A Liberian doctor is using HIV drugs to treat Ebola victims. The NIH is intrigued.

A woman waits in a Liberian Ministry of Health ambulance outside an old hospital that's been converted to an intake center for Ebola patients in Monrovia. (Michel du Cille/The Washington Post) Well before the Ebola virus was brought to the U.S. by a man traveling from Liberia, it was wreaking havoc in the West African country, where nearly 2,000 people have died during the worst Ebola outbreak in history. Now, some doctors in that country are trying new ways of treating Ebola-infected patients. Gorbee Logan, a doctor in rural Liberia, has given at least 15 Ebola patients lamivudine, which is considered a long-term and effective drug to treat HIV patients. All but two of them survived, Logan told CNN last week. Since that interview, Logan has been in contact with Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, about the treatment. "I can't say it's a good idea or bad idea," Fauci told The Post this week. "It's one of those things where you're in a situation where you have no therapy, so you look for things that might be available." Fauci said National Institutes of Health researchers have tested lamivudine's reaction to Ebola in test tubes. There was no response; but Fauci said researchers will adjust some levels and try it again "to see if there's even slight activity against Ebola." If there is, he said, NIH would consider going to the trial stage. Logan first tried another HIV drug on an Ebola patient, but it didn't seem to work, he told CNN. Then, he gave lamivudine to a health-care worker who'd become sick. The patient improved within a couple of days, CNN reported. It makes sense to consider lamivudine as a potential Ebola treatment: It belongs to a group of drugs known as nucleoside analogs, which interfere with the replication processes of certain viruses, Fauci explained. Other nucleoside analog drugs are in the pre-clinical stage of testing with animals, Fauci said. But there is a potential upshot with lamivudine that could make it stand out from the others, if it does actually work. "It's already an approved drug that can be distributed," Fauci said. "But that's a big, majestic leap." Logan told FrontPageAfrica that his method works only if Ebola patients come in soon after becoming symptomatic. He said desperation pushed him to treat Ebola patients using several different medications. Lamivudine can cause


Famed NBA halftime acrobat Rong Niu, aka Red Panda, is reportedly retiring

Acrobat Rong Niu of China, who goes by the name Red Panda, performs at halftime during a Knicks-Wizards game in 2004. (Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP) Get ready to say zàijiàn (that’s goodbye in Chinese) to one of the best NBA halftime acts on the planet. “Red Panda,” aka Rong Niu, the 40-something acrobat with a penchant for balancing bowls on her head, is reportedly retiring, according to SB Nation. The world is sad. Per Yahoo! Sports: This is not only a loss for the NBA — Red Panda has also appeared at college basketball games and various other events. No matter the venue, though, she always put on a great show. It wasn’t even especially rare for her to be the most impressive part of a particularly terrible game. SB Nation’s Rodger Sherman has even higher praise: In the four or five times I saw her perform live, I never saw her drop a single bowl. And yet, each time she held a bunch of bowls up and meticulously placed them on her shin while bobbing back and forth on her unicycle, I refused to believe that it was humanly possible she could possibly flip those bowls onto her head. I burst with shock and astonishment every single time. … Generally I go to sports to see the sports, not the sideshow. The one case this was not true was with the Red Panda. I circled that date in my head every time it was announced she was performing. At least the news doesn’t come as a shock. Red Panda hasn’t been seen at an NBA game in over a year. She took off last season due to injury. But at the height of her career, the acrobat commanded $5,000 for an appearance, according to ESPN’s Darren Rovell. $5,000, top of market RT @detroitmarc How much does a performer like Red Panda make per appearance? Red Panda Acrobat While no act can fill Red Panda’s shoes, er, unicycle seat, there are a few out there that have the potential to be the next big thing. Here are three contenders: Quick Change Quick change artists Rubberboy Best Half Time Show Ever: The Rubberboy These back-flipping dogs. Inside the NBA OKC Halftime Dog Show


Afghan politicians are exaggerating Taliban wins, U.S. general says

In a news conference on Thursday, the top U.S. general in Afghanistan said Taliban wins have been exaggerated. The new top U.S. commander in Afghanistan said Thursday that the Afghan military continues to hold its own against the Taliban insurgency, but Afghan military officials are afraid to describe their own successes and have to deal with Afghan politicians who exaggerate Taliban battlefield wins. The comments by Army Gen. John Campbell came amid a wave of violence by insurgents in recent days, and after the new Afghan president, Ashraf Ghani, agreed to a bilateral security agreement that will keep a U.S. military force of about 9,800 in Afghanistan after 2014. Campbell, speaking in a video conference call with reporters at the Pentagon, said the Taliban recently increased activity in Ghazi province’s Ajristan district, in Afghanistan’s east, that drew Afghan media attention. Campbell said that all of the operational reports he has received said that about six Afghan troops and 12 civilians killed — which was “nothing… like what the local media has provided here.” The criticism came two days after Campbell’s International Security Assistance Force released a statement disputing reporting out of Ghazi. Media there reported that the Taliban had launched a large-scale assault with hundreds of fighters. “There’s no terrain down there … the Afghans do not control,” Campbell said. “And there are some very exaggerated reports. I… feel very confident that Ajristan [and that] western part of Ghazni is not an issue.” In Helmand province, in Afghanistan’s south, the Taliban continue to contest areas around Sangin district, which was an insurgent stronghold when Marines assaulted it in 2010 and the site of hundreds of U.S. casualties in the following years. There is now a “pretty substantial fight” between the Taliban and Afghan forces there, but Afghan commandos, police and members of the Afghan Army’s 215th Corps will likely win the battle, Campbell said. “There are casualties on both sides, but I think here in the next 24 to 48 hours, what you’ll see in Helmand is that the Taliban do not own any of the ground that they’ve tried to get,” Campbell said. Afghan police and military commanders have generally been reticent to describe battlefield successes to the public, but the general wants them to do so. The Taliban has been winning the information war, he said, and more needs to be done to combat that. Campbell said that


Officials say as many as 100 had contact with Ebola patient; four have been quarantined

ordered by state and county health officials to remain home until at least Oct. 19, with a local law enforcement officer stationed there to enforce this order. The order, which was delivered by local health officials on Wednesday night, says that they cannot have visitors without approval, has to provide blood samples and must agree to any testing. While authorities seemed reluctant to go into detail about why these four people were quarantined, they said it had to do with making sure they remained at home and accessible for monitoring. “They were non-compliant with the request to stay home,” Jenkins said. “I don’t want to go too far beyond that.” Jenkins said that while the order was unusual, it was necessary in this case, adding that it was important not to have “people leaving the premises on a regular basis” against the wishes of authorities. “We do not intend to have to do that again,” he said. “But there’s nothing more important than keeping you safe.” People who have come into direct contact with an Ebola patient who has symptoms must be watched for three weeks, beginning on the last day they had that contact. This process, which is called contact tracing, involves observing them for symptoms such as a high fever, at which point a person will be isolated. “These individuals do not have any symptoms,” Lakey said. “At this time, they are healthy. There’s no risk they have spread disease to any other individual.” But he later said, “The information I was given, I couldn’t be confident that that monitoring was going to take place the way I needed it to take place.” There are also issues of hygiene at this apartment, including properly disposing of the sheets on which Duncan slept and his belongings. The home had not been cleaned by Thursday afternoon, as there has “been a little bit of hesitancy” in finding someone willing to do it, Lakey said. The sheets and Duncan’s belongings have been placed into a sealed plastic bag, and they will be disposed of by a contractor who agreed to clean the home and who has worked with hospitals on medical clean-ups before, Jenkins said. Three other people who came into contact with Johnson are the Dallas Fire Rescue crew members who took Duncan to the hospital. They are going to remain home and will be checked for symptoms over the


‘Scandal’ recap Season 4, Episode 2: ‘Stand and Clap’

inspiring, but in-your-face speech. Olivia, settling into her old job at Olivia Pope and (two?) Associates, is tasked with helping The White House ensure the attendance of a famous couple at the State of the Union. We meet James and Lisa Elliot, the former an Army veteran, who was tortured by the Taliban, the latter a teacher, who was shot in the spine during a horrific school shooting. They’ve been invited to be guests at the SOTU to garner support for Fitz’s gun control platform. They’re heroes — America’s sweethearts — but there’s just one problem — they hate each other. Couples therapy, by Olivia Pope. Olivia finds this out after doing her trademark scene-change teleportation to New Mexico — in clothing of which Slate would surely approve — to retrieve said couple. Upon arriving, she finds them hurling barbs (and I think a wine glass or two) at each other. She convinces them to return with her to Washington and delegates couplesitting duty to Huck and Quinn. It’s like she basically put them in a room with another version of themselves. In an effort to show Liv how out of touch she’s been as a boss, Abby lets her know exactly how well Huckleberry Quinn works together: “Huck and Quinn were incesting all over the office.” Olivia will never look at that conference table the same way. Fixers — they’re just like us! Just like the Elliots, Huck and Quinn have some unresolved issues — Huck resents Quinn for informing him that his wife and son are within reach and Quinn resents Huck for ignoring her in the wake of that information. Quinn: “You’ll always be the guy who pulled my teeth out!” That apparently doesn’t stop her attraction because it definitely looked like they were about to start “incesting” again. But then Lisa Elliot had to go and stab her husband with a wine corkscrew. Olivia arrives on the scene, horrified by both the fraternization in her office and the Elliots’s fighting. But she convinces the Elliots to keep their plans to appear at the State of the Union in support of their country and president. It doesn’t hurt that she promises to help them both retain their speaking engagements post-divorce. That leaves just one other high-profile SOTU guest to be convinced to attend — Mellie. An impassioned plea from Fitz doesn’t do the trick. A heart-to-heart with


