Welcome to a Beer Town

considered the front-runners as beer cities in the mid-Atlantic, the Washington area has arrived to the scene. “It used to be that we were very much a little brother to Philly,” said Sam Fitz, the beer director at Meridian Pint. There is an argument that we’ve surpassed them as “one of, if not [the], premier East Coast beer scenes,” he said. “I can’t think of a bar that’s opened in the past two years that hasn’t opened with craft beer.” But what makes a good beer town? It’s not just the beer. Or the breweries. What makes D.C. unique is the melange of tastes and the transcendent interest in craft beer. “What I’m consistently impressed by is how it’s not just the beer geeks that are into the beer anymore,” said Greg Engert, beer director for the Neighborhood Restaurant Group. “It’s everybody.” D.C. resident Irina King happily enjoyed a New Belgium Rampant Imperial IPA at Smith Commons on Tuesday during its Masters of the Craft Beer Universe event series. “It’s amazing,” she said. “In New York, in Charleston, in the South, it’s nothing like here. People love beer here. And they appreciate the fact that it’s from D.C., it’s homegrown. It’s not a fad.” Dan Kopman, co-founder of Schlafly Beer and a lobbyist for the Brewers Association, summed up why D.C. is a unique beer experience: There is an international community that demands imports and there are people from around the country who are interested in their hometown or regional beers. “You overlay that with new breweries starting up here in the District and it just creates this synergy of international, national, [and] local,” Kopman said on the floor of the trade show Wednesday. “You won’t get that in other cities.” Besides the size of the venue, the decision to bring this year’s Craft Brewers Conference to D.C. was also policy-related. On Tuesday, more than 200 brewery owners, CEOs and employees lobbied on Capitol Hill to gain support for new federal excise tax legislation. “The decision to come here first started getting momentum in 2009,” said Bob Pease, chief operating officer of the Brewers Association. “The vision at that time was that we would come here and we would have hundreds of our members engage in some type of advocacy effort [and] that Washington would blossom into a great craft beer community … Much of that has come to fruition.”


Heurich House

Brewery owner Christian Heurich liked his beer warm and his buildings fireproof. He was a pragmatic businessman who kept his company afloat through Prohibition by making and selling ice. And he lived in this fine example of Victorian excess, also known as the “Brewmaster’s Castle.” Tour it to learn about turn-of-the-20th-century decor, Heurich’s beer and the quirky, folksy man himself. Heurich’s first brewery was heavily damaged by a fire in 1892. He made sure his next brewery was fireproof, and did the same with this home, completed in 1894. The concrete-and-reinforced-steel Victorian had electricity and central heating well before they were commonplace; none of the home’s 15 fireplaces were ever used. In the basement is Heurich’s rec room/man cave/breakfast nook, where he played skat (German bridge). “He who has never been drunk is not a good man,” reads one of the German mottoes on the walls. The Christian Heurich Brewing Co.’s Senate, Maerzen and other beers were popular nationwide up until the 1950s, when larger breweries proved to be insurmountable foes. Heurich billed its beer as a healthy beverage. One 1897 ad read, “Nursing mothers should drink Heurich’s ‘Maerzen,’ as it will insure pure and heavy milk for the babies.” The company sold Champeer, a “champagnelike” sparkling malt liquor, in the late 1940s — until being sued by a New Jersey brewery making the similar Champale. Christian Heurich lived to age 102. He ascribed his longevity to moderation in all things and to drinking Heurich beer. Heurich House, 1307 New Hampshire Ave. NW; $5; 202-429-1894. (Dupont Circle) Learn More!


Face Time: Alain Ducasse

With more than 20 restaurants and about as many Michelin stars under his toque — and with a new cookbook, “Nature” ($45, Rizzoli), in stores — you might expect chef Alain Ducasse to be intimidating. Yet when we met over croissants at Adour in the St. Regis hotel (923 16th St. NW; 202-509-8000) to dish about the new lunch menu he created for the restaurant, he was wholesome and accessible, with a charming French accent. Which is exactly how we’d describe the new midday service. What’s the new menu like? How often will the options rotate? In what ways will lunch be different than dinner at Adour? Do you have a garden at home? You have restaurants in eight countries. What have you learned about global cuisine? Is there a particular restaurant you look forward to when you visit D.C.?


Cities, not rural areas, are the real Internet deserts

The “digital divide” is back in the news, with both Democratic presidential candidates and incumbent government officials promising billions to provide high-speed Internet to millions of Americans in rural areas who don’t currently have access to it at home. The digital divide, however, is not exclusively or even most significantly a rural problem. Due to inaccurate coverage maps, it is difficult to know where specifically access is lacking. But we know from regular Census Bureau surveys that three times as many households in urban areas remain unconnected as in rural areas. And regardless of geography, access isn’t the main reason these homes are without Internet service. The vast majority of U.S. homes without broadband service could have it today, but they don’t want it. The real problem is convincing those who are offline of the value of being part of our digital life. The singular focus on infrastructure deployment distracts policymakers from the actual explanation for why so many Americans are still offline. To put the access in perspective: In a recent Pew Research Center survey, only a fifth of respondents said they don’t have broadband at home because they can’t get it. Based on Census Bureau and Federal Communications Commission data, that correlates to between 4.5 and 7.5 million households, total, with no high-speed provider. For context, 3 million American homes still don’t have indoor plumbing, a problem the U.S. has been working a lot longer to solve. Over the last 20 years, in fact, home broadband in the U.S. has witnessed one of the fastest adoptions of a new technology ever seen. That’s especially impressive given that the FCC has, as new technologies and services have been deployed, repeatedly increased the speeds required to qualify as broadband. The current minimum is 125 times faster than what the agency started with in 1999. Yet even at the current standard, nearly 200 million Americans have broadband at home, where it’s useful for everything from entertainment to homework. And there is ample reason to believe the broadband picture will continue to improve, especially as high-speed mobile technologies fill in some of the gaps. The remaining Americans who can’t get wired broadband will have new options soon. In the last several months, for example, the FCC has offered three different solutions to the rural access problem: low-orbiting satellites it argues will offer service to remote areas, merger conditions it claims will provide


How the Internet has changed the way we write — and speak. It’s not all ALL bad.

Megan Marz is a writer in Chicago. To talk about how we communicate is often to complain about it. There are too many emails, too many texts and too many social media posts. Some are hateful, others merely annoying; yet, to our dismay, we spend hours a day reading and writing them. The linguist Gretchen McCulloch views this glut as a delightful abundance. “When I see the boundless creativity of Internet language flowing past me online, I can’t help but want to understand how it works,” she writes in her book, “Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language.” “Why did emoji become so popular so quickly? What’s the deal with how people of different ages punctuate their emails and text messages so differently?” These are the types of questions she answers in her detailed but light-on-its-feet account of how we communicate now that we’re communicating online. (“We,” in this case, means Internet-connected speakers of English, in particular its American varieties.) For one thing, McCulloch argues, the Internet is speeding up the evolution of English by increasing our ability to stay loosely in touch with, and mutually influence, one another. For another, linguists can now study the resulting changes more easily. The rapid increase in informal writing brought on by the Internet has enabled researchers to take “a deeper look into day-to-day language than we’ve ever been able to see.” Older means of studying everyday expression involved time-consuming processes like conducting and transcribing interviews. And examples of informal writing used to come disproportionately from “the kinds of famous people whose papers get donated to archives.” Now — on social media and, with permission, in texts and emails — researchers can see informal language written by a huge (if still not perfectly representative) portion of the population. Linguists looking at geotagged tweets a few years ago found that “hella” was particularly frequent in Northern California and that the abbreviation “ikr” (“I know, right?”) was popular in Detroit. We already knew that where we live and whom we spend time with influence how we speak. On the Internet, McCulloch argues, it also matters when and why we got online in the first place. People who first used the Internet to socialize, whether on AOL Instant Messenger or Snapchat, tend to adhere to linguistic norms that coalesced online. Those who use the Internet rarely or for mostly practical reasons (work, shopping) often just


In the Central Oregon desert, an observatory with out-of-this-world views

Our gazes first met at a party, from across a crowded galaxy. I gaped at an object of impossible beauty seemingly bedecked in diamonds. It stared back at me, and the 34,000-light-year distance between us disappeared. Star-struck, I couldn’t tear my eyes away. The object of my attraction was Messier 3, one of the night sky’s biggest and brightest globular star clusters. And the party was Astronomy Day, held on May 11 and Oct. 5 this year. I was celebrating at the Oregon Observatory at Sunriver, which houses about 30 telescopes in the country’s largest facility for public viewing. The nonprofit Oregon Observatory is dedicated to providing public access to the heavens. Unlike most research observatories where visitors admire telescopes from afar, it encourages aspiring astronomers to get an eyeful through its scopes, typically 12 to 15 on a given night. Celestial bodies are the stars of the show. And they’re easy to spot, thanks to clear air and the darkness; Sunriver, the surrounding resort town, has a stringent lighting ordinance that protects the night sky from light pollution. “We want people to look though the eyepieces,” said observatory manager Robert Grossfeld, who has worked at the site since it opened in 1990. “Public access to such an array of telescopes is unusual. We have a diverse collection, and because different telescopes do different things well, people can view a wide range of objects in the sky.” Planetary viewing is often a highlight, since visitors can recognize details such as Jupiter’s moons and Saturn’s rings. But spring and fall are prime times for globular clusters (dense collections of ancient stars), especially on nights when bright moonlight might drown out the planets. The observatory also offers daily solar viewing through two special telescopes that allow visitors to safely watch hydrogen storms and sun spots. “Looking directly at the sun is a unique experience,” Grossfeld said. “The sun changes every day and every hour. Telescopes give us the opportunity to show people what a star truly looks like, since our sun is the only star where you can see detail.” For the biannual star party, I had driven a half-hour from downtown Bend, arriving for my springtime visit at 9 p.m. Frogs croaked in the fading twilight, which painted the surrounding Central Oregon high desert pastel. I followed a trail of red lights (the color helped our eyes remain adjusted to the


