D.C. news in brief

‘Do More 24’ online fundraiser is today Do More 24, a 24-hour online campaign, started early Thursday and ends at midnight. Hosted by the United Way of the National Capital Area, the event allows the public to make online contributions to more than 500 nonprofit groups serving the District, Northern Virginia, and Montgomery and Prince George’s counties. A wide variety of social service, environmental and arts organizations are among the participating groups, including the Capital Area Food Bank, the Women’s Center, the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Studio Theatre, the SPCA, Habitat for Humanity and the Homeless Children’s Playtime Project. Last year, the inaugural Do More 24 event raised $1.3 million for area nonprofit groups in one day. To donate, visit www.domore24.org anytime Thursday. For information, call 202-488-2009. Meetings planned on Rock Creek Park The Rock Creek Conservancy is having the first two public meetings on the future of Rock Creek Park, from 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Saturday at Mount Pleasant Neighborhood Library, 3160 16th St. NW, and June 28 at Chevy Chase Library, 5625 Connecticut Ave. NW. The nonprofit conservancy works closely with the National Park Service to protect and maintain accessibility to the park. The discussion topics include public access, historic buildings and landscapes, programming and recreation, and the environment, with a focus on the watershed and invasive species. Next year will mark the 125th anniversary of Rock Creek Park. For information, go to www.rockcreekconservancy.org. Permitting for athletic fields through June 27 The D.C. Department of Parks and Recreation is approving permits for its athletic fields and gyms during the fall (Aug. 23 to Nov. 30) and winter (Dec. 1 to March 20) seasons. The window to apply for fall and winter permits ends June 27. Parks and Recreation issues permits with the following order of preference: DPR programs, D.C. public schools and public charter schools, organizations that have an ongoing partnership agreement with the department, private youth leagues and teams, and private adult leagues. Requests received after the permit window has closed will be reviewed on a first-come, first-served basis. Grass fields will be unavailable beginning Nov. 21 and will reopen March 21. Artificial turf and indoor courts and gyms are available by permit year-round. Applicants will receive notifications the week of Aug. 4. For information, call 202-671-2597, e-mail dprpermits@dc.gov or go to www.dpr.dc.gov. Nominations sought for Mayor’s Arts Awards The D.C. Commission on the Arts and Humanities


Prince George’s County Animal Watch

PRINCE GEORGE’S COUNTY These were among cases received recently by the Prince George’s County Animal Management Division. Call 301-780-7200 for directions to the county animal shelter, hours of operation, and adoption and licensing procedures. The department Web site is www.princegeorgespets4us.com. Stray dog found in yard: Cat in a trap: Caged bird abandoned: Black snakes caught in netting: Annapolis pet adoption showcase: Upper Marlboro low-cost animal clinic: The Partnership for Animal Welfare — Compiled by Jillian S. Jarrett


Abu Khattala was an unlikely leader before Benghazi attacks — and a loner afterward

the more powerful militias had tried to rein in his movements and put him under their protection, said one former Benghazi fighter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of potential backlash. “His followers are shocked” by the news of his capture, the former fighter said from Benghazi. “They can’t believe it.” Abu Khattala is apparently in his early 40s; his exact age is unclear. Ali Soufan, a former FBI agent who tracks extremists, said Abu Khattala was born in 1973 in Benghazi. Soufan said that he comes from a middle-class Libyan family and that his father is a retired government employee. He has a brother who was born in 1975 and works in the medical field, Soufan said. Abu Khattala was arrested in about 1991 by the Gaddafi government for his involvement in Islamist militant activities in Benghazi. Soufan said Abu Khattala spent a long time at the Abu Salim prison in Tripoli. Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) and Mark Begich (D-Alaska) discuss the capture of the alleged ringleader of the 2012 Benghazi attacks and whether he should be tried and held in Guantanamo. He apparently was released in 2004 as part of an amnesty program sponsored by Saif al-Islam Gaddafi, the dictator’s son. After his release, Abu Khattala — a burly man — had started a small construction company in Benghazi, hiring local youths to help paint and build houses, a neighbor said. In 2012, he told reporters from the Reuters news agency that he did not attend college, had never left the country and was not married. “He was a quiet man, a mysterious man,” said the neighbor, who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retribution from Islamist militias there. Others who met Abu Khattala in Benghazi describe him as extremely serious and resolutely opposed to the efforts to build a democratic state. “Nobody in the neighborhood really knew him,” the neighbor said, adding that even he was unsure whether Abu Khattala was married. In 2011, a rebellion against Gaddafi began in the east of Libya, where Benghazi is located. Abu Khattala used his local network to collect money for food, clothes and even weapons for the fighters. Eventually, he took up arms himself. He started a small Islamist militia called Obeida ibn al-Jarrah and later came to ally himself with Ansar al-Sharia, although militia leaders here say


ULA chief accuses Elon Musk’s SpaceX of trying to “cut corners”

After weeks of taunts by Elon Musk’s spunky space start-up, the nation’s most established rocket launch company is finally pushing back. In a meeting with reporters Wednesday, Michael Gass, the head of United Launch Alliance, met critics’ questions about its reliance on Russian-made engines head on, saying it would begin to develop its own engine in conjunction with several other firms. And he targeted Musk’s SpaceX, saying it was trying to “cut corners” and taking a “dangerous approach” to entering the national security launch business. The counterattack by ULA, which is made up of defense giants Lockheed Martin and Boeing, includes a media campaign designed to showcase the firm’s long-held dominance in the field of space flight and highlight what it calls “results over rhetoric.” “The whole tenor of the campaign is to make perfectly clear that there is a lot at stake when it comes to successful space launches — literally lives are at stake,” Gass said. “We also want to make clear that there is a big distinction between a company that has a 100-year combined heritage in successfully delivering satellites into orbit and a company that is not yet even certified to conduct one [national security] launch.” In April, SpaceX sued the federal government, protesting the award of a multibillion-dollar contract to launch defense payloads, such as satellites. Musk has repeatedly said that the contract, which was awarded to ULA on a sole-source basis, should be canceled and that SpaceX should be allowed to compete. Since then, he trumpeted his company’s ability to provide the launches more cheaply and has repeatedly mocked ULA for using the Russian-made RD-180 engine in some of its rockets at a time of heightened tension between the United States and Russia. At an appearance at the Newseum last week, Musk said that “Lockheed and Boeing are used to stomping on new companies, and they certainly tried to stomp on us. . . . We’re certainly a small up-and-comer going against giants.” Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin has said he would prohibit the export of the Russian-made engine for uses in U.S. military launches. But Gass said there has been no disruption in supply and that he expected orders to continue to be filled. Two engines are scheduled to be delivered in August, he said, and three more in October. ULA is also capable of eventually building the engine domestically, Gass said.


Chaos in Iraq prompts soul-searching among military veterans

Department official during the last years of the George W. Bush administration. Officers in the early days of the war were slow to recognize that they were fighting an insurgency. U.S. troops often alienated the Iraqi people with heavy-handed tactics and struggled to develop effective Iraqi security forces. Cohen is among those who believe that Iraq was on a “fragile trajectory toward success” before the U.S. withdrawal. In recent days, he said, he has detected “real anger at the Obama administration” among senior members of the military for not pressing the Iraqis harder to accept a long-term U.S. presence. But he worried that the military’s impulse to blame Iraq’s problems on Obama or Iraqi political leaders would prevent the Army from undertaking a “sober institutional stock-taking” of its own failures. “Actually, the Army is doing a much worse job of taking a hard look at itself than it did after Vietnam,” Cohen said. The military’s post-Vietnam narrative, which pinned the blame for its loss on the Johnson administration, largely absolved the Army of its own mistakes during the Vietnam War. This view held for years and eventually gave rise to a muscular U.S. military force that smashed Hussein’s forces in two conflicts but was ill-prepared for long guerrilla wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Today, most Iraq war veterans feel tremendous pride in their service, mixed with a deep cynicism regarding the Iraq war’s goals and its outcome. A Washington Post poll of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans taken a few months before the recent chaos found that only 44 percent believed the Iraq war had been worth fighting. Nearly 90 percent, though, said they would volunteer to serve again. Those somewhat contradictory feelings have grown more intense in recent days. As the president weighed his military options in Iraq, Col. Steve Miska, who spent 40 months in the country, called his brother, who is also a veteran of multiple Iraqi tours. The war had consumed much of the two brothers’ lives since the 2003 invasion. Now the two career soldiers — one an officer, the other a sergeant major —were on the verge of retirement. “What a mess,” Miska texted his brother as ISIS troops pressed towards Baghdad last week. “Hopefully all our guys that gave their lives didn’t do it for nothing,” his brother replied. The two then spoke on the phone. Miska insisted that their service — especially during


loss on the Johnson administration, largely absolved the Army of its own mistakes during the Vietnam War. This view held for years and eventually gave rise to a muscular U.S. military force that smashed Hussein’s forces in two conflicts but was ill-prepared for long guerrilla wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Today, most Iraq war veterans feel tremendous pride in their service, mixed with a deep cynicism regarding the Iraq war’s goals and its outcome. A Washington Post poll of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans taken a few months before the recent chaos found that only 44 percent believed the Iraq war had been worth fighting. Nearly 90 percent, though, said they would volunteer to serve again. Those somewhat contradictory feelings have grown more intense in recent days. As the president weighed his military options in Iraq, Col. Steve Miska, who spent 40 months in the country, called his brother, who is also a veteran of multiple Iraqi tours. The war had consumed much of the two brothers’ lives since the 2003 invasion. Now the two career soldiers — one an officer, the other a sergeant major —were on the verge of retirement. “What a mess,” Miska texted his brother as ISIS troops pressed towards Baghdad last week. “Hopefully all our guys that gave their lives didn’t do it for nothing,” his brother replied. The two then spoke on the phone. Miska insisted that their service — especially during the 2007 surge — had made a difference in Iraq. At that point in the war, Sunni and Shiite death squads had taken hold of the capital. “I have no doubt that we helped stop a civil war,” Miska recalled telling his brother. “I have no doubt we saved thousands of Iraqi lives.” Miska returned to Iraq for the last time in 2009 to command a battalion of about 800 soldiers. By then, much of the fighting had subsided. His troops, who occupied a desert base south of Baghdad, were mostly bored. Miska left Iraq that last time hopeful that Iraq’s feuding Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds would take advantage of the period of relative calm to make the kinds of political compromises that would result in a lasting peace. For him, the current mess in Iraq defies any simple explanation. “I don’t think the military lost in Iraq,” Miska said. “We created a window of opportunity. It just didn’t break the Iraqis’ way.”


