Welcome to English as a Second Language Podcast number 1198, Failed Government Projects.
This is English as a Second Language Podcast, episode 1198.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.
If you do, you can download a learning guide for this episode that contains a complete transcript of everything we say.
This episode is a dialogue between Mariana and Klaus about government projects that don't seem to be very successful.
Let's get started.
Don't hold your breath.
The plan for the stadium is fundamentally flawed, but the government rammed it down the throats of the voters.
Do you really think the project is doomed?
Haven't you heard the reports of corruption and poor management?
They're cutting corners left and right.
I wouldn't be surprised if the stadium is being built with shoddy materials.
Then the entire thing is a joke.
Yes, and the joke is on us.
Government officials are going through the motions, not caring about the results.
All they care about is lining their pockets.
I have heard about the cost overruns.
Do you think the city will ever recoup the money spent on this project?
Maybe a little if we can sell the entire thing as scrap metal.
Mariana begins by asking, how long do you think it will be before the stadium is finished?
A stadium, S-T-A-D-I-U-M, is a large building with many seats, many places to sit in it usually.
That is used for sporting events or other large gatherings such as music concerts.
Most large cities in the US and in most cities in the world have stadiums that are used for playing sports.
It may be a football stadium in many parts of the world.
Here in the U.S., there are baseball stadiums and football stadiums.
Some stadiums are used for playing more than one kind of sport.
Here in Los Angeles we have several large stadiums used for sporting events and concerts not only professional sporting events, but also ones for college sport teams.
Mariana is asking when the stadium is going to be finished.
Klaus says, don't hold your breath.
The expression don't hold H-O-L-D your breath.
B-R-E-A-T-H means don't expect too much to happen very soon, or don't expect this to be completed anytime soon.
We use this expression when we're telling someone that they shouldn't get too excited or they shouldn't look forward to something too much, because it is not likely it will happen anytime soon.
The expression to hold your breath means to take air into your lungs and not to breathe out.
We hold our breath when we, for example, go underwater.
If you hold your breath for too long, of course, you could eventually lose consciousness.
You could what we would say in English, pass out.
To pass out means to become unconscious suddenly.
That's what would happen if you held your breath for too long.
So the expression, don't hold your breath, means that you shouldn't be waiting for something.
If you actually held your breath, you would probably pass out before anything good would happen.
Klaus says the plan for the stadium is fundamentally flawed, but the government rammed it down the throats of the voters.
To say something is flawed F-L-A-W-E-D means there is something wrong with it.
It isn't going to work properly.
To say something is fundamentally flawed means that the problems are so serious that you can't fix it that you might as well start again or get a new one.
If you say that a plan is fundamentally flawed, you're saying that it's so bad it's never going to work.
Kloss says that the plan for the stadium is fundamentally flawed, but the government rammed it down the throats of the voters.
To ram, R-A-M.
Something down the throat.
T-H-R-O-A-T of someone or of a group of people means to force someone or some group to do something that he or they didn't really want to do.
To ram something down someone's throat is to say that they have to do it.
They don't have any other choice.
Even though it may look like they are saying yes to something, in fact, they had no other option.
The voters are the people who vote in an election, in a democracy.
So to ram something down the throats of the voters is to tell people voting they have no choice.
They have to accept this.
Sometimes we use this expression when...
You actually do have a choice.
If you're a voter you can always vote no on something.
But we use it when the government is using some pressure or using some tactic, some strategy to make people do something that they don't really want to do.
They are persuading people to do something by using arguments perhaps that aren't completely honest.
Mariana says, do you really think the project is doomed?
If something is doomed, D O O M E D, it is expected to fail.
It is something that will not work, will not be successful.
If something or someone is doomed, that thing or that person will not be successful.
Bad things will happen.
Klaus says, haven't you heard the reports of corruption and poor management?
Corruption, C-O-R-R-U-P-T-I-O-N is when people in power, especially in the government, do things that are dishonest, illegal or unethical, often because they are getting money illegally to do something.
Corruption is a problem in all governments in every country in the world.
Klaus says there, meaning the government, they're cutting corners left and right.
To cut corners C-O-R-N-E-R-S means to not do what you are supposed to do in order to get something done more quickly.
To cut corners means to find a cheaper, faster way to do something, but in a way that lowers the quality of whatever it is you are doing.
