D.C. police arrest suspect in killing of woman 23 years ago

D.C. police using DNA evidence found at a fatal stabbing of a woman nearly a quarter of a century ago in Northwest Washington’s Petworth neighborhood arrested a suspect in Baltimore on Wednesday. Therion Clyde Bryant, 48, was charged with first-degree murder while armed and ordered detained until a preliminary hearing on Monday in D.C. Superior Court. Bryant, who lives in Parkville, north of Baltimore, is charged with killing Charlene Johnson, 25, of Northwest Washington in the fall of 1993. Police said in an arrest affidavit that Bryant admitted to having sex with the victim but denied any involvement in her killing. He told police that he knew Johnson from elementary school but had not seen her in years before they met up again about October 1993. Johnson’s relatives could not be reached Thursday. Bryant was arrested in South Baltimore’s Morrell Park neighborhood. The arrest ends a lengthy police investigation in which detectives said in court documents that they had considered, but ruled out as suspects, the victim’s boyfriend, a man confined to a mental institution who they said falsely confessed to the killing, and another man suspected in a series of killings in Petworth at the time. Johnson’s body was found about 9:40 a.m. on Oct. 16, 1993, at the bottom of an outdoor stairwell leading to a basement door to a rowhouse in the 3600 block of New Hampshire Avenue NW, near the Georgia Avenue-Petworth Metro station. She was found wearing a red and white robe, lying next to a rug and a refrigerator that had blood spattered on the door. A broken beer bottle was next to her hand. An arrest affidavit filed by police said that Johnson had been beaten, stabbed and her throat cut after she had sex or was sexually assaulted. The FBI linked blood and semen DNA to Bryant in 2014, the arrest affidavit said. Police said additional tests were run this year and a more decisive link was made to the suspect.


In this trendy Mexico City neighborhood, you won’t be hard-pressed to find a good cocktail

that I decide to cut myself off for the night. I make the rounds with cheek-kiss goodbyes and saunter toward the exit. I stumble out to the other side, satisfied in knowing that what lies behind the beer fridge is not a portal to another dimension, but just — finally — a good, honest drink. Kroth is a travel writer based in Mexico City and California. More from Travel: Find your own path to tranquility in the Mexican town of Tepoztlan Postcard From Tom: In Mexico City, restaurants favor the authentic approach This isn’t Darwin’s Galapagos: The wildlife-rich islands are more tourist-friendly than you think If you go Where to stay Stara Hamburgo Calle Hamburgo 32, Cuauhtemoc, Juarez 011-52-55-5351-6800 starahotels.com/en A historic Porfiriato building turned adults-only boutique hotel complete with balcony suites, a fitness center and a rooftop bar. Doubles from $238 a night. Where to eat Lucerna Comedor Calle Lucerna 51, Cuauhtemoc, Juarez 011-52-55-5535-8665 facebook.com/LucernaComedor Dine on burgers, tacos, hot dogs and more under twinkly lights in this new open-air food court, which also has craft beer and cocktails. Food and cocktails start at $4. La Panaderia Havre Calle Havre 73, Cuauhtemoc, Juarez 011-52-55-5207-7065 rosetta.com.mx/panaderia-en/locales-havre.html If the wait for brunch is too long at celebrated chef Elena Reygadas’s ultra-popular bakery-cafe, grab a fig-studded mini-baguette or caramel-filled brioche para llevar to go. Brunch entrees are around $4. Amaya Gral. Prim 95 011-52-55-7021-9189 facebook.com/restauranteamaya A just-opened spot from Chef Jair Téllez (of Merotoro and “Latin America’s 50 Best Restaurants” fame) features eclectic dishes and natural wines from Tecate. Where to drink Hanky Panky 011-52-55-9155-0958 facebook.com/Hanky-Panky-Cocktail-Bar-1086123258073748/ It’s not easy to get into this invitation-only, members-only speakeasy, but out-of-town visitors can send a message to the bar’s Facebook page to request a reservation and location information. Drinks range from $6.50-$11.50. Taberna Luciferina Calle Lucerna 34, Cuauhtemoc, Juárez 011-52-55-5535-4424 tabernaluciferina.com Elegant turn-of-the-century mansion converted into a nightspot serving creative cocktails and more. Cocktails are around $6.50. Havre Cancino Havre 64, Juarez 011-52-55-5207-4398 facebook.com/havreenlajuarez Wood-fired pizza, mezcal-beer cocktails and addictive truffle fries stand out in this designer basement spot. Cocktails are around $5. Parker Lenox Calle Milan 14, Cuauhtemoc, Juarez 011-52-55-5546-6979 facebook.com/parkerandlenox In a city starved for live jazz, Parker & Lenox is a welcome addition. Snack on classic American dishes in the diner up front, then move to the club for drinks and a show. Show cover starts at $5.50. Information visitmexico.com/es/ciudad-de-mexico-df — M.K.


WADA heard of Russian doping in 2010, didn’t investigate until media reports

Natalya Bochkaryova, left, and Ilya Podolsky work at the Russia's national drug-testing laboratory in Moscow on May 24. The Russians have been accused of state-sponsored doping at the 2014 Sochi Olympics. (Alexander Zemlianichenko/Associated Press) At the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, a whistleblower approached three officials with the World Anti-Doping Agency, the global organization that combats drug cheating in sports. Vitaliy Stepanov was a disillusioned Russian anti-doping agent, and in several meetings with WADA officials held in the Olympic Village in February 2010, he detailed how drug cheating was endemic among Russia’s Olympic athletes and how the government and Russia’s anti-doping agency were complicit. For four years after those first meetings, Stepanov exchanged hundreds of emails with WADA employees, but the rules-enforcing agency never opened an investigation into Russia’s alleged rule-breaking. Finally, in early 2014, a senior WADA official, convinced his agency would never pursue the claims, directed Stepanov to contact a German journalist, in the hopes that the journalist would investigate them, according to Stepanov and a person familiar with the case who spoke on condition of anonymity. Now, reports of widespread doping by Russian athletes at the past two Olympics are public, and WADA is rushing to complete its own investigation and decide whether to ban athletes from this summer’s Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro. But the revelation that WADA effectively outsourced an investigation to a journalist, four years after first learning of alleged doping, raises more questions from Olympic athletes about the effectiveness of the agency. “Athletes have lost faith in the process and the way that they’re being protected,” said Hayley Wickenheiser, a Canadian ice hockey player and five-time Olympic medalist. “It makes you question your faith in the whole system and whether the playing field truly is even.” WADA spokesman Ben Nichols said his agency’s rules did not grant it the authority to conduct investigations until January 2015. “In simple terms, it came down to the fact that we, as an organization, didn’t have any investigative powers,” said Nichols, who did not dispute the basic facts of Stepanov’s story. As the years passed after his first conversation with WADA officials in 2010, the Russian whistleblower said he began to wonder whether anything would ever come of his overtures. “I often wondered what I was to WADA,” said Stepanov, who spoke by phone from an undisclosed location in the United States. “I didn’t know if


a surprise email from Robertson. The WADA investigator told the Russian whistleblower to contact Hajo Seppelt, a German reporter and filmmaker who had investigated doping in Russia before. (Robertson and Seppelt declined to comment for this story. Stepanov confirmed it was Robertson who connected him with the German reporter.) The resulting documentary, “Top-Secret Doping: How Russia Makes Its Winners,” aired on German television in December 2014. Within weeks, WADA, which at that point finally had investigatory authority thanks to a change in its governance, commissioned an investigation. Last November, WADA made public the results of the investigation, which found widespread doping in Russian track and field, and suggested the cheating was rampant in other sports and that government officials were involved. The report stopped short of conclusively implicating sports beyond track and field. A few weeks later, at a WADA meeting, Beckie Scott, chair of the agency’s athlete’s committee, implored WADA officials to open another investigation into all of Russia’s Olympic sports programs. Her request was ignored. “I left the meeting a little perplexed. I thought maybe they just needed some time to consider this,” said Scott, a former Olympic cross-country skiier from Canada who in the 2002 Olympics finished behind two Russian skiiers who later tested positive for banned drugs. “The curtain had been pulled back here of a state-sponsored methodology of undermining the anti-doping system and cheating, and yet only one sport was going to be affected? What about the other sports?” In March, Scott and other athletes renewed calls to WADA for a wider investigation into Russian doping. Then in May, two more media reports stoked WADA to act again. First, “60 Minutes” aired a piece on Stepanov and his wife. Then, a former director of Russia’s anti-doping lab, Grigory Rodchenkov, told the New York Times how he helped sabotage drug testing at the 2014 Games in Sochi, with the assistance of Russian government agents. In response, the International Olympic Committee started retesting urine samples from previous games and WADA has opened a second, wider investigation of Russia. WADA has set a goal to complete the investigation by July 15 so that a decision about Russia’s participation in Rio can be made. Dick Pound, the former WADA president who led last year’s investigation, said Thursday he believes this new investigation will be comprehensive despite the timeline. “It’ll be high-speed, but it’ll be thorough,” he said. Conflicting agendas


Summer opera: Wine, women and Gassmann

Trap’s Lucretia is J’Nai Bridges, a “young professional” with an impressive résumé and a host of awards (including the Marian Anderson award in 2012). If you miss her this summer, you can hear her next year in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony, Christoph Eschenbach’s final performances as music director of the National Symphony Orchestra. Not all of Wolf Trap’s offerings are offbeat. In recent years, the company has revived the practice of doing one show a summer at the Filene Center, with the National Symphony Orchestra; this summer, it’s “La bohème,” conducted by Grant Gershon and directed by Paul Curran. (Aug. 5.) But if you’ve never heard of Gassmann, you’re not alone. An 18th-century composer active in Venice and then in Vienna, he wrote “L’Opera Seria” in 1769, and its Wolf Trap performances (July 15-23) will be the first ever given in America. The subject, though, is topical enough: backstage drama during the production of an opera, at the end of which the presenter absconds with all the money. How better to prepare young singers for their professional careers? Other summer highlights: If the future of classical music is on your mind, the National Orchestral Institute is another reason for optimism. This program selects gifted young players from across the country and brings them to the University of Maryland for a month of intensive lessons, rehearsals, master classes and performances of all stripes, including three marquee appearances by the National Festival Orchestra, made up of all the participating students. This year’s conductors include James Ross (whose leadership at U-Md. has helped spark some of the most interesting orchestral programs I’ve ever seen, such as the choreographed collaborations of “Appalachian Spring” and “Afternoon of a faun”), who leads an evening of American symphonies June 11, and Osmo Vänskä, the acclaimed conductor of the Minnesota Orchestra, on June 25. Minnesota Orchestra conductor, Osmo Vänskä. (Kaapo Kamu) “Firebird” Creator Janni Younge with puppets. (Courtesy of Wolf Trap) A pinnacle of Wolf Trap’s summer is a new “Firebird,” co-commissioned with several other groups from a member of South Africa’s Handspring Puppet Company — the team responsible for “War Horse.” The National Symphony Orchestra under Cristian Macelaru will play Stravinsky’s score to live puppet accompaniment in what is being billed as a spectacular and colorful performance (July 23). Also of interest on the NSO’s Wolf Trap calendar are a performance by the star pianist Yuja Wang, playing


