美国大选首场辩论：特朗普和拜登的言语互殴战
With Cross Talk, Lies and Mockery, Trump Tramples Decorum in Debate With Biden
JONATHAN MARTIN, ALEXANDER BURNS
2020年9月30日
WASHINGTON — The first presidential debate between President Trump and Joseph R. Biden Jr. unraveled into a rhetorical melee Tuesday, as Mr. Trump hectored and interrupted Mr. Biden nearly every time he spoke and the former vice president denounced the president as a “clown” and told him to “shut up.”
华盛顿——周二，特朗普总统与小约瑟夫·R·拜登(Joseph R. Biden Jr.)的首次总统辩论演变为一场言语上的互殴，拜登每一次讲话都会被特朗普骚扰和插嘴，而前副总统则指责总统是一个“小丑”，并叫他“闭嘴”。
In a chaotic, 90-minute back-and-forth, the two major party nominees expressed a level of acrid contempt for each other unheard-of in modern American politics.
在长达90分钟的混战中，两位主要政党候选人对彼此的尖酸蔑视在现代美国政坛可谓闻所未闻。
Mr. Trump, trailing in the polls and urgently hoping to revive his campaign, was plainly attempting to be the aggressor. But he interjected so insistently that Mr. Biden could scarcely answer the questions posed to him, forcing the moderator, Chris Wallace of Fox News, to repeatedly urge the president to let his opponent speak.
在民调中落后、急切希望挽回竞选颓势的特朗普显然想做一个挑衅者。但他固执地不断插嘴，以至于拜登几乎无法回答向他提出的问题，迫使辩论主持人——来自福克斯新闻的克里斯·华莱士(Chris Wallace)——一再敦促总统让他的对手发言。
“Will you shut up, man?” Mr. Biden demanded of Mr. Trump at one point in obvious exasperation. “This is so unpresidential.”
“老兄，你能闭嘴吗？”明显被激怒的拜登一度这样问特朗普。“这太没总统样子了。”
Yet Mr. Biden also lobbed a series of bitingly personal attacks of his own.
然而拜登自己也发起了一系列尖锐的人身攻击。
“You’re the worst president America has ever had,” he said to Mr. Trump.
“你就是美国有史以来最糟糕的总统，”他这样对特朗普说。
“In 47 months I’ve done more than you have in 47 years,” Mr. Trump shot back, referring to his rival’s career in Washington.
“我在47个月里做的比他在47年里做的还多，”特朗普在回击中这样评价对手在华盛顿的政治生涯。
The president’s bulldozer-style tactics represented an extraordinary risk for an incumbent who’s trailing Mr. Biden because voters, including some who supported him in 2016, are so fatigued by his near-daily attacks and outbursts. Yet the former vice president veered between trying to ignore Mr. Trump by speaking directly into the camera to the voters, and giving in to temptation by hurling insults at the president. Mr. Biden called Mr. Trump a liar and a racist.
总统的推土机式策略说明了这位落后于拜登的现任面临的巨大风险，因为选民——包括一些在2016年支持过他的人——已经对他几乎每天都在进行的攻击和爆发感到厌倦。然而，前副总统时而试图忽略他，直接对着镜头向选民讲话，时而又忍不住对着总统进行谩骂。拜登称特朗普是一个骗子和种族主义者。
Mr. Trump peppered his remarks with misleading claims and outright lies, predicting that a coronavirus vaccine was imminent when his own chief health advisers say otherwise, claiming that his rollback of fuel-efficiency standards would not increase pollution and insisting that a political adviser, Kellyanne Conway, had not described riots as useful to Mr. Trump’s campaign, when she did so on television.
