The Health 202: Industry is tussling over drug prices. But it’s united on combating Medicare-for-all

stay away from nearly 100 countries or regions. But last month, that warning was downgraded by the CDC, and our Post colleague Lena H. Sun reports WHO is planning to follow with a similar easing of travel warnings. “Officials said the disease has died down in most of the world — although they think it is still circulating at a much lower level,” Lena writes. She adds Zika is “still circulating in Southeast Asia and South Asia, but large numbers of new infections and Zika-related birth defects are not being reported … The only region reporting an active Zika outbreak is in India’s northwestern state of Rajasthan.” Still, health officials say pregnant women or those who are thinking about getting pregnant should talk to their health-care providers about Zika risks before traveling. But there’s not always a clear way to get the best information. “Academic researchers and CDC officials say Zika has waned in most places in the Western Hemisphere because so many people became infected,” Lena adds. “After being infected, people are immune to the virus and cannot pass it to other people either directly, via sex and bodily fluids, or through mosquitoes.” OOF: When doctors at a Pennsylvania pediatric practice were targeted online by anti-vaccine activists for a video reminding parents to get their kids vaccinated for human papillomavirus, the doctors helped turned that online attack into the first systematic research into how anti-vax activists coordinate harmful social media campaigns. New findings out this morning, based on data the practice shared with researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Center for Research on Media, Technology, “confirm previous research about those who are opposed or reluctant to vaccinate and the key arguments that resonate with them,” Lena reports. The attacks came from members of private anti-vaccine Facebook groups. After posting a video on the practice’s Facebook page, doctors had received a barrage of 10,000 negative comments from about 800 commenters across the country and around the world, threatening the doctors or telling them they had been brainwashed. The new study was based on a random sample of 200 of the commenters and analysis of publicly available information on their Facebook pages over two years. “Among the anti-vaccine themes in the comments were a mistrust of the scientific community, concerns about personal liberty, perceived risks about vaccine safety and the belief that government and pharmaceutical companies are part of a conspiracy


Federal judge demands Trump administration reveal how its drilling plans will fuel climate change

A federal judge ruled late Tuesday that the Interior Department violated federal law by failing to take into account the climate impact of its oil and gas leasing in the West. The decision by U.S. District Judge Rudolph Contreras of Washington could force the Trump administration to account for the full climate impact of its energy-dominance agenda, and it could signal trouble for the president’s plan to boost fossil fuel production across the country. Contreras concluded that the Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management “did not sufficiently consider climate change” when making decisions to auction off federal land in Wyoming to oil and gas drilling under President Barack Obama in 2015 and 2016. The judge temporarily blocked drilling on about 300,000 acres of land in the state. The initial ruling in the case, brought by the advocacy groups WildEarth Guardians and Physicians for Social Responsibility, has implications for oil and gas drilling on federal land throughout the West. In the decision, Contreras — an Obama appointee — faulted the agency’s environmental assessments as inadequate because they did not detail how individual drilling projects contribute to the nation’s overall carbon output. Since greenhouse gas emissions are driving climate change, the judge wrote, these analyses did not provide policymakers and the public with a sufficient understanding of drilling’s impact, as required under the National Environmental Policy Act. “Given the national, cumulative nature of climate change, considering each individual drilling project in a vacuum deprives the agency and the public of the context necessary to evaluate oil and gas drilling on federal land before irretrievably committing to that drilling,” he wrote. Asked about the decision Wednesday, Interior Department spokeswoman Molly Block said in an email, “We do not comment on ongoing litigation." Wyoming Gov. Mark Gordon (R) criticized the ruling in a statement, and suggested that the state might appeal it. “We will be exploring options and following up with our state, federal, and industry partners,” Gordon said. “Our country’s efforts to reduce carbon should not center on the livelihoods of those committed workers and industries who seek to provide reliable and affordable energy, especially when we don’t look to the detrimental effects of other expansive industries. Bringing our country to its knees is not the way to thwart climate change.” Contreras did not void the leases outright, but instead ordered the bureau to redo its analysis of hundreds of projects in Wyoming.


‘It’s deplorable what he said:’ Johnny Isakson delivers the indictment of Trump’s McCain-bashing other Republicans won’t

Wednesday afternoon. Before the appearance, he previewed his comments in an interview with the Bulwark’s A.B. Stoddard. “I just want to lay it on the line, that the country deserves better, the McCain family deserves better, I don’t care if he’s president of United States, owns all the real estate in New York, or is building the greatest immigration system in the world. Nothing is more important than the integrity of the country and those who fought and risked their lives for all of us,” Isakson said. Isakson splices into his criticism of Trump some very notable winks at the president. The idea that Trump “owns all the real estate in New York” and is “building the greatest immigration system in the world” is the kind of thing he loves to hear. So even as Isakson suggests he’s about to denounce Trump, he’s inoculating himself from the blowback so many Republicans (like McCain) suffered for their Trump-related apostasies. But that bit of politics aside, what Isakson says is important. In many ways, he makes the case about reverence for military service that other Republicans have declined to make in recent days. He goes on: Bingo. This is exactly the point. People can take issue with McCain for his politics. They can forever begrudge his style and, as Trump does, his decisive vote against the GOP’s Obamacare repeal bill. But when you take that a step further and say he’ll never be worthy of your regard, you’re implicitly opting out of the bargain I described at the top. And it does send a signal to everyone, as in the time of Vietnam, that military service isn’t something that inherently defines you as a person worthy of respect. It also degrades the attractiveness of service for would-be recruits. Isakson said in his comments Wednesday afternoon that he hoped his decision to speak out would tempt other Republicans to do the same. “I’m not a big word-user, but I am on this," he said. Thus far, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Arizona Sen. Martha McSally (R) have issued tweets praising McCain, but without addressing Trump like Isakson did. Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) joined Isakson in urging Trump to knock it off: The combination of that and what Isakson is saying make the already tepid reaction of Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) seem significantly more halfhearted. And it makes every other Republican


The Brexit mess gets messier as the deadline nears

Britain crashing out of the union without any agreement and therefore into a future set of arrangements that no one can fully anticipate, let alone explain. The reverberations would be felt widely, in Britain and elsewhere in Europe, with complex supply chains disrupted in ways few can predict and the economic damage unpredictable. A divided Parliament voted recently against leaving the E.U. without an exit agreement — a “hard” Brexit — even though the prime minister has been unable to command a majority for any such exit agreement. Members of Parliament who sought to take over the issue failed in that attempt. Simply put, things are a total mess. May, meanwhile, clung to the belief that with her agreement, the third time with Parliament will be a charm. May spent the weekend wooing members of Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party, in the hope that support from that small bloc would in turn create a domino effect that would bring along the hard-liners in her party (and perhaps some others) in numbers enough to command a majority. Then Bercow dropped his bombshell, and she has been forced to scramble anew. E.U. officials sound in no hurry to grant May’s request for an extension — and indicated for now that they would do so only if May can prove she has enough votes to win approval in Parliament. That means nothing will happen on the delay request until sometime next week, putting Britain on the brink days ahead of the deadline. On Wednesday evening, May spoke to the public in a brief televised address. She cast the coming showdown as the people vs. Parliament and put herself on the side of the people who had voted to leave the E.U., ruling out a longer extension or a second referendum. “You’re tired of the infighting, and you’re tired of the procedural rows. . . . You want this stage of the Brexit process to be over and done with,” she said. “I agree. I am on your side.” But she reiterated that she will not seek an extension beyond June 30. She will learn next week whether she swayed enough votes. Into all this confusion have leaped President Trump and his eldest son, Donald Trump Jr., though in ways that only add to the muddle. The president last week told reporters at an Oval Office photo op that he had given May advice


Traffic jam rehearsals and 1 million bottles of wine: Britons prepare for a no-deal Brexit

have short shelf life,” she said. “I’ve become the largest buyer of fridges in the world,” Health Secretary Matt Hancock acknowledged on BBC “Newsnight.” “I didn’t expect that.” Hancock came under fire for those comments, as anti-Brexit campaigners and commentators declared the risk to NHS patients is “irresponsible.” Others have questioned the cost of stockpiling refrigerators and suggested the money would be better spent on reviving the NHS. On Tuesday, British radio stations began broadcasting advertisements for a government-run website that can help answer questions about post-Brexit life. The ads featured Europeans with different accents asking questions about how Brexit will affect them personally, directing them to a site called “Prepare for EU Exit.” Visitors can use the site to look up how Brexit will affect businesses and individuals depending on their passports and residencies. The ads did not go over so well with those campaigning to stay in the European Union. “This dreadful ad campaign is a metaphor for Brexit — terrible from start to finish,” Labour lawmaker Jo Stevens said. The website “looked like it was made by some children in their lunch break,” she said. Keeping bikes on the road may be less important than keeping medicine fresh, but folding-bike manufacturer Brompton Bicycle is also stockpiling parts and renting more warehouse space just in case. The company’s additional material purchases are valued at about $1.27 million, the Guardian reported this week. The company said it would rather dish out for extra storage space now than risk running out of parts later. Brompton is just one of a number of manufacturers, including makers of chocolate, butter and cheese, preparing for potential shortages in materials they need to keep their businesses running. “The most important thing is that we are going to continue to make it through Brexit,” Will Butler-Adams, the company’s chief executive, told the Guardian. “The rest we’ll muddle through.” These are the two items of which the chief supermarket chain Morrisons has seen some stockpiling, chief executive David Potts told a recent earnings call. “Whether that has any bearing on how people are feeling about Brexit, I don’t know,” he cautioned. Do not worry: Emergency plans are in place to make sure Britons do not run out of wine, either. Majestic Wine, a British retailer, plans to increase its stock to 1 million to 1.5 million bottles from various European countries, the Guardian reported. “We feel


