Some Caps fans furious over 150 percent increase in season-ticket prices

seats in section 106 row C as soon as he got his first post-college job. “If they’re really expecting folks to just take it on the chin and just try to find another seat, that’s pretty [awful], pardon my French. That’s really the most disappointing thing, that and being inevitably forced out of a relatively tight-knit group of season ticket holders.” The fans said they couldn’t possibly afford paying $20,000 for two hockey tickets, and many said they had no desire for the VIP amenities. “I don’t eat and drink at games and I don’t want to spend time in the coaches club; I want to watch a hockey game,” Frankel said. “I don’t go there to get all the fussy stuff; I go to watch the games,” Harman agreed. “I don’t want the VIP,” said Alper, who has had seats in section 105 row C since 2005. “I’ve been down there. It’s not a big deal to get a hot dog or a glass of beer. That doesn’t impress me, and I don’t want my name on the back of my seat. … They didn’t even have the courtesy to give us a heads-up. That seems to me to be totally telling the people they did this to that you’re not really important, that we really want the big bucks.” Van Stone said the team doesn’t inform season ticket holders of price increases before invoices go out, but that representatives will get in touch with every aggrieved party and try to handle their concerns. Some of the fans said they felt better after speaking to these representatives, while others remained angry. They thought the team could have grandfathered current ticket holders out of the VIP prices, or promised them the best 100-level seats that come open, or given them the option to upgrade to VIP status. “We’ve stuck with them through the bad times when they were lucky to get 10,000 [fans], and now we are being pushed aside,” Alper wrote. “That doesn’t change regardless of how accommodating they try to be.” “Obviously it puts a black eye on the experience, but can I get past that? Probably,” said Andrew, a season ticket holder from Chevy Chase who asked that his last name not be used. “If I can get row E or F or something comparable that I think is a good ticket, that’s not the end of


Can Democrats make GOP ‘climate non-committalism’ an electoral liability?

top Dem target — by tying him to the Obama administration’s alleged “war on coal.” But why should we assume energy issues will automatically favor Republicans in the 2016 cycle? Republicans have increasingly taken to claiming “I’m not a scientist” when questioned about climate. They tend to acknowledge climate change is a reality but demur on whether human activity is a leading cause of it. This posture might best be described as “climate non-committalism.” Earlier this year, many Senate Republicans up for reelection in 2016 in presidential swing states cast votes putting them on record as climate non-committalists. Senators such as Portman of Ohio, Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, Marco Rubio of Florida, and Richard Burr of North Carolina voted No on a Democratic amendment declaring that human activity contributes significantly to climate change, though Republicans supported an amendment generally denying that global warming is an out-and-out hoax. Rubio, of course, may run for president. And Senator Rand Paul, who may also run for president, also voted No on the human activity amendment. NextGen hopes to make this climate non-committalism a liability in both the Senate and presidential elections, in key swing states. The basic idea taking shape is to use the issue as a wedge between GOP base voters and moderates by casting GOP climate non-committalism as trapped in the past. To link GOP climate non-committalism to specific climate and environment-related events within states, localizing the issue. And to tie the GOP climate stance to special interests (the Koch brothers) and use that to sow doubts about the trustworthiness of the GOP candidates. A model for this strategy: One of the only bright spots Democrats enjoyed in 2014, the Michigan Senate race. Democrat Gary Peters went on offense on climate in the manner described above, and won, in a race NextGen also invested in. To be sure, NextGen spent huge money on a bunch of Senate races in 2014, and lost most of them. But NextGen hopes those expenditures merely laid the foundation for what will be a long game. And this time the map will look very different. While in 2014 Democrats were fending off “war on coal” attacks in many red southern and coal states, this time GOP Senators will be on defense in swing states carried by Obama, amid a presidential year electorate. Thus, the NextGen strategy also will have a positive component, emphasizing the health, economic,


‘Badass lawyer’ Todd Levitt loses libel lawsuit over @levittlawyer parody Twitter feed

Tweets reminding any readers that the account was parody or satire. On April 15, 2014, defendant tweeted, “Remember kiddoes, parody accounts are #badass and #lawful.” On April 16, 2014, defendant tweeted, “Word of the day for @twebbsays is satire. Three syllables. Once you get a grasp of the concept a lot of things will start making sense.” Finally, on April 22, 2014, defendant tweeted, “A gentle reminder to potential seekers of Todd Levitt: This is not him. This is a parody account. You can find the real Todd(ler) @levittlaw.” When Todd Levitt 2.0 is considered in the context of these multiple disclaimers, this court finds that the account cannot reasonably be interpreted as stating actual facts about the plaintiff. Defendant’s Twitter account, Todd Levitt 2.0, is a parody that is protected under the First Amendment of the United States Constitution. The Tweets were meant to ridicule and satirize plaintiff’s social media presence in a humorous way. However, whether defendant succeeded in creating a humorous parody is irrelevant for the purposes of the First Amendment. It is clear that Todd Levitt 2.0 cannot reasonably be interpreted as anything other than a parody account. Therefore, it is protected speech under the First Amendment. I’d differ with the court on a few of these items, but the bottom-line result looks right. For a similar (though not identical) case, see the Where the Wild Libel Lawsuits Are case from the Texas Supreme Court (New Times, Inc. v. Isaacks (Tex. 2004)). For more on the backstory, see this Inside Higher Ed article (Carl Straumsheim); the Inside Higher Ed connection is that Todd Levitt was an adjunct professor at Central Michigan University, and the defendant, Zachary Felton, was a student there (and the son of finance and law professor James Felton). The Inside Higher Ed story reports that Todd Levitt’s colorful reactions to Felton’s parody are archived here. Thanks to the Media Law Resource Center MediaLawDaily for the pointer. And, look, it wouldn’t be right for me to opine on my own ass, but if I had a bad one, I wouldn’t be bragging about it. UPDATE: Levitt will apparently be filing a (presumably badass) appeal; Central Michigan Life (Ben Solis) quotes Levitt as saying: “This is not the end of my case. It’s just the beginning. In some ways, this is a case of first impression that needs to go up to (a) higher court.”


Where and why food prices lead to social upheaval

concluded that democracies and to a lesser extent anocracies (or “hybrid regimes” that combine democratic and authoritarian elements) experience more urban unrest in times of high prices; there is no relationship between food prices and urban unrest in autocracies. However, is this outcome the result of more pro-rural policies in democracies or a more liberal environment for protest? We found that democracies and anocracies did enact more pro-rural food policy. In particular, democracies in Africa and Asia enact policies that favor urban areas less and rural areas more. These take the form of enhancing farmer incomes and raising consumer prices, which often causes protests and rioting. Lessening urban bias in food policy may be good pro-poor policy, given the continued concentration of poverty in rural areas, but it carries political risks. What of the Arab Spring? These popular uprisings seem to challenge our findings, because they reflected autocracies that failed to pacify restive urban populations. However, it was not for lack of trying. Rather, the Arab Spring reflects some of the risks autocratic leaders face when attempting to insulate urban consumers from global market prices. Consumer subsidies have long been part of the “authoritarian bargain” between the state and citizens in the Middle East and North Africa, and attempts to withdraw them have been met with protest before: Egypt’s bread intifada, which erupted over an attempt to reform food subsidies, killed 800 in 1977. These subsidies explicitly encouraged citizens across the region to evaluate their governments’ effectiveness in terms of their ability to maintain low consumer prices — prices that, given these countries’ dependence on food imports, those governments ultimately could not control. What can be done to decouple food price shocks from political upheaval? Most favored policy instruments for addressing acute food crises (means-tested targeted transfers, such as food stamps) are likely to be ineffective: As the somewhat portly “Bread Helmet Man” of the Arab Spring made clear, food price-related protests don’t often involve the most acutely food insecure. In the near term, one thing the international community should do is act collectively to address export bans. Although it not widely recognized, the 2010 ban on Russian grain exports roiled markets and may have even helped catalyze Arab Spring protests. Export bans are a perfect example of a collective action problem amenable to international cooperation: They are individually rational but impose substantial costs on the entire system. One possible


Build emergency savings first. Then pay down that debt.

up with their bills after an emergency or a job loss. But for many Americans living on low wages or paying down debt, building a fund is out of reach. Roughly one fourth of consumers have more credit card debt than emergency savings, according to a survey released Monday by Bankrate.com. Another 13 percent don’t have savings or credit card debt, which leaves them vulnerable to taking on debt when emergencies happen. “Too many people don’t have enough emergency savings,” says Greg McBride, chief financial analyst at Bankrate.com. Not everyone is in the red: 58 percent of Americans have more emergency savings than credit card debt, up from 51 percent in 2014 and 55 percent in 2013. Consumers became much better about paying down debt after the financial crisis. As my colleague Danielle Paquette reported last week, delinquency rates for most types of loans are falling, with the exception of student loans and car loans. Most consumers slashed their borrowing during the downturn, but rebuilding credit can time. Many consumers are struggling with subprime credit scores, partly because they are still waiting for blunders they made during the crisis — such as delinquencies and foreclosures — to clear from their credit reports. That can take seven years. Now that the economy is improving, more people are focused on saving, McBride says, but they are struggling to make progress because of stagnant wages. “They know they have work to do,” he says, “they just haven’t been able to move the needle. ” Saving can be especially difficult for someone who is still paying down debt. Some financial advisers recommend consumers set aside money to cover a few months worth of expenses before they aggressively pay down their debt. That way, if something goes wrong, they have a cash cushion to spend before they turn to their credit cards. Once the debt is clear, payments that used to go toward loans can be stashed into the savings account. The easiest way to save is to have the money deducted automatically from your paycheck into a savings account. “If you wait until the end of the month to save what’s left over,” McBride says, “nothing will be left over.” Read More: A guide to paying off your student loans The least student loan debt, yet the most likely to default Americans are having more trouble paying off their student debt than their houses


