One of National Zoo’s panda cubs is getting round-the-clock medical care

National Zoo panda Mei Xiang gave birth Saturday afternoon to twin cubs just days after zoo officials confirmed she was pregnant. A few hours later the zoo's panda cam showed her playing with one of the newborns. One of the two tiny giant panda cubs born at the National Zoo on Saturday is faltering, requiring extra medical attention from zookeepers. Zoo officials provided an update Tuesday, saying that the smaller of the two cubs has been regurgitating and has not been keeping on weight but also has not had more serious problems such as respiratory distress. When the cub was born, it weighed just 3 ounces, while its twin weighed 4.8 ounces. In the wild, giant pandas that give birth to twins often nurture one cub and let the other perish. To prevent Mei Xiang, the National Zoo’s mother panda, from abandoning one of her babies, zookeepers planned to switch the cubs every four hours, letting her spend one-on-one time with each cub. But Mei Xiang has rejected that plan. Since 2 p.m. Monday, she has refused to switch, keeping only the larger cub — which seems to be doing well in her care, although it is still in the high-risk period of infancy, the zoo said Tuesday. Mei Xiang’s preference for the larger cub means zookeepers must nurture the smaller cub around the clock. They are feeding it by bottle and tube, giving it antibiotics to prevent infection and administering fluid under its skin to keep it hydrated. The zoo said that it has added veterinarians, including a panda keeper from Zoo Atlanta, to its team of caretakers during this perilous time. The good news: The tiny creature is behaving as a healthy infant giant panda should and is urinating, defecating and breathing normally. The bad news: Its weight has been fluctuating over the first few days of its life, which should not happen after its first 48 hours, the zoo said. And its regurgitation could lead to aspiration of food into its lungs, which would be dangerous for the cub. The zoo noted Tuesday that even for giant pandas — which give birth to the smallest babies in relation to their mothers of any placental mammals — these twins are very tiny. An ordinary cub-to-mother weight ratio is 1 to 700, the zoo said. Mei Xiang, who weighs about 238 pounds, is 783 times heavier than the larger


Some Maryland football fans didn’t get memo on increased season ticket costs

Maryland says it has required certain season ticket holders for games at Bryd Stadium to donate to the school’s scholarship fund since 2001, but the policy wasn’t always enforced. (Mark Gail/For The Washington Post) One afternoon earlier this spring, while he sat with a patient inside his Annapolis-based dentistry practice, Dennis Guard received an unexpected call from the University of Maryland’s season ticket office. Guard said he was told that in order to renew his football season tickets, which he had held for about 35 years, he’d have to donate an additional $2,200 to the school or risk being moved. “I was really kind of shocked,” said Guard, 76. A few weeks later, in June, Guard said he was offered another deal: to pay the donation in three installments over the next three years to keep his seats. It was his introduction to what Maryland is calling the Donor Step Program to fund athletic scholarships. Season ticket holders now have four options in addition to paying face value for their seats: pay a full donation requirement; join the newly created Donor Step Program and make payments over three years; relocate to another seat that requires no donation or a different amount; or give up the tickets and request a full refund. The move appears to be an effort by Maryland to keep up with the increased price of scholarships. But for some longtime fans such as Guard, it came as an unwelcome surprise. The estimated cost of the Terrapin Club Scholarship Fund is expected to rise to $13 million in 2016. Part of that increase is the result of a January vote by members of the NCAA’s five most powerful conferences to increase scholarship amounts to cover the full cost of school attendance — which amounts to more than $3,000 per athlete this fall at Maryland, according to an analysis by the Chronicle of Higher Education. In addition, Maryland announced in August 2014 that it would guarantee lifetime scholarships for its athletes. Maryland’s athletic scholarship fund raised $10.1 million in fiscal year 2015, which ended July 1. Six Big Ten schools — Ohio State, Penn State, Michigan, Michigan State, Wisconsin and Rutgers — require a scholarship donation for each season ticket sold, although most schools have seating fees attached to premium sections. Maryland has had a similar policy for season ticket sales since 2001, according to Joe Foley, the school’s


Islamic State accused of using mustard gas in Syria attack

This image posted on a militant Web site in 2014 shows fighters from the Islamic State marching in Raqqa, Syria. (Militant Web site via AP) BEIRUT — The incident Friday apparently involved dozens of mortar rounds that struck a village north of Aleppo called Marea, where the militant group is battling other armed opponents of the Syrian government. In video testimony, a doctor from the area said the Islamic State appears to have used mustard gas in the attack, which affected mostly “women and children.” The Syrian American Medical Society said it treated 50 people who showed symptoms of exposure to chemical agents, including wheezing, skin irritation and severe itching. The humanitarian group, which operates a field clinic in the area, said 30 of those people developed severe blisters that doctors linked to mustard gas. The group said that “local sources” blamed the attack on the Islamic State, also known as ISIS and ISIL. Evidence is mounting that the Islamic State has used mustard agent in recent attacks in Syria and Iraq, countries where the group controls vast territory. The access to and weaponization of such banned chemical agents would mark a serious escalation in the threat posed by the group, which is being targeted by a U.S.-led coalition. U.S. military officials said recently that Islamic State militants used mustard gas during an attack this past month on Kurdish forces elsewhere in Syria. U.S. officials also have linked the group to an attack on Kurdish forces in Iraq that appeared to involve mustard gas. Syria’s government has been accused of using chemical weapons over the course of the country’s four-year-old conflict, including a recent spate of attacks in the north involving chlorine gas, a choking agent. The West accuses President Bashar al-Assad’s forces of using sarin gas, a nerve agent, in an attack two years ago near the capital, Damascus, that killed hundreds. In a statement released Tuesday, the humanitarian organization Doctors Without Borders said it treated four patients, all members of one family from Marea, who showed signs of exposure to chemical agents. The family’s home was struck Friday with a shell that emitted a yellow gas that filled the living room, the group said. Although it did not indicate whether mustard gas was used, the group said the family members’ symptoms “all point to exposure to a chemical agent.” The relatives arrived at a Doctors Without Borders hospital


It’s time to remind ourselves what ‘good’ tastes like

well. What’s new is his take on what happens when lab-created flavors are attached to foods with little nutrient value — or none. We gorge on them, Schatzker says, because we’re trying to cash in on a payoff that never comes. In his well-researched book, Schatzker introduces us to the “chemical language” of flavor and how closely it is tied to secondary compounds that plants make, often for self-defense. These include antioxidants, whose health benefits have been highly touted in recent years. For a long time, little research had been done to show whether fresh, well-grown produce might make us healthier, so it’s been good to see the gut feelings of fellow gardeners confirmed, even if the end result has been to isolate such compounds, extract them and take food production away from the soil and into the chemistry lab. Apparently scientists have these gut feelings, too, even though much more work lies ahead. Schatzker remarks, “Of the dozens of scientists I spoke to over the course of researching this book . . . not a single one doubted that the peculiar chemicals plants make are an important reason fruits and vegetables are good for you.” Several fascinating studies he describes at length show how both free-ranging goats and young children given a free-choice diet make surprisingly wise choices and have an inborn nutritional intelligence as long as it isn’t confused by artificial flavoring. Fortunately, no one needs a PhD in biochemistry to get back in sync with the way humans were meant to eat. Simply put real food on the table. You might start by eating whole, unsweetened fruit instead of the gooey mess at the bottom of the yogurt cup. Serve as many fresh, unprocessed vegetables as possible. If you are a gardener, you have even more opportunities to retrain your palate and appreciate the differences between, say, one Brussels sprout and another. The range of vegetable and fruit varieties that seed catalogues offer to home gardeners (and enlightened market gardeners) is astonishingly varied compared with what is available to shoppers in most stores. Now’s the time to plant some greens for fall and winter. Don’t like kale? Try Swiss chard. Sow a few rows of naturally sweet, carotene-rich carrots for snacks. Savor their flavor. Will they give you a nutritional boost? You bet your life they will. Damrosch is author of “The Four Season Farm Gardener’s Cookbook.”