For the first time in 13 years, a full moon rises this Friday the 13th

(This article has been updated.) Coming this Friday night: the spookiest full moon in 13 years. This Friday the 13th full moon is the first since January 2006. Only about one percent of full moons fall on a Friday the 13th. But this full moon, most commonly known as the harvest moon, will appear much smaller than most. That’s because the moon will be at apogee, or the farthest point in its roughly four-week orbit. Timeanddate.com estimates a “micromoon” appears 14 percent smaller and 30 percent dimmer than the widely reported “supermoons” that dominate the news. Though there is no universal definition governing what qualifies as a supermoon or micromoon, Time and Date says micromoons must be more than 251,655 miles away from Earth. Friday night’s moon will be 816 miles farther than that. Supermoons, on the other hand, must be at least 2,039 miles closer to Earth than a micromoon. Most of the time, the moon sits somewhere in between those bounds. For a micromoon and Friday the 13th full moon to occur together is extraordinarily rare. The last time it happened was in 1832 and it won’t happen again for more than 500 years according to Tony Rice, a meteorologist and engineer at NASA. The moon rises over Washington at 7:31 p.m. Friday although clouds may be obscure the view. But, if there are breaks in the clouds, just look to the east about five minutes after sunset, and you’ll see the orange disk poking above the horizon. Until it’s firmly planted high in the sky, however, it’ll be tough to appreciate just how small it looks. If you’re looking for a fun Friday night activity, considering inviting your friends and/or resident canine to howl with you at the lunar disk. While clouds could spoil the view in Washington, clear skies are likely in New England and much of the western half of the county (outside the Pacific Northwest). Moonrise also occurs between 7 and 7:30 p.m. in Boston, Denver, and Los Angeles (local time). Some call the harvest moon the “corn moon,” since September marks a time during which farmers in the Plains typically begin harvesting their corn. Farther north, some may wait a bit later. This Friday the 13th full moon won’t technically reach peak illumination until 12:32 a.m. Eastern time on Saturday, but for all practical purposes is considered full Friday night (it will be


Mea culpa, NBC News

for a scolding columnist to work with: Dilanian had told MSNBC host Rachel Maddow that a former Russian asset generally isn’t in danger until he’s "discovered by the media in the world and we all start writing about him. That essentially pokes the bear.” Intervening days, however, have treated our opinion poorly. Whereas NBC News withheld the name of the asset — and continues to do so — numerous outlets have published it. Kommersant, a Russian publication, reported the name of a former Russian government employee in connection with CNN’s scoop. As The Post noted, that publication acted with the likely knowledge of Russian President Vladimir Putin. Michael McFaul, who served as U.S. ambassador to Moscow during the Obama administration, speculated that the motive behind the release was to “intimidate.” The Post, Reuters, the New York Times and others have repeated the name. In light of those circumstances, Dilanian’s NBC News report appears to be an act of relative restraint. That’s not to say that the Erik Wemple Blog would have proceeded exactly as he did — and we certainly would have ditched the poke-the-bear talk. But our judgment was excessive, ill-considered and awful. We apologize. Editors and reporters puzzle over how to produce aggressive coverage of the U.S. intelligence community without compromising its sources and methods. Stern warnings from intelligence officials often beget deference from news outlets. In 2003, for example, then-New York Times reporter James Risen sought comment from the government on Operation Merlin, a failed effort to thwart Iran’s nuclear program. Government memos that surfaced in a subsequent leak case show how officials stressed that publication of the story could “easily” lead to the death of a U.S. citizen and “conceivably contribute to the deaths of millions of innocent victims of a foreign nuclear weapons program.” The New York Times killed the story, but Risen published it in his book "State of War: The Secret History of the CIA and the Bush Administration." Jill Abramson, who, at that time, was the Washington bureau chief for the New York Times, later told Vanity Fair, "I feel bad in retrospect that I wasn’t focused on Jim’s story, or interested in it.” Foreign intelligence sources take great risks to pass along information critical to U.S. democracy. According to CNN, the extracted spy “was considered the highest level source for the US inside the Kremlin, high up in the national security


Washington man dies of gunshot wounds

One of the six people wounded in a spate of violent incidents in the District on Friday night has died. Police found George Ransford, 32, of Northwest Washington, suffering from gunshot wounds about 8:25 p.m. Friday in the 5000 block of Arkansas Avenue in Northwest Washington. Ransford was taken to the hospital, where he died of his injuries, police said. D.C. police are offering a reward of up to $25,000 for information that leads to an arrest and conviction in the case. Anyone with information can call 202-727-9099 or text 50411. jenna.portnoy@washpost.com


In Washington, harvest moon is curtained from sight by clouds

Whether we in Washington witnessed it or not, a full moon ascended the skies Friday night, and not just any full moon, but the one known in folklore, farming and popular song as the harvest moon. But no matter how much any of us might have urged that orb to “shine on, shine on,” clouds apparently veiled it from view. In many areas, people could gaze aloft, to see Earth’s satellite signifying reassuringly that the laws of nature still prevailed. But here in the Washington area, for hour after hour on Friday, the sky above us, as described by the National Weather Service, was overcast. It would have been something to see. In this month’s orbit, the moon was at its farthest point from us, and was known as a micromoon. The date, as many were aware, was Friday the 13th. And it was widely noted that a full harvest moon might not recur on a Friday the 13th for a long time. Here in the Washington area, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., aware of possible inhibitions, exhorted via Twitter: “don’t let superstitions keep you from going out to see tonight’s full Moon.” But it seemed that not even NASA, which has reached the moon, could keep clouds from covering it. martin.weil@washpost.com


PM Update: Showers/storms possible this evening; sunny and warmer Sunday

A gloomy Saturday with high temperatures near 80 gives way to scattered showers and storms this evening. Nothing severe is expected, although pockets of brief heavy rain, frequent lightning and some stronger wind gusts could be seen in parts of the area. Sunday will be much brighter and a little warmer, with a noticeable drop in humidity. Listen to our daily D.C. forecasts: Apple Podcasts | Amazon Echo | More options Through Tonight: View the Tomorrow (Sunday): See Ian Livingston’s forecast through the weekend. And if you haven’t already, join us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter and Instagram. For related traffic news, check out Gridlock. Delightful stretch of September weather this week: Want our 5 a.m. forecast delivered to your email inbox?


This Russian forest symbolized Stalin’s brutality. Now some contend the Finns should share the blame.

of the gravesite. “To make a hypothesis into a theory,” said Andrei Spiridorov, a professor of archaeology, “you need facts. Give us facts.” By the time the war broke out, Sandarmokh had become an international burial ground. Ukrainian, Lithuanian, Georgian, Finnish, German, Czech prisoners were taken here, shot, and pushed into graves. An American, Enoch Mattias Nelson, is here, too. He served in the Navy during World War I and came to the Soviet Union in 1921 to help build a Communist future. Like many such idealists, his life ended in 1938 as he fell into an anonymous grave in a sandy forest. Today his memorial is decked with the flags of his home state, California, and the United States. No one knows where specific prisoners are buried, but memorials are scattered through the 25-acre site. The names of 6,241 prisoners who died here were recovered from the archives in the 1990s, and relatives still come to leave flowers and say a prayer. One stone commemorates the Soloviev brothers — Pavel, Pyotr and Stepan, 47, 39 and 35 years old — who died together on Jan. 9, 1938. “I never cast any doubt on Sandarmokh as a place of political repression and burial of the repressed,” Verigin said. “I’m only arguing that there may be Soviet soldiers buried there as well.” Popov said he believes there could well be Soviet soldiers at Sandarmokh — shot not by the Finns but by the Soviets themselves when the prisoners were released in 1944. The dig was carried out last year and again this summer under the auspices of the Russian Military Historical Society. Slabunova went to court in July to try to stop it, but the hearing was scheduled for later this month — weeks after the work was completed. Slabunova argues that the historical society did not obtain proper permits for its work. “Sandarmokh in the ’30s was a site of state arbitrariness,” she said, “and it remains so now.” A spokeswoman for the historical society, Nadezhda Usmanova, denied there was anything improper about the work. She said that bullets and pieces of clothing recovered from the graves had been sent off for forensic examination, and that it will be several months before they get results back. The searchers dug at sites where probes had suggested there were single graves, where they believed they’d be more likely to find POWs. “Everybody


Worried about the Tokyo heat, 2020 Summer Games organizers experiment with snow cannons

“But it is possible for us to use it.” Olympic officials have suggested a host of other heat-mitigation strategies. The government is considering asking businesses near Olympic events to open their doors and windows and blast their air conditioning into the street, according to Japanese news site Sora News. The government also considered implementing a two-hour daylight saving time, the BBC reported, but the proposal was met with harsh opposition from workers fearful it would lengthen business hours. Already, some events are slated to start at the crack of dawn to avoid the hottest midday hours. The marathon at the 2020 Games, for example will begin at 6 a.m. “The Tokyo marathon normally gets [a half-million] to 1 million spectators. Even if 0.1 percent of them get ill from heat, that would amount to 500 to 1,000 people,” Makoto Yokohari, a professor of urban engineering at the University of Tokyo, told The Washington Post in 2018 as officials began considering heat-related issues. “Tokyo currently does not have the capability to rescue that many people, though starting at 6 may mean fewer spectators.” The organizing committee also has marketed umbrella hats because past Olympic events have prohibited fans from bringing their own umbrellas for shade or their own drinks because of security and sponsorship concerns. Organizers are reportedly considering relaxing those rules for 2020. Tokyo organizers downplayed the city’s summer climate in their bid to the International Olympic Committee, telling the IOC that it had “many days of mild and sunny weather” and the conditions presented “an ideal climate for athletes to perform at their best.” Officials are scrambling to make those words ring true. The previous time Tokyo hosted the Summer Olympics, in 1964, competition began in mid-October, but the Games haven’t started that late in the year since 1968. The IOC prefers the July and August time frame to accommodate their broadcast partners and to avoid scheduling conflicts with the likes of the NFL and international soccer. “The ideal conclusion,” Yokohari said, “is not to do it in Tokyo at that time of the year.” Read more: Why everyone is talking about Kobe Bryant, youth basketball coach and former ... dancer? Team USA eliminated from World Cup medal contention with 89-79 loss to France ‘I am in your head. The rent is free.’ Meet the hardest-working mouth in MLS. The Texas-LSU air-conditioning tiff now involves HVAC investigations and spreadsheets