Baltimore activists file suit to void city election results

Baltimore, MD--May 3, 2016--Left to right: J. Wyndal Gordon, C.D. Witherspoon (at microphone), Hassan Giordano and other political activists hold a press conference about what they say are voter irregularities in last week's election. It was held outside the city's board of election headquarters. (Barbara Haddock Taylor/Baltimore Sun) A group of Baltimore activists has filed a federal lawsuit seeking to void the results of the city’s April 26 primary it called an“absolute disaster” after a series of glitches and irregularities. The group, Voters Organized for the Integrity of City Elections, says the only way to renew confidence in the Baltimore’s election process is to start over and hold a new election. The problems during the spring primary have raised questions about the results in municipal races, where state Senate Majority Leader Catherine Pugh won the Democratic primary for the mayoral election against former Baltimore Mayor Sheila Dixon by just about 2400 votes. Contests for city council were also tight; several incumbents lost their seats in some cases by a margin of just a few dozen votes. The State Board of Elections moved to decertify the results after discovering there were more completed ballots than voters who checked into polling places. An investigation uncovered nearly 1,200 provisional ballots improperly counted without verifying the voter’s registration status — with no way to remove them from the results. The results were recertified with some irregularities unexplained. The lawsuit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Maryland, also alleges Baltimore poll workers were “woefully unprepared,” that thumb drives with election results went missing and that some votes were illegally won with promises of Election Day jobs and boxed chicken meals. Lead plaintiff Hassan Giordano, a Baltimore activist, said filing a lawsuit was the only recourse after state officials declined to intervene. “We finally had an election where people were inspired enough to show up, had record turn out and this happens: Issue after issue after issue,” said Giordano. Dixon, the runner-up in the mayoral race, declined to seek a recount or file her own court challenge this week. Her spokeswoman Martha McKenna says the campaign is working to get answers about where things went wrong directly from the State Board of Elections. City and state elections officials did not immediately return requests for comment on the lawsuit.


Clean, accessible water for African nations

A woman gathers water from a dam in Qunu, South Africa, in 2013. (Schalk van Zuydam/Associated Press) The June 2 World article “The toll African women pay to collect water,” which highlighted a recent analysis of global access to clean water, reported on a critical problem that is grossly neglected in many African countries. The daily ordeals and burdens of water-collecting, left mainly to women and children, are an unsettling phenomenon that should worry African policymakers. The article brought back poignant moments I experienced on several trips to rural regions in Ethiopia. Images of malnourished, barefoot women and children, carrying plastic buckets in both hands, came to mind. In small and large groups, they traveled several miles every day to fetch water, mostly from dwindling rivers and streams. The water in many areas was muddy. It was heartbreaking to watch children struggle to carry the water-filled buckets back to their homes while trying to maintain their balance to prevent spilling the precious liquid. Having regular meals and attending school are unreachable luxuries to these children who are subjected to the agonizingly difficult chore. Finding clean water, a basic necessity to maintain a healthy community, should not remain the cause of so much suffering. Unless African countries succeed in liberating a significant portion of their populations from this terrible situation, any development program will remain meaningless. Tewodros Abebe, Accokeek


Muhammad Ali: A superstar before the word meant anything

PHOTOS: The legendary heavyweight boxer was one of the most important political, social and athletic figures of the 20th century. As much as any man or woman of his time — and far more than any mere sports celebrity — Muhammad Ali would come to understand what it takes to be a superstar well before the term really meant anything. There was the controversy and the polarization: In the silent-majority construct of the 1960s, his heyday, he was a “draft dodger”; a convert to a strange religion, the Nation of Islam; a racial separatist who called white people “devils.” Ali made enemies when he crystallized his opposition to the Vietnam War by refusing Army induction in 1967. “Man, I ain’t got no quarrel with them Viet Cong,” he said. “No Viet Cong ever called me ‘nigger.’ ” As an angry young man, Ali was beloved by the counterculture, reviled by almost everyone else. There were the legendary athletic feats: Ali — then known as Cassius Clay, his “slave name,” he later called it — upset the heavily favored champion, Sonny Liston, for his first professional boxing title in 1964. He was 22, the youngest heavyweight champion ever at that time. Robbed of his best years in the ring as a result of a nearly four-year legal battle over his draft status that exiled him from boxing, he was stripped of his title, winning it back twice more, the last time somewhat miraculously as a broken-down, past-his-prime plugger in 1978. There was, too, an abundance of charisma and media savvy: Ali talked like a street poet, with the patter and swagger of a proto-rapper. At a time when African American athletes were expected to play and stay silent, Ali openly courted the TV camera, unapologetically placing himself and his racial pride before it. In this he was greatly enabled by another outsider, a Jewish sportswriter turned broadcaster from Brooklyn named Howard Cosell. Ali’s best lines were not just memorable — “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee” — but often fantastic. Muhammad Ali's larger than life persona and way with words helped him become a global phenomenon. Here are some of Ali's classic lines delivered throughout his career. “I’ve done something new for this fight,” he announced before the 1974 “Rumble in the Jungle” with George Foreman. “I done wrestled with an alligator. I done tussled with a whale, handcuffed


Animal Watch: Caught in the act at a coop

BLUEMONT, Among cases received by the Loudoun County Department of Animal Services.


Beer of the Week: The Monarchy Preussen Weisse

(Fritz Hahn/The Washington Post) If there’s one law beer lovers know, it’s the Reinheitsgebot, the 1516 “German beer purity law” decreeing that only barley, hops and water could be used to make beer. Although the law originally applied just to Bavaria, by 1906 it was enforced across Germany. The Reinheitsgebot turned 500 in April, and it’s not without critics on both sides of the Atlantic. German brewers complain that it stifles their ability to create styles as diverse as lambics or fruit-based IPAs; here in the States, Dogfish Head owner Sam Calagione refers to the law as “nothing more than a form of art censorship.” Before the Reinheitsgebot took effect across Germany, regional breweries used many more ingredients. The Monarchy, a brewery in the western German state of North Rhine-Westphalia that re-creates historic, out-of-favor beer styles, claims to have found an 1831 recipe for a weissbier that incorporates juniper, ginger and sugar-beet syrup. Its version, called Preussen Weisse, is a summer beer for people who find the usual banana and clove flavors in hefeweizen too fruity and cloying. The earthy juniper and ginger combine well with some apple flavors, a hint of gin and a quick hit of sourness on the finish, making it very pleasant in warm weather. The sugar beet provides a noticeable sweetness, but the beer finishes dry and clean. — Fritz Hahn The Monarchy Preussen Weisse. themonarchybeer.de. $6 per 500-milliliter bottle. More from Food: Beer Column archive


Just call me The Court Jester of Dud Suds

resided since at least 1830. “America” showed up on store shelves May 23 and will remain until mid-November. On cans and bottles, the phrase “King of Beers” has been replaced by “E Pluribus Unum.” (I would have replaced “King of Beers” with “Prince of Swill.” And who among Budweiser patrons knows what “E Pluribus Unum” means? I would imagine few.) The “America” rebranding is in the spirit of what Budweiser vice president Ricardo Marques referred to as “probably the most American summer of our generation.” I’m not quite sure why this is the most American summer of our generation. Budweiser points out that this summer is bringing us Memorial Day, Independence Day and Labor Day, plus the Olympics, the Copa America Centenario soccer fest and the presidential election. Now, not to nitpick here, but those three holidays occur every year, plus the Summer Games and the presidential election occur every four years. Americans are participating in the Olympics, but they are being held in Rio de Janeiro, which is somewhat south of America as we know it. And, yes, this soccer competition is being hosted throughout the United States this month, but — and I don’t want to be too unpatriotic or too 19th century here — if the Copa America were held in my back yard, I would close the Venetian blinds, pop open a Yuengling and watch a “Duck Dynasty” marathon on Hulu. Speaking of which, my beer of choice once was Rolling Rock, but I left Rolling Rock when it was bought by Anheuser-Busch. I switched to Pabst Blue Ribbon but left PBR when it was bought by the Russians. So I now proudly stand with Yuengling, America’s oldest brewery, which, of course, makes it somewhat more American than Budweiser, er, “America.” Budweiser is synonymous with American sports. But remember that great ad jingle, “Baseball, hot dogs, apple pie and Chevrolet, they go together in the good ole USA?” Notice they don’t mention Budweiser? Heck, they didn’t even mention Bud before it skedaddled to Brussels. (Actually, I like drinking Bud while watching backgammon on TV; alas, there is usually no backgammon on TV. I also have been slowly transitioning to esports, but esports really go best with Yoo-hoo.) You do have to be impressed in regard to Budweiser’s hold on the American beer-drinking public, in light of all the terrific imports and craft brews now on the