Panda keepers switch from being hopeful to having their hands full

Veterinarians at the National Zoo examine giant panda Mei Xiang’s second cub. The cubs are getting a lot of attention, and care for the first-born cub is nearly constant. (Pamela Baker-Masson/Smithsonian's National Zoo) Giant panda Mei Xiang was sensitive to sound. She stopped showing an interest in food. During training sessions, she appeared less responsive than normal. Staff at the National Zoo knew something was happening. Once she started pulling nesting material into her den, they got hopeful: Mei Xiang (pronounced may-SHONG) might be pregnant. It had been two years since Mei Xiang, the only adult female panda at the National Zoo, gave birth to her last cub, Bao Bao. Pandas can become pregnant only for a few days each spring, so zoo vets tried to help fertilize Mei Xiang’s eggs in a medical procedure. Months later, they still weren’t sure it worked. But on August 19, an ultrasound examination, which shows pictures from inside the body, revealed that Mei Xiang was carrying a fetus. Zoo officials at the time said they were “cautiously optimistic” about a birth. Saturday turned out to be the big day. At about 5:30 p.m., Mei Xiang gave birth, and a tiny, pink cub was spotted on the Panda Cam. More than four hours later, Mei surprised everyone when she delivered another cub. Their sex will not be determined until next week at the earliest. The births, coupled with Sunday’s birthday of big sister Bao Bao (rhymes with bow-wow), made for a weekend of panda-monium. “The panda is so linked with who the National Zoo is,” said Steve Sarro, the curator of giant pandas at the zoo. Amid all the excitement, the panda team remains on high alert. Although twins are a common occurrence in panda births (it happens about 50 percent of the time), both cubs don’t normally survive. “It’s very difficult for the female to raise both,” Sarro said. At birth, panda cubs are blind, deaf and extremely fragile, making them very needy. Because both cubs are battling for the mother’s attention and milk, zoo veterinarians have a plan to increase the chances that both cubs will make it. “Our plan right now is we’re doing a baby swap,” Sarro said. “We’re pulling one baby and letting her have one, and then we swap the kids. So she gets to bond and work with both.” While a cub is away from Mei Xiang,


linked with who the National Zoo is,” said Steve Sarro, the curator of giant pandas at the zoo. Amid all the excitement, the panda team remains on high alert. Although twins are a common occurrence in panda births (it happens about 50 percent of the time), both cubs don’t normally survive. “It’s very difficult for the female to raise both,” Sarro said. At birth, panda cubs are blind, deaf and extremely fragile, making them very needy. Because both cubs are battling for the mother’s attention and milk, zoo veterinarians have a plan to increase the chances that both cubs will make it. “Our plan right now is we’re doing a baby swap,” Sarro said. “We’re pulling one baby and letting her have one, and then we swap the kids. So she gets to bond and work with both.” While a cub is away from Mei Xiang, the veterinarians help feed and care for it. The mother has begun to favor the larger cub and has become less accepting of the swapping process, leaving vets to take care of the smaller cub. Veterinarians at the Smithsonian's National Zoo examine the first cub Mei Xiang gave birth to on Aug. 22. While around-the-clock efforts are needed by zoo vets to keep the cubs stabilized, it’s possible that both will survive. “Zoo Atlanta had twins, and they’re doing very, very well,” Sarro said. The National Zoo is one of only four zoos in the United States that have giant pandas. The others are in San Diego, California; Memphis, Tennessee; and Atlanta, Georgia. China owns every panda, but the United States has an arrangement with China to allow certain American zoos to borrow pandas to help them breed and increase their population, according to Sarro. Not only are there not many giant pandas in the United States, but few remain in the world. Giant pandas are a threatened species, which makes the birth of panda cubs very important. According to the National Zoo, fewer than 1,600 giant pandas are left in the wild. The National Zoo aims to help species whose populations have been dwindling to dangerously low levels. Although zoo vets work to breed many threatened species, such as the Cuban crocodile, pandas are their main focus. “We save species. Pandas are very important to that mission,” Sarro said. “We want to make sure that these animals never go extinct in the wild.”


At the National Zoo, it’s time for a young male elephant to find a mate

A playful Kandula tosses around a tire at the National Zoo in Washington. (Nikki Kahn/The Washington Post) “Tail,” Debbie Flinkman commanded the gray behemoth standing before her. “Kandula,” she said, holding out an orange-tipped training stick. “Tail.” The Asian elephant she helped raise weighs 7,300 pounds. He is 13, has brown eyes and long eyelashes, and was standing in a huge steel shipping container, open at one end. He knew that “tail” meant he had to present his rear. That meant turning around and backing into the container, which is scary. But he had to practice because he is going on a journey. Kandula gets used to being in a shipping crate at the National Zoo in Washington. (Nikki Kahn/The Washington Post) The National Zoo, where its prized male elephant was born, said Tuesday that Kandula will be shipped to the Oklahoma City Zoo this fall so that he can breed. The departure comes as the zoo has been trying to build its elephant herd, with the addition of four new elephants in the past two years. But Kandula is too closely related to the zoo’s breeding-age female, Maharani, who is technically his aunt. The zoo wants to get an unrelated breeding male to replace Kandula — and has a potential candidate, officials said. Despite the loss to the zoo, the move should be good for Kandula, veteran elephant curator Tony Barthel said Tuesday. He will come under the tutelage of a 47-year-old bull named Rex in a state-of-the art facility. And he will have access to females to whom he is not related. The Oklahoma City Zoo has a herd of seven elephants. But it will be frightening for the adolescent Kandula, who once developed a phobia of flying insects after he was stung by bees. And it will be difficult for long-term elephant keepers like Flinkman. “Love of my life,” she said at the zoo Tuesday. “I love that kid so much.” “I think about him all day when I’m here,” she said. “And when I’m at home, I’m thinking of things to bring. . . . ‘Oh, he would love that.’ Or, ‘How can I make that elephant-size.’ ” “I miss him already,” she said. “Sometimes, I just cry. But he’ll always be ours.” (The zoo said it will retain ownership of Kandula.) “I’m treating him like my nieces and nephews who are going off to college,”


