Walter Mercado united Latinos across geography and generations

miss your sister’s sign!” my mother yelled from the kitchen. “Now I don’t know what’s going to happen to her.” Eventually, I learned to listen to Mercado as intently as I would any other relative. If my mom missed one of our signs, I knew which ones to repeat back to her. Even as Mercado moved on from “Primer Impacto,” we would seek out his advice online around the end of the year. Like a visiting member of the family around the holidays, Mercado was as much a part of our New Year’s traditions as eating 12 grapes within the first minute for good luck or cleaning the house to get rid of last year’s unpleasant baggage. After a particularly trying year, I looked up what Mercado prescribed for the zodiac sign Aries to set myself right for a new future ahead. His first piece of advice was to wear red. I did one better: I dyed the ends of my hair red. My mother then took me shopping for a new red dress, which I wore on New Year’s Eve. I followed his next step in the coming days: “You must burn a piece of paper with the list of all the negative things that happened during 2017,” he wrote. “As it burns, you should welcome all positive things and pray that all of the negatives from the past not be repeated during your lifetime.” I ripped a sheet from my reporter’s notebook and started writing, filling the page with bad memories. I folded the page and held it over a candle. It burned within seconds, which felt a little anticlimactic after so much preparation. Yet relief soon set in. If I could burn up the past 12 months when I thought my life was over in seconds, I could survive the next 12 that had yet to be written. Through his larger-than-life persona and a career that spanned several decades, Mercado offered comfort and encouragement to anyone seeking it. He was one of those rare public Latinx figures who felt like he belonged to all of us — no matter if we grew up in the States or in Latin America; if we watched him when we were young or old; or if we identify as Latinx, Latinos or Hispanics. His lasting benediction for this and any generation of fans will always be, “Sobre todos, mucho, mucho amor.”


Goodbye festivities planned for Bei Bei, the giant panda

Goodbye, Bei Bei. The giant panda at the National Zoo has a slew of events scheduled online and in-person as the nation’s capital says goodbye to its black and white, fuzzy friend before he heads to China. The events are scheduled to run Nov. 11 through Nov. 18. A list is available online, and the panda cam will track many of the festivities. Bei Bei is scheduled to leave Washington and head to China on Nov. 19. That move is part of a deal with China that all giant pandas born in U.S. zoos be sent to a breeding program in China after their fourth birthday. Bei Bei turned 4 on Aug. 22. For Bei Bei, there will be plenty of special treats and toys — twice a day during the celebrations as he prepares to leave the D.C. zoo. The zoo also has two other pandas: Bei Bei’s father, Tian Tian; and his mother, Mei Xiang. They also will get ice cakes on Nov. 16 and Nov. 17 in honor of Bei Bei’s departure. For humans, there will be free hot chocolate. Other activities include one in which fans of Bei Bei can get a postcard at the zoo and write a farewell note to the panda that zoo officials said “will travel with him to China.” In China, Bei Bei will join two other giant panda cubs from Washington: Bao Bao, who left in 2017; and her brother, Tai Shan, who went over in 2010. In sending a panda to China, there’s a lot of preparation. One of the biggest factors is getting Bei Bei used to the travel crate used for the flight. Zookeepers have been putting the crate in his exhibit daily as he gets accustomed to spending short periods of time in it with the door closed. Bei Bei will have a crew of zookeepers, staff and a veterinarian, plus loads of snackable bamboo on the flight to the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda in Chengdu, China.


2019 holiday gift guide: Food

[This story has been optimized for offline reading on our apps. For a richer experience, you can find the full version of this story here. An Internet connection is required.] Getting someone something tasty is always a good bet, whether they love to cook, love to eat or just need a little flavor in their life. For the hot sauce fiend Brooklyn Brew Shop: Fermented Hot Sauce Kit Brooklyn Brew Shop is known for its beer-making kits for all levels of homebrewers. This year, spice is in style, so turn to hot sauce for a fun, hands-on challenge ($40, brooklynbrewshop.com). For the global palate Lao Gan Ma: Spicy Chili Crisp This unassuming chili condiment has a massive cult following. Crunchy and not-too-spicy with an electric scarlet hue, it can top eggs, ice cream and more ($7.57 for a 7.41-ounce jar, amazon.com). For the Netflix watcher Penguin Random House: Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: A Collection of 20 Prints Samin Nosrat’s knockout cookbook and Netflix series “Salt Fat Acid Heat” are full of cooking revelations. This collection of prints from her illustrator translates Nosrat’s wisdom into beautiful, informative decorations ($15.92, amazon.com). For the coffee connoisseur Atlas Coffee Club: 3-Month Gift Subscription Picking coffee for someone who loves it is difficult, so leave it to a subscription service. Atlas Coffee Club curates from all over the world, meaning there is something new to try every month ($60, atlascoffeeclub.com). For the chocoholic Harper Macaw: Rainforest Origin 5-Bar Gift Set Giving a gorgeous, high-quality set of chocolates is always a good move. Bonus: Harper Macaw is committed to ethically sourcing cacao and supporting rainforest conservation, making these bars even sweeter ($45, harpermacaw.com). For the wannabe Vermonter Runamok Maple: Sugarmaker’s Gift Box There’s a world of difference in maple syrup quality, and Runamok Maple knows that. This set draws together its team’s favorite infusions for a variety of fascinating flavors ($32, amazon.com). For the sweet tooth Sugarfina: Design Your Own 8 Piece Candy Bento Box Sugarfina’s rosé gummy bears are wildly popular, so add them into a set of treats — designed like a bento box — for someone particularly sweet ($65, sugarfina.com). For the entertainer Crate & Barrel: Denim Apron With a real leather neck strap and high-quality cotton, this durable chambray-like apron is a classy addition to the home chef’s kitchen wardrobe ($39.95, crateandbarrel.com). For the home bartender Cocktail Punk: Basic Bitters Set If


Transcript: Veterans in America

if we can get folks to understand that, that have the issues--and by the way, don't get penalized for it, whether they're in the military or out of the military--I think you'll get a lot more folks asking for help when they need it. MS. CASEY: Some other numbers that are important. The Washington Post had a story just yesterday noting there are 49,000 vacant positions at the VA. Ninety-six percent of VA facilities report at least one severe occupational shortage. The inspector general has pointed out that these shortages are a real problem and a root cause for many of the issues in veterans' care. SEN. MORAN: Our legislation does some things in that regard. A shortage of professionals means that we can utilize telemedicine, telehealth, tele mental health more. So with insufficient number of healthcare providers, we need to figure out how we utilize their services better, more efficiently. But more importantly, there are educated and trained individuals that the VA doesn't, in my view, utilize sufficiently: marriage and family counselors, licensed mental health professionals. Again, there is a shortage everywhere, inside the VA, outside the VA, rural, urban. We need to use the other additional professionals that can help meet the needs. Our legislation requires the VA to utilize those additional types of trained individuals, educated individuals, to be helpful. And those professions are asking for the opportunity to be a part of the VA in helping those across the country who desperately need that help. MS. CASEY: How do you make this a competitive job, though, something with adequate pay and also the reputation and the pride that could come with taking a job like this? SEN. MORAN: The bill, again, puts additional resources. We both have been appropriators on the Committee that appropriates for the Department of Veterans Affairs. And as John indicated, we are increasing the funding at the Department of Veterans Affairs. It is one of the fastest-growing expenditures that we have. But you have to attract professionals. And this is a profession that doesn't adequately compensate to bring people to the profession. The challenges are great. The rewards, I think, could be tremendous. But more money is--you know, we say that often as kind of a trite expression, more money is not the answer to everything. That's true. But in this case, additional resources so that salaries and compensation can be improved


Flower etiquette has changed dramatically over time. But the type you give still sends a message.

looks fun. They prefer something white and green.” Dowling, whose studio is in Alexandria, says condolence flowers “don’t have to be all white. Having flowers that are soft and comforting and focus on texture is a good way to go. Make them personal, and possibly reflecting a certain flower the person loved. Then they can really evoke the sense of a warm hug.” New York flower designer and illustrator Cathy Graham says her go-to sympathy flowers include a paperwhite plant and a white or blue hydrangea plant that could bloom for a few weeks. “You don’t have to do all white, but I would not use bright, festive colors.” Don’t overlook household pets when you are creating a bouquet or arrangement to send to someone, says Graham. “Lilies and other flowers are bad for cats,” says Graham, who worries about that with her own two ginger cats Reggie and Cheddar. The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals publishes a list of plants that are poisonous to pets. The main thing with flowers is don’t overthink them. “People are so touched by your making the effort to send flowers that pretty much whatever you send will be appreciated,” Graham says. Anne Chertoff, chief operating officer of Beaumont Etiquette, a New York consulting firm, says it’s always a good idea to check on religious practices and customs. “People like to know the rules,” she says. “They can think about the message they want to get across. Then it’s up to them if and when they want to use the rules or break with them.” For instance, flowers for a funeral often center on lilies. But she says instead of flowers, it’s customary for Jews to send or bring food to the homes of the family who aren’t supposed to cook during the shiva, which lasts seven days, and also to feed people who come to pay respects to the family. “I’m Jewish, so I would send an edible arrangement,” she says. Amy Merrick, a flower designer who ran her own studio in Brooklyn and now focuses on events and teaching, says she’s found that many customers don’t have a very good knowledge of the varieties of flowers and place more importance on the style or mood of their arrangements. “The average person does have an interest in what flowers represent, but not in the historical context,” she says. People