Self-defense against overflying drones

to the extent of the privilege for self-help in the face of privacy torts like intrusion upon seclusion. - Under tort law principles, a person’s privilege to defend her property by harming a robot reasonably perceived as dangerous will turn on the value of the robot as much as on the value of the property being threatened. A person can be expected to know the value of the property she is protecting, but the law will recognize that it will be difficult for the canonical ordinary reasonable person to make an estimate of a robot’s value in a timely manner during an emergency. If courts attempt to rely on the reasonably perceived value of the robot, then that creates incentives for robot designers to make their robots look more expensive than they are. Encouraging gilding of robots in order to make them resistant to self-defense predicated on tort claims of property damage seems undesirable. Our initial set of proposed solutions to these problems begins with the observation that most of these problems spring from some kind of uncertainty about, or relating to, robots. We therefore suggest measures to reduce those uncertainties. For starters, we suggest a total ban on weaponized robots in the US. A blanket ban would remove one of the greatest threats people might otherwise perceive, and make it much less reasonable to respond to a large class of robot intrusions with force. We also propose that all mobile robots should be required to carry warning markings, lights, and the equivalent of a Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) that would be recorded in a state or national registry. At present, there’s no practical way to tell a robot’s capabilities by looking at it (and drones can be hard to see, especially in the dark). Although far from perfect, these notices would be calibrated not just to warn of the drone’s presence, but also to say something about its capabilities, such as whether it carries a camera, and whether it is capable of capturing sounds or wifi or other information. Setting up a licensing regime and national or state-based registries would help connect a malfeasant robot to its owner or user, but no single system is likely to work in all circumstances. Because drones can be small and may be used outdoors in low-light situations, license plates or airplane-style markings alone may be poor solutions; conversely, license plates or markings


On democracies surrendering the Olympic Games to authoritarians…

This file photograph taken on Feb. 10, 2010 shows India’s Shiva Keshavan Kannan Palan practicing for the luge event at the Whistler Sliding Centre in preparation for the Vancouver Winter Olympics. (Peter Parks/AFP/Getty Images As this week in Authoritarians Gotta Authoritate continues, it’s worth noting that there’s another arena of international affairs where it seems that democracies are in retreat: hosting the Olympics. The case in point is the bidding for the 2022 Winter Olympics. Earlier in the year, Deadspin’s Barry Patchesky warned that cities thinking about hosting the games were dropping like flies, because those pesky voters don’t seem keen on paying for the honor of hosting the Olympics. Yesterday, Krakow , Poland, officially withdrew its bid for the games, a day after a citywide referendum where 70 percent of voters came out against hosting the Olympics. “Krakow is closing its efforts to be the host of the 2022 Winter Games due to the low support for the idea among the residents,” said mayor Jacek Majchrowski. In January, another of the six original finalists pulled out, when Stockholm, Sweden‘s ruling political party declined to fund the games. They cited the pointlessness of paying hundreds of millions for facilities that would be used for two weeks and then rarely again, a story common to almost all Olympic hosts. “Arranging a Winter Olympics would mean a big investment in new sports facilities, for example for the bobsleigh and luge,” the Moderate party said in a statement.“There isn’t any need for that type of that kind of facility after an Olympics.” In November, voters in Munich, Germany, rejected a proposed Olympic bid. “The vote is not a signal against the sport,” said one lawmaker, “but against the non-transparency and the greed for profit of the IOC.” Last March, a joint bid from Davos/St. Moritz, Switzerland, fell apart after being rejected by a public referendum. One of the remaining bidders was Oslo, Norway… until this week. As Slate’s Ben Mathis-Lilley has reported, the Norwegians grew rather weary of International Olympic Committee demands for hosting the games, including my personal favorite, “separate lanes should be created on all roads where IOC members will travel, which are not to be used by regular people or public transportation.” The IOC responded to Oslo’s withdrawal by issuing a contender for Snottiest News Release Ever — but this doesn’t change the fact that the only remaining bidders for


Why supermarkets are in trouble

The grocery department at a Wal-Mart, one of many new competitors in the grocery space. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu) For decades, the traditional supermarket reigned as the primary destination for our grocery shopping. It began with A&P, the pioneering grocery company that began to put independent grocers out of business nearly 100 years ago as it fanned out across the country. Today, major grocery chains still capture a huge share of our grocery dollars: Kroger, the nation’s largest chain, raked in $98.4 billion from its fleet of 2,640 stores last year. Safeway pulled in $36.1 billion; Publix, $28 billion. And yet experts say the industry is in the early stages of a massive shake-up, with rivals coming from all sides to siphon away customers. Players such as Whole Foods Market and Fresh Market are wooing customers seeking natural, organic foods. Wal-Mart and Target are using their huge store footprints to offer a vast assortment of items, and they are joining dollar stores in going after a price-conscious grocery shopper. Still more competition is coming from drug stores and convenience stores. Jones Lang LaSalle’s retail research team has compiled a report that illuminates just how different the grocery store landscape is bound to look in the not-so-distant future. Using data from retail consultancy Willard Bishop, JLL projects how sales and store counts will change across a variety of store formats between 2013 and 2018. As you can see from these two charts, it’s not looking good for traditional supermarkets: (A small note to help you understand the charts: The “fresh format” category includes Whole Foods and other organic grocers; the “limited assortment” category includes small-footprint outlets such as Trader Joe’s and Aldi. The rest of the categories are self-explanatory.) In these forecasts, traditional grocery stores distantly trail their rivals in two key measures of growth. The fresh format stores, in particular, have aggressive expansion plans in the coming year, a strategy that reflects a heightened interest in healthy diets and sustainable food practices. “Beyond fresh format stores, limited assortment and dollar stores are also seeing strong percentage increases in store openings, which underscores that consumers continue to seek out value since the recession,” Ahlburn said in an e-mail. Trader Joe’s is the emblem of success in the limited assortment category: With its low prices and a tightly-edited collection of products, the store is pulling down $1,723 in sales per square foot, compared


Inova said to be in negotiations to buy 117-acre campus for genetics institute

Inova Health System executives have engaged in lengthy negotiations with officials from Exxon Mobil in an effort to acquire the energy company’s 117-acre campus in Merrifield as a new home for its Translational Medicine Institute. The deal could allow the the expansion of Inova’s high-profile genomics research led by Dr. John Niederhuber, a nationally renowned surgeon who is chief executive of the institute and co-director of a clinical research network at Johns Hopkins University. Sources familiar with the discussions, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the talks were meant to be private, cautioned that negotiations have not neared completion and a deal may still not be reached. An overhead image of Exxon Mobil’s Merrifield campus, from the company’s marketing materials. (Courtesy Exxon Mobil) Two sources said Inova, Northern Virginia’s largest healthcare provider, made its first offer for the property months ago and have since conducted escalating back-and-forth discussions with Exxon over how to reach a deal for the institute’s future home. “They’ve been going back and forth and back and forth,” said one source. “The initial offer was an insult to Exxon. But now [Inova] is the only one that they’re focused on. They’re not talking to anybody else.” Another source said Inova was also considering the relocation of its cancer center onto the Exxon property. Spokespersons for Exxon Mobil and Inova declined to comment. Personalized medicine based on genetic research is considered a major opportunity for expansion by Inova Health, led by president J. Knox Singleton, and a field ripe for commercialization that could boost the economy in Northern Virginia. The campus is located just off the Capital Beltway at Route 50 and across the street from Inova’s flagship facility, Inova Fairfax Hospital. Under the direction of Niederhuber, researchers at the Transalational Medicine Institute investigate ways to use personal genetic data in the diagnosis, treatment and management of disease. Last summer, for example, the institute launched a partnership aimed at developing and commercializing computer models capable of predicting the risk of premature births. Researchers there are also in the midst of a study that will capture the genetic codes of 5,000 expectant families and track the first two years of the babies’ lives to gain more information about what triggers disease. Dr. John Niederhuber, chief executive of Inova’s Translational Medicine Institute. (JIM WATSON/AFP/Getty Images) The wooded campus is one of Fairfax County’s most valuable commercial properties, assessed


Student loans plus financial illiteracy equals big debts for some older women

offsets aren’t trivial. The Treasury Department collected an average of around $130 each month from these retirees in 2013. Although benefits can’t fall below a $750 floor, that amount isn’t indexed for inflation and it’s now well below the poverty line. Had the floor been indexed for inflation, more than 60 percent of borrowers over age 64 wouldn’t be having their Social Security benefits reduced. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) plans to introduce legislation that will index the floor for inflation. Moreover, these loans aren’t for their children’s or their grandchildren’s education. More than 80 percent of the outstanding loans are for the retirees own education (the data don’t indicate whether the debt is for loans taken out relatively recently or when the debtor was a young, college student). How is it that so many elderly people have such large student loan debt? One reason is because people, in general, don’t have a good grasp of their finances. Survey after survey shows that Americans are financially illiterate. A recent survey, for example, asked a basic question about interest compounding — If you put $100 in a savings account that earns 2 percent interest a year, would you have more than $100 after five years, less than $100, or exactly $100? — and two others on inflation, and risk. Only one in three Americans could answer all three questions correctly. This is a big problem because people who don’t know how to do the interest calculation are much less likely to plan for their retirement or to accumulate wealth. The financial literacy problem is especially acute for women. Only 22 percent of women got all three questions correct. Along with the gender gap in pay, there’s a gender gap in financial literacy. That’s what George Washington University business school professor Annamaria Lusardi and her co-author Professor Olivia S. Mitchell from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania found when they surveyed levels of financial literacy. Whether it’s a fairly simple question about the impact of compound interest or how inflation affects the rate of return on an investment, or a slightly more complicated one about the riskiness of an investment portfolio, women aren’t as financially knowledgeable as men. “We find a gender deficit in financial literacy when we survey Americans of all ages,” Lusardi told me in her office, tucked away inside George Washington University’s Global Financial Literacy Excellence Center. Lusardi