特朗普在自己的讲话中散布了误导性言论和赤裸裸的谎言，预言一种冠状病毒疫苗即将问世，虽然他自己的首席卫生顾问持相反态度，宣称他取消燃油效率标准不会增加污染，并坚称政治顾问凯莉安·康维(Kellyanne Conway)没有把骚乱描述为对他的竞选有利，而她在电视上确实这样说过。
And even as he went on the offensive against Mr. Biden on matters of law and order, Mr. Trump declined to condemn white supremacy and right-wing extremist groups when prompted by Mr. Wallace and Mr. Biden. When Mr. Wallace asked him whether he would be willing to do so, Mr. Trump replied, “Sure,” and asked the two men to name a group they would like him to denounce.
然而，尽管在法律与秩序的问题上对拜登发起攻势，在华莱士和拜登的催促下，他还是拒绝谴责白人至上主义和右翼极端组织。当华莱士问他是否愿意这么做时，特朗普回答道，“当然，”并要这两人说出他们希望他谴责的组织名称。
But when Mr. Biden named the Proud Boys, a far-right group, Mr. Trump did not do so and even suggested they be at the ready.
但当拜登点名极右组织“骄傲小子”(Proud Boys)时，特朗普并没有谴责，甚至表示他们应该做好准备。
“Proud Boys? Stand back and stand by,” the president said, before pivoting to say, “Somebody’s got to do something about antifa and the left.”
“骄傲小子？后退一步，做好准备，”总统说，随后又转移话题道，“总得有人对反法(antifa)和左翼组织做点什么吧。”
Mr. Trump’s volcanic performance appeared to be the gambit of a president seeking to tarnish his opponent by any means available, unbounded by norms of accuracy and decorum and unguided by a calculated sense of how to sway the electorate or assuage voters’ reservations about his leadership.
特朗普火山喷发式的表现，看起来就是一名总统不择手段玷污其对手的策略，他不受准确和得体规范的约束，也不听从对如何左右选民或平息选民对他领导能力的不满的精心指导。
In an election marked by sharply defined and stubbornly stable opinions about both candidates, the president’s conduct was the equivalent of pulling the pin on a hand grenade and hoping that the ensuing explosion would harm the other candidate more.
在这场大选中，两位候选人的形象都极其鲜明而固定，总统的行为等于拉开了手榴弹上的保险针，希望随后的爆炸会对另一位候选人造成更大的伤害。
But Mr. Trump made no effort to address his most obvious political vulnerabilities, from his mismanagement of the pandemic to his refusal to condemn right-wing extremism, and it was not clear that he did anything over the course of the evening to appeal to voters who have deeply disliked him, including those who reluctantly supported him four years ago. Rather than focus on those voters, he sought to undercut confidence in the act of voting itself, making claims about fraud while offering little evidence.
但特朗普完全没有直面自己最明显的政治弱点，从他对大流行的处理不当到他拒绝谴责右翼极端主义，整个晚上他都没做什么争取那些非常不喜欢他的选民的事，包括对那些四年前不情不愿支持了他的人。他没有把重点放在这些选民身上，而是试图削弱人们对投票本身的信心，声称选举存在舞弊，但没有提供什么证据。
The debate, at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, quickly descended into name-calling and hectoring in the first 15 minutes, derisive attacks that were extraordinary even by the standards of Mr. Trump’s unruly presidency.
这场在克利夫兰凯斯西储大学(Case Western Reserve University)进行的辩论在前15分钟里迅速演变为中伤和恐吓，即便是按照特朗普德任职期间无所顾忌的标准，这种嘲弄攻击都算得上过分。
When Mr. Biden attempted to discuss voters who had lost loved ones to the coronavirus, Mr. Trump interjected. “You would’ve lost far more people,” he declared.
当拜登试图谈论因冠状病毒失去亲人的选民时，特朗普打断了他。“换作是你，死人会更多，”他宣称道。
The former vice president veered between smiling and shaking his head in bemusement and firing off attacks of his own as Mr. Trump kept interrupting.
