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2008-11-05 22:16:45
Nov. 4, 2008, is a historic day because it marks the end of an economic era, a political era and a generational era all at once.
2008年11月4日，是历史性的一天。因为这一天标志着一个经济时代，一个政治时代和一代人的同时结束。
Economically, it marks the end of the Long Boom, which began in 1983. Politically, it probably marks the end of conservative dominance, which began in 1980. Generationally, it marks the end of baby boomer supremacy, which began in 1968. For the past 16 years, baby boomers, who were formed by the tumult of the 1960s, occupied the White House. By Tuesday night, if the polls are to be believed, a member of a new generation will become president-elect.
So today is not only a pivot, but a confluence of pivots.
从经济角度看，它标志着始于1983年长期繁荣的结束（the Long Boom）。从政治角度看，他也许标志着始于1980年保守主导地位的结束。从代代相传角度看，他标志着始于1968年出生于生育高峰的人的统治的结束。过去16年，由出生于上世纪60年代生育高峰的骚动一代占领着白宫。到周二晚上，若是民意调查可信的话，一个新时代的人将当选为总统。
因此今天不仅是一个轴心，而是一系列轴心汇聚。
当历史学家们回顾现在这正在逝去的时代时，他们将看到是一个私人成就和公众失望的时代。过去20年，美国已经成为一个更加有趣的地方。诸如星巴克，苹果，Crate & Barrel，微软以及许多其他公司使日常生活有了生气。普通老百姓，尤其是年轻人，修复了社会结构，致力于社区服务，降低吸毒和少女怀孕。
Yet, at the same time, the public sphere has not flourished. Despite decades of affluence, longstanding issues like health care, education, energy and entitlement debt have not been adequately addressed. The baby boomers, who entered adulthood promising a lifetime of activism, have been a politically undistinguished generation. They produced two presidents, neither of whom lived up to his potential. They remained consumed by the culture war that divided their generation. They pass their political supremacy today having squandered the fat years and the golden opportunities.
然而同时，公共领域没有繁荣起来。尽管数十年富裕，但一些长期问题如卫生保健，教育，能源和权利债务，并未得到足够的处理。出生于生育高峰的人，在成年后承诺行动主义，只是一代政治上平庸的一代。他们中产生了两个总统，都未能发挥自身的潜力。他们的精力被文化战争所消耗，而文化战争又使这一代人分裂。他们如今走过了政治统治的时期，挥霍了丰腴年华和绝佳机会。
Month by month, frustration has mounted. Americans are anxious about their private lives but absolutely disgusted by public leaders. So change is demanded.
日积月累，挫败感不断加大。美国人对自身的私生活感到焦虑，但对公众领导人是绝对的厌恶。所以变化应需而生。
Republicans nominated an old warrior with a record of making hard decisions and absorbing the blows that ensue. Many of us regard him — and always will — as one of the heroes of our time. But the public demand for change was total, and if the polls are right, voters will elect the man who breaks from the recent past in almost every way.
共和党提名了一位老战士，有着作出艰难决定以及承受随之而来打击的记录。我们有许多人都视他为，也将永远视他为我们时代的英雄之一。但公众对变化的意愿是一切，假如民意测试正确的话，选民将会选举一个打破过去一切的人。
Barack Obama is a child of a child of the 1960s. His mother was born only five years earlier than Hillary Clinton. For people in Obama’s generation, the great disruption had already occurred by the time they hit adulthood. Theirs is a generation of consolidation and neo-traditionalism — a generation of sunscreen and bicycle helmets, more anxious about parenthood than anything else.
巴拉克·奥巴马是60年代的孩子。他母亲只比希拉里·克林顿大5岁。对于和奥巴马一代的人来说，当他们成年后就已经产生巨大的分裂。他们是一代团结和新传统主义的一代——搽着防晒油戴着机车头盔的一代，对父母职责最为焦虑。
Obama is not only a member of this temperate generation, but of its most educated segment. He has lived nearly his entire adult life within a few miles of one or another of the country’s top 10 universities.
奥巴马不仅仅是这温和的一代，还是其中受教育最多的一部分。他整个成年都离全国10所最好大学中的几所只有几英里。
His upscale, post-boomer cohort has rallied behind him with unalloyed fervor. Major college newspapers have endorsed him at a rate of 63 to 1. The upscale educated class — from the universities, the media, the law and the financial centers — has financed his $600 million campaign (which relied on big-dollar donations even more heavily than George W. Bush’s 2004 effort). This cohort will soon become the ruling class.
他的社会高层，后生育高峰的支持者以无比的热情集结在他身后。主要大学报纸对其支持率达到63:1。受过高等教育的社会高层——他们来自大学，媒体，法律以及金融中心——为其资助6亿美元的竞选费用（这比2004年布什还要依赖于大笔金钱的支助）。这些人不久就会成为统治阶层。
And the irony is that they will be confronted by the problem for which they have the least experience and for which they are the least prepared: the problem of scarcity.
讽刺的是，他们将最没有经验也最没有准备地面临这样一个问题：稀缺性。
Raised in prosperity, favored by genetics, these young meritocrats will have to govern in a period when the demands on the nation’s wealth outstrip the supply. They will grapple with the growing burdens of an aging society, rising health care costs and high energy prices. They will have to make up for the trillion-plus dollars the government will spend to avoid a deep recession. They will have to struggle to keep their promises to cut taxes, create an energy revolution, pass an expensive health care plan and all the rest.
长于繁荣时代，又是优生一代，这些年轻的精英们将在国家财富超过供应的这样一个时代治理国家。他们要担起一个不断老龄化社会，上涨的卫生保健费用和能源高价的担子。他们还要弥补政府用于救市的高达万亿美元的费用。他们还要努力实践其减税，创造能源革命，通过高昂的卫生保健计划以及其他所有的承诺。
As Robert J. Samuelson writes in his forthcoming book, “The Great Inflation and Its Aftermath,” “Already, Americans face far more claims on their incomes than can be easily met.”
正如Robert J. Samuelson在其即将出版的书中所写：“大通胀和余波”，“美国人已经面临超多的收入要求”。
In the next few years, the nation’s wealth will either stagnate or shrink. The fiscal squeeze will grow severe. There will be fiercer struggles over scarce resources, starker divisions along factional lines. The challenge for the next president will be to cushion the pain of the current recession while at the same time trying to build a solid fiscal foundation so the country can thrive at some point in the future.
在接下来几年，国家财富要么停滞要么缩水。财政问题会越来越严重。对稀缺资源，派别间分歧的争斗会越来越激烈。下个总统面对的挑战将是减轻目前经济衰退的痛苦，同时努力建立起坚固的财政基础，这样国家才会在将来某个时段繁荣起来。
We’re probably entering a period, in other words, in which smart young liberals meet a stone-cold scarcity that they do not seem to recognize or have a plan for.
换而言之，我们也许正进入这样一个时代：年轻而聪明的自由主义者遇到冷冰冰的稀缺性问题，对此他们又似乎无法识别或没有计划。
In an age of transition, the children are left to grapple with the burdens of their elders.
在一个转变的时代，年轻一代要担起老一代的负担。