Marijuana may be even safer than previously thought, researchers say

time. Related stories: - How marijuana legalization in Colorado and Washington is making the world a better place - Colorado marijuana revenues hit a new high - Study: Teens who smoke weed daily are 60% less likely to complete high school than those who never use - Stoned drivers are a lot safer than drunk ones, new federal data show It's important to note here that "safer than alcohol" doesn't mean "safe, full stop." Indeed, one of the more troubling lines of thought I see in some quarters of the marijuana legalization movement is that because marijuana is "natural," or because it can be used as (non-FDA approved) "medicine," it is therefore "safe." But of course, rattlesnake venom is natural, too, and nobody would call that safe. And prescription painkillers are medicinal and responsible for tens of thousands of deaths each year. There are any number of risks associated with marijuana use. Most of these risks involve mental health issues, and most increase the earlier you start using and the more frequently you use. That said, there are risks associated with literally anything you put in your body. Eat too much sugar and you're on the fast track to rotting teeth and diabetes. Take in too much salt and you're looking at increased odds of a stroke. Psychoactive substances, such as marijuana and alcohol, aren't at all unique for having risks associated with them. What is unique is how these substances are treated under the law, and particularly the way in which alcohol and nicotine essentially get a free pass under the Controlled Substances Act, the cornerstone of the nation's drug policy. This study's authors note that legislative classifications of psychoactive drugs often "lack a scientific basis," and their findings are confirmation of this fact. Given the relative risks associated with marijuana and alcohol, the authors recommend "risk management prioritization towards alcohol and tobacco rather than illicit drugs." And they say that when it comes to marijuana, the low amounts of risk associated with the drug "suggest a strict legal regulatory approach rather than the current prohibition approach." In other words, individuals and organizations up in arms over marijuana legalization could have a greater effect on the health and well-being of this country by shifting their attention to alcohol and cigarettes. It takes extraordinary chutzpah to rail against the dangers of marijuana use by day and then go home to


The dirty dozen: 12 of the most destructive invasive animals in the United States

tens of millions of ash trees have been killed, and their numbers continue to grow. Nutria (Harald Henkel) The official name comes off like some kind of vitamin drink, so Louisianans came up with another that sounds more fitting: swamp rats. Nutria don’t just look like rats with long tails and orange buck teeth, they breed like them. Female nutria give birth to litters of up to 14 then go back into heat in two days. Federal wildlife officials say there’s no hope of eradicating them from Louisiana, where they were imported from South America for their fur in the 1930s and grew out of control after being released when the industry died. A Chesapeake Nutria Eradication Program is working furiously to push them off the Del Marva Peninsula and wipe them out in Maryland and Delaware. Their endless digging on the banks of rivers rips up plants by the root, causing soil to erode, destroying native habitat for everything from muskrats to crabs to juvenile fish. European starling (AP/Kitsap Sun/Larry Steagall) Starlings are little birds that travel in huge packs, and they are known for wreaking havoc. Birders don’t like it, but starlings are generally regarded as pests. Every year, the Agriculture Department’s division of Wildlife Service’s kills 4 million animals identified by residents across the country as a nuisance, and starlings are targeted the most — by far. Moving in flocks that resemble small black clouds, they descend on cities, towns and mostly farms, beaks aimed at the ground in search of food. Starlings are known to swarm toward feeding cattle to steal their food, needling and harassing the bigger animals until they back off. Since their introduction to the United States by Shakespeare enthusiasts in the 1890s, they have become arguably the most successful foraging bird in the country, with a population of about 200 million. Northern snakehead (William Thomas Cain/Getty Images) It’s called a snakehead. That dreadful name pretty much sums up the most feared fish in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, a sharp-tooth monster so scary that fishing tournaments are held not to eat, or fight it on the line, but solely to kill it. Snakeheads look like some weird cross between a python and an electric eel, and attempts to get large numbers of people to fish and eat it so that snakeheads don’t eat too many other creatures in the estuary have failed. Stories


You can change the minds of climate change skeptics. Here’s how.

on nations worldwide to adopt stricter carbon dioxide emissions. In the third condition, people first read a news report announcing that a leading scientific body — very much like the NAS — had called for more research into geoengineering. Logically speaking, the information in the second and third conditions was no more relevant to assessing the validity of the climate change study than was the information in first condition. But psychologically, the news reports mattered a great deal. In the first condition, there was predictable evidence of cultural cognition: People with egalitarian and communitarian worldviews readily credited the climate change study, while those with more hierarchical and individualistic worldviews dismissed it. The call for stricter carbon dioxide restrictions featured in the anti-pollution news report made these tendencies even worse. By triggering antagonistic associations between climate change and free markets, this news report increased polarization among people with different world views. The call for geoengineering, however, had a very different effect. The idea that human ingenuity is itself up to the task of managing the environmental risks that human ingenuity creates is a historical theme that powerfully resonates with persons who have individualistic and hierarchical outlooks. And so we predicted that substituting this identity-affirming “yes we can” narrative for the denigrating “we told you so” one, which animates many climate change policy messages, would mitigate rejection of the evidence among the people most predisposed to do so. That’s what we found. The call for geoengineering made subjects with hierarchical and individualistic values react less dismissively toward the study. As a result, polarization decreased among people who read the anti-pollution news report. Our study, therefore, calls into doubt the argument of commentators who warn that exploring geoengineering could lull the public into a sense of complacency on climate change. We found that those who first read about geoengineering were the most concerned about the dangers of global warming. Of course, there is no guarantee that the effects we observed in this experiment would emerge if we could confront people with similar messages. (We are working on this, however.) Nevertheless, our study suggests that it would be foolish — not to mention awkward — for those who care about climate change to deny that geoengineering research is exactly what scientific consensus recommends. Dan M. Kahan This post is part of our series on science and politics. The introduction to the series is here.


Giant plant waits 80 years to bloom, immediately begins dying

when this particular plant arrived at Matthaei Botanical Gardens from Mexico, it's been relatively slow going. Basically nothing unusual happened until last year, when it became clear that the decades-long wait for the plant's bloom would finally be over. In May, it had a massive growth spurt, adding nearly six inches a day. The growth was so significant that workers had to remove a glass pane in the ceiling so that it could have more room to bloom. This timelapse video from the University of Michigan's Matthaei Botanical Gardens shows its 80-year-old Agave americana growing and blooming from May 5, 2014, to June 9, 2014. What makes this agave's 80-year life span so unusual is that in nature, American agave plants usually flower after about 10 to 25 years, according to the Matthaei Botanical Gardens. Why the plant flowers when it does is just another of nature's many mysteries. [Another extraordinary plant: A big stinker hogs the spotlight at U.S. Botanic Garden] "No one knows for sure what combination of environmental conditions induces flowering," Palmer said. "And it's rare for one to bloom indoors. Of course, being in a conservatory helps!" The good news is, the dying plant will live on through its offspring. But in another twist, this agave did not actually produce seeds that were expected to be clones of the original, Palmer told the AP: Instead, they'll use the seeds from the pods to create a new agave where it now stands, although the new agave will "be slightly different," said Palmer, who cared for the plant during the past 15 years. "It was a good run," he said. In November, the upper portion of the 28-foot-tall agave at the Matthaei Botanical Gardens was removed in order to replace the glass in the greenhouse ceiling. A native of the Southwestern United States and Mexico, the American agave has evolved to survive in pretty harsh, low-water environments. So the plants produce hundreds, if not thousands, of seeds, giving them the best chance that a few might actually survive. [The monarch massacre: Nearly a billion butterflies have vanished] This agave's seeds are already being planted -- although by the time they bloom, it'll perhaps be something for your (great) grandchildren to see. More good news about this unusual plant: It can also be used to make booze -- though not tequila, which, the Matthaei Botanical Gardens notes, is only


A dozen hospitalized after apparently overdosing on Molly at Wesleyan University

Ecstasy usage over a 30-day span among college kids was at 2.5 percent in a 2000 Monitoring the Future study, but dropped to 0.6 percent in 2006. However, student deaths attributed to MDMA — this time in Molly form — brought it back into the discussion of risky campus drug use at the beginning of the 2013 school year. Two New Hampshire college students died at concerts, with symptoms consistent with an MDMA overdose. There were also several reported overdoses among college-aged individuals in the Boston area, and a University of Virginia sophomore’s death at around the same time was also linked to Molly use. How have campuses responded? Many New England campuses built resources to discuss the drug with their students, and sent out information about the dangers of Molly use, the Huffington Post reported at the time. Pat Ketcham, president of the board of directors at the American College Health Association, told the Chronicle of Higher Education in 2013 that MDMA “has fallen off our radar a little bit and now recently is back on.” Since then, facing some evidence that Molly is becoming increasingly popular among students, many colleges have increased awareness among students of the drug, particularly its potential adverse effects. That’s appropriate, given one of the factors Monitoring the Future tracks in order to anticipate increases in popularity among specific drugs: People have a tendency to forget the adverse effects of a drug as it declines in popularity, paradoxically opening up the risk that it could then become more popular. “In the 2000’s we have seen drug use subside to some degree, which once again has created the conditions for generational forgetting of the dangers of many of these drugs,” the 2013 report on college drug use writes. How widespread is Molly use? MDMA, like many drugs, has come in and out of popularity through the years, but the percentage of users has always remained relatively low. Data indicates that there was a surge in MDMA use from about 1999 to 2001, before rates fell sharply. And that surge itself followed a few years of declined usage in the mid to late ’90s. In addition to the increased attention on Molly incidents at colleges, there is some statistical evidence to suggest that Molly use is increasing. In 2013, the Drug Abuse Warning Network reported a sharp rise in MDMA-related hospitalizations between 2005 and 2011 among