Ravens lineman pushing marijuana on the NFL

for cannabinoids to help current and former players, as is evidenced by them taking the call, and also expressed a desire to learn more,” said Marcel Bonn-Miller, an adjunct assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania school of medicine. “They are definitely showing genuine curiosity, and they are definitely not throwing up roadblocks.” Monroe’s advocacy comes as America’s views on marijuana continue to shift and the country’s opioid crisis grows starker. Twenty-four states plus the District of Columbia have legalized medical marijuana, with more likely by year’s end. Four states plus the District have legalized it in full. Meanwhile, overdoses related to prescription pain medication caused 19,000 deaths in 2014, the latest figures released by the American Society of Addiction Medicine. The number rises to nearly 40,000 when heroin overdoses are factored in, and prescription pain killers can lead to heroin use. “In my mind, there’s no comparison if we just started from scratch in the year 2016 and looked newly at which class of drugs worked better to treat pain and side-effect profile up to and including death, in the case of opioids,” said Daniel Clauw, a University of Michigan professor who has performed studies comparing opioids and cannabis. “You put the two next to each other, and there really is no debate which is more effective to treat pain. You would go the cannabinoid route instead of the opiate route.” On Wednesday afternoon at a local juice bar, Monroe outlined his stance. He is a skilled and disciplined messenger, amiable yet forceful, eloquent but not conversational. His response to an interviewer’s first question lasted more than five minutes. He does not present himself as a radical but rather as an emissary of common-sense science that has been dismissed owing to outdated stigma. When it was mentioned that there is no conclusive proof that cannabis aids in concussions, Monroe casually interrupted, “The U.S. Department of Health has a patent — 6630507 — defining it has neuroprotective capabilities in the event of traumatic injury to the brain.” Earlier this year, as Monroe gathered information and prepared to go public, Nureya posed a question to him. “What do you want to come out of this?” she asked. “I want to break down the doors,” Monroe replied. “And if I can get a huge organization like the NFL to acknowledge this is something we can do to help people, if the NFL


Farmers market part of new health and wellness effort in Temple Hills

Shirley Marshall shops for apples at the farmers market in Temple Hills. The market operates on Wednesdays from 2 to 7 p.m. in an area that is considered a “food desert.” (Michael Robinson Chavez/The Washington Post) For Temple Hills resident Denise Woodard, fruits and vegetables are more than a mile away from her home. That’s how far Woodard has to walk to reach the nearest grocery store if she wants fresh produce. And if that store doesn’t have what she wants, she has to go two more miles. Woodard is an Army veteran who generally walks about five miles a day, so she is used to the trek. But she worries about her neighbors. Many don’t drive, and others are older or not in the best of health. They are the people most in need of healthy food, and those least likely to get it because they live in a “food desert” — a neighborhood without a fullservice grocery store. Two months ago, Catholic Charities joined with a Maryland farm to bring some relief to Temple Hills residents. Operating out of a parking lot, Catholic Charities and Miller Farms of Clinton set up a half-dozen tables filled with fresh fruits, vegetables and herbs for their first attempt to provide the neighborhood with food. It would not be their last. Each Wednesday, from 2 to 7 p.m. through September, they will bring in more produce and assorted goods to needy residents, and at discounted prices. Alex True sorts through green beans at the Temple Hills farmer’s market. (Michael Robinson Chavez/The Washington Post) Woodard stumbled upon the inaugural outing in April and found plump tomatoes, asparagus spears, ears of sweet corn and fresh fruit that she described as something seemingly “out of place in this community.” But several groups are working to make sure fresh produce is the norm and not an occasional treat. The market is located across the street from Love of the Gospel Church in Temple Hills. The Rev. James Love, the church’s pastor, came up with the idea for a farmers market after he learned that Catholic Charities had purchased the building across the street from his church. Love, who grew up in the area, said he could recall a time when there were several supermarkets in Temple Hills. But as white residents began to move out of Prince George’s County in the late 1960s, many storeowners closed


Trump is a much worse threat than Brexit

more than 10 percent and the British stock market could fall by as much as 10 percent, with even greater declines for companies that conduct all of their business in Britain. It is widely believed that the uncertainties associated with Brexit are consequential enough to affect the policies of the Federal Reserve and other major central banks. There are good reasons for markets to be on hair-trigger alert over Brexit. It would in all likelihood be economically very costly for Britain to leave the E.U. — causing increased uncertainty about the future of the British economy, making Britain a less attractive destination for businesses oriented toward the European economy, raising questions about the future cohesion of the United Kingdom, threatening London’s role as a financial center and curtailing British exports to Europe. What is very surprising is that U.S. and global markets and financial policy makers seem much less sensitive to Trump risk. Options markets suggest only modestly elevated volatility in the period surrounding the presidential election. While every Fed watcher comments on the implications for the Fed of Brexit, almost none comment on the possible consequences of Trump. As Britain's main opposition leader, Jeremy Corbyn, jumps into the Brexit debate, opinion polls hint at an evenly divided electorate. Yet, as great as the risks of Brexit are to the British economy, I believe the risks to the U.S. and global economies of Trump’s election as president of the United States are far greater. Indeed, if he were elected, I would expect a protracted recession to begin within 18 months. The damage would in all likelihood be felt far beyond the United States. Here’s why. First, there is a substantial risk of highly erratic policy. Trump has raised the possibility of more than $10 trillion in tax cuts, which would threaten U.S. fiscal stability. He has also raised the possibility of the United States restructuring its debt in the manner of a failed real estate developer. Perhaps this is just campaign rhetoric. But historical research suggests that, contrary to popular belief, presidents tend to carry out their major campaign promises. The shadowboxingover raising the debt limit in 2011 (where all participants recognized the danger of default) was central to the stock market falling by 17 percent. A president with an entirely reckless fiscal program and an openness to restructuring debt could damage confidence and markets in the short run and


Krispy Kreme to open in Manassas this fall

part of an agreement the Winston-Salem, N.C.-based Krispy Kreme signed with Monument Restaurants in 2014. In that deal, Monument acquired the existing Krispy Kreme in Rockville, Md., and the two companies announced that another 20 doughnut shops would be built in the greater Washington area and elsewhere in Maryland over the next several years. Overall, Krispy Kreme has more than 1,000 shops in 27 countries, according to the company’s website. A number of factors influenced Monument’s decision to come to Manassas, Horton said. Demographic data — such as average household income in the area — looked good, he said, and Davis Ford Crossing seemed like it would be easy for customers to enter and exit. Monument at one time was the largest franchisee of another Washington-area restaurant chain, burger giant Five Guys. Horton said he and his partners were attracted to Krispy Kreme for several reasons, including the longevity of the brand – it has been around since 1937 – its Southern heritage and its iconic nature, symbolized by glazed doughnuts and round neon signs that alert customers as to when the signature snacks are hot and coming off the conveyor belt. “The doughnut business is alive and well,” he said. Prince William-area residents must travel to Alexandria, the District or Fredericksburg for Krispy Kremes, but Duck Donuts, a staple of North Carolina’s Outer Banks, has a location in Bristow and one planned for Woodbridge. Another popular chain, Sugar Shack Donuts, which started in Richmond, has expanded to Fredericksburg, Alexandria and Arlington. Those doughnut dealers and others, such as convenience stores, fielded special advertising campaigns for National Doughnut Day. The annual holiday, held on the first Friday in June, was begun by the Salvation Army in 1938 to honor the organization’s “doughnut lassies,” women who served the confections to soldiers in World War I. The doughnut lassies are sometimes credited with popularizing the sweets in the United States as troops returned home from war, according to Krispy Kreme and the Salvation Army. Krispy Kreme locations also were to collect donations for the Salvation Army on Friday in miniature versions of the red kettles that the nonprofit organization uses for the same purpose during the Christmas season. A day earlier, however, Manassas Mayor Harry J. “Hal” Parrish II (R) was quick with a quip when asked for a comment about Krispy Kreme coming to his home town. “It’s sweet,” he said.


Deaths of NPR journalists underscore new risks in Afghan coverage

who had been driving them had been killed in the ambush. On Monday, remembrances poured in as, once again, journalists were reminded of the risks associated with working in Afghanistan and other conflict zones. Gilkey, 50, had won a George Polk Award in 2010, an Emmy in 2007 and numerous distinctions from the White House News Photographers Association. He had covered wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, among other stories during his career. He joined NPR, working for its website, in 2007. Tamanna, 38, was also a journalist, shooting photos in Afghanistan for China’s Xinhua News Agency and writing for Turkey’s Anadolu agency. “Zabi and David, who were on the front line to report about the truth, themselves became the victims of Taliban brutality,” Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said. “History will remember Zabi and David as fighters for freedom of information and expression.” According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, 27 journalists or media workers have been killed in Afghanistan since 2001. But Gilkey, a native of Portland, Ore., was the first foreign journalist to be killed in Afghanistan since 2014, when a rogue Afghan police officer shot and killed Associated Press photographer Anja Niedringhaus, a German national. The deaths are once again causing journalists here to reevaluate the risks in a country where both the brutality of the Taliban and the number of casualties continue to grow. Yet the determination to bear witness to the war is something Kathy Gannon, chief Associated Press correspondent for Afghanistan-Pakistan, knows well. During the 2014 attack that killed Niedringhaus, Gannon, 62, was shot six times. She endured 16 surgeries over the past two years but returned to her Islamabad-based job earlier this year. “We are not motivated by danger; we are motivated by stories,” Gannon said in an interview Monday. “We are driven by that desire to get as close as possible to the people in the country, in the village, and in the conflict, and the only way we can best tell their story is to be by their side.” For much of the war, journalists in Afghanistan wanting to get near the fighting could embed with U.S. or coalition soldiers. But with the U.S. military having reduced its troop presence here over the past two years, those trips must now be taken alone or accompanying the Afghan military. That presents a host of life-threatening challenges. Afghan


Read this before you lug home that jackfruit

Fresh jackfruit at Whole Foods Market in Alexandria. The mid-Atlantic chain is selling whole fruit (at 20 pounds and up) and shrink-wrapped cut sections. (Robyn Webb) Never eat anything bigger than your head: Such generally sound advice must be tossed out the window when it comes to jackfruit, the exotic produce that happens to be #trending with some confusion. In the States, it was once available solely as a canned product in Asian markets, but now whole fresh specimens weighing 10 to 25 pounds are stacked like spiky green submarines in mainstream American grocery stores. The fruit’s sheer mass and forbidding exterior tend to ward off potential takers, but those who have tasted its innards are forever fans. Things don’t get easier once you cut the fruit open. A milky, hard-to-remove sap is released with each cut. Jackfruit can contain varying amounts of sweet, yellow flesh pods embedded in a tough core, depending on the level of ripeness. And its hard, ecru-colored seeds evoke fat garlic cloves in shape and size — solid as rocks, yet once boiled and peeled, they are beloved for their potato-chestnut hybrid appeal. Tasters at The Washington Post found notes of pear, pineapple, banana and papaya in the ripe fruit, commenting favorably on a texture they identified as having more body than mango and a satisfying moisture level (read: not too sticky or juicy). “Jackfruit has been in America for decades, and it’s the biggest produce story over the past four months or so,” says Melissa’s Produce spokesman Robert Schueller. Three years ago, the nationwide distributor was selling a few cases per year. “Now we sell 250 cases per week,” he says. It has long been carried in Asian supermarkets (whole and in shrink-wrapped portions), where shoppers understand the beauty of slumping, less-than-perfect hulks. Media buzz might be due to jackfruit’s growing status as a plant-based meat substitute, low in protein — a selling point for those avoiding high-protein foods — and rich in nutrients such as calcium and potassium. In 2014, an NPR report touted an initiative in India to promote jackfruit as an answer to solving food insecurity, as the fruit grows abundantly in tropical climates and offers versatility. It took Chicago-based Upton’s Naturals about four years to source the right kind of jackfruit from Southeast Asia for its March 2015 product launch in flavors of Thai curry, barbecue and chili lime carnitas.


