Winick does not want a flat rate tax because______.A．it is hard to figure out that she is

A．Patients no longer needed drugs in their recovery.

B．Patients were not wholly dependent on expensive medicine.

C．Patients needed good-quality drugs in their recovery.

D．Patients used fewer pain killers in their recovery.

bservation?

A．Opposition.

B．Approval.

C．Objectivity.

D．Suspicion.

What happened in 1882 according to the passage?

A．Chester Arthur became the vice president in the United States.

B．President James Garfield was murdered and Chester Arthur held the office.

C．A lot of new cases of corruption in the government were discovered.

D．Chester Arthur succeeded in civil service reforming with the help of Congress.

e reform. Chester Arthur was elected vice-president of the United States in 1880. In the summer of 1881 President James Garfield was assassinated. A few hours after the Presidents death, Chester Arthur took the oath of office. President Arthur had been a successful lawyer and worked in politics for many years, but he had never held an elected office, so in the beginning, some Americans questioned his ability to serve in the White House. President Arthur surprised them; his success in the reform. of the civil service system won him much support from the people. In his first message to Congress President Arthur proposed a new civil service system that would let ability, not politics, decide who got government jobs. The Republican Party leaders opposed this proposal because the civil service system would stop them form. giving federal jobs to their supporters. It would destroy much of their power. These Republican leaders controlled the Congress. They refused to act on the civil service proposal. New cases of dishonesty were discovered in government departments. The public began to demand laws to clean up the civil service. In 1882 a new Congress was elected. The new Congress was controlled by the Democratic Party. President Arthur again appealed for civil service reform. This time he got results. The new Congress passed the Civil Service Bill, which required 10 percent of all federal jobs to be filled through competitive examinations. This 10 percent included most workers at the Federal Customs Houses and half the officials in the Post Office Department. Chester Arthurs efforts for honest government won him much support from the people, but he could not win the support of his own Republican Party. He failed to win the Presidential nomination in the Republican Nominating Convention in 1884. Questions:

Which of the following sentences is True according to the passage?

A．Chester Arthur killed President James Garfield and took the oath of office.

B．Chester Arthur had worked in politics for many years and held an elected office.

C．Chester Arthur was turned down by Congress when he first put forward his proposal for the new civil service system.

D．Chester Arthur was strongly opposed by Congress and the common people after he carried out his civil service reform.

Why does the author mention humans in the second paragraph?

A．To show how they use camels.

B．To contrast them to desert mammals.

C．To give instructions about desert survival.

D．To show how they have adapted to desert life.

According to the passage, why is light coloring an advantage to large desert animals?

A．It helps them hide from predators.

B．It does not absorb sunlight as much as dark colors.

C．It helps them see their young at night.

D．It keeps them cool at night.

What health problems do many elderly people have?

A．They lose some ability to walk or see or hear well.

B．They have got high blood pressure and heart problems.

C．They are suffering from lacking of money to see a doctor.

D．They are lonely because they don"t live with younger people.

dont argue against taxes. They just argue about how taxes should be collected. At present the federal government works with a "progressive tax". The tax covers a percentage of peoples wages. Not everyone pays the same percentage of his salary in taxes. Taxpayers fall into different "tax brackets" depending on their income. Poor people are in a low tax bracket. They pay the smallest percentage of income in taxes. Middle income workers pay a larger percentage than the poor. And the rich fall into the high tax brackets. Few rich people like the progressive tax. The government took a poll. Among other people, the government talked to Ray Mathers and Eve Winick. "Lets change to a flat rate tax," says Ray Mather. "Everyone should be taxed the same percentage. Its fair. And its easy to figure out. " Mathers is president of Trig Computer Company. He makes over $ 80 000 a year. "I dont want a flat rate income tax," says Eve Winick. Winick is a grammar school teacher. Her school is in a poor neighborhood. She makes $ 14 000 a year. "I dont care if its easier to figure out. What I want to know is, would I pay less tax?" Winick worries about her students parents. "Some of them can hardly support themselves. Why should they pay heavier taxes? Theyre the people who need government services. " Mathers thinks a flat rate would help in the long run. "The country could lower taxes after a while. See, if I paid fewer taxes, Id save money. Id put that money into my business and hire more people. Those people could pay taxes. Everybody would be better off. " Questions:

According to the progressive tax, who should pay the highest percentage of their income in taxes?

A．The rich.

B．The poor.

C．The middle class.

D．The lower class.

The author mentions Massachusetts Institute of Technology in order to______.

A．show that it is a world famous university of the U. S.

B．illustrate that college tuition is increasing rapidly

C．prove that public colleges are better than private ones

D．suggest that it is very expensive to study in college nowadays

h as the telegraph, the steamboat and the weaving machine? Among the many shaping factors, I would single out the countrys excellent elementary schools; a labor force that welcomed the new technology; the practice of giving premiums to inventors; and above all the American genius for nonverbal, "spatial" thinking about things technological. Why mention the elementary schools? Because thanks to these schools our early mechanics, especially in the New England and Middle Atlantic states, were generally literate and at home in arithmetic and in some aspects of geometry and trigonometry. Acute foreign observers related American adaptiveness and inventiveness to this educational advantage. As a member of a British commission visiting here in 1853 reported, "With a mind prepared by thorough school discipline, the American boy develops rapidly into the skilled workman. " A further stimulus to invention came from the "premium" system, which preceded our patent system and for years ran parallel with it. This approach, originated abroad, offered inventors medals, cash prizes and other incentives. In the United States, multitudes of premiums for new devices were awarded at country fairs and at the industrial fairs in major cities. Americans flocked to these fairs to admire the new machines and thus to renew their faith in the beneficence of technological advance. Given this optimistic approach to technological innovation, the American worker took readily to that special kind of nonverbal thinking required in mechanical technology. As Eugene Ferguson has pointed out, "A technologist thinks about objects that cannot be reduced to unambiguous verbal descriptions; they are dealt with in his mind by a visual, nonverbal process.... The designer and the inventor... are able to assemble and manipulate in their minds devices that as yet do not exist. " This nonverbal "spatial" thinking can be just as creative as painting and writing. Robert Fulton once wrote, "The mechanic should sit down among levers, screws, wedges, wheels, etc. , like a poet among the letters of the alphabet, considering them as an exhibition of his thoughts, in which a new arrangement transmits a new idea. " When all these shaping forces—schools, open attitudes, the premium system, a genius for spatial thinking—interacted with one another on the rich U. S. mainland, they produced that American characteristic emulation. Today that word implies mere imitation. But in earlier times it meant a friendly but competitive striving for fame and excellence. Questions:

According to the author, the great outburst of major inventions in early America was in a large part due to______.

A．elementary schools

B．enthusiastic workers

C．the attractive premium system

D．a special way of thinking