Obama makes a peculiar pick to showcase the country’s manufacturing revival

(AFP PHOTO/Nicholas KAMMNICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images) President Obama visited a small Indiana company today that he says shows the strength of American manufacturing and the jobs it creates throughout the supply chain. But it was a peculiar choice. The story of Millenium Steel in Princeton, Ind., is actually a complicated tale. It is a small minority owned business, founded solely to serve the Japanese auto giant Toyota. It has the word steel in its name, but it is a service company that only warehouses, delivers and cuts rolls of raw steel that is manufactured by bigger American companies. While Toyota and Millenium are having a good year, those big steel makers are struggling to stay afloat in the face of competition from China, which now produces nearly ten times as much steel as the United States. Millenium Steel wouldn't exist were it not for Toyota's push a dozen years ago to make minority business enterprises 5 percent of its supply chain. In 2001, Toyota's affiliate Toyota Tsusho America and Henry Jackson, a Vietnam War vet and prominent Kentucky businessman who ran a plastics company supplying Toyota, became partners in Millenium Steel. Millenium Steel was one of seven minority business enterprises Toyota helped establish around that time, according to a 2004 report in Automotive News. Millenium Steel isn't a steel manufacturer, though it is part of the manufacturing supply chain in between raw steel makers and Toyota. It sits literally next door to Toyota's light truck making plant in Princeton (which makes Sienna minivans and Highlander SUVs), and it sits on the site of Toyota's plant in San Antonio (which makes Tundra and Takoma pickup trucks). In Toyota's Texas plant, it also gathers leftover steel for reclamation. Neither Millenium nor either of the two Toyota plants are unionized, something that a Democratic president in a different era might have paid more attention to. In 2011, when it celebrated its 10-year anniversary, Millenium had 40 employees and $200 million in revenues. Today the private firm has about 50 employees, Toyota said. This is one part of the American manufacturing story. In a different era, big U.S. automakers manufactured many of the components that they now outsource. Toyota's San Antonio plant employes 3,000 people directly, but also has 3,000 people working for independent suppliers on its plant site. The White House also notes that the United States is on track to produce 13 million


Former Army Ranger Peter Kassig identified as potential next Islamic State victim

taken hostage in Syria last year. Kassig started a small medical relief company known as Special Emergency Response and Assistance, or SERA, in 2012 that has headquarters in Gaziantep, Turkey, according to the company’s LinkedIn page. The city is close to the Syrian border and a way station of sorts for relief workers and journalists. Kassig also was an employee with TYR Solutions LTD, a British firm that provides security and consulting and training for individuals planning to go to war zones, according to his LinkedIn profile. Kassig enlisted as an infantryman, and was in the Army from June 2006 to September 2007 before being medically discharged as a private first class, Army officials aid. He was with the Army’s famous 75th Ranger Regiment from October 2006 to September 2007, and deployed with them to Iraq from April to July 2007. Kassig said in an interview published by Time magazine last year that he traveled to the Middle East in 2012 after leaving the Army and while on spring break from Butler University in Indiana. He wanted to learn about the humanitarian crisis in Syria firsthand and see what he could do to raise awareness about it. In a web page raising funds for his cause, the former soldier said he felt that more could be done to help the Syrians, and thought the most effective way was “through a close connection to those who were in desperate need, by meeting them where they were.” “We may not have much but I have always felt that the reasons why you do something are as important as what you do,” he wrote. “This is about making a difference not just through material goods, but also the exchange of ideas and experiences that the interanational [sic] community benefits from through this type of iniative [sic].” In a 2012 interview with CNN, Kassig said that he first traveled to the Lebanese capital of Beirut where he studied how complicated the conflict was. He said some people questioned what he was doing. He told CNN he also wondered whether America was doing enough to help, although he didn’t support military intervention. “This is real, and it’s scary stuff, and it’s sad what is happening to people here,” he told CNN. “People back home need to know about it, they need to know. Sometimes you gotta take a stand, you gotta draw a line somewhere.”


‘It’s positive for Ebola.’ Dreaded words set CDC’s emergency operation in motion.

in for the outbreak of Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) in 2012 on the Arabian Peninsula. That dangerous infection has now spread globally, including to the United States. Ebola in the United States was always a possibility -- perhaps an inevitable one, the CDC team knew. Now they had their own patient zero. Before the conference call ended, Kuhar was already headed out the door. Within minutes, the CDC had made his travel arrangements. Booked on the 9:50 flight to Dallas, he dashed home to pack. An hour later, he was parking his 2002 Honda Accord in the economy lot (he knew he wasn’t coming home anytime soon) and hoofed it to the main terminal. At least seven of the eventual 10 members of the team made the flight. (The number of CDC staff in Dallas will fluctuate over the coming days and weeks, Kuhar said, but the group includes senior epidemiologists, epidemic intelligence officers, doctors and nurses.) Everyone on the team dropped what they were doing. One member based in Houston immediately got in his car and drove to Dallas. Communications coordinator, Dave Daigle, quickly cancelled vacation plans with his wife and his plans to visit his mother in Florida. By the time the team arrived at the Courtyard Marriott on the North Central Expressway in Dallas, it was past midnight. Less than 24 hours after the Ebola confirmation, the team was in place, just a mile from Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital. The Marriott would be their unofficial headquarters for the time being. Kuhar was up at 6:30 the next morning, Oct. 1, a Wednesday. The team met briefly in the lobby, inhaling oatmeal, fruit cups and coffee. At 7:30, they were at the hospital. By 8, they were in a conference room with dozens of county and state health officials for what Kuhar called “a meet-and-greet.” “We’re here to assist you,” he told the anxious crowd. “Our immediate priority is contact tracing – contact with people who might be at risk of becoming sick.” The doctor spoke for nearly an hour. Low-key and soft-spoken, Kuhar has a naturally calm disposition. At the end, he took questions. Few were asked. He wasn’t really surprised. He understood it was all so new, so confusing for these people, but he made it clear there was a plan in place and a protocol to deal with those who had been exposed. The


What Texas can learn from Nigeria when it comes to containing Ebola

past — namely polio in 2012 and large-scale lead poisoning in 2010. When someone is on a contact list, that doesn't mean that person has to stay at home for the entire incubation period of 21 days from the last contact with someone who had Ebola. People on contact lists are not under quarantine or in isolation. They can still go to work and go on with their their lives. But they should take their temperature twice a day for 21 days and check in with health workers. Officials in Texas began with a list of about 100 names; they have whittled the list down to 50 people who had some contact with Duncan. Of those, 10 are considered high-risk. The CDC recommends that people without symptoms but who have had direct contact with the bodily fluids of a person sick with Ebola be put under either conditional release, meaning that they self-monitor their health and temperature and check in daily, or controlled movement. People under controlled movement have to notify officials about any intended travel and shouldn't use commercial planes or trains. Local public transportation use is approved on a case-by-case basis. When symptoms do develop, that's when the response kicks into high gear. People with Ebola are contagious only once they begin exhibiting symptoms, which include fever, severe headaches and vomiting. While four people in Dallas are under government-ordered quarantine, that is not the norm. Those individuals "were non-compliant with the request to stay home. I don’t want to go too far beyond that," Dallas County Judge Clay Lewis Jenkins said Thursday. On Friday, the four people were moved to a private residence from the apartment where Duncan had been staying when he became symptomatic. A law enforcement officer will remain with them to enforce the order, and none of the people are allowed to leave until Oct. 19. Duncan is the only person with an Ebola diagnosis in Dallas, and no one else is showing symptoms at the moment. But, as Nigeria knows, the work in Dallas has just begun. RELATED READING: Why hasn’t the U.S. closed its airports to travelers from Ebola-ravaged countries? For quarantined relatives, extra cautions, hope and prayer ‘It’s positive for Ebola.’ Dreaded words set CDC’s emergency operation in motion. Can you catch Ebola from an infected blanket? A Liberian doctor is using HIV drugs to treat Ebola victims. The NIH is intrigued.


Peter Kassig’s family pleads for release of Islamic State hostage

The parents of Peter Kassig, an American aid worker being held hostage by Islamic State militants, released a statement pleading for their son's release. The parents of an American aid worker taken hostage by the Islamic State released a video Saturday pleading with their son’s captors to show mercy and free the young man. Peter Kassig’s family said he was in the region doing humanitarian work when he disappeared a year ago near the city of Raqqa in eastern Syria. “We implore those who are holding you to show mercy and use their power to let you go,” Kassig’s mother, Paula said, while holding a picture of their 26-year-old son. The Islamic State revealed publicly for the first time in a separate video Friday that it was holding Kassig, a former U.S. Army Ranger who served in Iraq in 2007. In the same video, a militant dubbed “Jihadi John,” beheaded an British hostage named Alan Henning, a taxi driver from Manchester. He then threatened to kill Kassig, a Muslim convert, because of U.S. bombing of Islamic State targets in Syria. This undated photo shows former Army Ranger Peter Kassig standing in front of a truck filled with supplies for Syrian refugees. A video purportedly produced by militants in Syria released Friday shows Kassig, of Indianapolis, kneeling on the ground as a masked militant says he will be killed next by Islamic State militants. (AP Photo/Courtesy Kassig Family) Henning was the fourth western hostage the Islamic State has executed in a series of gruesome videos. In three earlier ones, the same militant decapitated American journalists Steven Sotloff and James Foley as well as British humanitarian aid worker David Haines. The group is holding at least three other westerners, including British journalist John Cantlie and two women, one of whom is an American. Kassig’s family said the United States’ decision to attack the Islamic State is beyond their control and more violence was a not a solution. “We asked our government to change its actions, but like our son, we have no more control over the U.S. government than you have over the break of dawn,” Ed Kassig said. “We implore his captors to show mercy and use their power to let our son go.” Kassig is a native of Indiana who founded SERA (Special Emergency Response and Assistance), a non-governmental organization to provide aid to Syrians fleeing the civil war in


Why hasn’t the U.S. closed its airports to travelers from Ebola-ravaged countries?