said. “Over the years, he’s slowly moved from that calf, to that young elephant, to now, when you look at him, you really can’t help but see a bull,” he said. “He just emanates that in his walk.” But Tuesday, he was wary. His ears flapped. His tail twitched. “Hey, bud,” Barthel said as the elephant appeared. Barthel said the keepers, Flinkman and Jason Gue, were trying to get Kandula used to the container and to other noises and distractions he might encounter on the road. “It’ll be stressful enough, the whole [transit] process,” he said. “We do everything we can to minimize . . . stress.” If Kandula can become familiar with going in and out of the container, the transfer will be easier. Flinkman said a part of her hopes the move doesn’t happen. But she said she knows it’s for the best. She and her “baby boy” go back far. She was present when he was born Nov. 25, 2001. She, and others, stayed in the elephant compound 24 hours a day for 14 days after he was born, sleeping on cots at night. “I had pneumonia,” Flinkman said. “It was Thanksgiving weekend.” She helped his mother, Shanthi, get used to nursing her rambunctious son. She watched him learn to swim. As a calf, he tried to sit on Flinkman’s lap. “I would say, ‘Boy, you’re 300 pounds. You don’t fit.’ ” She learned his likes and dislikes and saw his fears — bees, butterflies and moths, for example, as well as a scary face a keeper drew in chalk on a wall. Kandula was so bothered by the face that the staff had to wash it off, Flinkman said. The elephant is very expressive and easy to read, she said, but can be aggressive if frustrated. The trip “is going to be the most scary thing he’s ever done in his life,” she said. Hence, the container training. “I need him to be . . . comfortable in that crate. I need it to be his sanctuary.” She plans to make the trip to Oklahoma City with him. And it would be great, she said, if someday he were to come back to breed with new females here. Although there are no such plans, Flinkman said she would then get to see things come “full circle.” And if he does return, she said, “I’ll be waiting.”


Last inmate is transferred out of the scandal-plagued Baltimore jail

The Maryland Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services transferred the last inmate from the men’s jail at the Baltimore City Detention Center on Tuesday evening, officially shutting down the beleaguered facility less than a month after Gov. Larry Hogan (R) ordered it to close. Hogan surprised lawmakers and local officials on July 30 when he announced that he had instructed Stephen T. Moyer, the corrections secretary, to begin the closure of the Civil War-era facility immediately and the transfer of its 750 pretrial inmates. For decades, advocates complained about the deplorable conditions at the jail. And two years ago, the facility became the focus of a state task force after a sweeping federal indictment revealed that a gang leader was operating an elaborate drug operation from behind bars with help from several state correctional officers. “The final closure of this detention center removes a stain on the reputation of our state and Maryland’s correctional system,” Hogan said in a statement. “For years, corruption, criminal activity, and deplorable conditions have plagued this facility.” Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan speaks in front of Maryland Secretary of Public Safety and Correctional Services Stephen Moyer at Baltimore City Detention Center, Thursday, July 30, 2015, in Baltimore, to announce his plan to immediately shut down the jail. The jail grabbed headlines in 2013 after a sweeping federal indictment exposed a sophisticated drug- and cellphone-smuggling ring involving dozens of gang members and correctional officers. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky) (Patrick Semansky/AP) State officials estimate that the state will save $10 million to $15 million a year by closing the jail. Inmates were transferred to other parts of the Baltimore City pretrial complex. Many advocates for prisoners praised Hogan for closing the facility, which they deemed one of the worst facilities in the country. But they also worried how some inmates, especially those who take medicines or received medical treatment, might be affected by the transfers. Charles H. Dorsey III, deputy public defender for the state, said the main challenge his office initially faced in recent weeks was locating clients. “It has been a challenge to find our clients,” Dorsey said, noting that his office represents about 80 percent of the jail’s caseload.


Two U.S. troops killed in apparent ‘insider’ attack by Afghan soldier

forces at Camp Bastion, a sprawling military base in central Helmand. Army Col. Brian Tribus, a U.S. military spokesman in Afghanistan, said that no coalition service members are “permanently located in Helmand province” at present but that “expeditionary advising teams” travel to different Afghan military bases in Helmand “to conduct their TAA [train, advise and assist] mission.” Tribus and other U.S. officials declined to say whether the slain service members were Special Operations troops or specify on which base the shooting occurred. In October, U.S. Marines and British forces withdrew from Camp Bastion and handed it over to the Afghan National Army. Most remaining American forces in southern Afghanistan have been based at Kandahar Airfield in neighboring Kandahar province. Afghan forces in Helmand have been struggling to repel repeated attacks by insurgents from the Afghan Taliban. Attal said the confrontation Wednesday may have been sparked by a verbal dispute between coalition forces and soldiers from the Afghan National Army. But coalition troops have long been vulnerable to unprovoked attacks from rogue Afghan soldiers or those who sympathize with the Taliban. In addition to Wednesday’s incident, there have been two other insider or “green on blue” attacks in Afghanistan this year. In January, an Afghan soldier killed three American civilian contractors at a base near Kabul’s international airport. An Afghan soldier also shot and killed an American soldier in April in eastern Nangahar province, the Associated Press reported. Last August, U.S Army Maj. Gen. Harold J. Greene was killed when an Afghan soldier opened fire at a military academy near Kabul, becoming the highest-ranking U.S. officer to be killed in a combat zone since the Vietnam War. The Washington Post published a story last week detailing how Greene’s widow and other family members are questioning a Pentagon investigation into the incident. Wednesday’s attack came amid a spike in lethal attacks on coalition troops and contractors serving in Afghanistan. On Saturday, three civilian U.S. contractors were killed when a vehicle packed with explosives rammed a coalition convoy in central Kabul. The three contractors worked for McLean, Va.-based DynCorp International, which provides logistical and training support to coalition and Afghan forces in Afghanistan. In a statement, the company identified the victims of Saturday’s attack as Corey J. Dodge, 40, of Dexter, Maine; Richard P. McEvoy, 57, of Peachtree City, Ga.; and Barry D. Sutton, 46, of Calhoun, Ga. McEvoy was a retired Army


Montgomery Animal Watch

These cases were received by the Montgomery County Animal Services Division. For information, call 240-773-5900. This number provides recorded information on topics such as the new animal services and adoption center’s hours and location in Derwood, adoption and licensing procedures, and lost-and-found and field services. Split personality? Fighting leads to biting: Raccoon trouble: MCHS “Yappy Hour!” fundraiser: Reduced fees for cat adoption: Germantown Adoptable cats at no-kill shelter: Gaithersburg Noon to 3 p.m. Saturday6 to 8 p.m. Wednesday Adopt dogs and cats at MCHS no-kill rescue: Rockville — Compiled by Lisa M. Bolton