An elaborate rescue operation for a rare visitor in Northern Virginia: A wayward crane

offered him, and I was very concerned about that,” Burwell said. “And he wasn’t very afraid of us. . . . We were concerned that if we let him go here, he would find his way back to people.” Burwell and Nicole Hamilton, president of the Loudoun Wildlife Conservancy, began exhaustively researching sandhill cranes and their habitats, hoping to find a better place to continue Kevin’s rehabilitation and release him into the wild. The search lasted over a week, Hamilton said, until it became clear that they no longer had the luxury of time. The bird started eating even less, and his attempts to befriend his cage-mate, a turkey vulture, weren’t getting him anywhere. “We had to move faster,” Hamilton said. “When they get depressed, they typically don’t last long,” With the search kicked into high gear, Hamilton said her e-mails, listserv postings and calls eventually narrowed to focus on one particular recommendation: the Howell Conference and Nature Center in Howell, Mich. The Howell center’s staff said they would be happy to take the bird; they had several other cranes that were also being rehabilitated and prepared for release in a nearby area populated by wild cranes. The destination was confirmed. So was the mode of transport: Hamilton and her husband, Gil, a pilot, offered to personally deliver Kevin to his new home via a private flight in the couple’s four-seater Cessna airplane. On the morning of June 14, they loaded Kevin’s travel crate into the back of the plane and took off into clear skies. “We didn’t know what to expect; when we fly with our dog he just goes to sleep — but he’s a dog, and this was a bird,” Hamilton said. “We wondered what a bird would do at altitude flying in a plane.” But Kevin was a quiet passenger all the way to Michigan, Hamilton said, where staff from the Howell nature center were waiting at the airport. After his first few days in Michigan, wildlife rehabilitator Maxine Biwer said Kevin was happily bonding with his fellow birds and eating appropriate meals. “Cranes are quite social, and they seem to relax a lot more when they’re in a group,” Biwer said. “The plan is to keep the bird until it has shown that it is healthy, that it flies well, eats well. Then we can release it.” Burwell and Hamilton said Kevin was the first


BICEP2 scientists publish cosmic inflation paper hedging claim of gravitational waves

Center for Astrophysics. The scientists continue to believe that they’ve seen the signal of “cosmic inflation,” a sudden, exponential enlargement of the baby universe in the first moments after the big bang. But other scientists have pointed out that the BICEP2 team may have seriously underestimated the amount of foreground dust that could mimic the effects of dawn-of-time gravitational waves. Discoveries in our solar system and beyond. John Kovac, the leader of the BICEP2 team, has been traveling in Russia and said via e-mail: “I don’t think there are major new developments here, just the usual peer review revision process with typical additional detail and clarifications added. But we’ll see what others make of it.” The peer-reviewed paper modifies the bold conclusion of the original, non-peer-reviewed version that went online at the time of the news conference in March. The news conference electrified the science community, and there was much talk of a possible Nobel Prize. The theorists who came up with the theory of cosmic inflation were thrilled. The original paper concluded, “The long search for tensor B-modes is apparently over, and a new era of B-mode cosmology has begun.” The peer-reviewed, published paper hedges that statement significantly and elaborates on the uncertainties: “If the origin is in tensors, as favored by the evidence presented above, it heralds a new era of B-mode cosmology. However, if these B modes represent evidence of high-dust foreground, it reveals the scale of the challenges that lie ahead.” Many teams of astrophysicists are searching for the gravitational waves predicted by inflation theory. Some are using South Pole telescopes and others are operating high in the Andes. This quest is extraordinarily significant for theorists, because it speaks to the essential question of how the universe came into existence and why it has certain properties, such as the fact that it looks strikingly the same in all directions. Moreover, if correct, the observation of primordial gravitational waves would reveal much about gravity itself. Familiar though it may be, gravity remains an elusive phenomenon, and this result would seemingly demonstrate that gravity emerges from quantum mechanics. “The overarching theme here is that, out there at the frontier of discovery, it’s very foggy,” said University of Chicago cosmologist Michael Turner. “Maybe they got a little enthusiastic in their [original] paper, but none of the results have changed, maybe a few words in the presentation. Everybody knew that


New research brings claims of quantum computer maker into doubt

an advantage from adding quantumness. “It’s important to consider multiple kinds of benchmarks,” Hilton said. “The problem type used [by Troyer] is really not the right problem type.” The new findings are a far cry from previous test results, conducted by a consultant hired by D-Wave, which found that its machine was operating 3,600 times faster than a conventional algorithm. The results caused an initial wave of praise by the news media but was followed by a quick backlash of skepticism by quantum computing experts. “People started to realize it was just a meaningless comparison,” said MIT theoretical computer scientist Scott Aaronson, who was not involved in the study. “When you make the comparison fair, the performance advantage for D-Wave essentially evaporates.” He argues that the algorithms used by the consultant were far from ideal, in an effort to artificially hobble the PC and make D-Wave look more impressive. That’s when Troyer stepped in and decided to set up a fair-comparison experiment with his optimized code. He had been conversing with people from D-Wave and in December 2012 shared his not-so-favorable findings with the company. “They lost interest,” he said. Hilton thinks that the backlash from academic naysayers is “unfortunate” and that D-Wave’s continued success can only help the quantum computing field gain more popularity and funding. But experts remain unconvinced. Physicist Wim van Dam, who was not involved in the study, worries that D-Wave’s quick-and-dirty commercial approach — that may ultimately not work at all — could turn people off quantum computing for good. “I worry that people will equate the two, D-Wave and quantum computing,” said van Dam, a professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara. Aaronson concurs, although he notes that some of his academic colleagues agree with Hilton’s thoughts about D-Wave raising awareness of the field, despite some dubious claims. The attitude of “ ‘Just shut up, and there’s money in it for all of us’ — I can understand it, but I can’t sympathize with it,” he said. “That’s a very dangerous game for academic scientists to be playing.” Kim is a freelance science journalist based in Philadelphia. More from The Washington Post: Gallery: A new way to look at math Racing to build a quantum computer that cracks encryption D-Wave sold Google a quantum computer. Here’s how it works. What you’re seeing right now is a composite of images past and present


Chip-and-PIN cards, coming soon (hopefully) to a U.S. bank near you. You’ll need them.

we don’t. Chip-and-PIN, for the uninitiated, is the common name for the EMV smart card payment system used by credit, debit and ATM cards in Europe and most of the rest of the world. The systems authenticate your identity by means of a computer chip embedded in the card and a personal identification number, or PIN. Most American credit cards use an older credit card technology that relies on a magnetic strip to verify the customer, also referred to as swipe-and-sign. They’ve been slower to adopt the technology primarily because of price. It’s cheaper to write off the cost of the fraud resulting from the less secure credit card technology than to invest in the more secure chip-and-PIN systems. The United States is scheduled to begin broadly adopting chip technology next year. Until then, here’s what you need to know: Credit card problems are more frequent than your bank wants you to think. While an increasing number of banks offer chipped cards, only a few are actually worth carrying. And by the way, if you’re reading this story, you probably need one. I won’t make you scroll to the bottom to find out what happened to my family’s chip-and-PINless misadventure. I couldn’t open the van door because the toll booth blocked it, but my 11-year-old son, Aren, bravely slid the back door open and retrieved the card. And after I pushed a button to talk to a person, the gate simply went up and let us through. Turns out there are plenty of other travelers with plastic problems like mine. Matthew Reames, a PhD student in Charlottesville, Va., recently tried to use his American credit card to pay for his train fare in Copenhagen. The automated kiosks rejected the card because it didn’t have the chip-and-PIN feature. “I suppose my work-around would have been to go to an ATM and withdraw money,” he says. But he had a better solution: He tried his British ATM card, which worked. No one knows precisely how many American credit cards use chip-and-PIN technology, or how many of the cards are in circulation, but the number of U.S. cards that use the technology and are worth applying for can be counted on one hand — literally. Many chip cards carry foreign transaction fees of between 1 and 3 percent, “which really isn’t a worthwhile price to pay for convenience,” says Brian Karimzad, director of