The cautionary political tale of Iceland’s last McDonald’s burger that simply won’t rot, even after 10 years

since, Iceland’s economy has surprisingly rebounded; tourism bookings have remained largely steady, as other airlines have filled WOW Air’s gap. “The economy is doing much better than expected,” said Erna Björg Sverrisdóttir, chief economist of Iceland’s Arion Bank, who credited larger central bank reserves and low debt, among other factors. Iceland was in a very different position in 1993, when McDonald’s opened its first restaurant in the country. Rather than focusing on resilience and government intervention — as has been the case since 2008 — Iceland was then laying the groundwork for what would cause the system’s collapse two decades on. It embraced free market ideals like few other countries. The economy boomed. As free market capitalism produced stunning growth around the world, the sight of world leaders opening McDonald’s restaurants became somewhat of a symbol for the victory of capitalism over socialism, just years after the fall of the Berlin Wall. In Britain, then-Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher became known as an outspoken fan of the corporation. Meanwhile, in Iceland, images from that time show the country’s prime minister, Davíð Oddsson, biting into a burger on the day the company celebrated its first Iceland opening. “It was a very cheerful moment,” said anthropologist Kristín Loftsdóttir, who has studied the history of the company in Iceland. The reasons for the country’s enthusiasm were deeply rooted, she said. “Iceland had for a long time been very anxious about its role within the community of nations,” Loftsdóttir said. With a population the size of a small U.S. city, Iceland was afraid there wouldn’t be a place for it on the table of mature nations in the post-Soviet world. The arrival of McDonald’s, she said, appeared to indicate a new chapter: Iceland was modernizing and had become “part of a global community," Loftsdóttir said. That success story started to unravel as the financial crisis began in 2007. Within months, Iceland was on the brink of economic disaster. But it took two subsequent collapses — the breakdown of the country’s banking system, and the pullout of McDonald’s — for Icelanders to realize just how deep they had sunk into crisis. Operating in Iceland had become too costly for McDonald’s in the aftermath of the crisis: The currency collapsed, and inflation skyrocketed. McDonald’s was far from the only company to abandon the embattled country, but to some, it felt like being thrown out of the international


Iran bars U.N. nuclear inspector from uranium-enrichment plant, citing positive test for explosive nitrates

Iran has prevented a United Nations nuclear inspector from entering a uranium-enrichment facility and revoked her credentials after Iranian officials said she tested positive for explosive nitrates. The move drew condemnation from the United States, which called Iran’s decision to expel the inspector an “outrageous provocation.” A spokesman for the International Atomic Energy Agency, the U.N. nuclear watchdog, confirmed that one of its inspectors was “temporarily prevented from leaving Iran” last week. “The Agency does not agree with Iran’s characterization of the situation involving the inspector, who was carrying out official safeguard duties in Iran,” said Fredrik Dahl, the agency’s spokesman. “Preventing an inspector from leaving a country, particularly when instructed to do so by the Agency, is not acceptable and should not occur,” the agency’s acting director general, Cornel Feruta, said in a statement. According to Iranian officials, the inspector was halted by security at the gate of Iran’s main enrichment plant in Natanz after triggering an alarm. The alert raised officials’ concerns she was carrying “suspicious material.” The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran said Wednesday that her credentials were revoked and that the IAEA was informed of the incident. Iran did not immediately provide further details about the inspector, including her nationality. In remarks Thursday in Vienna, where the IAEA is headquartered, Tehran’s envoy to the agency said the inspector, who arrived with a team, had initially tested positive for explosive nitrates. The other members were cleared to enter. “We repeated the [security] process with different detectors and also her suitcase, and the alarms went off every time,” Kazem Gharbabadi, Iran’s ambassador to the IAEA, said in an interview Thursday with Iranian state television. He said the woman went to the bathroom at one point while awaiting a further screening and apparently removed the material. He did not offer an explanation for why the inspector allegedly had the residue on her, but he indicated it was deemed a threat. “Considering the history of sabotage against our nuclear facilities, we are not going to tolerate risking our national security,” Gharbabadi said. “We have asked the agency to replace this inspector with someone else.” The United States and Iran have been facing off over Tehran’s nuclear program, after President Trump withdrew from a 2015 agreement that Iran reached with world powers curbing Iran’s atomic activities in exchange for the lifting of sanctions. The Trump administration reimposed a harsh embargo on


Pentagon leader appeals to Trump to allow military justice cases to proceed unfettered

Army lieutenant serving time for killing an Iraqi prisoner in 2008. He has also made comments about ongoing cases that critics have said could constitute undue command influence, possibly leading to the dismissal of cases by military judges. Any further intervention, the defense official said, also could undermine the authority of commanders who have overseen those cases, which most military leaders see as clear instances in which service members had to be prosecuted. The issue constitutes a potential point of friction between Trump and the Pentagon at a time when defense leaders are scrambling to publicly align themselves with the president’s evolving policy on Syria, which some military officials have privately criticized, and shore up alliances frayed by the administration’s erratic decision-making. Some of the cases in which Fox reported that Trump is considering interceding have been the subject of lobbying by advocacy groups and politicians who want to see the service members cleared, according to Fox News. Pentagon officials have voiced worry that Trump may be getting erroneous information, in part from TV personalities. “He needed to know all the facts,” the official said. CNN first reported that Esper was preparing to discuss the cases with Trump. They include the prosecutions of Edward Gallagher, a Navy SEAL who was acquitted this year on serious charges including killing an Islamic State detainee but was convicted of posing for a photo with the man’s corpse; Clint Lorance, a former Army lieutenant who was convicted of murder in 2013 in relation to U.S. troops’ opening fire on Afghan elders; and Army Maj. Mathew Golsteyn, who is charged with killing a detained Taliban militant in 2010. Last month. Trump said the prosecution of Golsteyn, who has pleaded not guilty, was under review. “We train our boys to be killing machines, then prosecute them when they kill!” he said on Twitter. This spring, Trump intervened to move Gallagher out of solitary confinement. After the SEAL was acquitted of the majority of charges against him, Trump criticized the military lawyers who prosecuted the case. According to Fox, Trump now intends to act to reverse Gallagher’s demotion. Esper declined to discuss the cases in detail. “As you know, I’m in the chain of command, and I’m very conscious of my remarks,” he said. “But I do have full confidence in the military justice system, and we’ll let things play out as they play out.” missy.ryan@washpost.com josh.dawsey@washpost.com


The Finance 202: Wall Street is sounding alarms over Warren. Her campaign thinks that’s good news.

has concluded likely ordered the assassination of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul last year.” — IMF warns Europe about coming slump: “Germany stuck to its stance that Europe’s economic engine will pull through its current trough without a spending jolt, countering increasingly dire warnings from the International Monetary Fund,” Bloomberg News’s Nikos Chrysoloras and Birgit Jennen report. “Europe needs to come up with emergency plans, since monetary policy has all but exhausted its arsenal and risks spread, the fund warned. The stark warning comes after the latest data showed that the euro-area economy is proving more resilient than anticipated, driven by robust expansion in countries such as France. Still, Germany probably went into a technical recession during the last quarter, and the labor market in the continent’s biggest economy started to deteriorate.” — Sackler legacy at stake as future of Purdue is decided: “A battle over billions of dollars in the bankruptcy case of Purdue Pharma has eclipsed what observers see as a key element of a proposed settlement of thousands of opioid lawsuits: a bid to repair the Sackler family legacy,” my colleague Christopher Rowland reports. “The Sackler family’s Purdue Pharma — widely blamed for fueling the opioid epidemic with its marketing of the addictive pain killer OxyContin — would be reinvented in the proposed bankruptcy settlement as a public interest trust dedicated to fighting addiction and overdose deaths. If successful, it would be a startling turnaround. The Sackler family business would be transformed from a maker of a well-known prescription narcotic into an entity focused on manufacturing and distributing overdose antidote drugs free or at a low cost to communities hit hard by addiction.” — Company insiders are taking advantage of buybacks: “ … Insiders — including chief executives and directors who authorize buybacks — often sell during the short-term price pops that typically follow disclosure of new authorizations, or when the companies are actively buying in the market,” Gary Putka reports for The Post. “A review by The Washington Post found that insider stock sales during buybacks are surprisingly common. At least 500 insiders sold during buyback programs at their companies in just one 15-month period in 2017 and 2018, according to The Post analysis of data compiled by the SEC as well as regulatory filings. More than 50 of the insider sellers were chief executives … SEC rules do allow insider selling during a buyback.” —


A woman jogged through a swarm of flies. A month later, she pulled a parasitic worm from her eye.

near where she was staying at the time. The doctor extracted a third worm, which was preserved for analysis. Still, her eye irritation persisted, so when the woman returned to Nebraska, she consulted another doctor. No worms made an appearance during that visit, but the woman was informed that both her eyes were inflamed. It didn’t take long for the woman to find and pull out what would be the fourth and final worm herself. Her symptoms finally cleared up about two weeks later, the journal article said. Meanwhile, the worm sample was making the rounds. It was first sent to the California State Public Health Laboratory before getting forwarded to the CDC, where researchers nailed down the exact species and noticed a significant detail about the eye worm. The worm was an adult female and her eggs contained developed larvae, “indicating that humans are suitable hosts for the reproduction of T. gulosa,” the paper said. The Nebraska woman’s horrific experience was preceded by an eerily similar case involving a 26-year-old woman, who became infected with the worms in 2016 after spending time in cattle fields near her native southern Oregon, The Washington Post’s Lena H. Sun reported. In that instance, the woman had 14 of the tiny translucent worms removed from her eye. Though there have been only two recorded occurrences of the parasite showing up in humans, researchers say the relatively short time period between the first and second case suggests that “this may represent an emerging zoonotic disease in the United States,” according to the October article. “While it may just be a ‘fluke’ event that two cases have occurred within a year or two of each other, it does raise the possibility that something might have changed in the ecology of T. gulosa in the USA to cause it to start occasionally infecting humans,” Bradbury told Gizmodo. But other infectious disease experts say that it is still too soon to call it a trend. “You have to have the right fly, with the right bug and the right timing,” Erin Bonura, an associate professor of infectious diseases at Oregon Health & Science University who was the treating physician in the 2016 case, told The Post. “It’s just chance, and that’s why we don’t see it very often.” It is also unlikely that a parasite would suddenly decide to switch hosts, such as going from an animal