Pinterest files for an initial public offering of stock, to trade under PINS

raised nearly $1.5 billion in the private markets and was last valued at $12.3 billion in 2017, according to PitchBook Data. — Associated Press ENERGY Loans finalized for nuclear reactors The U.S. Energy Department on Friday finalized up to $3.7 billion in loan guarantees to finance construction of two reactors at the delayed Vogtle nuclear power plant in Georgia. The financing for Vogtle, the first nuclear power plant to be licensed and begin construction in the United States in more than three decades, was first announced in 2017. The decision brings the federal government’s total in loan guarantees for Vogtle to $12 billion, some of which was provided in 2014 and 2015, under the Obama administration. Up to $1.67 billion will go to Georgia Power, a subsidiary of Southern Co.; up to $1.6 billion will go to Oglethorpe Power, and up to $415 million will go to three subsidiaries of the Municipal Electric Authority of Georgia. The reactors at Vogtle are years behind schedule, and the construction cost has soared to $20 billion or more. Critics of subsidies slammed the loan guarantees, saying that taxpayers would foot the bill if Vogtle fails. — Reuters HOUSING Existing-home sales surged in February Sales of previously owned U.S. homes rebounded in February to the fastest pace in almost a year, topping estimates and snapping a three-month streak of declines to offer a robust indication that the housing market is stabilizing after last year’s slump. Contract closings rose 11.8 percent, the most since 2015, from January’s pace to a 5.51 million annual rate, the National Association of Realtors said Friday. The median sales price climbed 3.6 percent from a year earlier. The strong gain, driven by single-family homes, indicates that the lowest mortgage rates in a year, resilient consumer sentiment and the Federal Reserve’s vow to stay patient on interest-rate hikes are helping stabilize housing markets after sales tumbled in 2018. Single-family home sales jumped 13.3 percent to a 4.94 million pace amid strong gains in the South and West. The pace of condo sales was unchanged at 570,000. At the current pace, it would take 3½ months to sell all the homes on the market, compared with almost four months in January; Realtors see anything below five months of supply as a tight market. — Bloomberg News Also in Business Papa John's has The U.S. Food and Drug Administration — From news services


More Boeing problems: Another space vehicle it’s building for NASA is significantly delayed

left in between the two flights, allowing it to fly its crewed mission this year. SpaceX’s Dragon capsule has a number of issues to work through between flights, officials said, so the time in between flights could be greater, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine has said. “I think there’s going to be less time between the uncrewed vehicle for Boeing and crewed vehicle for Boeing and longer time between [flights for] SpaceX,” he recently told CNBC. “Which means whoever gets to fly that first crew — we don’t know right now. But I will tell you I’m highly confident it will be before the end of 2019.” NASA is also expected to announce soon that when Boeing does finally fly a three-member crew to the station in its first test flight with humans on board, the astronauts will stay for up to almost seven months in what NASA is calling a “long-duration” mission. Previously, the astronauts on the crewed test flight were only supposed to stay on the station for about two weeks. NASA awarded Boeing a $4.2 billion contract in 2014 to build Starliner. But it has run into numerous problems. Last year, during a test of its emergency abort system, officials discovered a propellant leak that has required it to redesign valves in the system. The Government Accountability Office also found an issue with the abort system that could possibly cause it to “tumble, which could pose a threat to the crews’ safety.” Boeing has said it is on its way to having the problem fixed. Part of the reason the company is pushing the launch date back is because there is a sensitive national security launch, scheduled for June, that will occupy the launchpad and related facilities for weeks, officials said, forcing Boeing to push into August. The news of the Starliner delay comes as Bridenstine said the agency was looking at sidelining its Space Launch System rocket that Boeing is helping build in an effort to speed up a mission to send a spacecraft in orbit around the moon. SLS, as the rocket is known, has also faced repeated delays, and a government watchdog recently took aim at Boeing, the prime contractor on the project, saying it has already spent $5.3 billion and is expected to burning through the remaining funds by early this year, three years ahead of schedule and without delivering a single rocket stage.


NASA rocket becomes Boeing’s latest headache as Trump demands moon mission

NASA still steadfastly supports the massive rocket, known as the Space Launch System (SLS), the agency would consider sidelining it and instead using commercially available rockets for the mission known as Exploration Mission-1 (EM-1). Bridenstine’s comments at the Senate hearing touched off a political maelstrom — angering Sen. Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.), the chairman of the appropriations committee and SLS’s chief benefactor. Critics say the latest machinations are yet another example of how political pressures have sustained the lucrative rocket program for years, as it has maintained Congressional support no matter how high the costs or lengthy the delays. In the space world, Bridenstine’s announcement set off shock waves. It not only signaled a potentially radical change in NASA’s plans to return to the moon, but was a major blow to NASA’s flagship rocket program and its main contractor, Boeing. The announcement came as the company has been under scrutiny for the way it has handled the crashes of two of its commercial airplanes that killed 346 people. Bridenstine’s announcement prompted critics of the program to question whether NASA truly needs a government-owned heavy-lift rocket. The private sector is already producing such rockets. And although they are not as powerful as the SLS, they’re cheaper to fly, with reusable boosters. Trump’s latest budget request states that a commercial rocket, not the SLS as previously planned, would be used to send a robotic probe to Jupiter’s moon Europa. The request also says commercial rockets would be used to put up a new outpost in lunar orbit, called the Gateway. Bridenstine testified last week that commercial rockets also could send astronauts to the Gateway — another presumed SLS function. And NASA has abandoned a much-derided mission to haul an asteroid to lunar orbit to be inspected by astronauts launched via the SLS. “This is a rocket that has been looking for a mission,” said Lori Garver, who served as NASA’s deputy administrator under President Barack Obama. For years, Boeing has long faced criticism for its handling of the program. Last year, a report from the NASA inspector general was withering in its criticism of the company, saying it already has spent $5.3 billion and is expected to burn through the remaining money by early this year, three years too soon, without delivering a single rocket stage. The report said problems at Boeing have led to a 2½-year delay and $4 billion in


Ares V, a modern successor to the Saturn V. It would hurl a new capsule, Orion, to the moon. When Obama entered office, the Constellation program was struggling, and administration officials called it “over budget, behind schedule, off course and ‘unexecutable.’ ” Obama killed Constellation in 2010, and directed NASA to aim for an asteroid and Mars instead of the moon. But the move once again angered Shelby, whose state is home to the Marshall Spaceflight Center, where much of the work on Constellation would have been based. "The president’s proposed NASA budget begins the death march for the future of U.S. human spaceflight,” he said at the time. “If this budget is enacted, NASA will no longer be an agency of innovation and hard science. It will be an agency of pipe dreams and fairy talks.” Although the administration terminated the moon plan, it found it politically impossible to kill all of the projects already pouring billions of dollars into coffers of major aerospace contractors. A quartet of powerful senators who have NASA space bases in their states — Shelby, Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), Barbara A. Mikulski (D-Md.) and Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-Tex.) — protected the heavy-lift rocket as well as the Orion capsule. They pushed through legislation mandating construction of a heavy-lift rocket and even dictating how it would be designed, including the use of legacy space shuttle hardware. With Constellation’s moon mission canceled, the precise purpose — the actual destinations — of the SLS and Orion became murky. The SLS clearly existed to launch Orion. But to where? Throughout this process, the big rocket and Orion have crawled toward completion. NASA has been spending more than $3 billion a year on SLS and Orion. Both programs have faced delays. The SLS has taken so long to build that it arguably is technologically obsolete, industry officials say. Much of the hardware is derived from the space shuttle, developed in the 1970s. Meanwhile, a vibrant commercial launch industry, with Boeing, Lockheed and Northrop Grumman, is facing competition from relatively new entrants such as SpaceX, founded by Elon Musk, and Blue Origin, founded by Jeffrey P. Bezos (who owns The Washington Post). SpaceX has disrupted the launch industry by building largely reusable rockets and selling them at a discount: $62 million for its Falcon 9 and as low as $90 million for its Falcon Heavy. By contrast, NASA officials have said


Theresa May isn’t the adult in the room. She’s part of the problem.

European leaders have told her that the United Kingdom can have a Brexit extension until May 22, if May can get her withdrawal agreement passed in Parliament, but must crash out of all of its trading arrangements on April 12 if not — underlines this bitter truth. She is not to be pitied: She is the worst prime minister in living memory, presiding over a crisis of her own creation. The list of her mistakes is not short. She did not have to trigger Article 50, the legal mechanism for leaving the European Union, before making a plan on how to do so: That decision set a two-year clock ticking and has resulted in the cliff edge the country would have reached on the 29th of this month if an extension had not been granted. She did not have to call an unnecessary parliamentary election in 2017, one which resulted in the loss of her majority and forced her to rely on a small, radical, Protestant Northern Irish political party, as well as the extreme anti-European faction within her own party, in order to stay in power. But her errors go even deeper. In fact, all of the events of the past two years have been shaped by a decision she made, by herself, following bad advice, at the very beginning of this process. Remember that the British did not vote for any particular form of Brexit: Thanks to Cameron’s simplistic, open-ended referendum question, they chose to “Leave” the European Union but did not express any view on what should happen next. When she took office, May could have observed that the vote was very close, that Britain’s commercial and political ties to Europe were strong, and that it would make sense for the United Kingdom to stay within the single market, the pan-European free-trade zone that Britain itself did so much to create — or at the very least within a customs union. Instead, she chose to leave both of those institutions, a decision that immediately triggered the problem of the border between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, which was eliminated thanks to E.U. trade treaties but will, if customs barriers are put in place, need to be built back. Her decision also created potential problems for anyone who trades with Britain or works with Britain — and for Brits who trade and work in Europe. But


Napa and Sonoma bottles rise to the top of American wine lists. Again.