Running concept through computer doesn’t merit patent

The Supreme Court was unanimous Thursday in ruling that simply implementing basic business concepts through the use of a computer is not enough to make such a method eligible for a patent. If it were, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote for the court, an applicant could stake a claim to “any principle of the physical or social sciences by reciting a computer system configured to implement the relevant concept.” The case, Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank , had drawn the attention of the nation’s biggest technology companies. Some, such as Microsoft and IBM, were concerned about the loss of existing patents. Others, including Google and Facebook, worried that business process patents are too easily awarded, thwart innovation and launch waves of unproductive litigation. But while the case was heralded as having the potential to affect hundreds of thousands of software patents, the justices continued their pattern of deciding patent cases narrowly and mostly restricted to the facts of specific cases. In the one at issue, the court said Australia-based Alice Corp. should not have received a patent for its computer-implemented process for mitigating the chances that one party in a financial transaction will not pay all it owes. Patents are awarded for inventing any “new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof.” But there are three exceptions: for “laws of nature, physical phenomena, and abstract ideas.” Alice came up with a computer-aided method to ensure that foreign currency transactions proceed smoothly and protect the parties. CLS developed a similar program. Thomas said that Alice’s method was an abstract idea that falls within the exceptions. Alice had not done enough to elevate the concept into something more, Thomas said. “The mere recitation of a generic computer cannot transform a patent-ineligible abstract idea into a patent-eligible invention,” Thomas wrote. The justices upheld a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, the specialized court that hears patent claims. While that court said Alice should not have received the patent, its judges split several ways on why. Reaction to the Supreme Court decision was subdued. Victoria Espinel, president and chief executive of BSA/The Software Alliance, praised the court for making clear that “real software inventions are patentable under U.S. law and that merely connecting an abstract idea to a computer doesn’t make it patentable.” But others said the court’s incremental and cautious


from the year earlier — the second-biggest increase since the two companies began issuing wealth reports with comparable data in 2000. Japan gained 425,000 millionaires — a rise of 22 percent, its biggest year-over-year increase since 2000. Japan’s was the largest percentage gain among the 25 countries with the most millionaires. A big reason for the jump in Japan was surging stocks. The Nikkei 225, the main stock index, rose 57 percent last year. By contrast, the Standard and Poor’s 500 rose nearly 30 percent. Japanese millionaires totaled 2.3 million, second only to the United States. The number of U.S. millionaires rose 570,000, 17 percent, to 4 million. — Associated Press Also in Business ● T-Mobile US announced plans to offer free seven-day iPhonetrials of its network. The carrier also announced a new music-streaming service in partnership with Rhapsody International and said that similar products like Spotify and Pandora Media will no longer count against the amount of gigabytes of high-speed data users pay for each month. ● Corinthian Colleges, a for-profit education company with about 75,000 students nationwide, warned that it may fail as it clashes with U.S. regulators over student data. Corinthian, which owns the Everest College, Heald College and WyoTech schools, said that the U.S. Department of Education has limited its access to federal funds after it failed to provide documents and other information to the agency. Shares in the company plunged 67 percent to 28 cents. ● Rolls-Royce said it will return $1.7 billion to shareholders instead of buying another company, a moved aimed at restoring investors’ confidence in the British aero-engine maker. The company’s shares climbed 7.4 percent after the announcement. The stock had lost 17 percent of its value over the past six months. Investors’ confidence in Rolls-Royce was shaken by an acquisition attempt followed by a profits warning earlier this year and an engine order cancellation. ● A U.S. judge said she had concerns about approving a $324.5 million settlement involving Apple, Google and two other tech companies in a lawsuit accusing them of conspiring to avoid poaching each other’s workers. U.S. District Judge Lucy Koh in San Jose, Calif., must approve the deal. “I just have concerns about whether this is really fair to the class,” Koh said at a court hearing, adding that she had not made a decision about whether to approve the deal. ● Shares of Markit rose as


World Digest: June 19, 2014

AFGHANISTAN NATO fuel trucks destroyed by Taliban Taliban suicide bombers struck NATO fuel trucks at a key border crossing between Afghanistan and Pakistan on Thursday, setting off blasts that destroyed dozens of trucks and triggering a gun battle with police guards that left all three attackers dead, officials said. The attack underscored the instability plaguing Afghanistan and the continuing danger to the U.S.-led mission in the country as combat forces prepare to withdraw by the end of the year. Western officials had hoped that a peaceful transfer of authority to a new president would help ease the transition, but allegations of fraud in the June 14 runoff vote have plunged the country into a new political crisis. Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid asserted responsibility for the attack in Nangahar province. A border police spokesman said 37 NATO trucks were destroyed in the assault. — Associated Press UGANDA U.S. cuts assistance over anti-gay law The United States on Thursday cut aid to Uganda, imposed visa restrictions and canceled a regional military exercise in response to a Ugandan law that imposes harsh penalties for homosexuality. The law, signed by President Yoweri Museveni in February, imposes jail terms of up to life for “aggravated homosexuality.” It also criminalizes lesbianism and makes it a crime to help individuals engage in homosexual acts. The White House said the United States will impose visa restrictions on Ugandans suspected of human rights violations, halt $2.4 million in funding for a Ugandan community policing program and reallocate $3 million in funding to another African country, which it did not name. It also canceled plans for a U.S.-sponsored military exercise in Uganda intended to include other East African countries. — Reuters EGYPT Brotherhood leader sentenced to death An Egyptian court on Thursday sentenced to death the top leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, along with 13 other members and supporters of the group, over violence last summer. The death sentence against Mohammed Badie, the Brotherhood’s “supreme guide,” is the second in less than three months. The case is rooted in deadly violence during protests that led to the July ouster of President Mohamed Morsi, a Brotherhood stalwart. In April, Badie was sentenced to death along with more than 680 others over violence in southern Egyptian. Meanwhile, former president Hosni Mubarak broke his leg at a Cairo military hospital where he is serving a three-year sentence in a graft case, a security


Five myths about organic food

periodically allowing land to lie fallow. But just because food is organic doesn’t mean its production and distribution are necessarily good for the environment. Consider a can of organic black beans from Bolivia, a bag of organic rice from China or a box of organic apricots from Armenia. Transporting such products to your neighborhood grocery store creates a carbon footprint much bigger than transporting locally grown products. Additionally, converting natural habitat to vast tracts of farmland can harm local flora and fauna. Coastline-preserving mangroves in Southeast Asia are ripped out, for example, to make space for palm-oil plantations, rice paddies and coconut farms. Organic food grown and produced in distant lands may also come to U.S. stores with a social cost. What are the working conditions for the farm laborers and factory employees who tend and process those products? And how fair are their wages? 4. Products labeled organic are inspected to guarantee their purity. Each apple or asparagus spear isn’t checked for its organic veracity, nor is every container filled with processed food and labeled organic approved before it’s stocked on market shelves. Such meticulous diligence would be impractical and inefficient. The inspection process The official USDA certificates guaranteeing that a product is organic are relatively easy to forge. And because the organic rules are designed for larger-scale commercial operations, mom-and-pop farmstands may be exempt from inspections if they yield no more than $5,000 a year in sales. So, whether food really meets organic standards is more a matter of trusting purveyors than trusting the organic label. 5. Imported products labeled as organic meet U.S. standards. Food labeled USDA Organic that originates outside the United States is supposed to meet U.S. standards. But the same potential problems confronting domestic certification are exacerbated when food is imported. Employees of the third-party certifiers rarely travel overseas to make inspections. Instead, the certifiers contract with local firms operating in the source countries. Such an extended bureaucratic chain increases the opportunities for fraud and lax enforcement, especially when food is imported from places rife with corruption, such as Ukraine and Kazakhstan. Food that does not meet U.S. organic standards can also be shipped through third countries with loose regulatory enforcement. Italian authorities point to Malta as a transit point where paperwork is laundered to mark conventional food as organic. Though sometimes impractical, the best guide when shopping for organic food is: Think globally,


Summer is the perfect time to spy dragonflies

sneak up on a dragonfly. Local naturalist and educator Kevin Munroe said that if your eyes were proportionately as big as a dragonfly’s, they would “touch the top of your head, under your chin and stretch past your ears.” Imagine what you could see! Each of a dragonfly’s four wings moves independently of the others. This allows the insect to hover like a helicopter, or move forward, backward and side to side to catch its food in flight and to escape such predators as birds or frogs. It can fly upside down, too! Notice how transparent the wings are: They look so delicate but are very powerful. They beat about 50 times a second. Some dragonflies zip along at 40 miles per hour! You’ll often see dragonfly symbols on Native American pottery or jewelry because the insect signifies speed and action to some people. On the front edges of the wings, near the tips, there are little dark rectangular spots called stigmas. These are patches of dried blood inside the wing’s cells; they act like a weight, controlling the wing’s vibrations. Munroe, who has studied dragonflies closely for more than a decade, says, “Scientists are still discovering new species, even right here in the D.C. area, so you can help by taking photos and keeping notes of what you see.” Time to start searching! — Ann Cameron Siegal Dragonflies and damselflies: Can you tell the difference? They really look similar, but the easiest way to tell the difference is to watch them at rest. A dragonfly’s wings are held horizontally, like wings on an airplane, while damselflies rest their wings behind them, in line with their bodies. (See photo above.) The rear pair of wings on a dragonfly are larger than its front wings, but damselfly wings are about the same size. And the two large eyes on most dragonflies touch in the middle. The eyes of damselflies are spaced wide apart. Learn more about dragonflies Check out www.dragonfliesnva.com, a new Web site with lots of information on local dragonflies — how to identify them, where to find them and why they are so fascinating. Even though the site is geared to Northern Virginia, the species covered are found in nearby Maryland and the District of Columbia, too. To understand how a nymph becomes an adult dragonfly, watch this short BBC nature video. Always ask a parent before going online.


As opioid deaths surge, a push to get antidote into hands of abusers’ friends and family

but it offered a glimpse into the growing effort to get naloxone, commonly known by the brand name Narcan, into the hands of more people on the front lines of the nation’s unrelenting opioid epidemic. Until the past few years, naloxone has been used mostly by paramedics, hospitals and drug-treatment programs. But as opioid deaths surge — an estimated 16,000 lives are lost to overdoses each year — government officials, nonprofit groups and community activists are pressing hard to get naloxone into the hands of police officers, firefighters and especially addicts’ family members and friends. Opioid overdoses are marked by depressed breathing, extreme fatigue and changes in heart rate. Victims tend to lose consciousness and deteriorate rapidly. Naloxone temporarily counteracts those effects by blocking opiate receptors in the brain, allowing normal respiration to resume and buying time to get the patient medical treatment. In Tewksbury and nearly a dozen other Massachusetts towns, relatives come each week for free training on how to administer the antidote by Learn to Cope, a support group for family members with loved ones addicted to heroin, OxyContin and other opiates. They leave with kits — the group hands out more than 500 a month under a physician’s “standing order” — along with the peace of mind that if an overdose were to occur at home, having naloxone could mean a second chance instead of a funeral. Efforts like the one in Tewksbury are unfolding across the country. For example, nearly two dozens states and the District have enacted legislation making it easier for opioid users’ friends and family to get the antidote. Community-based naloxone distribution programs have existed in the United States since 1996, providing the drug to more than 50,000 people and reversing more than 10,000 overdoses, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But for years, those groups operated without much support from governments or society. “The impact it had on people was very obvious to anyone who would look. It’s just that some people weren’t willing to look,” said Dan Bigg, director of the Chicago Recovery Alliance, one of the nation’s oldest and largest naloxone distribution programs, which began in 1996. But as prescription painkiller deaths skyrocketed through the 2000s and heroin abuse became a suburban as well as an urban scourge, more people began to acknowledge the value of naloxone — not as a cure, but as a vital


