoughtful people who are capable of empathy and who try to do the right thing.

所以，他好几周都没有解雇弗林，尽管他知道弗林撒谎了。他攻击自己的司法部，因为他签署了修订后的、偏执的旅行禁令，在最高法院面前，他把他们的案子说得毫无意义。他毫不掩饰自己在试图从自己的职位上赚钱，他的家人也是如此，他根本不关心薪酬条款。他说众议院共和党的医疗法案是有史以来最好的法案。他在弗林和他自己的事情上向科米施压，他解雇了科米，告诉了莱斯特·霍尔特，还有椭圆形办公室的俄罗斯人，他这样做是因为俄罗斯人的调查。除非他想有效地治理国家。他根本不在乎——他甚至无法想象那意味着什么。他想得到关注。他暴露了自己的腐败和妨碍司法公正，但他也不在乎这些。这是激动人心的电视真人秀！人们议论纷纷，它提高了收视率。可弹劾的罪行出现了……他知道麦康奈尔、瑞安和其他共和党人不会对此采取任何行动。他们都关心“真相”，关心他是否是一名俄罗斯满洲候选人，他破坏了我们的国家安全和国家主权，就像德文·努涅斯一样。他们会对每一个叛国和勾结敌人的迹象，以及每一个可弹劾的、有辱宪法的罪行视而不见。最终，他可能会解雇穆勒，而共和党人也会对此视而不见。特朗普在诋毁我们的制度，但他并不关心我们的制度或宪法。特朗普拥有精神病患者的智慧，他知道，如果你违反所有规范，没有良心地行事，这种无情在很多情况下会让你自由，让你比那些愚蠢、天真、有想法的人更有优势，这些人有同理心，试图做正确的事情。

Republicans everywhere are learning from Trump’s example. Greg Gianforte body-slammed a mild-mannered reporter at least a foot shorter than he was for no reason. He threw the guy to the ground, shouting at him, punching him, choking him, and broke his glasses. Then he and his campaign lied about it to the police and presented the reporter as the aggressor. The audiotape and the accounts of the other reporters present proved Gianforte a liar. That’s a pretty stupid thing to do as a candidate the night before the election, right? Brutally assault someone for no reason and lie like a coward to the cops about it?
But it turns out Gianforte, like Trump, is smarter than the rest of us. Montana voters ate it up! They were glad to see a Jew reporter from The Guardian with a slight build get pummeled; they warned other reporters to expect the same! Republicans in DC said Gianforte had “made a mistake.” Imagine if someone assaulted you that way for no reason and lied about it — would it just be a “mistake”? But he got a slap on the wrist for the crime. He’s not going to jail — he’s going to Congress! Trump called it a “great win in Montana.” It’s actually a great win for what Trump is trying to turn this country into: a thugocracy. Maybe I am wrong to say that Trump has no vision of what this country can become. It’s just that his vision is very, very different from mine.

各地的共和党人都在学习特朗普的榜样。格雷格·吉安福特（Greg Gianforte）无缘无故用身体撞向了一名举止温和且至少比他矮了一英尺记者。他把那个家伙摔倒在地，对他大喊大叫，拳打脚踢，掐他，还打碎了他的眼镜。然后，他和他的竞选团队向警方撒谎，并将记者称为侵略者。录音带和在场的其他记者的叙述证明了吉安福特是个骗子。作为一名候选人，在选举前一天晚上无端野蛮袭击某人，并像懦夫一样对警察撒谎是非常愚蠢的做法，对吧？
但事实证明，吉安福特和特朗普一样，比我们其他人都聪明。蒙大拿州的选民欣然接受！他们很高兴看到《卫报》一个身材瘦弱的犹太记者被打;他们警告其他记者也要做好同样的准备！华盛顿的共和党人说吉安福特“犯了一个错误”。想象一下，如果有人无缘无故地以这种方式袭击你并撒谎，这会是一个“错误”吗？但他的罪行只受到轻微处罚。他不会进监狱，他会进国会!川普称这是“蒙大拿州的伟大胜利”。这实际上是特朗普试图把这个国家变成一个暴徒政权的伟大胜利。也许我说特朗普对这个国家的未来没有任何愿景是错的。只是他的想法和我的非常非常不同。

Can Trump miscalculate? Sure. He’s gone bankrupt and simultaneously built three casinos that competed with each other and lost fortunes … but then Russian gangsters bailed him out and funded his new projects when most world banks wouldn’t lend to him because he’s a bad risk. He used his financial crash as a pretext to stop paying taxes. He says that “makes me smart.” Maybe, using the criteria that he and the Republicans now use, it does. Is it possible that once the Republican healthcare bill robs 23 million of care, and years go by without Trump accomplishing anything except hitting a lot of golf balls and tweeting, that Democrats can take back Congress in 2018? It’s possible. But Trump has done well so far betting on the American people to vote against their own interests. It’s the very people who voted for him that he’s sticking it to, and they don’t care so long as he bashes and scapegoats vulnerable minorities, General Pinochet and the junta in Chile miscalculated in the end; they held a plebiscite, and they lost power. But they ruled from 1973 to 1990 with something like 40% of the population supporting them to the very end — 40% of Chileans didn’t mind the loss of a free society, the crippling of the economy for many Chileans, the thousands who were tortured, murdered, disappeared by the military … and even after civilians took over, Pinochet and his fellow murderers got away with what they had done. Franco, in Spain, died in bed at a ripe old age, still in power. Robert Mugabe in Zimbabwe is still chugging along at age 93.