Panda cub dies at National Zoo after frantic six-hour effort to save its life

began administering antibiotics, fluids and nutrition, and pumping oxygen into the incubator. Neiffer said it was unclear what, if anything, happened when the cub was with Mei overnight. He said it can be impossible to see the tiny cub tucked into the fur of its burly mother. “Mom’s able to literally hide it under her chin,” he said. By midmorning, Neiffer said the cub seemed to improve. “At that point, the kid was coming up,” Neiffer said. “Slowly. Not great. But making some strides.” Then about 12:30 p.m., Neiffer got a call that the cub seemed to be failing. He rushed to the panda house, where almost a dozen experts were crowded around the cub trying to save its life, he said. About 2 p.m., the cub went into respiratory arrest and then cardiac arrest. Veterinarians did gentle cardiopulmonary resuscitation. “We had our moments during that two hours where we said, ‘All right, we are going to get over this,’ ” Neiffer said. But they could not. “It was very quick,” he said of the animal’s death. “I don’t know how long the heart was beating after the baby stopped breathing. Probably not very long.” “I made the call,” he said. “It’s part of the job. It’s not the fun part of the job. . . . It’s my burden, that I chose.” Smith said that many of the country’s foremost panda experts, including a zookeeper from Zoo Atlanta who sped to Washington as soon as the National Zoo announced that Mei Xiang had had twins, were involved in the cub’s care. Experts in China advised the team by phone. “We’ve all been awake since pretty much Saturday,” Smith said. “The entire panda house was filled with the best medical care team in the world. . . . We were so incredibly hopeful because we had that team.” Ultimately, zookeepers do not know what caused the baby panda’s death, Neiffer said. They plan a necropsy, which may lead to better panda science. “When we receive back our results from pathology, depending what they identify, it may alter the way we approach the next panda cub, and we will share that,” Neiffer said. Before Saturday, Mei Xiang had delivered two surviving cubs since 2005 — Tai Shan on July 9, 2005, and Bao Bao on Aug. 23, 2013. She gave birth to a stillborn cub about 26 hours after Bao Bao.


Md. farmers market finds: honey, pie, root beer cake, fermented apple butter

Woodberry Kitchen's Pikesville Honey Pie. (Dixie D. Vereen/For The Washington Post) ■ The same terrific honey pie that’s on the dessert menu at Woodberry Kitchen in Baltimore is available at the restaurant’s stand in the Baltimore Farmers Market and Bazaar (under the JFX Expressway at East Saratoga Street, Sundays 7 a.m. to noon). The chess-pie-like filling is made with cream, eggs, Pikesville Rye Straight Whiskey (now distilled in Kentucky), local honey and contains local sorghum flour in the crust. Six-inch pie, $8. Root Beer Cake from Stone Soup Catering. (T.J. Kirkpatrick/For The Washington Post) ■ Chef Robert Zello’s root beer cake gets its rich, moist goodness from his own house-made root beer syrup and vanilla extract and a house-made brown sugar; $4 per piece, regular or gluten-free; available at the Gaithersburg Farmers Market in the Kentlands (Saturdays 9 a.m to 2 p.m.) and at the Olney Farmers and Artisans Market (Sundays 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.). For more information, contact Stone Soup Catering, 8613 Ziggy Lane, Gaithersburg. 301-515-6998. ■ The lacto-fermented apple butter from Growing Soul in Sandy Spring is smooth and not too sweet, with the slight tang you’d expect. Half-pints, $5; available at the Olney Farmers and Artisans Market on Sundays. Info: GrowingSoul.org. More from Food: Shopping Cart


One of National Zoo’s giant panda cubs dies

Mei Xiang's first-born giant panda cub began to decline Wednesday and died shortly after 2 p.m. National Zoo officials don’t know the cause of death. (Becky Malinsky/Smithsonian's National Zoo) The smaller of two cubs born Saturday at the National Zoo died Wednesday afternoon of unknown causes, zoo officials said. Zookeepers had been swapping the cubs so they could spend some time with mom Mei Xiang and some time in an incubator. The smaller cub had been with its mom since Tuesday afternoon, and zookeepers were able to hear it on the Panda Cam. “This morning the larger cub went in with mom, and at that point we noticed that the smaller cub was having issues,” said Don Neiffer, the zoo’s chief veterinarian. Neiffer said the cub had not gained weight and had begun to show signs of distress. Despite medical attention from the panda team, the tiny cub died shortly after 2 p.m. Zoo officials said they will know more about why the cub died after tests are run, but they said Mei Xiang was doing her best with both cubs. Mom Mei Xiang and the second twin are said to be in good health. But even healthy cubs are very fragile in the first few weeks of life. (Susan Walsh/AP) “There’s been some misunderstanding that she preferred one cub over the other,” Neiffer said. “That’s not the case.” Giant pandas often have trouble raising more than one cub. That’s why zookeepers were helping to care for them. The panda team will now focus on Mei and the remaining cub. “Right now we still have a very healthy mom and one very healthy baby,” said Brandi Smith, the zoo’s associate director of animal care sciences. “Our goal right now is working with Mei Xiang to make sure this cub survives.” But Smith admitted that the panda team, which hadn’t slept much since Saturday, was hit hard by the loss. “When we realized the panda wasn’t going to make it, it was devastating,” she said.


Md. corrections workers avoid layoffs — for now

Gov. Larry Hogan speaks in front of Maryland Secretary of Public Safety and Correctional Services Stephen Moyer at Baltimore City Detention Center in July. (Patrick Semansky/AP) A plan to lay off dozens of administrative workers from Maryland’s troubled corrections department met with resistance Wednesday as distressed employees pleaded with the state’s Board of Public Works not to go through with the cuts. At the request of Gov. Larry Hogan (R), who chairs the three-member board, the group deferred its decision until its next meeting, in three weeks. The proposal was recommended by Stephen T. Moyer, secretary of the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services, as part of a plan to root out corruption. It would cut the department’s human resources workforce nearly in half, eliminating 63 positions and consolidating separate staffs at each prison facility into one office to ensure uniform hiring and firing practices. “I’m 63 years old, and I’m trying to figure out — what did I do?” said Emily Eubanks, who would lose her job under the proposal. Her question reflected one of the main concerns among critics of the layoff plan: Few of the workers who stand to lose their jobs had anything to do with hiring bad apples, officials say, and most have earned satisfactory or outstanding marks on performance reviews. Moyer said his department desperately needs to change its hiring and accountability practices. He said 253 corrections workers have been arrested since January 2013, an indication that workers are being hired without proper scrutiny. About 200 of those people are still employed by the state, Moyer said, because the agency lacks a strong system for holding them accountable and firing them. He did not specify why they were arrested. Moyer has pledged to improve hiring and add safeguards, in part by centralizing the personnel office. Moyer pointed to well-documented problems with the recently shuttered Baltimore City Detention Center, a state-run facility where corrections officers had helped a gang leader operate a violent drug enterprise. Hogan said he supports the secretary’s goals but asked the board to defer its decision to allow time for the panel, the state’s management chief, the corrections department and the attorney general’s office to consider the best path. “A major component of fighting this corruption and reforming this department is ensuring that we hire good, honest people with the integrity to uphold higher professional standards,” Hogan said. “We have