On Saturday, CDC officials were dispatched to Newark Liberty International airport after a passenger on an incoming flight from Brussels began vomiting, NBC New York reported. Several African nations have restricted or banned air travel from Ebola-stricken countries, and airlines including Kenya Airways, British Airways, Air Cote D’Ivoire and Nigeria's Arik Air have suspended flights from the countries. Front Page Africa reported Wednesday, though, that Kenya Airways and Air Cote D’Ivoire are expected to resume some of their so-called "Ebola flights" this month. Others airlines have greatly reduced air travel in the region. Some of that is a natural consequence of the fact that few people, save for aid workers and government officials, are traveling in and out of the region. But other suspensions reflect a widespread fear that a person sick with Ebola could get on a plane and potentially infect other passengers and airline crew members. The airline industry has been trying to tamp down Ebola fears this week as more and more people ask whether there should be restrictions on who can fly into the United States. More travel restrictions, though, aren't going to make the world safer when it comes to Ebola, according to several global public health organizations. In fact, they might make the situation worse. Air travel restrictions ignore the way Ebola is transmitted Ebola can only be contracted through direct contact with a sick person's bodily fluids. That means saliva, feces, urine, blood, vomit or semen. It isn't transmitted through the air, so you are more likely to catch a cold on a flight than Ebola. “It is not an optimal measure for controlling the import of Ebola virus disease,” said chief United Nations spokesperson Stephane Dujarric. “The measure does not reflect what is known about the way in which the virus passes between people." [RELATED: How do you get Ebola?] The U.S. has similarly spurned travel restrictions in the face of a more infectious, though less deadly, disease like Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) for similar reasons, even when sick passengers were coming to the U.S. The State Department has warned U.S. citizens against non-essential travel to Liberia and Sierra Leone, but there are currently no plans to alter the travel warning in the wake of diagnosis, a State Department official told The Post on Wednesday. The screening procedures at the airport in Monrovia, the Liberian capital, have been in place for


public health organizations. In fact, they might make the situation worse. Air travel restrictions ignore the way Ebola is transmitted Ebola can only be contracted through direct contact with a sick person's bodily fluids. That means saliva, feces, urine, blood, vomit or semen. It isn't transmitted through the air, so you are more likely to catch a cold on a flight than Ebola. “It is not an optimal measure for controlling the import of Ebola virus disease,” said chief United Nations spokesperson Stephane Dujarric. “The measure does not reflect what is known about the way in which the virus passes between people." [RELATED: How do you get Ebola?] The U.S. has similarly spurned travel restrictions in the face of a more infectious, though less deadly, disease like Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) for similar reasons, even when sick passengers were coming to the U.S. The State Department has warned U.S. citizens against non-essential travel to Liberia and Sierra Leone, but there are currently no plans to alter the travel warning in the wake of diagnosis, a State Department official told The Post on Wednesday. The screening procedures at the airport in Monrovia, the Liberian capital, have been in place for months, Deborah R. Malac, the U.S. ambassador to Liberia, told The Post in a telephone interview Thursday. The CDC's Division of Global Migration and Quarantine has worked with airport officials on screening protocols, and, Malac said, CDC officials "have confidence that everything that was supposed to have been done was done." The restrictions are also redundant If someone isn't exhibiting symptoms of Ebola, that person is not infectious. And one of the first symptoms of Ebola is a fever. In airports in all of the affected regions and across the world, passengers coming from flights from West Africa are being screened for elevated temperatures. If a passenger is sick or has a fever, they won't fly Post Despite the fact that an infected passenger flew from Liberia to Dallas this month, that passenger, Duncan, was not sick -- and was therefore not contagious -- while he was traveling. And once people become symptomatic, they become very sick, very quickly. In this case, it is unlikely that a sick person could go 10 days without seeking medical care, CDC Director Tom Frieden said on Tuesday. "At this point, there is zero risk of transmission on the flight," Frieden said. "The illness


Protesters interrupt St. Louis Symphony with ‘Requiem for Mike Brown’

Demonstrators 'disrupt' STL symphony singing a 'Requiem for Mike Brown' Ferguson, Mo. — Protesters rallying over the slaying of unarmed black teenager Michael Brown left the streets on Saturday night, put on sports coats and fancy dresses and sat in on the St. Louis Symphony. During the intermission of a performance of Brahms Requiem, the 23 protesters sitting in various parts of the auditorium stood up and sang, “Requiem for Mike Brown.” “Justice for Mike Brown is Justice for us All, Which side are you on friend? Which side are you on?” As they began to sing, protests unfurled banners from the balcony that encouraged symphony patrons to “join the movement.” The group was surprised by the response, said Derek Laney, an organizer for Missourians Organizing for Reform and Empowerment. Instead of being ushered out in handcuffs by police, some patrons of the symphony — and some symphony members themselves — applauded the tuneful message. The group left on their own after about a minute and a half of singing, while they chanted “Blacks Lives Matter.” “It went to show that there are people among that crowd who think that the protests matter and that it’s not okay to just kill black children, and they’d be receptive to hear that message,” Laney said. “It was a perfect moment. As we left, people were smiling and reaching out to shake our hands.” Music has been an integral part of protests in Ferguson, and in St. Louis, with the airwaves featuring hip-hop songs aplenty mourning the loss of Brown at the hands of a white police officer, Darren Wilson. But a flash mob at the symphony was an attempt to “speak to a segment of the population that has the luxury of being comfortable,” Laney said. “You have to make a choice for just staying in your comfort zones or will you speak out for something that’s important? It’s not all right to just ignore it.” The protesters, who were remarkably on pitch as seen on video footage posted late Saturday night, only practiced the song a few times hours before the demonstration. The demonstration was yet another example of protesters in and around Ferguson trying to expand their base in anticipation of “national mobilization” effort scheduled in the St. Louis suburb next week.


It’s highly unlikely that you’ll become infected with Ebola. So what are you so afraid of?

The body of a suspected Ebola victim is taken away by Liberian Ministry of Health workers in the capital city of Monrovia. (Michel du Cille/The Washington Post) This is how to get Ebola: Come into direct contact with the bodily fluids of a person who is infected with the virus and already symptomatic. Ebola doesn't travel through the air. A person in Washington, D.C., can't catch Ebola from an Ebola-infected person in Dallas without going there and coming into direct contact with the patient's bodily fluids. Still, amid the deadliest Ebola outbreak in history, in West Africa, the news of the first case diagnosed in the United States has prompted people to act as if they're a half-breath away from catching the virus anyway. America's Patient Zero is in Texas. He's in isolation, and the people who were in an apartment with him when he became sick are under quarantine. None of the people who potentially came into contact with the man while he was symptomatic have yet become sick with Ebola. Multiple potential U.S. cases elsewhere — from New York to Washington — have come up negative. The virus has not ravaged the United States. But the word — Ebola! — is ubiquitous, and so is the fear that comes with it. As The Post noted today in a front-page story about the global health disaster: "This is both a biological plague and a psychological one, and fear can spread even faster than the virus." Here's how the virus spreads and how contact tracing works to stop outbreaks. An example, from Wednesday: Mehmet Oz — aka Dr. Oz — went on television to pronounce that the epidemic could alter the world "as much as any plague in history." Dr. Oz's apocalyptic statement depended not on the realities of the disease as it exists now, but, he said, on "the question no one wants to ask, but everyone fears": Will the Ebola virus mutate and go airborne? Cue a terrifying segment during which little blips on a spinning globe turned the world red with disease. The doomsday potential is "a question that keeps [experts] up at night," Dr. Oz said, adding: "It should keep you up as well." But should it? "People are feeling out of control. They had no control about whether Ebola comes to the United States," David Kaplan of the American Counseling Association said last week. For


Town Square | Ultimate live-work location for foodies

(Courtesy of M Squared Real Estate) La Fourchette What many aficionados of the restaurant don’t realize is that Chef Pierre Chauvet and his wife, hostess Jacqueline Chauvet, also own an apartment adjacent to the restaurant which is part of the $2.9 million asking price. (Courtesy of M Squared Real Estate) The La Fourchette property, open since 1978 at 2429 18th St. NW, includes approximately 2,588 square feet in the restaurant, which has 20-foot-high ceilings and an exposed brick wall, along with a 20-seat outdoor patio. The two-story apartment has a separate entrance, 1,680 square feet, three bedrooms, two baths, a spiral staircase and views of 18th Street. (Courtesy of M Squared Real Estate) For more information about the property, contact Robert Tack of the Capital Real Estate Group at 202-319-2884 or click here. Return of first-time home buyer tax break in D.C.? D.C. Council members David Grosso (I-At Large) and Jack Evans (D-Ward 2) introduced a bill last month that would reduce the recordation tax rate for first-time home buyers in the city from 1.45 percent to 0.725 percent in order to encourage homeownership. The bill is also meant to offset the difference in tax rates between Maryland, Virginia and the District. Currently, D.C.’s recordation and transfer tax rates are about 50 percent higher than the neighboring states, according to Grosso. The tax break would apply only to first-time buyers in the city who intend to be owner-occupants, not investors. The bill is under review by the Council. If passed, the new tax break will be implemented beginning Sept. 30, 2015. (Courtesy of Radpad) Pay your rent in 90 seconds In a world in which most consumers pay their utility and credit card bills and even their friends with a tap of their smart phone, paying the rent has been the last hold-out requiring a check or cash handed over to a landlord. Now RadPad, an online rental marketplace, has upgraded its technology to allow renters to pay their rent with an iPhone or through their Web site with the “Pay with RadPad” service. The service accepts Visa, MasterCard and Discover credit cards and debit cards, with American Express to be added later this fall. Renters pay $4.95 for debit card payments and 3.25 percent of their monthly rent for credit payments. To use the service, renters need to set up a “My Rent” button to enter their rent and


the District. Currently, D.C.’s recordation and transfer tax rates are about 50 percent higher than the neighboring states, according to Grosso. The tax break would apply only to first-time buyers in the city who intend to be owner-occupants, not investors. The bill is under review by the Council. If passed, the new tax break will be implemented beginning Sept. 30, 2015. (Courtesy of Radpad) Pay your rent in 90 seconds In a world in which most consumers pay their utility and credit card bills and even their friends with a tap of their smart phone, paying the rent has been the last hold-out requiring a check or cash handed over to a landlord. Now RadPad, an online rental marketplace, has upgraded its technology to allow renters to pay their rent with an iPhone or through their Web site with the “Pay with RadPad” service. The service accepts Visa, MasterCard and Discover credit cards and debit cards, with American Express to be added later this fall. Renters pay $4.95 for debit card payments and 3.25 percent of their monthly rent for credit payments. To use the service, renters need to set up a “My Rent” button to enter their rent and the due date; the name and address of the company or individual to whom they make payments and then add the credit card or debit card of their choice. RadPad ensures that the rent is paid on time each month even if the landlord doesn’t use RadPad. In addition to offering the benefit of knowing the rent will always be paid on time, the service makes it easy for roommates to split the rent since each can sign up for Pay with RadPad. A payment history will be stored with the RadPad profile to show future landlords. For more information, go to https://www.onradpad.com/paymyrent. News Corp to buy Realtor.com One of the world’s largest global media companies, News Corp, which owns publications such as the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post along with a leading Australian residential property site, announced its plans to purchase Move.Inc, owner and operator of Realtor.com for $950 million. The acquisition is anticipated to expand the global reach of Realtor.com, which currently has nearly 35 million visitors per month and has partnerships with more than 800 multiple listing services around the country. Move.Inc. has operated Realtor.com under an agreement with the National Association of Realtors