Rare photos from the golden age of space exploration

let me make this shot.”<br /> (Ralph Morse/Courtesy of Bloomsbury Auctions) Ed White on the first U.S. spacewalk in 1965. “Captivated by the experience of his spacewalk, Ed White resisted repeated calls from Houston to get back to the craft,” Bloomsbury wrote. (James McDivitt/Courtesy of Bloomsbury Auctions) 1965: White in the first in-flight portrait of an astronaut. (James McDivitt/Courtesy of Bloomsbury Auctions) 1968: First Earthrise seen by human eyes. “There was nothing in the plan for an Earthrise photo,” astronaut William Anders said. “Indeed, we didn’t even see an actual Earthrise until, on our third orbit, we changed the spacecraft’s orientation to heads up and looking forward. As we came round the back side of the moon, where I had been taking pictures of craters near our orbital track, I looked up and saw the startlingly beautiful sight of our home planet ‘rising’ up above the stark and battered lunar horizon. It was the only color against the deep blackness of space. In short, it was beautiful.” (William Anders/Courtesy of Bloomsbury Auctions) 1969: First photograph of a man standing on the surface of the moon. “Aldrin is unfurling the solar wind sheet, designed to trap tiny particles hurled from the distant sun,” Bloomsbury wrote. “The two black spots in the sky above the horizon and the foggy areas seen in the photograph were caused by the refraction of sunlight in the lens of Armstrong’s camera.” (Neil Armstrong/Courtesy of Bloomsbury Auctions) Apollo 12, 1969: Eclipse of the sun from the Earth. (NASA/Courtesy of Bloomsbury Auctions) Apollo 17, December 1972: Harrison Schmitt with the Earth above the U.S. flag. (Eugene Cernan/Courtesy of Bloomsbury Auctions) Apollo 15, August 1971: Portrait of astronaut James Irwin and a rover.”‘When I look at the Moon I do not see a hostile, empty world,” astronaut David Scott said. “I see the radiant body where man has taken his first steps into a frontier that will never end.” (David Scott/Courtesy of Bloomsbury Auctions) Apollo 15, 1971: Last photograph taken on the lunar surface. (David Scott/Courtesy of Bloomsbury Auctions) Apollo 7, Oct. 1968: Florida. (Walter Cunningham/Courtesy of Bloomsbury Auctions) The auction “From the Earth to the Moon: Vintage NASA Photographs” will be held on Feb. 26. You can view the catalogue here. Related: Discoveries in our solar system and beyond. First Hasselblad camera in space to be auctioned Social media in orbit: An astronaut’s stunning photos shared via Twitter


‘With great marijuana laws comes great responsibility’ — pot is legal in Alaska today

(Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol) (Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol) Marijuana officially becomes legal in Alaska on Tuesday, and advocates plan to celebrate with ads on Anchorage city buses. The ads are part of a public education campaign to encourage responsible consumption and read, “With great marijuana laws comes great responsibility.” The campaign will be officially launched at a 10 a.m. news conference in Anchorage in which advocates will discuss implementation of the law, which was approved by 53 percent of voters last fall. Under the law, adults 21 and older may possess up to an ounce of pot and grow as many as six plants, though public consumption is still banned. The Marijuana Policy Project, a key backer of the successful effort to legalize marijuana in Colorado and Alaska, launched the “Consume Responsibly” campaign in September, with billboards, print and online ads and materials in stores in Colorado and Washington. Voters in Oregon and Washington, D.C., also approved legalization in November. Oregon’s law goes into effect this summer and D.C.’s appears set to begin this Friday.


Alaska legalizes marijuana today. Here’s how its law compares to all the others.

fund for enforcement, studies and public health monitoring. In Oregon, the money must be divided as follows: 40 percent to a school fund; 20 percent to a mental health, alcoholism and drug services account; 15 percent to state police; 20 percent to cities and counties for local law enforcement; and 5 percent to alcohol and drug abuse prevention, early intervention and treatment services. In Washington, marijuana revenue is divvied up in two ways. The following payments must be made every quarter: up to $1.25 million for administration of the program; $185,000 to study youth use; $50,000 to pay for reports mandated by the initiative; and $5,000 to create and maintain online educational materials. After those payments are made, the rest of the money must be split up as follows: 50 percent to a state health plan trust account; 15 percent for reducing substance abuse among young people; 10 percent for a public health program; less than 10 percent to study the short- and long-term effects of marijuana use, to provide health and dental care and to fund bridge building. Just under a fifth of the remaining amount goes to the general fund. Can municipalities opt out? Local municipalities may opt out in each of the four states where marijuana has been legalized. They also have varying degrees of power over the number of businesses allowed within their limits and the time, place and manner in which the businesses can operate. What’s next? The Marijuana Policy Project has played a pivotal role in past legalization efforts and has its sights set on even more. They have established committees to pursue legalization on the 2016 ballot in a number of states, such as Arizona, California, Maine, Massachusetts and Nevada. And it has plans to pursue legalization through the legislature in states such as Rhode Island, Vermont, New Hampshire, Delaware, Hawaii and Maryland. Bills have been introduce in Maryland and Vermont, where the state recently commissioned a study on its options. What’s next for the marijuana movement. (Washington Post) Read more: In D.C., fears of chaos grow as legal pot nears A dozen ways to legalize the marijuana supply chain, in Vermont or any state How public opinion on marijuana has changed over the last half-century Alaska summary, by the Marijuana Policy Project Colorado summary, by the MPP D.C. summary, by the MPP Oregon summary, by the MPP Washington summary, by the MPP


How public opinion on marijuana has changed over the last half-century

Marijuana officially became legal in Alaska on Tuesday, making it the third state to legalize recreational marijuana in as many years. Voters in two other places — Oregon and Washington, D.C. — have also approved legal marijuana, with similar efforts underway in several other states. [Alaska legalizes marijuana today. Here’s how its law compares to all the others.] The arrival of legal weed in Alaska and the campaigns across the country come as a majority of the public now thinks marijuana should be legalized. And this is a very recent development, as public opinion on marijuana has radically changed in recent years. As you can see from this graph from the Pew Research Center, public support for legalizing marijuana gradually increased between the late 1960s and the late 1970s. But that support plummeted in the 1980s, the decade of “Just Say No,” and remained low through the 1990s. It wasn’t until the tail end of the 20th century that public opinion returned to where it was two decades earlier in the waning years of the 1970s. However, that support remained fairly steady as the 21st century got underway. It was not until this decade that more than half of the public said they supported legalization, a threshold that was reached thanks to a leap in support between 2010 and 2013. What happened? Well, far fewer people believed that marijuana was linked to hard drug usage. In 1977, shortly before support really fell, six out of 10 people fell that way, compared to fewer than four in 10 people in 2013, according to Pew. This change has also been notable among the nearly half of the population who say they have never tried marijuana: Seven in 10 people (72 percent) who said they had not tried marijuana in 1977 believed it was a gateway drug, but that dropped to 50 percent by 2013. (Meanwhile, new research shows that marijuana may be even safer than previously thought.) The cost of enforcement is also quite unpopular. A majority of Americans also say that it is not worth the money it costs to enforce the country’s marijuana laws, a belief that spans political parties (majorities of Republicans, Democrats and independents all say they feel this way). Much more recently, there was also a considerable turnaround in how many people felt marijuana use was immoral (50 percent of people felt this way in 2006, a


What exactly would happen during a DHS shutdown?

(Paul J. Richards/AFP via Getty Images) “Senate Democrats remain united in their push to pass a clean DHS funding bill, while Republicans continue to hold the funding hostage in futile protest against President Obama’s executive action on immigration-pushing us closer to a DHS shutdown and putting American national security at risk.” — Democratic Policy and Communications Center, post on Web site, Feb. 23, 2015 “There are a couple of times when … it was clear that nothing [to affect national security] was going to happen and the debate was just all about politics. This is a debate over funding a part of government so essential that if funding is not there, almost all of the employees show up anyway. They’re considered essential.” — Sen. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), Senate floor speech, Feb. 12, 2015 The debate over funding the Department of Homeland Security is ramping up as lawmakers near a deadline to work through the gridlock. Funding for DHS is scheduled to expire Feb. 27 and the agency faces a potential shutdown. Lawmakers largely agree that the agency must be funded in some way. But with four days until the deadline, the Senate failed to take up the House-passed DHS funding bill that would fund its operations yet still punish the president for his executive actions on immigration. As negotiations continue, both Democrats and Republicans have made claims on just how much a shutdown would affect the agency. The claims above are representative of a range of comments — from warnings that it will endanger national security to skepticism that a shutdown would cripple the agency. So let’s look at the facts. What exactly would happen in the case of an agency shutdown? The Facts President Obama On the other end of the debate were comments such as Blunt’s and that of Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-Fla.), who told Politico late in January: “In other words, it’s not the end of the world if we get to that time because the national security functions will not stop — whether it’s border security or a lot of other issues. … Having said so, I think we should always aspire to try to get it done.” A look at what happened during the October 2013 federal government shutdown paints neither of those pictures. About 31,295 DHS employees were placed on furlough during the shutdown, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS). But about 85