Fact-checking the third Democratic presidential debate

1.68 million African American men under state and federal criminal justice supervision in 2013, 807,076 more than the number of African American men who were enslaved in 1850,” the fact check said, rating it “True.” But that’s not what Booker said. Moreover, even if the black men comparison is correct in terms of raw numbers, it’s still misleading because the U.S. population has soared since 1850, as our colleagues at Wonkblog noted in 2015. The census that year found that roughly 9 in 10 of the nation’s 3.6 million black people were enslaved. By contrast, 1 in 11 black people is under correctional supervision today, according to the Pew Charitable Trusts. “Over 90 percent of the American people think we have to get assault weapons off the street — period.” — Biden This is wildly off base. Support for banning the sale of assault weapons usually ranges from 50 to 60 percent in recent surveys. It was 56 percent in the Washington Post-ABC poll released this week. Fifty-two percent in that same poll supported a mandatory buyback program for assault weapons. A Monmouth University poll released this week found 43 percent supported a mandatory buyback program. Biden may have been mixing up the statistics for polling on expanding background checks, which does get support in the 90 percent range. “You’ve got to defend the fact that 500,000 Americans are going bankrupt. You know why they’re going bankrupt? Because they suffered a terrible disease — cancer or heart disease.” — Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) Campaigning for universal health care, Sanders claims 500,000 people go bankrupt every year from medical bills or illness. That’s about two-thirds of the 750,000 total bankruptcies per year. Sanders’s claim is based on a study published by the American Journal of Public Health in March. The researchers surveyed debtors and asked about factors that contributed to their bankruptcies. Forty-four percent said either medical bills or loss of work related to illness “very much” contributed; 22 percent said either medical bills or illness “somewhat” contributed. Combining both groups of respondents, the study estimated 530,000 bankruptcies a year. But the study doesn’t establish that all 530,000 bankruptcies were caused by medical bills or illness, as Sanders describes it. The lead researcher behind the study says Sanders’s claim might be on target when measuring only the share of respondents who said medical bills or illness “very much” contributed to their


Local Digest: Skunk sisters mark five years at National Zoo

THE DISTRICT Washington’s inventory of fascinating residents includes two skunk sisters, who are supported at public expense, and have been living here quietly for about five years now. The sisters, the National Zoo said Friday, go by Trixie and Clementine and, the zoo noted, are among the “mini marvels” that make their homes in the Small Mammal House. Not native Washingtonians, the two first saw the light of day at a Pennsylvania breeding zoo in May 2014 and went on exhibit in Washington that fall. — Martin Weil MARYLAND A man was found fatally shot Saturday in the Chillum area of Prince George’s County, police said. He was found about 3:45 p.m. in the 1400 block of Chillum Road, police said. Officers went there after the shooting was reported and found the man, who has not yet been identified. — Martin Weil A beached whale that initially drew a large crowd of Maryland oceanfront onlookers is dead. The National Aquarium in Baltimore sent a team to Ocean City on Sunday morning to assess the juvenile sperm whale. The aquarium said the Maryland Department of Natural Resources and Ocean City police will remove the animal from the beach. The department will perform a necropsy. — Associated Press


In Afghanistan negotiations, we must include our allies

Regarding the Sept. 10 news article “Afghan president faces leadership test amid threat of more Taliban attacks”: It is stunning that in all the reporting about the now-failed negotiations between the United States and the Taliban to bring about an end to the war in Afghanistan , a vital aspect has been missing in action: NATO and its Resolute Support Mission, which replaced the International Security Assistance Force in 2014. In addition to the United States, 38 countries have more than 8,000 troops serving in Afghanistan. How any peace agreement was being shaped outside the Afghan government of President Ashraf Ghani was bad enough, smacking of the Paris Peace Accords that ended the Vietnam War and, shortly thereafter, the Republic of South Vietnam. But to omit our loyal allies, many of whom have been in Afghanistan for nearly as long as we have, is incompetence and arrogance on steroids on the part of the administration. And shame on the media that failed to report on this, too. What, indeed, were our friends and allies going to do and what roles if any were they to play had an agreement been reached? The world wonders. Harlan Ullman The writer is a senior adviser at the Atlantic Council and author of "Anatomy of Failure: Why America Loses Every War It Starts." Read more letters to the editor.


Found: The first ‘super-Earth’ with water in its skies

... But I don’t think it’s potentially habitable.” Scientists have previously detected water only in the atmospheres of “gas giants” — huge exoplanets that lack solid surfaces, much like Jupiter and Saturn in our solar system. But rocky exoplanets are smaller, making them harder to find and more difficult to study. Even a super-Earth like K2-18b can be examined only with humanity’s most sensitive space telescope — the Hubble. When K2-18b was discovered in 2015, Tsiaras and his colleagues thought it would be a good candidate for a form of analysis called transit spectroscopy, which involves studying the changes in a star’s light as a planet “transits,” or passes in front of it. The planet is so close to its cool host star that it takes just 33 days to orbit. So month after month, the researchers waited with Hubble to capture the moment of transit. As the starlight filtered through the planet’s atmosphere, some of it would be absorbed by the gases in the planet’s air. By separating the light into its component parts, the scientists could look for signatures of particular molecules. What they found suggests that the composition of K2-18b’s atmosphere could range from 0.1 percent water vapor (about the proportion in Earth’s upper atmosphere) to a whopping 50 percent. (At its highest, water vapor concentration in Earth’s lower atmosphere is about 4 percent.) Hubble isn’t sensitive to the right types of light to detect other important molecules, such as nitrogen or methane, so the researchers can only speculate about the precise composition of the atmosphere. The planet could have thick clouds, like Venus, that would heat its surface to an intolerable degree. Or its atmosphere might not be substantial enough to offer protection from the perils of space. Researchers must wait for more sophisticated tools, such as the long-delayed James Webb Space Telescope, to reveal more details about the distant world. Yet Giovanna Tinetti, a colleague of Tsiaras at University College London and a co-author of the Nature study, suggested it’s still possible there is liquid water somewhere below the atmosphere. “We’re going to need more observations,” she said. “We need to know much more about the planet.” Read more: So long, Kepler, and thanks for all the planets Found: Another star system with eight planets, just like ours There’s a new planet in the neighborhood — and it looks like a nice place to live


Gridlock in the sky

The space industry wants to launch more rockets through an already congested airspace. The airline industry says that will lead to more flight delays.


Anti-vaping bills would close 19 of 22 vape shops in Maryland’s largest jurisdiction

Maryland’s largest jurisdiction will introduce legislation Tuesday to restrict access to e-cigarettes for young adults and teenagers, joining a wave of jurisdictions trying to address underage vaping. The bills include a zoning amendment that would prohibit vaping shops within a half-mile of any middle or high school in Montgomery County, and a ban on manufacturers distributing e-cigarettes to retail stores in those areas. Nineteen of 22 vape shops in the county of 1 million people are within a half mile of a middle or high school, officials said. Those shops would be allowed to operate for 24 months after the zoning amendment went into effect but would then have to close or adapt their businesses. Buying tobacco, including e-cigarettes, is already illegal in Maryland for those younger than 18; starting next month, the minimum age will increase to 21, with an exception for members of the military. More than 450 cases of lung disease linked to vaping, including six deaths, have been reported across the country. On Monday, New York became the second state after Michigan to announce plans to ban flavored e-cigarettes, which are popular among underage users. Last week, U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said the Trump administration intends to “clear the market” of flavored e-cigarettes. Some officials have urged jurisdictions against going too far with restrictions on e-cigarettes, which many adults have turned to as a healthier alternative than regular cigarettes. “We should take this epidemic of casual e-cigarette use among children seriously, but we should not overreact,” Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller wrote in an op-ed for The Washington Post. At a news conference attended by all nine members of the Montgomery County Council as well as County Executive Marc Elrich (D), officials described underage vaping as a public health epidemic. There have been 15 cases of vaping-related illnesses in Maryland. The lone victim from Montgomery was between 18 and 24 years old, county Health Officer Travis Gayles said, and experienced “significant respiratory distress” but stabilized after a week in the hospital. Council member Gabe Albornoz (D-At Large), co-lead sponsor of the two anti-vaping bills, said paramedics have been called to county schools at least three times in the past year to treat students who fell ill shortly after using vaping products. Vaping has become so common, officials said, that some students refer to school bathrooms as “vape rooms.” Council member Craig Rice


The Health 202: Who is writing 2020 Democrats’ health plans? We found out.

while researching treatment options three years ago, our Post colleague Ariana Eunjung Cha reports in this extraordinary piece. Experts say the revelation of an autism cluster that involves the group of children across the United States, Canada and Europe is unprecedented. Rizzo searched online and found the man’s sperm was still being sold at four companies, contacting the companies but receiving a minimal response from representatives who told her she didn’t have “evidence” that the sperm was the cause of the autism cluster. She contacted health-care regulators in New York and California who also denied responsibility. And the Food and Drug Administration told her its oversight of the industry was limited to screening for sexually transmitted diseases. Finally, Rizzo filed a lawsuit in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in July 2017. “She says in the complaint that research, based on public documents and calls to his relatives, showed that the donor had no college degrees, had been diagnosed with ADHD, and ‘went to a school for children with learning and emotional disabilities,’ ” Ariana reports. “Moreover, her attorneys wrote in the filing, ‘Donor H898 is a prolific sperm donor who has fathered at least 12 children through sperm donation, and that each of those children has either been diagnosed with Autism, or suffers from signs and symptoms associated with Autism.’ In court documents, other mothers corroborated the story.” Rizzo, who agreed to a settlement in March, said she wants her case to prompt greater oversight of sperm bank industry. “I did not sue because my children are autistic. I was suing to right a wrong,” she told Ariana. — The Food and Drug Administration’s advisory committee voted 7 to 2 to greenlight a first-of-its-kind peanut allergy treatment, which could be a step toward more such allergy treatments that aim to prevent allergic reactions rather than just treat them, our Post colleague Carolyn Y. Johnson reports. The biotech company behind the drug wants to get the therapy approved for kids ages 4 to 17. The drug — called Palforzia — would not be a cure, but would desensitize children to what can be life-threatening allergies. After a year of treatment, children involved in a large trial could handle the equivalent of two peanuts, Carolyn writes. — And here are a few more good reads: Coming Up Trump rebuffs calls for Kavanaugh’s impeachment following new sexual misconduct report:


Why Iran is getting the blame for an attack on Saudi Arabia claimed by Yemen’s Houthis

on ways to “empower” the Houthis. “At this meeting, they agreed to increase the amount of help, through training, arms and financial support,” the official said. Iran has issued official denials of accusations that it is arming the Houthis, but intercepted weapons shipments in the Arabian Sea have yielded rifles, rocket launchers, antitank guided missiles and munitions that appear to have been en route from Iran to Yemen for the insurgency. Yes. Since the start of the conflict within Yemen, the Houthis have sought to punish Saudi Arabia for its prominent role by launching attacks on Saudi soil. Last year, Saudi officials said they had intercepted more than 100 ballistic missiles fired from Houthi territory. Armed drones attacked oil-pumping stations west of Riyadh in May and caused serious damage, while an attack on Abha airport in the south wounded 26 people in June. But Saturday’s attacks struck right at the center of Saudi Arabia’s oil production facilities, making it a significantly more sophisticated operation than what the Houthis have been known for in the past. The blasts took place in the districts of Khurais and Abqaiq, more than than 500 miles from the Houthi-controlled zones in Yemen, using precision strikes to cause maximum damage. The attacks may have used both drones and missiles. Fabian Hinz, a research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at Monterey, argued that photos of the remnants of a missile in Saudi Arabia show a weapon both too sophisticated to be produced domestically by the Houthis and never seen in Iran. “Is Iran secretly designing, testing and producing missile systems for exclusive use by its proxies?” Hinz asked in a blog post for Arms Control Wonk. The advanced nature of the attack has led to assertions that it did not originate in Yemen but was carried out by Iranian proxies in Iraq or even Iran itself. It is not clear why the Houthis would claim the strike, if so. It may be part of a regional strategy by Iran and its allies that would attempt to sow confusion, although many analysts have argued in the past that the Houthis, driven by local concerns, act independently of Iran when they wish to. “Now they say that they had nothing to do with the attack on Saudi Arabia,” President Trump tweeted of Iran on Monday morning, before adding a tentative question. “We’ll see?” he wrote.


A renowned scientist wants to thank the stranger who helped him stay in America

time. “It is seared in me,” said Afif Ghannoum, the scientist’s oldest son, who was 10 when he watched the invasion of his homeland on television. “The fear. The look on my parents’ faces, knowing that everything we had was gone.” All their assets were frozen, they didn’t know if their home had survived the invasion. And a real future in England wasn’t likely. “I know in England, he could’ve just ended up as one of those stories: ‘That guy’s a scientist who now works at a fish-and-chips shop,’ ” Afif said. That trip to Washington was the key to a new life in America. If dad could make a connection and find a job, it would work out, they figured. He printed out his résumé, borrowed a suit and flew to the United States. He had two days. But it was the wrong conference for job hunting, the scientists there told him. If he could just wait in D.C. for a week, the people doing all the hiring in his field would be in town the next week and he’d surely get a job, they said. Waiting a week in Washington? Impossible. “There was truly no money,” Afif said. “He was eating apples out of the hotel lobby. There was no way to just Venmo him some cash or anything. He had nowhere to stay, no place to go.” But the family had one friend in America, a man in Milwaukee. If Ghannoum could get to Milwaukee, he could stay there, then return to Washington to meet with the people who could hire him. On a whim, as he was walking from the conference rooms at the Willard Hotel and trying to hatch a plan, he stopped at a travel agency. “I saw this travel agent who was a black guy,” he said. The man behind the counter looked up and asked Ghannoum, “Can I help you?” All he had was this one-way airline ticket back to England. He asked the agent if he could somehow reroute it to Milwaukee. The agent told him he’d lose his job if he did that. “And I told him, ‘I am struggling. I see you are black, and you’ve struggled, too. I need your help,’ ” he said. The travel agent listened to the story from this Muslim man with a mustache and a brown suit, told through Ghannoum’s thick accent. The


Local Digest: Man is slain in Northeast D.C., police say

THE DISTRICT A man was fatally shot in Northeast Washington on Sunday, authorities said. The shooting happened just before 6 p.m. at 35th and East Capitol streets NE. Officers responded to reported gunshots and found a man unconscious and suffering from several gunshot wounds. The victim was identified as Lamont Munden, 20, of Southeast . Police said he was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead. The District has reported more than 120 homicides this year. — Dana Hedgpeth MARYLAND A Chillum man has been arrested in the fatal shooting of a homeless man over the weekend. Guy Young, 40, has been charged with first-degree murder in the killing of Samuel Wright, 33, according to Prince George’s County police. Both men knew each other and had been involved in a dispute before the shooting, police said. Officers responding to a report of a shooting in the 5600 block of Sargent Road about 3:45 p.m. Saturday found Wright with gunshot wounds, police said. He was pronounced dead at the scene. Young is in custody in the District and will be extradited to Prince George’s County, police said. — Lynh Bui Gov. Larry Hogan (R) is scheduled to leave next week for an eight-day “infrastructure trade mission” to Australia. He will be joined by Maryland Commerce Secretary Kelly M. Schulz and James F. Ports, the executive director of the Transportation Authority. In a statement, Hogan called the trip an opportunity to “exchange ideas and innovations to modernize our roads, bridges, transit and ports to meet the needs of the 21st century” and to forge partnerships to create jobs. The trade mission, which runs from Sept. 22-30 and includes visits to Sydney, Adelaide and Melbourne, is Hogan’s first since being reelected in 2018 and taking the helm of the National Governors Association this summer. In his first term, Hogan led trade missions to Asia, Israel and Europe. — Ovetta Wiggins


Starting a New Drinking Game

Politicians have pledged to clean up Washington for years with little success. So instead, Zoe Sakoutis and Erica Huss have a plan to cleanse Washington. In 2007, the duo founded BluePrintCleanse to introduce newbies to the benefits of spending a few days on an all-juice diet. Because it’s tough to jump right into slurping kale from a cup, the N.Y-based company offers several menu plans of six fresh-pressed juices a day. Beginners can start with drinks with more appealing flavor profiles and work their way up to the super nutrient dense options. That approach, combined with the fact that BluePrint ships anywhere in the country, has won the devotion of fans, including a healthy contingent in D.C. So when BluePrint decided to sell grab-and-go juices at Whole Foods stores in several cities, Washington was one of the winners. Shoppers can now buy individual bottles ($10-$12 each) of five blends: Green (romaine, celery, cucumber, apple, spinach, kale, parsley, lemon, ginger), Red (apple, carrot, beet, lemon, ginger), Yellow (lemon, water, cayenne, agave), Gold (pineapple, apple, mint) and White (cashew, water, vanilla, cinnamon, agave). “When we first launched, we had a tremendous amount of education to do,” Huss says. BluePrint had to explain that cleansing isn’t the same as fasting, and that the pricing makes sense considering the cost of organic produce and how time-consuming it is to re-create a juice cleanse at home. With the retail availability of the juices, it’s likely some customers will buy in bulk to do cleanses. But this line is also for folks who just want to get some juice in their daily diets — which is how Sakoutis and Huss often use their products. “I definitely start every morning with juice. It’s sort of my coffee, but I drink coffee, too,” says Sakoutis, whose go-to is the Green, which boasts six pounds of produce per bottle. “A day without it and I feel it’s missing.” And kale in a bowl just isn’t the same thing.


No-Fear Beer

Don’t tell the frat boys downing Miller High Life or PBR in Adams Morgan, but there’s a flood of better-tasting brews out there, stuff worthy of the serious sipping and sniffing usually associated with wine. And, maybe in a nod, er, quaff to the locavore food movement, many of these beers have been produced by small, indie breweries — several of them in the D.C. area. So the next time you have friends over for suds, maybe you’ll be pouring small-batch oyster stouts or seasonal wheat beers that were practically made in your own backyard. (At a campaign stop this week, President Obama revealed that even the White House produces homebrews.) Craft beer tends to have more complex flavors than such mass-produced varieties as Coors and Bud. That’s because they often feature higher quality and more specialty ingredients than those used by major brewers (who tend to just stick with trad hops, barley and malt). They’re turned out in smaller batches than the big guys, and offer a wider range of tastes. “There’s been a groundswell of interest and enthusiasm for craft beer locally,” says Greg Engert, beer director for the Neighborhood Restaurant Group, which includes 14th Street brewtopia ChurchKey (1137 14th St. NW; 202-567-2576). “Since we opened in 2009, it’s spread out into the mainstream. Our crowd is so diverse.” Local breweries are also powering this hoppy revolution, including Port City Brewing Company in Alexandria and DC Brau in Northeast, both founded in the past two years. Other new Washington-area labels include 3 Stars, Bluejacket and Chocolate City (which are only available at a handful of locations for now). We are awash in new brews. “I think D.C. looked inward and was like, ‘We need this,’ ” says Jeff Hancock, the brewer behind DC Brau. “You could get beer from everywhere else in the U.S., but we’re the nation’s capital, and we didn’t have our own brewery — the last one closed in 1956, which was a generation ago. That prompted my business partner Brandon [Skall] and I to start production.” There’s an art to appreciating craft beer, but the biggest piece of advice? Stop and smell the hops. “Slow down, don’t drink so fast and appreciate what’s in your glass,” says Jason Camsky of Port City Brewing Company. And since we’re at the end of D.C. Beer Week (through Saturday), we’re pouring out tips on how to better


