订阅压力如何逐渐消失……虽然总统因其明显违法的、由纳税人资金支持的竞选广告而几乎不会面临任何后果，但我们必须记住：他确实应该为此负责。
How the subscription squeeze is ending. While the president is unlikely to face any consequences for his patently illegal, taxpayer-funded ads, it’s essential to remember he should.
像许多美国人一样，周六我在观看大学体育比赛时，突然看到一则唐纳德·特朗普的新竞选广告打断了我的观看体验。在广告中，特朗普承诺要清除国内的共产主义者和马克思主义者；这让我愤怒地盯着电视，忍不住低声说道：“我哪儿都不会去，你个混蛋！”广告末尾还有一句奇怪的标语：“本广告由美国政府资助。”这句话立刻让我想起了相关法律：联邦法律明文禁止使用纳税人的钱来制作竞选广告或其他形式的宣传材料。
Like many Americans, I was watching college gladiatorial sports on Saturday when a new Donald Trump campaign ad interrupted my nachos and circus. In the ad, Trump promises to rid the country of communists and Marxists—which made me glare at my TV long enough to mumble, “I’m not going anywhere, you piece of shit”—followed by a curious tagline: “Paid for by the U.S. government.”The line immediately activated my lawyer brain. Federal law prohibits taxpayer dollars from being used for campaign ads and other forms of propaganda.
特朗普的这则广告显然违反了这一规定。此外，该广告还违反了《哈奇法案》（Hatch Act），该法案禁止联邦官员以公职身份发表竞选言论。这些广告（特朗普显然用纳税人的钱制作了三则不同的广告）完全不合法，也绝不能被容忍。
Trump’s ad was a clear violation of this restriction. Moreover, the ad violates the Hatch Act, which bars federal officials from making campaign statements in their official capacity. Nothing about these ads (Trump apparently made three different ones with our tax dollars) is remotely legal, or okay. And yet, before the game resumed, I knew how the rest of the story would play out.
然而，在比赛继续之前，我就已经预料到了后续的发展：民主党人会要求对此违法行为进行调查；共和党人则会耸耸肩，要么声称自己没看到这则广告，要么表示这没什么大不了的；特朗普政府则会给出一些敷衍的辩解（比如“反正现在有一位黑人总统在执政”）。最终，什么都不会发生。与此同时，那些揭露这些广告违法性的报道反而会让更多人注意到那些通过电视传播的政府宣传内容……正如我预料的那样，事态发展大体如预期。
Democrats would demand an “investigation” into this facially obvious violation. Republicans would shrug and either say they hadn’t seen it, or that it was no big deal. The Trump administration would offer some limp legal defense that amounted to “but a Black president existed.”Nothing would happen. All the while, the stories highlighting the ad’s illegality would draw more attention to the state propaganda beamed into our eyeballs. It’s played out pretty much as I anticipated.
理查德·佩特和诺姆·艾森等知名伦理学家严厉抨击了政府。艾森对《纽约时报》表示：“总统及其政府已从‘违法’转为‘践踏法律’。”参议员伊丽莎白·沃伦对《国会山报》表示：“应该进行全面调查，因为表面上看这违反了联邦法律。”即使是共和党参议院多数党领袖约翰·图恩也稍作反驳，尽管他不得不小心翼翼地在轻轻训斥其“亲爱的领袖”时，仍要舔特朗普的靴子。图恩说：“信息传递得很好，我喜欢这个信息，但不应该由纳税人买单。”
Popular ethicists like Richard Painter and Norm Eisen have excoriated the administration. Eisen told The New York Times: “The president and his administration have gone from breaking the law to trampling it.”Senator Elizabeth Warren told The Hill: “There should be a full investigation because on its face it appears to be a violation of federal law.”Even the Republican Senate majority leader John Thune pushed back a little, though he had to be careful to still lick Trump’s boot while lightly admonishing his dear leader. Thune said: “It’s a great message, I like the message, but it shouldn’t be paid for by taxpayer dollars.”