A new threat appears along the U.S.-Mexico border: Americans with measles

A health worker in Ciudad Juarez at the Mexican border crossing with El Paso, Texas, hands out leaflets to passing motorists and people as part of a measles prevention program. (REUTERS/Jose Luis Gonzalez) As Republican lawmakers suggest that undocumented immigrants crossing the southern border may be responsible for bringing measles and other diseases into the country, Mexican health authorities are warning people traveling to the United States about the risk of infection here following an outbreak of measles at Disneyland last month that has sickened dozens of people in several states. It's a remarkable reversal that demonstrates how far public health in Latin America has advanced in the past few decades -- especially in contrast to measles's alarming return in the United States. Health officials in the Mexican state of Chihuahua, which borders Texas and New Mexico, are distributing pamphlets with information about measles at airports, bus stations and border crossings. They're urging anyone with plans to travel to U.S. states where the outbreak has spread to immunize themselves, if they haven't already. These actions follow the arrival of two people with measles in Mexico from the United States last month, one of them an infant nearing her second birthday. Measles poses grave risks to small children, including permanent deafness, brain damage and death. "The U.S. exported [the] measles virus to Mexico,” Anne Schuchat, an official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has said. She told U.S. lawmakers at a hearing this month that in years past, travelers and immigrants from Mexico and Latin America brought measles and other diseases into the United States. Yet immunization rates in Latin American countries have improved, and the rate in Mexico has been higher than the U.S. rate for most of the past 20 years, according to the World Health Organization. Now, although vaccination rates in the United States remain above 90 percent, sentiment has turned against vaccines in a few communities. The country had 644 cases last year, by far the most in at least decades, and the recent outbreak, which has already infected at least 123 people and likely more, has spread south to Mexico. "We see the virus unfortunately going the other direction," Schuchat said later. Measles's new reality is at odds with the warnings given by some G.O.P. lawmakers, such as Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), who recently suggested that the southern border was a risk to public


in the past few decades -- especially in contrast to measles's alarming return in the United States. Health officials in the Mexican state of Chihuahua, which borders Texas and New Mexico, are distributing pamphlets with information about measles at airports, bus stations and border crossings. They're urging anyone with plans to travel to U.S. states where the outbreak has spread to immunize themselves, if they haven't already. These actions follow the arrival of two people with measles in Mexico from the United States last month, one of them an infant nearing her second birthday. Measles poses grave risks to small children, including permanent deafness, brain damage and death. "The U.S. exported [the] measles virus to Mexico,” Anne Schuchat, an official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, has said. She told U.S. lawmakers at a hearing this month that in years past, travelers and immigrants from Mexico and Latin America brought measles and other diseases into the United States. Yet immunization rates in Latin American countries have improved, and the rate in Mexico has been higher than the U.S. rate for most of the past 20 years, according to the World Health Organization. Now, although vaccination rates in the United States remain above 90 percent, sentiment has turned against vaccines in a few communities. The country had 644 cases last year, by far the most in at least decades, and the recent outbreak, which has already infected at least 123 people and likely more, has spread south to Mexico. "We see the virus unfortunately going the other direction," Schuchat said later. Measles's new reality is at odds with the warnings given by some G.O.P. lawmakers, such as Rep. Mo Brooks (R-Ala.), who recently suggested that the southern border was a risk to public health in the United States. "I don’t think there is any health care professional who has examined the facts who can honestly say that Americans have not died because the diseases brought into America by illegal aliens who are not properly health care screened as lawful immigrants are," he said. Schuchat told lawmakers that most measles strains are now brought into the United States by unvaccinated Americans traveling abroad, who probably enter the country without being screened in any way when they return home. Meanwhile, Americans who are worried about any public health risk from illegal immigration can still protect themselves through vaccinations for most diseases.


Update: After four smokeless days, expansion plans can’t come quick enough for DCity

is also working out the details on two deals that will expand his smokehouse empire: One will move his tiny treehouse of a barbecue shop to the ground floor of a small condo unit at 1700 Second St. NW. Sonderman says he's in the final stages of purchasing the space. He hopes to close within a month or so. The doors have been shut tight for three days now at DCity have a water pipe break. (Tim Carman/The Washington Post) The other deal will expand DCity, at least for awhile, to a parcel of land just across Penn Street NE from the Dolcezza Gelato Factory and Coffee Lab in the Union Market area. The land is part of Gallaudet University's Sixth Street Development, a planned mixed-use destination that the school is developing with the JBG Companies. But those plans are far into the future; in the meantime, Sonderman has cut a deal that will allow him to smoke meats on a space where fruit, vegetable and poultry vendors used to hawk their wares at the old Union Terminal Market. [The $20 Diner explains why DCity is the best barbecue joint in the District.] Sonderman isn't sure how long the DCity pop-up would squat on the property. It could be one summer, it could be more. But he expects to start smoking meats for a "Texas-style barbecue" market in May or June. The menu will be a pared-down version of the one that convinced the $20 Diner to call DCity the best barbecue joint in the District. The pitmaster plans to sell meat by the pound along with sides, bread, pickles and beer. He even mentioned something about batch cocktails. A makeshift sign explains the bad news at DCity Smokehouse. (Tim Carman/The Washington Post) Just don't look for the Meaty Palmer, the Brisket Champ or any other of those muscular sandwiches that have earned DCity raves from barbecue enthusiasts. Sonderman won't have a full kitchen, and without one, he won't be able to craft sandwiches to his satisfaction. Right now, Sonderman isn't crafting anything. He has been dealing with frozen water pipes, which burst on Friday and have continued springing leaks for days as crews have tried to repair the faulty conduits. At least three large sections have been replaced, Sonderman says, while several other sections have been patched. Crews are now knocking down a wall in the basement so a


Beep Beep Beep Beep

That’s the sound of the US backing up. We are going backwards intellectually, backwards in terms of policy debate and backwards technologically. I’ll just start by mentioning that the US has SLOW internet speeds compared with other advanced nations. We have HIGH medical costs compared to other advanced nations. And yet we still like to ball our fists elbows out in front of our chests and rotate our torsos back and forth and bray about American exceptionalism. Our exceptionalism is more and more how far off the pace of adapting to future realities we are, both in policy discussion and policy fact. For example, are we even aware of this fact? When it comes to energy issues, we are locked in a mindset and argument that any transition from fossil fuels is an unmitigated cost. The reality is that there are both costs, and benefits TOO. And a further reality is that the future is highly likely to be far more about alternatives than fossils, because we are eventually going to be transitioning, for one reason or another. We can choose to be in the front of the pack there, or the retro king of coal-fired steam engines. I’m going to break my one-link-per-post rule today. I am also going to cite Bill Gates for a second time in about a month. I’ve never been a Gates fan, in that his wealth was built on a ruthless monolopy-instinct that has unfortunately become a standard US tech model. Nevertheless, sometimes he says something correct anyway, even though research alone is hardly sufficient.


Meet the fast-charging, affordable ‘future’ car that Elon Musk hates

its home country of Japan are investing heavily into ushering in what Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has called the world's "hydrogen era." The Mirai is an absolute oddity even in the world's still-small green car market. A dozen workers in blue hard hats will hand-craft the cars without help of conveyor belt, turning out only three a day, Toyota said. The small-batch operation will roll out 700 this year for the U.S., Japan, Europe, and crank up to 2,000 starting next year. Toyota plans to sell the Mirai for about $45,000 in the U.S., including about $13,000 in federal and California incentives, starting next year. It will sell to the public in Japan next month. At 300 miles, the four-seat Mirai offers the longest range of any electric vehicle on the market (and more than Tesla's $80,000 Model S, which gets 265 miles). A full tank of hydrogen, Toyota adds, has enough energy to power the average American home for a week. But hydrogen fuel cells carry their own challenges. To sell successfully in America, the cars will need a nationwide infrastructure for refueling (a problem Musk has sought to get around through Tesla's national network of "superchargers.") Though its emissions are greener, hydrogen is now mostly sourced from natural gas, which carries its own environmental impacts. But Toyota has been strong in its defense of hydrogen, saying it will give drivers far quicker refueling times and farther range than the typical battery-powered electric car. Toyota is not the only automaker pushing hard on fuel cells: The hydrogen-powered Hyundai Tucson is now available in California, and Honda's fuel-cell car is expected to roll out next year. But Toyota has been one of its biggest boosters, opening its more than 5,000 fuel-cell related patents up for free and saying it wants to build and fund new fueling stations, first in California and then stretching to the east coast. California is investing tens of millions of dollars to build 28 new hydrogen refueling stations, on top of the 10 it was home to as of last year. Japan has proven to be far more embracing of the "hydrogen society," investing in self-service hydrogen stations, easing fuel-cell regulations and offering about 3 million yen (about $25,200) in incentives to early Mirai buyers. Prime Minister Abe, one of the first to receive a Mirai, said he wants all of Japan's agencies to have one,


New chronic fatigue syndrome report doesn’t help us

with a trivializing name — "chronic fatigue syndrome" — and a broad set of criteria that did nothing to distinguish true sufferers of this debilitating disease. Now, the government is trying to do it again, under the guise of helping us, with a new report from the Institute of Medicine, the health arm of the National Academy of Sciences. This issue is not only important to the 1 million Americans sickened by "myalgic encephalomyelitis," most of whom are homebound or bedbound, but also to U.S. taxpayers. This illness's estimated cost to the national economy is more than $10 billion a year. Overly broad definitions have led to great confusion and held back research into biomarkers and effective treatments for this disease. Imagine the impact on research results if patients without cancer were included in chemotherapy trials. This inadequacy has resulted in a lack of meaningful studies and no effective treatments to date. Experts in the disease have produced two sets of criteria based on the most recent research: the Canadian Consensus Criteria (CCC) in 2003 and the International Consensus Criteria (ICC) in 2011. In the ICC, the experts restored our condition's historic name, "myalgic encephalomyelitis (ME)," replacing the belittling moniker "chronic fatigue syndrome." Despite the wishes of the ME community, and in spite of the updated expert criteria, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) negotiated a highly controversial contract with the Institute of Medicine (IOM) to study, rename and redefine this disease. The results were announced Feb. 10. At first glance, the new IOM report gives the impression that the committee of eight non-experts and seven experts produced a solid clinical definition of this disabling disease. Advocates and patients who welcome the new criteria correctly argue that the committee got it right by including the hallmark defining symptom of post exertional malaise (or collapse). Upon closer inspection, however, there are serious flaws. MEAdvocacy.org The new name, Systemic Exertional Intolerance Disease or SEID, also is causing controversy. It still does not adequately convey the seriousness of the disease, again connoting that we are just lazy. ME patients have suffered through decades of neglect. We will not agree with another non-specific definition that will set us back for decades more, when we already have a definition created by experts in the 2011 ICC. We at MEAdvocacy.org call for rejection of the IOM report. Robin Funk is a member of MEAdvocacy.org