A small measure of justice for Boris Nemtsov

Propagandists working for the Russian state told the public that Nemtsov was “bankrolled” by the United States; that he drew “inspiration for throwing mud at [his] country from abroad, from those who dream of swallowing, strangling and dismembering Russia”; that he was a “wretched thief” who “robbed Russia”; and that he would have “greeted” Nazi troops had they entered Moscow in 1941. This was not journalism. This was state-sponsored incitement. Needless to say, its perpetrators — the Streichers and the Nahimanas of today’s Russia — enjoy government immunity. But there is a way to hold these dealers of hate accountable. The Kremlin’s propagandists prefer to spend their money and their vacations in the very countries they tell the Russian people to despise. This hypocrisy must stop. The United States has a federal law — the Sergei Magnitsky Act, adopted in 2012 in memory of a Russian anti-corruption lawyer killed in prison — that denies access to the United States and its financial system to those responsible for “gross violations of internationally recognized human rights committed against individuals seeking . . . to expose illegal activity carried out by officials of the Government of the Russian Federation.” The actions of Putin’s propagandists in relation to Nemtsov meet this standard. This year, former Russian prime minister Mikhail Kasyanov and I met with congressional leaders. We asked them to include on the sanctions list the names of eight state television employees responsible for incitement against Nemtsov . They promised to raise the issue with the Obama administration. In a May 2014 interview, shortly after Putin launched his war on Ukraine, Nemtsov urged the West to sanction Kremlin propagandists for fueling the aggression. “These are not journalists,” he said. “They are fighters on Putin’s amoral battlefield, they incite hatred and provoke gunfire.” No one at the time could have imagined the level this hatred would reach. Denying Putin’s propagandists the privilege of traveling to the United States — with the possibility that the European Union would follow with measures — is a poor substitute for justice that these people should be facing in Russia. It is, however, a tangible step . And it is the least the free world can do to honor the memory of Boris Nemtsov. Read more on this topic: The Post’s View: Boris Nemtsov’s last act of courage The Post’s View: Boris Nemtsov’s murder is another dark sign for Russia


A man asked police for help finding his illegal pet. Now it’s dead, and he could be arrested.

The coyote caught and euthanized on Wednesday morning. (Calvert County Sheriff's Office) When a Maryland man went to local police on Wednesday, he was just hoping to get his lost pet back. Instead, animal control officers killed his pet, and the man is facing possible arrest. His pet, you see, was this rather terrifying-looking coyote. And keeping a coyote as a pet, even one with a collar like this one had, is illegal in Maryland. Capt. Todd Ireland of the Calvert County Sheriff’s Office said the coyote, which he described as about the size of a small German shepherd, got loose from his owner some time before 8 a.m. Wednesday. A resident saw the coyote near Neptune’s Seafood Pub in North Beach and called police. An animal control officer captured the animal and brought it to the sheriff’s office — where a North Beach resident arrived, saying he was the owner. The owner, whom police have not named, bought the coyote as a pup in Virginia, Ireland said. Ireland said the coyote showed no signs of rabies. But knowing that coyotes might contract the disease, animal control officers decided to euthanize it. On Thursday afternoon, Ireland said lab tests proved that the coyote was not rabid when it died. Ireland said officers are considering bringing charges against the owner.


Zoo to announce sex and paternity of its twin giant panda cubs

WASHINGTON, DC - AUGUST 24: In this handout provided by the Smithsonian's National Zoo, one of two newborn Giant Pandas born August 22 is cared for by a member of the panda team at the Smithsonian's National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute August 24, 2015 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Smithsonian's National Zoo via Getty Images) (Handout/Getty Images) The National Zoo said it will announce Friday the gender and paternity of the twin giant panda cubs born there last Saturday. As of Thursday, one remained alive and seemed to be thriving. The other died Wednesday. The zoo said it will also provide initial results of a necropsy performed on the body of the dead cub. The zoo’s female giant panda, Mei Xiang, was artificially inseminated twice this year — on April 26 and 27 — with semen collected from the zoo’s male giant panda, Tian Tian, and from a male at a research center in Wolong, China. The Wolong panda, Hui Hui, was picked because he was a good genetic match for Mei, the zoo has said. The sample from Hui Hui was frozen and flown from China to the zoo’s cryopreservation bank. The zoo said earlier that DNA tests can be used to determine sex and see which male sired the cubs. In 2013, genetic tests showed that Tian Tian was the father of zoo’s cub Bao Bao, born Aug. 23, 2013, and a still born cub delivered the next day. That year Mei had been inseminated with sperm from Tian Tian and with some shipped from giant panda at the San Diego zoo, Gao Gao. Zoo experts have said it is hard to determine visually the sex of a cub because the reproductive organs are not fully developed. So veterinarians examine chromosomes. Females have two X chromosomes, and males have an X and a Y chromosome, the zoo has said. The announcement will be the latest chapter in a whirlwind nine days, in which zoo experts realized Mei was pregnant Aug. 19, she delivered the twins Aug. 22, and the smaller cub died Wednesday afternoon. The deceased cub had been born at 5:35 p.m. Saturday, weighing about three ounces. Its larger twin was born at 10:07 p.m. Saturday, weighing 4.8 ounces, the zoo said. Keepers had been switching the cubs as often as they could — giving one to Mei, while caring for the other in a special


Robbing the victims of lead paint poisoning

situation in Maryland’s little-regulated world of structured settlement buyouts. People terribly damaged in childhood by lead paint poisoning are being robbed of the compensation that is supposed to sustain them. State lawmakers need to enact true protections, and those who have been complicit in exploiting these vulnerable people, including judges who have enabled opportunistic businesses, should be held accountable. The disgraceful practices of companies that purchase the rights to court-awarded settlements paid out monthly to lead paint victims were detailed in a searing exposé by The Post’s Terrence McCoy. Baltimore, with long-standing problems of decaying and dangerous housing, has been a primary hunting ground. Those victimized are poor people, many of whom suffered severe cognitive brain damage as the result of childhood exposure to lead paint. The Post’s investigation detailed how these people have been preyed upon by companies that purchase the rights to their structured settlements for a bare fraction of their value. Among the cases cited was a victim who sold nearly $327,000 worth of payments, which had a present-day value of $179,000, for less than $16,200 — about 9 cents on the dollar. Keep in mind that the court settlements were structured in the first place to avoid lump-sum payments so that vulnerable, disabled recipients would have a dependable source of income throughout adulthood. So how on earth could any judge in good conscience sign off on that deal as being in the seller’s best interests? Supposed protections built into a 2000 Maryland law governing these buyouts are wholly inadequate, merely giving cover to companies to act with impunity. It’s absurd that these arrangements can be approved without the settlement recipient being in the courtroom and that companies can shop the state for judges likely to give less scrutiny. Moreover, the independent professional advisers whom the law requires a seller to consult seem to have been more interested in helping companies seal their deals than in finding what is best for the seller. Del. Samuel I. Rosenberg (D-Baltimore) said he will introduce legislation in the upcoming General Assembly session to deal with the issue, and Attorney General Brian E. Frosh (D) said his office is aggressively reviewing the matter, including different aspects of these transactions. We hope that means investigation of the companies behind these deals and recourse for people who have been twice victimized. Read More: Terrence McCoy: How companies make millions off lead-poisoned, poor blacks