bottle age at incredibly reasonable prices. Ideal for restaurant wine lists, in other words. With this year’s survey, published in the April issue, one might say, “Order restored.” R. Lopez de Heredia slipped to third place (still remarkable) and was eclipsed by two California brands known for cabernet sauvignon. Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars of Napa Valley, and Jordan Vineyard & Winery of Sonoma County’s Alexander Valley took the top two positions. California brands, including chardonnay specialists Kistler and Sonoma-Cutrer, continue to dominate the top 10 spots on the list, which the editors attribute to the sustained popularity of steakhouse restaurants. “Wines from the US still hold diners in thrall, making up 38.4 percent of the Most Popular bottlings,” the magazine said. But beneath this stability, change is apparent. Sancerre, the top sauvignon blanc of France’s Loire Valley, may be challenging chardonnay for palate love from white wine drinkers. The Lucien Crochet Sancerre ranked ninth this year, its first appearance in the top 10. And while several of the top wines topped three digits in price, this year’s survey noted that diners are increasingly demanding value. While some customers continue to splurge, about one-third of the restaurant respondents said overall sales were holding steady. “We’re seeing more extremes now,” Giancarlo Paterlini, of 1760 and Acquerello restaurants in San Francisco, told the magazine. “We’re seeing a large number of guests who don’t drink at all; people who drink a glass or a cheap bottle; and people who come in and spend $500 or more. The middle ground is gone.” And there are sub-trends. Millennials continue to be ambivalent about wine, often preferring cocktails. Among wine drinkers, new regions continue to be popular: The survey noted upticks in popularity for wines from Ontario, Mexico, Georgia (no, not our Georgia) and even Cru Bourgeois Bordeaux, as consumers search for value in the classic regions. Diners are also willing to be adventurous and try something new and unusual by the glass, without committing to a full bottle. There’s a hint to sommeliers to be willing to diversify their BTG lists. And “natural wine,” contentious though it is, continues to rise in popularity. Several sommeliers said diners seek out the most “different,” “unusual” or “stinkiest” wines on the list. Who knows? In another few years, those “stinky” wines might rise into the top 10. Appreciation Gordon Murchie Murchie, 86, made wine his second career after retiring


The left comes up with an economic idea silly enough to rival the Trumpublicans

a lot lower than they were pre-Laffer. Okay. Before I get to MMT, let me make two disclosures: First, I was an English major in college who was also a straight-A economics student. (That’s because I took one course, got an A, and decided to quit while I was ahead.) I’ve learned about business and finance on the job, not in the classroom. Second, I tried to read some of the key documents underlying MMT but couldn’t finish the job because I found them both dense and nonsensical. An interesting combination. When MMT first emerged, I did a little research and figured it was so silly that it would have a short shelf life. That’s why I didn’t write about it. But now that MMT seems to be gaining ground and is getting treated with respect, let me offer up a few thoughts on just one aspect of how this theory won’t work in the real world. These thoughts, by the way, are based on how the financial world actually works. Not on how academic ideologues and other true believers would like the world to work. Magic Money — I’m sorry, Modern Monetary Theory — adherents claim that federal budget deficits don’t matter. Why? Because our government borrows in our own currency, the U.S. dollar. So if the Federal Reserve can create trillions of dollars out of thin air, why worry about deficits or the national debt? Just have the Fed print enough dollars for the Treasury to meet its obligations. Piece of cake. Therefore, the theory goes, our government can afford all sorts of expensive stuff — rebuilding our infrastructure, Medicare-for-all (whatever that is), a Green New Deal (ditto), free college tuition and, for all I know, putting a chicken in every pot — without raising taxes, except maybe on “the rich” (whoever they are), or causing interest rates or inflation to rise. As an example, these folks cite Japan, which has run massive budget deficits without running up interest rates very much or generating much inflation. The Japanese central bank has printed gazillions of yen, and everything is great (except for the fact that the Japanese economy has been sluggish for about 30 years). But even if you disregard other examples of countries printing their own currency to fund deficits — can you spell Venezuela? — the United States isn’t Japan. That’s because, among other things, we derive


Abolish the electoral college? Here’s a better idea for Democrats.

that put farmers at the center of the farm economy. That’s what the second theme is all about. Farmers have a leading, transformative and potentially lucrative role to play in fighting climate change. Scientists are looking with rising excitement at the potential of soil — good old dirt — to capture and store huge quantities of carbon currently loose in the atmosphere. A few facts frame the picture. Roughly three times as much carbon is contained in just the top meter of Earth’s soil as in the entire atmosphere. Traditional farming practices gradually release that carbon. From the dawn of the Industrial Age to the present, the work of clearing and farming the soil has transferred almost as much carbon into the atmosphere as the burning of all fossil fuels, according to a 2017 survey of this subject in the journal Scientific Reports. The good news is that existing techniques — if adopted widely — can reverse this process while improving crops at the same time. Instead of producing atmospheric carbon as a byproduct of outdated practices, global agriculture can pull huge, game-changing quantities of carbon from the air and store it back in the soil through methods such as mulching, organic manure fertilizing, tree farming and proper crop rotation. Remember: Organic matter is largely built from carbon. By using that decaying material to build up soil, and by disturbing the soil as little as possible, the carbon is stored. In the process, other important nutrients also enrich the earth. Admittedly, some of these techniques may sound like tips for backyard gardeners from the Whole Earth Catalog. But experts aren’t pushing some hippie reverie of subsistence farming. Emerging strategies for refilling the carbon reservoirs in soil are compatible with the high-tech agriculture of the United States today. For example, GPS systems and no-till seeders allow today’s farmers to plant large fields more densely than before, and with far less soil disturbance. Next-generation soil management strategies present both an environmental and an economic opportunity. We have seen this play before. Poor soil management was the primary cause of the Dust Bowl that decimated agriculture across much of the Midwest during the 1930s. Together, America’s farmers and the government turned that disaster into a long-range triumph. The campaign to undo the Dust Bowl ultimately improved farms, enriched farmers, conserved topsoil, advanced science, strengthened universities and filled bellies around the world. No one


In the galleries: Printmakers’ works are anything but two-dimensional

Hricko’s “Second Growth,” which places the viewer almost inside a dense thicket. The assortment includes conventional renderings of people, but more intriguing are pictures in which clothing suggests missing figures: Pauline Jakobsberg’s “Extra Buttons,” a paper garment on a real metal hanger; and Amy Helminiak’s “The Way My Garden Grows,” which plants two pieces of underwear amid flowers to represent transgender identity. Selected by Smithsonian American Art Museum curator Crawford Alexander Mann III, the works represent nearly a dozen techniques, including laser printing. Mostly, though, “Ink It” is a showcase of traditional printmaking expertise, however untraditional the subject or theme. Karametou, Dixon and Alvarez Yurcisin “To Eat or Not to Eat” is not actually the question, except for someone contemplating a hunger strike. What the three local artists of this show at Joan Hisaoka Healing Arts Gallery are really asking is: What to eat? And what are the effects of that choice? Maria Karametou, who organized the show, arranges edibles to illustrate ecological issues. Chains of blackened banana peels represent the risks of single-crop agriculture, while floral arrangements of garlic peels celebrate the healthy diet of the artist’s Greek childhood. Tea bags imprinted with pictures of hands symbolize the loss of direct contact with the plants people consume, which are increasingly picked and processed by machines. Fabiola Alvarez Yurcisin blends cuisine and geography, offering a map of the District’s demographics (as of the 2010 Census), in which the different colors are spices, cornmeal and other foodstuffs. More personally, her set of photographs depicts a dozen tortillas, each embellished with a self-identifying noun. The 12-word autobiography journeys from “Mexican” to “American” via “artist” and “immigrant.” Migration is also a theme for Elsabe Dixon, a South Africa-bred artist who’s known for work inspired by keeping bees and silkworms. Her hivelike structures include one made mostly of rubber and latex and another in which oversize cells are filled with rounds of bread, save for one loaf made of beeswax. Just like humans, bees gather, manufacture, store and transport food. But what Dixon calls “our cross species affinity” with the insects hasn’t worked out so well for them. And plummeting bee populations are an ominous portent for our species as well. Miller & Ikard Nostalgia is a lot sleeker than it used to be, or at least that’s how it appears in the work of Luke Ikard and Curtis Miller. The two Baltimore artists


How ordinary Iraqis resisted the Islamic State

project. Under the Islamic State’s rule, everyday resistance manifested itself in many ways. This included civilians abstaining from going to the mandatory prayers; smoking; drinking alcohol; listening to and playing music; men shaving their beards; and women not fully covering their faces in public. For example, 22 percent reported having engaged in shirking as an act of resistance — intentionally dragging their feet when working under the Islamic State. If we consider all types of everyday resistance together, as much as 83 percent of respondents reported having engaged in these types of behavior. How do we know respondents were truthful? Studying resistance through self-reported behavior is obviously difficult. Given that the Islamic State is now discredited and defeated, there is a risk that residents of Mosul will overreport their resistance toward the Islamic State, not least because the Iraqi government applies draconian measures against alleged Islamic State supporters. While the risk of strategic misrepresentation cannot be completely ruled out, there are indications that the risk of inflated responses is less severe than expected. First, the vast majority of respondents openly reported that they considered the Islamic State to have improved governance in Mosul on a number of levels, something that would be unlikely if respondents were trying to present themselves as more opposed to the Islamic State than they actually were. Second, in each of the resistance categories, it was only a minority (around a few percent to maximum 37 percent) that reportedly engaged in this particular type of behavior. Third, we asked whether the respondents had observed other people engaging in resistance — the overlap with self-reported resistance was roughly similar in most categories. Moreover, respondents filled in the survey privately on digital devices, which helped to secure a high degree of confidentiality. Iraqi government’s crackdown on Islamic State supporters Our research is particularly important in light of the present Shiite-led backlash against the Sunni minority, a policy that builds on the assumption that all Sunnis collaborated fully with the Islamic State. Our research shows that this assumption is, most likely, not true. Recently, a comparable survey in Mosul by Mara Revkin and Kristen Kao demonstrated that the Iraqi government’s crackdown against alleged Islamic State supporters has little public support. Our research further indicates that civilians in Mosul worked to undermine, refused to fully cooperate with, or engaged in defiance and resistance against the Islamic State’s occupation in a


Two U.S. soldiers killed in Afghanistan, says the U.S.-led NATO coalition

The U.S. service members, who were conducting an operation, were killed in action on Friday, according to a statement from Debra Richardson, a spokeswoman for the U.S.-led NATO coalition. There are no other details at present. Their deaths come as peace talks between the U.S. and the Taliban intensify.This is a developing story. It will be updated.