Three who discovered ‘inner GPS’ win Nobel Prize in Medicine

Three scientists, including a husband-and-wife team, have been awarded this year’s Nobel Prize in Medicine for deciphering the mechanism in the brain that allows us to find our way around. The three winners of the world’s most coveted medical research prize are John O’Keefe, who holds both U.S. and British citizenship and is director of the Sainsbury Wellcome Center in Neural Circuits and Behavior at University College London; May-Britt Moser, a professor of neuroscience at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology, and Edward I. Moser of the same university. All worked on different components of the same problem: how we “orient ourselves in space” and navigate, the Stockholm-based Nobel committee said in announcing the prize. The full statement is here. O’Keefe was honored for finding a type of nerve cell in the brain area called the hippocampus in 1975 activated according to where a rat located itself in a room. O’Keefe “concluded that these ‘place cells’ formed a map of the room,” the committee said. In 2005, the Mosers mapped the connections in the hippocampus as rats moved about a room. They “discovered an astonishing pattern of activity in a nearby part of the brain called the entorhinal cortex,” where certain cells activated as the rats moved past locations in a hexagonal grid. The found that these “grid cells” comprised a system of coordinates that permitted spatial navigation. Later research using brain imaging showed that the same system exists in humans. Patients with Alzheimer’s disease lose their way around because the particular areas of the brain are affected. Said the committee: “The discovery of the brain’s positioning system represents a paradigm shift in our understanding of how ensembles of specialized cells work together to execute higher cognitive functions. It has opened new avenues for understanding other cognitive processes, such as memory, thinking and planning.”


Charred bodies found in ‘the land of the wicked’ may be missing Mexican students

On Oct. 5, 2014, students hold back a military vehicle during a roadblock to demand the safe return of those who went missing on Sept. 26 on the outskirts of Chilpancingo in the Mexican state of Guerrero. (REUTERS/Jorge Dan Lopez) On Saturday, 28 charred bodies were found in a mass grave on the outskirts of a town in southern Mexico where a group of student protesters went missing after police opened fire on them in late September. Prosecutors have since uncovered ties between organized crime and the local police and city government of Iguala, a town 125 miles south of the capital, Mexico City. The mayor of the town and its security chief have disappeared, evading warrants for their arrest. After eight members of the Guerreros Unidos gang were arrested, they tipped off authorities on the location of the mass grave, uncovered Saturday in a poor district on outskirts of Iguala. “They grabbed 17, took them to the top of a hill in Pueblo Viejo where they have clandestine graves and where they say they killed them,” state prosecutor Inaky Blanco said Sunday, according to Agence France-Presse. Blanco cautioned those details haven’t been confirmed by investigators. “El Chucky,” the gang’s feared leader, ordered the hit, but the motive still isn’t clear, Blanco added. Authorities uncovered a mass grave in an area where dozens of people were missing after clashes with police and armed men last week. Iguala is a gateway to the Tierra Caliente, a lawless region where vigilantes do battle with powerful Mexican drug cartels. “This is the land of the wicked,” a resident named Jose Garcia told AFP. Garcia said he saw police going up the hill to the site where the mass grave was found, a mile from the nearest road on steep hillside thick with vegetation. The bodies were found on a bed of branches and tree trunks that had been set ablaze. It could take more than two weeks to identify the disfigured corpses with genetic testing, Blanco said, declining to speculate whether the bodies were those of 43 students from the Ayotzinapa Normal School teacher’s college who went missing Sept. 26. They came to Iguala to raise funds for a planned protest against hiring practices that, in their view, favor urban students over rural ones. According to the Associated Press, these students and others in Mexico’s rural teacher’s college system are radicals whose militant


Wonkbook: The never-ending tale of two economies

want a mortgage? Other financial reads: Perry Capital appeals Fannie, Freddie bailout ruling. Margaret Cronin Fisk in Bloomberg. Tiny horse interlude: 4. The fallout from the latest data breach State attorneys general are teaming up to investigate the JPMorgan Chase breach. Banks' problems could easily become other industries' problems. Explainer: The source and intent of the breaches remain unclear. Lawmakers ratchet up push for cybersecurity legislation. Other tech reads: Henry Waxman has a plan to save net neutrality. Brendan Sasso in National Journal. Congress may ban NSA phone-data collection. Erin Kelly in USA Today. Sports interlude: Wonkblog roundup Inflation hawks keep insisting they’re right. Reality disagrees. Matt O'Brien. The online illicit drug economy is booming. Here’s what people are buying. Christopher Ingraham. Obama makes a peculiar pick to showcase the country’s manufacturing revival. Steven Mufson. The whole truth about “whole milk.” Roberto A. Ferdman. Did Americans permanently change their spending habits during the recession? Jeff Guo. Americans think the unemployment rate is way higher than it really is. Emily Badger. Measuring America’s drinking habit is tricky — here’s how to do it. Christopher Ingraham. Name That Data! Volume 11.Christopher Ingraham. Unemployment is finally under 6 percent, but don’t expect a raise anytime soon. Matt O'Brien. Why Zappos’ CEO couldn’t save downtown Las Vegas. Emily Badger. Hiring rebounds in September; unemployment rate falls to 5.9 percent. Ylan Q. Mui. The government is still stocking vending machines with junk food. Roberto A. Ferdman. Et Cetera Long read: The most ambitious environmental lawsuit ever. Nathaniel Rich in The New York Times. Treasury inversion rules claim victim as benefits remain. Richard Rubin in Bloomberg. As Supreme Court term begins, prospect of a gay-marriage ruling looms large. Robert Barnes in The Washington Post. Texas ruling cancels dozens of abortions that had been scheduled. Sandhya Somashekhar in The Washington Post. The bipartisan border-abuse bill Congress is ignoring. Nora Caplan-Bricker in National Journal. Changes in AP history trigger a culture clash in Colorado. Karen Tumulty and Lyndsey Layton in The Washington Post. States seek to protect student athletes from heat stroke, other maladies. Michael Ollove in Pew Stateline. Psychologists are trying to learn how to convince conservatives to take climate change seriously. Jesse Singal in New York Magazine. Holder's civil-rights agenda at a crossroads. Benjamin Goad in The Hill. Got tips, additions, or comments? E-mail us. Wonkbook is produced with help from Michelle Williams and Ryan McCarthy


Parents of American aid worker held captive by Islamic State release letter from their son

name from Peter to Abdul-Rahman upon conversion. The parents of Peter Kassig, an American aid worker being held hostage by Islamic State militants, released a statement pleading for their son's release. On Sunday, Kassig’s parents wrote that “Abdul-Rahman’s journey toward Islam began before he was taken captive,” adding that “he observed the month-long Ramadan fast in July-August 2013 prior to his capture, and spoke of the great impact this spiritual practice had on him.” Their son, they said, “worked and lived alongside Syrian Muslims before his capture and had come to admire and respect them greatly.” Kassig disappeared from Raqqah in eastern Syria a year ago while doing humanitarian work in the region. On Friday, the Islamic State revealed that it had Kassig in captivity and threatened to kill the American because of a U.S. bombing campaign against Islamic State targets. In the same video, an unidentified militant executed British hostage Alan Henning. The same militant appears to be the person who killed American journalists Steven Sotloff and James Foley and British aid worker David Haines. Those killings were announced via gruesome online videos. In the letter to his family, written during his captivity, Kassig said: “In terms of my faith, I pray every day and I am not angry about my situation in that sense. I am in a dogmatically complicated situation here, but I am at peace with myself.” The family, in its statement, added: “We want to send our heartfelt thanks to the many people around the world who have offered their prayers and support to our family at this difficult time.” Here is the full excerpt from the family, which edited the original letter for length and to omit sensitive information: The first thing I want to say is thank you. Both to you and mom for everything you have both done for me as parents; for everything you have taught me, shown me, and experienced with me. I cannot imagine the strength and commitment it has taken to raise a son like me but your love and patience are things I am so deeply grateful for. I am obviously pretty scared to die but the hardest part is not knowing, wondering, hoping, and wondering if I should even hope at all. I am very sad that all this has happened and for what all of you back home are going through. If I do die,