Boris Johnson booed by protesters, berated by prime minister in Luxembourg

in London will hear the combined cases Tuesday. Johnson seems to be calculating that fears of the economic consequences of a no-deal Brexit will drive E.U. leaders to make concessions at a last-call summit that begins Oct. 17. But E.U. policymakers say they can’t grant Johnson what he is asking. The talks are stuck on how to keep the border open between Ireland, which is staying in the E.U., and Northern Ireland, which would leave along with the rest of the United Kingdom. Officials on both sides of the border fear that if any border controls are imposed, it could reignite sectarian violence quelled by the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. Johnson is seeking a way to keep Northern Ireland partly aligned with E.U. regulations to avoid a hard border with Ireland, but E.U. negotiators have said that his proposals are not specific enough to negotiate in earnest. “The European Union is always to ready to negotiate with a proper proposal from the United Kingdom side,” Finnish European Affairs Minister Tytti Tuppurainen said Monday. “So far, I haven’t seen any proposal that would compensate” for current insurance plans to keep the border open, she said. Johnson’s comparison of himself to the Incredible Hulk superhero from movies and comic books drew dismay from European policymakers, who said it was unlikely to help reach a deal. The British leader told the Mail on Sunday that Britain would be like Bruce Banner, the mild-mannered physicist who can transform into the Hulk when angered. “Banner might be bound in manacles, but when provoked he would explode out of them,” Johnson said. “Hulk always escaped, no matter how tightly bound in he seemed to be — and that is the case for this country. We will come out on 31 October and we will get it done.” “The madder Hulk gets, the stronger Hulk gets,” he said. E.U. policymakers shot him down. “Even to Trumpian standards, the Hulk comparison is infantile. Is the E.U. supposed to be scared by this?” Guy Verhofstadt, a Belgian lawmaker who is leading Brexit negotiations inside the European Parliament, tweeted. And so did Mark Ruffalo, the actor who plays the Hulk in the movies. “Boris Johnson forgets that the Hulk only fights for the good of the whole,” Ruffalo tweeted. “The Hulk works best when he is in unison with a team, and is a disaster when he is alone.” michael.birnbaum@washpost.com


Up Close and Very Personal

by the Smithsonian Gardens with the U.S. Botanic Garden and National Museum of Natural History. Orchids have become more accessible to the casual grower in recent years: You can buy an orchid at most grocery stores today. But those won’t come close to the delicacy and breeding of the orchids at this exhibition. About 300 varieties of the plant are on view in the 18th annual orchid show. (The theme changes each year, and this year’s celebrates Latin American traditions of using orchids as decor for large religious feasts.) It must be noted that part of the reason orchids have long been considered so exotic and rarefied is their “erotic” appearance — something that’s been observed since ancient times. (Look below for some science on this matter.) The plant family name “orchidacae” means “testicle” in Greek, and ancient Greeks believed orchids boosted virility. A Chinese legend holds that the “13 treasures” cymbidium orchid smelled so wonderful that it could help a barren woman bear that many children. And when the cattelya orchid was introduced to Europe in the 19th century, its shape “caused an absolute sensation” — especially among men, Mirenda says. “Think about Georgia O’Keeffe and her kind of sexualized look of flowers,” Mirenda says. “Without going into too much detail, I think you could look at an orchid and see something else. “Don’t blush!” he says, laughing. “You know what I’m talking about!” People and orchids are “bilaterally symmetrical” — if we cut them in half in a certain way (vertically, for humans), the two sides mirror each other. (Other flowers, such as daisies, are “radially symmetrical” and can be divided on any plane.) What’s more, some orchids — such as the Miltoniopsis Princess Diana — appear to have “eyes” (symmetrical spots on the petals). In other words, “when we look at an orchid,” specialist Tom Mirenda says, “it seems to look back.” Orchids need to perpetuate their species, so they must attract insects and birds (which spread pollen among plants). This is often accomplished by luring those “pollinators” to the plants’ central reproductive parts. The middle “labellum” petal — tricked out with stripes, spots or extra colors — is adapted to attract pollinators. “Like the lights on the runway of an airport,” in Mirenda’s words, “nectar guides” help steer pollinators toward these targets. The U.S. Botanic Garden Hillwood Estate, Museum and Gardens The National Capital Orchid Society


Running Commentary

The news about running hasn’t been so hot recently. There’s the Michigan dentist who’s been labeled a “marathon fraud” for his questionable wins. There’s the competitive runner who was caught injecting EPO. Even the Lance Armstrong scandal has extended to his marathon times, which are likely to get wiped from the record books. “There’s lying and cheating in the air. It must be a presidential election year,” jokes David Willey, editor-in-chief of Runner’s World, which unexpectedly had a scoop this summer when it found that Paul Ryan had fudged his claim that he’d run a marathon in less than three hours. Whether the GOP vice presidential candidate purposely lied or just has a bad memory, the story had legs — particularly among Willey’s readership. “Runners are upstanding, responsible, goal-oriented people who put pride into efforts and times,” he says. “He tried to claim credit for an achievement without doing the work. That violated their unspoken code.” Will it affect the results of today’s election? Probably not, Willey says, but he thinks runners as a voting bloc will cast their ballots with a few specific issues in mind, including the environment and health care. Personally, he’d like to see running used as a public policy in the fight against obesity. “It’s the best and quickest way to get kids moving,” Willey says. It’s also an effective regimen for presidents, who don’t just run for office but also for exercise, stress relief, mental clarity and a host of other benefits, he says. The November issue of Runner’s World features an interview with former Secret Service agent Nick Trotta, who ran with President Bill Clinton and both Presidents Bush. “You can really tell a lot about the person by what kind of runner he or she is,” says Willey, who notes the major differences between the presidents’ styles. While W liked to go out in 100-degree-plus weather and rarely had anyone other than his security detail tag along, Clinton used his jogs as social events, inviting other folks to join in and often ending with a bite at McDonald’s. Willey finds it unremarkable that so many presidents have been runners. (“It’s not as though they’re stamp collectors. There are a lot of runners in America.”) What amazes him is that more politicians don’t run. “Running sends the message that a president is healthy, vigorous and active,” Willey says. “It’s also incredibly egalitarian and


African dictators have been losing power — some to democratic governments. Militaries can tip the scales toward democracy.

through genuinely free, peaceful and fair elections. Recent 1. Massive, inclusive, peaceful protests. One key reason for the recent turnover in African leadership is the unprecedented number of peaceful mass protests. Militaries usually consider their role to be a country’s defense and often hesitate to exercise violence against peaceful protesters. So the more united protesters are across religious, ethnic or economic lines, the harder it is for security forces to repress or exploit divisions among them. Armies that recruit their lower ranks from marginalized socioeconomic groups or that are broadly representative of society find it particularly challenging to stop large protests, as in the fall of dictators in Sudan, Ethiopia and Algeria. 2. Military recruitment and promotion are merit-based. After civil wars, many African nations work to integrate their armies across units that fought on different sides and represent different regions. Research shows this significantly improves the chances of lasting peace, as happened in South Africa. More broadly, if civilian and military leaders recruit and promote based on merit rather than ethnic or other loyalties, that military is more likely to support — or at least not oppose — a democratic transition. African dictators who structure their armies along religious, ethnic or tribal lines may give their troops incentives to resist democracy, but they also lose military effectiveness and risk coups or rebellions from excluded groups. 3. The military’s institutional needs are met. Security forces tend to value their own institutional interests — budgets, salaries, training opportunities and equipment — above all else. In some countries, such as Senegal and Tunisia, the military consumes few resources, has little involvement in national politics and competes with powerful parallel security forces such as police or presidential guards. Such militaries are less likely to be used by dictators against their populations and less likely to intervene after a democratic settlement. In Tunisia, soldiers were overseen by a powerful police apparatus, banned from political participation and rarely used to put down popular upheaval. As a result, the military did not support continuing authoritarian rule during the 2011 Arab Spring and has helped build Tunisia’s emerging democracy. But in other countries, security forces have been dominant political players. In Zimbabwe and Egypt, security forces are tightly networked into the leading political parties, profiting from the regime. In such cases, they can effectively veto any government change. In Zimbabwe, for instance, the ruling party’s close alliance


party’s close alliance with the military has thwarted reformers within and outside the regime who want to reduce the military’s corruption, economic control and political influence. In 2017, the military protected its interests by throwing out Robert Mugabe after he’d served 37 years as president. When militaries are tightly linked to those in power, democratic change is likely to come more slowly and requires some kind of agreement and concessions to the old regime. 4. Mutual understanding exists between senior military and opposition leaders. Even when security forces resist democracy, political leaders with deep personal relationships with military leaders can use carrots, sticks, guarantees and concessions to persuade the military to respect the will of the people. Consider Ethiopia’s reformist prime minister, Abiy Ahmed, a former army colonel and intelligence officer: His experience has enabled his regime to begin to lift martial law, release political prisoners, and start to reduce border and ethnic violence. What’s equally crucial is that civilian opposition groups understand how to communicate with their country’s security forces. Opposition groups in Sudan helped end Bashir’s rule in part by appealing directly to security forces by avoiding violence, staying united and holding sit-ins in front of military headquarters. 5. Outside assistance is less helpful when building tactical capacity and more helpful when reducing corruption and human rights abuses. U.S. efforts to support African militaries has primarily meant providing training and equipment. That has not been particularly effective at either reducing terrorism or fostering political stability. Recent research suggests that programs that focus more on building accountable defense institutions, improving financial oversight and instilling human rights norms show more promise. These types of efforts are associated with lower levels of political violence and government repression. They could help ensure militaries are not used to repress dissent and democratic protest — unlike in Rwanda and Zimbabwe, where security forces are routinely used to commit violence against political opponents. Africa’s security forces have long and complex histories. They most often make headlines when they commit atrocities, crack down on protesters or seize power in coups. But Africa’s troops can also contribute to democracy and peace when they lay down their arms or refuse orders to turn their guns against the people. Nathaniel Allen ( Alexander Noyes ( The views expressed in this article reflect the personal opinions of the authors and not the official positions of the organizations they work for.