The Washington Post names Ezzedine C. Fishere its second Jamal Khashoggi fellow

Washington Post Opinions today announced that it has selected Ezzedine C. Fishere as its next Jamal Khashoggi fellow. Fishere, an Egyptian scholar, novelist and former diplomat, will write columns in the Global Opinions section on autocracy, freedom of expression, shifting politics and social and economic aspirations in the Middle East and North Africa. He is the second recipient of the fellowship which The Post established earlier this year in honor of the columnist Jamal Khashoggi, who was murdered inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul last year. The fellowship provides an independent platform for writers from parts of the world where freedom of expression is threatened or suppressed. “As repression continues in Egypt and the political dynamics in the region continue to shift, we are pleased to add Ezzedine’s perspective to help make sense of it all,” said Eli Lopez, Senior Global Opinions Editor. “He will draw from his experience as a writer, career diplomat and academic to contextualize the state of regional politics and highlight paths for progress.” Fishere is a visiting professor at Dartmouth College, where he has taught courses on Middle East politics and culture since 2016. He previously taught in the Political Science department of the American University in Cairo. During the period of the Arab Spring, Fishere served as an advisor to pro-democracy movements and political candidates including Mohamed Elbaradei (2011-2013) and Hamdeen Sabahi (2014). He worked for the Egyptian Foreign Service and the United Nations missions in the Middle East. He directed the Arab-Israeli project at the International Crisis Group (2007 - 2008), and worked as a counselor to the Egyptian foreign minister (2005 – 2007). He served as a political adviser at the United Nations Missions in Sudan (2004-2005) and the United Nations Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process (UNSCO) in Jerusalem (2001 – 2004). Fishere has published seven novels, mostly depicting Egyptian social and political decay. Two of his books were nominated for the Arabic Booker Prize and another two were turned into Arabic TV series. “Embrace at Brooklyn Bridge,” his novel on identity construction and shifts, was translated to English and Italian. “The Egyptian Assassin,” his novel on politics and violence, was just released in English.


Superman’s secret identity won’t be secret anymore

It’s not a bird. It’s not a plane. And what writer Brian Michael Bendis really wants you to know is, it’s not a trick. Superman will reveal his secret identity to the world next month in the pages of his self-titled series from DC Comics. No more nonprescription glasses and combing back the s-curl to blend in with the society he protects. No more slouching. No more phone booths. (Well, it’s probably been a while since he’s used one of those.) But Superman is coming clean, and Bendis says the new story line he wrote will be a lasting change for the Man of Steel. “There’s no Kryptonite. There’s no Mister Mxyzptlk [a magical, reality altering foe]. There’s no magic amulet. No Bizarro,” Bendis said emphatically. “It’s a hero who gave a lot and needs a little something for himself.” The biggest moment for Superman since he was killed in the early 1990s begins to take root in “Superman” No. 17 (illustrated by Kevin Maguire), on sale in print and digitally on Nov. 13. Issues No. 18 (on sale Dec. 12) and No. 19 (January), both illustrated by Ivan Reis and Joe Prado) will deal with Superman’s opening up to the world and the aftermath. In February, DC will also publish two one-shot issues, “Superman: Heroes” in January, and “Superman: Villains,” that will show the impact of Superman’s decision from the perspective of DC’s biggest names both good and evil. The decision was not an easy one to make — this is Bendis’s first potentially polarizing creative decision at DC since he made the move from Marvel Comics in 2017. He said DC’s top brass had to give approval after a whole lot of internal debating. Meetings were had with anyone who works on Superman characters in the DC universe, as the weight of this decision would be felt in their titles, as well. But don’t fall for the notion that this is the end of Clark Kent. “I get why people would immediately think … that Clark Kent just goes away,” Bendis said, adding, “Clark Kent is a huge part of who [Superman] is. It’s who he grew up as. He’s not giving it up. He’s sharing it with people. He’s saying ‘this is who I truthfully am. This is how I’m good at both jobs, and I want you to know that so we have a more honest


Mormon killings: Mexico’s López Obrador rejects U.S. suggestion he get more aggressive against violence

to defend its territory. The three attacks on the LeBaron family occurred near that municipality, close to the border of Chihuahua and Sonora states — a key corridor for sending drugs to the United States. “We assume this cell that was sent to prevent any incursion by Los Salazar is what is behind the aggression against the family,” Mendoza said. He said the gunmen might have mistaken the families’ SUVs for vehicles belonging to its rivals. Family members have protested that security forces took hours to reach the scene of the crime, forcing them to conduct their own search for victims. Some said the Mexican government should accept U.S. offers of assistance. “We’ll accept help from aliens, if it comes to that,” family spokesman Julian LeBaron told El Universal. Mendoza said that the attacks occurred at 9:40 and 11 a.m. Monday but that authorities didn’t learn about them until 2:30 p.m. because area residents were too frightened to approach the sites. The military didn’t arrive at the scene until 6:15 p.m., he said. “We had very few personnel” in the area, the general said. He noted that it had not been identified as a conflict zone. He said the military and national guard were rushing more forces to the region. The attacks, the latest in a series to rock Mexico, have brought more scrutiny of López Obrador’s new approach against organized crime. The president, who took office in December, has created a 70,000-member national guard, but it has been unable to halt the violence. Mexico is likely to set a record for homicides this year. Critics say the government hasn’t used the new force strategically to contain violence — troops have instead been spread around the country to handle a variety of tasks, including detaining unauthorized migrants heading for the U.S. border. Alejandro Hope, a security analyst, noted that the national guard had 3,799 troops in Mexico City as of Oct. 14. It had 4,126 troops in Sonora and Chihuahua, which represent 21 percent of the national territory. “If this force serves any purpose, it should be for territorial control, to ensure a presence of the state where it’s almost impossible to add police,” Hope wrote in El Universal. Durazo said authorities investigated a suspect arrested Tuesday in Sonora with multiple weapons and two hostages, but it appeared he was “not connected to the aggression against the LeBaron family.” mary.sheridan@washpost.com


Pride of place in Prince George’s County’s affordable, diverse Fairwood community

turf farm that supplied sod to the Washington area, including the lawns of the White House, the Capitol and the Mall. By the late 1990s, the turf farm had fallen on hard times and the family decided to sell part of it to the Rouse Co., developer of Columbia, Md., and Harborplace in Baltimore, to transform it into the planned community it has become. Living there: Before the mortgage crisis, houses sold for more than $1 million. Starting in 2008, however, the area was hit hard by a rash of foreclosures and many homes lost their value, according to Yvonne Lee, a real estate agent with Re/Max Allegiance. Half the loans on newly constructed homes in Fairwood during the housing boom in 2006 and 2007 ended up in foreclosure, according to a 2015 Washington Post article. “But it’s bounced back over the past 10 years,” Lee says. “Now it’s the hottest real estate market in P.G. County.” In 2018, according to Lee, 75 homes in the neighborhood were sold, at an average price of $456,722. Fifteen homes are for sale; the lowest-priced is a two-bedroom, three-bathroom condominium for $320,000. The highest-priced is the original Fairview plantation house. Built circa 1790, the five-bedroom federal and Greek revival home on 10 acres is listed for just under $1 million. Fairwood’s home values are one of the secrets of Maryland’s real estate market, says Hammett. “If you were to transfer our homes to Silver Spring or Bethesda or Northern Virginia,” he adds, “they would cost double or triple and be a lot older.” Just 15 miles from downtown Washington and Annapolis, the location is another draw, says Jessica Slaughter, who has lived in Fairwood’s Sanctuary Townhomes since 2010. The retired Air Force health-care administrator also likes how quiet, safe and walkable it is. “I can even walk to my beauty salon to get my hair done,” Slaughter says as she sits under a hair dryer at Salon DK in the neighborhood’s main shopping center on Fairwood Parkway, which also has a Safeway, restaurants, a nail salon and a Gold’s Gym. Brown says a lot of people want a community where you can go through the different ages and stages of your life. “People have asked me ‘This is your first home, are you going to buy another one?’ ” he says. “Not unless I can take my neighbors with me.” Schools: Transit: realestate@washpost.com


Schools in meat-loving rural Brazil went vegan. The community revolted.

a party without a barbecue — also has one of the highest rates of vegetarianism. In the past decade, amid mounting awareness of the repercussions of humanity’s meat addiction — from growing rates of obesity to the deforestation of the Amazon — the number of Brazilians who consider themselves vegetarian has nearly doubled, from 8 percent of the population to 14 percent in 2018, according to surveys. By some measures, only India, with its cultural and religious traditions of vegetarianism, has a higher rate. The carnivores and the herbivores mostly coexist harmoniously, if discordantly. Near the churrascaria sits the vegan sushi shop. In Rio de Janeiro, Burger King rents billboards to tout its newest offering: A plant-based patty with the “flavor and texture of meat.” But the meeting of meat and health food, conservative tradition and liberal environmentalism would play out differently here in the northeastern state of Bahia, where people eat meat because that’s what people have always eaten. There would be threats. Furious parents. A battle over science. Eventually, the federal government would get involved. But before all of that, there was Baird, trying to establish the consequences of inaction before hundreds of parents. The health of children was on the line. The planet was facing an ecological crisis. “How are we going to resolve this?” she asked. An exotic food had been set out on a table: Jars of organic peanut butter. Parents inspected it with suspicion. There’s a question that Baird won’t stop asking. “Why not? Why not try?” she asked. “The forest is burning, and the water is harder to get to, and the public health — these are very big things. So why not?” Driving to a nut-butter producer offering an alternative protein source for schools, she shook her head. In a rural environment, she asked, with little money and even less water, why not remove meat, a product that required a lot of both? In a region where kids suffered from high rates of obesity, why not help them become a bit healthier? Why not save the community some money in medical costs? She stared out the window at the desolate expanse of endless brown and tan. She was from Mato Grosso do Sul in southern Brazil, which unfurled like a green blanket, but this was home now. After moving to Bahia in 2011, she met her husband, took a prosecutor job monitoring