Behind the scenes of a U.S. superbug discovery that made headlines around the world

The Post's Lena Sun visited Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in Silver Spring, Md., where scientists there identified a strain of bacteria resistant to the last-resort antibiotic, colistin. The bacteria was found in a Pennsylvania woman. Microbiologist Patrick McGann explains how his team identified the gene that gives the bacteria this resistance Microbiologist Patrick McGann knew he had identified a dangerous germ. He just didn’t know how dangerous. In mid-May, a colleague had found a strain of E. coli bacteria from a 49-year-old Pennsylvania woman that tested positive for resistance to a drug called colistin. That’s the antibiotic used when all others fail. McGann, whose job is to prevent outbreaks of new pathogens in the U.S. military’s sprawling health-care system, wasn’t yet alarmed. Sometimes mutations occur spontaneously that make bacteria resistant to an antibiotic. It would be a completely different problem, though, if the bacteria turned out to carry a certain colistin-resistant gene called mcr-1. But that required deeper molecular testing. McGann asked his research team at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research in Silver Spring, Md., to do an initial test for the presence of the resistant gene. And on May 18, he got the result as he rode Metro’s Red Line back to the lab from a meeting. Research technician Ana Ong texted him to say the strain of E. coli had tested positive for the mcr-1 gene. Stunned, McGann texted back: “You’re s----ing me??” And then, realizing what the discovery meant, he didn’t wait for her reply. “Onto the sequencer ASAP,” he wrote back, referring to the labor-intensive, round-the-clock effort required to read the entire genetic code of the bacteria and determine how easily the gene might spread. “We had to drop everything else to get this done,” he explained later. “When [the test] came back positive, all hell broke loose.” U.S. health officials and experts had been bracing for this moment since the gene’s discovery late last year in China. They’d hunted for mcr-1 in tens of thousands of samples from meat sources, animals and people. And now that it’s definitively here, officials expect to find more cases — provoking even greater alarm. Immediately, the discovery in Pennsylvania gave new urgency to measures throughout the military and the federal government to determine where else the gene might be lurking and how to control its spread. Patrick McGann, left, and Kathy "Ana" Ong, prepare blood


Stephen King’s ‘End of Watch’: This summer’s undeniable page-turner

Brady has been very busy indeed. A homegrown, if murderous, computer genius before Holly clobbered him, Brady’s consciousness has returned, augmented by illegal drugs administered by Babineau, chief of the clinic’s neurology department. While he’s still unable to move from his bed, Brady’s consciousness can leapfrog from his own brain into those of others, controlling them like zombie drones. Worse, he uses all of these human puppets to buy up hundreds of Zappits, discontinued computer tablets. Among the many games bundled into each Zappit is one called Fishin’ Hole. The fiendish Brady reprograms the benign game into a demonic version of Candy Crush or Angry Birds: Anyone looking at the demo becomes hypnotized by its brightly colored fish, whereupon Brady commands them to kill themselves. And even more nefariously, Brady has plans to give away the Zappits to all those kids who attended that boy-band concert five years earlier, thereby igniting a suicide epidemic. He sets up a suicide-inducing website, too, which, in a sly nod to the TV version of King’s The Stand, uses “Don’t Fear the Reaper” as its theme song. Bestselling author Stephen King (Shane Leonard) So much for the page-turning aspects of “End of Watch,” which are many, complex, and grimly entertaining. More intriguing is the novel’s emotional heart, which resides in Hodges. As the book opens, the aging detective learns he has pancreatic cancer. He refuses treatment and tells no one, though the loyal Holly quickly figures out the truth. King sends Hodges, and the reader, on a death march in pursuit of Brady. Exhausted and in gut-wrenching pain, Hodges knows this will be his last case. No point in enlisting the cops: Who would believe a paraplegic patient is capable of possessing another human being? Not long ago, the events described here would seem as improbable as a haunted 1958 Plymouth Fury named Christine. Today, however, quantum advances in neuroscience, computers and social media make “End of Watch” seem creepily plausible, especially in its vivid depiction of the diabolical game Fishin’ Hole, and the reactions of those vulnerable people, mostly teenagers, who are susceptible to its deadly subliminal message. Throughout his tale, King nimbly pulls together numerous plot threads and characters, adding a few from “Mr. Mercedes” and “Finders Keepers,” and for good measure throws in a final nail-biting chase through a blizzard. One finishes this novel feeling great empathy for its resolute protagonist,


In remembrance of Muhammad Ali, let’s not forget his true legacy

irony, was the very thing that made her and the other Africans she freed slaves. I can’t pinpoint when the hijacking, or Disneyfication, of all of these biographies began, but I can with Ali’s. It happened shortly after it was revealed Parkinson’s struck him and it was accelerated when he teetered on that Atlanta stadium platform with the Olympic torch in hand to light ’96 Summer Games’ flame. In Atlanta to cover the Games, I remember watching the NBC broadcast later as Bob Costas told the world that Ali didn’t lose his gold medal from the 1960 Rome Games in the dramatic manner that he told Richard Durham over 15 pages in “The Greatest: My Own Story.” In that autobiography, Ali said he unceremoniously chucked his medallion into the Ohio River in his home town, Louisville, after being denied service at a restaurant because of his color. “My holiday as White Hope was over,” Ali said. “I felt a new, secret strength.” But Costas said Ali simply lost the medal and dismissed the tale as apocryphal. Mark Durham, the son of Richard and a friend of mine, told me Costas’s account was ludicrous. Ali’s lifelong photographer Howard Bingham told me then that was the champ’s truth. Years later, former Washington Post writer David Remnick, editor of the New Yorker, quoted author Toni Morrison, who edited “The Greatest.” “The book was more accurate than not. As for the gold medal story, Ali came to deny it was true when the book came out.” But there was no dismissing what Ali’s story, real or not, symbolized, as Costas went on to say, unless one wants to somehow defang his legacy by making him appear more pliant than defiant. Ali cast away three years, the prime of his career, for refusing to swallow his beliefs about the immorality of war in general and the Vietnam War in particular at a time when U.S. citizens overwhelmingly supported fighting communism in Asia. For that, he was stripped of his right to make a living in his chosen vocation. Ring magazine in 1967 declined to name a boxer of the year because Ali, the runaway candidate, was a verboten public figure. At least the Supreme Court vindicated his stance. Most observers since Friday noted Ali’s singularity in our history. That isn’t the truth about him, either. He too was part of a lineage in sports of


He beat leukemia. But then, mysteriously, things got really bad.

recently recovered from leukemia when he was struck by unexplained dementia-like symptoms. He credits a specialist doctor with discovering the surprising cause. McGhee’s spinal tap did yield some positive news: There was no indication of Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, though there was evidence of an infection or inflammation. That did not rule out another form of dementia or other serious illnesses, including a recurrence of his cancer. Because Williams was scheduled to be away for two weeks, a colleague temporarily took over McGhee’s case and oversaw three days of inpatient testing. In the hospital, Melinda McGhee said, doctors told her they were fairly certain that her father’s confusion and other symptoms were the result of dementia. “It just didn’t make any sense,” she recalled. How, in a matter of weeks, could he go from a man adept at managing his finances to someone who couldn’t find his checkbook? Doctors, she said, told her that while his deterioration looked sudden, it wasn’t. “They would say things like, ‘Your dad is a really smart guy, and he’s been hiding it from you. It’s been going on for a really long time.’ ” But more tests revealed little. Once home, McGhee, who had begun receiving two weeks of IV antibiotics, seemed to be getting better. His confusion began to clear, his short-term memory improved and his tremors abated. “I could feel myself recovering,” he recalled. On Sept. 29, he went back to see Williams, who was heartened by the improvement. “He looked 1,000 percent better than when I last saw him,” Williams noted. After reviewing the test results, he concluded that McGhee had been suffering not from dementia but from Lyme meningoencephalitis, a rare bacterial infection of the nervous system that typically occurs several weeks, or even months, after Lyme exposure. “Spring and summer is when these teeny, tiny ticks come out, and 20 percent of people who are bitten don’t have a bull’s-eye rash,” Williams noted. “And Lyme is on the list of the causes of rapidly progressive dementia,” although it is unusual. McGhee said he was unaware of any tick bite. He wonders if the disease might have taken hold because his immune system was suppressed by the chemo he underwent to treat his leukemia. Williams said he doesn’t think so, because McGhee’s treatment had ended months earlier. “He just happened to get two bad things: cancer and Lyme disease,” the neurologist said.


See the stars with the pros at Astronomy Festival on the Mall

The annual astronomy festival offers free tours of the night sky. (iStock) Coming up Friday evening, a festival starring . . . the stars. Let’s hope for clear skies. It’s the sixth annual Astronomy Festival on the National Mall, offering visitors free guided tours of the night sky with the aid of 20 solar, optical and radio telescopes and a collection of experts from scientific and educational institutions. The event, organized by Donald Lubowich, coordinator of astronomy outreach at Hofstra University in New York, will begin at 6 p.m., when visitors will be able to view sunspots through specially filtered solar telescopes. Once it’s dark, other telescopes can be used to get a good look at the moon, Saturn, Mars and Jupiter and its moons. And, of course, the stars. There will be demonstrations, speakers, hands-on activities, a planetarium show beneath a blow-up dome and lots of astronomers and astronomy aficionados to answer questions or talk about careers in science. The show ends at 11 p.m. The festival will be held north of the Washington Monument at 15th Street and Constitution Avenue NW. The rain date is Saturday at Catholic University, 620 Michigan Avenue NE.