Save the invertebrates at the National Zoo

One of Washington’s hidden gems is the invertebrate exhibit at the National Zoo. It was conceived by visionary zoo director Michael Robinson in 1987 as the only major invertebrate exhibit in the United States and it has been one of the few such permanent exhibits in the world . This highly popular but modest exhibit is dedicated to learning about invertebrates — terrestrial animals such as leaf cutter ants, bees, butterflies, spiders and praying mantis; and marine animals including the Giant Pacific Octopus, anemones, cuttlefish, crabs and mantis shrimp — which experts estimate make up more than 90 percent of the world’s animal life. Sadly, budget challenges have led Smithsonian leaders to conclude that this area must be sacrificed to preserve funds for exhibits that feature large terrestrial animals, principally mammals and reptiles. The invertebrate exhibit’s public closure is scheduled for today, followed by the decommissioning of most exhibit animals and the realignment of some into a much smaller presence in other zoo exhibits. This exhibit is usually teeming with children and parents learning about these creatures, attended to by committed staff and volunteers. This helps children become excited about science and the importance of invertebrate ecosystems (some of these exist in our own back yards or are critical to our food chains). Perhaps some corporate and philanthropic leaders will recognize this benefit and work to save the exhibit. Many scientific and commercial applications and technologies have resulted from the study of invertebrates including advanced fibers, robotics and medical discoveries. I am struck by the irony that this decision coincides with President Obama’s proposal to expand Pacific Ocean sanctuaries . These important marine ecosystems, which most Americans will never have the opportunity to visit, might be better understood if exhibits explaining them, such as the one at the National Zoo’s invertebrate exhibit, remained accessible to the average citizen. After all, education is part of the zoo’s mission statement. As the zoo acknowledged in its announcement of the closure, invertebrates are “nature’s unsung heroes, quietly playing vital roles in Earth’s ecosystems.” The National Zoo’s giant Pacific octopus explores its tank at the Invertebrate Exhibit. (Joe Elbert/The Washington Post) I hope the occasion will arise to reexamine this unfortunate decision and the budget realities associated with it.


Clearing the air in Maryland

I live in the Maryland countryside about 50 miles outside of Washington. It’s a beautiful region with rolling hills and farmland and dense forest rife with delicious green smells. I run in the early morning with my dog because the air is cooler and fresher. This is particularly important during the warmer months, as smog season in Maryland begins in June. Every year, the cool freshness of the spring air turns warm, heavy and laden with moisture, which becomes a problem when mixed with the sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide released by coal-burning power plants. The few times I’ve run later in the day, even in the winter, I’ve noticed a distinct, acrid tang in the air and a tightened feeling in my lungs. That’s a taste of how it feels to be asthmatic. I don’t suffer from asthma, but I have friends who do, and I have seen them having an attack. Asthma is a nasty disease that makes you feel like you’re suffocating. It makes it impossible to do a host of things; it ruins the quality of your life; and it kills. In 2009, asthma was an underlying cause of death for 72 Maryland residents, while 149 others died with asthma as a contributing factor. More than a quarter of high school students in Baltimore have been diagnosed with asthma. NEWBURG, MD - MAY 29: Emissions spew out of a large stack at the coal fired Morgantown Generating Station, on May 29, 2014 in Newburg, Maryland. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images) Asthma is particularly common among Marylanders because our state has the worst air quality on the East Coast, says the Environmental Protection Agency. Only five of Maryland’s 13 coal-burning power plants have modern pollution-cutting technology for sulfur dioxide and smog-causing nitrogen oxide. And none of the five plants uses its technology to the maximum extent possible to reduce pollution. Why not? Smog and sulfur dioxide not only contribute to asthma, but they can also trigger heart attacks and lead to bronchitis and pneumonia, which also can kill. Everyone needs to breathe clean air. We must take action now.


Hero worship of the military is getting in the way of good policy

Benjamin Summers is a captain in the U.S. Army. The views expressed are his own. I have worn an Army uniform for the past eight years and deployed twice to Afghanistan. This doesn’t make me a hero. Many veterans deserve high praise for their heroism, but others of us do not. Infantrymen who put their lives on the line for a mission, aircrews who flew into harm’s way to evacuate the wounded, servicemen and women who made the ultimate sacrifice — these are some of the heroes I’ve been privileged to know. Applying the label “hero” to those of us who haven’t earned it diminishes the service and sacrifice of those who did. It also gets in the way of constructive debate and policymaking. Over the past decade, a growing chasm between military and civil society has raised the pedestal upon which the United States places those who serve in its military. Too much hero-labeling reinforces a false dichotomy that’s commonly heard in our political discourse: You’re either for the troops or you’re against them. We badly need to find ways to bridge this civilian-military gap to cultivate a more nuanced appreciation of service and to produce better policy in Washington. According to a 2013 Pew Research Center report, the percentage of Americans who served in the military has been declining since 1970 — an obvious consequence of the move from a draft to an all-volunteer force after the Vietnam War. The number of veterans in Congress also has fallen dramatically, from more than 50 percent in the 1980s to about 20 percent today. Inevitably, a smaller proportion of veterans in civil society means less civil knowledge of military issues. Army Pfc. Colin Morris, left, and Marine Cpl. Zach Powers, center, salute participates of Rolling Thunder 'Ride for Freedom' event in Washington, Sunday, May 25, 2014. (Molly Riley/AP) At the same time, the widening civil-military divide intensifies the aura that attaches to military service, especially when the country is at war. Over the past decade, veterans did many things that the general public didn’t do and doesn’t necessarily comprehend fully: deploying, being away from home for a year, serving in war zones. During these years, it’s undeniable that veterans have received a hero’s embrace from their nation; one need look no further than the positive treatment of veterans in Super Bowl commercials or at emotional airport welcome-home events. While we


Washington. According to a 2013 Pew Research Center report, the percentage of Americans who served in the military has been declining since 1970 — an obvious consequence of the move from a draft to an all-volunteer force after the Vietnam War. The number of veterans in Congress also has fallen dramatically, from more than 50 percent in the 1980s to about 20 percent today. Inevitably, a smaller proportion of veterans in civil society means less civil knowledge of military issues. Army Pfc. Colin Morris, left, and Marine Cpl. Zach Powers, center, salute participates of Rolling Thunder 'Ride for Freedom' event in Washington, Sunday, May 25, 2014. (Molly Riley/AP) At the same time, the widening civil-military divide intensifies the aura that attaches to military service, especially when the country is at war. Over the past decade, veterans did many things that the general public didn’t do and doesn’t necessarily comprehend fully: deploying, being away from home for a year, serving in war zones. During these years, it’s undeniable that veterans have received a hero’s embrace from their nation; one need look no further than the positive treatment of veterans in Super Bowl commercials or at emotional airport welcome-home events. While we veterans surely appreciate a supportive public, too much hero-labeling has unintended consequences. The past year offers an indication of the blinding effects of this problem. Defense spending is a prime example. Too often, policymakers frame discussion of whether to cut the military budget as being for or against the troops; the political battle over the military portion of the sequester is an example of this black-or-white mind-set. But any bureaucracy — particularly one that doesn’t function with a profit-and-loss mentality — can innovate and gain efficiencies when it’s forced to do more with less. If we’re not searching for opportunities to fix, clean and trim our organizations, we’re not being good stewards of them. When we can’t have political discussions that dig beneath the blanket of “for or against the troops,” palatability wins over stewardship. And one of our nation’s most precious resources suffers the long-term consequences. The recent Department of Veterans Affairs scandals further illuminate this problem. A backlog of disability claims is surely evidence of a VA system that needed to be fixed. The allegations of serious ethical shortcomings in accounting for long waits for VA health care in Phoenix were reprehensible. But the public outcry addressed only


World Digest: June 20, 2014

first since March — along with the security dragnet in and around Beirut sparked fears of renewed violence in a country that has been buffeted by the conflict in neighboring Syria. Al-Qaeda-inspired militants have claimed bombings in the past, particularly against the Shiite group Hezbollah. Still, Friday’s bombing was the first in several months, suggesting a possible link to events in Iraq, where the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, an al-Qaeda splinter group, has seized large chunks of territory in the country’s north. A Lebanese security official confirmed that the arrests in Beirut on Friday netted suspected members of the group. He spoke to the Associated Press on the condition of anonymity because of security regulations. — Associated Press WEST AFRICA Ebola ‘totally out of control,’ group says The Ebola outbreak ravaging West Africa is “totally out of control,” according to a senior official for Doctors Without Borders, who said the group is stretched to the limit in responding. The outbreak has caused more deaths than any other of the disease, said another official with the medical charity. Ebola has been linked to more than 330 deaths in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, according to the World Health Organization. International organizations and the governments involved need to send in more health experts and increase publiceducation about how to stop the spread of the disease, Bart Janssens, director of operations for Doctors Without Borders in Brussels, said Friday. “The reality is clear that the epidemic is now in a second wave,” Janssens said. “And, for me, it is totally out of control.” — Associated Press EGYPT Saudi king displays his support for Sissi Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah stopped in Cairo on Friday to meet with Egypt’s new president Abdel Fatah al-Sisi to show his strong support through a symbolic but brief visit. The 90-year-old monarch, on his way home from Morocco, did not leave his plane, which was on the ground at Cairo’s airport for just over an hour. Sisi and his delegation were on board for just over 30 minutes. Abdullah’s advanced age and frail health mean he rarely travels on state business, so even the short visit was a clear sign of how he has positioned himself as Sisi’s leading Arab ally. — Reuters Syria bars unapproved aid deliveries: Pope says no to legalizing drugs: Woman who stopped for ducks guilty in 2 deaths: — From news services