The Technology 202: Facebook password glitch adds to list of company’s woes

the position sat vacant for the first two years of his presidency. Kratsios has already developed strategic plans or national initiatives for artificial intelligence, quantum computing, 5G and autonomous vehicles. He also has convened meetings with tech executives at the White House on issues such as artificial intelligence as well as math and science education. “Over the past two years, I’ve seen how passionate he is about developing smart, results-oriented policies that unleash America’s technological strengths and innovative spirit,” said IBM president and chief executive Ginni Rometty in a statement. “He also knows that innovation is about people as much as technology, and that we need education and training policies to help students and workers succeed in a tech-powered economy.” Kratsios previously served as a principal at Thiel Capital, one of the venture firms founded by Peter Thiel, one of Silicon Valley’s most outspoken supporters of President Trump. NIBBLES: Instagram is the top place for young people to socialize — but that also makes it the next likely battleground for misinformation, Instagram may have escaped high-level attention in part because of its reputation among older users — who primarily use it to post personal photos or keep in touch with friends. But teenagers on the other hand use it to explore their identity — and often to consume information about current events. “Instagram is teeming with these conspiracy theories, viral misinformation, and extremist memes, all daisy-chained together via a network of accounts with incredible algorithmic reach and millions of collective followers,” Lorenz writes. “These accounts intersperse TikTok videos and nostalgia memes with anti-vaccination rhetoric, conspiracy theories about George Soros and the Clinton family, and jokes about killing women, Jews, Muslims, and liberals.” BYTES: The founder of 8chan — a website known for allowing content banned by mainstream social networks — is expressing regret in the fallout of the New Zealand mosque shooting, Fredrick Brennan, who cut ties with 8chan in December, said the site’s administrators were too slow to remove a post last week from Christchurch shooter Brenton Tarrant and other posts inciting violence. Brennan said their reluctance to remove the post, coupled with the spread of posts praising the shooting, make Brennan think the site will one day again be connected to another mass shooting. “It was very difficult in the days that followed to know that I had created that site,” Fredrick Brennan told McMillan in an interview.


Britain will not leave the E.U. next week after European leaders allow a short Brexit reprieve

increases pressure on British lawmakers to cut across party lines to approve some sort of deal. It also gives E.U. leaders political cover with their own voters if Britain departs without a safety net, since they can say they did everything possible to avoid it. Economists and political analysts have warned that a no-deal Brexit could result in the halting of trade and travel and a hit to the British and European economies. By now, many E.U. policymakers no longer hold out hope for a second referendum that could reverse the Brexit decision and think it best to break up and move on — a marked shift on a continent that once wanted Britain to stay. “We don’t want in the coming months, in the coming years, to be busy with Brexit,” said Guy Verhofstadt, the European Parliament’s Brexit coordinator, who used to post wistful videos on Twitter appealing to Britons to abandon Brexit. “We want to be busy with the renewal of the European Union,” he told reporters before the meeting. When May triggered the two-year Brexit window, confident Brexiteers said squabbling European countries would quickly succumb to the crack British team of negotiators. Instead, the Europeans have remained unusually united, while the first two British Brexit ministers resigned to protest the deals they themselves agreed on. May and British lawmakers are now blaming each other for failing to have agreed on how to leave. May’s deal was defeated by 149 votes on March 12 — and by 230 votes on Jan. 15. Both votes were widely described as humiliations. Many members of her Conservative Party voted against the prime minister’s exit plan and have vowed to do so again. May needs to persuade at least 75 lawmakers to back the exit deal, including the 10 members from Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party, which props up her minority government. She also needs at least some of the most rebellious, hardcore Tory Brexiteers, plus some Labour Party lawmakers, to cross over. This will not be easy. Some of the 48 percent of people who voted to remain in the European Union in the June 2016 Brexit referendum were growing increasingly nervous about what might happen over the next few days. An online public petition calling on May to cancel Brexit attracted more than 2 million signatures in mere hours, crashing the website once from the surge in traffic. michael.birnbaum@washpost.com william.booth@washpost.com


For first time, more Americans fault discrimination than self-motivation for white-black prosperity gap

to rise out of poverty, a concern up nine points since 2014. The shifts parallel a rise in concern about racial equality in the years after the fatal police shooting of Michael Brown in 2014 in Ferguson, Mo., which sparked protests over police treatment of black Americans across the country. Last year Congress passed and President Trump signed a sweeping criminal justice law aimed in part at curtailing punishments that were criticized for disproportionately affecting black Americans, and Democratic presidential candidates have focused on combating racial inequality with some encouraging a discussion of reparations for slavery. Despite the unemployment rate falling to near-record lows for the country overall as well as African Americans specifically, federal statistics show a persistently stark racial divide in income. The Census Bureau estimates that in 2017 the median income for black households was roughly $40,000, compared with just over $50,000 for Hispanics, $68,000 for whites and over $81,000 for Asian households. The newly released survey finds concern that discrimination is holding blacks behind is rising among a wide range of groups, though Democrats have shifted more sharply than others. A 60 percent majority of Democrats said discrimination is a main factor in the disparities between blacks and whites, up 16 points from 2014. Fewer than half as many Republicans said discrimination is a reason for racial differences, 25 percent, though this figure was still up six points from 2014. As a result, the partisan divide on views of discrimination against blacks has swelled to 35 points, similar to 2016 but larger than any point in the previous four decades. Non-Hispanic black Americans have also grown more likely to attribute disparities in jobs, income and housing to discrimination, rising from 55 percent in 2014 to 65 percent in 2018. Non-Hispanic whites’ concerns about discrimination against blacks have also increased by 10 points to 40 percent, though they remain far less likely than blacks to express this view. Americans of other racial backgrounds stand in the middle, with 52 percent blaming discrimination for the gap between blacks and whites. Americans also have grown more supportive of increasing federal spending to improve black Americans’ standing. A record high 52 percent of all Americans last year said the nation spends too little on “improving the conditions of blacks,” up from 30 percent in 2014 and from 47 percent in 2016. From 1973 to 2012, the survey never found more


Mr. Brexit? Trump, a critic of the E.U., keeps undermining Theresa May’s plan to leave it.

newspaper last week that he had spoken with the president and both agreed that aborted talks with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un in Vietnam showed the value in walking away from negotiations. It’s far from clear that any of these tactics would work in practice. Britain’s exit from the E.U. is quite different from bilateral denuclearization talks with North Korea. For example, Trump has said that post-Brexit Britain shouldn’t align its trade too closely with the E.U. so that it can write its own free trade agreements later, but such a move could potentially result in a hard border with Ireland — something the E.U. is unlikely to agree to. Amanda Sloat, senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a former deputy assistant secretary of state for European affairs, said she wasn’t sure that Trump understood the nuances of negotiations. “Walking away from Brexit with no deal doesn’t mean that nothing happens,” Sloat said. “It means you have significant rupture in all the existing arrangements.” Trump is a long-standing critic of the E.U., but he has made a number of predictions about it that did not pan out. In 2012, the then-businessman made a number of claims that the euro, the currency used by 19 of the 28 E.U. member states, was “done” and “going to collapse soon.” The president has repeatedly claimed to have predicted Brexit itself. However, his retelling of a June 2016 visit to his Turnberry Golf Course in Scotland omits a key detail: Trump arrived in the country June 24, the day after the referendum, not the day before as he has claimed. Trump did make a prediction a few days later. “I think the E.U. is going to break up,” he said in an interview with the Times of London on June 27. That has not occurred. The president’s support for Britain and opposition to the E.U. is not surprising. His family originated in Scotland, and he is fond of Britain, but in the past few years he has suggested that the E.U. is a “foe” and that it was formed as a “consortium so that it could compete with the United States.” In his 2000 book, “The America We Deserve,” Trump spoke of the need to pull back from Europe and “save this country millions of dollars annually.” In the same book, Trump suggests that the United States has been there for “England”


At the center of Mueller’s inquiry, a campaign that appeared to welcome Russia’s help

Trump foreign-policy adviser, George Papadopoulos, who was told by a London-based professor in April 2016 that the Russians held damaging information about Clinton in the form of thousands of emails, according to court filings. The professor then connected Papadopoulos to a Russian think-tank director, and Papadopoulos worked for months in an ultimately unsuccessful effort to use his new connections to secure Trump or campaign aides meetings with Putin or Russians officials. Court documents show that Papadopoulos kept his campaign supervisors briefed along the way. “Make the trip if it is feasible,” campaign co-chairman Sam Clovis told Papadopoulos in August 2016, as the young aide advocated meeting with Russian officials in London or Moscow. Clovis’s lawyer has said he was just being polite. Meanwhile, Manafort, the man at the top of the campaign, was having ongoing interactions with a longtime Russian associate, the special counsel’s investigation revealed. Manafort, who had deep connections in Ukraine and Russia because of a decade spent as a political consultant in Kiev, communicated with the Russian throughout the six months he worked for Trump. The Russian was a Manafort employee who Mueller’s prosecutors have said had ties to Russian intelligence, according to court papers. In July 2016, Manafort instructed the employee, Konstantin Kilimnik, to offer private campaign briefings to a Russian business mogul to whom Manafort owed millions of dollars. The businessman, Oleg Deripaska, who is close to Putin, has said he never received Trump campaign briefings. By August 2016, court documents show, Manafort had shared campaign polling data with Kilimnik, for reasons not yet publicly understood. Manafort was convicted of eight counts of bank and tax fraud in a trial in Virginia in August and in September pleaded guilty to other charges in Washington: conspiring against the United States and obstruction of justice. The 69-year-old was sentenced this month to a total of 7½ years in prison. Meanwhile, Trump’s personal attorney Michael Cohen was aggressively seeking the consummation of a long-held Trump dream of building a Trump Tower in Moscow. Cohen pursued the idea well into the 2016 campaign, and, at one point, spoke directly to a Kremlin aide to ask for government assistance in advancing the lucrative project, prosecutors revealed in November. Cohen and Trump business associate Felix Sater perceived the project as a way to boost Trump’s presidential ambitions by demonstrating his close ties to a world leader, their communications show. “I will