Attending a service academy comes with certain expectations for all

draft pick. (Patrick Semansky/Associated Press) As the daughter of a career naval officer, sister of a Marine and aunt of two recent graduates of the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, I am embarrassed to admit I was unaware that graduates of the military academies were allowed to renege on their service commitments after graduation to become professional athletes. Tom Slear was correct in lamenting that there has been little public debate on this [“What service academy athletes owe us before they go pro,” op-ed, June 3]. Perhaps the few who know about it are invested in the lucrative financials of sports. Universities and the military academies recruit athletes from high schools based on their ability to bring financial and public relations benefits through their athletic talent; academic performance plays a lesser role. But the military academies are different in a major way from other educational institutions: At taxpayers’ expense, these young people receive an excellent education and job training that will benefit them all their careers. In return for a subsidized, prestigious, lifelong credential, graduates agree to military service for a limited time. To allow them to skip that important commitment undermines our respect for the academies. It says that carrying a ball is more important than carrying a rifle in the defense of a nation. The solution seems obvious: When they leave, these athletes should be billed for the cost of their academy educations. This may take care of their financial obligation, but it would do little to fix the disdain their departure shows the military. Mary McKay, McLean Kudos to Tom Slear for opposing I know Mr. Slear and I are sailing against the wind, but the service academy’s job is to educate future military officers, not to serve as “recruiter” for institutions that have thousands of outstanding applicants every year. Should a young USNA choir soprano with a Sarah Brightman voice be given a “get out of the real military free” ticket to go to Broadway? What upsets me the most is that those released from their commitment may well have taken the place of a rejected academy applicant who would have become an outstanding Navy or Marine Corps officer. Generally, midshipmen have the option of leaving the academy up to the end of their second year. If you hope to play professional football, go to the University of Michigan or Louisiana State University. John Conley, Chester, Md.


The dangerous new age of global autarky

A Vote to Leave campaigner holds a placard on May 25 in Bolton, England. (Christopher Furlong/Getty Images) The age of autarky is again upon us. Britain, in two weeks, will vote on whether to leave the European Union, that great postwar project to promote both peace and prosperity. No matter that economists have almost uniformly warned that a possible “Brexit” would devastate the British economy, with an estimated cost of approximately $6,000 per British household. Disregard news that markets are already freaking out about the consequences for the pound and the overall financial sector; that high-skilled talent has become skittish about moving to the British isles, whose relationship to the E.U. in a post-Brexit world is as yet unknown; and that foreign clients have begun suspending or delaying contracts with British companies. Who cares that these small islands, so dependent on the continent for both what they consume and where they send their exports, are putting so much economic activity at risk? Many Brits want to withdraw, to show they’re separate and politically self-determined and not really into all this expensive pan-ethnic, pan-European unity rubbish. So withdraw they might. Recent polls show the “leave” and “stay” contingents about evenly split. As Britain's main opposition leader, Jeremy Corbyn, jumps into the Brexit debate, opinion polls hint at an evenly divided electorate. Financially self-defeating as it may seem, the British are hardly alone in their flirtation with economic, political and cultural separatism. Other E.U. exit portmanteaus — Grexit, Itexit, Spexit — speckle the headlines. Within Spain, Catalonians have once again been agitating for independence. Secessionists in the Flanders region of Belgium have reawakened. Even within Britain itself, Scotland not so long ago held a referendum to disunite from the United Kingdom. Farther east, Russia has engaged in its own jingoistic displays of economic separatism, bulldozing tons of foreign foods and shutting off access to additional imports. (This has of course contributed to the great cheese surplus in the United States.) Likewise China, once seen as moving toward greater economic and cultural openness, has lately taken a more nationalist, xenophobic and protectionist approach. This spring the government even launched a propaganda campaign warning citizens not to get too cozy with handsome foreigners. And of course here at home in the United States, all three of our remaining major-party presidential candidates — Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton — have embraced anti-trade talk.


A decade after ‘The Omnivore’s Dilemma,’ Michael Pollan sees signs of hope

Agriculture began keeping track. This is encouraging news, since it’s hard to imagine creating a more sustainable and diversified agriculture without a great many more farmers on the land. This new generation of young farmers is helping to build what amounts to an alternative food economy. That new economy is comprised of farms supplying local markets; farms employing organic and other sustainable methods; and farms raising animals outdoors, as well as producers of artisanal foodstuffs of all kinds and new distribution models such as the farm subscriptions known as CSAs, or community-supported agriculture. No one knows quite how large this new food economy is, but we do know it is growing much faster than the old one, which has stalled. Its rise is the direct result of consumers and producers working together to shorten the food chain in order to radically simplify the answer to the “Where does my food come from” question. Yet the fate of this new economy is still up for grabs: It isn’t certain that these new farmers will make it, or that our desire to eat from a shorter, simpler food chain won’t somehow be co-opted by a food industry that now recognizes its consumers want something different — something more transparent about its origins and ethically defensible in its practices. Big Food is snapping up artisanal companies that positioned themselves as ethical alternatives. At the same time, the practice of “farm-washing,” in which highly industrialized food products are marketed as if they came from small farms, is popping up both in the supermarket and fast food outlet. These days Big Food is certainly talking a good game — promising to improve the welfare and diet of the animals, drop the antibiotics, simplify their products and support farmers and ranchers — but whether such promises will actually be kept is questionable. McDonald’s recently won plaudits for a promise to stop buying chicken raised with antibiotics — until a reporter recalled that this was the very same promise the company had made, and failed to keep, a decade before. The reform of the food industry is important, but it’s doubtful it will happen voluntarily. Even so, the fact the industry feels compelled to make these promises is helping to legitimize a new set of values in the food system, one in which simplicity and transparency are prized. But there is such a long way to go.


African American museum announces consulting chef: TV celeb Carla Hall

cafeteria-style restaurant in the museum, which is set to open Sept. 24 on the Mall. The principals involved in North Star expect it to rival Mitsitam Cafe at the National Museum of the American Indian, an award-winning cafeteria on the Mall that broke the mold for museum dining. The day-to-day operations of North Star will be jointly handled by Thompson Hospitality — the country’s largest minority-owned food-service provider — and Restaurant Associates, which runs most of the cafes on Smithsonian properties. Restaurant Associates and Thompson beat out two other bidders to earn the 10-year contract to provide food at the African American Museum. Museum officials wouldn’t comment on whether celebrity chefs were attached to the other bids. Thompson Hospitality had a personal connection to Hall, 52, who interned at the company, based in Reston, Va., more than two decades ago after she completed her training at L’Academie de Cuisine in Gaithersburg, Md. Benita Thompson-Byas, senior vice president of joint ventures for Thompson, reached out to Hall in late 2014 to see if the TV star and chef might be interested in working on North Star. “How often can you say that you’re actually a part of such an important place that everybody from all over the country is going to come and see?” Hall said in explaining her reasons for accepting the job. Like Mitsitam, North Star (named for the star that slaves followed to freedom) will have stations dedicated to different culinary regions. North Star’s four regions were identified with the help of Jessica B. Harris, a respected author and researcher on African American food ways. Harris and the Smithsonian initially laid out the regions to help guide companies bidding for the museum gig. The regions are the Agricultural South, the Creole Coast, the North States and the Western Range. Using those geographical outlines as a guide, Thompson Hospitality, Restaurant Associates, museum curators and Hall have been identifying ingredients, flavors, dishes and historical figures to direct their menu planning. They’re trying to achieve a delicate balance between maintaining historical accuracy and serving food that would appeal to, say, a family of four from the Midwest. Jessica Harris, shown at a cookbook event in 2010, worked with the Smithsonian to identify the different culinary regions that the new museum’s cafeteria-style restaurant would feature. (Juana Arias/For The Washington Post) As one example, George Conomos, vice president of operations for Restaurant Associates,


At the Heurich House Museum, history goes down with a cold one

Kim Bender is the executive director of the Heurich House Museum in Washington. (Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post) Kimberly Bender, 38, is executive director of Heurich House Museum, the preserved home of Victorian-era Washington beer magnate Christian Heurich. In March, Heurich House, with partner DC Brau, re-created and sold Heurich’s Lager. You do a lot of late-night and alcohol-infused activities that get in young people who maybe wouldn’t go to museums otherwise. How’d you get started doing that? Christian Heurich was a brewmaster, and so one of our themes is talking about his business and his role in the brewing history of Washington. We want to educate visitors about the craft of brewing, what he did on a daily basis. So we ended up creating History and Hops. That tends to draw a certain crowd. Looking at Heurich, I would pronounce it Hoyreeccchhh, which is not how you’re pronouncing it. That is the proper German way of pronouncing that name, but he changed it to HY-rick. During World War I their German heritage wasn’t received well. Their youngest daughter, Karla, who was in elementary school, was called “the little Hun.” Heurich’s heyday really wasn’t that long ago. Maybe Washington doesn’t keep track of what happened 100 years ago. It’s one of our biggest challenges here. People forget their collective history if there isn’t a group to preserve it. Heurich was the largest private employer and landowner in Washington. His brand of beer was the beer that everyone drank, before Prohibition. It was a household name. Trucks drove down the street every day with his name on it. It’s really interesting that nobody remembers who he is. So many other lost stories have been recovered, and people have integrated it into their lives. Like for instance, a lot of neighborhoods used to have different nicknames. One that more and more people use every day is Hell’s Bottom, which is Shaw. I never heard that! Yeah, DC Brau at one point brewed a Hell’s Bottom beer. That’s a great name. That’s a lot better than Shaw. Have you had problems mixing the alcohol-related nature of the museum with the fact that you’ve got a historical collection? We’ve had a couple of incidents where people will crawl into one of the bathtubs in one of the bathrooms, even now that there are two signs on the bathtub saying very clearly, “Please do not touch.”