Brass Connection, band for Washington Mystics, makes crowds dance on D.C. streets

walked past the corner, and then turned around. A woman who had been walking around Gallery Place without shoes picked up her sneakers, which had been on the sidewalk, so she could dance on subway grates without hurting herself. Another woman seemed uninterested as she sat outside the Metro station, holding a sign asking for money to feed her kids. During a percussion breakdown, a teenage stranger shook her chest at Joyce Ciotti, 54, from Pittsburgh, who responded in kind. Ciotti’s husband told her they had to leave — it was getting late, and her daughter was getting married the next day. “Just one more song,” she responded, pushing him away. “Take my hotel key.” “They’re not from here, but they’re the best band here,” said Antonio Cabbbagestalk, 34, a panhandler who often hangs out around Gallery Place. “I like them because they’re a family. Just like the Jackson 5.” Drawing a diverse crowd Different street corners have different personalities. The lunchtime crowd at L’Enfant Plaza was known for being hard to crack — world-famous violinist Joshua Bell once performed there undercover as a part of a Washington Post magazine story and made only $32.17. But Brass Connection eventually got people dancing. The Gallery Place crowd is the most generous but consists mostly of tourists. U Street, meanwhile, has more residents and the loosest audience. “That’s the Way I Like It!” Jones yelled. Heather Busam, 44, was walking with her husband, Joe Meade, and his guide dog, Skittle, when the KC & the Sunshine Band cover song began. Meade, who is blind, had an instinctive reaction. He took his wife and started twirling her. Skittle joined in as well, his leash wrapping around his owner’s leg. Busam gushed over the group. “They really embody the neighborhood,” she said. “They are young, talented, vibrant. Look at them. It feels so good to have them around.” A group of teenage dance contortionists heard the sound and started pop-locking. Two women held each other’s arms and started swinging around. Then they formed a dance circle with a familiar face: The sad-looking woman who had been asking for money was now dancing, too. She came with the woman who had been dancing on the grates, now shoeless, and Cabbagestalk, the panhandler. “We all decided we should walk here,” Cabbagestalk said. After the band left, the streets around Verizon Center seemed a little too boring.


Even as marijuana gains ground, some tightly enforce laws

often argue with officers about the fairness of enforcing a law that is ignored or defunct elsewhere. In Colorado, where recreational marijuana is legal, police who find pot plants in the homes of people they are arresting on other charges “have to literally walk away from the plants,” says Chief John Jackson of Greenwood Village, Colo. “It’s considered personal property. If we seize it, we have to keep those plants alive or compensate the user.” PostTV travels to the county in West Virginia with the highest-rate increase in marijuana possession arrests to see how pot laws have affected communities. Fletcher, for his part, says he pays no mind to the cultural or legal debate over marijuana, a drug he calls dangerous, habit-forming and much stronger than it once was. “You have politicians who look at marijuana as being not such a bad thing because they blew a little dope 40 years ago,” he says. “And we have leadership in Washington, D.C., now that says certain laws are beneath them. Well, you can’t say, ‘Boys, that’s just marijuana — ignore that.’ ” A few blocks from the Phillipses’ trailer, on a street of tidy houses just up from the Ohio River, Beverly Enochs and Sue Thompson sing the praises of the drug task force. Last year, the women summoned the sheriff and other authorities to a town meeting that drew more than 200 people in a place where only 1,400 live. Residents confronted officials with the damage heroin was doing to their neighborhood — unprecedented fear and suspicion, and a string of burglaries by addicts looking for anything they could sell. The response was swift and dramatic. Officers swarmed the tiny town day and night. Then lawmen raided Newell and arrested 39 people on heroin, meth, cocaine and marijuana charges. The devastation that heroin and prescription pills have visited upon the county is plain in the gaunt faces and wrecked teeth of addicts on downtown streets and up in the hills. Marijuana, Thompson and Enochs say, is not the problem. “We don’t smoke pot,” says Enochs, 63, “but that’s gone on forever around here. Most people are to the point where they don’t even mind the marijuana. Heroin is what’s killing our kids. They die with the needle in their arms.” “I wonder if it’s even worth the effort to go after the pot,” says Thompson, 67. Sue Thompson, left, 67,


Invertebrate exhibit that opened in 1987 closes at National Zoo in Washington; cost is blamed

It’s those without backbones, always vulnerable in a city such as Washington, that lost a prized place in the public eye Saturday. Saturday, according to the National Zoo, was the last day for the public to visit the zoo’s invertebrate exhibit. The display houses an array of creatures — including cuttlefish and coral, crabs and butterflies — seemingly linked only by their spinelessness. Invertebrates make up more than 95 percent of all living species. Lack of spine did not prompt the shuttering of the exhibit that opened in a basement in 1987. Nor, said Dennis Kelly, the zoo’s director, is it because of an absence of keeper concern or of biological importance. In fact, Kelly said the exhibit has been “a hidden gem” but costly to keep up. As expenses escalate, closing the home of the spider and the lair of the leaf-cutter ant allows resources to be shifted to other zoo areas needing attention, he said. Many animals will go elsewhere, and some might go to new homes in the zoo, the zoo said. Meanwhile, an online petition has been started asking that the exhibit be kept. According to its Web site, more than 2,700 signatures appear on the petition to save the dwelling place of the bee and the lobster and the shrimp and the cockroach.


Second arrest made in 2007 slaying of Maryland teen in D.C.

D.C police have made a second arrest in the 2007 fatal shooting of an Upper Marlboro teen. On Friday, police arrested 24-year-old Maurice Pope of Northeast Washington and charged him with first-degree murder in connection with the death of 19-year-old Terrence Fowler. Fowler was shot eight times on June 2, 2007, in the Lincoln Heights area of Northeast Washington over $400 he owed for a gun, according to previous reports. Police had also previously charged Joshua Holifeld with first-degree murder in Fowler’s death. Get updates on your area delivered via e-mail


Highs and lows at National Orchestral Institute program

The University of Maryland’s National Orchestral Institute, an annual summer event since 1988, draws top talent from colleges and conservatories around the country for a month of intensive training and concerts. Its fourth program (of five) Saturday at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center might have been subtitled “Technicolor” — works by Strauss (Till Eulenspiegel lustige Streiche), Britten (Four Sea Interludes) and Holst (The Planets), whose most prominent feature is a dazzling array of creative sonorities and tone-painting. Perhaps the most enjoyable facet of the NOI concerts is that the orchestra fields a full complement of strings, far more than one sees at Baltimore Symphony concerts at Strathmore, for example. This gives conductors a shot at melding proper balances among the sections. British conductor Christopher Seaman, who led the Rochester Philharmonic for many years, seemed to have a good enough rapport with his young charges, but his musical direction was often flabby and undercharacterized. He handled traffic-cop duties effectively; the ensemble was admirably tight in the bustling “Mercury” and “Uranus” sections of the Holst. But slower music often sagged; each phrase of the Britten “Moonlight” sat like a lump, with no overarching line, and the Holst “Venus” drifted. There was never any really soft playing in tutti passages, and despite the strings’ advantageous numbers, Seaman often left them unprotected from overwhelming outbursts in the brass, a recurring problem in the Strauss and in the Britten “Storm” section. Most appalling was his decision to perform “Neptune,” the closing work, with a synthesizer standing in for the women’s chorus. I know the NOI can find a women’s chorus because it did so last year. Here, a work that is supposed to end with a magical view of the infinite ended instead with a teeth-grating musical affront. Notwithstanding, these musicians, many on the cusp of professional careers, should be proud of their work last week. The winds were particularly clear and solid throughout all sections, the brass in “Saturn” produced a wondrous, bear-like sound, and the atmosphere in the hall (likely with many friends and family present) was like a pep rally. The NOI’s final program (led by Leonard Slatkin) is this Saturday. The National Orchestral Institute chamber rehearsals are hosted at the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center. (Geoff Sheil/Geoff Sheil) Battey is a freelance writer.


Regional briefs: D.C. police make second arrest in shooting death of teen in 2007

THE DISTRICT Second arrest made in 2007 gun killing Police have made a second arrest in the 2007 fatal shooting of a teenager from Upper Marlboro, Md. On Friday, police arrested Maurice Pope, 24, of Northeast Washington and charged him with first-degree murder in connection with the death of Terrence Fowler, 19. Fowler was shot eight times June 2, 2007, in the Lincoln Heights area of Northeast over $400 he owed for a gun, according to previous reports. Police previously charged Joshua Holifeld with first-degree murder in Fowler’s death. — Lynh Bui VIRGINIA Man dies when van overturns exiting I-95 State police are investigating a crash that left a man dead Saturday night, authorities said Sunday. Police said a 2006 Dodge Caravan was traveling north on Interstate 95. As the driver took the exit 156A ramp in Prince William County shortly after 10 p.m. Saturday, the van ran off the right side of the road, went into a ditch, rode an embankment for about 200 feet and overturned onto its roof. The driver, Bruce L. Dickerson, 46, of Fredericksburg, Va., was dead at the scene, police said. The exit ramp was closed for about three hours, police said. Dickerson was wearing a seat belt, police said. The cause of the crash remains under investigation. — Lynh Bui Alexandria man dies days after being shot A man who was shot in Alexandria last week died from his injuries Sunday, authorities said. Julio Caesar Urrutia-Erazo, 27, of Alexandria was shot in the 3800 block of Russell Road on Thursday after an argument between two groups of people in the area, Alexandria police said. Police have not made an arrest in the case. They are asking anyone with information about the shooting to call Alexandria police detective Michael Rodriguez at 703-746-6165. — Lynh Bui


CoStar: More hotel options should boost tourism

It’s summertime in the nation’s capital, which means you must be prepared to give directions to camera-toting tourists at any time. D.C. has always been a popular tourist destination because of its rich history, enviable (and free) museums and stately monuments — and 2013 was no different. In fact, the year broke a record for the number of domestic tourists visiting the District at 17.4 million, according to the Destination D.C. tourism bureau. The recent completion of the 1,175-room Marriott Marquis next to the Walter E. Washington Convention Center should attract even more visitors with its greater capacity to accommodate conventioneers. One of the largest hotels in the region, it features five restaurants, event space and an underground walkway to the convention center. In another recent headline-grabbing project, the Trump Organization is converting the historical Old Post Office Pavilion into a luxury 271-room hotel, expected to be open in time for the 2017 presidential inaugural parade. Other notable hotel projects include a 200-room hotel in the NoMa neighborhood being built by the JBG Cos., 680 hotel rooms are underway at the massive mixed-use project in Southwest D.C. called the Wharf (delivery in 2017), and 187 rooms at the mixed-use development, City Market at O, opened last month in the East End of the District. For visitors and local business owners, the boomlet in hotel development will provide more room options across the rate spectrum. Hotel occupancies are hovering slightly below their 25-year average and will likely decrease as new projects come on line, so hotel owners may have to lower room rates to attract patrons. As hotels continue to pop up, local businesses should find it more affordable to host client conferences or sales team meetings, and tourists should have more options and discounts on their vacations to the nation’s capital. The increased tourist traffic through D.C. and consequent hotel demand could be a boon to the local economy. Maeve Gallagher is a real estate economist with CoStar Group.