特朗普会误判吗？当然，他曾破产，同时建立了三家相互竞争的赌场，损失了很多财富，但后来俄罗斯黑帮帮他摆脱了困境，为他的新项目提供了资金，当时大多数世界银行都不愿意借钱给他，因为他的风险太大了。他以金融危机为借口停止纳税。他说这“让我变得聪明”。也许，按照他和共和党人现在使用的标准，确实如此。一旦共和党的医保法案剥夺了2300万人的医保，而特朗普多年来除了打高尔夫球和发推特外什么都没做成，民主党有没有可能在2018年夺回国会？这是可能的。但到目前为止，特朗普在押注美国人民投票反对自己的利益方面做得很好。正是那些投票给他的人，他一直坚持着，只要他抨击弱势少数群体，把他们当成替罪羊，他们就不在乎。皮诺切特将军和智利军政府最终误判了；他们举行了公民投票，他们失去了权力。但他们在1973年至1990年的统治期间，大约有40%的人口一直支持他们——40%的智利人不介意失去自由社会，不介意许多智利人的经济瘫痪，甚至不介意在平民接管后，成千上万的人被军队折磨、谋杀、失踪，皮诺切特和他的谋杀同伙却逍遥法外。在西班牙，佛朗哥（Franco）在高龄时死在床上，但当时仍大权在握。津巴布韦的罗伯特·穆加贝(Robert Mugabe)在93岁高龄时仍在蹒跚前行。

Hitler fell in the end. Mussolini wound up on a meat hook. Men with this kind of genius are not infallible. But they have a cunning kind of wisdom that makes fools of those of us who are idealistic, who believe in the best in humanity, who believe in the principles that we were taught, as children, our countries are founded on.

希特勒最终倒台了。墨索里尼被吊在了肉钩上。有这种天赋的人并非不会犯错。但他们有一种狡猾的智慧，让我们这些理想主义的人成为傻瓜，我们相信人性的美好，我们相信我们小时候被教育的原则，我们的国家是建立在这些原则的基础上的。

Bisswajit Singh
The USA, like any other country, has a complex and multifaceted history. There have been various events and actions that have been considered negative or controversial by different groups of people. Here are some examples:
Slavery and systemic racism: The United States has a history of institutionalized slavery, followed by segregation and ongoing discrimination that has impacted millions of people of color.
Forced removal of Native Americans: The U.S. government forcibly removed Native American tribes from their ancestral lands, leading to widespread displacement, death, and destruction of indigenous cultures.
War and military interventions: The United States has been involved in several wars and military interventions, some of which have been criticized for their human rights violations and lack of legitimacy.
Internment of Japanese Americans during World War II: The U.S. government forcibly removed more than 100,000 Japanese Americans from their homes and placed them in internment camps during World War II, violating their civil rights.
Environmental degradation: The United States has been criticized for its role in contributing to global climate change and the degradation of natural resources through practices such as oil and gas extraction and deforestation.
It's important to note that this is not an exhaustive list, and different people may have different opinions about what constitutes the "worst things" the United States has done.

美国和其他国家一样，有着复杂而多面的历史。有各种各样的事件和行动被不同群体的人认为是消极的或有争议的。下面是一些例子:
奴隶制和系统性种族主义:美国有制度化奴隶制的历史，随后是种族隔离和持续的歧视，影响了无数有色人种。
强行驱逐美洲原住民：美国政府强行将美洲原住民部落从其祖先的土地上驱逐出去，导致大范围的流离失所、死亡和土著文化遭遇破坏。
战争和军事干预:美国卷入了几场战争和军事干预，其中一些战争因侵犯人权和缺乏合法性而受到批评。
二战期间对日裔美国人的拘留:二战期间，美国政府强迫10万多名日裔美国人离开家园，将他们安置在拘留营，侵犯了他们的公民权利。
环境退化:美国因其在全球气候变化和自然资源退化方面所扮演的角色而受到批评，这些行为包括石油和天然气开采以及森林砍伐。
需要注意的是，这并不是一个详尽的清单，不同的人可能对美国所做的“最糟糕的事情”有不同的看法。

Matthew Bates
Why is the world so critical of the USA?
For the same reason people criticize Jeff Bezos more than they criticize Moises, the nice guy who delivers Amazon packages in my neighborhood: you can’t criticize what you don’t even know about.
Do you know the leader of the U.S.? Have you ever seen an American movie? Heard an American song? Read a book published in America, written by an American? Is there an American military presence in your country? Do you own something that was invented or made by an American company?
Now, can you answer “yes” to those questions for any other country than the U.S. and your home country?
That’s why people criticize the U.S.: We’re omnipresent even outside of our country. If you want to be a world player, you have to play with the U.S.
That generates a lot of criticism. A lot of praise, too, for what it’s worth.
Personally, I’m indifferent either way. I was born into all of this. I had no hand in making any of it happen. I won’t take credit or blame for decisions that were made way before I came along. Criticize that American base in your country all you want… I didn’t put it there, and I have zero power to remove it.

为什么世界如此批评美国?
出于同样的原因，人们批评杰夫·贝佐斯(Jeff Bezos)比批评在我家附近送亚马逊(Amazon)包裹的好人莫伊塞斯(Moises)更多:你不能批评你根本不了解的东西。
你认识美国的领导人吗?你看过美国电影吗?听过一首美国歌曲吗?读一本在美国出版，由美国人写的书?你们国家有美国军队吗?你拥有美国公司发明或制造的东西吗?
现在，除了美国和你的祖国，你能在其他国家对这些问题回答“是”吗?
这就是人们批评美国的原因:即使在国外，我们也无处不在。如果你想在世界舞台上发挥作用，你就必须和美国合作。
这引发了很多批评。也得到了很多赞扬，因为这是值得的。
就我个人而言，不管怎样我都无所谓。我出生在这样的环境中。这一切都与我无关。我不会为那些早在我出现之前就做出的决定去赞扬或指责。随便你怎么批评美国在你们国家的基地……我没有把它放在那里，我也没有能力移除它。