The Technology 202: Facebook and YouTube content pushing steroids raises more platform policing questions

Tony. “And they are forcing censorship to create a narrative in the sense that this is not what happened.” On TikTok, Drew and Tony found just 11 posts with hashtags related to the protests, a significantly small amount than the thousands of posts on Facebook and Twitter. TikTok’s parent company ByteDance, told Drew and Tony it had a U.S.-specific moderation team for the app and did not apply any Chinese laws to its moderation. But researchers still find troubling the limited amount of information the company provides on the removal of U.S. content, especially given China’s recent influence campaigns on Twitter and Facebook. “If they’re willing to do this on Twitter and Facebook, of course they’re going to want to do it on their own platform,” said Elliott Zaagman, a writer and co-host of a popular podcast on the Chinese tech industry. NIBBLES: The Senate Intelligence Committee is expected to release a report in the coming weeks on ways to improve U.S. defenses against disinformation in 2020, At the core of the conflict is intelligence agencies’ push for information that could put tech companies afoul of mounting government enforcement over privacy violations, they report. Both social media companies and government agencies have increased their efforts to police election disinformation since 2016. But tech companies still remain wary of cooperating with security agencies more than six years after former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden revealed the extent of the industry’s partnerships with government, Dustin and Deepa report. “This is such a complicated space,” April Doss, a former intelligence lawyer at the National Security Agency, told the Journal. “Our traditional models of public-private interaction really don’t have a template for how to handle this.” BYTES: House lawmakers are surveying consumers as part of a wide-ranging investigation into the business practices of Big Tech, While the survey doesn’t name any tech companies, the release follows requests to Alphabet, Amazon, Facebook and Apple seeking information about their acquisitions and business. The survey could provide key insights to lawmakers in the House as they weigh how to best enforce and possibly update antitrust regulations with regard to digital competition. “If the panel finds competition is so scant that the customers of big technology companies have no viable alternatives, it justifies further scrutiny of business practices as well as mergers and acquisitions,” Spencer adds. — News from the public sector: — News from the private sector: —


Cure for a Bias?

En route back home from a vacation, my husband and I recently spent a night in a London hotel. When we arrived, we were starving, but it was rainy and late. Reluctantly, we decided to eat at the hotel’s restaurant. I always assume hotel eateries will be stereotypically bland settings with equally bland food — in other words, not authentic local experiences. Luckily, our dinner was pretty decent. Back in D.C., I realized I’m proved wrong on a regular basis by the city’s many top-notch hotel restaurants. Witness the popularity of places such as Bourbon Steak, in the Four Seasons, and Firefly, in Dupont Circle’s Madera Hotel. A recent meal at Cure Bar & Bistro in the Grand Hyatt Washington (1000 H St. NW) made me question my beliefs yet again. Maybe it shouldn’t have been a surprise, considering that Hyatt had just announced plans to serve healthier, locally sourced dishes at its restaurants. I was impressed with my meal’s balance of flavor, nutrition and originality. The asparagus salad ($12) featured a generous serving of the cooked stalks, a soft-boiled egg and delicate creme fraiche. My entree, pan-roasted salmon ($23), sat atop thinly sliced green apple, celery and cucumber (a variation on the regular salad of peas, fennel and frisee). The artful and appetizing plates allowed me to notch two servings of fresh produce AND to temporarily forget I was inside an establishment geared toward tourists. I think it’s an enviable accomplishment for a hotel eatery in any city.


For NASA contractors, lunar landing failures by Israel and India hit close to home

two deaths,” Thornton said. He took over as chief executive and refocused the company on trying to develop and market a commercial delivery service to the moon. The idea was derided as fantasy, and as he was pitching Astrobotic to investors at a conference, there was “one guy laughing the entire time,” he recalled. “And he wasn’t laughing with me.” Earlier this year, however, NASA awarded it a $79.5 million contract, a big source of revenue for the small company that gave it a level of credibility it hadn’t had before. Last month, it chose its ride to the moon, signing a deal with the United Launch Alliance to launch its Peregrine lunar lander, which stands about 6 feet tall, on ULA’s Vulcan Centaur rocket. But getting to the moon is hard, as Israel learned in April when its Beresheet spacecraft crashed into the moon. It was a devastating outcome, but industry leaders and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was in the mission command center, vowed to learn from it and push on. “If at first you don’t succeed, you try again,” Netanyahu said. Then last week, India lost communication with its spacecraft as it descended toward the moon, a heartbreaking outcome for the country’s space agency. It has since located the lander but has not established communication with it or released any details about its condition. India is also taking stock of its lunar ambitions. The lunar lander seemed to be on the right trajectory, but then in the final moments appeared to fall straight down, stunning the people packed in the space agency’s control center. Afterward, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, “Our determination to touch the moon has become even stronger.” And he consoled a distraught K. Sivan, the head of the county’s space agency, with an emotional embrace. In a tweet These were the first attempts by Israel and India to land on the surface of the moon, so failure may have been expected, as it was at the dawn of the Space Age, when countries treated the moon like a dartboard, crashing spacecraft into the lunar surface as if it were target practice. In the 1960s, spacecraft like the Soviet Luna 2 and NASA’s Ranger 7 plowed into the lunar surface routinely, as space agencies taught themselves how to hit another celestial body. Failed moon missions might have been politically acceptable when the United States


With food supply of U.S. troops at stake and executives facing prison, Kuwaiti company launches lobbying blitz

further complicate matters, as agency officials look for a way to comply with the court order while ensuring troops receive food and water. The challenges KGL faces illustrate how the U.S. military has struggled to find suitable partners on the ground in its long-running wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. At least three previous corporate recipients of the food supply contract — a multibillion-dollar program called Subsistence Prime Vendor — have been accused of stealing U.S. taxpayer dollars on a massive scale. Last year, Anham was temporarily suspended after three executives were charged with building a fake construction site to mislead government inspectors, part of a litany of fraud charges brought by the Justice Department. An attorney for Anham noted the company has since been declared “a responsible contractor” and cleared to fulfill existing contracts and pursue future awards. Companies that handled food supply in Afghanistan and Iraq have paid more than $500 million to resolve civil and criminal charges, largely related to allegedly unfair pricing. KGL defended its record in a statement to The Washington Post and encouraged the Kuwaiti government to resolve the dispute. “We trust that the Kuwait government, which values its relationship with the U.S. military, will fully support the Department of Defense’s selection of KGL Food Service to deliver food to U.S. troops in the region and avoid driving up the cost to the U.S. military by limiting competition to [Kuwait government]-favored contractors,” the company said. The fierce competition for military food funding is one focus of a wide-ranging lobbying campaign covering human rights issues stemming from the embezzlement prosecution of the two former KGL executives: Saeed Dashti and Marsha Lazareva. KGL Investment (KGLI) — a private-equity firm spun off from KGL in 2006 — has been pouring resources into Washington’s lobbying establishment, hoping to pressure Congress and the White House for support. It has asked for sanctions against powerful Kuwaiti officials, seeking to relieve pressure on Dashti and Lazareva. Representatives for Dashti and Lazareva say the charges are false. Those stumping for KGL Investment include Neil Bush, a son of George H.W. Bush; Cherie Blair, a human rights lawyer and wife of former prime minister Tony Blair of Britain; a former FBI director; a former U.S. secretary of veterans affairs; and eight Washington lobbying and public relations firms, records show. Lobbyists and a spokesman representing both KGLI and KGL say the two companies are no


No giant panda cub this year at National Zoo

was artificially inseminated March 28 and showed signs of possibly being pregnant. According to zoo officials, in July, her levels of “urinary progesterone began to rise and that indicated that she would give birth to a cub or experience the final stages of pregnancy within 6 to 8 weeks.” In August, zoo keepers started to watch her closely. Mei Xiang’s behavior began to change and she became sensitive to noise, prompting officials to close the panda house. Ultrasounds were performed several times a week to look for changes in her uterus. But it wasn’t meant to be. Veterinarians didn’t see a fetus on any ultrasounds and her hormone levels and behavior are returning to normal, officials said. It isn’t atypical for female giant pandas to have pseudopregnancies that can last between three to six months — just like a real panda pregnancy. Mei Xiang has given birth to three surviving cubs with Tian Tian. All of the cubs were born at the zoo. Her first cub, Tai Shan, was born in 2005, and her second cub, Bao Bao, was born in 2013. Both live in China. Her third cub, Bei Bei, was born in 2015 and is expected to go to China in the coming months. All panda cubs born at the zoo move to China when they are about 4 years old as part of an agreement between the countries. “We’ve been watching her hormones for months,” said zoo spokeswoman Devin Murphy. “This is one of the things that can happen for . female pandas. Their hormones can be the same whether they are having a pregnancy or a pseudopregnancy, which is why we monitor her so closely.” For visitors who typically go in droves to see a new panda cub and follow it on the panda cam, the news will be disappointing. “It’s always special and exciting to have a panda cub,” Murphy said. “We’ve been lucky to have three born here. This year, it looks like we won’t have one.” At 21, Mei Xiang is considered to be at “advanced maternal age,” zoo officials said, but they said giant pandas older than her have had cubs. It’s not known whether she will breed next year. Zoo experts will consult with their counterparts in China, Murphy said. Mei Xiang will likely return to her “normal routine” within a few weeks, her keepers said. The panda house reopened Wednesday.