How we control a pest in our garden without the use of pesticides

find. And we pick off any egg masses, larvae and adult beetles that appear, as these creatures are voracious and can entirely defoliate the plants. If we have postponed this depredation long enough by hand-picking, we’ll find a decent crop of potatoes waiting for us under the soil. This year, we’re also trying a trap crop. It’s a time-honored garden practice by which you deliberately plant something as a decoy to lure a pest away. It could be a completely different plant, such as a row of radishes to distract flea beetles from the arugula. Or it could be the same crop you’re protecting but at a different time or place. For instance, we’ve sprouted some of our seed potatoes extra early and set them ahead of the main crop in the section of the garden where they grew last year, where the beetles are sure to find them. Potato beetles overwinter in the soil as pupae near the place where they have been feeding, then emerge in spring as adult insects, ready to walk or fly to the nearest nightshade-clan feast. When they do, we will start destroying any we find, before they have a chance to move on and discover where the main crop is growing. This is important, of course. There’s no point in trying the trap crop maneuver unless you make every effort to eradicate what you attract. Look under the leaves for orange egg masses and rub them off with your fingers. Knock the round, striped adults into a quart yogurt container full of soapsuds before they can fly away. Drown the fat, bloated pink larvae, too, or squish them with your fingers. Disgusting? Yes. Tedious? Yes. But easier to do it with this small crop than with your larger one. At times it’s best to cut off the most affected leaves and plunge them into a bucket of water, a fate the pests will not survive. Another trap crop you can try is eggplant, which potato beetles love most of all. And because the flea beetles do, too, your arugula will thank you as well. Damrosch is the author of “The Four Season Farm Gardener’s Cookbook.” Tip of the week Check the condition of screens on rain barrels to prevent access by egg-laying mosquitoes. A larvicide product containing natural bacteria — Bt — will provide an added, organic form of protection. — Adrian Higgins


The end of ‘shrink it and pink it’: A history of advertisers missing the mark with women

reaction? “What a slap in the face to all women brewers and drinkers,” one commenter on the beer’s Facebook page said. “What does gender have to do with beer?” wrote another. You can’t begrudge any manufacturer for wanting to tap into a burgeoning market, and for the beer industry, there is certainly room to grow: Women make up slightly more than half the U.S. population but consume only 32 percent of American-made craft beer. But is wrapping it in pink really going to do the trick? “We didn’t put pink on the label for women,” said Kristi McGuire, the brewmaster and creator of High Heel. “We put on a dark raspberry color because it popped on the shelf.” After her beer was unveiled in May, McGuire was shocked by the backlash. She sat up at night scrolling through the comments and mulling her 20 years in the male-dominated brewing community. She says she believed she could make a beer everyone would like, while using the name and packaging to celebrate that it was brewed by a woman. High Heel Brewmaster Kristi McGuire was stunned by the backlash. (Nicole Galli Mohler/Courtesy of High Heel Brewing) But the “for her” marketing approach seems to have lost its appeal. Pink is not a strategy, unless you’re raising money for breast cancer research,” said Bridget Brennan, the author of “Why She Buys.” “In 2016, marketing to women is all about being inclusive. That doesn’t mean excluding men; it means excluding stereotypes.” It’s not that women don’t want products made with them in mind. “Marketing to Women” author Marti Barletta points to other examples in the business of alcohol: Skinnygirl Cocktails and Vixen Vodka. Their logos feature spiky pumps and female silhouettes to indicate their target market — but without explicitly declaring it, as High Heel Brewing did. (It may have helped that vodka has long been seen as a drink that appeals to both sexes, unlike beer.) “Anything that says ‘you women’ is going to get a backlash,” Barletta said, whereas an approach that comes from the angle of “we women” just might get a listen. Women have been the primary targets of advertising since the early days — notably for food products. But that was because marketers saw them more as the domestic providers than the ultimate consumer. Those early ads didn’t quite recognize women as full people, said Katherine Parkin, an associate


Montgomery Animal Watch

This case was received by the Montgomery County Animal Services Division. For information, call 240-773-5900. This number provides recorded information on topics such as the new animal services and adoption center’s hours and location in Derwood, adoption and licensing procedures, and lost-and-found and field services. Backyard troubles: Wanted: Volunteers: Adoptable cats at no-kill shelter: Gaithersburg Adopt dogs and cats at MCHS no-kill rescue: Rockville Reduced fees for cat adoption: Germantown — Compiled by Lisa M. Bolton


Muhammad Ali remembered for boxing, following his principles

Unlike most heavyweight boxers, Muhammad Ali moved gracefully around the ring, almost dancing on the canvas. Here, he celebrates his first-round victory over Sonny Liston in a championship bout in Lewiston, Maine, in 1965. (AP) Kids may wonder what the big deal is about Muhammad Ali. While Ali, who died Friday at age 74, was a three-time boxing champion, his last fight was almost 35 years ago. But Ali was an important person. To understand why, you have to understand the 1960s and 1970s, when Ali was at the height of his athletic fame. Let’s take a look. Boxing was much more popular back in the ’60s than it is today. My guess is that in 1964, most kids knew the name of the heavyweight champion. These days, I doubt one kid in a hundred could tell you who the heavyweight champ is without Googling it. (It’s Tyson Fury of Great Britain.) So when Ali, then called Cassius Clay, shocked everyone in February 1964 by upsetting Sonny Liston to become the youngest heavyweight champion ever, he was world-famous. Ali was a very different kind of fighter. Although a big man (around 6 feet 3 inches and 220 pounds), Ali was quick on his feet. Unlike most heavyweights, Ali moved gracefully around the ring, almost dancing on the canvas. But Ali could punch. “Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee” is how Ali and his handlers described the champ in the ring. Ali also said to anyone who would listen that he was the greatest. He bragged about his skill in the boxing ring and how “pretty” he looked. Ali was so cocky that he predicted, often accurately, the round when he would knock out his opponent. After his win over Liston, Ali defended his heavyweight crown eight times in three years, defeating his opponents with ease. In 1967, Ali was 25 years old, undefeated (29 wins, no losses) and on top of the sports world. But the United States was stuck in a controversial war in Vietnam. Some people supported the war, which eventually cost more than 58,000 American lives, while others thought the United States should not be fighting in Southeast Asia. The United States did not have a volunteer military, as it does today. Instead, men were drafted into the armed forces and were required by law to serve. Any man, even a boxing champion, could be


This government competition could completely change the American city

future of the American city at stake. Transportation officials say they had never done a live-streamed public face-off over a government grant. One winner will be chosen later this month. For Foxx, a former mayor of Charlotte, the hands-on work with cities has been an upbeat note in a job that often entails presenting grand plans and being rebuffed by Congress. The Obama administration’s latest proposed transportation budget, which included a $4 billion, 10-year plan to spread autonomous-vehicle technology, landed with a thud on Capitol Hill. Given a “chronic lack of investment” in a stressed transportation system, Foxx said, adding an expected 70 million people and 45 percent more freight over U.S. roads in the next 30 years will be debilitating if more isn’t done. “All of these things are converging to make life hell for people who are trying to get from one place to another. That’s the bottom line,” Foxx said. So working with cities, and helping to draw out — and feed off of — their ideas for the future, has been an exhilarating shift. “That’s exciting to people. Think about when President Lincoln put a marker down to create the transcontinental railroad or when Eisenhower decided to support the interstate highway system. These were big, seismic moments in our country’s transportation system,” Foxx said. And this is another one. Blurring traditional roles, the feds are serving both as seed-funder and midwife, trying to help develop a list of great ideas that prove strong enough to spread elsewhere. “When one city does something successful, it’s the single best way to get it adopted more broadly,” said Dan Doctoroff, a former deputy mayor of New York City and chief executive of Sidewalk Labs, a firm started by Google that markets technology to cities and is partnering on the federal effort. When New York’s High Line park — an elevated ribbon of green on a former freight rail line in Manhattan — opened to the public in 2009, the idea took off, Doctoroff said. By the next year, “there were 36 High Lines under development around the world.” The same thing will happen when a city figures out how to use technology to squeeze the most out of its transportation networks, Doctoroff said. Sensors, cameras and computers are powerful and cheap, and can be distributed widely and connected easily. Artificial intelligence can help channel more cars through the same


A desperate woman’s email from Iraq reveals the high toll of Obama’s low-cost wars

they had called her, U.S. military officials also could have learned that their investigation of the Hatra attack, which concluded that there were four civilian deaths, was incorrect. According to Ekabee, the colonel and government officials in Nineveh province, at least 11 civilians were killed — more than double the number in the U.S. report. “This email means that the lives of innocents are cheap,” Ekabee said, “and that they don’t want to be responsible for their mistakes.” Reporting casualties The Hatra strike also points to another problem: Nearly two years into the U.S. bombing campaign, there are still no real channels for Iraqis and Syrians to seek redress when their civilian relatives are accidentally killed or injured in American attacks. At the height of the U.S. occupation of Iraq, someone like Ekabee could have filed a complaint at one of the hundreds of combat outposts scattered around Iraq. In Afghanistan, where it’s harder to travel, the military established a Dari- and Pashto-language website and text messaging service to help Afghans alert them to civilian deaths. In both war zones, preventing mistakes and making condolence payments were once considered not only a moral imperative, but a critical piece of a broader American strategy aimed at rebuilding fractured societies and winning the support of the population. To that end, the United States paid out hundreds of millions of dollars to Iraqis and Afghans who suffered losses. The commanders’ focus also helped drive down the civilian death toll. In 2009, the United States was causing one civilian death for every six airstrikes, according to U.N. data and a recently released report on civilian casualties by the Open Society Foundations. By 2014, the rate had decreased to one civilian death for every 11 airstrikes, according to the United Nations. Because so few American troops are operating in Iraq and Syria, U.S. military officials say it is difficult to conduct thorough civilian casualty investigations. So far, the military said it has looked into 178 allegations of civilian deaths and, relying almost exclusively on gun-camera video for confirmation, found 129 of them not to be credible. The remaining 49 were either found to be credible or are still being investigated. “We don’t have the traditional means of doing interviews, knocking on doors, forensics testing — the kinds of things you would do,” Ryder said. As a result, many mistakes in Iraq and Syria are never