Polio vaccine effort in Syria reaches 1.4 million children as volunteers brave violence

An activist health worker administers a polio vaccination to a child in Aleppo on May 4. (Hosam Katan/Reuters) GAZIANTEP, Turkey — The reemergence of polio in Syria in October alarmed health organizations, which feared that factors such as tainted water, dysfunctional sanitation systems and a mobile population could contribute to a broader, region-wide epidemic. In response, a coalition of nonprofit organizations quickly recruited and deployed thousands of volunteers in the country’s embattled north, where they won the cooperation of rebel fighters and braved shelling and airstrikes to administer the vaccine to children under age 5. Four volunteers have been killed in the process, but there has not been a confirmed case of polio in Syria in nearly five months. “Implementing the campaign is not hard from a medical standpoint. It’s two drops in the mouth,” said Abd al-Rizzaq Darweesh, a doctor working in the northern city of Aleppo. “The difficulty is primarily the war.” Since the identification of the first case in the northeastern province of Deir al-Zour, 35 more cases of the highly contagious disease were confirmed in Syria, according to the Global Polio Eradication Initiative. The infection had not been seen in the country since 1999, and Pakistan, Afghanistan and Nigeria were thought to be among the last bastions of the infamous disease. “Everyone was shocked,” said Tamer Hassan, the Turkey country director for the Syrian American Medical Society (SAMS), one of a handful of organizations involved in the campaign. And, Tamer said, the urgent question became: “What to do?” The answer, many of those involved in the response said, was clear: As many children as possible needed to be vaccinated. After the first Syria case was discovered, UNICEF and its partners launched what they call the biggest immunization campaign in Middle Eastern history — one that they say has reached 25 million children in seven countries. A volunteer network But the U.N. agency had limited access to northern Syria. So last fall, a group of small, Syria-oriented organizations formed the ad-hoc Polio Control Task Force. Headquartered in southern Turkey, the coalition includes SAMS, the opposition-linked Assistance Coordination Unit (ACU) and about half a dozen other groups. It is supported by a patchwork of local organizations, international aid groups and foreign governments. Task force officials said they started by recruiting and training low-paid volunteers, many drawn from a network of opposition doctors and activists that had been built


Iraqi military facing ‘psychological collapse’ after losses, desertions

of ISIS, which seeks to create an Islamic caliphate stretching across Syria and Iraq. Much of that equipment came from the United States. While ISIS militants have posted videos flaunting their use of seized weaponry and vehicles, Pentagon officials said they had no accurate accounting of what had ended up in ISIS hands. Among the tasks of the U.S. advisers, expected to arrive in small units, with only a few dozen initially, is to assess the state of the Iraqi army and its equipment. Lt. Gen. Rasheed Fleih, head of the Anbar Operations Command, in the critical western province bordering Syria, put on a stoic front Sunday, claiming in a televised statement that “security forces are reviving” and that volunteers are being deployed to the area. But the addition of tens of thousands of volunteers to the security forces has been chaotic. Many are joining under the banners of militias, though Maan argued that they will not be able to function as such. When they sign up, they will be given a “week or less” of training and be deployed where they are needed, he said. “The basic problem with the Iraqi military is that it’s a sectarian force,” said James Jeffrey, a former U.S. ambassador to Iraq. “That’s combined with the fact that you have sycophantic generals, you have low morale and a Shiite volunteer force. They didn’t do very much training. They don’t have the equipment or skills of the [ISIS] guys.” The crisis in the armed forces is a result of corruption, poor leadership and intelligence, and severe inattention to training, said a former U.S. adviser to the Iraqi armed forces who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation. Those problems have turned what was a functioning military when U.S. troops withdrew in 2011 into an “empty shell that is resorting to a call to arms of men and boys off the street,” he said. He added that the scale of the reverses this month has been “catastrophic.” Accusations against officers Members of the security forces who were serving in Mosul when the Iraqi army’s 2nd Division disintegrated this month complained that the leadership vanished in the face of the ISIS offensive. The speed of the collapse has led to accusations from some soldiers that their leaders were in some way complicit. Maliki is sending 59 officers to court for fleeing


Bidding the bugs farewell as the zoo plans to shut down its invertebrate exhibit

An inside look at the National Zoo’s invertebrates exhibit, which closed for good on June 22. It all started with the octopus. When she died of old age in February, her tank at the National Zoo’s invertebrate exhibit was left empty. The zoo’s administration never started looking for another creature to take her place. And the keepers wondered. Meanwhile, the 1930s building that the spineless animals were housed in was falling apart. There was peeling wallpaper, leaking pipes, cracked tanks — and a $5 million estimation of what it would take to fix it all. So the keepers worried. Then, on June 16, the announcement was made. Within the week, the invertebrate exhibit would close for good. Now the keepers knew. “I thought maybe we were in the clear financially, but we know now that’s not the case,” said curator Alan Peters. He helped create the exhibit in 1987, when the idea of having an area for invertebrates only was unheard of across the country. The dark and damp space housed a wide variety of animals with one commonality: no spines. Ella Stough, 9, meets a butterfly at the National Zoo’s invertebrate exhibit, one day before the exhibit was scheduled to close. (Yue Wu/The Washington Post) Despite the gloominess and drizzle of Saturday’s weather, thousands of people streamed through the zoo, past the lions — visitors remarking, “Don’t you just want to cuddle with him!” — the playful otters — “This just never gets old” — and the iconic panda — “Follow daddy’s finger, he’s up in the tree!” — to stand in line for what was billed as the final chance to see the bugs, jellyfish and the empty octopus tank. “They might look disgusting, they might feel weird, but they make a huge difference in the lives of all of us. They allow the flowers to grow, the birds to eat, and they are a great teaching tool about how life works,” said Enrique Ograj, who brought his 11- and 14-year-old children to the exhibit for the last time, partially to try to curb his daughter’s fear of squids. That fear of squids, or tarantulas, or beetles — or any of the other invertebrates that might not be at the top of anyone’s favorite zoo creature list — is one of the main reasons invertebrate conservationists are upset about the closure of the exhibit. “This pushes invertebrates out


to close. (Yue Wu/The Washington Post) Despite the gloominess and drizzle of Saturday’s weather, thousands of people streamed through the zoo, past the lions — visitors remarking, “Don’t you just want to cuddle with him!” — the playful otters — “This just never gets old” — and the iconic panda — “Follow daddy’s finger, he’s up in the tree!” — to stand in line for what was billed as the final chance to see the bugs, jellyfish and the empty octopus tank. “They might look disgusting, they might feel weird, but they make a huge difference in the lives of all of us. They allow the flowers to grow, the birds to eat, and they are a great teaching tool about how life works,” said Enrique Ograj, who brought his 11- and 14-year-old children to the exhibit for the last time, partially to try to curb his daughter’s fear of squids. That fear of squids, or tarantulas, or beetles — or any of the other invertebrates that might not be at the top of anyone’s favorite zoo creature list — is one of the main reasons invertebrate conservationists are upset about the closure of the exhibit. “This pushes invertebrates out of the limelight even more,” said Matthew Shepherd of the Xerces Society, an invertebrate conservation organization. “When people don’t get to see and learn about invertebrates, then they only think of them when they see honeybee swarms or bedbugs or cockroach infestations on the news.” Curator Peters and his zookeepers have been trying to bridge that divide for 27 years, bringing zoo visitors up close and personal with peacock mantis shrimp, goliath bird-eating tarantulas and hissing cockroaches. In the final hours of the exhibit’s existence, children pressed their noses against the tanks of the coral, asked volunteers how leafcutter ants build their homes and jumped back when they realized there was no glass separating them from the webs of the golden orb spiders. It seemed, one volunteer said, like any other day. Meanwhile, the staff was celebrating and mourning, toasting with plastic glasses of champagne and passing around scoops of chocolate and vanilla ice cream. Peters’s daughter picked out the flavors. Sitting in a moist-smelling back room, the ice cream melted as the keepers and volunteers waited for Peters to finish interviews for the many news cameras that arrived at the zoo Saturday. When bug fans on local and national


Seeding the clouds offers rainmaking hope for drought-stricken planet

China has recently faced drastic water shortages. Here, a worker shields young trees at a nursery on the edge of a desert. (Agence France-Presse via Getty Images) Around the world, 168 countries are undergoing “some level of desertification,” Dan Baum reports in the June issue of Scientific American. California, source of many fruits and vegetables, is in a three-year drought. Australia just emerged from nine years of drought. Brazil, China and much of the Middle East and South Asia have recently faced drastic water shortages. Where can the world find more fresh water? In the air, some scientists say. Cloud seeding — infusing clouds with chemicals that help water vapor coalesce into rain droplets — was invented in 1946 by atmospheric scientist Bernard Vonnegut (brother of novelist Kurt). Its success has been mixed. But Baum reports that “a fleet of new NASA weather satellites, advances in radar and . . . growth of computing power have combined to let scientists say with considerable certainty — for the first time — that yes, under the right circumstances and in limited ways, cloud seeding works.” From the Chinese government’s “weather army” of 50 planes, 7,000 rocket launchers and 7,000 cannons to the seven-county West Texas Weather Modification Association, Baum explains how seeding works, how hucksters have given it a bad name and how it offers some hope of greening our problematic planet. A dried up river filled with sand winds its way across the desert near Gos Beida in eastern Chad. (Finbarr O'Reilly/Reuters) He also explains what scientists cannot do: They can enhance rain, but they can’t make something out of nothing. “Think of pulling a sponge out of a bucket of water,” one expert says. “You can hold it up and let it drip, or you can squeeze it. What we do is squeeze.” Related: Can a great wall of trees stop China’s spreading desert?