The key to White Claw’s surging popularity: Marketing to a post-gender world

welcomed finding cans of White Claw at parties. “Usually you’d go to a barbecue and there’s just beer — so it fits the bill there.” Schuhmacher says the beer industry in particular has been slower to adapt because the biggest companies have historically been family-owned. “Habits and mores change more slowly than when you have a publicly traded company with shareholders,” he said. Hard seltzer even has appeal among drinkers who would ordinarily consider themselves too sophisticated to swill a canned malted liquor. Brad Glynn, the co-founder and vice president of marketing of Minnesota craft brewery Lift Bridge, said his company decided to develop its own line of hard seltzers after seeing the success of the national brands — even with beer connoisseurs. All it took was overcoming a little beer snobbery. “We looked around and saw that all of our friends are drinking it — we’re drinking it — so why are we scared of that?” he said. Their strategy? “Let’s do it and let’s do it better.” The entry of craft brewers into the category suggests that the hard seltzer phenomenon is more than a blip, unlike its spiritual predecessor, the 1990s one-hit wonder that was Zima, Coors’ lemon-lime malt drink. Zima, which become a synonym for “effete” in David Letterman’s late-night jokes, never could shake its “girly-man” association. The industry is taking notice: Natural Light just launched a new seltzer line (and hired Wallace for a marketing stunt that involved the comedian famous for his love of Claw to land a Natty-Light-branded helicopter on a yacht off Catalina Island). A higher-alcohol (and probably higher-testosterone) entry is expected soon from Four Loko, the company best known for a mid-2000s caffeinated malt liquor that was ultimately banned by the Food and Drug Administration. They’ll join other White Claw competitors, including Boston Beer’s Truly and Anheuser-Busch InBev’s Bon & Viv. Some forecasters suspect that overall, hard seltzer sales might fall off a bit in cooler weather. But there’s no indication that the fizzy party is close to being over. According to data from Nielsen, sales are projected to top the $1 billion mark by the end of 2019. And the Bank of America Merrill Lynch study finds that there is “a big untapped market potential” for the category. The end of summer brings tailgates, Halloween parties and holiday revelry — or in the language of White Claw’s marketing department, plenty


A local’s guide to Shanghai

newspaper Shen Bao, more and more periodicals and printers opened on this road as the city grew. Today, print may have lost its primacy, but lovers of paper and ink find solace in this street still dedicated to book and stationary shops, with block upon block of literary offerings. The Foreign Language Bookstore offers three floors of English titles. The Brush & Ink Museum gives an introduction to traditional forms. Baixin Bookstore stocks the best variety of stationery and pens, and Art Goods Store at No. 402 has the best fine-art supplies. And the little shops are full of rare finds as well. BTW: address: Shanghai Brush & Ink Museum, Fuzhou Road, Huangpu, Shanghai, China latlng: phone: website: Twitter: instagram: In the past decade, Shanghai has evolved into one of Asia’s main cities for contemporary art, home to leading artists, renowned galleries and a plethora of museums. The city’s two main art districts — the gallery cluster M50, at 50 Moganshan Lu, and the museums and galleries at West Bund — are somewhat far from downtown. However, one of the most critically renowned institutions, the Rockbund Art Museum (RAM), sits right behind the Bund in a 1932 building that originally housed the Royal Asiatic Society. Opened in 2010 with a stunning presentation by Cai Guo-Qiang, the artist who designed the fireworks display for the Beijing Olympics closing ceremony, RAM consistently organizes engaging conceptual shows. In October 2019, for example, is an exhibition on emerging Asian artists. This museum is closed for installation in between shows, but the exterior is still worth a detour, as are the commercial galleries Lisson, Perrotin and Almine Rech, all across the street at 27 Huqiu Lu. BTW: address: Rockbund Art Museum, 20 Huqiu Lu, Huangpu Qu, Shanghai Shi, China latlng: phone: website: http://www.rockbundartmuseum.org/en/ Twitter: instagram: rockbundartmuseum Shanghai is crazy for coffee, or at least for cafes. Themed cafes, focused on everything from stuffed animals to Sherlock Holmes to Line Friends, open (and close) at a dizzying pace, and cozy spots full of laptop warriors and social-media-worthy lattes dot most blocks. One of the best cafes in town is the Press, by Inno Coffee, which embraces its building’s history as one of the early offices of Shanghai’s long-running newspaper Shen Bao. BTW: address: The Press, A1-03, 1/F, 309 Hankou Lu 1F Rm. A1-03, Shanghai latlng: phone: 011-86-21-5169-0777 website: Twitter: instagram: Jazz runs deep in Shanghai’s identity,


The Cybersecurity 202: Huawei gets its day in court

companies’ data to China. The DOJ argument prevailed in a highly similar case last year when a federal judge dismissed a challenge from the Russian anti-virus company Kaspersky Lab, which Congress also banned from U.S. governmnt computer networks. But some think Huawei might have a better chance of beating the motion to dismiss because it will be easier to cast doubt on U.S. motives. “There’s certainly a tug of war with policy vis a vis the Chinese now, and Huawei’s been in the middle of that. Kaspersky didn’t have the benefit of making that argument because there was no Russian economic policy we were debating at the time,” he said. Mazzant may rule on the case immediately after the oral arguments or defer the ruling. Huawei and the DOJ both declined to comment because their litigation is ongoing. You are reading The Cybersecurity 202 , our must-read newsletter on cybersecurity policy news. PINGED: Colorado’s top election official will stop allowing voting machines that use printed bar codes to count votes in 2021, “A voter can verify the ovals, the candidates they chose, but how it gets tabulated is actually through an encrypted QR code,” Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold said to CNN. “Is it really a voter-verified paper trail if a voter cannot verify the encrypted QR code?” Under the new system, voters will still vote electronically, but the printed receipts will show darkened ovals similar to a hand-marked ballot so the voter can verify everything is recorded accurately before the machine counts the ballot. The machine will tally votes based on those ovals rather than a bar code. But some cybersecurity researchers say the major issue isn’t machine tallies that rely on bar codes, but rather whether people are conducting audits to ensure those machine counts are accurate. ”So long as the human-readable part of the paper ballot can be reviewed by each voter for mistakes and a post-election audit is conducted to verify the outcome based on the paper ballots, whether or not there’s a bar code does not matter,” voting security researcher Matt Bernhard told Kevin. PATCHED: Sen. Mark R. Warner (D-Va.) wants U.S. Customs and Border Protection to provide more information on the cybersecurity practices of its contractors following a June data breach that resulted in the theft photos of thousands of travelers. Warner described the breach as just the latest in a series of


Commentary: CFPB needs to lift restrictions that discourage minority home buying

a loan in the first place. As most lenders are not willing to take on such legal risk, the CFPB is in effect determining who will have meaningful access to the mortgage market. This is no easy task. We learned in the housing crisis of a decade ago that it is in no one’s interest for the agency to open the door to unsustainable lending. Yet restricting the ability of creditworthy borrowers to get loans doesn’t make sense either, since it constrains homeownership and all of the economic and social benefits that come with homeownership. To thread that needle, the CFPB is considering limiting this legal safe harbor to loans made to borrowers whose monthly debt payment falls below a certain percentage of their reported monthly income. However, this makes little economic sense, because the risk that a borrower may be unable to pay their loan is driven by many factors other than the amount of debt they carry, including their credit score and the amount of savings they have in the bank. Indeed, among credit score, the size of a borrower’s loan relative to the value of their home, and their debt relative to income, it is the latter, the so-called debt-to-income ratio, that has proved far and away the least important in predicting whether a borrower will default. Policymakers and lenders alike have struggled to determine what a borrower should even count as income when applying for a mortgage, making a borrower’s debt-to-income ratio at best an uneven measure of credit risk. Even more disconcerting is the impact this approach would have on access to mortgage loans, particularly among families of color. More than one in five African Americans who have gotten a mortgage recently would have a much harder time under this cap, along with one in four Hispanic Americans. It would thus further constrain access to homeownership for the very groups for which we desperately need to find ways to expand it. If the housing market is to keep up with the nation’s changing demographics and contribute to our economy’s success, policymakers must find ways to make it easier — not harder — for lenders to identify families who can become sustainable homeowners. The CFPB should not set a debt-to-income ratio cap, but allow lenders to weigh all the relevant factors to determine a borrower’s risk. Doing so doesn’t just make more sense in assessing credit


Knack for Snacks

Katelyn Sornik wanted something she could stuff in her purse to eat on the go. The problem? The 29-year-old Georgetown resident can’t eat most somethings. “I had food poisoning and it messed up my whole system,” says Sornik, whose 2007 illness forced her to eliminate dairy, eggs, meat and gluten from her diet. “I couldn’t digest like I used to. A lot of my go-to foods were off the table.” The sudden shift inspired her to learn to cook and start a blog — newkidontheveganblock.com — about her culinary adventures. That’s when she started experimenting to develop a snack bar she could actually stomach. In search of protein, fiber and a chewy texture, Sornik blended almond butter, coconut, rolled oats, chia seeds and flax meal with fruits and spices. She added in rice cereal because, she says, “It breaks it apart, so it’s not such a brick of a bar.” Sornik’s mostly organic creations were raw originally, but those weren’t any good when she couldn’t be near her fridge. Once she figured out a way to cook the bars at just the right time and temperature so they wouldn’t be “hard as a rock,” Sornik’s friends got a taste — and they persuaded her to start selling. That’s how she started Kate Bakes (katebakesbars.com), which currently sells four flavors of the 220-calorie, 2-ounce bars for $3 each: Banana Cinnamon Oatmeal, Chocolate Coffee, Sunflower Raisin Butter and Cardamom Date. Her successful Kickstarter campaign that ended July 31 netted her more than $5,000 to expand the line to include more flavors and add granola. Kate Bakes products have also just arrived at her first retailer, the Muse Cafe in the Corcoran Gallery (500 17th St. NW, toddgraysmuse.com). The success is a sign to Sornik that she’s not the only one looking for easily portable vegan and gluten-free options. “It’s a convenient food that’s made in a much more evolved way,” she says. Expect more evolution ahead.


Just a Matter of Degrees

Is there any advice you can give a financially struggling parent whose daughter was accepted to a top university but won’t be able to foot the $50,000-a-year tuition bill? If I could put my kidney on eBay for a good price to cover her tuition, I would do it in a heartbeat. -Parent Meet with financial aid advisers, guidance counselors, investment gurus and people who know a heck of a lot more about money than I do. Have your daughter check out every scholarship she might possibly qualify for (Granddaughters of Pinochle-Playing Half-Armenians, anyone?). And keep an honest dialogue going with her. Let her know you take her feelings seriously, you truly want the best for her and you will try your hardest to make her dreams work. But you also need to help her realize that the “best” path doesn’t usually involve driving your family into the ground with financial stress in order to get a certain diploma, or letting her graduate with decades of debt. There are many schools that could be right for your daughter (schools whose acceptance letters hopefully have also graced your mailbox). Treating her feelings with respect will go even further than a kidney. I have a co-worker who insists on doing my job, not helpfully, but in a sneaky way. On our last project together, she withheld critical information. When the project seemed to fail, she miraculously used the information to save the day. My supervisor has a “house of cards” theory regarding our team: If we cannot see eye-to-eye as an organization, we will ultimately fail. This makes it hard to approach him regarding the situation because I may be viewed as a defector. Am I being too critical, or even paranoid? -Let Me Do My Job If it’s too critical to be frustrated by someone stealing and sabotaging your work, then I’m curious about what workplace behavior would actually be deemed unacceptable. So your supervisor believes that the workplace team is a delicate “house of cards.” Then he should most definitely be bothered by one of his employees coming at it with a leaf blower. You’ve got concrete and specific evidence of situations where she has hurt the team for her own gain. Use it. Conceptualize it not as you being victimized but as concern about future projects. I can’t imagine anything more in the interest of teamwork than that.