At decrepit Baltimore jail, all that’s left are worn, empty cells

Layers of paint cover bars in a cell in the now-closed men's section of the Baltimore City Detention Center. (Patrick Semansky/AP) The dank, dirty cells of the men’s detention center at the Baltimore City jail are empty now. All that remain are the metal bed frames for the bunk beds, the metal toilets and sinks. Beige paint has been scraped off the cinderblock walls in places, revealing at least three other colors underneath. A sliver of light shines from a small crevice near the ceiling of each 6-by-8-foot enclosure. Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) ordered state correctional officials last month to shut down the state-run jail, which dates to the 19th century and includes lots of small, dark corners where correctional officers worried about their safety. For years, many cells were uninhabitable because of non-working toilets or leaky pipes, according to officials and attorneys. The last detainee was removed from the jail this week. A sign hangs in an interior courtyard during a media tour of the Baltimore City Detention Center. (Patrick Semansky/AP) On Thursday, the state corrections secretary, Stephen T. Moyer, provided a tour of the shuttered facility, offering a rare glimpse of the conditions that men who were awaiting trial experienced. “This building needed to go,” he said. “Prison isn’t a good place for anybody, but people deserve better conditions than what that building offered.” The majority of the 850 men housed in the pretrial detention facility have been moved to the Metropolitan Transition Center, a facility built in the 1990s in the same city block as the men’s jail. There, inmates are housed in a dormitory-style, two-story area that is flooded with light. Dozens of beds are arranged side by side on each floor. On the first level are a half dozen round tables, with plastic chairs surrounding them. Moyer said none of the detainees who are awaiting trial were transferred out of the city. Instead, the state moved several hundred already-sentenced inmates to its prison in Jessup and other nearby facilities to make room for the pretrial detainees. The transfers marked the end of a long and troubled period for the facility, the detainees who were held there and the employees who guarded them. Prison reform advocates complained for decades about the deplorable conditions, arguing that the jail was unsafe for workers and inhumane for people awaiting trial. The jail gained national attention two years ago


Dedicating time and resources to safety on our nation’s trains

legislation requiring passenger and freight railroads to implement a communications technology called positive train control (PTC), which keeps trains from speed limit violations and collisions. It set a firm Dec. 31 deadline that the Federal Railroad Administration cannot waive: Congress alone has the power to delay. If it does not, liability concerns may stop trains from operating. The problem is nicely illustrated by two Washington-area examples: Maryland’s MARC commu ter train service and the Virginia Railway Express (VRE). There are two components to the upgrade. One involves changes to the trains. Those are under the purview of MARC and VRE, and both say they fully expect their systems to be in compliance by the deadline. The second set of modifications, though, have to occur on the tracks. It’s up to Amtrak and the freight carriers who own the miles of rail in each state’s jurisdiction to get that job done. Amtrak has the system in place in the Northeast Corridor and says it will have finished testing by the deadline. The freight carriers, however, are not there yet. Chances are they still will not be in January. That threatens not only Maryland and Virginia commuter rails but also operations on carrier-owned rails throughout the country. Railroad companies have little excuse not to get into compliance faster. Experts say PTC could have prevented May’s fatal Amtrak crash near Philadelphia. Eight people died there. The National Transportation Safety Board estimates that the technology could have saved 65 more lives between 2004 and 2014. Surely the threat of a standstill in January would push all parties involved to tune up their trains and their tracks. A shutdown would leave 50,000 Maryland and Virginia commuters stranded every day, if not more in other states. Contingency plans to put commuters on buses are hardly an acceptable substitute for mass railway travel. There is a middle ground. The federal government needs to be able to impose fines and other penalties on delinquent passenger and freight lines, and commuters need to be able to get where they’re going. Congress should revise the 2008 legislation to give railroads more time to come into compliance, with consequences for those who fail to produce concrete plans for immediate improvement and meet milestones along the way. Read more about this topic: The Post’s View: Prevent the next train tragedy The Post’s View: Safety standards for oil trains are way off track


Local digest

MARYLAND Man is charged in death of toddler A Riverdale area man has been charged with first-degree murder and child abuse after his girlfriend’s 1-year-old son died of blunt-force injuries, Prince George’s County police said Thursday. Osman Sesay, 28, was arrested in connection with the boy’s death Wednesday. The child’s mother left the boy with Sesay when she went to work on Aug. 1, police said. At about 10:30 a.m., police were called to the 6800 block of Riverdale Road, where they found Ahmed Jalloh “unresponsive and barely breathing,” according to charging documents. The toddler was taken to a hospital, where he was pronounced dead. Teen slaying suspect in police custody A 17-year-old wanted in connection with the slaying of another teen is now in custody, according to Prince George’s County Police. Chet Markland Jarrett Jr. Police found the wounded Mcrae at about 9:55 p.m. Aug. 21 in the 4300 block of Rockport Lane in Glenn Dale. He died at a hospital. Officers euthanize coyote kept as pet When a Maryland man went to the police on Wednesday, he was hoping to retrieve his lost pet. Instead, animal control officers killed the pet. The animal was a coyote, and keeping a coyote as a pet is illegal in Maryland. Capt. Todd Ireland of the Calvert County Sheriff’s Office said the coyote got away from his owner before 8 a.m. Wednesday. Ireland said the coyote showed no signs of rabies, but because coyotes can contract the disease, the animal was euthanized. On Thursday, Ireland said tests proved that the coyote was not rabid. VIRGINIA Teen’s body found in Potomac search Rescue workers on Thursday found the body of a teenager who disappeared during a fishing excursion with friends along the Potomac. Fairfax County police identified the teen as Vladimir Antonio Perez Flores, 16. The teen and others were fishing on Wednesday evening in the Mount Vernon area where Little Hunting Creek meets the river. He disappeared while swimming, police said. Witnesses immediately called 911. Rescue crews from the Fairfax police and fire departments, along with the U.S. Coast Guard, were involved in searching for the youth. — Dana Hedgpeth and Julie Zauzmer


Assault, looting among charges for Md. corrections employees still on the job

corrections bureau 90 days to complete disciplinary cases once officials became aware of criminal charges against uniformed employees. But officials say the process often took as long as six months. Then-Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) signed legislation last year that eliminated the 90-day processing window for criminal cases and for incidents involving inmates or events at correctional facilities. Moyer said he is streamlining the process to resolve delays and ensure that his office is quickly aware of offenses. He has hired a new investigations director, human resources director and other top officials to help lead the process. “All are working with a specific mission in mind: To make certain that we hire good people faster and terminate law breakers and bad employees faster,” Thomas said, adding that the department has already reduced the time it takes to process termination cases to about 45 days. The employees arrested over the past 32 months include two female corrections officers who were seen on surveillance video looting a 7-Eleven during April’s riots in Baltimore. Both were charged with felonies, and the department has placed them on emergency suspension. Their hearings and court cases are pending. The employees Moyer cited Wednesday do not include two dozen who were indicted in a notorious 2013 case at the recently shuttered Baltimore men’s detention center where corrections officers helped a gang leader operate a violent drug enterprise. AFSCME, the union that represents the state’s corrections officers, noted that only a tiny fraction of the 11,000 personnel who work for the department are facing charges. But the union agreed that the agency needs to root out bad actors. “If these folks committed serious crimes and they’re convicted, we agree — they should lose their jobs,” said Jeff Pittman, a spokesman for AFSCME. “But the vast majority of the employees are doing their jobs with integrity.” As part of his effort to improve hiring and firing, Moyer has proposed cutting 63 human-resources positions and consolidating separate staffs at each prison facility into one office. Union officials say the proposal is making scapegoats of innocent workers. Pittman said “many state workers with sterling job records and no responsibility for hiring and firing are being unfairly targeted for firing themselves.” The state Board of Public Works on Wednesday delayed a decision on cutting those positions until mid-September. The board is chaired by Gov. Larry Hogan (R). Ovetta Wiggins contributed to this report.


