题目内容
The number of scientists and engineers going to America to study and work is dropping precipitously. An important reason is the length of time it now takes to get a visa. This is both deterring would-be visitors from coming, and hindering some of those who try. Not only may this lead to a decline in America's scientific strength, it is also an undeserved obstacle for many students.
Things are getting a little better--delays in visa processing, according to both America's State Department and academic observers, are shorter than a year ago. And only a small percentage of student-visa applications are held up for extremely long periods. Nonetheless, since the summer of 2003, applicants for student visas have been required to appear at an American consulate for an interview. Because consular staffs have not been expanded, this has led to delays of several weeks in order to sit for an interview that often lasts only a few minutes. Such a blanket requirement puts undue stress on both students and consulates, without yielding tangible security benefits. A more focused system makes more sense.
The current mess could prove costly to America. Its economic and military prowess owes a great deal to emigrating scientists and engineers. They were key members of the team which built its first atomic bomb in 1945, and they have played an important role ever since. In 2001, 35% of science and engineering doctorates a- warded by American universities went to foreign students, and foreigners comprise a similar proportion of America's scientific and engineering workforce.
Furthermore, several requirements have exacerbated delays, with little benefit to security. For example, checks on scientists working in areas that might relate to national security (exactly which areas are secret) are currently valid only for a year. Since such checks take on average two months to complete, and cannot be applied for within America, it thus becomes difficult to complete a course of study lasting five or six years. Visas should be granted for the duration of a course of study -if someone is not deemed a security risk today, it is un- likely he will be so a year from now. Legitimate visa holders should be allowed to enter and leave the country, and to apply for a renewal of their visas while still in America
There are also problems at home. The State Department and the Department of Homeland Security, which are jointly responsible for visas, are struggling to respond to the concerns of scientists but they are woefully ill- equipped files are exchanged twice weekly with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) on computer disks, while the FBI takes up to three days to reply that a person has not appeared on its database. Furthermore, the State Department keeps inadequate data about visa delays and applications. This is inexcusable. All manners of businesses use software today to segment and understand their customers' behavior. The government's failure to use the same technology is leading to both inefficiency and a decrease in security.
A more logical visa regime would make America safer, and those wishing to study or work there happier. Other countries are currently benefiting from the shortcomings in America's system. But change would, in the long term, serve even their interests. A return to honest global competition for scientists and engineers would be healthier and more productive.
The fact that key members of team that built America's first nuclear bomb were foreigners is used to ______.
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听力原文： A fire broke out in a Buenos Aires nightclub, which packed with young revelers celebrating the New Year holidays. It killed at least 175 people when a crowd was trapped by locked doors, official said on Friday. At least 619 people were injured in the blaze, after a flare fired into the club's ceiling during a rock concert. The blaze may have claimed more victims because four of the club's six doors were inexplicably tied shut with wire.
Which is the most possible reason for such a disaster？
The centenary of the birth of William Faulkner, one of the great modern novelists, was celebrated in September, 1997. Faulkner wrote about the southern states of the United States of America where he grew up, and where his family had an important part to play in the history of that region. His work became a touchstone for insights into the troubled issues of southern American identity, race relations, and the family interrelation- ships of the old-time southern gentry.
Faulkner was born in New Albany, Mississippi on September 25, 1897. Despite his interest in writing, he left Oxford High School, Mississippi, without graduating. After World War 1, he entered the University of Mississippi as a special student, a right to study which was granted to war veterans, although Faulkner had training with the Air Force in Canada, he did not enter combat.
Faulkner began to write poems, a verse play, short stories and finished his first novel Satoris in 1928. His fiction was centered for 14 of the 19 novels published during his lifetime a fictional region called Yoknapatawpha County. The name is said to be stem from the India Chickasaw word meaning split land.
In December 1950, Faulkner was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. When he accepted it in Stuck-holm, his speech emphasized that he wished to continue writing, but in a positive way that affirmed the power of humanity to prevail over adverse circumstances. As he said in his speech, he still felt that, despite the threat of nuclear war then hanging over the world, the central concern of the writer should be "the problems of the human heart in conflict with itself", He wanted the tension and problems that he had cast the spotlight on in the southern states of America to be resolved by the life-affirming attitudes and actions of his characters.
Like playwright Tennessee Williams, Faulkner was a major voice who spoke for the troubled heart of the southern states of America. His achievement is all the more remarkable because, as a schoolboy, he was not only a frequent truant but also reportedly failed to reach pass grades in English class. His collected short stories, novels, poems, allegorical stories and other writings which form. a legacy of literature which casts pro found illumination on the special culture of the South, a culture, which developed from a history and social circumstances that were often tumultuous and always unique.
From the focus on a fictional county, and by remaining true to his view of a dose-knit but authentic society that reflected the greater world around him, Faulkner in the end fashioned a saga of the Deep South that is one of the major achievements of 20th-century literature. (451)
Which of the following statements about William Faulkner is NOT true？
The women don't do anything to prevent property grabbing because ______.
North Korea's decision to resume nuclear disarmament talks ______ to its long-standing goal of a nuclear- free Korean Peninsula
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