Moke, the 11-month-old gorilla at the National Zoo, recovers after breaking his leg

Moke, an 11-month-old western lowland gorilla, is back to his young self at the National Zoo, after recovering from a fractured left thighbone. Moke fractured his femur in February. Zoo officials weren’t exactly sure how he injured himself but suspected he may have landed wrong during one of his many jumps. (He has been labeled a bit of a daredevil by zookeepers.) The keepers noticed something was wrong when he stopped placing weight on it. Zoo experts examined Moke (pronounced “mo-KEY”) and determined that, although there was a fracture, it was best to let the leg heal naturally and that more drastic measures, such as surgery, were not necessary. The fracture was “not significantly displaced,” and the two pieces were not separate from each other, experts said at the time of his injury. On Friday, zoo officials said in a statement that Moke was basically back to well, acting like a healthy gorilla. “Both his demeanor and his mobility indicate that he has made a full recovery,” the statement said. Moke has been mischievous and playfully chasing after others. His first birthday is April 15. Moke is one of six gorillas at the zoo. His name means “junior” or “little one” in the Lingala language of Africa. His father is Baraka, a 400-pound, 26-year-old silverback, and his mother is Calaya, 15. His parents have been a couple since she came to the zoo in 2015. Other than his broken leg, he has hit all the major milestones of being an infant. He is growing, sprouting more hair and teeth and, well, being a gorilla. The fracture required Moke to be separated from the rest of the gorilla troop, especially so he could not “roughhouse with his favorite playmate, another gorilla — 10-year-old Kibibi.” Zoo officials said they had “opened the ‘howdy’ door” between the gorillas late last month and gave the animals “full physical access to each other once again.” The zoo put out a video with the headline, “#GorillaStory: The Troop is Back Together!” There was much celebration over the reunion, the zoo said; there was even popcorn to forage for and coconuts to crack open. The gorillas made noises of excitement — what zoo experts call “pleasure rumbles or positive vocalization” for a few hours. Then they “calmed down and seemed relieved and content to be back together.” dana.hedgpeth@washpost.com


Navy cryptologist Shannon Kent, who died in an ISIS suicide attack in Syria, was torn between family and duty

10 active-duty slots for the program. But there was a problem. Between her pregnancies, she had gotten a diagnosis of thyroid cancer. She matter-of-factly informed Joe, who was deployed at the time, by text only after she had emergency throat surgery to remove a growth. The cancer was caught early and did not require chemotherapy. But she had to be commissioned as an officer to enter the PhD program, and doing so required the same clean bill of health that anyone joining the military for the first time must have. The Navy determined the cancer made her medically unfit. She applied for a waiver and was denied. Meanwhile, Shannon’s home duty was coming to an end, and she was on a shortlist of people with needed skills. In the spring of 2018, even as she appealed the Navy’s decision, she began predeployment training: refreshers in firearms, combat driving, first aid. “I tried to do the officer program so I would be in school for the next five years, home with the babies every night,” she texted her cousin Sharron. “But of course the Navy said, ‘F‑‑‑ you.’ ” Shannon and Joe sought congressional help, and several lawmakers petitioned on her behalf. The Navy did not budge. She was healthy enough to stay in but not to become an officer. Shannon tried to remain positive. She set her sights not just on securing entry into the PhD program — she hoped to get a waiver the following year — but on changing the Navy’s commissioning standard so others wouldn’t face the same obstacle. Still, “it was a gut punch,” her cousin said. “I never minded before,” Shannon texted Sharron about deploying. “Now I feel sick to my stomach every day.” T With 15 years in, Shannon might have found a way out of the deployment, by seeing a psychologist or volunteering for additional shore duty. She couldn’t bring herself to do it. “She would say, ‘Every part of my DNA is telling me don’t do this, it’s wrong,’ ” Joe said. “She said, ‘At the same time, my conscience and what I feel like has propelled me through my entire adult life is telling me I have to go on this deployment because it’s my turn.’ ” Joe and Shannon figured the odds were that she would be fine. This wasn’t Iraq of 2007, when Americans were blown up every day.


Theresa May must pass her Brexit deal next week. The odds are against her.

“extreme unpredictability.” That’s British English for crazy times. House of Commons Speaker John Bercow threw a wrench into the works earlier this week — a lifetime ago in British politics — saying May could not offer a third meaningful vote, dubbed MV3, unless the deal was “significantly” different. May’s spokeswoman on Friday predicted Bercow will allow it, as the deal has been modified with new E.U. deadlines, timetables and fresh choices. How does May find support for her twice-defeated deal? Remember, it was defeated by a whopping 230 votes in January — the largest defeat in British parliamentary history. It was rejected againthis month, losing by a smaller but significant margin of 149 votes. In the January vote, 118 Conservatives voted against the deal; in March, it was 75 Conservatives. So May needs to win over at least 75 lawmakers who previously opposed her deal. She has spent the past weeks sweet-talking the Democratic Unionists from Northern Ireland, the Protestant loyalists who remain fearful they will someday be cut off from the United Kingdom, and ultimately be absorbed by or confederated with the Republic of Ireland to their south. “When it comes to the outcome from Brexit, the key thing that the DUP will have to have are assurances that the U.K. union is not under threat,” said political sociologist Katy Hayward in Belfast. “That is the red line that unites the party.” Cynics predict the DUP could be bought with money. After all, the party agreed to prop up May’s minority government after her disastrous loss in 2017, in part, for a billion pounds of government spending in Northern Ireland. While money will probably be on offer, there are limits. Nigel Dodds, the deputy leader of the DUP, said in a statement that nothing had changed as far as the withdrawal agreement was concerned. Dodds, like many lawmakers, was stung by May’s assertion in a speech Wednesday night that the shambles of Brexit is all the fault of Parliament — and not hers. “Lectures by the prime minister putting the blame on others cannot disguise the responsibility her government bears for the current debacle and the fact that her agreement has been twice overwhelmingly rejected in Parliament,” Dodds said. “The DUP are about as staunch, as belligerent in politics, as you are going to get,” said Naomi Long, leader of the cross-community Alliance Party in Northern Ireland. “They see


Priest at Northwest Washington church rejects plea deal in assault case

to a court filing, if convicted without the plea deal, Vazquez could face as much as 13 years in prison. With the plea deal, Vazquez could face about half that time. — Keith L. Alexander MARYLAND County finance director leaving for post in Va. Montgomery County Finance Director Alexandre Espinosa is leaving the suburban Maryland jurisdiction to become the chief financial officer for Stafford County, Va., according to county officials. Espinosa, a 21-year county employee, has held the top role at the finance department since August 2016. He was one of the department heads who County Executive Marc Elrich (D) announced was staying on in his new administration. Espinosa earned an annual salary of $200,000 in 2018, according to Montgomery County employee records. It is unclear what his salary will be in Virginia. His last day with the county will be April 5. — Jennifer Barrios 2 charges, 1 warrant in 2013 Rockville slaying Police said they have linked three men to a five-year-old homicide in Maryland. Montgomery County police said Alexander Benson Buie, 34, was killed Nov. 6, 2013, at a home in Rockville, after three men — one with a gun — knocked on the door and forced their way into the home. They confronted three other men inside, including Buie, and a struggle ensued, according to police. Buie was shot. On Thursday, police said, they had arrested two men in connection to Buie’s killing — Trevon Derick Davis, 28, of Hyattsville, and Bryan Donte Byrd, 28, of Northeast Washington. They have been charged with first-degree murder and other counts. Officials also issued an arrest warrant for Vaughn Darvel Bellamy, 28, of Hagerstown, on charges of armed robbery and first-degree murder. Bellamy is in jail for an unrelated homicide, police said. — Dana Hedgpeth Two men charged in woman's fatal shooting Two men have been charged in the fatal shooting of a woman during a drug robbery, police said. Alexander Maskiewicz, 21, of Aberdeen, and Shelton Holt III, 26, of Reisterstown, have been charged with murder in the killing of Salina Rivera, 27, of Hyattsville, according to Prince George’s County police. Hyattsville police responded to a shooting at around 8 p.m. Tuesday in the 6200 block of Belcrest Road and found Rivera in a walkway, police said. She was pronounced dead. Maskiewicz shot Rivera while trying to rob her during a drug sale, police said. — Lynh Bui


Lisa Wardell walked into a meeting with 14 white, male bankers — and she ran the room

got a job selling sneakers at Athlete’s Foot at age 13. She worked there for all of her high school years. “A new drug epidemic, specifically crack cocaine, had just hit the D.C. area, and as a result, the manager of my store became a user and was unable to function or manage the store. I have vivid memories of him climbing up into the ceiling looking for cameras because he was convinced the store was bugged. The drug trade was booming, so lots of our transactions were for very large amounts of cash, with dealers buying 15 to 20 pairs of shoes at a time. “One of those customers showed me how to count out thousands of dollars quickly, so as not to hold up the cashier line, and calculate sales tax in my head when the system was down.” An overnight cleaning woman taught her how to store inventory and avoid shrinkage, which is a fancy word for theft. “These experiences allowed me to realize, over time, that my background is an advantage, not a disadvantage,” Wardell said. The cleaning lady knew the retail sports shoe business because she was there every day. Fast-forward to present day: “When I visit Adtalem Education locations now, I always get up early, go running, and get a download from the gardeners and janitors, the people who care for our facilities, about what’s really going on.” She apparently knows what is going on. She remembers one formative meeting between herself, Johnson and a host of bankers when she was chief operating officer for RLJ. “I walk into the room, and there are 14 bankers there, including the managing partner, all white men, and Bob. And now me. No fancy pens. Bob says exactly one sentence the entire meeting: ‘It is absolutely amazing to me that you came to meet with the only black billionaire in American business, and you don’t have one diverse person on your team. You didn’t even bring that analyst you guys keep in the backroom.’ ” The room fell into an awkward silence, and Bob turned to Wardell: “Lisa?” After a 90-minute presentation by Wardell, she turned to Johnson and asked why he put her on the spot to do all the talking. “Because I want you to understand,” Johnson said, “that until you believe that you belong in the room, you don’t belong in the room.” thomas.heath@washpost.com