Ecstasy use rose sharply in the mid-2000s — but has fallen since then

dangerous drugs. On top of that, many kids don't even realize that Molly is as a form of Ecstasy, or that the active ingredient in both is MDMA. All this uncertainty adds a certain amount of fuzziness to survey-based measures of the drug's use. We do know that in 2013, 4 percent of 18 to 25-year-olds say they used "Ecstasy" in the past year. This is essentially unchanged from the prior few years, but down sharply from 2002, when almost 6 percent reported using the drug. As far as drugs go, ecstasy is less popular in that age group than cocaine, and half as popular as recreational painkillers. And of course the elephants in that room -- and not included in the chart -- are tobacco, alcohol and marijuana, with past-year use rates for 21 to 25-year-olds of 50 percent, 84 percent and 29 percent, respectively. The amount of domestic MDMA seized by the Drug Enforcement Administration has dropped sharply since 2009. While this could be due to changes in law enforcement priorities, these numbers don't quite mesh with the notion that Ecstasy is becoming more prevalent across the U.S. Finally, while Ecstasy-related ER visits surged from 2007 to 2009, they flattened out between 2009 and 2011. Unfortunately these emergency department numbers aren't updated as frequently as other indicators, so we can't tell what hospital visits look like from 2012 onward. Overall, the numbers taken together point a picture of a rise in use from the early to late 2000s, followed by decline and plateau in the case of the usage rates and ER visits, and a sharp drop in the total quantity seized by the DEA. So while its worth keeping an eye on these trends, fears of an epidemic are probably overblown. That said, there's little question that popping pills and capsules of unknown purity and potency is a highly risky proposition. Policymakers concerned about dangers associated with the drug have some tools at their disposal to reduce those risks. Colleges and universities should consider enacting Good Samaritan policies that shield drug users or their friends from criminal charges if they seek help for an overdose, says NYU's Palamar. "If a student on campus is sick [from a drug], that student or his friends shouldn't have to worry about seeking help," he says. "This puts health before the criminal justice aspect." Testing drugs for purity at music events


A long look at the thousands of less-prominent deserters in the U.S. military

André Shepherd is one of several U.S. service members who fled military service and is profiled in a new New York Magazine feature story. (Photo by Christopher Anderson/ Courtesy New York Magazine) When conversation about deserting in the military comes up, it usually touches first on the most drastic examples imaginable. In the last year, there is the conviction of Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun, the Marine who fled his base in Iraq in 2004 and lived in Lebanon for years. There is the case of 2nd Lt. Lawrence J. Franks Jr., the U.S. soldier recently convicted for fleeing his unit to serve in the French Foreign Legion. And there is Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who was recovered last year after years in captivity after slipping away from his base in Afghanistan, and still may face desertion charges. A new story by New York Magazine probes the lives of more ordinary examples, however. Like Hassoun, Franks and Bergdahl, they all have spent years away from their units in other countries. But their cases haven’t risen to national prominence, and it seems unlikely — in at least some cases — that they will ever be prosecuted. As the magazine notes, there are thousands of deserters from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan alone — so many that the military has conflicting numbers on those still missing. Those who fled to Canada, a common spot, haven’t found things easy, and it could get even more sticky. Prime Minister Stephen Harper, a conservative, is trailing in the polls, and it seems likely that anyone else running will want to deport American deserters, the magazine reports. Still, the deserters carry on, sometimes fleeing Canada for Europe when deportation orders come. This passage captures a meeting led by Michelle Robidoux, an activist in Toronto who helps American troops on the run: One by one, the deserters around the table reported their latest news—receiving a deportation order, or giving notice at work, or else packing their bags and selling or donating their belongings in preparation for prison. Robidoux listened in silence; when everyone had spoken, she provided an update for one of the deserters who wasn’t there. Over the course of combat in Iraq, he had developed extreme traumatic stress and still suffered frequent dissociative breaks. Now the immigration authorities had instructed him to leave Canada within two weeks; his wife was hoping to follow him to


Astronomers find a shockingly ancient black hole the size of 12 billion suns

luminous object ever seen in such ancient space. It's from just 900 million years after the big bang, and the old quasar — a shining object produced by a massive black hole — is 420 trillion times more luminous than our sun. That brightness and size is surprising in a black hole from so close to the dawn of time. In a new study published Wednesday in Nature, researchers describe a cosmic light that defies convention. It was even detectable with a relatively small telescope, though researchers in China did have to ask for help from astronomers in Chile and the United States to get a higher-resolution look. "How could we have this massive black hole when the universe was so young? We don't currently have a satisfactory theory to explain it," said lead author Xue-Bing Wu of Peking University and the Kavli Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics. The newly discovered quasar SDSS J0100+2802 is the one with the most massive black hole and the highest luminosity among all known distant quasars. (Zhaoyu Li/Shanghai Astronomical Observatory/Yunnan Observatories) For the black hole to grow to such a staggering size in less than a billion years, the astronomers posit, it must have been pulling in interstellar mass from its surroundings at the maximum rate the whole time. Even so, the radiation of the quasar formed by the black hole should have started to limit that mass accumulation before such a size was reached. So there are puzzles left to be solved. But for now, Wu said, his team is using the brilliant quasar as a beacon to find other space objects. "Just like a lighthouse sitting in a dark, distant universe," he said, "it gives us a chance to see things in between our own planet and the black hole by illuminating them. It provides a unique chance to understand things between the distant galaxy and ours." Wu and his team have many follow-up observations planned for the coming year, including projects using space telescopes like the Hubble to get an even better look at things in and near this impressive quasar's galaxy. Read More: That spooky white spot on Ceres? New photos show two of them. For the first time ever, a multistar system is caught during its earliest days New Horizons spots Pluto’s smaller moons for the first time NASA video shows a fireball burning through the skies of Pennsylvania


After Silver Slugger-winning season, Anthony Rendon hopes to keep it simple in 2015

play more than 60 games out of the year when I got to college. But going through over 100 games, over 120 games, whatever, knowing what that feels like on your body, I feel like I maintained myself in 2014, just tried to maintain my body weight, stay strong throughout the whole year.” So Rendon took the same approach to this offseason as he did to last. Position players underwent physicals Wednesday, and Rendon said he weighed in almost exactly where he did last year at this time, with similar body fat numbers. “I got to give credit to my strength coach in the offseason [Ben Fairchild],” said Rendon, the product of Lamar High School and Rice University who still spends his offseasons in Houston. “He’s not really like, ‘Oh we gotta put on 400 pounds of muscle and throw big weight, you know. We’re not worth anything as a player if we’re not on the field, if we’re on the DL the whole time. So he’s just really stressed body movement, try to stay lean, try to stay healthy the whole year.” While he split time between second and third base in his first two seasons, Rendon will enter 2015 as the starting third baseman. as franchise cornerstone Ryan Zimmerman moves to first. Rendon said he has learned a lot from Zimmerman, though more from observation than extensive conversations with him. “He doesn’t talk a lot, so he’s one of those guys that leads by example,” Rendon said. “So just watching him do his work each and every day and come to the ballpark, that’s what I learned most from him. Just the way he carries himself.” When asked about replacing Zimmerman, Rendon politely refused the premise. “It’s pretty crazy. I grew up kind of watching him play, I knew his name,” he said. “He’s helped me a lot throughout the way with different things here and there. I don’t think I’m replacing anybody. I’m just helping the team, going over there, he’ll be doing the same thing. He’ll be a great first baseman, I’m excited to watch him play.” Rendon, Bryce Harper, Ian Desmond, and Denard Span hit in the first batting practice group Wednesday afternoon after pitchers and catchers worked out in the morning. A previous version of this blog post incorrectly stated that Rendon led the league in RBIs last season. This version has been corrected.


Light to moderate snow likely for Thursday morning commute, with slick roads

A winter storm is streaking toward the Washington, D.C., area. Snow is likely to coincide with the morning commute, producing slick roads and hazardous travel conditions. Capital Weather Gang's Jason Samenow has your forecast. 5:10 p.m. update: 3:10 p.m. update: 2:10 p.m. update: 12:55 p.m. update: Original post, from noon NAM model simulation of storm between 10 p.m. Wednesday and 10 a.m. Thursday (WeatherBell.com) A major southern winter storm streaks toward the region overnight, spreading light to moderate snow into the region. The snow is likely to coincide with the morning commute, producing slick roads and hazardous travel conditions. The cold ground means the snow will stick immediately. While we expect accumulating snow in the D.C. area, the heaviest snow — by far — will occur southeast of the D.C. metro region. Richmond could get five to 10 inches of snow and the Norfolk area around a foot. D.C. is on the northern edge of this storm system, which is the trickiest place to forecast. Capital Weather Gang snowfall forecast for Feb. 26, 2015, first issued 11:50 a.m. on Feb. 25 Key points: - Snow likely begins between midnight and 4 a.m., from south to north. - The steadiest and heaviest snow probably occurs between about 4 a.m. and 8 a.m. - Snow tapers off from west to east between about 8 a.m. and noon. - We expect roughly one to three inches of snow in the immediate D.C. area, two to five inches in D.C.’s far southern areas, including Fredericksburg, and less than an inch in D.C.’s far northern suburbs, including Columbia and Frederick. - The snow will be heavier and start earlier (and potentially last longer) south and southeast of the District - If the storm tracks a bit farther north than currently forecast, more substantial snow amounts could impact the immediate D.C. area, and the snow would last longer (BOOM scenario, 25 percent chance) - If the storm tracks a bit farther south than forecast, very little snow may fall, and it will not last very long, likely ending by around sunrise, with minimal effects on the morning commute (BUST scenario, 15 percent chance) - Temperatures will mostly be in the mid-20s to around 30 while the snow falls, though it may be right around freezing in the city when the snow begins before falling to around 30. - Some school delays and cancellations are likely. We’ll