Rocking the red: A lunar eclipse bathes the moon in color Wednesday morning

This picture taken in Manassas, Virginia shows the moon during the peak of a total lunar eclipse on December, 21, 2010. (KAREN BLEIER/AFP/Getty Images) Now, even the moon will rock the red. On Wednesday morning Oct. 8 before sunrise, the moon wraps itself in reddish, copper tones thanks to a total lunar eclipse in the western sky. Lunar eclipses – unlike solar eclipses – are safe to watch, says noted eclipse expert Fred Espenak. (Espenak’s EclipseWise website can be found here.) A lunar eclipse can be observed with nothing more than the naked eye, he says. Standing between the sun and the moon, our planet throws a shadow as a result. This shadow has two parts: a penumbra and an umbra. The umbra is the central shadow and the penumbra is the perimeter shadow surrounding the umbra. Entering the partial phase (the penumbral shadow) at 5:15 a.m. EDT, the moon slowly gains a red glow. Our lunar colleague then moves into the umbral shadow by 6:25 a.m., and – and barring cloudy skies – consumes itself wholly in crimson. The full moon officially occurs at 6:51 a.m. (EDT), according to the U.S. Naval Observatory. And the middle of the total lunar eclipse occurs at 6:55 a.m., but note the sky will be lightening for sunrise (7:11 a.m.) in the east. The moon sets in the west a mere five minutes later at 7:16 a.m., according to the Naval Observatory. The moon will turn a lovely shade of "celestial red" when it passes through the shadow of Earth for a total lunar eclipse in the early morning hours of Oct. 8. Quartet in the cosmos This total lunar eclipse is the second of four total lunar eclipses in a row and that special quartet of events is called a tetrad. The first total lunar eclipse in the tetrad was April 15 and the next one will be April 4, 2015 and then Sept. 28, 2015. Between 1582 and 1908, there were no tetrads. In our modern age, there will be eight tetrads in this century. The last quartet was 2003-04, while the next one will occur in 2032-33. It’s a family affair Lunar eclipses occur in a series – or a family – every 18 years, 11 days and 8 hours, and these eclipse families are called “saros,” says NASA. The Oct. 8 eclipse belongs to lunar eclipse Saros 127, a


The brain science that just won a Nobel Prize could help us build better cities

Flickr image courtesy of David Foltz, under a Creative Commons license. The Nobel Prize for physiology or medicine was given Monday morning to three scientists who've uncovered the "inner GPS" in our brains that helps us find our way through the world around us, identifying where we are, where we've been and how to get back there again. From the Nobel committee's poetic announcement: The discoveries of John O'Keefe, May‐Britt Moser and Edvard Moser have solved a problem that has occupied philosophers and scientists for centuries – how does the brain create a map of the space surrounding us and how can we navigate our way through a complex environment? The answers have some direct implications for how we understand diseases like Alzheimer's that rob people of their spatial memory. But they also have some fascinating implications for perfectly healthy people, too, and for the way we design spaces — from individual buildings to neighborhoods and whole transportation networks — that we move through daily. While the first story is clearly the province of scientists and doctors, the second is very much of interest to urban planners, architects and cartographers. For them, the evolving science of your "inner GPS" could help create places that aren't so confusing — or help us understand why so many of the places we've already built (medical complexes, train stations, downtown Atlanta) are. First, a very quick sketch of what the newest Nobel laureates have taught us about our brains (and the brains of rats): Back in 1971, O'Keefe discovered nerve cells in rats that activated each time the animals passed by a particular location in a room. When the rats were in one corner, certain cells in their brains activated; when they were in a different part of the room, other cells lit up. O'Keefe called these "place cells," and research since his initial discovery suggests that humans have them, too. They help us construct mental maps of space, recognizing the difference between one street corner and the next, between your cubicle and your coworker's. The Mosers (they're married) much more recently added to this the discovery of "grid cells" that, along with place cells, allow us to determine our position in the world and to navigate through it. All of this inner navigational work happens without any conscious effort on our part. And yet actual navigation is a real-world challenge most of


The latest orchestra lockout: the situation in Atlanta

Atlanta Symphony Orchestra Music Director Robert Spano, left, applauds as orchestra musicians and chorus members hold a silent protest in front of Symphony Hall on what would have been the season opening night, Thursday, Sept. 25, 2014, in Atlanta. The orchestra’s contract with the musician’s union ended earlier this month, and the musicians have been locked out since September 6. (AP Photo/David Goldman) When the Metropolitan Opera administration managed to negotiate a new contract with its union employees this summer without resorting to a threatened lockout, one might have hoped it was breaking what was becoming a sad and lengthy chain: the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, the Indianapolis Symphony, the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, and, of course, the Minnesota Orchestra. But Atlanta, alas, got right back on the bandwagon. On September 6, they locked their musicians out for the second time in two years — after those musicians had agreed to considerable concessions in 2012 (a 15% salary cut, a reduction of the orchestra from 95 members to 88, a season ten weeks shorter) based on promises that no such lockout would ever happen again. To date, the Atlanta lockout has cancelled the opening of the season and at least the first few weeks of concerts; the season won’t resume til November at the earliest. It has also marshalled widespread support for the musicians, including public statements from the orchestra’s music director, Robert Spano, and principal guest conductor, Donald Runnicles, and an open letter from a roster of well-known composers. One of the issues is the size of the orchestra; further cutting the number of players, musicians contend, would compromise the quality of the institution. The tin-ear-management-versus-beleagered-musicians equation that often emerges in such situations was upended to a certain degree at the end of September when the orchestra’s president, Stanley Romanstein, unexpectedly resigned, saying — probably accurately — that his presence was an impediment to reaching an agreement. Since Romanstein’s interim successor, Terry Neal — a retired Coca-Cola executive and a member of the ASO board — is explicitly not going to be involved in contract negotiations, this leaves the orchestra contending, effectively, with the Woodruff Arts Center, which is at once the complex in which the Atlanta Symphony performs and its parent organization. (The WAC was in the news, since the last lockout, as the victim of embezzlement by an employee to the tune of more than $1 million; the


Nobel Prize in medicine awarded for discovery of brain’s ‘GPS’

is represented. This is why some people compare memories to moving through space.” Joshua Sanes, director of Harvard University’s Center for Brain Research, said that while the work by O’Keefe and the Moser is still in the early stages – it has only been done in animals, and it’s unclear whether human brains are set up the same way – it provides fundamental insights into brains and their relation to life. “It’s about navigational abilities that little kids have, mice have, ants have and honey bees have,” he said. “It’s a very basic evolutionary mental activity that is absolutely critical for many species' survival. How the brain works is maybe the biggest mystery that remains in all the world of the life sciences, and this is a key piece in the puzzle.” The Nobel winners’ work provides such a fundamental insight into the brain that many neuroscientists are hopeful that the discovery will one day help us find treatments for a host of neurological conditions. “The studies were of a part of the brain involved in certain neurological disease, such as Alzheimer’s, and getting lost is a symptom of Alzheimer’s,” Sanes explained. “While nobody should be thinking this is on the direct road to a treatment, but it provides a starting point for the first time.” Emery Brown, a member of the advisory committee for the BRAIN initiative, said he expects work building on the three scientists’ discoveries to accelerate over the next few years as scientists try to figure out whether the place and grid cells work the same way in humans. If it turns out to be the case, he said, the implications are far-reaching. “You could think of ways to help stimulate areas to enhance memory, to help people who have had brain injuries recover function, maybe even to help preserve function as we grow older,” said Brown, a professor of computational neuroscience at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The Nobel Prize in physics will be announced Tuesday, the prize in chemistry Wednesday, and literature on Thursday. The Nobel Peace Prize will be announced Friday. A prize in economics, in memory of Alfred Nobel, will be announced on Oct. 13. Three scientists, including a husband-and-wife team, have been awarded this year’s prize for their research on the brain. View Photo Gallery — Three scientists, including a husband-and-wife team, have been awarded this year’s Nobel Prize in Medicine.


Why does the moon turn red during a lunar eclipse?

If you plan on rising in the pre-dawn hours of Oct. 8 to view the lunar eclipse, here's what you should know ahead of the early morning show in the sky. Early Wednesday morning, just before the sun rises, the full moon will turn red in a total lunar eclipse. But why red? Every month the moon circles Earth in uneventful fashion. However, about twice a year, it passes through the shadow of the Earth — the umbra — which prevents direct sunlight from reaching the surface of the moon. This is the total lunar eclipse. Related: The lunar eclipse over the Washington Monument on February 20, 2008. (Kevin Ambrose) Even though the moon is in the Earth’s shadow, some light does manage to hit the lunar surface during the eclipse, and this is what gives the moon its crimson glow, for the same reason that the sky is blue, and sunsets on Earth appear orange, pink, and red. As light passes through the atmosphere of the Earth, it is scattered in all directions. The molecules in the atmosphere are an excellent size for scattering short wavelength blue light, which makes our sky appear blue when the sun is overhead. But as sunlight passes through long, dense portions of the atmosphere, like it does at sunrise and sunset, longer wavelengths of light, which we see as red, are filtered out the least. (NASA) Just like at sunset, during a lunar eclipse the sun’s rays have a lot of atmosphere to pass through around the edges of the Earth. And in addition to the red-colored scattering, the light is also refracted, or bent, sending the red light straight toward the moon. In fact, if you were standing on the surface of the moon during the eclipse, you would see a halo of red around the Earth as it passed in front of the sun, like a 360-degree sunset. While all lunar eclipses end up being some shade of red, the exact color can vary based on the nature of the particles in our atmosphere. Temperature, humidity and dust can all play a role in the intensity of the moon’s redness, which can vary from orange to deep crimson.