Jamal Khashoggi symbolized the promise of reconciling political Islam and democracy

and reflected when faced with opposing views. Across the divide that separated us, we managed to discuss, not just debate, and find common ground. By the time Jamal moved to the Washington area, I had already settled at Dartmouth. It was ironic, and telling, that both of us ended up in the United States. The rulers of the Arab world had become intolerant of democracy of any form. Yet we didn’t dismiss our disagreements. On the contrary, we realized that bridging our different understandings of democracy was vital for the future. Unless Islamists and liberals are able to agree on the relationship between majority rule and individual rights, we will never be able to coexist peacefully — and ultimately will achieve neither majority rule nor individual rights. Dictators will be able to continue justifying their authoritarianism by arguing it is needed to maintain peace between two camps who can’t agree on the fundamentals of peaceful coexistence. And they will be right. So Jamal and I suggested to an Arabic-language television station based in Washington that we could co-host a show where liberals and Islamists would discuss these issues, with the aim of finding common ground. But we both got busy with our lives: He was considering building a pro-democracy think tank, while I was teaching Middle East misery. The next thing I heard was a message from a friend telling me that Jamal had gone into a Saudi Consulate a few hours earlier and had not emerged yet. This is not a requiem for Jamal Khashoggi. This piece is not about his decency, his integrity or his chilling murder. It is simply a reminder of the promise that Jamal offered: the chance to reconcile political Islam and liberal democracy. The work needed to fulfill this promise still lies ahead of us. Those who advocate democratizing the Arab world have not yet agreed among themselves on how to achieve the productive coexistence of democracy and Islamism. But unless those of us who haven’t yet been murdered fulfill this promise, many more Arabs will need requiems. Read more about Jamal Khashoggi: A missing voice, a growing chorus Asli Aydintasbas: The liberal world order crumbled a year ago. We’re still reeling. Iyad el-Baghdadi: Saudi Arabia is suffocating the Arabic public sphere. We must fight back. Tawakkol Karman: We need justice for Yemen — and justice for Khashoggi David Von Drehle: Hollywood loves triumphant


‘Retail apocalypse’ now: Analysts say 75,000 more U.S. stores could be doomed.

80 locations. A number of other retailers, including Gap, have hinted that store closures are on the horizon. The main reason for the shift, analysts say, is simple: Americans are increasingly shopping online. The average U.S. household spent $5,200 online last year, up nearly 50 percent from five years earlier. “This is a healthy cleansing for the retail industry,” said John D. Morris, senior brand apparel analyst for financial services firm D.A. Davidson. “We’re in the middle of a multiyear retail purge. Companies are finding that when it comes to stores, less is more.” Overall, retailers have closed more than 15,000 stores since 2017, according to UBS. Among them: Radio Shack (which closed 1,470 stores), Toys R Us (735 stores), and Mattress Firm and GNC (700 stores each). “Retailers have been hanging on too long to their bricks-and-mortar stores,” Morris said. After a decade of steady retail closures — enough to coin the term “retail apocalypse” — analysts said in-store sales ticked up in 2018, in part because of tax cuts for some Americans. But those gains are likely to be reversed this year, said UBS analysts Jay Sole and Michael Lasser. “This pace of store productivity improvement is unlikely to be sustained in 2019 as the boost from fiscal stimulus fades,” they wrote in a note to clients on Tuesday. “This will likely lead to an acceleration in physical store closures in the upcoming year.” Even so, some Internet-only companies such as furniture retailer Wayfair and mattress brand Casper are beginning to open physical stores. But analysts said these outposts — often smaller and more sparse than traditional stores — function more as showrooms for items customers can order online than a one-stop shop with swaths of inventory. “The trend is toward more streamlined stores: Less chaos, less inventory, less choice,” Morris said. “If a customer wants something in a different color or size, they can find that online.” Big-box retailers such as Target and Ikea are also shrinking their store sizes to appeal to time-strapped shoppers in urban areas. Sears said last week that it will open a handful of “Sears Home & Life” shops that are about one-tenth the size of its traditional department stores. Read more: How Target won back its customers: By going all-in on brick-and-mortar How Amazon could change the country’s grocery game Can Macy’s and J.C. Penney overcome ‘a legacy of bad decisions’?


Ever wondered what’s floating around in space?

The night sky is full of stars, but it’s also full of garbage. Humans put lots of satellites up there — about 1,700 working spacecraft are in orbit around our planet — and not every piece of machinery comes right back when its job is done. Many keep speeding through the sky long after scientists have lost touch, leaving them liable to crash into one another and break into small pieces. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) estimates that there are about 23,000 pieces of space debris larger than 10 centimeters (or about four inches), about 500,000 larger than one centimeter, and about 100,000,000 larger than one millimeter. A piece of metal smaller than a sesame seed might not sound dangerous, but even these tiny bits can pose a big risk. The International Space Station navigates around the paths of the most dangerous hunks of junk, but tiny flakes of paint have managed to chip the craft’s quadruple-thick windows. That’s because space garbage moves fast. “Because of the super-high impact speed — more than 10 times the speed of a bullet 250 miles up — even a sub-millimeter debris could threaten astronauts when they conduct a spacewalk outside of the International Space Station,” says J.D. Harrington, a NASA public affairs officer. Small debris can punch a hole in a satellite, while larger debris can crush one entirely — creating even more wreckage. “The threat from orbital debris is real,” Harrington says. “Because of the ongoing space activities, the orbital debris problem is expected to worsen in the future and will present an even greater danger to future space missions.” An increase in orbital traffic — it’s becoming easier and cheaper for countries, private companies and research groups to send objects up — means that our corner of space will have increasingly less space. NASA doesn’t have plans to clean up what’s there, but the agency is working to keep the problem from worsening by ensuring that each new mission includes clear arrangements to dispose of spacecraft that no longer work and any pieces they eject. And there are potential solutions in the works from others: At the 2017 European Conference on Space Debris, presenters discussed pushing junk off into a higher orbit, capturing it with nets and harpoons or magnets, and other ideas. In May, the International Space Station is expected to deploy a test project called RemoveDEBRIS, which


chip the craft’s quadruple-thick windows. That’s because space garbage moves fast. “Because of the super-high impact speed — more than 10 times the speed of a bullet 250 miles up — even a sub-millimeter debris could threaten astronauts when they conduct a spacewalk outside of the International Space Station,” says J.D. Harrington, a NASA public affairs officer. Small debris can punch a hole in a satellite, while larger debris can crush one entirely — creating even more wreckage. “The threat from orbital debris is real,” Harrington says. “Because of the ongoing space activities, the orbital debris problem is expected to worsen in the future and will present an even greater danger to future space missions.” An increase in orbital traffic — it’s becoming easier and cheaper for countries, private companies and research groups to send objects up — means that our corner of space will have increasingly less space. NASA doesn’t have plans to clean up what’s there, but the agency is working to keep the problem from worsening by ensuring that each new mission includes clear arrangements to dispose of spacecraft that no longer work and any pieces they eject. And there are potential solutions in the works from others: At the 2017 European Conference on Space Debris, presenters discussed pushing junk off into a higher orbit, capturing it with nets and harpoons or magnets, and other ideas. In May, the International Space Station is expected to deploy a test project called RemoveDEBRIS, which will capture several pieces of pretend garbage before burning itself up in Earth’s atmosphere. But while we wait for someone to design the ultimate space vacuum, are folks on Earth safe from the danger of falling debris? The short answer is yes. Junk falls down all the time: 200 pieces of debris reentered the atmosphere in 2016 alone. Most of that burns up and breaks down in the process, and the pieces that remain are unlikely to cause harm. Most of the Earth is either covered in ocean or has plenty of open space, so chances are any hunks of junk will hit spots without humans there to get hurt. There’s only one known case of a human getting hit with a piece of spacecraft — Lottie Williams in Tulsa, Oklahoma, in 1997 — and she didn’t even get a bruise from the accident. You’re way, way more likely to get struck by lightning. kidspost@washpost.com


The fusion energy dream is inching toward planet-saving reality

fall away in recent years, thanks to the use of supercomputers to model and optimize the design of fusion systems, and to a new generation of superconductors that increase the magnetic fields that contain the artificial star, thereby dramatically decreasing the required size of fusion devices. Advanced manufacturing techniques for specialized fusion materials have also been developed. Recognizing that fusion may pass from theory to practical application, many governments and scientific institutions have scrambled to take the scientific lead. The latest development in this competition was the announcement last month that the Energy Department has authorized a pilot program to encourage private industry to use the resources of U.S. national laboratories with the goal of commercializing fusion energy. China has invested nearly a billion dollars in its fusion energy program. In September, Britain pledged $246 million toward the development of a commercially viable fusion power plant by 2040. But the world’s biggest fusion effort involves a collaboration between China, the European Union, India, Japan, Russia, South Korea and the United States. These entities have contributed tens of billions of dollars for a giant fusion experiment in southern France called ITER, with the goal of producing net energy. Construction began on a 103-acre site in 2010. Now, after delays, the device is projected to turn on in 2025, with the first production of net energy plasma — the superheated fourth state of matter — planned for 2035. A major milestone in the construction is scheduled for March, when the nearly 100-foot, 1,370-ton base of the largest stainless-steel high-vacuum pressure chamber ever built will be installed. At the same time, technological advances in recent years have spurred the interest of investors — mostly in the United States, but also in Canada and Britain — in the potential for commercial fusion that is smaller, faster and more economical. According to the Fusion Industry Association, private investment in entrepreneurial fusion projects has reached $1 billion to $1.5 billion, reflecting a growing appetite for a game-changing energy source. The United States has an opportunity to lead the world in fusion energy, capitalizing on robust research programs in academic institutions and government-sponsored national labs and on a growing Fusion Industry Association, which has more than a dozen companies working on different approaches to fusion energy. In contrast to its international competitors, the United States brings a worldview that favors early involvement of industry in technology development