Chef Tim Ma steps back from Maple Ave Restaurant as he plans a D.C. opening

It's hard for chef-owner Tim Ma to take a step back from Maple Ave Restaurant , which he calls his "baby." But, effective February 15, that's what he did, a move necessary to free up some time as he plans to launch three new concepts over the next two years. First things first: Ma is crossing the river. He confirmed to The Post that he will be opening a D.C. restaurant, though he wasn't able to provide any other details. Chef Tim Ma at Wall & Water, in Arlington, VA. (Photo by Scott Suchman/For the Washington Post) "D.C. scares me, I'm not going to lie," he said. "I've spent most of my life in Virginia, I'm comfortable in Virginia." He anticipates the new restaurant will open in 2016. In the meantime, he has his hands full with a supper club and catering business he plans to launch next month, and his forthcoming sandwich shop, Chase the Submarine, which will open in early fall in Vienna, if construction stays on track. The supper club, called Gather + Feast, will give fans of Maple Ave and Water & Wall a chance to have the chef cook in their own homes. Ma says he'll test dishes that may end up on future menus. [Here's how to get a celebrity chef to cook in your kitchen] The catering service, which will be sold through a Kickstarter, seems like a pretty great deal, too: For $100 per person (with a minimum of eight people and a max of 12), Ma will come to your house and cook one of several pre-selected but customizable menus. He'll also include a server, all of the cookware and dishware, all of the ingredients except for alcohol, and he'll clean the kitchen, leaving it "the way it was -- or better," said Ma. That was the case at a recent Sips and Suppers dinner at the home of Quinn Bradlee, son of Washington Post notables Sally Quinn and the late Ben Bradlee, who was left with a spotless kitchen once the meal was over. "At the end of the meal, [Quinn Bradlee] was looking at the kitchen, and he was like, 'I've never seen it like this!'" said Ma. Ma has already worked out a few themed menus for Gather + Feast. There's a duck-centric menu with plenty of foie gras, a surf and turf (but "not lobster and not


Neuroscience is coming to the law. Can we keep politics out of it?

know very little about neurolaw, and that Republicans and independents may diverge from Democrats in their support for neuroscience based legal reforms. In our study, we conducted an experiment within a national survey of Americans (more details about the survey are in our article). Everyone in the survey was told that, “Recently developed neuroscientific techniques allow researchers to see inside the human brain as never before.” One group of respondents was then asked: “Thinking about how neuroscience might be used in the legal system, do you disapprove or approve of legal reforms based on advances in neuroscience?” Among this group, 40 percent were undecided, and the rest split between disapproval and approval. There were no significant differences between Republicans and Democrats in baseline support for neurolaw. But our further findings raise concern. With respect to the criminal justice system, commentators have observed that neuroscience could either aid criminal defendants or aid the prosecution. Thus, we exposed two other groups of respondents either to the prospect that neuroscience would help the prosecution, leading to harsher sentences, or to the prospect that it would help the defense, leading to lighter sentences. When framed as being helpful to criminal defendants, both Republicans and Independents voiced more disapproval of using neuroscience in law. Democrats were not affected by either of these frames. This finding shows again how science based on individuals’ political or cultural leanings. And it is particularly concerning with regard to neurolaw — which, has yet to become a partisan political issue. For example, the Web site Conservapedia, which has been criticized for misrepresenting evolution and global warming, describes neuroscience in neutral terms, stating that “Neuroscience is the scientific study of the nervous systems …” and that “… Neuroscience is a rapidly growing field of interest.” But our study shows that neuroscience may not remain neutral for long. If framed in certain ways, neuroscience could fall victim to the same fate as climate change science. Such a development can only be avoided with careful attention to how neuroscience and its application to the legal system are presented to the public and politicians. Francis Shen This post is part of a series on politics and science. Other posts in the series include: “A scientific perspective on politics and science” “You can change the mind of climate change skeptics. Here’s how.” “Why science teachers sow doubt about evolution (even when they don’t mean to)”


The New York arrests and a Brooklyn mother’s struggle to keep her son away from the Islamic State

From left: A courtroom sketch shows 19-year-old Akhror Saidakhmetov of Kazakhstan, court interpreter Akhror Saidakmetov and 24-year-old Abdurasul Hasanovich Juraboev of Uzbekistan, in federal court in New York City. (Jane Rosenberg/European Pressphoto Agency) After 19-year-old Akhror Saidakhmetov was arrested yesterday and charged with plotting to fight for the Islamic State, among other things, reporters and television crews showed up at his apartment in Brooklyn. There, a woman believed to be his mother, upon being told of her son’s arrest, began wailing. “No, it can’t be,” she said. “It’s not true ” But it was true. And this was what she had feared and done her best to prevent, according to papers filed by federal prosecutors in the case. An ethnic Uzbek immigrant from Kazakhstan, she worried about other older Uzbeks in New York with whom her son was associating, like Abdurasul Hasanovich Juraboev, who was also arrested. She worried he might be vulnerable to the call of the jihadists. She confiscated her son’s passport, refusing on several occasions to return it to him. To get it back, he made up stories — about how he was really going to visit family in Uzbekistan — but she was not fooled. She still refused. She did her best. And her efforts, outlined sketchily in the FBI affadavit in support of the arrests, illustrate something experts on foreign fighters have often said: preventing young people from being lured to fight for the Islamic State doesn’t depend on denunciations of its barbarity or counterpropaganda from the U.S. government. It’s the families of those young Muslims who count. “The best line of defense in this whole issue is parents, family,” Imam Mohamed Magid of the All Dulles Area Muslim Society told ABC News earlier this week. “Complete awareness about your children, for instance, what they’re doing, who they are, friends they have in the virtual community, that’s very important.” “ISIS is very savvy in the Internet,” Magid said, using another name for the Islamic State. “They see the traffic, who’s coming to watch and so forth and during that time that’s where they catch the young person when he shows curiosity.” And young Saidakhmetov allegedly did show more than curiosity. He was caught up in the fervor, the affadavit suggests. When Islamic State videos last summer showed mass executions of Iraqi soldiers after extremist fighters took Mosul, millions turned away in horror. Not so Saidakhmetov.


Scientists may have solved mystery of matter’s origin

The cosmos at its most colorful: visible and near-infrared light spectrum collected from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope over a nine-year period. (NASA via AP) For decades, scientists have puzzled over one of the central, most essential mysteries of physics: Where did all the stuff that makes up the universe come from? Now researchers at the University of California at Los Angeles think they have an explanation, which they describe in the journal Physical Review Letters this month. Based on observations of the Higgs boson field at Switzerland’s Large Hadron Collider, the paper is fairly impenetrable for the lay reader — even the abstract contains few words with less than four syllables. But the gist of their theory is simple, even poetic: To develop this explanation, study authors Alexander Kusenko, Lauren Pearce and Louis Yang had to delve deep into the universe’s origins: roughly 1 decillionth of a second after the Big Bang. In this period, termed “inflation,” particles (the most basic ingredient of everything in the universe) and anti-particles (the opposite of all that) co-existed in a rapidly expanding “hot soup.” The two could switch identities (in other words, anti-particles could turn into particles and vice-versa), but the laws of physics applied equally both, meaning they were created in perfect proportion. Shortly after inflation, the universe’s growth slowed and the two kinds of particles (which are perfectly opposed in mass and charge and effectively cancel each other out) began colliding and annihilating one another. The battle would have swiftly ended in the elimination of all forms of particles — a kind of cosmic mutually assured destruction — if not for one tiny, unexplained asymmetry in the size of their forces: For every 10 billion anti-particles, there were 10 billion particles — plus one. That marginal imbalance meant that matter was the last man standing, leading to the creation of the elements, stars, solar systems, planet Earth and every person on it. Scientists have long known about this ancient asymmetry, but were unsure about what caused it. Many of the proposed theories were complex and unwieldy, requiring the existence of new kinds of particles or new laws of physics. By comparison, Kusenko described his theory as “economical.” “This one is appealing because it doesn’t require too many ingredients,” he said in a phone interview with The Washington Post. Instead, Kusenko relied on data from the Nobel Prize-winning research into the Higgs