Congress presses Trump on human rights in the Gulf

in the United States’ national security interests to have a stable Bahrain that respects the fundamental rights of its citizens and respects freedom of speech,” Rubio told me. “The [United States] has an obligation to stand up to repression wherever it happens in the world, especially when it involves our allies,” Murphy told me. To see what happens when partner regimes no longer feel U.S. pressure to adhere to human rights, one can look to Bahrain’s larger neighbor, Saudi Arabia. After regime agents murdered Post contributing columnist Jamal Khashoggi, long-simmering congressional anger over the Saudi military’s handling of the Yemen war spilled over. The Senate passed legislation for the first time to end U.S. aid for the Saudi mission in Yemen, although the president successfully vetoed it. But two senators who traveled to Saudi Arabia last week told me the Saudi government at least got the message. “We raised these issues and pressed [Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman] on Khashoggi and human rights,” Sen. Angus King (I-Maine) told me. “There’s work to be done. They understand the reputational hit they have taken.” Sen. Todd C. Young (R-Ind.) told me he believed Saudi officials were reducing civilian casualties in Yemen and allowing humanitarian aid to reach the people there. He cautioned that Congress and the U.S. government need to keep the pressure on to ensure Saudi Arabia and the UAE fulfill all their promises. “Much of that improvement is a function of the sense by the Saudi government that they had to improve,” he said. “There was a recognition that I had never seen before from Saudi leadership.” Of course, congressional pressure can go only so far, and even incremental improvements by Saudi Arabia are not enough. The Saudi regime’s easing of some restrictions on women has come with the jailing of female activists and many other dissenters. The regime still refuses to hold Khashoggi’s murderers accountable or produce his body. But the Saudi example should inform the Bahrainis and any other regimes taking advantage of Trump’s laissez-faire attitude on human rights that at least Congress is still watching. Lawmakers know that the more repressive a regime gets, the worse an ally it is. If only the president knew that, as well. Read more: Josh Rogin: John ‘Sully’ Sullivan was ‘everything we wanted America to be’ Josh Rogin: Bolton lost the latest Trump administration factional battle, but not the last


Bees swarmed a cockpit and caused a flight delay — and it’s far from the first time

the plane as a resting spot. Last year, a swarm wasn’t stopped before making it into the engine of a plane in South Africa. Mango Airlines tweeted at the time that three of its flights were delayed so that the bees could be removed. Newsweek reported that the bee removal company had to use a palm frond to prod the insects out of the engine because smoke would have been harmful. A year earlier, an American Airlines flight out of Miami was delayed for four hours after bees attached themselves to a plane near the cargo hold, CBS News reported. Passengers had to leave the plane while they waited for a professional to remove the bees. In a 2006 report with the headline “Bees on a Plane Are a Real-Life Problem Vexing Some Pilots,” the Wall Street Journal said Africanized honey bees had been cropping up across airports in the Southwest in greater numbers. Because of their tendency to travel across open spaces, they often end up pausing at planes, terminals or other man-made spots in lieu of more natural areas, the paper said. The Journal quoted Las Vegas exterminator George Botta as saying that a swarm of bees sucked into an engine could cause damage. “It’s not as bad as hitting a flock of birds, but it’d be like pouring a tank of honey into the engine,” Botta told the paper. Often, the buzz doesn’t even reach the media. David Marder, owner of Bee Busters in Southern California, said his company is called to airports “all the time.” “I just get out there with a shop vac and suck them up,” he said. That’s what he would have recommended for the swarm in India: “Everybody would have been gone in 20 minutes,” he said. Sometimes firefighters also use foam, but Marder said it’s always necessary to make sure that kind of solution is okay to use when a plane is involved. “When you have an aircraft full of people, the most important thing is to get the people safe so they can deplane or depart,” he said. Read more: Why a spilled cup of coffee forced a plane to make an unplanned landing Passengers were in for a long flight delay. Then one of them stepped up to fly the plane. Airline helpfully tweets advice on where on a plane you are least likely to die in a crash


He’s the King of Quinoa

and juices. When founder Matt Matros first opened across the street from the Sears Tower in 2009, the plan was to focus on protein shakes. But when he realized he had no customers at lunchtime, he expanded the food options, which helped him expand the business. Now, at any of the eight locations in Chicago or the outpost in D.C., there’s something for customers with just about any dietary restriction. The menu clearly labels everything that’s gluten-free, as well as which dishes can be made vegan. It’s been a hit among folks who’ve gone “Paleo” and eat only ingredients that would have been available to cavemen. Of course, Protein Bar has also lured people watching their weight, which is something Matros knows all about. “I grew up in LA heavy and heard every fat joke you can imagine,” he says. The low-fat diets that were popular during his youth never worked, so it wasn’t until he graduated from college and decided to try going high-protein, low-carb that he finally managed to slim down. “I’d go to Subway and peel off the bread. Instead of a bagel in the morning, I’d have a protein bar and green tea,” says the 33-year-old, who credits this diet and his exercise regimen with helping him drop 50 pounds in about six months. He maintains his figure these days with Protein Bar meals, which boast their nutritional stats right on the menu. He boasts that the bar-ritos have half the calories of popular items at Chipotle. Vitamins aren’t listed, but those numbers look good, too, especially in the salads made with the “Super 6” mix of kale, spinach, romaine, carrots, purple cabbage and broccoli. “D.C. is an underrated healthy city,” Matros says. “It’s the best for running, and there are so many yoga studios.” So he figures there’s an opportunity to tap into the fitness community to find Protein Bar customers. Expect him to show up at D.C. gyms with a blender to give out smoothie samples — and even to sweat. He’s already taken classes at Biker Barre and joined Vida Fitness. Washington’s vast population of young people makes the nation’s capital a no-brainer as the next market for Protein Bar, Matros says. A Ballston location will be opening in about six weeks, and he would like to see 15 to 20 branches in the D.C. area eventually. That’s a whole lot of quinoa.


Run For It — Or Just Walk

When Jackie Evans and her son Dan went back to Frankfurt, Ill., after filming the fifth season of “The Biggest Loser,” they were worried. The duo had lost a combined 225 pounds on the TV show’s ranch, and then, suddenly, they were on their own. That’s when they signed up for their first road race, and “it changed everything,” says Jackie, 55. “Instead of going on the treadmill — Dan calls it ‘the dreadmill’ — it’s a big social event.” The party atmosphere motivated the Evanses to stick with their healthier routines. Now they’re inviting everyone to join them for The Biggest Loser RunWalk Series, which is bringing races to cities nationwide. The next stop is D.C., for a 5K, 10K and 1-mile kids’ race Sunday at RFK Stadium Festival Grounds. What sets these events apart is the emphasis on walking, Dan says. There’s a separate walk division, with walkers eligible for prizes. Participants don’t need to rush when they can take 22 minutes per mile for the 10K and up to a half hour per mile in the 5K. “It’s taking away all of the big, scary ideas that come with 5Ks,” the 26-year-old says. The RunWalk concept also applies to how Jackie chooses to train. She completed her first half-marathon in 2010 and did 11 in 2011 — a feat her body couldn’t have handled if she’d run the whole way. “I run when I can, and I walk when I need to,” she says. But that doesn’t mean “the people who look like gazelles” should stay home. Speedsters remind the back of the pack of what’s possible. Participants will want to hurry to the finish-line festival after the race, where Dan — a country musician — will play for the crowd. He has a history of good performances in Washington: In 2012, he ran his fastest half-marathon here. “It wasn’t the flattest course, but it was so beautiful,” says Dan, who hopes the setting inspires others to earn their personal best on Sunday. Details: Register for The Biggest Loser RunWalk (biggestloserrunwalk.com) online or at Saturday’s packet pickup (11 a.m.-4 p.m., 801 E St. NW). The 5K ($35-$45) and the 10K ($50-$60) begin at 9 a.m. Sunday at RFK Stadium.


With student debt an emphasis, the Army meets a more modest recruiting goal in 2019

A year after falling about 6,500 people short of its recruiting goal, the Army expects to meet its target for 2019, senior Army officials said Tuesday, citing programs that help with student debt as one factor. The Army enlisted more than 68,000 new active-duty soldiers, exceeding its goal for the year. The service attributed the difference to an overhauled recruiting effort that included 700 more recruiters, a shift to primarily online advertising and an emphasis on 22 cities that were outside of the Army’s traditional strongholds in Southern and Southeastern states. “We made some pretty dramatic changes in this process,” Army Secretary Ryan D. McCarthy told reporters at the Pentagon. The service, he said, “had to do some soul-searching” after falling so far short in 2018. But the service also recalibrated its expectations as it grows from about 476,000 in 2017 to 500,000 in coming years. Last year, the service initially set a goal of bringing in 80,000 recruits, cut it to 76,500 partway through the year and still fell short. Gen. James C. McConville, the service’s top general, said Tuesday that the Army plans to grow more slowly but still exceeded its plan for 2019. The service intended to have about 478,000 soldiers at the end of the fiscal year closing this month and will exceed that with between 481,000 and 483,000. Several thousand more are ready to go in October, at the beginning of fiscal 2020. Each of the other services met their recruiting goals in 2018. The Pentagon has not yet announced its numbers for 2019, but the expectation is that it will exceed them again. The Army’s goal was met despite nationwide unemployment of about 3.7 percent. The service traditionally is able to recruit more people when the economy is weaker. Maj. Gen. Frank Muth, the commanding officer of Army Recruiting Command, cited rising college debt as being part of the equation. The average student has $31,000 in loans, he said, a figure that several studies show to be about accurate. McCarthy said the Army presents not only a way to pay tuition, but also positions service members in “one of the most extraordinary organizations on Earth.” “That entire package together is a great opportunity,” he said. McCarthy said he would turn to an economist to assess whether anything will be done to bring down student debt in the next few years but predicted “it’s probably