UPDATE 1-U.S. air strikes kill a dozen Afghans, battle intensifies in Taliban strongholds

KUNDUZ, Afghanistan — U.S. airstrikes in the northern Afghan province of Kunduz killed about a dozen civilians this weekend, local officials said, as fighting intensified there and in southern Helmand province. The airstrikes killed 13 civilians, said Safiullah Amiri, a member of the Kunduz provincial council. The casualties included children, said fellow council member Amruddin, who pegged the civilian death toll at 12 and goes by one name. The bodies were brought into Kunduz city in the back of a truck as part of protests by dozens of civilians. The civilian fatalities occurred as Afghan and Taliban forces claimed to inflict heavy losses on each other in Kunduz and Helmand, two Taliban strongholds. Sgt. Debra Richardson, a spokeswoman for the NATO-led Resolute Support mission in Afghanistan, said it is aware of the civilian casualty reports and added that the mission reviews all credible allegations. “We take every measure to prevent civilian casualties, in contrast to the Taliban who intentionally hide behind women and children,” she said in a statement. Resolute Support, comprising troops from 39 countries, trains, advises and assists Afghan security forces. Richardson said Afghan and U.S. forces fought the Taliban for about 30 hours from Friday to Saturday near Kunduz city, during which Taliban militants maneuvered in and out of civilian homes. She said that after killing 94 Taliban insurgents, some U.S. and Afghan troops drove vehicles to a security checkpoint, where they were fired upon at close range. That was followed by Taliban fighters on either side of the checkpoint shooting at them. An airstrike was then conducted on a Taliban compound, one of a number that day, she said. Four Afghan soldiers died in the fight, a senior Afghan military official said. The Taliban said it had killed 19 members of Afghanistan’s security forces and five from foreign forces in Kunduz. Kunduz is also where two U.S. soldiers were killed in combat on Friday. The U.S. Defense Department identified the soldiers as Spec. Joseph Collette, 29, and Sgt. 1st Class Will Lindsay, 33. A record number of Afghan civilians were killed last year as aerial attacks and suicide bombings increased, the United Nations said in a February report. Fighting has accelerated during a period of recurring peace talks. The latest negotiating round concluded this month with U.S. and Taliban officials citing progress toward ending the 17-year war.


World Digest: March 24, 2019

who seek East Jerusalem as capital of a future state. Most countries have embassies in Tel Aviv out of sensitivity over the contested city. — Associated Press IRAQ Parliament fires official over ferry's capsizing Iraq’s parliament voted Sunday to sack a provincial official after the sinking of a ferry in the Tigris river that killed nearly 100 people, the house’s deputy speaker said. Hassan al-Kaabi said the majority of the house’s 329 members voted to sack the governor of Nineveh province and his two deputies. Residents of Mosul had demanded Nofal al-Akoub’s firing. The ferry, loaded with vacationers celebrating the Kurdish and Persian new year, sank Thursday. Police official Mazen Abdullah said 97 people were killed and 67 remain missing. Abdullah said 55 were rescued. Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi has ordered an investigation into the incident. — Associated Press KENYA Teacher who helped poor gets $1 million A Kenyan teacher from a remote village who gave away most of his earnings to the poor received a $1 million prize on Sunday for his work teaching in a government-run school that has just one computer and shoddy Internet access. The annual Global Teacher Prize was awarded to Peter Tabichi in Dubai. Tabichi teaches science to high schoolers in the semiarid village of Pwani, where almost a third of the children are orphans or have only one parent. Drought and famine are common. He said the school has no library and no laboratory. He plans to use the million dollars to improve the school and feed the poor. Despite the obstacles Tabichi’s students face, he’s credited with helping many stay in school, qualify for international competitions in science and engineering, and go on to college. Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta said Tabichi’s story “is the story of Africa” and of hope for future generations. As a member of the Roman Catholic brotherhood, Tabichi wore a plain, floor-length brown robe to receive the award. The prize is awarded by the Varkey Foundation, whose founder, Sunny Varkey, established the for-profit GEMS Education company, which runs 55 schools in the United Arab Emirates, Egypt and Qatar. Now in its fifth year, the prize is the largest of its kind. Tabichi was selected out of about 10,000 applicants. — Associated Press Death toll in Mali massacre up to 134, U.N. says Erdogan says Turkey will take issue of Golan Heights to U.N.: — From news services


National Digest: Pentagon identifies 2 soldiers killed in Afghanistan

WASHINGTON Pentagon identifies 2 killed in Afghanistan The Pentagon has identified two U.S. soldiers killed in Afghanistan while involved in combat operations Friday in Kunduz province. The men were identified Saturday as Spc. Joseph P. Collette, 29, of Lancaster, Ohio; and Sgt. 1st Class Will D. Lindsay, 33, of Cortez, Colo. Collette was assigned to the 242nd Ordnance Battalion, 71st Explosive Ordnance Disposal Group, and Lindsay was assigned to 2nd Battalion, 10th Special Forces Group (Airborne). Both were based at Fort Carson, Colo. — Associated Press PENNSYLVANIA Demonstrations follow acquittal in shooting The father of a slain black teenager pleaded for peace in Pittsburgh on Saturday after the acquittal of a white police officer touched off protests in Pittsburgh and bullets were fired at the defense attorney’s office. The verdict late Friday in the shooting of Antwon Rose II, 17, angered his family and civic leaders. Hundreds of people gathered Saturday afternoon in the Hill District neighborhood. “It’s very painful to see what happened, to sit there and deal with it,” Rose’s father, Antwon Rose Sr., told the crowd. “I just don’t want it to happen to our city no more.” The crowd marched through downtown Pittsburgh and other neighborhoods, periodically blocking streets as they chanted, “Who did this? Police did this!” Police reported no immediate arrests or injuries. Early Friday, five to eight shots were fired into the building where the officer’s attorney, Patrick Thomassey, works, police said. No one was hurt. Former East Pittsburgh police officer Michael Rosfeld was charged with homicide in the shooting of Rose as the unarmed teen fled a traffic stop in June. Rosfeld testified that he thought Rose or another suspect was pointing a gun at him. — Associated Press Off-duty officer fatally shot in Chicago: — From news services


Europe says it’s prepared for a ‘no-deal’ Brexit. Britain can’t say the same.

prepared for it,” the commission’s statement said. It also noted that, since December 2017, the European Commission “has published 90 preparedness notices, 3 Commission Communications, and has made 19 legislative proposals.” Contingency measures on matters ranging from fishing rights to rail and road connectivity to climate policy have been put in place. Why is there seemingly more preparedness in the European Commission than there is from the country that decided on Brexit in the first place? “The 27 E.U. member states are doing their own contingency planning, with visits by Commission officials . . . The U.K., which will be the most directly affected in political and economic terms by no-deal, is undertaking its own planning,” Amanda Sloat, a senior fellow in the Center on the United States and Europe at Brookings, wrote in an email. That isn’t to say that the European Union is actually fully prepared. “How can you fully prepare . . . for something you have no historical understanding of doing?” Heather Conley, director of the Europe Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, asked. In addition, this E.U. Commission is coming to an end. Soon there will be new commissioners and a new financial framework. Still, she said, the commission has been “doing what it can.” And Britain, to be clear, has also spent millions in trying to prepare. “The UK began some planning after the 2016 referendum, with efforts increasing in summer 2018. In recent weeks, the pace has significantly increased with many civil servants redirected from their day jobs to no-deal planning,” wrote Sloat. Still, the European Union appears to be more prepared for that for which they cannot prepare than Britain. “The E.U. is clearly more prepared for a no-deal outcome, with planning underway since December 2017 and the rolling publication of detailed contingency measures,” added Sloat, formerly deputy assistant secretary for Southern Europe and Eastern Mediterranean Affairs in the Obama administration’s State Department. “Although the E.U. had fewer issues to address, it was more realistic about a potential no-deal outcome and has made the necessary preparations.” Just over a week ago, Parliament rejected a no-deal Brexit, even though, in reality, unless Parliament votes for a deal, which it has not done, the country will be left with a no-deal Brexit. There’s also an additional complication in that, with no government in Northern Ireland, May admitted in Parliament on Monday


Once again, female giant panda shows signs that breeding time approaches

The road to panda pregnancy is long and arduous, but at the National Zoo, Mei Xiang has apparently embarked once again on the journey. On March 15, the zoo said last week, she “started exhibiting behavioral signs that breeding season is approaching! “ Analysis of hormones in her urine confirmed that changes in her behavior were due to rising levels of estrogen, the zoo said. That, according to the zoo, indicated the breeding season for pandas would soon be here. She has been “much more active,” the zoo said, describing her as eager to play, and engaging in scent-marking around her living quarters. Scent-marking, it seems is one of the things you do if you are a female giant panda interested in attracting the attentions of a male. Adult pandas, the zoo said, are solitary animals. This means they do not hang out together outside of breeding season. So, the zoo said, a scent mark helps make it possible for the animals to locate each other in the brief time available for breeding. The breeding window, the zoo said, can be as short as 24 hours. On the upside, it stretches to 72. So far, the zoo said, the male panda, named Tian Tian, has shown great interest in Mei Xiang. But she has indicated, the zoo said, that she is not yet ready. Such natural handicaps have helped to make reproduction a challenge for the giant panda. Many setbacks have been encountered on the path to expanding the panda population. Since 2000 when the adult pair arrived here, the number of surviving cubs stands at three. Correction: This story was updated to reflect that three cubs survive since 2000, not two. Martin.Weil@washpost.com


Today’s bulk-bin aisle is more than oats and trail mix. Here’s how to make the most of it.