3 food clubs in D.C. for charcuterie, wine and sandwich enthusiasts

Members of The Charcuterie Club D.C. sample meats and wines during a recent event at Each Peach Market in Mount Pleasant. The unthinkable happened at a recent gathering of The Charcuterie Club D.C., co-founder Cathryn Marcuse recalls. “There were two people sitting next to each other who talked for four hours before realizing they worked at the same company,” Marcuse says. “That is so rare.” In a city where strangers tend to suss out one another’s vocations within minutes of meeting, organized food gatherings allow gourmands to drop the script and get to know each other on a deeper level. Cathryn and her husband, Josh, started the charcuterie club (thecharcuterieclubdc.com) last February with a handful of friends and a roll of salami. Today, the group has nearly 200 members and organizes events like informal tastings, classes and sit-down dinners. “Food is something that you can talk about with anybody,” says Sean Morash, co-founder of D.C.’s Baseball-Sandwich Club. A food lover and baseball fanatic, Morash launched the organization last July. Roughly 15 people turned out for the first two gatherings for free-form discussions about the great American pastime — as well as friendly debates, like whether a hot dog qualifies as a sandwich. “Everyone has gotten along so well because it’s still the offseason,” Morash says. “Everyone thinks [their team] still has a chance.” Nothing fuels fruitful discussions like a little booze, Jess Hagadorn has learned. The founder of Young Winos of DC (youngwinosofdc.com) organized the group in 2010 to connect with other oenophiles. “My friends enjoyed wine, but they didn’t want to talk about it like I did,” Hagadorn says. Now with more than 700 members (and nearly 50 new ones joining each month), Young Winos brings people together for sommelier-led wine tastings, vineyard field trips and happy hours. “I’ve met some really great friends through the club,” Hagadorn says. “Some were even invited to my wedding. I had no idea who these people were beforehand.” Membership for each of these clubs is free, with the occasional fee for ticketed events. The respite they offer is priceless. “The line between work and social activities is so thin in D.C.,” Marcuse says. “Food clubs provide a great escape.” Dig right in Interested in joining one of the clubs? Jump in by attending one of these upcoming events. - D.C. Charcuterie club: Charcuterie and wine pairing at Lupo Verde, March 15. Cost:


News coverage of civil conflict is biased in both democracies and autocracies

line: coverage of protest and civil conflict is likely to be “one sided” in both democracies and autocracies, but for different reasons. While the media in democracies typically are relatively independent from government influence, they have their own institutional biases — such as “newsworthiness” criteria that emphasize novelty, conflict, proximity, and drama. In civil conflicts, these preferences generate disproportionate coverage of developments and movements that challenge the regime, and underscore the unsustainability of the status quo. In non-democracies, where governments frequently own or influence media firms, news coverage is more likely to reflect the regime’s preferences for political self-preservation, emphasizing the legitimacy and stability of the prevailing order. Mobilization against peer autocratic regimes, through its example, can raise regime opponents’ expectations that domestic state authority could be successfully challenged. This provides non-democratic leaders with strong incentives to suppress any news coverage that might result in emulation efforts at home. These patterns emerged in our analysis of new data, containing every article on Libya published by 2,252 newspapers in 113 countries between Dec. 18, 2010 (the first day of protests in Tunisia, which ignited the Arab Spring) and Oct. 23, 2011 (three days following the capture and death of Muammar Qaddafi). We investigated whether the type and intensity of violence on the ground predicted the timing of these 213,406 articles, across the countries in our sample. Unsurprisingly, we found that news coverage in democracies was both more voluminous and more diverse. Yet, we also found stark variation in coverage following specific types of events. Media firms in non-democracies responded to nonviolent protests by reducing coverage, while those in democracies either increased coverage or left it unchanged. For instance, following a significant increase in Libyan protests (e.g. 1st to 99th percentile), the probability that an average newspaper in a non-democracy published a story on Libya fell by 38 percent. In democracies, the same spike in protests yielded a 14 percent increase in probability of publication. We also found differences in reporting after civilian victimization, depending on who inflicted the violence. The probability of Libya coverage in non-democracies rose by 47 percent following a spike in rebel-induced civilian deaths. Yet, media outlets in democracies typically did not change their coverage in response to rebel abuses. Civilian victimization by government forces produced opposing patterns. Democratic states saw far more news coverage following a significant increase in civilians killed or wounded by the government, with


Thousands of dead fish found in Rio Olympic sailing venue

that this may have been triggered by a drought. However, the waters have drawn other unwanted attention because they’re polluted by garbage and untreated sewage from the more than 8 million residents of the 15 cities that share the bay’s shoreline. Twaite shad are a small, silverish fish much like herring. The waters have made headlines because of the presence of a “super bacteria”, sparking concerns about the health risks to athletes. The discovery of the fish die-off came during a visit Monday by International Olympic Committee, which said the city was making progress in preparing for the games. But only last month the Brazilian government admitted that it would fall short of its goal of reducing pollution at the venue by the August 2016 start of the games. State governor Luiz Fernando Pezao admitted that cleaning up the area has not been easy. “Every time we have a negotiation,” state governor Luiz Fernando Pezao told reporters (via Sky News) on Wednesday, “the bidding process [for the project] slows and postpones things.” However, Christophe Dubi, the IOC’s executive director of the Olympic Games, remains optimistic that the goal of reducing pollution by 80 percent remains. “We are still aiming for this goal. We cannot judge until the finish line,” he said. “We are like athletes in that we are pushing toward the finish line and we should respect that every effort is being made.” A lagoon system in western Rio, beside the sites of the Olympic park, is stressed, too, the Associated Press reports. The Jacarepagua lagoon system is also filled with sewage and trash, and aerial photos taken Tuesday by the environmental group Olho Verde showed a massive bacterial bloom inside the lagoon that has spilled out onto the Atlantic and a popular nearby beach. Cyanobacteria are single-celled organisms that give the water a vibrant blue-green hue and can sometimes prove toxic to humans and other plant and animal species. Athletes visiting Rio in recent months for test sailing events complained about health risks and the hazards of encountering floating debris in the waters where they’ll compete. Rio’s environmental agency noted in a statement that the there was a die-off of twaite shad in the bay last November and that analysis then revealed “neither abnormalities in the water, nor the presence of chemical or toxic substances. Therefore, specialists concluded that the incidents could be related to the intense drought.”


Can Eric Holder change the federal drug classification of marijuana?

he has authority. They encouraged one another on Facebook and Twitter to flood Holder’s office with calls challenging his statement. They made another push asking him to reclassify marijuana, noting that President Obama has said that he does not believe marijuana is more dangerous than alcohol. Marijuana remains a Schedule I drug under the federal Controlled Substances Act of 1970, meaning it is classified as the most harmful category of drugs, with a high potential for abuse and no currently accepted medical use. Advocates believe that if marijuana is taken out of that classification, it would clear the path for more research into the effects of marijuana and ultimately lead to legalization and regulation nationwide. While Holder’s statement was an opinion, and something that can’t easily be fact-checked, it is important to explore it, as well as Cohen’s response. As more states look toward legalizing recreational marijuana, advocates are pushing back stronger on statements such as Holder’s. Twenty-three states have legalized medical marijuana. Alaska recently became the third state to legalize marijuana, and D.C.’s recreational marijuana law is set to take effect Feb. 26. Can the attorney general change the drug classification of marijuana? What are underlying policy issues that lead to questions over exactly what authority he has? The Facts Under federal law, the attorney general can move to add, reschedule or remove drugs on his own, at the request of the health and human services secretary or in response to a public petition. But the law also requires the attorney general to gather data and scientific and medical evaluation from the HHS secretary before doing so. Congress can pass laws to change the scheduling of drugs. Even if the attorney general does decide to move toward rescheduling, Congress can overturn his decision, experts say. The Drug Enforcement Administration already has denied a petition to reschedule the drug, based on findings by HHS. HHS determined that marijuana has a “high potential for abuse” and “no currently accepted medical use in treatment in the United States,” leading the DEA to reject the petition in 2011. The petition was filed nearly a decade earlier, in 2002. HHS found that there are “no adequate and well-controlled studies proving efficacy.” Further, “the known risks of marijuana use have not been shown to be outweighed by specific benefits in well-controlled clinical trials that scientifically evaluate safety and efficacy.” The FDA is now re-evaluating its


How Mohammed Emwazi became Jihadi John: 5 key takeaways

at the rights group CAGE. “I feel like a prisoner, only not in a cage, in London." It's unclear why Emwazi was under investigation, though the BBC reports that he was "linked to a man with connections to al-Shabab." In a statement, Qureshi of CAGE condemned Emwazi's treatment by British security agencies: "He desperately wanted to use the system to change his situation, but the system ultimately rejected him." Somehow, he got to Syria. Friends told The Post that in 2012 Emwazi hoped to travel to Saudi Arabia to teach English, but his attempts were unsuccessful. At some point later, he appears to have vanished. Despite the attention placed on him by the British security agencies, he somehow made it to Syria, a place he had discussed going since 2012, according to the Guardian. The next we hear of Emwazi is in 2013, when he is believed to have guarded Western captives at a prison in Idlib, Syria. In 2014, the hostages were moved to the city of Raqqa, and Emwazi took on a more important role within the Islamic State. In August 2014, "Jihadi John" appeared in a video in which American journalist James Foley was killed, and he became infamous around the world. Since then, he has been seen in at least seven other videos, including the ones where British aid workers David Haines and Alan Henning were beheaded. He left remarkably little trace online. Little information about Emwazi existed online before his name was released on Thursday. No social media accounts were found that could be linked to him. As the Guardian notes, extensive online searching revealed only his name on Britain's electoral roll. Members of his family appear to have deleted their online presences. It seems likely that Emwazi didn't want his identity known. In a number of videos, his voice was digitally altered, apparently in an attempt to disguise it. In the end, authorities used a variety of different techniques to identify Emwazi as "Jihadi John," including voice analysis and interviews with former hostages. Exactly how security services identified Emwazi is unknown, though the FBI said it believed it knew the true identity of "Jihadi John" just one month after Foley was killed. Related stories on Emwazi and the Islamic State - Scotland Yard wouldn't confirm identity of Jihadi John - View: The atrocities of the Islamic State - Map: Foreign fighters flow to Syria


Researchers think they’ve found a “gateway belief” that leads to greater science acceptance

for public action,” the authors wrote. They provide this figure, showing how they expect the “gateway belief” model to work: Van der Linden et al, “The Scientific Consensus on Climate Change as a Gateway Belief: Experimental Evidence,” PLOS One, Feb. 25, 2015. So did it work out that way? The answer, says the study, is yes. After being presented with the consensus message, people on average increased their estimate of the percentage of scientists who agree about climate change by 12.8 percent. And the paper further found that when people up their estimate of the percentage of scientists who accept that global warming is caused by humans, they also increase their own belief in the science, and their own worry about it, becoming more likely to want the world to take climate action. “Perceived scientific consensus acts as a key gateway belief for both Democrats and Republicans,” wrote the authors. Interestingly, the paper found that the consensus message was particularly effective with Republicans — a group that, in general, is not easily swayed on the climate issue. The authors concluded by suggesting that this finding could be the basis for a public information campaign. “Repeated exposure to simple messages that correctly state the actual scientific consensus on human-caused climate change is a strategy likely to help counter the concerted efforts to misinform the public,” they wrote. It’s important to note, however, that not every researcher agrees with this approach. Indeed, Yale public opinion researcher Dan Kahan has already blogged a response to the new study, and it’s pretty critical. “I gotta say, I just don’t see any evidence in these results that the ‘97% consensus msg’ meaningfully affected any of the outcome variables that the authors’ new writeup is focused on (belief in climate change, perceived risk, support for policy),” he wrote. Kahan objected that while statistically significant, the changes were relatively small and may not have “practical” significance. More broadly, Kahan questions whether, in light of how politicized the climate debate has become, mere statements about fact like the “97 percent” claim can successfully depolarize matters. Kahan himself recently published research suggesting that a wildly different approach — telling people about the subject of geoengineering — actually has a depolarizing effect. So in sum — 97 percent of scientists may agree about climate change, but scientific agreement about how to get people to accept that is significantly lower.


