Despite looking rather impotent at times in qualifying, Portugal will see this as a chance to stake an early claim on second place.

虽然在晋级路上显得相当无力，但葡萄牙将此视为早早抢占第二名的机会。

youdao

In Mr Greenspan's telling, central Banks were innocent and impotent bystanders in a global macroeconomic shift.

根据格林斯潘的说法，中央银行并无责任，它在这场全球宏观经济的变化面前只是个无能为力的旁观者。

youdao

As an alternative to this impotent "realism," I'd like to propose a clear-eyed idealism, which recognizes that these are bad times but refuses to accept that the bad times are inevitable.

为了取代这样一个令人无助的“现实”，我更愿意提出一种保持洞察力的理想主义，就是说认识到这些是坏的时候，但拒绝接受坏的命运是不可避免的。

youdao

Indeed, monetary policy seems largely impotent about turning a deep recession in 2008 into a powerful recovery in 2012.

FORBES: Obama Will Owe His 2nd Term In Part to Bernanke's QE

But a chief risk officer is impotent if he is nothing more than a glorified compliance chief, as is still the case at many banks.

ECONOMIST: How banks can improve their approach to risk management

Amid the overkill, there are scenes of a sudden and startling beauty, and the impotent ranks of teachers are played by a cast of surprising (if underused) power, including Marcia Gay Harden, Christina Hendricks, Blythe Danner, William Petersen, Lucy Liu, a tweedy Tim Blake Nelson, and, best of all, James Caan.

NEWYORKER: Movies