就特朗普政府而言，他们将该广告称为“公共服务公告”，并将其比作（请稍等）奥巴马鼓励人们报名参加《平价医疗法案》的广告。白宫称该广告旨在“提醒美国人热爱祖国，并理解是什么让祖国值得捍卫，无论是在国内、边境还是海外”。朋友们，这些广告里没有宣布任何“公共服务”。没有任何特朗普向我提供的计划或机会。他没有提醒我报名参加任何事情。他甚至没有像那些“发现可疑情况，立即举报”的广告那样，让我去干涉别人的事务，或监视我的穆斯林邻居。这纯粹就是一则竞选广告。
For its part, the Trump administration has called the ad a “public service announcement” and likened it to (wait for it) Barack Obama’s ads encouraging people to sign up for the Affordable Care Act. The White House said the ad is about “reminding Americans to love their country and understand what makes it worth defending, at home, at our borders, and abroad.”Friends, there is no “public service” announced in these ads. There is no program or opportunity Trump is offering me. He’s not reminding me to sign up for anything. He’s not even telling me to meddle in other people’s business, or spy on my Muslim neighbors like those “if you see something, say something” ads. It’s just a straight campaign ad.
确实，我们知道这是竞选广告，因为它和特朗普其他的竞选广告如出一辙。它具备所有特朗普式的标志：他独自一人，在阴森的音乐中走在黑暗的走廊里。这样想吧：几乎人尽皆知的最著名公共服务公告是“知识就是力量”系列。那些广告以一道彩虹和一颗星星作为标志。它们看起来不像反乌托邦谋杀悬疑片，而那显然是特朗普风格指南中唯一的一页。
Indeed, we know it’s a campaign ad, because it’s like all of Trump’s other campaign ads. It has all the Trump ticks: he’s alone, walking in a dark hallway to ominous music. Think about it this way: the most famous public service announcement that nearly everyone is familiar with is the “The More You Know” series. Those ads are punctuated with a freaking rainbow and a star. They don’t look like a dystopian murder mystery that is apparently the only page in the Trump style guide.
特朗普正在花纳税人的钱为非法的国家宣传买单，而这样做的代价将是……什么也没有。你或许可以认为，仅此一事就足以让特朗普被弹劾，但事到如今，如果你还认为一名已被判34项重罪成立的总统会仅仅因为这笔小额的公款侵占行为而被弹劾，那你就只能是个幼稚的傻瓜。如果媒体仍然能够正常发挥舆论监督作用，人们对这些广告的愤怒程度将高到足以造成巨大干扰，迫使特朗普撤下广告，并解雇一名替罪羊式幕僚来为此事谢罪；事实上，就在不久之前，特朗普还以克里斯蒂·诺姆挪用纳税人的钱用于个人广告宣传活动为由解雇了她，尽管这只是一个表面上的理由。
Trump is using taxpayers dollars for illegal state propaganda, and the penalty for that will be… nothing. You could make the argument that this is an impeachable offense for Trump, but at this point you’d have to be a naive fool to think that the president who has been convicted of 34 felonies will be impeached over this light embezzlement of public funds. If we still had a functional media the outrage over these ads would reach such a level of distraction that Trump would be compelled to pull them and fire a sacrificial staffer for the offense; indeed, it wasn’t too long ago that Trump fired Kristi Noem ostensibly because she misused taxpayer funds for a personal ad campaign.
但诺姆是女性，而特朗普就是特朗普，他从不为自己的行为承担个人责任。最有可能的是，他会继续投放这些广告几个星期，以证明自己毫不在乎法律，然后在足够多的共和党人恳求他这样做之后，悄悄撤下广告，因为这些广告实际上无助于他们通过竞选继续掌权。
But Noem is a woman, and Trump is Trump, and Trump never takes personal responsibility for his actions. Most likely, he will continue running these ads for a couple of weeks to prove he does not care about laws, then quietly pull them after enough Republicans beg him to do so because it’s not actually helping them in their campaigns to retain power.
事情就会这样收场。又一起胆大妄为的违法行为，又一次公款挪用，又一件特朗普不会为之承担责任的事情。
And that will be that. Another brazen illegality, another misappropriation of public funds, and another thing Trump will not be held accountable for.