Neil deGrasse Tyson to receive the National Academy of Sciences’ most prestigious honor

Scientist Neil deGrasse Tyson in his office at the Hayden Planetarium in New York, N.Y., on Feb. 4, 2015. Tyson is director of the Hayden Planetarium. (Jesse Dittmar for The Washington Post) The National Academy of Sciences has announced that Neil deGrasse Tyson, most widely known for hosting the recent reboot of Carl Sagan's popular science show "Cosmos," will receive their most prestigious award at a ceremony this April. The Public Welfare Medal Tyson will be the first person to receive the award for his efforts in science communication to the general public since Sagan himself won in 1994. The two men are connected by more than their shared awards and TV styles: Back when Tyson was a high school student in the Bronx considering colleges, Sagan wrote him a heartfelt invitation to visit his lab at Cornell -- one that Tyson accepted. He ended up at Harvard instead of learning at the feet of the master, but I guess he turned out okay. "Through just about every form of media available, Neil deGrasse Tyson has made millions of people around the world excited about science," Susan Wessler, home secretary for the National Academy of Sciences and chair of the selection committee for the award, said in a statement. "Ultimately, the success of science depends on the public's understanding of its importance and value. Neil masterfully conveys why science matters -- not just to a few, but to all of us." Tyson has been a vocal advocate for science literacy since his appointment as director of the Hayden Planetarium in New York in 1995. His "Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey" reboot was an Emmy-nominated critical success, and was shown in 181 countries in 45 languages. Tackling everything from the dawn of time to the theory of evolution, Tyson managed to educate and excite viewers of all ages across the globe. He's now set to have the first ever late-night science program: StarTalk, which will air on National Geographic starting in April, will be a studio-filmed adaptation of his popular live events and podcasts of the same name. And Tyson's outreach doesn't stop when the TV is off: His Twitter account has everything from quippy thoughts about science to awestruck proclamations about the beauty of the universe, to hard and fast takedowns of anti-science views in the news. Read More: Star talker: Neil deGrasse Tyson on fame, education and tweets Bill Nye


Mohammed Emwazi and the debate over poverty’s link to terrorism

LONDON, FEB. 26: Journalists gather outside the home where Islamic State militant Mohammed Emwazi, popularly known as Jihadi John, is believed to have once lived. Emwazi, a Kuwaiti-born British man in his 20s, has been pictured in videos of the beheadings of a number of Western hostages. (Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images) Earlier this month, Marie Harf, a spokeswoman for the U.S. State Department, told MSNBC's Chris Matthews that the United States couldn't win the fight against the Islamic State by simply killing all the militants. Instead, she suggested, other factors had to be considered, including "a lack of opportunity for jobs." Harf's comment was widely mocked (it prompted a hashtag, #JobsForISIS) but really Harf wasn't saying anything that the Obama administration, or, in fact, the Bush administration, had not said before: Poverty can lead people to join radical Islamist groups. Now, revelations about the upbringing of the man dubbed Jihadi John have prompted people to return to Harf's comments. Mohammed Emwazi is a Kuwaiti-born British man who became notorious for his masked appearances in Islamic State beheading videos. And, as The Post's Souad Mekhennet and Adam Goldman revealed on Thursday, his upbringing was not marked by poverty, but instead was pretty well-to-do. Emwazi's economic background was repeatedly pointed out online. WaPo: “Jihadi John” identified by intelligence officials as … a wealthy dilettante http://t.co/KZqRqrJIvF Jihadi John is middle class & educated, demonstrates again that radicalisation is not necessarily driven by poverty or social deprivation. As someone who grew up not too far from Emwazi, let me give my own subjective opinion here: The idea that he was raised in affluent or even wealthy circumstances is a bit of a red herring. The house Emwazi was raised in seems fairly modest, and the neighborhood of Queens Park is socioeconomically mixed, with a large number of immigrants in the area. The Telegraph reports that his father had worked as a minicab driver -- a stable career that is not known for its high salary (London's "black cab" drivers are far better paid). In addition, the idea that Emwazi was highly-educated strikes me as a little dubious. He attended a local state school, Quintin Kynaston Community Academy, which has a fairly good reputation. Then he studied computer science at the University of Westminster, ranked 95th in the country by the Guardian. Westminster is a fine university, but it's not Oxbridge, nor a rival


The ‘gentle, kind’ Jihadi John, a ‘beautiful young man’

Asim Qureshi - The story of Mohammed Emwazi aka Jihadi John VIDEO: An activist explains how Mohammed Emwazi, a.k.a. Jihadi John, descended into alienation: “What role have our security services played in completely alienating people in this society?” When the world saw a masked man behead Islamic State prisoners multiple times over the course of a year, most people thought: That’s a bad guy. But when one British human rights group considered the case of Jihadi John — the man now revealed to be Mohammed Emwazi — it saw something else: a victim of circumstance. Sure, Jihadi John was a monster, but how did he get that way? [RELATED: ‘Jihadi John’: Islamic State killer is identified as Londoner Mohammed Emwazi] CAGE, an activist organization based in London, tries to draw lines between extremism and what it calls the corrupt government policies that foster it. “CAGE is an independent advocacy organisation working to empower communities impacted by the War on Terror,” reads a statement on the group’s Web site. “The organisation highlights and campaigns against state policies, striving for a world free from oppression and injustice. CAGE has been campaigning against the War on Terror for more than a decade. Its work has focused on working with survivors of abuse and mistreatment across the globe.” As described in The Washington Post’s story about identifying Jihadi John, CAGE’s research director was one of those who had contact with Emwazi as the British national was repeatedly stymied by that country’s immigration and security services. “There was an extremely strong resemblance,” Asim Qureshi said. “… This is making me feel fairly certain that this is the same person.” Foreign policy reporter Adam Goldman explains who Mohammed Emwazi is and how The Washington Post discovered his identity. But in a longer statement posted to CAGE’s Web site, Qureshi — who described Emwazi as a “extremely gentle, kind … beautiful young man” at a press conference — elaborated on the frustration that led him to embrace jihad. The statement appeared under the title “Jihadi John: ‘Radicalised’ By Britain.” “Suffocating domestic policies aimed at turning a person into an informant but which prevent a person from fulfilling their basic life needs would have left a lasting impression on Emwazi,” Qureshi said. “He desperately wanted to use the system to change his situation, but the system ultimately rejected him.” Qureshi’s statement challenges popular perceptions of Westerners who join


After net neutrality vote, an uncertain future for the Internet

The agency can then regulate broadband using laws passed to oversee Ma Bell, treating it the way it does the old (and now nearly dead) copper phone network. Those laws, or some uncertain subset of them, will now apply to the Internet. While the goal of preserving the remarkably free and open global Internet is one that no one disagrees with, I have great fears about both the intended and unintended consequences this unprecedented shift in policy will have on the perpetual motion machine of innovation that the Internet has long supported. And I’m not alone. On Tuesday, for example, at an event sponsored by the Georgetown Center for Business and Public Policy, I asked David Farber, professor of computer science and public policy at Carnegie Mellon and the FCC’s chief technologist from 2000 to 2001, what he thought of the FCC’s proposal. Farber, a principal inventor of the government networks that ultimately became the Internet, didn’t mince words. “Title II,” he said, “is a catastrophe.” On Wednesday, I testified before a House subcommittee at a hearing aptly-titled “The Uncertain Future of the Internet.” Uncertainty — of what the FCC intends to do, of how the courts will view their efforts, and how private investors in broadband infrastructure will respond — is now the order of the day. That is both a significant and unfortunate course change. For most of the Internet era, as I told the committee, tech policy has been a bright spot in Washington. Not only has it been a rare example of bipartisanship, but also of regulatory wisdom. Recognizing that the pace of technology change far exceeds that of lawmakers and regulators, the 1996 Telecommunications Act, passed by a Republican Congress and signed by Democratic President Bill Clinton, boldly announced that it was the policy of the United States “to preserve the vibrant and competitive free market that presently exists for the Internet and other interactive computer services, unfettered by Federal or State regulation.” The governance of the Internet, for the most part, was left to the engineers who invented it, rather than to the whims of lawmakers and regulators. For now, at least, that bipartisan view has been jettisoned, lost to an emotional and likely politically-motivated appeal by President Obama late last year. In a dramatic statement posted to the White House Web site, the president urged Wheeler to end the “light touch” era and