Chemical-based insect repellents work, but you may want to try safer alternatives

cases, intravenous fluids and prescription pain drugs. Dealing with DEET DEET (N,N-diethyl-meta-toluamide), first used by the U.S. Army, has been sold to consumers since the 1950s. It can cause allergic skin reactions, particularly at concentrations of 50 percent and above, and eye irritation. A 2013 analysis of about 4,000 DEET-related calls to poison control centers found that 450 people needed medical treatment after applying DEET; two died. Most cases of seizures, slurred speech, coma and other serious side effects have occurred in people who ingested DEET or applied it for three or more days in a row, or used products with 95 percent DEET or more. It’s unclear whether lower doses pose the same risks, especially if you follow directions. Still, our experts urge children, seniors and those with weakened immunity to use it with extra caution. The American Academy of Pediatrics says DEET shouldn’t be used on infants younger than 2 months, and Canada’s federal health department says children 6 months to 12 years old should avoid products with more than 10 percent DEET. “Most important, people should first try safer ways of avoiding bugs,” Rangan says. She points out that in our tests, products with 30 percent or less DEET worked well. “So if you decide you really want to try DEET, stick with the lowest effective dose, and avoid those that are more than 30 percent DEET.” Smartest precautions ●Avoid tight clothes (which mosquitoes can penetrate), dark clothes (where ticks can hide) and strong scents (which attract mosquitoes). ●Stay inside as much as possible when mosquitoes are out: sunrise, sunset and early evening. ●When you’re sitting on a deck or patio, plug in a fan to blow away mosquitoes. ●When heading out to woody or grassy areas, tuck pants into socks, wear boots and tuck hair into a hat. When you get home, check for ticks, shower and toss clothes into a dryer. ●If you need a repellent, first try plant-based products. If you opt for DEET, use products with low concentrations, such as Off Family-Care Smooth & Dry spray (15 percent). ●Apply repellents outdoors and use them only on clothing or exposed skin (not under clothes), and wash clothes before wearing them again. Copyright 2014. Consumers Union of United States Inc. For further guidance, go to www.ConsumerReports.org/Health, where more detailed information, including CR’s ratings of prescription drugs, treatments, hospitals and healthy-living products, is available to subscribers.


‘When bees swarm, it’s good news’ — for the bees, anyway

Pollen sticks to a bee as it gathers nectar from a dandelion. (Matt Rourke/AP) Amateur beekeeper David Ferguson grabs a potted tree on the sidewalk outside the Ritz-Carlton in Washington’s Foggy Bottom area. “1, 2, 3!” As he shakes the tree, hundreds of honeybees cascade into a cardboard box held by fellow amateur Toni Burnham. The swarm had descended on the high-end hotel in search of a new home. And they’ll get that new home — but probably not in the way they expected. Later in the day, Ferguson will deliver the 10,000 or so captured bees to a hive owned by an experienced Virginia beekeeper. Ferguson and Burnham are members of the DC Beekeepers Alliance, which responds to calls about swarms that end up in inconvenient places. Their services are especially timely: About 30 percent of honeybees in managed colonies have died each winter for the past eight years, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture and a group called the Bee Informed Partnership. Large beekeepers mostly replace losses by splitting colonies and buying additional queens for the spinoffs. Moving honeybee swarms to places where they will be cared for by a beekeeper could give them a better shot at success, experts say. Bees are critical, not only for the honey they produce but also for the plants they help pollinate. “Every third bite on our plate comes from honeybees,” said Burnham, wearing a beekeeping veil, white canvas jacket and leather gloves to protect herself from stings. She added, “If you talk about the network of life, bees are a critical link.” A ‘tornado’ of bees Last month Ritz sommelier Michael Kennedy saw the horde of bees roar down 22nd Street at lunchtime, making a sound Burnham likens to a flying air conditioner. “The swarm just came down the street like a tornado and just came to the tree,” Kennedy recalled. Burnham, founder of the beekeepers group, arrived to corral the swarm soon after receiving a tip e-mailed by a passerby. She has received 200 swarm reports this year, though nearly all are false alarms, mostly involving not honeybees but carpenter bees, which don’t form colonies and which use their powerful jaws to drill their nests in wood. Once she determines that there is, indeed, a swarm of honeybees, she contacts fellow beekeepers to help. Of the dozen or so honeybee swarms they confirmed, they snagged 10. Swarming is


Study examines how income inequality is taking shape in the D.C. area

with college degrees rose by about 200,000 jobs between 2007 and 2012. For those without college degrees, however, there were 110,000 fewer jobs. “Our economy just isn’t working like it used to for workers without a college degree,” said Jenny Reed, policy director of the D.C. Fiscal Policy Institute. “There was a point in time where you could find a job to support a family with just a high school diploma. But those opportunities are now few and far between.” The study illustrates that a slack labor market and a decline in wages are having a deep impact even outside the region’s urban center. The biggest dips in household income in this area were in Calvert and Fauquier counties, while the poverty rate in Charles County doubled between 2007 and 2012. “It underlines that poverty exists, and it is actually in greater numbers in the suburbs than in the core of the region,” said Benjamin Orr, executive director of the Maryland Center on Economic Policy. Suburban residents in the Washington area also face a difficult cost-of-living conundrum: Workers are often lured to the suburbs by cheaper housing but then have to endure grueling commutes. About 12 percent of low-wage workers have commutes that are greater than 50 miles. And those commutes can be pricey: The study found that in Fauquier, Spotsylvania and Frederick counties, the average housing and transportation costs equal more than 45 percent of the median incomes in those counties. The same is true of Prince George’s, a close-in county. Reed said this can be a difficult situation for low-wage workers to break out of because many of the jobs they are most qualified for, such as positions in restaurants or hotels, are clustered in the most expensive neighborhoods. The researchers who conducted the study say recent boosts to the minimum wage in the District and Montgomery and Prince George’s counties could be part of a solution to these problems. In fact, they’ve calculated that 64,000 jobs in the District alone will see a bump in pay thanks to the new provisions. The nonprofits also recommend increasing affordable housing as well as access to health care and job training as ways to help low- and mid-wage workers get on stronger economic footing. “The economy in the national capital region is very much rewarding the highly educated workers,” Cassidy said, “whereas less educated workers are left in the dust.”


Invertebrates deserve a home at the National Zoo

Rick Stark’s Local Opinions commentary on the closing of the National Zoo’s invertebrate exhibit was on the mark [“Save the invertebrates,’’ Metro, June 22]. I was the original curator of that exhibit and, following the vision of our late director, Michael Robinson, led the design team that created it. I am dismayed by the recent decision to close its doors. Robinson promoted the inclusion of invertebrates in the zoo because too much emphasis was placed on large animals, misrepresenting the diversity of life. Invertebrates make up the vast majority of the animal kingdom, are critical to the health of ecosystems, have diverse and complex behaviors and take an amazing array of forms. They expand the definition of “real animals’’ beyond what is traditional in zoos. Because of a lack of funding, invertebrates must go, as they are seen to be less critical to the zoo’s mission. If zoo officials truly understood the significance of invertebrates in the natural world, they would find the funding. This could be made available by trimming other programs. Doing this, of course, would lessen the representation of “real animals.” Jaren Horsley, Arlington


Some lawmakers worry about troops smoking, but Defense officials warn them to go easy

overall U.S. civilian rate and that service members’ use of smokeless tobacco has gone up to more than 400 percent higher than the U.S. average. “One out of three members of the military who use tobacco today say they started after they enlisted,” Durbin added. The last major military smoking study, requested by the Pentagon in 2007 and completed by the Institute of Medicine in 2009, found that “smoking rates among military personnel returning from Iraq and Afghanistan may be 50 percent higher than rates among nondeployed military personnel.” The institute’s study said, “Current cigarette use in the military is more likely among men, those who are white, have less than a college education, are younger than 34 years old, and are enlisted versus officers.” In 2005, smoking rates for 18-to-25-year-old military men was high at 42.2 percent, although it varied by service, with the Army and Marines being highest, and the Air Force the lowest. In short, smoking is highest with those most likely to be involved in fighting on the ground. A 2008 study found that “smoking rates increased by 57 percent among those deployed and by 44 percent among those not deployed.” Last March, when Stars and Stripes carried a story about Navy Secretary Ray Mabus considering a ban on all tobacco sales on ships and bases, the comments received previewed what could come if more actions are taken. “THIS IS OUT OF CONTROL!!!!,” wrote one ex-Marine. “When I was sitting in a bunker in Vietnam at 0400, a cigarette gave me comfort and pleasure. OH!!!! It is not good to get lung cancer but a sucking chest wound is???” Dempsey was more diplomatic: Because smoking is legal, taking more steps to halt it “is an issue for the broader Congress of the United States, not uniquely for the United States military.” Rep. Duncan D. Hunter (R-Calif.), a Marine Reserve major with three combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, has already acted. He argued at one point: “We sleep in the dirt for this country. We get shot at for this country. But we can’t have a cigarette if we want to for this country, because that’s unhealthy.” He got the House to approve his prohibition of any new restrictions on legal products — including tobacco, sold on military bases, commissaries, post exchanges, and even ships — added to the fiscal 2015 Defense Authorization Bill. Let’s see