Opera notes from all over

Powell Hall audience members briefly interrupt a performance of the St. Louis Symphony on Saturday, Oct. 4, 2014, in St. Louis. Several dozen people protesting the shooting death of 18-year-old Michael Brown interrupted the performance of the symphony in a peaceful demonstration. The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reports the demonstrators began singing and unfurled from a balcony three banners related to Brown’s shooting in August by a Ferguson police officer. (AP Photo/St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Steve Giegerich) The San Francisco Opera Other San Francisco news In St. Louis on Saturday Today (Monday), the Washington National Opera


DC Brau, Capitol City Brewing Company lead the local winners at the Great American Beer Festival

The Great American Beer Festival wrapped up Saturday night, hours after its annual award ceremony recognized the country's top brewers and beers. Gold, silver and bronze medals are awarded in 90 categories, with more than 5,500 beers submitted for consideration. Devils Backbone was named the Mid-Size Brewing Company and Mid-Size Brewing Company Brewer of the Year at the Great American Beer Festival. (Fritz Hahn/The Washington Post) Washington's only winner was DC Brau's the Citizen, the brewery's flagship Belgian pale ale, which placed second in the Belgian-and-French-Style-Ale category. This is the second time DC Brau has won a silver medal in that category in three years. (The limited-release Your Favorite Foreign Movie, created by the winner of a homebrew contest at Meridian Pint, took the prize in 2012.) Maryland brewers won five medals, including a gold for the rauchbier from Gordon Biersch Annapolis. That smoky lager is currently on tap at the brewpub and costs $6.50 for a 21-ounce glass. The bar says they have just over five barrels of the beer remaining, which they estimate to be "a two week supply." The Gordon Biersch location in Rockville won a silver medal for its Belgian IPA in the American-Belgo-Style-Ale category, and it's also currently available on tap. Three Baltimore-area breweries were rewarded: Union Craft Brewing's Old Pro Gose took silver in the German-Style Sour Ale category; the Heavy Seas Gold Ale won bronze in the Golden or Blonde Ale category; and DuClaw's Sweet Baby Jesus! brought home a bronze medal in the Chocolate Beer category. (Sweet Baby Jesus! is currently pouring at DuClaw's bar in Bowie, while the other two winners are widely available; the Gold Ale is available at the Heavy Seas Alehouse in Rosslyn.) Northern Virginia's only winner was Capitol City Brewing Company: The Shirlington brewery's staple Amber Waves Ale won the silver medal in the American-Style Amber/Red Ale category. This was one of the most heavily contested divisions, with 140 entries, which speaks well of brewer Kristi Mathews Griner and her team. Further afield in Virginia, Devils Backbone – a frequent sight on local taps – continued its streak of major wins in the competition, being named the Mid-Size Brewing Company and Mid-Size Brewing Company Brewer of the Year. Devils Backbone took home the awards for the Small Brewpub and Small Brewpub Brewer of the Year at the 2012 festival, and then was named Small Brewing Company and


Iran explosion: An accident or a reminder ?

Correction: This post originally stated that the Parchin military site was an enrichment facility. It is a testing site. The version below has been corrected. The BBC reports That is right — the West still has had no access to one of Iran’s key enrichment testing sites yet has now twice extended sanctions relief. A worker rides a bicycle in front of the reactor building of the Bushehr nuclear power plant, just outside the southern city of Bushehr, Iran. (AP Photo/Mehr News Agency, Majid Asgaripour, File) It is unknown whether this was an Iranian accident or sabotage. As one Iran expert put it to me, “Never underestimate the Iranian regime’s capacity to screw up on its own without the involvement of foreign intelligence services.” On the other hand, the ambiguity as to the cause of the explosion serves the West’s interests, and especially Israel’s. It is a reminder, at the very least, to the Obama negotiators as well as the mullahs that Israeli intelligence and military remain the wild card, even as the U.S. president seems bent on giving away the store at the negotiating table. The JINSA Iran panel’s report in July The panel recommended transferring “bunker-buster” bombs to Israel along with an appropriate delivery system. (“This would reinforce diplomatic efforts in two ways. First, by sending an unmistakable signal that Israel has the ability – on top of the will – to execute a military strike, it would increase Tehran’s concerns about what could happen if no acceptable deal is reached. Second, it would bolster the U.S. position at the negotiating table by communicating preparedness to consider other options if diplomacy goes nowhere.”) Perhaps the reported explosion was simply an accident. But if it was an intentional reminder that Israel, even without additional U.S. military assistance, has the will and capacity to do real damage to Iran’s program, then maybe, just maybe the U.S. negotiators will use that to their advantage. You think so? Me neither, but one can hope.


Spanish nurse contracts Ebola in first transmission case outside of Africa

Health officials confirmed on Monday that a Spanish nurse, who treated a priest repatriated with Ebola last month, has contracted the virus. In the first known case of Ebola transmission outside of Africa, a nurse in Spain has contracted the deadly virus after caring for a sick priest who had been flown back from West Africa for treatment, Spanish health minister Ana Mato said at a news conference Monday. Two tests confirmed the diagnosis of the woman, Mato said. She was part of a medical team treating Manuel Garcia Viejo, the priest who died Sept. 25 of Ebola, according to the BBC. The infected health worker's only symptom so far is a fever, and her condition remains stable, Mato said. Authorities are trying to determine how exactly she contracted Ebola and whether the team caring for the priest observed proper medical protocols, Mato added. Ebola is spread through direct contact with the bodily fluids of an infected person exhibiting symptoms. Authorities are already trying to trace all of the people the health-care worker may have had contact with, said Madrid's primary health-care director Antonio Alemany, according to the Associated Press. The 30 health care workers who came into contact with her will be under a 21-day period of monitoring, the incubation period for the disease to take hold, NBC news reported. The nurse worked as a sanitary technician, entering the priest's room once to treat him and one other time to collect his belongings, according to NBC News. She began showing symptoms Sept. 30 and went to a Madrid-area hospital Sunday, AP reported. There have been more than 7,400 confirmed, suspected and probable cases of Ebola in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, according to World Health Organization figures released Friday. The death toll in the deadliest Ebola outbreak in history has surpassed 3,400. According to the WHO, "exposure of health-care workers ... continues to be an alarming feature of this outbreak." As of Oct. 1, the WHO said, 382 health-care workers have been infected by Ebola in West Africa; 216 of them have died. [This post originally reported the wrong day of the nurse's hospitalization. It has been corrected and updated.] Read more: How the world failed to stop the Ebola epidemic The death toll has risen to more than 4,000 in West Africa, with the first U.S. death from disease occurring in Texas.


Safeway’s Palisades plans at issue in Tuesday D.C. Council vote

This real estate prospectus has Palisades residents nervous. (KLNB Retail) The upscale environs of the Palisades may not strike anyone as a potential “food desert” — a term of art usually reserved for more hardscrabble areas lacking in fresh-food sales — but residents say that could very much be the Ward 3 neighborhood’s future unless the D.C. Council acts Tuesday. Palisades residents are now served by one full-service grocery store, the Safeway on MacArthur Boulevard NW near the Georgetown reservoir. After spending much time and money exploring a mixed-use renovation of that store, Safeway now appears intent on selling the store outright to a developer. And residents fear that Safeway, in keeping with its past practices and those common in the retail industry, will move to restrict a new supermarket from opening on that site once it leaves. If the Safeway were to close, Palisades residents’ other options would be to travel more than two miles to either the Georgetown Safeway or Glover Park Whole Foods Market. Those living in the western reaches of the neighborhood might instead find themselves visiting Tenleytown or, gasp, Bethesda. Enter D.C. Council members Mary M. Cheh (D-Ward 3) and David A. Catania (I-At Large), who have proposed emergency legislation set for a Tuesday vote that would ban property owners who are in the “primary business of selling grocery products” from restricting the future use of the site for food retail. “This undermines competition in the grocery store industry and creates ‘food deserts,’ which limit resident access to fresh food,” the council members wrote in a memo to colleagues and staff. “In an area bereft of other grocery store options this unnecessarily harms resident access to healthy, affordable food” — particularly seniors and residents without cars. Cheh said in an interview that the legislation was motivated by the developing situation in the Palisades. “But it’s broader than that,” she said. “It’s like a boilerplate thing for them. To put that [covenant] in, it may effectively foreclose the ability of a community to have a grocery store. … The idea of having a neighborhood grocery store is extraordinarily valuable in any community.” Safeway is not swayed by those appeals. In a letter sent to Council Chairman Phil Mendelson (D) on Monday, a company executive asked him to oppose the legislation, saying, “Safeway has not entered into any discussions or negotiations with potential purchasers” despite entertaining offers


4-year-old’s death in September was caused by Enterovirus 68, which is sweeping U.S.

Eli Waller went to sleep one night late last month and never woke up. The 4-year-old from Hamilton, N.J., stayed home from preschool that day, when his parents thought he might have pink eye and didn’t want him to infect his classmates. He had no other symptoms of the respiratory virus sweeping the country — no fever, no coughing or sneezing, no muscle aches and no problems breathing. But sometime after they tucked him into bed Sept. 24 and before they tried to wake him the next morning, he died. Eli’s death is believed to be the first in the United States directly linked to Enterovirus 68, or EV-D68, health officials ruled Oct. 3. Since August, the virus has hit nearly 600 people, most of them children, across 43 states and District of Columbia, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Four others who died were infected with the disease, but it’s not clear what role it played in their deaths. Eli’s pink eye was unrelated. “I think Eli’s case is the exception to the other cases around the country,” Hamilton Township health officer Jeff Plunkett told ABC News. “He had no signs of any illness that night, and his passing was sudden and shocking.” Last month, several children in Colorado, including some who tested positive for the illness, also experienced neurological symptoms such as muscle weakness and paralysis. Eli, the youngest of triplets, was “smaller and lighter than his sisters,” his father, Andy Waller, said in a statement. Although some children are more susceptible to the virus because of preexisting conditions, the medical examiner said this was not the case with Eli. The medical examiner determined Eli had brain and lymph node swelling that were a result of the disease, according to news reports. On Sunday, Andy Waller released a tribute to his son. Here’s an excerpt: My words probably won’t capture him well, but everyone who met Eli knows how he made people feel; imagine a shy little puppy who wants only to make people proud and happy, maybe tripping a bit over his own paws, but truly full of unconditional love. He was a beautiful mix of eagerness and hesitancy, need and striving, caution and surprise, all of which were grounded in a pure, unconditional love. The youngest of a set of triplets, born much smaller and lighter than his sisters, Eli nevertheless persevered through