We usually use this expression to cut corners easily, to mean to lower the cost of doing something to try to save money.
But often you're saving money by doing something that you shouldn't do or that might even be dangerous.
The expression left and right here means in many different places or in many different areas.
We put the two together to cut corners left and right and we get an expression that means to try to save money in many different parts of the project.
Kahl says, I wouldn't be surprised if the stadium is being built with shoddy materials.
Shoddy S-H-O-D-D-Y is an adjective meaning of low quality, something that is poorly made, something that won't last very long.
Mariana says, then the entire thing is a joke.
When she says the entire thing is a joke J-O-K-E, she doesn't mean that it's supposed to make you laugh.
Here, the word joke means that it wasn't being done properly and therefore is a complete failure.
Here the word joke is used in an insulting way to describe some action or some plan or some project as being very poorly done and not worth taking seriously.
Klaus says yes, and the joke is on us.
Here we see another meaning of the word joke.
In the expression, the joke is on us.
The joke is on us means that someone has made us look stupid.
Someone has tricked us.
Someone has fooled us.
He says government officials are going through the motions, not caring about the results.
To go through the motions, M-O-T-I-O-N-S, means to do something but not with very much commitment.
To do something without trying very hard.
To do something without being very enthusiastic about it.
To go through the motions means to do your job, to do what you're supposed to do, but not very well or not with very much dedication and interest.
Klaus says, all they meaning the government officials, the people who work for the government care about is lining their pockets.
The expression to line L-I-N-E one's pockets P-O-C-K-E-T-S means to do something in order to make a lot of money.
Usually to do it in a corrupt way, illegally or unethically.
It's an expression we often use when we're talking about corrupt government officials.
They are getting money illegally.
They're only doing what they are doing in order to make money.
They are lining their pockets.
Your pockets are those things in your pants that you use to put coins in, or your keys in or your cell phone in.
So in effect, they are putting money into their own pockets and getting rich.
Mariana says, I have heard about the cost overruns.
Cost overruns, O-V-E-R-R-U-N-S, refers to when a project costs more than you thought it would.
You thought it would cost $100 million, and it ends up costing $500 million.
That's a cost overrun.
Most government projects have cost overruns.
They say they're only going to cost this amount of money, but then you find out it costs twice that much.
Mariana says, do you think the city will ever recoup the money spent on this project?
To recoup, R-E-C-O-U-P, the money means to get the money back, to regain the money.
What happens often in U.S. cities is that the local government will help build the stadium.
They will pay money to build the stadium with the idea that eventually all the business that the stadium will bring will get that money back to them through taxes.
That the city will, in the end, make more money than it spent.
Usually, that's not what happens.
Klaus says, maybe a little meaning.
Maybe the city will get some of the money back that it spent to build this stadium.
It will recoup some of the money.
That will happen, however, only if we can sell the entire thing as scrap metal.
Scrap, S-C-R-A-P, is something that is no longer used anymore for what it was made to be used for.
You could talk about scraps of food, food that you are not going to eat anymore, or very small pieces of food.
Some people feed their dogs scraps from the table, the food that they are not eating, they give to the dog.
Scrap metal M-E-T-A-L are small pieces of metal that are no longer being used and that are usually melted down and used for something else.
Klaus is saying, the only way the city will make money or recoup some of its money on this project is if they tear the stadium down and sell it as scrap metal.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
Don't hold your breath.
The plan for the stadium is fundamentally flawed, but the government rammed it down the throats of the voters.
Do you really think the project is doomed?
Haven't you heard the reports of corruption and poor management?
They're cutting corners left and right.
I wouldn't be surprised if the stadium is being built with shoddy materials.
Then the entire thing is a joke.
Yes, and the joke is on us.
Government officials are going through the motions, not caring about the results.
All they care about is lining their pockets.
I have heard about the cost overruns.
Do you think the city will ever recoup the money spent on this project?
Maybe a little, if we can sell the entire thing as scrap metal.
We never cut corners with our scripts here at ESL Podcast.
Nothing but the highest quality comes from the pen of Dr. Lucy Say, our script writer.
Thank you, Lucy.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thank you for listening.
Come back and listen to us again right here on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2016 by the Center for Educational Development.
