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For too many, the present is hard enough.
對很多人來說，當下都已經夠艱難了。
Income inequality has soared:
收入不平等已經加劇：
inflation-adjusted middle-class wages have been nearly frozen for the last four decades, while earnings of the top 1% have nearly tripled.
通脹調整后的中產階級工資凍結了將近40年，收入最高的那1%的人群的收入卻增長了近兩倍之多。
The recovery from the crash of 2008— which saw banks and bankers bailed out while millions lost their homes, savings and jobs—
2008年金融危機后——在那場危機中，銀行和銀行家得到了紓困，卻有數百萬人失去他們的住房、存款和工作——
was reserved almost exclusively for the wealthiest.
復蘇幾乎成了最富有的那群人才有的機會。
Their incomes in the three years following the crash went up by nearly a third, while the bottom 99% saw an uptick of less than half of 1%.
金融危機后的前三年，他們的收入就增長了近1/3，而底層99%的人的收入都只增長了不到0.5%。
Only a democracy and an economy that has discarded its basic mission of holding the community together, or failed at it, would produce those results.
只有放棄了將各個階層團結在一起這一基本使命，或沒能完成這一使命的民主體制和經濟體才會出現這樣的結果。
Meanwhile, the celebrated American economic-mobility engine is sputtering.
與此同時，美國著名的經濟流動引擎正在熄火。
For adults in their 30s, the chance of earning more than their parents dropped to 50% from 90% just two generations earlier.
對于30多歲的成年人來說，收入超過父母的幾率從兩代人之前的90%下降到了50%。
The American middle class, once an aspirational model for the world, is no longer the world's richest.
曾引領了全世界的夢想的美國中產階級如今已不再是世界上最富有的階層。
Most Americans with average incomes have been left to fend for themselves,
大多數收入在平均水平線的美國人都不得不自謀生路，
often at jobs where automation, outsourcing, the decline of union protection
而他們從事的往往又是被自動化、外包、工會保護的減少
and the boss's obsession with squeezing out every penny of short-term profit have eroded any sense of security.
以及老板對榨取每一分錢短期利潤的癡迷榨干了他們的安全感的工作。
In 2017, household debt had grown higher than the peak reached in 2008 before the crash,
隨著學生貸款和汽車貸款對家庭收入的要求越來越高，
with student and automobile loans staking growing claims on family paychecks.
2017年，家庭債務的水平就已經超過了2008年危機前的峰值。
Although the U.S. remains the world's richest country,
盡管美國當前依舊是世界上最富有的國家，
it has the third-highest poverty rate among the 35 nations in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), behind only Turkey and Israel.
但美國的貧困率也高居經濟合作與發展組織的35個成員國中的前三，僅次于土耳其和以色列。
Nearly 1 in 5 American children lives in a household that the government classifies as "food insecure,"
近五分之一的美國兒童都生活在政府劃定的“三餐不繼”的家庭中，
meaning they are without "access to enough food for active, healthy living."
意思就是他們連“過上積極健康的生活所需的食物”都不夠。
Beyond that, too few basic services seem to work as they should.
除此之外，國家的基礎服務也極少能正常運行。
America's airports are an embarrassment, and a modern air-traffic control system is more than 25 years behind its original schedule.
美國的機場建設簡直令人尷尬，現代空中交通管制系統也比原計劃落后了25年。
The power grid, roads and rails are crumbling, pushing the U.S. far down international rankings for infrastructure quality.
美國的電網、公路和鐵路正在崩潰，以致美國在基礎設施質量方面的國際排名大幅下滑。
Despite spending more on health care and K-12 education per capita than most other developed countries,
此外，盡管美國在醫療保健和K-12階段的教育方面的人均投入比大多數發達國家都多，
health care outcomes and student achievement also rank in the middle or worse globally.
但醫療保健方面的成果和學生的成績在全球也還是處于中等甚至更差的水平。
Among the 35 OECD countries, American children rank 30th in math proficiency and 19th in science.
在35個經合組織國家中，美國兒童的數學水平排到了第30名，科學水平也排到了第19名。
American politicians talk about "American exceptionalism" so habitually that it should have its own key on their speechwriters' laptops.
美國政客們總是習慣性地談論“美國例外論”，已經到了應該給他們的演講稿撰寫人的筆記本電腦專門配個“美國例外論”鍵的地步。
Is this the exceptionalism they have in mind?
這就是他們心目中的例外主義嗎？
Perhaps they should look at their own performance, which is best described as pathetic.
也許那些政客們應該看看他們自己的表現，用“可悲”來形容最恰當不過了。
Congress has not passed a comprehensive budget on time without omnibus bills since 1994.
自1994年以來，國會沒有哪次是在不借助綜合條例草案的情況下及時通過了全面預算的。
There are more than 20 registered lobbyists for every member of Congress.
每名國會議員都有20多名注冊說客。
Most are deployed to block anything that would tax, regulate or otherwise threaten a deep-pocketed client.
其中大多數說客的工作都是阻止任何可能對財力雄厚的客戶進行征稅、監管或對他們構成威脅的行為。
Indeed, money has come to dominate everything so completely
的確，金錢已經完全主宰了世間萬物，
that the people we send to D.C. to represent us have been reduced to begging on the phone for campaign cash up to five hours a day
以致于我們派到華盛頓特區去代表我們的人，都已經淪落到每天花長達五個小時的時間打電話向我們討競選資金，
and spending their evenings taking checks at fundraisers organized by those swarming lobbyists.
晚上到那些成群結隊的游說者組織的籌款活動上收支票的地步。
A gerrymandering process has rigged easy wins for most of them, as long as they fend off primary challengers—
選區劃分過程的不公操縱了他們中的大多數人輕松獲勝的過程，只要他們能抵擋住主要的挑戰者——
which ensures that they will gravitate toward the special-interest positions of their donors and their party's base,
這就確保了他們會被捐贈人和黨內基層的特殊利益所吸引，逐漸向他們靠攏，
while racking up mounting deficits to pay for goods and services that cost more than budgeted,
盡管他們用于支付超出預算的商品和服務帶來的赤字不斷攀升，
rarely work as promised and are seldom delivered on time.
又很少像他們承諾的那樣努力工作，也很少按時交出工作成績。
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