Bannon fodder
班氏炮灰[1]
Steve Bannon is ousted as the president’s chief strategist
史蒂夫.班农被罢黜总统首席战略师一职
He may yet prove more effective outside the White House
可能他会证明自己在白宫外更得力
Democracy in America
Aug 18th 2017
by J.F. | WASHINGTON, DC
美国民主
2017年8月18日
英文作者J.F.发自华盛顿
THE statement was short and bland: “WhiteHouse Chief of Staff John Kelly and Steve Bannon have mutually agreed today would be Steve’s last day. We are grateful for his service and wish him the best.” As with most such statements, this one concealed more than it revealed. According to President Donald Trump, there was nothing mutual about the separation: he had decided to remove his nationalist chief strategist. Mr Bannon’s camp insisted that in fact their man had resigned 11 days ago and that the events of Charlottesville had delayed the announcement. Signs that the relationship between the two men was not as harmonious as it used to be had emerged on Tuesday, when the strongest defence of Mr Bannon that Mr Trump could muster was to call him a “friend”, and “not a racist”, but warned that “we’ll see what happens with Mr Bannon.”
那份声明简短直白：“白宫幕僚长约翰.凯利（John Kelly）和史蒂夫.班农（Steve Bannon）双方一致同意今天是史蒂夫在白宫的最后一天。我们感谢他的效力并祝福他。”正如所有此类声明，台面下的比台面上的多。根据唐纳德.特朗普总统，这场分手没什么双方一致：他之前就决定要开除他的国家首席战略师了。而班农的人则坚持称事实上班农11天前就主动请辞了，只是（弗吉尼亚）夏洛茨维尔事件[2]拖延了他的辞职声明。而关于特朗普和班农的关系不像之前那么和谐的迹象，本周二就浮现了，当时班农强烈辩护说特朗普称他是“朋友”，“不是种族歧视分子”，但是警告说“我们和班农走着看吧。”
Of all the senior aides who have left Mr Trump’s White House over the past few weeks, this was the most surprising. Sean Spicer and Reince Priebus were creatures of the Republican National Committee: their loyalty was to a political party rather than to Mr Trump himself,which in Trumpworld made them suspect. Anthony Scaramucci was loyal to Mr Trump but bad at his job: he lasted, as he put it on a recent late-night appearance, about as long as a carton of milk.
在过去几周离开特朗普的所有高级侍臣中，班农算是最出人意料的。肖恩.斯派塞（Sean Spicer）[3]和雷恩斯.普利巴斯（Reince Priebus）[4]都是共和党全国委员会（Republican National Committee）的人：他们效忠于一个政党而非特朗普本人，在特朗普圈子里，他们反倒成了卧底。安东尼.史卡拉穆奇（Anthony Scaramucci）[5]忠于特朗普，但能力不行：如他自己在最近一档深夜节目中所言，他大概只能坚持一盒牛奶的期限了。
Mr Bannon is a different creature entirely. Before joining Mr Trump’s campaign last August, he ran Breitbart, a right-wing news site that he proudly called “the platform for thealt-right”. His sharp-edged nationalism and hostility toward what he calls “the permanent political class” defined Mr Trump’s campaign and his presidency. He loves to needle liberals and is very good at it. “Darkness is good,” enthused Mr Bannon soon after Mr Trump’s election elevated him to his position as the president’s chief strategist. “Dick Cheney. DarthVader.Satan. That’s power.”
班农完全是另一类人。在去年8月加入特朗普竞选团队之前，班农执掌布莱特巴特（Breitbart），他曾自豪地称这家右翼新闻网站为“另类右派的讲台”。他针对他所谓的“固化的政治阶级”的尖锐民族主义和敌意定义了特朗普的竞选主旨和总统胜券。他喜欢并且擅长激怒自由主义人士。“黑暗即好，”特朗普掌权后被提升做总统首席战略师的班农热血澎湃。“迪克切尼[6].达斯维达[7].撒旦，这就是力量。”
His time at the WhiteHouse was not smooth. He clashed with what he called “globalists” in the administration, which seemed to encompass all those who did not share his yearning to limit legal immigration and his belief that the West was undersiege. Negative stories about H.R. McMaster, the national security advisor who booted Mr Bannon from the national security council’s principals committee, began to appear on Breitbart. He had no shortage of internal enemies: one unnamed official told Politico, “No one liked him. People didn't know what he did other than stab his colleagues in the back.” Though Mr Bannon entered government vowing to turn the Republicans into the party of the working and middle classes, he and his boss have no signature policy achievements after eight months in office. Instead, Mr Bannon proved adroit at making enemies. Many—particularly on the left—will be glad to see him go.
但是班农在白宫过得并不顺遂，他和同僚中他所谓的“全球主义者”撕逼，这些人似乎囊括了所有不苟同他限制合法移民之愿和西方已被围攻之念的人。比如布莱特巴特新闻网开始报道关于H.R.麦克马斯特（H.R. McMaster）的负面新闻，这位时任国家安全顾问把班农踢出国家安全委员会的核心班子。班农的确不缺内敌：某位匿名官员告诉《政客》（Politico）[8]，“没人喜欢他，大家只知道他会暗箭诽谤同事。”尽管班农当初入职白宫时誓言要把共和党变成工人阶级和中产阶级的政党，共事8个月后，他和他的老板都没有可圈可点的政绩。班农反而证明了自己擅长树敌，很多人－尤其是左派人士－看到他走都拍手叫好。
Precisely why he left remains a mystery. But there seem to be two likely reasons. The first possibility is that he committed the same crime as Mr Scaramucci: hogging headlines. Earlyin his presidency Mr Trump was said to be incensed at the raft of stories and images depicting Mr Bannon as the power behind the throne. Mr Bannon assumed alower profile. He managed to survive the palace coup that ousted Messrs Spicer, Priebus and Scaramucci. Recently, however, he gave a bizarre interview to a lefty outlet,the American Prospect, in which he called the far-right“clowns”, urged Democrats to keep harping on about “race and identity” and mused over whom he was trying to oust and which colleagues he disliked. Perhaps most damagingly, he said in the interview that “there’s no military solution” to North Korea. (James Mattis, the defence secretary, rebutted the remarks about North Korea.) Mr Trump was also reportedly incensed at the credit his strategist received for winning the electionin a recent book by Joshua Green.