Fentanyl and heroin deaths continue steep rise in Maryland

year. The rise continues an alarming trend that began in 2013. Since that year, the number of fentanyl-related deaths has increased 12-fold. Health officials attribute the rapid spike to illicit fentanyl, rather than the prescription form of the drug. Illicit fentanyl is produced in underground laboratories and often mixed with heroin to create an especially strong high. They say the drug can be 50 to 100 times more potent than heroin and morphine. Deaths from all categories of opioids reached new highs in Maryland last year, with heroin fatalities increasing 29 percent, to 748, while deaths from prescription pain medications climbed 6 percent, to 351. It was the fifth straight year that heroin deaths were on the rise, and the third straight year for prescription opioids. Overall, opioids accounted for 86 percent of Maryland overdose deaths in 2015. “Maryland, like many states across the nation, has been in the midst of an opioid epidemic,” said Health and Mental Hygiene Secretary Van T. Mitchell. “Health and Mental Hygiene continues our work to try to save lives by making residents aware of the peril associated with substance-use disorder and of the resources available to treat those who grapple with this problem.” A Washington Post-University of Maryland poll Gov. Larry Hogan (R), who lost a cousin to a heroin overdose, created a task force last year to study the issue and recommend plans for addressing it. Based on the work group’s input, Hogan released more than $2 million last year to increase access to treatment in rural parts of the state, create an outreach program in Baltimore for overdose survivors, launch a public-awareness campaign about the dangers of addiction, and boost police efforts to disrupt drug trafficking. The state also authorized pharmacists to dispense the overdose-reversal drug naloxone without a prescription to people trained and certified through the state’s Overdose Response Program, which has graduated 23,000 people since 2014. This year, Hogan dedicated $3 million in new spending to support addiction treatment in prisons and $2.3 million to fund a modest increase in the reimbursement rate for providers of drug-abuse treatment, with the goal of attracting and retaining more workers in the field. Additionally, Hogan and the General Assembly approved legislation that requires prescribers to use a statewide database to track potential abuse of painkiller medications, with a requirement to alert doctors and pharmacists and notify licensing boards and police of suspicious activity.


An effective and safe treatment for pain

Baltimore Ravens tackle Eugene Monroe is fighting to get marijuana removed from a list of substances banned by the NFL. (Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post) Regarding the June 6 Sports article “Medical marijuana and the NFL”: My hat is off to Baltimore Ravens tackle Eugene Monroe for bringing medical marijuana to the forefront in dealing with chronic pain. Although my football career ended in high school, an undiagnosed cervical injury started me down the road toward degenerative disc disease in my later life. Eight back surgeries have left me in chronic pain. After a decade of treatment with opioids, they have become less and less effective, and the anti-inflammatories prescribed were a contributing factor in my developing kidney failure. Medical marijuana is legal in Maryland, but the state has lagged in developing a distribution system that would provide relief to many who suffer from chronic pain. A number of doctors with expertise in treating chronic pain with cannabinoids work with patients to relieve their suffering. My own experience with cannabidiol, a nonpsychotropic component of cannabis, has resulted in a significant decrease in the need for opioids and a better quality of life. Robert Pickrell, Chevy Chase


How I found the perfect koshary — an Egyptian delicacy — in Cairo

stuck out her hand, jabbed a finger at her open palm and shrieked. The waiter rushed back, pushed her outside and apologized. This happened three or four times. Outside, a swarm of merchants grabbed at my arms and legs, pleading with me to buy carpets, Nefertiti busts, King Tut tchotchkes of every conceivable variety. Now I understood Misr, the Arabic word for Egypt. It means “frontier.” I was an urban frontiersman bushwhacking through the hinterlands of civilization. A taxi driver whistled at me. His name was Ahmed. I reluctantly got in the back seat. I told him to find me a beer shop. Ahmed drove cross-legged on a rickety bench seat as we circumnavigated the city. The radio, windshield wipers, ashtray and perhaps significant portions of the engine had been removed from the car. Forget about AC. For music, Ahmed sang. For an ashtray, he used the whole taxi. After passing the same street corner three times, Ahmed pulled over, straddling the curb. “Here. I wait.” I looked up. We were only a few steps from where he’d picked me up. I stared at Ahmed. He shrugged, smiled. “Take your time. No problem.” The beer — Luxor — was good, but unastonishing. Nothing to commit to pictographs or etch into stone tablets. It was the standard medium-bodied lager sold throughout Asia and North Africa. “Where I take you now?” Should I stay with Ahmed? He drove a deathtrap. He drove it recklessly. He wasn’t a stickler for honesty. “Lunch. I want koshary.” “Ah, yes. I show you the absolute best place.” “Well, I have recommendations. Here — ” I reached for the list in my pocket. “No, no. I will show you the best place in all of Cairo.” Ahmed put his hands over his heart. I couldn’t say no. We crawled along in his decrepit cab. Falafel stands. Bodegas. Garment shops. An old man hobbled down the center of a busy road. Carts drawn by horses and mules shuffled alongside the cars. Children played in the back of speeding trucks. People dragged goats home to slaughter. An elderly woman in the back of a jostling cart sat on a throne of hay. We drove through the city center toward increasingly quiet, neglected streets. Condemned buildings. Rusting cars. Stone-faced women staring down from third-floor windows. Balconies cramped with laundry, plastic buckets, mops, cracked flowerpots, stacked cases of bottled water. There


Minister of sport: ‘Brazil has prepared very well for these Games’

according to Picciani. “There’s not actually a lot of leeway for vastly accelerating or delaying the [impeachment] process because of the timeline requirements that are within the constitution and the legislation,” Picciani said. He cited a May survey in which 79 percent of respondents said they believed the change in governance would not affect the Games. “We believe that the institutions will fulfill their responsibilities with respect to impeachment in a proper, constitutional and lawful manner.” Worldwide concern over the Zika virus reached a peak earlier this month after a coalition of 200 scientists and medical experts called for the Games to be moved or postponed to reduce the virus’s spread. Several athletes already have withdrawn from consideration for the Olympics because of Zika, which is spread primarily by mosquitoes and can cause serious health issues, most notably a birth defect called microcephaly, marked by small heads and underdeveloped brains. Picciani said Brazilian officials have worked closely with the World Health Organization to combat the virus, lining up additional medical personnel and preparing an “abundant supply” of insect repellant for the Games. He also pointed out that August falls during Brazil’s winter, when temperatures are cooler and the mosquito presence is reduced. He said that Rio de Janeiro has hosted 43 test events at Olympic venues between June 2015 and April 2016, featuring more than 7,000 athletes, and that there was “not a single verified case” of Zika reported by the athletes or their delegations. “Since we have followed rigorously all of the actions recommended by the World Health Organization, with good results, we have strong confidence this will not represent a problem during the Olympic Games,” Picciani said. He added the number of reported Zika cases in Rio has fallen from 7,000 in January to 4,000 in April and 700 in May. “We hope and expect to get close to zero by August.” On other issues facing the Rio de Janeiro Games, Picciani said: ●Brazil is taking the issues of crime and visitor safety “with all the seriousness it deserves,” with a coordinated effort between municipal police, state police, armed forces, federal police and national guard. He cited Rio’s history of hosting “massive international events,” including the 2014 FIFA World Cup final, the 2013 FIFA Confederations Cup final and the 2013 World Youth Day featuring an address by Pope Francis to an estimated 3,000,000 attendants. “At none of these


E.U. referendum exposes Britain’s political decay

Britons will decide June 23 whether to remain in the European Union. (Russell Boyce/Reuters) London The scariest thing about Britain’s referendum on European Union membership — and the thing that ought to resonate acutely with Americans — is what it exposes about the political culture: the refusal to take responsibility, the contempt for truth, the willful numbness to human suffering beyond one’s own borders. Britain was once a country that prided itself on punching above its weight and stood out as a model of enlightened pragmatism. But returning to live here after nearly two decades in the United States, I encounter a version of the political decay that pains my friends in Washington. Of course, Britain has always stood aloof from Europe. Generations of orators have channeled John of Gaunt, the patriot in Shakespeare’s “Richard II,” who celebrates “this scepter’d isle . . . this precious stone set in the silver sea . . . this blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England.” When Michael Gove, the erudite leader of the anti-E.U. “Leave” campaign, calls on schools to give “children the ability to hear our island story,” he stands as the heir to a powerful tradition. For centuries, Britain has been a sort of diluted Japan: an island on the edge of a great continental mass, proud of its insularity. But Britain has also had a contrary tradition, as Cambridge historian Brendan Simms argues in his fine book, “Britain’s Europe.” As far back as 1871, Prime Minister William Gladstone lamented “the melancholy and doubtful character of the prospects which hang before Europe.” But then he pivoted swiftly. “We have no right to wrap ourselves up in an absolute and selfish isolation,” he said. “We should be unworthy . . . if we disowned the obligations which arise out of these relations to others more liable to suffer than ourselves.” Britons have till midnight Tuesday to register to vote, if they want to have a say on whether the U.K. stays in or leaves the E.U. My earliest political memories feature Gladstone’s internationalism triumphing over small-minded provincialism. When I was 11, in 1975, Britons voted 2-to-1 in favor of membership in Europe, swayed by the message that Britain had a duty to build a prosperous continent and put the memory of two world wars behind it. In a stirring editorial, the now frequently Eurosceptic London Times channeled the idealism of


It’s worth asking questions when your doctor prescibes a drug off label

billions of dollars in fines “as a cost of doing business,” Schiff says. In 2013, Johnson & Johnson agreed to pay more than $2.2 billion to resolve charges of, among other things, promoting off-label use of the antipsychotic risperidone (Risperdal). More recently, Endo Pharmaceuticals agreed to pay almost $200 million for promoting Lidoderm — a patch approved for shingles-related nerve pain — for many other types of pain. We may soon see more off-label marketing. Last year, Amarin Pharma began promoting use of a prescription fish oil pill off label after a federal court ruled that such marketing was protected by the right to free speech. The FDA has also proposed regulations that would give makers of drugs and devices more leeway in distributing information about off-label uses for their products. When does off-label prescribing have benefits? Off-label prescribing can sometimes be useful for treating people outside a drug’s approved group, such as those who are older. Also, doctors may want to take advantage of an emerging use of a drug, notably for patients with limited options. Off-label use of cancer drugs is quite common, for example, because some of these medications work against several types of tumors. And there’s good evidence behind certain off-label uses. Take the anti-seizure drug topiramate. It has been recommended in American and international guidelines for treating alcohol dependence. The antidepressant amitriptyline is recognized as a first-line therapy for fibromyalgia pain, and it costs less than approved treatments. Questions to ask Before you take a new drug, ask your doctor or pharmacist whether it’s being prescribed for an approved use. (Or go to dailymed.nlm.nih.gov, search by drug, then click “Indications & Usage.”) If it’s not, ask whether the use is supported by well-designed trials and why it’s better for you than approved drugs. And call your insurance company, which may not cover off-label use or may require proof that conventional treatments failed and that the off-label drug will work for you. Drugs commonly prescribed off-label without good evidence Quinine sulfate (Qualaquin) for nighttime leg pain. Clonazepam (Klonopin) for restless legs syndrome and insomnia. Gabapentin (Neurontin) for diabetic peripheral neuropathy. Trazodone (Oleptro) for anxiety and insomnia. Quetiapine (Seroquel) for dementia and obsessive-compulsive disorder. Copyright 2016. Consumers Union of United States Inc. For further guidance, go to ConsumerReports.org/Health, where more detailed information, including CR’s ratings of prescription drugs, treatments, hospitals and healthy-living products, is available to subscribers.