Pretending all Chinese companies are evil schemers will only hurt the U.S. economy

Japanese bosses and returning home to watch Sony TVs. Rather than projecting confidence, the United States initially responded by smashing things. U.S. autoworkers took hammers to Japanese cars during rallies. After Toshiba sold dual-use technology to the Soviet Union, a group of lawmakers held a news conference in 1987 during which they swung sledgehammers at a Toshiba boombox. “The United States is rapidly becoming a colony of Japan,” another lawmaker warned in 1990. Pop culture was not much subtler: In 1990, best-selling novelist Clive Cussler published “Dragon,” a thriller about Japanese bad guys who plan to smuggle nuclear weapons into the United States by hiding them in Japanese cars. (Publishers Weekly called it a “Japan-bashing adventure . . . perfect beach reading.”) Michael Crichton’s “Rising Sun,” published in 1992 and released as a movie the following year, warned that the United States was selling its future to Japan. The story begins with a murder in the U.S. headquarters of a Japanese corporation and proceeds to expose the imagined sins of Japan Inc. (In case readers missed the point, Crichton’s afterword concluded: “The Japanese are not our saviors. They are our competitors. We should not forget it.”) Japan, of course, is a democracy and a U.S. ally. China is neither of these things, it is much larger, and its behavior is objectively more alarming. At home, its technology companies have helped create a police state that has imprisoned more than 1 million ethnic minorities. Abroad, they help authoritarian regimes spy on opposition groups. Effectively competing with China, however, requires more nuance than a good-vs.-evil framework allows. The paranoid style dangerously neglects offense. Rather than considering how the United States should become more competitive, it fixates on defensive measures to undercut foreign competitors. It views the competition as nefarious — and, therefore, lacking in any redeeming qualities that could be emulated or lessons that could be learned. It puts the blame on cunning foreigners, avoiding difficult questions about why domestic companies are struggling. It replaces introspection with condemnation. Take Huawei. It has benefited from generous state subsidies and alleged intellectual-property theft. But it has also thrived by providing communications technology to rural and underserved markets, especially in Asia and Africa, which are expected to drive global growth in the coming decades. With about half of humanity still lacking access to the Internet, the United States should be thinking about how to incentivize


The wine world keeps changing. This essential reference book shows how.

“Wine is the one thing we buy to eat or drink where we can tell just from looking at the label exactly which spot on the globe produced it,” says British wine writer Jancis Robinson. “And if we look at the vintage — when; and at the name of the producer — who. It’s geography in a bottle.” Geography needs an atlas. And because wine’s geography is changing dramatically, as the wine world’s reach expands with advances in viticulture and changes in climate, it’s time for “The World Atlas of Wine, 8th Edition” (Mitchell Beazley, October 2019, $65), written by Robinson and Hugh Johnson. This is an authoritative reference wine lovers will want to explore, even if they have invested in previous editions. That description of wine’s mystique, a large part of its appeal to romantics and poets throughout the centuries, was uttered by Robinson in an interview with me last month at an event hosted by the Smithsonian Associates. Robinson has taken over primary authorship of the atlas since she joined its masthead with the fifth edition. In our conversation, she described how this is the most dramatic revision yet. Wine lovers scrutinize each new version for regions receiving recognition. When the seventh edition was published in 2013, Virginia celebrated its entrance onto the world stage with its own section. (Disclosure: I consulted on the Virginia page in this edition.) This year, British Columbia, Uruguay and Brazil receive their own sections, and Israel and Lebanon, lumped together in previous editions, have solo roles. There is also more specificity — the Napa Valley section has a new part on the St. Helena area, and “Burgundy keeps filling in,” Robinson said. But the more remarkable changes reflect trends that started before the 2013 edition but really became notable since then. These include climate change and a shift in consumer perceptions of wine, as well as changes in the way information is presented and consumed in the new tech era. “The effect of a changing climate was not something we could ignore,” Robinson said in a particularly British locution. The book’s front section, in previous editions given to basic information about wine appreciation, now includes a discussion of climate change, including a graph showing harvest start dates in Chateauneuf-du-Pape moving from late September and early October around 1950 to the beginning of September in 2000. “That could be anywhere, really,” Robinson said.


Giant pandas: How much do you know about them?

kidspost@washpost.com


The U.S.-China trade war is cooling off. But the tech war is heating up.

resist any Chinese-led effort for “using AI to build a dystopian surveillance state.” This proposal for a free-world AI alliance was endorsed Tuesday by NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen at a conference hosted by the commission. He argued that NATO should create its own AI commission “as a forum for exchange of data” and “to counter the autocracies,” according to a transcript of the forum prepared by C-SPAN. The Pentagon’s biggest challenge in checking China’s rapid advances in AI may simply be gathering the best brains in the United States (including those working here who were born abroad). The Chinese can commandeer their best and brightest; America can’t. The difficulty in enlisting America’s brainpower was illustrated by the rebellion last year of Google engineers who refused to participate in a Pentagon AI application known as Project Maven. Schmidt and Work both argue that tech companies and their employees are now more willing to work with the Pentagon, so long as projects are transparent and meet clear ethical standards. To proselytize for such cooperation, the Defense Innovation Board, also headed by Schmidt, spent the past year traveling to top U.S. universities to frame a set of recommendations for “ethical” AI. The guidelines, which were released last week, establish a baseline for a continuing conversation with a tech community that instinctively mistrusts governments. Discussing AI strategy is a bit like trying to navigate in a hurricane: The force of the technological change coming toward us is so intense that it’s hard to measure. Henry Kissinger, the former secretary of state who made his name as a strategist of nuclear war in the 1950s, said at Tuesday’s conference that what may lie ahead is “algorithmic warfare.” Chinese and American AI brains would try to outthink and outmaneuver each other, perhaps aided by deceptions that corrupted the other side’s data. A hint of the strategic stakes came in a brief passage of the commission’s report that discussed possible agreements with China and Russia for “prohibiting the use of AI to authorize the launch of nuclear weapons.” Dr. Strangelove’s “Doomsday Machine” has nearly arrived. We’re lucky that even in a chaotic Washington, a few of our best minds, such as Schmidt and Work, are thinking about how America can survive and prosper in the coming AI-driven world. Read more from David Ignatius’s archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook.


How Mexico’s cartel wars shattered American Mormons’ wary peace

Also last month, in the city of Culiacan, the Sinaloa cartel overpowered government security forces and forced the release of Ovidio Guzmán López, one of the country’s best-known drug traffickers. Through it all, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador has resisted calls to toughen his security policies. Instead, he’s trying to provide jobs to lure people away from the cartels. He has handed out millions of scholarships to keep kids in school. “We aren’t going to change the strategy,” he reiterated Thursday. “We are going to continue to address the causes behind insecurity and violence.” Residents of La Mora have taken their own precautions. They began traveling in convoys when moving between Sonora and Chihuahua. They decided it was time to secure legal firearms. On Monday, when the three women and their children left town, Rhonita Miller paused before leaving. She told her mother-in-law, Loretta Miller: “I have a bad feeling about this. Maybe I shouldn’t go.” Less than an hour later, Rhonita Miller was killed with her four children. When residents found her car, it was on fire, apparently set alight by gunmen. The other victims were found later. Two surviving children walked for hours through the wilderness after escaping. One of them recounted that gunmen had fired at him as he ran into the brush. Within hours, the massacre sent a shock wave through Mexico and the United States, renewing questions about Mexico’s failure to secure its territory, prompting President Trump to offer up the firepower of the U.S. military. The residents of La Mora began preparing for the funerals. They made wooden coffins. Amber Langford, the midwife who delivered the children who were killed, now embalmed their bodies. Hundreds of people arrived from northern Mexico and the United States on Thursday for the funeral of Dawna Langford, 43, and her children Trevor, 11, and Rogan, 2, in the family’s backyard. Troops from Mexico’s national guard stood near the entrance. Family members wept as they spoke of their loss, remembering the way Dawna told stories, how Trevor devoured waffles, how Rogan couldn’t seem to stop smiling. “When I heard what happened, I just felt a helplessness for my family,” Ryan Langford, Dawna’s son, said through tears in his eulogy. As the community mourned, members became aware of how their ordeal had reinvigorated a debate about how to end Mexico’s years of bloodshed. “I’m not saying I want the U.S.


Can Twitter get back on the right side of history?

the risk of a mass exodus of users. Remember MySpace? Neither do I. If real users who provide insights and commentary to organically earned followings — as, for example, Jamal Khashoggi did — can no longer trust Twitter’s ability to protect their private information, then perhaps it’s time to take these conversations elsewhere. It is unclear whether Ahmad Abouammo, a U.S. citizen and one of the two former employees being charged in the case, specifically targeted Khashoggi. There’s speculation the figure described in the charges as “Twitter User 1,” the “prominent critic” of the Saudi royal family who had more than 1 million followers, is actually another prominent Saudi voice. But the profile is consistent with that of my colleague who was savagely murdered on the orders of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Just as chilling, though, is the thought that Mohammed bin Salman might have used his agents to target thousands of dissidents, gathering information that could later be used to similarly extinguish their critical voices. Should all users with a long reach into societies living under repressive leaders expect a similar fate? Since the murder of Khashoggi, commentators around the world have focused on the lengths to which Mohammed bin Salman is willing to go to stifle dissent — inside the kingdom, beyond its borders, and in cyberspace. The evidence of his sociopathy grows by the day. Few outside the ranks of the crown prince’s sympathizers, paid or unpaid, would dispute it. But that’s not the story here. If a young and relatively inexperienced autocrat would invest in this sort of attack on the privacy of people, many of whom are citizens of countries other than his own, what makes us believe that others aren’t actively engaged in similarly nefarious operations? How can we trust these tech companies to make sure malevolent forces aren’t exploiting our urge to communicate with each other? If Twitter and other social media empires want to promote and sustain our most vital conversations, this is the question that they need to answer. Honestly. Read more The Post’s View: Investing in Saudi Arabia’s oil company is an investment in a brutal regime Jason Rezaian: Women in Iran need America’s help. Why won’t we give it to them? Jamal Khashoggi: A missing voice, a growing chorus Sudarsan Raghavan and Heba Farouk Mahfouz: In Egypt, dissent is silenced by masked men, riot police and blocked roads