You don’t have to be a zero-waste social influencer to tap into what is happening in today’s bulk-bin aisle. It may well be the most dynamic place to buy much of what you need to live well — or at least with a nod to sustainability. What was once the destination for a small number of environmentally conscious souls now draws customers shopping for economic, cultural, medicinal and even political reasons, says Kenneth Yates, a manager at the Takoma Park-Silver Spring Co-op, not far from the D.C.-Maryland border. Oats, dried beans and trail mix have filled the scoop and gravity bins for decades. But they now share display space with bulk offerings of shampoo and laundry detergents, spices and wellness herbs, teas and coffee beans, oils and vinegars, liquid sweeteners and edible insects, in several flavors. There’s a difference between “bulk” and “bulky,” so do not be put off by the term. Bulk bins afford the opportunity to acquire items great and small. You will often pay less per pound for the same foodstuffs packaged elsewhere in the store, and you can save money by purchasing just the amount you need. Stores committed to reducing food waste, such as Dawson’s Market in Rockville, even give their employees 25-cent bin deals on bruised produce and nearly expired items. The “aisle” extends to shopping in bulk online, which is not the same thing as, say, loading up on dual-bag cereal boxes via Costco.com. Oregon-based Azure Standard ships fresh and shelf-stable foods directly to consumers nationwide, and in some parts of the country its trucks deliver to locations for customer pickup, which saves on shipping costs, especially for heavy goods. The more you buy in bulk via Azure, the lower the price per pound goes. A five-pound order of rolled oats costs $1.03 per pound, which drops to 67 cents for a 25-pound order. (The company is so committed to zero waste that it uses packing boxes obtained free — ones misprinted by other companies.) Frontier Co-op You might wonder, if bulk bin is such a win-win for sustainability and household food budgets, why haven’t we seen it flourish in all supermarkets? One reason might be the fallout from concerns about food safety. In The Post Food section’s 1983 story on FDA guidelines for bulk-food retail sales, there were tales of shoppers’ hands dipping into bins for sampling and worries that enforcement from


The Orioles enter a full-scale rebuild. The city of Baltimore needs it to succeed.

manager Mike Elias and manager Brandon Hyde. This rebuilt front office arrived with a mandate to install a new-age, analytics-heavy philosophy throughout the organization, something Elias brought with him from the Houston Astros after helping General Manager Jeff Luhnow build a last-place team into the 2017 World Series champion. If Elias and assistant general manager for analytics Sig Mejdal succeed in turning the Orioles into an AL East power over the next several years, there might be a lesson in that for the city. There comes a time when the same old ideas stop working and need to be replaced with new ones. In both cases, real change requires imagination, time and patience. John and Louis Angelos, who have taken over the leadership of the franchise from their ailing father, owner Peter Angelos, appear ready to provide the time and patience. There are never going to be guarantees in a sport in which the richest teams have a clear competitive advantage, but this appears to be the Orioles’ best chance of competing with the New York Yankees and Boston Red Sox year in and year out. Don’t expect a lot of specifics from the people who designed the program, but it was clear this spring that even the least experienced players in camp recognize they need to adapt to digesting a large new body of knowledge going forward. That doesn’t mean all the old baseball principles and coaching techniques have become irrelevant. It’s still a game that requires the same physical tools, but the pitchers are already seeing the benefit of better pitch sequencing and defensive positioning, and the hitters are getting more detailed information to help them with pitch recognition and selection. Nobody is fantasizing that all this is going to turn a 115-loss team into a pennant contender this year, but when you’ve got a roster full of kids, it’s okay to take a few baby steps. What’s important now is projecting a sense that the Orioles have changed the subject and are moving in the right direction again. If they can do that and provide a fresh young team that’s fun to watch, it will create new hope, lure back some disaffected fans and pump more life into the area around the ballpark. That will be good for the team. It will be good for the city. It will be good for everyone. — The Baltimore Sun


Michael Tilson Thomas shook up the San Francisco Symphony. So why such standard pieces for their victory lap?

my face; I will readily confess that of all the chestnuts in the repertoire, these are two I happen to enjoy. Yet I was also left wondering: What exactly is the San Francisco Symphony trying to show? Touring is a huge, expensive proposition these days. Is the real statement you want to make about your supposedly innovative music director that he can lead programs of standard repertoire with assurance? (Some other cities got a second program featuring the Mendelssohn concerto and the Sibelius second symphony — equally staid fare.) Tilson Thomas’s own piece, “Agnegram,” written for the 90th birthday of longtime donor Agnes Albert, was an affectionate tribute, interleaved with quotes from other pieces and whipping the orchestra into a Bernsteinian lather. It was a fun amuse-bouche; it was not intended as a significant statement of the new. MTT, of course, doesn’t need a tour to burnish his legacy. For one thing, he’s remaining active in San Francisco and at the New World Symphony in Florida, the training orchestra he co-founded 32 years ago, even after he steps down. For another, he has plenty of outlets, such as a Perspectives series at Carnegie Hall this season that is showing a more complete picture of him, from many angles — with the Vienna Philharmonic, with the New World Symphony, with pianist Yuja Wang playing one of his works. Is it even fair to be critical of such a nice concert? The orchestra played with clarity and precision, emphasized by Tilson Thomas’s occasional use, in the Beethoven, of different numbers of string desks to underline the desired effect — balancing solo winds with fewer strings; using more when power was wanted. (Tilson Thomas specifically mentioned this to me in an interview before the concert, and I wish program notes more often reflected what the musicians were actually thinking about in a given evening. The program notes in this case were by Michael Steinberg, who died in 2009, and they were good; but I’m sure Saturday’s audience would have been all the more intrigued to hear about MTT’s own goals for the evening.) Thomas led a dancing, lithe Mozart and vivid “Eroica,” particularly the first movement. I can’t criticize an orchestra for playing well. But somehow, the evening, topped off with the encore of Brahms’s 10th Hungarian Dance in F, left me feeling I’d eaten a marvelous dessert, delicious but ultimately insubstantial. anne.midgette@washpost.com


My mom was right: Eat your broccoli

was good for you? Or, say, garlic? To hear her tell it, garlic was “Russian penicillin.” It helped prevent colds. In 2012, researchers at St. Joseph Family Medicine Residency in Mishawaka, Indiana, did a study that found — you guessed it — garlic helped prevent colds. Tomatoes and beets were good for the blood, she said, and carrots could improve your eye sight. In 1998, two researchers at the University of Toronto reported that lycopene found in tomatoes could prevent cancer. And in other studies, beets and carrots also did as advertised. Where did mom’s insights come from? Her mother — and her grandmother before that, and on back to the family roots in West Africa. “African people were more plant-based than animal eaters,” said Danni McGhee, a plant-based nutrition coach, vegan chef and author of the book, “Ready to Go Vegan?,” a guide for transitioning to an affordable plant-based diet. “As enslaved peoples, they brought that tradition with them to the Americas. My folks are from Jamaica, so for most of their childhood they grew their own food and lived off the land, which is something our ancestors always did.” McGhee, owns a D.C.-based nutrition education company, Dam Good Vegan (the name derives from her initials, Danni Adrienne McGhee). In her work, she has seen some encouraging changes. “Just in Washington, D.C., more people are getting connected with what I call their indigenous roots,” she said. “So many urban farms are cropping up, and a lot of people are growing their own foods when the weather permits.” I had lost that tradition to a microwave lifestyle. Eschewing mom’s admonition to eat my fruits and vegetables, that an “apple a day keeps the doctor away,” I’d opted for a processed food-based diet. Junk food. Fast food. Fake food. Food made from animals pumped up with hormones to make them grow faster. I grew faster, too. Ballooned up this past winter while guzzling eggnog and holiday cakes. I was oblivious to all the estrogen that gets into cow milk. The next thing I know, I’m getting man boobs. Desperate to reverse the damage, I wrote a column last year asking for a tasty broccoli recipe. Readers responded with the most creative concoctions. The only problem was they all contained broccoli. But thank you anyway. I also heard from Gwyn Whittaker, owner of GreenFare Organic Cafe in Herndon. She claimed to have


Chemical that EPA allows to help clean up oil spills sickens people and fish, lawsuit claims

Kindra Arnesen’s fishing boats are still parked near Venice, La., but she left years ago. Her family was driven out by the toxic odor from a chemical dispersant sprayed in the Gulf of Mexico to break up oil from the massive 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon spill. Before they fled, her husband experienced respiratory problems. Her daughter broke out in rashes. Arnesen, 41, had headaches and other skin problems. “We live in the middle of an oil field,” she said, referring to the thousands of oil platforms in the gulf. Oil continues to seep a few miles off Venice from a Taylor Energy operation destroyed during a hurricane nearly 15 years ago. “People don’t realize how many spills we have here.” Fearing the next spill, Arnesen joined a lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency, claiming that the agency has allowed 25 years to go by without updating the National Contingency Plan to respond to oil spills. On Monday, the University of California at Berkeley Environmental Law Center issued the agency a 60-day intent to sue notice on behalf of several groups and individuals “for failure to perform a non-discretionary duty” under the Clean Water Act. In the absence of an update, the EPA has continued to allow emergency responders to use a chemical mixture called Corexit to disperse oil into droplets that allow microbes to further break it down, the groups say. About 20 percent of nearly 5,000 Coast Guard personnel who responded to the BP spill and were exposed to the toxin reported persistent coughing. Others experienced wheezing and trouble breathing, according to a 2018 study commissioned by the National Institutes of Health. “The combination of both oil and oil dispersants presented associations that were much greater in magnitude than oil alone for coughing, shortness of breath and wheezing,” the report said. A Louisiana State University study two years prior reported a similar finding: that symptoms from exposure resulted in “burning in nose, throat or lungs, sore throat, dizziness and wheezing." That was evident during the Deepwater Horizon cleanup efforts, when “dispersants and oil combined to form droplets of chemical enhanced oil that is more deadly than oil alone to people,” said Riki Ott, the marine toxicology director for Alert, a project of Earth Island Institute, one of five plaintiffs in the suit. The other plaintiffs come from Alaska, where the Trump administration is pushing to open up the Arctic