班农为何离开白宫？准确说来仍是个谜团，但也存在两种可能性。第一，他和史卡拉穆奇承认了同样的罪行：抢头条。特朗普刚当上总统时，据说他很不满有关班农就是宝座幕后操盘手的大量报道和图片。班农以较低的姿态，成功躲过了除名斯派塞、普利巴斯和史卡拉穆奇的宫廷政变。但是近期他给左翼媒体《美国瞭望》（American Prospect）做了一份奇怪的访谈，称极右翼是“小丑”，敦促民主党人继续盯着“种族和身份”，还想了一下他预备开除谁、不喜欢哪些同僚，可能在访谈中最危险的一点就是他说“打仗对付不了”北朝鲜。（美国国防部长詹姆斯.马蒂斯James Mattis随后驳斥了班农在北朝鲜问题上的言论。）还有报道称，特朗普对约书亚.格林（Joshua Green）在新书中有关于他的战略师为他赢得大选的溢美之词感到愤怒。
Another possibility is that Mr Trump believes that firing Mr Bannon will somehow compensate for his disastrous handling of last weekend’s deadly riots in Charlottesville. Some have urged Mr Trump to apologise for equating Nazis with those who protest Nazism. Alas, Mr Trump appears temperamentally incapable of apologising. But firing Mr Bannon would let him tell critics, “See? I just sacked the guy you kept calling a racist.” Trump-friendly media outlets could then argue that Mr Bannon’s firing shows the administration has turned a corner on race, and that those who still claim that the president sympathises with the far-right will just never be satisfied.
第二，特朗普认为开除班农－这某种程度上可以弥补他对上周末夏洛茨维尔暴力冲突事件的糟糕处理。已经有人让特朗普为其将纳粹党和纳粹主义拥护者相提并论而道歉。唉，特朗普好像本性上没能力说对不起。但是革职班农，他就可以跟评论人士说，“看到了吧？我刚开了那个你们一直说是种族歧视分子的人。”善待特朗普的媒体则能叫嚣：辞退班农说明当权政府在种族问题上已经转向了，但就是永远不能满足那些总是断言总统认同极右派的人。
The real reason may besome combination of the two. Firing Mr Bannon gets rid of someone who does not play well with others, thus making the White House run more smoothly. It also makes it look as though the president is rejecting the far-right without having to actually reject the far-right.Mr Trump seems sufficiently wedded to Mr Bannon’s brand of grievance-driven nationalism. His Tuesday press conference, after all, achieved Bannonism’s highest aim: it made the right people angry.
真相可能是两者皆有。罢黜班农，白宫就脱手了一个不站队的的人，这样白宫执事更顺利些。这也让外界觉得好像总统正在清除极右翼，但又没有非得真的清除极右翼。特朗普似乎充分打上了班农那满腹怨恨的民族主义烙印，别忘了他可在周二新闻发布会上做到了班农主义的极致，他说：这可让右派不开心了。
In the end, Mr Bannon may prove a more effective advocate for his worldview freed from the strictures of the White House—particularly under John Kelly, the new chief of staff who was hired to impose discipline. He was unsuccessful at enacting policy, but he is an adept shin-kicker and rabble-rouser. He is rumoured to be considering a new media venture with the Mercer family, conservative billionaires who supported several of his enterprises, including Breitbart, before he joined the Trump campaign. Mr Bannon may be out of the White House. But Bannonism is likely to remain a powerful force in American politics for some time.
最后，班农可能会证明自己脱离白宫束缚后－尤其是脱离约翰.凯利，这位新任白宫幕僚长专门严纪整风的－能更得力地布道自己的世界观。虽然班农不善于建言献策，但他可是个煽动群众的高手。有传言称他考虑和Mercer家族投资一家新的媒体公司，后者这个保守的亿万家族在班农加入特朗普团队之前投资了他几家公司，包括布赖特巴特。班农也许无缘白宫了，但一段时间内班农主义对美国政治的影响势必不容小觑。
英文链接：
https://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2017/08/bannon-fodder
翻译参考：
https://baike.baidu.com/item/史蒂夫·班农/20203114?fr=aladdin
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Bannon
[1]Bannon fodder一词取自英文cannon fodder,炮灰的意思，和报道内容切合，非常精妙，这里译作班氏炮灰
[2]8月11日，美国数千名白人种族主义者在弗吉尼亚州夏洛茨维尔市聚集，爆发了10年内最大的“白人至上”主义游行。游行进一步引发了暴力事件造成3人死亡，多人受伤。
[3]肖恩.斯派塞（Sean Spicer），原白宫发言人
[4]雷恩斯.普利巴斯（Reince Priebus），共和党全国委员会第65任主席
[5]安东尼.史卡拉穆奇（Anthony Scaramucci），华尔街金融家
[6]Dick Cheney迪克.切尼，译者不确定，可能指2001到2009年时任乔治.布什手下副总统的迪克.切尼
[7]Darth Vader达斯.维达，星球大战中重要的反派人物
[8]《政客》（Politico）是一家美国左倾政治新闻媒体。
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