Marco Rubio may be on to something — if he gives up the straw-men arguments

The 2020 election is still a year away (although the Democratic primary has been underway for approximately 3,000 years). Nevertheless, Sen. Marco Rubio is workshopping a new stump speech for 2024. His remarks Tuesday in Washington turned on the one issue that might bring our warring parties into agreement. They also demonstrated what could pull them apart. The Florida Republican spoke about how American capitalism had run aground and how a different understanding of the role of business and markets could save us from drowning. He argued that business had forgotten its obligation to society, describing in detail the disintegration of families and hollowing of communities. Noting the right of workers to share in the benefits they create for their employers, he proposed taxes on stock buybacks, an expanded federal child tax credit, paid parental leave and even a national cooperative bank for domestic investment. And he posed what might be the key question of our time: “Does our country exist to serve the interest of the market, or does the market exist to serve the interest of our nation, and of our people?” Considering the level of division that seems evident day to day, both the right and the left might be inching toward consensus that capitalism is not working for Americans anymore. Even Republicans realize that the market has ceased to serve the people, that the people have grown to resent it. And that unless business and its GOP allies find a better way, the people will instead. Into this breach, Rubio now calls for an economy in which “workers and businesses are not competitors for their share of limited resources, but instead partners in an effort that benefits both.” Rubio is on to something here. Both Democrats and Republicans have grown skeptical of an economic system in which the financial sector’s share of corporate profits has increased from 10 percent to nearly 30 percent over the past four decades at the expense of the average worker. Proud socialists would like to be able to support their families by earning an honest wage, while even self-avowed capitalists would prefer their jobs not be offshored under the guise of “market efficiency.” It’s the rare issue on which Tucker Carlson and Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) see eye to eye. Given the potentially broad bipartisan appeal, it is all the more disappointing then that Rubio chose to surround his new approach


Scorsese’s ‘The Irishman’ dismantles the myths the filmmaker helped create in movies like ‘Goodfellas’

forms an indelible bond, becoming the union boss’s steadfast fixer, enforcer and family friend. Just how Sheeran went from Hoffa’s trusted confidant to murderer forms the emotional arc of “The Irishman,” which was written for the screen by Steven Zaillian. And even if the answer still isn’t entirely clear by the end of the film’s prodigious 3½ -hour running time, Scorsese gives audiences plenty of atmospheric set pieces and larger-than-life characters to keep them from feeling deprived. De Niro and Pesci, who haven’t worked together under Scorsese since 1995’s “Casino,” get back into harness with one another with the ease of the pros that they are: Pesci’s relatively mild-mannered Bufalino is a particularly surprising and welcome departure from the hair-trigger histrionics of the characters he’s best known for. But it’s when Pacino arrives on the scene as Hoffa that “The Irishman” truly levitates, the actor making his Scorsese picture debut with a performance that is at once bombastic and subtle, obnoxious and curiously sympathetic. Throughout the film, Sheeran’s daughter Peggy looks askance at Bufalino, while trusting Hoffa implicitly (maybe because he loves ice cream as much as she does). Played by Anna Paquin as a young woman, Peggy becomes perhaps the most maddeningly paradoxical figure in “The Irishman,” largely silenced by the filmmakers (she literally speaks only one or two lines), her increasingly appalled glares at Sheeran serving as stand-ins for conscience in his otherwise amoral, transactional world. One of the reasons “The Irishman” has taken so long to get to the screen was the tricky business of de-aging the lead actors for its earliest scenes; here, the process is barely noticeable, thanks not only to the sophistication of computer technology but Rodrigo Prieto’s exquisite cinematography, which suggests several different eras through the use of changing palettes (the film toggles between the ’50s, ’60s, ’70s and early aughts). Although “The Irishman” is full of familiar Scorsese motifs — one-on-one encounters dripping with subtextual dread, nightclub outings with “the wives” and a crooner onstage, those gorgeous dolly shots — here they’re recapitulated with a more mournful, contemplative tone. Indeed, “The Irishman” is so full of Scorsese’s most beloved rep players and repeated tropes that it’s difficult not to compare it to such predecessors as “Mean Streets,” “Raging Bull” and especially “Goodfellas.” (The equivalent scene to the Lufthansa heist here is a wonderfully piquant account of the Bay of Pigs operation.) This


This foreign meat company got U.S. tax money. Now it wants to conquer America.

— among meat companies in the United States, and the second highest rate of serious injuries among all companies in the United States. The Post used federal data on the number of serious worker injuries and the number of employees to determine the injury rates. JBS disagreed with The Post’s methodology and said JBS was better than the industry average in other safety metrics using federal data, such as time lost because of injury. Consolidation can lead to benefits for consumers. Trey Malone, an agricultural economist at Michigan State University, said consolidation has led to lower prices and an explosion of new food products. A grocery store in 1995 had about 8,000 options on average. Now, it’s more than 45,000. “As companies get larger, you get economies of scale. The cost of production per unit decreases,” Malone said. “Companies increasingly compete at quality levels, offering hormone-free meat, Angus beef. They create new products. From a consumer perspective, you have higher quality meat and cheaper meat products.” But the small number of major players increases the possibility that companies could collude to increase prices, Malone and other economists say. A lawsuit filed in 2016 by a food service firm in New York alleges that JBS-owned Pilgrim’s Pride and other poultry companies intentionally destroyed flocks of breeder hens to reduce the poultry supply. The coordinated effort resulted in a 50 percent increase in the wholesale price of broiler chickens, the lawsuit claims. The civil suit is on hold as the Justice Department investigates. JBS denied the accusations in the lawsuit. Lawyers for Pilgrim’s Pride and other poultry companies filed a motion to dismiss the case in January. JBS said concentration in the meat industry has been “fairly static” since the mid-1990s. Analysts point to data showing the market has become more concentrated; they say companies with plants and processing facilities around the world increasingly dominate. “This is a consumer disaster because of the amount of power, money and political clout that these companies hold,” said Marion Nestle, a New York University professor who studies the food industry. “If you own everything, you get to set the rules, you get to set the price, because there is no real competition.” [Inspector General wants to know if USDA concealed worker safety data] With a few large operators, meat contamination can pose a greater threat because their products end up on plates across the nation.


Nine members of Mormon family, dual U.S.-Mexican citizens, killed in attack in northern Mexico; Trump offers support

in the daytime,” she said. “But this happened yesterday in the middle of the day.” A crescendo of violence in Mexico is posing one of the biggest tests of López Obrador’s year-old presidency. Last month’s failed anti-drug raid in Culiacán stirred so much concern that retired generals took the unusual step of publicly complaining to Defense Minister Luis Cresencio Sandoval about the president’s strategy. That cartel siege followed shootouts in Guerrero and Michoacan states that left at least 14 security officials dead, and an attack on a bar in the southern city of Coatzacoalcos that killed at least 27. López Obrador has created a National Guard with about 70,000 troops to improve security, and provided millions of young people with scholarships aimed at discouraging them from involvement in organized crime. But Mexico is on track for its deadliest year in recent history, with nearly 26,000 people slain in the first nine months of 2019. The two U.S. senators from majority-Mormon Utah, Mitt Romney and Mike Lee, called on López Obrador to ensure justice after the massacre. Romney’s forebears lived in a different Mormon community in Mexico, one that retained closer ties with the main LDS Church. “The U.S. must work with Mexican officials to hold accountable those responsible for this senseless violence,” Romney tweeted. Durazo, the public security secretary, told reporters that “serious advances” had been made in the investigation into the killings, but did not provide details. Mormons began to settle in Mexico and Canada in the 1870s and 1880s to avoid being prosecuted by the U.S. government over their practice of polygamy, according to Matthew Bowman, the chair of Mormon studies at Claremont Graduate University in California. The main LDS Church, headquartered in Utah, abandoned polygamy and began to crack down on its practice by excommunicating members. Offshoot groups such as the LeBaron family began to form in Mexico in the early 1900s. For decades, the LeBaron clan lived quietly in farming communities, speaking both Spanish and English. But their relative wealth made them targets of extortion and kidnapping as organized-crime groups increasingly asserted themselves. In 2009, a prominent member of the clan, Benjamin LeBaron, 31, was shot dead near his community. He had publicly denounced the drug traffickers after they abducted his younger brother and demanded a $1 million ransom. The family refused to pay, and the killers said the murder was in retaliation. The children who


A troubled teen hoped to start over at college. Instead he died ‘in the drunk tank.’

RADFORD, Va. — His words were slow and slurred as he gazed unsteadily into a phone camera late one September night. “Hey, everybody,” Aris Lobo-Perez mumbled to a few hundred followers on Snapchat. The 18-year-old had arrived at Radford University from Culpeper, Va., three weeks earlier with more than the usual first-year itch for freedom. After a serious car accident in high school, college was his chance to escape a hometown filled with bad memories. But instead of starting over at Radford, he had slid backward. Friends worried Aris was skipping class, drinking too much and trying hard drugs. In the Sept. 11 video, his champagne-colored eyes were foggy, half-closed and ringed with dark shadows. Within an hour of posting the clip on Snapchat, Aris was arrested in his dorm by campus police for public intoxication. The next morning — before his family even knew he had been arrested — guards at New River Valley Regional Jail found him dead in his cell. More than a month later, the Sept. 12 death remains a mystery, and his family is raising questions about the way the university chose to deal with Aris. State police, who are handling the investigation, are looking into his suspected “illegal recreational drug use,” including what he might have taken and who might have given it to him, according to an affidavit for a warrant to search Aris’s phone. But a toxicology report has yet to be completed, and an autopsy did not reveal a cause of death. Radford University officials refuse to release an arrest report while the inquiry is ongoing. More than 1,800 college students die each year of alcohol-related injuries, including car accidents, according to one widely cited study. Suicides, drug overdoses, hazing incidents and even campus shootings account for hundreds more. Yet few die in jail. “It’s much more likely that a student who is intoxicated dies in their bed,” said Kevin Kruger, president of the National Association of Student Personnel Administrators. “Many colleges or universities don’t have facilities to ensure that an intoxicated person will not do harm to themselves or others, so literally the safest place to be may be in detention.” After seeing the Snapchat video, Aris’s family can’t understand why he wound up in a jail cell instead of a medical facility. “It’s obvious that he needed to go to the hospital,” said Aris’s mother, Dixiana Perez. Two witnesses


Ever Wondered: Where do bugs go in winter?