什么都不会发生，但我们仍须记住，本应有事情发生。我们不能丧失看到犯罪行为时识别它的能力。公开反对国家宣传，是抵制它的最佳方式。通过识别它，并揭露它的真实本质，无论政府如何试图对我们进行精神操控，我们都能与现实保持联系。引用我最喜欢的《星际迷航》整个正史系列中的一句话：“那里有四盏灯。”不是五盏。无论政府多少次试图欺骗你，喊出正确答案都很重要。
Nothing will happen, but it’s still important to remember that something should happen. We can’t lose the ability to spot a crime when we see it. Speaking out against state propaganda is the best way to resist it. By spotting it and calling it out for what it is, we remain tethered to reality, no matter how hard the state tries to gaslight us. To quote my favorite line in the entire Star Trek canon: “There are four lights.”Not five. And it is important to shout out the right answer, no matter how many times the government tries to lie to you.
同样重要的是记住真相，因为如果民主党再次夺回权力，特朗普违反的法律将是需要修复和加强的法律之一。哈奇法案在特朗普政府被多次违反，已不再具备功能性。我们需要一部新的、具有实质约束力的法案，真正阻止公共官员利用纳税人的钱进行竞选。我们还需要更新的FCC法律，适应数字流媒体时代，确保候选人获得平等时间，同时削弱该机构的威力，使其无法威胁吉米·基梅尔和斯蒂芬·科尔伯特。
It’s also important to remember the truth, because if the Democrats ever take back power, the laws Trump has broken are among those that will need to be fixed and strengthened. The Hatch Act has been violated so many times by the Trump administration it no longer functionally exists. We’re going to need a new one, with real teeth, that will actually deter public officials from campaigning on the taxpayers’ dime. We’re going to need new FCC laws, updated for a digital streaming age, to ensure equal time for candidates while also defanging the institution so it can’t menace Jimmy Kimmell and Stephen Colbert.
在我们能安然吃玉米片、观看美式足球之前，我们需要修复许多问题。
We’re going to need to fix a lot of things before we can eat nachos and watch football in peace.
成为本月持续捐赠者 今年九月，在右翼红色恐慌的复苏与唐纳德·特朗普使用令人寒心的《国家安全总统备忘录-7》将左翼政治组织定为犯罪之间，我们正目睹麦卡锡主义在我们眼前重现。
Become a Sustaining Donor This September Between the reemergence of right-wing red-baiting and Donald Trump’s use of the chilling National Security Presidential Memorandum–7 to criminalize left political organizing, we’re seeing McCarthyism reborn before our eyes.
对民主的这场攻击不能被忽视或愿望消除。抵抗它需要在威胁和压迫面前的勇气，对真相的坚定承诺，以及坚定不移的信念，即我们能够——并且将会——克服这片黑暗。
This assault on democracy cannot be ignored or wished away. Resisting it requires bravery in the face of threats and repression, a steadfast commitment to the truth, and the unwavering belief that we can—and will—overcome this darkness.
若想赢得这场斗争，我们必须拥有独立媒体，纠正记录，揭露腐败与权力滥用，并推动普遍正义与尊严的政治。
We must have an independent media that sets the record straight, unearths corruption and abuses of power, and advances a politics of justice and dignity for all if we’re to win this fight.
这就是我今天写信给你的原因。今年九月，《国家》需要再增加100名月度捐赠者，以维持我们的进步新闻事业。你的捐款使得下一份调查报告、下一篇真相专栏和下一篇突破性文章成为可能。
That’s why I’m writing to you today. This September, The Nation needs to add 100 monthly donors to sustain our progressive journalism. Your contribution makes the next investigative report, the next truth-speaking column, and the next pathbreaking essay all possible.
我希望你今天就以定期捐赠的方式支持我们的工作。如果你每月捐赠10美元或以上，我们将寄给你一张全新的“别碰自由新闻！”贴纸，以表彰你对我们事业的承诺。请，今天就捐赠吧。
I hope you’ll support our work with a recurring donation today. If you donate $10 or more a month, we’ll send you a brand new “Hands Off the Free Press!” sticker to recognise your commitment to our cause. Please, donate today.
前进，Katrina vanden Heuvel，《国家》编辑与出版人
Onward, Katrina vanden Heuvel Editor and Publisher, The Nation