前副总统时而微笑，时而困惑地摇头，在特朗普不停地打断下发动自己的攻击。
In an exceptionally charged moment, Mr. Trump spoke dismissively about Mr. Biden’s deceased son, Beau, who died from brain cancer in 2015, rejecting an opportunity to show a modicum of personal grace toward his political opponent. Mr. Biden alluded to Beau Biden’s military service as he rebuked the president for having reportedly referred to America’s fallen soldiers as “losers.”
其中一个火药味特别浓的时刻，是特朗普轻蔑地谈到了拜登已故的儿子、在2015年死于脑癌的博(Beau)，他拒绝向他的政敌展示哪怕一丁点的个人风度。拜登在谴责报道所称的总统将美国阵亡士兵称为“失败者”时，提及了博·拜登的服役经历。
Mr. Trump answered with a rhetoric roll of the eyes, and began attacking Mr. Biden’s other son: “I don’t know Beau; I know Hunter,” he said, proceeding to ridicule Hunter Biden for his business dealings and struggles with drug addiction.
特朗普以翻白眼作为回应，并开始攻击拜登的另一个儿子：“我不认识博；但我认识亨特(Hunter)，”他说，紧接着嘲笑了亨特·拜登的商业交易和毒瘾问题。
Amid Mr. Trump’s onslaught, Mr. Biden repeatedly offered blanket denials that there was anything inappropriate in Hunter Biden’s overseas work, and said he was “proud of my son” for confronting addiction.
在特朗普的猛烈攻击下，拜登一再否认亨特·拜登的海外事业有任何不当之处，并称他为儿子能直面毒瘾“感到骄傲”。
He highlighted The New York Times’s revelations about how little Mr. Trump has paid in taxes. “This guy paid a total of $750,” Mr. Biden said.
他强调了《纽约时报》关于特朗普缴税非常少的披露。“这家伙一共交了750美元的税，”拜登说。
Pressed about how much he did pay in 2016 and 2017, the president claimed he paid “millions of dollars” but offered no evidence and declined to say he would release his tax returns.
当被质问在2016和2017年到底交了多少税时，总统声称他交了“数百万美元”，但没有提供证据，并拒绝承诺公布自己的纳税申报表。
One of the few phases of the debate that might have been taken by an open-minded viewer as an extended and articulate exchange of views came on the subject of the coronavirus pandemic. Mr. Trump voiced impatience with a range of public-health restrictions and Mr. Biden criticized the president for being dismissive of measures like mask wearing and social distancing.
少数几段可能会被开明观众称为深入且清晰交换了意见的辩论之一，就是关于冠状病毒大流行的问题。特朗普表达了对一系列公共卫生限制的不耐烦，而拜登则批评总统对戴口罩和保持社交距离等措施不屑一顾的态度。
“If we just wore masks between now — and social distanced — between now and January, we would probably save up to 100,000 lives,” said Mr. Biden, who also alluded to the disclosure in the journalist Bob Woodward’s recent book that the president had misled the American people about the severity of the virus last winter.
“如果我们从1月就开始戴口罩——以及保持社交距离——到现在，我们或许可以拯救多达10万人的生命，”拜登说，他还提到记者鲍勃·伍德沃德(Bob Woodward)在其新书中披露，总统冬天在病毒的严重性上误导了美国民众。
Mr. Trump, reiterating his demands that the country return quickly to normal, called on Democratic governors to “open these states up” quickly, and said without evidence, “They think they’re hurting us by keeping them closed.”
重申要国家迅速回归常态的特朗普呼吁民主党州长赶紧“让这些州开放”，并在没有证据的情况下声称，“他们认为封锁这些地方能伤害到我们。”
But even on a matter as grave as the pandemic, Mr. Trump indulged freely in personal mockery. When Mr. Biden called him “totally irresponsible” for holding mass rallies without health protections in place, Mr. Trump responded by mocking Mr. Biden’s more constrained events, suggesting the former vice president would hold large events, too, “if you could get the crowds.”