Go for a walk outside in the summertime, and you will no doubt be surrounded by buzzing bees, fluttering butterflies and ants on the march. But where do all these tiny creatures go when the weather turns to ice and snow? As it turns out, there are many answers to this question because there are many kinds of bugs. “One of the most common ways that bugs deal with winter, especially in North America, is that they are seasonal,” says Kristie Reddick, a scientist and half of the insect-loving duo known as the Bug Chicks. In other words, the adults die off when winter comes but not before burying the next generation of eggs underground or in another safe place — such as a rotting log. Praying mantises don’t bury their eggs, but they do protect them inside a foamy egg mass called an ootheca, which is secured to a twig or stem. “It looks like hair mousse when they first lay the eggs, but then it hardens and becomes camouflaged,” Reddick says. “And if you think about foam insulation in a house, it really regulates the temperature, so the ootheca can withstand freezing temperatures and cold and wind until springtime. Then, when things heat up, the baby mantids hatch out of the egg case.” Not all adult insects shrivel up and die, though. Honeybees huddle together in clusters inside their hive. The insects can even turn up the thermostat by vibrating their wings and raising the temperature inside the hive. The giant wetas of New Zealand, which are crickets as big as your hand, survive plunging temperatures thanks to a secret superpower — they have a sort of antifreeze in their blood. “So you can freeze them and then they will come back to life when you thaw them out,” says Reddick. “Which is like, c’mon!” Other insects avoid winter altogether by migrating to warmer areas. Monarch butterflies are famous for this because their migration takes them from the northern United States and Canada to the mountains of Mexico and back. But the longest migration of any insect belongs to the globe skimmer dragonfly, whose migration takes it from East Africa to India and back, a distance that can span more than 11,000 miles. That would be like than taking a round-trip flight from the top of Alaska to the bottom of the Florida Keys! Believe it or not,


AMLO’s counter-drug policy is failing in Mexico

THE HORRIFIC murder of three American women and six of their children in northern Mexico this week awoke many in Washington to the continuing deterioration of security conditions south of the border. To Mexicans, it was only the latest in a string of shocking episodes. The ambush of fundamentalist Mormon families in a desolate stretch of desert followed by just a few weeks the siege of a medium-size city, Culiacán, by hundreds of drug cartel fighters who outgunned Mexican security forces to release a cartel leader they had tried to arrest. Just days before that, 14 police officers were gunned down during an ambush in the state of Michoacan. And before that, the firebombing of a club in Veracruz killed at least 27 people. And so on. Mexico has struggled for years with the mayhem sown by drug cartels, but there has been an alarming escalation since leftist president Andrés Manuel López Obrador took office last December. In the first six months of 2019, there were some 17,000 homicides, and it seems likely the total for the year will surpass last year’s total of 33,000, which was the most ever recorded. It’s hard not to conclude that the spike is a consequence of Mr. López Obrador’s policy of deescalating the war on the cartels waged by previous presidents, which he labeled “a disaster.” His catchphrase has been “hugs, not bullets”; he says more social spending and the weeding out of corruption in government will reduce the violence. Following the slaughter of the Americans, the president was defiant: “You can’t fight violence with more violence,” he said. Mr. López Obrador has a point in arguing that the previous strategy of mobilizing the military against the cartels failed to defeat them while causing thousands of casualties. His own approach is not as pacific as it sounds: He created a 60,000-strong national guard to take up the fight. But the guard is distributed thinly around the country, and a chunk of it has been diverted to stopping migrants from Central America, in an effort to appease the Trump administration. Mr. López Obrador may calculate that the easiest way to reduce violence is to back off and hope for a de facto truce with the gangs. The massacre of the Mormons shows why that won’t work: As the drugrunners fight each other or prey on legitimate commerce, innocent people are killed. What Mexico needs


Nike vows investigation following Mary Cain’s allegations of abuse at Oregon Project

said, responded by telling her he was tired and wanted to go to sleep. In a statement to the Oregonian, Salazar denied that he mistreated Cain. “Mary’s father is a medical doctor, and both of her parents were deeply involved in her training, competition and health throughout the period she was coached by me,” Salazar said, according to the paper. “For example, Mary’s father consulted on medications and supplements Mary used during her time at the NOP. Neither of her parents nor Mary raised any of the issues that she now suggests occurred while I was coaching her. To be clear, I never encouraged her, or worse yet, shamed her, to maintain an unhealthy weight.” But several athletes Salazar trained at the club backed Cain’s account. Canadian runner Cam Levins apologized to Cain through his Twitter account for not supporting her when they were teammates the Oregon Project. “I knew that our coaching staff was obsessed with your weight loss, emphasizing it as if it were the single thing standing in the way of great performances,” Levins wrote. “I knew because they spoke of it openly among other athletes.” Adam and Kara Goucher, a married couple, both competed for the track club and have levied criticism at Salazar and Nike since leaving. Kara asked Nike on Twitter to come to her during its investigation “because I have stories to match all of Mary’s claims and so much more.” Adam wrote on his Twitter feed that the way club officials and coached talked about women’s bodies was “disgusting.” He recalled the 2011 Boston Marathon, which took place seven months after Kara gave birth. After Kara finished fifth, Adam said, Salazar approached Kara’s mother and said: “Don’t tell Kara, but she is still too heavy. She needs to lose her baby weight if she wants to be fast again.” Steve Magness, a former Oregon Project assistant coach who was a crucial whistleblower in USADA’s case against the club, confirmed Cain’s accounts on his Twitter feed. Magness said Salazar would encourage athletes to leave meals hungry and would rebuke them for eating certain foods, such as hamburgers. He called Salazar “obsessed” with weight and said Salazar tried to get athletes to take “shady” supplements. “I’ve witnessed the harm and damage that such a culture creates,” Magness wrote. “It’s lasting mental health issues. That’s the issue. The culture made it where crazy is normal.”


Amtrak touts record ridership, revenue for fiscal 2019

interiors with new seat covers, cushions and carpets. Some stations, including Washington’s Union Station, got enhanced lounges. On top of that, $110 million in technology upgrades made bookings easier for customers, including through an improved mobile app. And Amtrak also said last year it completed the installation of the automatic-braking system known as Positive Train Control on all tracks it owns and controls, and it is in full compliance with the federal mandate. Anderson said 93 percent of trains left the station on time in fiscal 2019, a potentially good sign for improvements on train delays that have plagued its national network for years. “It is very important for this railroad to run on time if we want to have the confidence of our customers and our policymakers,” Anderson said. Amtrak is expected to invest $2 billion in this fiscal year, officials said Friday. An internal survey found 9 out of 10 customers gave Amtrak good marks, the railroad said. Still, some of its recent actions to save money have proved to be unpopular. Train aficionados and passengers have pushed back on Amtrak’s decision to kill the dining car on its one-night long distance trains east of the Mississippi. Amtrak said it is reinventing its dining service to create more “flexible” and “contemporary” dining options that will save Amtrak money and attract a younger generation of riders. Amtrak has also beefed up sale promotions, adding more buy-one-get-one ticket sales, even on its premium fares, to boost ridership. This latest ridership report of 32.5 million reflects a year-over-year increase of 800,000 passengers. It is the highest in Amtrak’s history. Ridership was 22.5 million when Amtrak introduced the Acela Express in the Northeast two decades ago. Ridership for all Northeast Corridor services reached 12.5 million, an increase of 3.3 percent from 2018. State supported routes saw a 2.4 percent growth, reaching 15.4 million passengers. Amtrak’s 15 long distance routes carried 4.5 million passengers last year, an increase of less than 1 percent. Amtrak’s goal is to run the operations of the railroad with a positive net revenue and use the federal subsidies and other grants to reverse decades of underinvestment in the railroad and maintain a state of good repair, officials said. Amtrak has a backlog of $33.3 billion in projects needed to bring its assets to a state of good repair; over $28 billion of that is in the Northeast Corridor.