Mysterious group claims responsibility for brazen raid on North Korean Embassy

A revolutionary group that infiltrated North Korea’s Embassy in Madrid last month, tied up staff and escaped with computers and other items claimed responsibility for the brazen raid Tuesday in a statement on its website. The group, Free Joseon, which calls for the overthrow of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, said it shared information it obtained with the FBI and characterized it as having “enormous potential value.” “This information was shared voluntarily and on their request, not our own,” said the group, referring to its meeting with the FBI. The group’s claim of responsibility came after a judge in Spain lifted a secrecy order in the case Tuesday and accused an American, a Mexican and a South Korean of participating in the mysterious incident as a part of a 10-member group. The involvement of Free Joseon in the raid was first reported by The Washington Post two weeks ago. The judge, Jose de la Mata, said evidence of various crimes had been found, including trespassing, threats, illegal detentions and burglary committed by a “criminal organization.” The judge said one of the men later shared material stolen from the embassy with the FBI. When asked whether the FBI shared information about its meeting with the group with Spanish authorities, a spokeswoman for the FBI declined to comment directly, saying only that the bureau “enjoys a strong working relationship with our Spanish law enforcement partners that centers on information-sharing and regular cooperation around matters of mutual assistance.” The judge believes the assailants fled to the United States, according to a report by the Reuters news agency, and intends to request their extradition to Spain, where they could face a maximum of 28 years in prison. When asked about a potential extradition of the assailants, Justice Department spokeswoman Nicole Navas Oxman said the department “does not publicly comment on correspondence with foreign governments on extradition matters.” The statement by Free Joseon, also known as the Cheollima Civil Defense group, pushed back against Spanish media reports that the group beat and gagged embassy staff. “All occupants in the embassy were treated with dignity and necessary caution,” the group wrote. It also claimed that “no other governments” were aware of the raid until after it occurred. Initial media reports in Spain alleged that the CIA was involved. State Department spokesman Robert J. Palladino said Tuesday that the U.S. government “had nothing to do with”


The 10 best taco shops in the D.C. area

Would you drive out of your way for a good taco? This is a question I’ve been turning over in my head for days, debating the pros and cons and examining the inherent bias buried in the inquiry itself. I mean, why wouldn’t you make a special trip for good tacos? I can hear the usual discouraging words rush into my brain like dirty floodwaters: Because I can get good tacos anywhere. Why should I waste $10 in gas on $3 tacos? Taquerias are not Michelin-starred restaurants The older I get, the more these lines sound like prejudices, a form of casual racism that’s deeply ingrained and not thoroughly vetted. These words sound like the excuses the privileged use to justify their disregard for a cuisine when it’s not convenient for them. You say you love tacos, but what are you willing to sacrifice for a good one? Your time? Your comfort? The small risk here, of course, is that you might waste an afternoon on something that you ultimately deem a mediocre experience, or one that made you feel like a stranger in your own country. To which I’d say: There is value in that, too. There is value in the very decision to make a destination of another culture’s food. There is value in experiencing America how so many others do, as outsiders looking in. There is value in stretching your boundaries. Each of these 10 taquerias may stretch your boundaries. They certainly stretched mine — at least the act of picking my favorites did. It strained my loyalties to old standbys and forced me to question whether I prefer tradition or modernity. (I side with the former.) This is, without question, the single hardest list I’ve ever compiled. Good taco shops were left off this Top 10, places I deeply respect and enjoy. Then there were the ones that slipped through my fingers, like a place in Germantown, Md., called El Chilango Mexican Grill. El Chilango was recommended by a taco hound on Twitter, who forwarded a photo of the shop’s al pastor tower, which stands erect next to an open flame, its marinated pork glistening for the camera. This looked like al pastor perfection, and I couldn’t drive to Germantown fast enough to try it. But when I arrived at the designated location, there was nothing but dark, silent storefronts and an empty parking lot. I


Pentagon announces $1 billion transfer for border barriers, angering Democrats

money for projects in support of those troops. Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr., Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said his office is analyzing the projects the Department of Homeland Security has asked the Pentagon to complete under that law to decide whether they would in fact support forces deployed to the southwest border. Shanahan will then issue a determination on that matter once the analysis is complete. Shanahan is widely expected to agree that the projects support the troops so as to follow the letter of the law and allow Trump to take military construction funding for the wall. Meanwhile, questions emerged at a Senate Arms Services Committee hearing Tuesday about the $1 billion the Pentagon said it would be moving from Army personnel funds into the counterdrug-account to fund the wall. Sen. Jack Reed (R.I.), the top Democrat on the committee and a former Army officer, said the Army has a $2.3 billion unfunded priority list for fiscal 2020 that comprises projects for which the service does not have money. Army Secretary Mark T. Esper responded that the money has been reprogrammed from the Army’s military personnel account after it could not find enough soldiers to meet its planned number of recruits. “In a sense, you are forgoing at least the immediate use of those funds for military purposes like aviation readiness, is that correct?” Reed asked. “The needs always exceed the means, so yes, we could have used that money as the other services to continue to approve our readiness,” Esper said. Reed said the Army also has identified more than $500 million in unfunded infrastructure projects, and asked how detrimental it would be to readiness if they are not completed. “Senator, we need to see what projects will be teed up for repurposing, and I think that once we see those initial requests, we can better see what the impact will be,” Esper said. In the same hearing, Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.) pressed Esper and Army Gen. Mark Milley, who has been selected to be Trump’s next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, saying it appears that the administration is pulling an “end-around” by reprogramming money from the Army to the Pentagon’s counterdrug fund, which in turn will be used to fund the wall. “How is the southern border a greater priority for the Army than readiness and modernization?” he asked. Esper said that


Parliament to exert control over Brexit with ‘indicative votes’

LONDON — With Prime Minister Theresa May struggling to get support for her unloved Brexit deal, Parliament is seeking to exert influence over the Brexit process and break the political deadlock. Lawmakers scheduled several “indicative votes” for Wednesday, designed to assess which way Parliament wants to go and whether there’s a Brexit Plan B or C or D that could command a majority. Critics called it an unprecedented power grab, because the prime minister and her government traditionally control the agenda. But the votes are nonbinding and only express the will of the House of Commons. “Clearly, it’s incumbent on the government to listen to what the Commons says,” Health Secretary Matt Hancock told the BBC. “But we can’t pre-commit to following whatever they vote for, because they might vote for something that is completely impractical.” He added that “the best way through this impasse is the one deal that’s been negotiated with the E.U.” May, for her part, has objected that the planned votes “overturn the balance of our democratic institutions.” She noted, too, that the proposals that might be debated — such as a softer Brexit and a Canada-style free trade agreement — have nothing to do with the withdrawal treaty on offer, which is narrowly focused on how Britain leaves the trading bloc and not on the future relationship with Europe. That comes later. A survey published Tuesday suggested that more than 80 percent of Britons think the government has handled Brexit negotiations badly. It also suggested that 55 percent would now vote to remain in the European Union. Britain voted to leave by 52 percent to 48 percent in the June 2016 referendum. Rumors are swirling that May could announce her departure date in the hopes of winning over skeptical Brexiteers who would prefer another prime minister to lead the next phrase of Brexit talks. Or she could call a general election. Or May could plow on — as she is wont to do — and continue trying to win support for her twice-defeated Brexit deal. But she has clearly lost some control over Brexit machinery. On Monday, Parliament voted 329 to 302 to assess support for its own Brexit proposals. May’s dwindling authority took a further hit when 30 members of her Conservative Party rebelled to vote against the government, including three ministers who resigned from their posts. In a resignation letter published on Tuesday,


Trump confused everyone by canceling North Korea sanctions. The explanation may have been a coverup.

along with it. It also relies on the great deference that the U.S. legal system pays to the administration’s decisions about sanctions. When the administration says sanctions are in the security interests of the United States, American courts are likely to heed it. These limits are becoming increasingly clear as the Trump administration tests them. On the one hand, the administration is increasingly unwilling to listen to its allies about sanctions policy. It effectively forced SWIFT — a Belgium-based consortium — to adhere to the U.S. position on Iran, despite the strong opposition of European states. It is also changing its approach to Cuba sanctions in ways that may — if it continues on the current path — have massive repercussions for European firms. This is leading to increasingly organized opposition from America’s European allies, as well as traditional rivals and adversaries such as China and Russia. The Trump administration is also seeing increasing challenges to its sanctions decisions in U.S. courts. The energy giant ExxonMobil is suing the Treasury Department over a sanctions decision punishing it for its dealings with the Russian oil company Rosneft, while the Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska announced a lawsuit over sanctions this month. Finally, the OFAC is also seeing significant staff losses as personnel defect to the private sector. Administration inconsistency is undermining its approach to sanctions Trump’s apparent turnabout is only the most recent example of U.S. inconsistency on sanctions. Last year, the president watered down sanctions against Chinese tech company ZTE, apparently as a bargaining chip in trade negotiations. Adam Segal of the Council on Foreign Relations described this as a “flabbergasting” decision. Trump’s ambassador to Russia was willing to share a platform with a sanctioned Russian oligarch. White House press secretary Sarah Sanders’s reasoned defense of last week’s U-turn was that “President Trump likes Chairman Kim and he doesn’t think these sanctions will be necessary.” This inconsistency is damaging Washington’s ability to get U.S. allies to respect its sanctions and related policies overseas. European diplomats say in private that one of the reasons European states have not signed onto the effective U.S. embargo against telecommunications equipment made by China’s Huawei Technologies is that they do not know whether the administration will maintain it. They fear that if they change their policies and laws in response to U.S. pressure, Trump may just decide on the spur of the moment to change U.S.