但即便是在大流行这样的沉重话题上，特朗普仍肆意进行着个人嘲讽。当拜登称他在没有卫生防护的情况下举行大规模集会“完全不负责任”的时候，特朗普的回应是嘲讽拜登的那些有更多限制的活动，暗示前副总统也可以举办大型活动，“只要你有本事吸引那么多人。”
For all his evident frustration with Mr. Trump for not abiding by the rules, Mr. Wallace made no attempt to correct the president as he unspooled a series of falsehoods. Mr. Trump, for example, insisted that Mr. Biden had once called criminals “superpredators.” But it was Hillary Clinton who said it, in 1996.
尽管华莱士明显对特朗普不遵守规则感到不满，但当总统编造一系列谎言时，他并没有做出纠正。比如，特朗普坚称拜登曾称罪犯为“超级掠夺者”。但真正说这话的人是1996年的希拉里·克林顿(Hillary Clinton)。
In addition to lobbing false allegations, Mr. Trump also was unable, or unwilling, to discuss policy issues in a detailed manner. Pressed on whether he believed in climate change, the president said, “I think to an extent yes,” before quickly adding: “We’re planting a billion trees.”
除了抛出虚假指控，特朗普还不能或不愿详细讨论政策问题。在被质问是否相信气候变化时，总统说，“我想，在某种程度上是相信的，”随后很快补充道：“我们正在种十亿棵树。”
Overshadowed though it might have been, the policy content of the debate’s opening phase mirrored the stark contrasts already on display in the race. On the Supreme Court, the two men split over whether it was appropriate for Mr. Trump to name a new justice to the court in the final months of his term, with the president offering a defiant rationale for doing so: “We won the election,” he said, “and we have the right to do it.”
尽管被其他的声音掩盖，但辩论初始阶段提到的政策内容还是反映了在竞选中已经显现出来的鲜明对比。在最高法院的问题上，对特朗普在任期最后几个月任命一位新法官的做法是否合适，两人意见不一，总统提出了一个目中无人的理由：“我们赢了大选，”他说，“我们就有权做这事。”
Perhaps more surprisingly, Mr. Trump dismissed Mr. Biden’s warning that Roe v. Wade, the Supreme Court decision guaranteeing women’s right to abortion access, was “on the ballot.”
或许更令人惊讶的是，对于拜登警告称本次选举是对罗诉韦德案(Roe v. Wade)——最高法院保障女性堕胎权利的裁决——的“表决”，特朗普予以否认。
The president projected disbelief, though the decision would plainly be vulnerable to being overturned by a conservative court. “There’s nothing happening there,” Mr. Trump insisted.
总统对此表达了怀疑，尽管该裁决很容易会被保守派法庭推翻。“什么都不会发生，”特朗普坚称。
Mr. Trump had no defense for Mr. Biden’s warning that if the Supreme Court struck down the Affordable Care Act it could imperil women and people with pre-existing conditions, nor did he offer a substantive response to Mr. Wallace’s question prompting him to articulate a specific vision for health care policy.
拜登警告如果最高法推翻《合理医疗费用法案》（Affordable Care Act，简称ACA），女性和存在既有身体状况的人会受到伤害，对此特朗普没有做出反驳，而华莱士提出让他阐明医保政策的具体构想时，他也没有给出实质性的回应。
Mr. Trump argued that he had already done so, though he has not, and said that his success repealing the Obama-era law’s individual mandate was a “big thing” on its own. Instead of finally filling in the blanks of his health care agenda, Mr. Trump sought to go on the attack against Mr. Biden, tying him to the “socialist” aspirations of the left wing of the Democratic Party.
特朗普辩称他已经阐述过了，尽管他并没有，而且他说，他成功废除了奥巴马时期法律的个人强制规定，这本身就是一件“大事”。他没有填补自己的医保议程中的种种缺漏，却转而继续攻击拜登，将他和民主党左翼的“社会主义”愿景联系起来。
Mr. Biden, who campaigned against socialized medicine in the Democratic primary, deflected the attack — “I am the Democratic Party right now,” he said — and sought to keep the focus on Mr. Trump’s lack of health care policies besides gutting the A.C.A.