‘It’s a boy!’ the National Zoo says of surviving giant panda cub

Drum roll . . . The giant panda cub is a boy — and its father is Tian Tian. The National Zoo said Friday that the cub born there last Saturday was doing well. The other panda cub, also a boy and with the same father, died Wednesday. Officials said an initial necropsy showed that the cub had inhaled some food product, which led to pneumonia. The zoo’s female adult giant panda, Mei Xiang, was artificially inseminated twice this year — on April 26 and 27 — with semen collected from the zoo’s male giant panda, Tian Tian, and from a male at a research center in Wolong, China. The Wolong panda, Hui Hui, was picked because he was a good genetic match for Mei Xiang, the zoo has said. The sample from Hui Hui was frozen and flown from China to the zoo’s cryopreservation bank. The zoo used DNA tests and swabs from the cubs’ mouths to determine their sex and figure out which male sired the cubs, which were not identical twins. It has been a whirlwind nine days at the National Zoo after experts realized that Mei Xiang was pregnant Aug. 19. She delivered the cubs Aug. 22, and the smaller one died Wednesday afternoon after a six-hour effort by zookeepers to save it. Officials had used a bottle and a tube to feed the smaller panda cub at various points. On Friday, the zoo’s chief veterinarian, Don Neiffer, said the cub could have inhaled food during one of the bottle feedings. Experts had also resorted to tube feeding, inserting a tube down the cub’s throat so food could be delivered to its stomach. The cub could have inhaled food at that point as well, Neiffer said. “I’m sure the difficulty in breathing existed for the cub based on the degree of lung damage that we noted . . . during necropsy,” he said. “The ability for this cub to return to normal health was highly unlikely to impossible.” Zoo officials said they have been saddened by the death of the cub but are also watching — with hope — the surviving cub as he continues to do well, with a 16 percent weight gain. “We’re ecstatic about that,” Neiffer said. The zoo said no decision has been made on when the cub will be named. The zoo’s female cub, Bao Bao, was named 100 days after


22, and the smaller one died Wednesday afternoon after a six-hour effort by zookeepers to save it. Officials had used a bottle and a tube to feed the smaller panda cub at various points. On Friday, the zoo’s chief veterinarian, Don Neiffer, said the cub could have inhaled food during one of the bottle feedings. Experts had also resorted to tube feeding, inserting a tube down the cub’s throat so food could be delivered to its stomach. The cub could have inhaled food at that point as well, Neiffer said. “I’m sure the difficulty in breathing existed for the cub based on the degree of lung damage that we noted . . . during necropsy,” he said. “The ability for this cub to return to normal health was highly unlikely to impossible.” Zoo officials said they have been saddened by the death of the cub but are also watching — with hope — the surviving cub as he continues to do well, with a 16 percent weight gain. “We’re ecstatic about that,” Neiffer said. The zoo said no decision has been made on when the cub will be named. The zoo’s female cub, Bao Bao, was named 100 days after her birth, and the zoo may or may not do the same with the newborn cub. The newborn will probably make its first public appearance in January, said Pamela Baker-Masson, a zoo spokeswoman. Feeding complications On Friday, Neiffer said of the deceased cub, “My feeling is that the reason this cub declined is because of complications associated with us hand-rearing it, providing milk either through the nipple or the stomach tube.” The hand-rearing and swapping of the cubs in and out of their mother’s care was necessary, he said, and has worked well for giant panda cubs in captivity in China. “If we had not done anything, there was a real chance that neither cub would survive,” Neiffer said. The complications could have happened to either cub, Neiffer said, as both were hand-fed at different times. “As the [smaller one] got weaker, looking at the videos we have, there is some feeling that Mei Xiang knew something was going on,” he said. “There was never any evidence that she was preferring one cub over the other. “We knew going into this that there was potential for the complication that occurred,” he said. “We certainly are going to go back .


D.C.-based Liquidity Services takes stock of its own business

Liquidity Services employees refurbish flat screen TVs to resell for its Fortune 500 clients. The company has lost contracts with the Defense Department and Wal-Mart in the past year. (Courtesy of Liquidity Services) Liquidity Services is in the business of selling things you didn’t know you could buy, such as an ambulance, a silo or, until recently, a tank. The District-based company grew from its roots as a surplus marketplace founded during the dot-com boom to become a big player in the liquidation business, helping government and businesses get rid of their extra stuff. In the past year, Liquidity Services has had to take inventory on its own business. Its stock price and bottom line have been hammered as the company lost a pair of key contracts while it was in the midst of a costly makeover. The company runs nine separate marketplaces that operate on different systems: Some are aimed at consumers, others at businesses. There’s a site for consumers to buy military surplus and another for retail stores’ closeout items. It runs Web sites targeted at selling trucks to businesses, for example, and equipment for building pipelines and extracting natural gas. Its profits plummeted more than 90 percent, to $1.6 million, in its latest quarter, it reported. Over the past year, its stock price has been cut in half, to $7.36 a share. Analysts say the company could return to growing profits and bigger margins, but they don’t expect any sort of rebound for at least a year. The troubles began last year in April when Liquidity Services lost a bidding war for the right to sell the Defense Department’s old tanks, trailers and other vehicles. It was left with contracts to sell off the department’s scrap and other surplus — such as boots and bags — which carry thinner profit margins. Then, in December, Wal-Mart cut short its deal with the company. (Wal-Mart settled a dispute with the company this year for $7.5 million.) Losing those deals, Liquidity said, cost it nearly $34 million in sales this quarter, about one-quarter of its total revenue this time last year. All the while, the weak energy market has slowed sales of heavy machinery, and the company has been pouring money into a project to fuse the constellation of businesses and Web sites it runs, which has been a cumbersome and costly process, said Rohit Kulkarni, an RBC analyst. “This