German and Austrian Rieslings to try

Recommendations ★ ★ ★Exceptional ★ ★Excellent ★Very Good Availability information is based on distributor records. Wines might not be in stock at every listed store and might be available at additional stores. Check Winesearcher.com to verify availability, or ask a favorite wine store to order through a distributor. Here are German and Austrian Rieslings available in the Washington area market, including dry wines and some with a touch of sweetness. Don’t be shy about trying both. — D.M. Dr. Loosen Red Slate Dry Riesling 2012 ★ ★ ★ Mosel, Germany, $17 Ernst Loosen is Dr. Riesling. He has his finger on the pulse of this grape, whether it’s grown in the Mosel, where his home winery is located; in other areas of Germany; and even in Washington state, where he collaborates with Chateau Ste. Michelle winery on the popular Eroica Riesling. Red Slate refers to the type of soil in the vineyard, and this dry, mineral wine seems to summon the essence of that vineyard into the glass, where it can be released with a gentle swirl. It’s compelling enough to drink by itself, or try it with light appetizers. For spicier foods, I would recommend a fruitier, sweeter Riesling. Alcohol by volume: 12.5 percent. Country Vintner: Available in the District at Rodman’s; on the list at Rasika (Penn Quarter, West End). Available in Maryland at Georgetown Square Wine & Beer in Bethesda, Wine Source in Baltimore. Available in Virginia at Dominion Wine and Beer, German Gourmet and Merrifield Wine & Beer in Falls Church. Huber Riesling Terrassen 2012/2013 ★ ★ 1 / 2 Traisental, Austria, $18 Here’s an excellent example of what Austria, better known for its grüner veltliner, can do with Riesling. It is intense and impeccably focused. The best Austrian white wines seem to drill down to the Earth’s core; this one might not reach that far, but it digs deep. ABV: 12 percent. Country Vintner: Available in the District at Arrowine & Spirits, Eye Street Cellars, P&C Market, Rodman’s. Available in Maryland at Wine Source in Baltimore. Available in Virginia at German Gourmet in Falls Church, Swirl & Sip in Fairfax. J & P Matheus Piesporter Goldtröpfchen Riesling Kabinett 2012 ★ ★ 1 / 2 Mosel, Germany, $22 This wine exemplifies Riesling’s conundrum: It has perceptible sweetness, but the sugar is balanced by acidity, which renders the wine fruity and refreshing. Try it with moderately spicy


NASA asks: How would you commercialize our technology?

Think you can come up with a new way to use NASA’s technology? Thanks to NASA’s new crowdsourcing program, you — or anybody — can submit ideas to the agency about how to commercialize its virtual reality software. NASA plans to split royalties with the inventor if the product is developed and sold. NASA, one of the first government agencies to try this kind of crowdsourcing, is partnering with Edison Nation, an online company that helps other groups gather ideas from the public. Edison Nation normally partners with retailers and manufacturers, allowing Internet users to submit ideas for new products. The site is free to join but charges a $25 fee for submitting ideas, intended to cover the cost of product development, procuring intellectual property and other expenses. NASA is asking the public to come up with new applications for MindShift, a simulation game invented by scientists Alan Pope and Chad Stephens at NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va. MindShift uses wireless motion sensing and body gesture sensors — as well as heart rate, muscle, and brain wave activity sensors — to help users improve their response to stress, anxiety and loss of concentration. The research was originally intended for use by pilots and air traffic controllers. “We have a limited ability,” to come up with possible applications for the bio-feedback software, Pope said in an interview. “We’ve thought of a few, like surgical training, assembly training, and video games in particular . . . but we’re expecting and hoping that the Edison Nation community of innovators can think more broadly than that.” Teams from Edison Nation and NASA will evaluate all entries, which must be submitted through Edison Nation’s site by August 4, 2014.


D.C. Fringe Festival finds its new home in Connersmith gallery

million, including purchase price, new construction costs and an operating reserve. A major Fringe calling card has been carving performance venues out of small, rough spaces — storefronts and found rooms in and around the large (and largely derelict) building at 607 New York Ave. NW. To accommodate its 100-plus acts each July, Fringe has partnered with conventional companies such as Studio Theatre, Woolly Mammoth and Source, as well as with nearby local organizations such as the Goethe Institut, the Mount Vernon United Methodist Church and art galleries. Most of that will change next year with the shift to Florida Avenue, a block north of the Atlas Performing Arts Center at 1333 H St. NE. Connersmith bought its two-story 1927 building, formerly an auto garage, for $1.4 million in 2007. It is among the largest private galleries in the city and one of the most highly regarded. “Conner deserves its reputation as Washington’s best (or at least most popular) contemporary art space,” critic Michael O’Sullivan wrote in The Washington Post in 2011. Conner and Smith will seek a smaller space in Washington and, in the meantime, will continue operations in an art world that increasingly relies on art fairs and digital interactions. The gallery has already exhibited artists elsewhere in the United States and Europe. A smaller physical footprint, Conner says, “gives us the nimbleness to continue to do that.” For Fringe, the move represents more substantial control of its future and an opportunity to increase its presence year-round. Early plans for the new building include small performance venues, plus an outdoor space with a beer garden to replicate Fringe’s popular food-drink-performance Baldacchino Tent. Brienza and Fringe chief operating officer Peter Korbel say that converting the building for Fringe’s purposes will cost $2.7 million. Fringe has already begun to drift eastward: The Atlas will host 30 performances once this summer’s festival begins July 10. Sam Sweet, who stepped down in March after three seasons as executive director of the Atlas, has been hired by Fringe to help spearhead the capital campaign. Sweet’s previous jobs include managing director of both Signature Theatre and the Shakespeare Theatre Company. “We need to get money from the person who never thought they’d donate to us,” says Brienza, who signed a five-year contract extension with Fringe. “If people want a space like this, this is the time.” Correction: A sentence about the Capital Fringe Festival


Chen Guangcheng: Still waiting on China to honor its pledges

Chen Guangcheng is a distinguished senior fellow in human rights at the Witherspoon Institute, distinguished visiting fellow of the Institute for Policy Research and Catholic Studies at Catholic University and senior distinguished adviser at the Lantos Foundation for Human Rights and Justice. I recently learned that former secretary of state Hillary Clinton dedicated an entire chapter of her new book , “ Hard Choices ,” to the story of how she and her staff at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing gave me refuge and negotiated my safe travel to the United States after I escaped from illegal house arrest. I’m grateful for her decision to allow me to take sanctuary in the embassy. But I fear that my safe arrival in the United States has given the mistaken impression, as Clinton wrote, that Chinese authorities were “scrupulous” in living up to their agreement with the United States. Nothing could be further from the truth. Not only has the Chinese government relentlessly persecuted members of my family since my departure, it also never investigated its prior abuses, as it committed to do. And it imprisoned my nephew, who remains in jail today. By the time I arrived in the United States two years ago, many people knew about my journey. As a self-trained “barefoot” lawyer, I believed I could use the Chinese constitution — the government’s sacred promise to its people — to promote social justice and benefit my community. But I quickly learned that the rule of law means nothing in the face of tyranny and impunity. Like so many before me, I was jailed on fabricated charges. Even after my release, Chinese officials placed me under house arrest with no legal justification. To keep me in line, my entire family was targeted for persecution — an indication of just how badly the regime has lost its moral center. After I escaped from house arrest and fled to Beijing, the targeting of my family worsened dramatically. Communist Party officials and thugs descended upon the home of my brother, Chen Guangfu, who was arrested without a warrant, interrogated about my escape and tortured. The intruders also beat my sister-in-law and nephew, Chen Kegui, who was able to escape temporarily by defending himself from the onslaught with a kitchen knife. However, authorities arrested Kegui on April 29, 2012, and eventually sentenced him to more than three years in prison, where he remains


The myths of smoking pot

From her perch as head of the National Institute on Drug Abuse in Bethesda, Nora Volkow watches anxiously as the country embarks on what she sees as a risky social experiment in legalizing marijuana. For those who argue that marijuana is no more dangerous than tobacco and alcohol, Volkow has two main answers: We don’t entirely know , and, simultaneously, that is precisely the point . “Look at the evidence,” Volkow said in an interview on the National Institutes of Health campus, pointing to the harms already inflicted by tobacco and alcohol. “It’s not subtle — it’s huge. Legal drugs are the main problem that we have in our country as it relates to morbidity and mortality. By far. Many more people die of tobacco than all of the drugs together. Many more people die of alcohol than all of the illicit drugs together. “And it’s not because they are more dangerous or addictive. Not at all — they are less dangerous. It’s because they are legal. . . . The legalization process generates a much greater exposure of people and hence of negative consequences that will emerge. And that’s why I always say, ‘Can we as a country afford to have a third legal drug? Can we?’ We know the costs already on health care, we know the costs on accidents, on lost productivity. I let the numbers speak for themselves.” Volkow speaks rapidly, even urgently, in an accent that lingers from her childhood in Mexico. The great-granddaughter of Soviet communist Leon Trotsky, Volkow grew up in the Mexico City home where Trotsky was fatally attacked. It is easy to imagine, in her passionate determination, some of her ancestor’s revolutionary fervor, melded with a scientist’s evidentiary rigor. In this June 19, 2014 photo, freshly packaged cannabis-infused peanut butter cookies are prepared for casing, inside Sweet Grass Kitchen, a well-established gourmet marijuana edibles bakery which sells its confections to retail outlets, in Denver. (Brennan Linsley/AP) As Colorado and Washington state approve the sale of marijuana for recreational use and other states consider following suit, Volkow says, the notion that legalization represents a modest, cost-free move is dangerously overblown. The evidence on the supposed safety of marijuana — particularly marijuana in its modern, far more potent form — is far from clear enough to take this leap. “I think that what we are seeing is a little bit of wishful thinking