在民主党初选中反对社会化医疗的拜登转移了攻击——“我现在就是民主党，”他说——然后他试图把焦点保持在特朗普除了废除ACA没有别的医保政策上。
“He doesn’t have a plan,” Mr. Biden said. “The fact is, this man doesn’t know what he’s talking about.”
“他什么计划也没有，”拜登说。“事实上这个人不知道他在说什么。”
For Mr. Trump, this first debate appeared to be his best chance to change the trajectory of a presidential race that has so far resisted all manner of Trumpian efforts to shake it up. The president has cycled through an array of attacks against his Democratic challenger in recent months, criticizing or outright smearing Mr. Biden’s governing record, personal ethics, economic policies, family finances, and mental and physical health — often relying on misinformation and falsehoods.
对特朗普而言，首次辩论似乎是他改变竞选走向的最佳机会，迄今为止，特朗普已经使出所有他特有的手段，仍无法扭转。过去几个月里，总统变着法地攻击他的民主党挑战者，对拜登的执政记录、个人操守、经济政策、家庭财务和精神与身体状况发起指责乃至直接的污蔑——其间时常使用不实信息和谎言。
Over the last month, Republicans have made an especially concerted push to brand Mr. Biden as overly sympathetic to racial-justice protests that have turned unruly and insufficiently committed to maintaining public order.
在上个月，共和党人发起了一场格外整齐划一的行动，力求渲染拜登过分同情已经演变为骚乱的种族正义抗议活动，缺乏维护公共秩序的意愿。
Yet that argument has not budged the race an inch in Mr. Trump’s direction, or changed the minds of a majority of voters who take a negative view of his personal character and his leadership during the pandemic. From the outset of the race, Mr. Trump has prioritized his largely rural and conservative base ahead of all other constituencies, and he has done little to reach out to Americans who do not already support him.
然而这些说辞丝毫没有改变特朗普的竞选形势，而对他个人以及疫情中的领导力持负面看法的人，也大多没有改变看法。是次竞选一开始，特朗普就在优先考虑以农村地区和保守派为主的票仓，对那些本来并不支持他的美国人没有多少触及。
Rather, in a year of tumult, there has been one constant: Mr. Biden has enjoyed a steady lead in the polls since he effectively claimed the nomination in April.
而在这一年的动荡中，有一点未曾改变：自从4月成为事实上的总统提名人以来，拜登在民调中牢牢掌握领先优势。
Propelled by women, voters of color and whites with college degrees, and faring better with Republican-leaning constituencies than Mrs. Clinton did in 2016, the former vice president is better positioned going into the final month of the election than any challenger since 1992.
依靠女性、有色人种选民和有大学学历的白人，以及在倾向共和党的选区中取得远优于2016年的克林顿的成绩，前副总统在竞选最后一个月的形势，是自1992年以来所有挑战者中最好的。
Mr. Biden has established an advantage in the three Great Lakes states that swung the election to Mr. Trump: Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. And he is leading the president or deadlocked with him across much of the Sun Belt, including in Georgia and Arizona, states that no Democrat has carried this century.
拜登在曾经让竞选天平偏向特朗普的三个湖区州取得了优势：密歇根、威斯康辛和宾夕法尼亚。他在包括乔治亚和亚利桑那的“太阳带”相当一部分地区或领先于总统，或相持不下，本世纪以来民主党人还未曾赢下过这些州。
Just as revealing as it relates to Tuesday’s debate, there are few undecided voters left in America. So it’s questionable whether this or either of the following two debates can drastically shift the election.
与周二的辩论相关且很能说明问题的是，现在美国已经不剩多少还在摇摆的选民。因此，无论是这一次还是接下来的两次辩论，都不见得能对选举结果产生巨大的影响。