light beams from their semi-conductors in the early 1990s. Until then, we could create red and green light, but blue remained elusive. Red, blue, and green light combine to make the bright white produced by LED lightbulbs. Bulbs using blue light-emitting diodes are more efficient and have a longer lifetime than old fashioned bulbs (up to 100,000 hours, compared to 1,000 for incandescent bulbs and 10,000 hours for fluorescent lights). http://www.washingtonpost.com/posttv/world/asia_pacific/1-american-2-japanese-win-nobel-prize-in-physics/2014/10/07/104fae63-be5b-46b6-a2f4-2d2f8de2c286_video.html What’s a blue light-emitting diode? You probably know light-emitting diodes as LEDs. They’re little light bulbs that don’t rely on the filament you can see burning inside an old-fashioned bulb. Instead, electrons move through several layers of semiconducting materials – directly converting electricity into light, sparing the heat-waste of a traditional bulb (and keeping your fingers from getting burned!) Even in fluorescent lamps, which use less energy than fluorescent bulbs, the gas used creates both heat and light. A red light-emitting diode was invented during the 1950s, but without that magic blue light we couldn’t create white – and if LEDs couldn’t light up our homes, they just weren’t living up to their full potential. The discovery All three Nobel laureates are Japanese by birth, and worked in Japan at the time of their discoveries (Nakamura is now an American citizen, and serves on the faculty of UC Santa Barbara). Akasaki and Amano worked together at Nagoya University, and made early breakthroughs in the development of the semiconductor materials necessary for creating the diode during the 80s. In 1992, they presented their first working blue light. Nakamura, working at Nichia Chemicals on the island of Shikoku, started work on his own blue LED in 1988. Just a few years after Akasaki and Amano, he developed his own way of creating the necessary layers of semiconductor, and ultimately created a cheaper and easier method of creating the LED. All three men continued to improve on their work during the 90s, and also independently created blue lasers -- which, because of blue light's very short wavelength, allow for information to be stored much more densely than infrared light does. That’s how Blu-ray movie discs came to be. The Nobel Prize in physics goes to three men who gave us blue-light-emitting diodes, used in smartphone screens. View Photo Gallery — The Nobel Prize in physics goes to three men who gave us blue light-emitting diodes, used daily in your smartphone screen. Related:


Wonkbook: Is the debate over same-sex marriage all but over?

reads: Plan cancellations coming again, but for relatively few. Margot Sanger-Katz in The New York Times. $1.1 billion in drug, device payments not included in new database. Charles Ornstein in ProPublica. 'The Simpsons' interlude: 3. Still a long way to go on Dodd-Frank implementation Obama urges regulators to tailor standards for financial firms. Progress, but a long way to go on financial regs. Banks face another round of charges. Data breach raises concerns about financial system's safety. Are we suffering from data-breach fatigue? Paulson: AIG bailout designed to be 'punishment.' Other economic/financial reads: JPMorgan hackers sought to infiltrate other institutions. Danny Yadron, Emily Glazer and Devlin Barrett in The Wall Street Journal. Expand automated trading protectiosn to include brokerages, SEC members say. Dave Michaels in Bloomberg. Fed's labor-market conditions index strengthens. Christopher Condon in Bloomberg. Metal interlude: 4. The trade-offs of the shale boom With more hydraulic fracturing comes more oil and gas... ...and a greater need for pipelines. And more methane emissions. Other environmental/energy reads: Keystone XL delay won't slow Canadian pipelines, industry official says. Greg Quinn in Bloomberg. Agency questions firms on crude exports. Timothy Gardner and Valerie Volcovici in Reuters. Are energy sanctions on Russia working? Clare Foran in National Journal. Animals interlude: Wonkblog roundup Why extremely expensive drugs are often worth the cost. Jason Millman. What the Supreme Court said today by not saying anything at all on gay marriage. Emily Badger. Name That Data answers, Week 11. Christopher Ingraham. With the NBA’s new broadcasting deal, the players now have all the power. Roberto A. Ferdman. The architects of the 2008 financial bailouts have their day in court. Max Ehrenfreund. Heavily armed drug cops raid retiree’s garden, seize okra plants. Christopher Ingraham. The brain science that just won a Nobel Prize could help us build better cities. Emily Badger. Ben Affleck and Bill Maher are both wrong about Islamic fundamentalism.Christopher Ingraham. Et Cetera VA moves to ax 4 officials in response to scandal. Matthew Daly in the Associated Press. Regulation clips wings of drone makers. Jack Nicas in The Wall Street Journal. 2-tier Secret Service faces a test. Matt Apuzzo in The New York Times. State of the non-state, Washington, D.C. Jennifer Steinhauer in The New York Times. Cyberattacks on state databases escalate. Jeffrey Stinson in Pew Stateline. Got tips, additions, or comments? E-mail us. Wonkbook is produced with help from Michelle Williams and Ryan McCarthy


Why the mobile payments space is the most exciting space in tech right now

Innovations such as Apple Pay — introduced during an Apple event in Cupertino in September — could be the key to reaching the nation’s unbanked. (Stephen Lam/Reuters) It seems as if every big player in the tech sector is developing a mobile payment solution. It’s not just Apple Pay, which was announced with much fanfare at the big Apple launch event in early September, and reportedly could go live as early as Oct. 20. There are now rumors that Facebook is working on mobile payments. Add to the mix PayPal, Square and Google and it’s clear that some of the smartest innovators in the tech world are on the cusp of breaking the mobile payments space wide open. The reason why the mobile payments space is so exciting right now is not because of all the money to be made – the real reason is because of what the explosion of mobile payment alternatives means for the nation’s “unbanked” – the nearly 10 million American households that don’t use banks, don’t use checking accounts, and basically depend on cash and financial alternatives – like payday lenders and prepaid cards – for their financial transactions. What’s interesting is to drill down on the data about the nation’s unbanked to find out how mobile banking could help them become part of the financial system. According to a Federal Reserve bulletin released in September 2012, 63 percent of the unbanked have a mobile phone, and of these, 26 percent have smartphones. And, once these unbanked Americans get smartphones, says the Fed, they are more likely to use them for banking. Putting it all together, the Federal Reserve highlighted the significance of this for the future of the nation’s financial system, “The increased use of these devices coupled with the evolution of technologies that enable consumers to conduct financial transactions using their mobile phones has the potential to change how consumers manage their finances as new services and tools emerge.” The results are pretty clear: Get smartphones with mobile payment capabilities into the hands of unbanked consumers and they will use them. They may not have bank accounts, but they have smartphones. They may not have checkbooks, but they have apps. That’s why Bill Gates, in a recent interview with Bloomberg, called Apple Pay a “fantastic” idea — it’s going to make mobile banking easier and cheaper to use for transactions involving small amounts


My husband and I had no time for each other, so we created it

full marathon in Kenya with a group of friends. Peter would run the full and I the half; together, we would raise money to bring new schools and clean water to communities near the marathon course, on the Lewa wildlife conservancy in northern Kenya. Our three children would stay at home with my parents for those 10 days, though we enlisted their help choosing a baby elephant to foster at an orphanage in Nairobi. Soon after we made our reservations, Nairobi and the coastal areas of Kenya were the targets of several terrorist attacks. Although the Ebola crisis was developing on the opposite coast of Africa, there was also that to consider. As our departure drew near, I felt less like throwing caution to the wind and more like pressing some kind of parental panic button. Maybe we were taking the whole fitness-is-togetherness thing too far. Peter and I talked it over; it wouldn’t be an easy trip, but that was the point. We both still wanted to go. I began putting our affairs in order. I potty trained our toddler. I flew to Wisconsin to visit my 97-year-old grandmother. I called my sister and told her where we kept our will. One afternoon, in our 8-year-old daughter’s backpack, I found a small booklet made from scratch paper, bound tightly with dozens of staples. In her writing, it read, “How to Deal With Parents Going to Kenya: Based on Experience!” I breathed in sharply, chiding myself for overlooking her feelings in the midst of all my packing and preparation. Then I opened the book: each page provided a suggestion to help her manage in our absence. If she started missing us, she would draw pictures or play games with her grandparents to stay busy. The kids were going to be fine. Even so, the night before we left, I longed for them already; I peeked into their rooms and watched as they slept, their hands tucked under their cheeks, their thumbs resting in their mouths like little roots. The next afternoon, as the plane lumbered down the runway, its meal-service carts stowed and rattling in their compartments, I felt the full weight of the anxiety that had been building inside me for weeks. The houses on the sand in East Boston grew smaller, into postcards. For a few minutes, I pretended we were actually just taking a pail and shovel


How to see the blood moon, lunar eclipse Wednesday morning

The moon will turn a lovely shade of "celestial red" when it passes through the shadow of Earth for a total lunar eclipse in the early morning hours of Oct. 8. When the Earth passes directly between the sun and moon early Wednesday morning, the moon – cast in the Earth’s shadow – will glow red. You won’t want to miss this lunar eclipse spectacle. Now let’s hope clouds don’t play spoiler. Links: Best time to watch: If you’re inclined to wake up on the early side, partial eclipsing begins at 5:15 a.m. ET. Areas in the central and western U.S. have a longer viewing window, thanks to later moonset times. Refer to the table below, from Sky and Telescope, for a viewing schedule by region: Eclipse viewing times (SkyandTelescope.com) Where to look: Double your pleasure: Spectacles on both horizons! “Weather permitting, you could have a short window of roughly 2 to 9 minutes (depending on your location) with the possibility of simultaneously seeing the sun rising in the east while the eclipsed full moon is setting in the west,” writes Space.com. In Washington, D.C., sunrise Wednesday morning occurs at 7:11 a.m. (check TimeandDate.com for local sunrise times) – meaning both the eclipse and sunrise may be visible between roughly 7:11 a.m. and 7:16 a.m. Watch for Uranus: Those darn clouds: Forecast weather map at 8 a.m. Wednesday (National Weather Service) The National Weather Service’s map of forecast cloud cover below suggests excellent viewing over the central and western U.S. Like New England, the Great Lakes and Southwest may be draped in cloud cover. (Note: on this map blue shades indicate clear skies, whereas gray shades indicate cloudy skies). Forecast sky cover at 5 a.m. ET Wednesday (National Weather Service) Watch online: Share your photos! Photographing a total lunar eclipse isn’t difficult — but it does take a little preparation. Most importantly, you’ll need a telescope or telephoto lens that enlarges the Moon to a good size. The minimum focal length for getting a good-looking Moon is about 300 mm. You’ll also need a tripod to keep your camera rock-steady, or you can piggyback your camera on a tracking telescope mount. Because the coloration and brightness of eclipsed Moon is different every time it plunges through the umbra — and even during totality itself — the best advice for photographing a lunar eclipse is to take lots of pictures