Physics that makes sense

King Gustaf Adolf of Sweden hands the Nobel Prize in Physics to Richard P. Feynman in Stockholm in 1965. (Associated Press/Reportagebild) The May 29 news article “Schrödinger’s imaginary cat can now be alive, dead and in two places at once” quoted a scientist as saying, “You can’t understand it using common sense. We can’t either.” Scientists say that because most accept the particle picture of nature promulgated by physicist Richard Feynman. Of course, the idea that a cat can be both alive and dead is, as Schrödinger himself said, “ridiculous.” But there is another theory, espoused by Feynman’s rival Julian Schwinger, that makes perfect sense. It is called quantum field theory, and it describes a world made of fields. My book, “Fields of Color,” shows how this oft-neglected theory resolves the paradoxes of relativity and quantum mechanics, including Schrödinger’s cat paradox. Fields, unlike particles, are perfectly capable of being in multiple places and states at the same time. Unfortunately, many scientists, including the renowned Stephen Hawking, either don’t understand or don’t accept quantum field theory in its true fields-only sense. Some notable exceptions are Nobel laureates Steven Weinberg and Frank Wilczek. Rodney Brooks, Silver Spring


Weeding out corruption helps in the fight against terror

The Afghan National Police Major Crimes Task Force investigates cases from inside a discreet government warehouse tucked in the outskirts of Kabul. (Antonio Olivo/The Washington Post) Regarding the June 5 news article “Hard-boiled cops of Afghan unit confront lawbreakers”: We have long known that bribery can feed support for fundamentalist Islamist groups such as the Taliban because they are often viewed as “less corrupt” than official governments. As U.S. military forces are well aware, our approach has been to place civil corruption on the back burner while laboring to achieve stability. The trouble is that in the 15 years since we started engaging militarily in Afghanistan and the Middle East, the stability has grown worse. Maybe we ought to pursue Plan B? Can we make discovering corruption a higher priority, work to strengthen government institutions and enable courageous locals to out, shame and prosecute corruption and lawbreakers? Or do we chase an elusive stability for another 15 years? Dan Edwards, Woodbridge


Does Michelin include a sanitation rating?

Sous chefs Seth Wells, left, and BJ Lieberman work the line during dinner service at Rose’s Luxury in the District on Dec. 1. (Melina Mara/The Washington Post) Regarding the June 1 front-page article “New stars will grace the D.C. dining scene”: It is to be hoped, as Washington joins the ranks of culinary destinations subject to Michelin Guide inspection, that the famed arbiter of fine cuisine will consider the capital’s sanitation requirements in its criterion of “ingredient quality.” I am not inordinately fastidious, but I blanched at the sight of the three pictured chefs, two from Rose’s Luxury and one from Masseria, handling dishes without head or beard coverings or gloves. D.C. municipal regulations require that “food employees shall wear clean and effective hair restraints, such as hairnets or beard nets . . .” And while the code requires that food preparers limit bare-skinned contact (i.e., sans gloves) while handling raw foods, there are dissenting views on whether gloves substantially reduce food contamination where hand-washing is scrupulously observed. There is no doubt, however, as restaurant-goers who have had to pick someone’s hair from their food can attest, this is a universal “ewwww!” factor that should disqualify the awarding of any Michelin stars. Restaurants that do not wish to comply with hygiene regulations should post, in a prominent place, a sign to that effect. Anneka Westall, Lovettsville


A young man is skinned alive. A sign of new Taliban brutality?

brutal turn. “The amount of casualties, particularly with civilians, is a crime — a crime against humanity, a crime against Afghanistan, and a crime against our people,” Afghan President Ashraf Ghani said, somberly, in a meeting with reporters last week. Since 2001, the United States has invested more than $100 billion building Afghan military and police forces, a judicial system and schools in hopes of moving the country closer to normality. But all that spending appears to have done little to slow a cycle of rage and revenge that has made Afghanistan one of the world’s most dangerous countries. Horrific violence is nothing new in Afghanistan. Public executions were common when the Taliban ruled the country in the 1990s, and tens of thousands of Afghans have been killed during the post-2001 Taliban insurgency. Afghanistan, like neighboring Pakistan, also has a long history of cultural and religious conservatism associated with violent retribution. But analysts say the scale of the brutality continues to evolve as the Taliban becomes more fragmented and pushes out into additional areas of Afghanistan. Younger Taliban commanders also now operate more independently and are increasingly inspired by other brutal acts easily viewed on the Internet, they say. Secretary of State John Kerry said Pakistani and Afghani leaders was aware of the U.S. drone strike in Pakistan that apparently killed Afghan Taliban leader Mullah Akhtar Mansour on May 21, after some in Islamabad protested that their government was not informed. Over the past month, after a U.S. drone strike killed Taliban leader Akhtar Mohammad Mansour, militant groups have hijacked at least five buses, dragging passengers into the road to execute dozens of them, especially if they or members of their families were suspected of being police officers or soldiers. There also have been three recent deadly attacks on Afghan courthouses or judicial employees. Last month in Jowzjan province, a reported Taliban militant armed with an assault rifle shot and killed a burqa-clad woman for alleged adultery, according to a video of the crime posted to YouTube. “There are now tens of examples of public lashings, executions, and killings,” said Abdul Jama Jama, a provincial council member in Ghazni province. In recent days, the United Nations, Amnesty International and the Afghan Independent Human Rights Commission also have expressed concern over what they view as a hardening culture of violence here. Brig. Gen. Charles H. Cleveland, chief spokesman for the U.S.-led


A doctor’s dilemma: Do I prescribe opioids?

she and her daughter tell me at every visit that it is the only way she can function. Without the medications, she sits in her rocking chair and cries all day. With the pills, she can cook, garden and play with her grandchildren. Over the past 20 years, the United States has seen an unprecedented rise in opioid painkiller prescriptions. In the mid-1990s, pharmaceutical companies and a few pain specialists co-opted a small scientific study that purportedly demonstrated the safety of long-term opioid therapy, claiming a low risk of addiction. Drug companies such as Purdue Pharma, which introduced OxyContin in 1996, began an aggressive marketing campaign to promote opioid painkillers throughout the country. By 2012, doctors were writing 259 million opiate prescriptions a year, enough for every adult in the United States to have an entire bottle of pills. The result has been an astronomical rise in prescription overdose deaths, with opioid painkillers killing more Americans each year than HIV or homicide. Medical societies and popular media are recognizing this catastrophe, and so the pendulum is swinging rapidly in the opposite direction. Most doctors are frustrated by their experiences dealing with patients on opiates, and many are afraid to prescribe opioid medications at all. In the world of opiate prescribing, some cases are black and white. On the one hand, I have patients who clearly require and benefit from narcotic painkillers: patients with newly fractured bones, recent surgeries or metastatic cancer. On the other side of the spectrum are those to whom almost nobody with a medical license would prescribe opiates: individuals with long records of doctor shopping, positive urine toxicology screens for illicit substances, persistent requests for inappropriate and early refills, drug addiction and no objective documentation of physical pain conditions. But just as in much of medicine, the vast majority of patients do not align into black-and-white categories but instead fall squarely within the gray. Some have been on steady doses of chronic opiates for years, sometimes decades. They ask for refills month after month, and I grant or deny these wishes based on the unscientific combination of incomplete data and intuition. We know from years of research that, on a population level, opioid painkillers are not an appropriate choice for chronic pain. They come with a host of side effects ranging from constipation to depression to respiratory suppression and death. And, perhaps most important, in large trials,


Beer of the Week: Thiriez Extra

Thiriez Extra, a French farmhouse ale. (Goran Kosanovic/For The Washington Post) France is known for its wine and its cognac, but if you ever come across a French beer in the United States, it’s likely to be Kronenbourg 1664, a rather unexceptional pale lager. With France currently hosting soccer’s Euro 2016 championships, I decided to celebrate the tournament with a French beer that can hold its own against international competition. Brasserie Thiriez, which celebrates its 20th anniversary this year, comes from the village of Esquelbecq, located south of Dunkirk and a short drive west of the Belgian border. Geography is important here: Brewer Daniel Thiriez specializes in classic farmhouse ales that cross traditional French and Belgian styles and ingredients. Of his beers, my favorite is Thiriez Extra. This is a “dry-hopped French farmhouse ale,” according to the label, but the overall impression is a cross between a rustic saison and an IPA. The nose is classic earthy, peppery saison. Despite the low alcohol by volume at 4.5 percent, the beer’s golden body is full, with a prickly, almost champagne-light effervescence followed by a pleasing dryness. Most noticeable, though, is the sheer level of hops. Hopping and dry-hopping with English Bramling Cross adds a pronounced bitterness — definitely more pleasant than mouth-puckering, though, with lemony herbal notes. Extra’s name promises strength, yet it’s really suited to sipping while spending time with friends — like, say, watching a few televised games of soccer. — Fritz Hahn Thiriez Extra. brasseriethiriez.com. About $10 per 750-milliliter bottle at Pipetown Traders (pipetowntraders.com) and Cordial Craft Wine (cordialwine.com), both in the District; $20 in bars, including at the Sovereign (thesovereigndc.com). More from Food: Beer Column archive