James Le Mesurier, backer of Syria’s White Helmets, found dead in Istanbul

BAGHDAD — The British founder of a group that supported rescue efforts to save thousands of Syrian civilians was found dead in Istanbul on Monday. The body of James Le Mesurier, 48, a former British army officer, was found near his apartment in central Istanbul in the early hours of the morning, according to Turkish media reports, which said he had suffered fractures to his head and legs after apparently falling from a balcony. Circumstances surrounding his death were unclear, and the Istanbul governor’s office said an investigation had been launched. Le Mesurier had been a towering figure in an against-the-odds effort to save civilians from the Syrian and Russian governments’ barrel bombs and airstrikes. The organization that he founded, Mayday Rescue, has trained a civilian rescue team in Syria known as the White Helmets and overseen international government funding to it. “It is with very heavy hearts that Mayday Rescue must confirm the death of James Le Mesurier,” the organization said in a statement. “James dedicated his life to helping civilians respond to emergencies in conflicts and natural disasters. Nowhere was the impact of his important work felt so strongly as in Syria.” Le Mesurier was awarded an Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II in 2016 for his work in Syria. When bombs strike residential neighborhoods that lie outside Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s control, it is the White Helmets who respond, pulling families from the rubble and rushing casualties to the hospital. The group has been credited with saving thousands of lives and has documented chemical weapons attacks that spurred U.S. military action against targets linked to the Syrian army. That work had made the White Helmets, and Le Mesurier, a prime target for attacks by the Syrian and Russian governments and media, which placed them at the center of conspiracy theories and claimed they had terrorist links. “The White Helmets’ co-founder, James Le Mesurier, is a former agent of Britain’s MI6, who has been spotted all around the world, including in the #Balkans and the #MiddleEast,” the Russian Foreign Ministry wrote on its Twitter account on Friday, claiming he had a connection to “terrorist groups.” Although the White Helmets has been forced into a smaller and smaller swath of territory, increasingly controlled by militants, it says it remains a neutral civil defense force, focusing rescue efforts on the 3 million civilians caught between hard-liners and


Nigel Farage offers Boris Johnson a truce, boosting prospects for Conservatives in December election

LONDON — British Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s chances of success in next month’s election got a boost Monday after Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage offered a truce. Farage said he would not field candidates for the 317 seats that Johnson’s Conservative Party won in 2017. That means, in half of Britain, voters who hunger to leave the European Union will not have to decide between a pro-Brexit Conservative candidate and a really, really pro-Brexit Brexit Party candidate. This represents serious reprieve for Johnson, whose campaign launch last week for the Dec. 12 election was marred by comments from prominent party figures who insulted the victims of a notorious fire and played into criticism that the party is out of touch. Conservative Party leaders had feared that if Farage made good on his earlier threat to fight for all 650 seats in Parliament, votes could be split between them, giving an advantage to the opposition Labour Party, which takes a fuzzy stance on Brexit, and the Liberal Democrats, who oppose leaving the European Union. But Farage backed down from his threat on Monday and said his focus will be on beating Labour and stopping those who support a second referendum on Brexit, a position endorsed by Labour, the Liberal Democrats and other minority parties. “What we will do is concentrate our total effort into all of the seats that are held by the Labour Party, who have completely broken their manifesto in 2017,” which supported Brexit, he said. Labour has had its own stumbles beginning its campaign. First, Deputy Leader Tom Watson abruptly resigned. Then four ex-Labour lawmakers urged voters to back Johnson and the Conservatives to prevent Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn from becoming prime minister. Analysts spent Monday adjusting their electoral calculations. John Curtice, a politics professor at the University of Strathclyde — who is considered a savant after anticipating the Brexit referendum outcome — said that, on the whole, “this is good news for Boris, but it’s not as good as it looks.” He explained that “Farage is not standing down in seats that Boris needs to gain from Labour.” Johnson must top more than 40 percent of the vote to form a majority government — and avoid the perils of a hung Parliament or having to cast his lot again with the one-issue unionists in Northern Ireland. The Conservative Party is seeking to win over Labour voters who


Modern AI is a roulette wheel

The Nov. 6 news article “U.S. should consider pooling AI data with other countries, commission says” addressed concerns over autonomous artificial-intelligence-driven weapons and the U.S. military’s involvement in their development. These concerns are unwarranted. Modern artificial intelligence, especially in the field of computer vision, is a roulette wheel. The best models are pretty accurate, but do the math: If a model is correct 99 percent of the time, then in a war, the thousands of killer drones people are afraid of will shoot the wrong person hundreds of times upon deployment. On the off chance a major discovery enables the implementation of a consistent, fatal drone of death, the United States should be prepared to defend its citizens, so research on AI drones should continue. Until a major breakthrough happens, though, AI is a double-edged sword to any nation that tries to use it in war, so let’s allow the military to protect us and focus on the applications of AI to medical and technological industries. Derek Dong Read more letters to the editor.


Amazon pushes further into grocery business with new Los Angeles store

Amazon confirmed it plans to open a new grocery store brand in the Los Angeles area next year, initiating the latest phase of its brick-and-mortar expansion. The move, which has been rumored for months, will expand grocery offerings beyond the upscale selection shoppers typically find in Whole Foods locations and its smaller cashierless, convenience-like Amazon Go stores. It’s the latest move by Amazon into brick and mortar, a category it spurned for much of its early existence as it fundamentally shifted the retail landscape and prompted more and more shoppers to buy online with its Prime fast-shipping membership program and other perks. The market research firm eMarketer expects Amazon to account for about 37.7 percent of all U.S. e-commerce sales this year. Over the past few years, however, Amazon has become focused on physical retail as a strategic initiative, including opening pop-up stores, bookstores and other locations. Opening mainstream grocery stores is a “natural evolution” for Amazon, UBS Securities analyst Eric Sheridan wrote in a recent report. The company could use the locations of the new markets as a distribution point for grocery delivery, something it already does with Whole Foods stores. If Amazon makes delivery contingent on being a member of its lucrative Prime program, it “could act as a tailwind for Prime membership growth over time,” Sheridan wrote. (Amazon chief executive Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post.) The company plans to open its new grocery store location in Woodland Hills, Calif., just north of Los Angeles, in 2020, Amazon spokeswoman Pia Arthur said. The tech news website CNET first reported the news of the new location, after the company published job postings for it. One opening encouraged job seekers to join the company as “we launch Amazon’s first grocery store in Woodland Hills.” The Wall Street Journal reported in March that Amazon was eyeing expansion in the grocery business. Food has long stymied the online retail giant, in part because of the fickle nature of consumer shopping habits and the difficulty of predicting how much fresh food to order and when. The company scaled back its AmazonFresh delivery service in some Zip codes in 2017 after struggling to make it work. The company has learned from its acquisition of Whole Foods that same year, however, and has been rapidly expanding its footprint in two-hour grocery delivery. Recently, the company also started including Fresh delivery free with Prime membership.


news of the new location, after the company published job postings for it. One opening encouraged job seekers to join the company as “we launch Amazon’s first grocery store in Woodland Hills.” The Wall Street Journal reported in March that Amazon was eyeing expansion in the grocery business. Food has long stymied the online retail giant, in part because of the fickle nature of consumer shopping habits and the difficulty of predicting how much fresh food to order and when. The company scaled back its AmazonFresh delivery service in some Zip codes in 2017 after struggling to make it work. The company has learned from its acquisition of Whole Foods that same year, however, and has been rapidly expanding its footprint in two-hour grocery delivery. Recently, the company also started including Fresh delivery free with Prime membership. The company has yet to break through in the grocery business with the Amazon brand. The market is already crowded, and consumers tend to have strong preferences when it comes to where they shop. The new stores won’t be Whole Foods, and, unlike Amazon Go’s cashier-less checkout systems, they’ll have conventional checkout lanes. And unlike the natural-food focus of Whole Foods, the new locations are likely to carry brand-name sodas, cereals, sweets and more to cater to a wider base of customers. Revenue from Amazon’s physical locations stalled in the last quarter. In the three-month period that ended Sept. 30, sales from grocery locations as well as its bookstores and other brick-and-mortar businesses slid 1 percent, to $4.2 billion. Amazon’s overall sales in the quarter grew 24 percent to $70 billion. Amazon offers online grocery options, such as its AmazonFresh and Prime Now delivery businesses. Those compete with services such as Instacart, delivering perishable and nonperishable items within a few hours. But most consumers prefer to shop for much of their core shopping-list items in person, according to a 2017 report from Citi Research. The grocery expansion also ratchets up Amazon’s rivalry with Walmart, the nation’s largest retailer as well as its largest seller of groceries. Analysts have said the move could help make buying from Amazon even more of a habit for consumers, given the regular pace of grocery shopping. Owning physical retail also gives the company more places for shoppers to make returns, one of the expensive aspects of running an online store. Amazon already partners with Kohl’s for free returns.


Uber CEO calls slaying of Jamal Khashoggi ‘a mistake’ and compares it to a self-driving car crash

Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi called the slaying of Jamal Khashoggi “a serious mistake” by the Saudi government in an interview with Axios on Sunday, comparing it to the accident involving the tech company’s self-driving car that killed a pedestrian last year. “It’s a serious mistake. We’ve made mistakes, too — with self-driving, and we stopped driving and we’re recovering from that mistake,” he said in the episode of “Axios on HBO.” “I think that people make mistakes, it doesn’t mean they can never be forgiven. I think they have taken it seriously.” The car accident was caused by a bad sensor, the interviewer reminded Khosrowshahi, then continued, “The CIA suggested that the crown prince had a role in ordering the assassination. That’s a different thing — you didn’t intentionally run someone over.” (The National Transportation Safety Board will meet Nov. 19 to rule on a probable cause in the crash.) About an hour later, Khosrowshahi contacted Axios to clarify his comments on Khashoggi. “I said something in the moment that I do not believe. When it comes to Jamal Khashoggi, his murder was reprehensible and should not be forgotten or excused,” he wrote in an email, according to the publication. U.S. intelligence has said that Khashoggi, a Washington Post contributing columnist and prominent critic of the Saudi government, was strangled and dismembered by a team of 15 agents inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul just over a year ago. The Saudi royal family denied coordinating the slaughter. Still, in November, the CIA concluded that Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman ordered the assassination, based on audio recordings, intercepted phone calls and other intelligence. The State Department later classified the killing as a human rights abuse, and Saudi prosecutors charged 11 people in the killing. They plan to seek the death penalty for five of the accused. Uber stock has hit record lows since the company went public six months ago. It reported a $1.2 billion loss in the latest quarter. Saudi Arabia is the company’s fifth biggest shareholder, and Yasir al-Rumayyan, head of the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund, sits on Uber’s board of directors. Khosrowshahi on Sunday called Rumayyan a “very constructive” board member. “From a Saudi perspective, they’re just like any other shareholder now. We’re a public company,” he said. Sunday is the latest in a string of public relations missteps for the company, which has struggled to retain its