Five myths about pandas

Tai Shan, with mother Mei Xiang looking on, took his first steps outside at the National Zoo in December 2005. (Jessie Cohen/AFP/Getty Images) Bill McShea, also known as the “panda guy,” is a research scientist at the Smithsonian’s Conservation Biology Institute in Front Royal, Va. The Smithsonian National Zoo’s panda cam maxed out its bandwidth this past week as the saga of the giant panda family unfolded. There was celebration upon the birth of a cub, jubilant surprise at the arrival of a twin, then heartbreak when the smaller cub didn’t make it and suspense over the true father. Despite the public fascination with these animals, certain misconceptions are stubbornly persistent. If you should find yourself discussing the latest panda news, please do not fall for the following myths. 1. Pandas are cuddly, gentle creatures. Online photographs of grinning people hugging baby pandas may suggest that giant pandas would make perfect pets. But make no mistake: They are bears and built to be aggressive. Their canines and claws are well developed, and the musculature in their limbs and jaws is sufficient to inflict serious damage. Indeed, they do harm one another, particularly when males are establishing dominance or competing for females. Males in China’s Qinling Mountains are often observed with torn ears and bite wounds from tussling with other males. And in 2007, the first captive-born male reintroduced into the wild died after an apparent fight with other pandas. Attacks on humans are relatively unusual. In 1984, the National Zoo’s Ling-Ling bit a keeper. Generally keepers do not enter the pandas’ enclosures when the animals are there. They know that you should no more cuddle an adult giant panda than you should an adult black bear. 2. Pandas are incompetent breeders. The original power couple at the National Zoo, Hsing-Hsing and Ling-Ling, were a breeding pair for almost 20 years. Hsing-Hsing famously attempted to mate with Ling-Ling’s foot and ear. They ultimately produced five cubs; none survived. Such records have led to the hypothesis that reproductive incompetence is one factor behind the panda’s endangered status. “They have no libido, no interest in repopulating the species,” Brian Barrett wrote for Gizmodo in a typical rant. However, there is no evidence that giant pandas have any problems breeding in their natural habitat. (Their rarity in the wild has to do with too many people occupying the little remaining bamboo forest.) In the


National Zoo’s panda cub is a boy

t-TYEN t-YEN), the adult male panda at the zoo, is the father of the cubs. Zookeepers had taken swabs from inside the cubs’ mouths Monday to determine their sex. The unnamed surviving cub is gaining weight and appears to be healthy, said Don Neiffer, the zoo’s chief veterinarian. “He’s doing great, and we’re very excited about the progress of that little boy,” Neiffer said. Neiffer said more recent tests suggest that the smaller cub died as a result of the panda team helping to to feed it, either with a bottle or a tube directly into its stomach. Tian Tian (t-YEN t-YEN) wanders around his enclosure Friday. He is the father of the living male cub and the twin that died Wednesday. Male pandas do not help raise their cubs, so the two will have little interaction. (Shawn Thew/EPA) “We consider the most likely cause of death to be aspiration of food material into the respiratory system,” he said. Aspiration means that some of the formula accidentally went into the cub’s lungs. When that happens, bacteria or fungus can begin to grow and breathing can become difficult. Neiffer said the panda staff bottle-fed because Mei Xiang (may-SHONG) could not care for both cubs at the same time and zookeepers were not able to swap the cubs as often as they would have liked. “Unfortunately Mei . . . was not always willing to put down the cub that was in her possession,” he said. Bottle feeding and tube feeding, which zookeepers moved to as the cub failed to gain weight, both carry a risk of aspiration. The surviving cub has continued to gain weight. He has gone from 4.9 ounces to nearly 5.9 ounces from Wednesday till Friday. “We’re absolutely ecstatic about that,” Neiffer said. And Mei Xiang has been attentive to the cub’s needs. “When the cub squeals, Mei pays attention,” said Brandi Smith, the zoo’s associate director for animal care sciences. That meant Mei hadn’t had a bathroom break since before the birth. Early Friday morning, she finally had a chance to leave the den to urinate, Smith said. Zoo officials said the cub is still in a high-risk period, and they have made no decisions about when he will be named. Mei’s other surviving cubs, Tai Shan (tie-SHON) and Bao Bao (rhymes with bow-wow) were named at 100 days, the timing of which is a Chinese tradition.


Don’t fuss over food trucks

A food truck at Farragut Square. (David C. Kennedy for The Washington Post) Craving something more exciting than leftovers or instant noodles? If you live or work in the District, you’re in luck. Food trucks have firmly taken hold in the District and are transforming the way we think about dining out. But the news isn’t all good. Unhappy with their competition, restaurant owners in Bethesda and Arlington are calling for punitive regulations on these four-wheeled kitchens. Specifically, they want tight restrictions on when and where the trucks can operate. As they debate how to proceed, they may want to look to the District for guidance. Surprisingly, for a city known for its red tape, the District illustrates everything that’s right with the food truck movement. After years of reform and regulatory debates, food truckers say the capital’s regulations are “some of the best in the country.” The fruits of these efforts are everywhere you look. Hubs such as Farragut Square and L’Enfant Plaza teem with mobile restaurants. The District’s roadside culinary scene is a veritable United Nations of ethnic food and exciting fusions. Che Ruddell-Tabisola, founder and owner of the BBQ Bus, tried to start a butcher shop in 2011 but couldn’t afford the half-million-dollar loan. Instead, he borrowed $98,000 and put his operation on wheels. Four years later, he has a food truck and a brick-and-mortar store. Such entrepreneurial success stories are happening across the country. With at least 4,000 trucks operating nationwide, this year’s nearly $1 billion in revenue is expected to nearly triple to $2.7 billion by 2017. Food trucks aren’t a fad — they’re the future of dining. So why the fuss? Where the rest of us see innovation, brick-and-mortar restaurant owners see competition, and they’re trying to use the government to shut it down. In Montgomery County, food trucks can operate only from dawn to dusk. This prohibits them from catering to city nightlife and causes financial hurdles during short winter days. The Montgomery County Council is debating whether to lift this regulation, but restaurant owners are demanding a full menu of punitive regulations in return. Invoking supposed public safety concerns, they want food trucks to remain a minimum distance from restaurants, be confined to food truck zones or have their numbers capped. Restaurants in Arlington’s Courthouse area are making similar demands. Acting more like cartels than caterers, they’re trying to freeze food trucks


A summer so lawless in D.C., it feels like the Wild West

the better part of valor. After protests from the riding public and calls from chagrined city officials, Metro reversed its decision. But the reality of the situation can’t be changed: Lawlessness that would put the old Wild West to shame has taken root in parts of our city. We probably have more gunfights on our streets than occurred in Tombstone and Deadwood combined. And law-breaking takes place with impunity. Time was, most shootings and killings in the District occurred under the cover of darkness, offering the best chances for evasion and escape. Not so today. The brazenness is staggering. In one afternoon this month: A 21-year-old man was shot multiple times and died around noon on the grounds of St. Luke Roman Catholic Church on East Capitol Street; at 3:50 p.m., a 17-year-old in Southeast took a gun to the apartment of a woman and her 12-year-old boy — the mother died from gunshot wounds; at 4:45 p.m., a man was shot and killed in the 2700 block of 17th Street NE. And on a recent Saturday afternoon in broad daylight near a busy Metro station in Shaw, an innocent bystander was killed in crossfire. As is customary with a spike in crime, calls came forth to put more police on the streets, as if more cops on the corner are the answer. Consider this D.C. police news release: “On Wednesday, July 29th at around 11:00PM, at Piney Branch Road and Missouri Avenue, NW, three people were shot, each sustaining non-life threatening injuries. While in the area, MPD officers observed a subject running with what appeared to be a gun. The subject running was captured and recovered was a firearm.” Significance? The triple shooting occurred within eyesight of the police department’s Fourth District headquarters. What part of “impunity” is not understood? In the D.C. real estate market, the mantra is location, location, location. And where does D.C. crime take place? Anywhere it wants to. Yes, most of the violence is concentrated in neighborhoods east of North Capitol Street. But chalk that up to the perpetrators’ choice, not because the rest of the city is considered off-limits. Just ask the folks who live in the vicinity of the 3200 block of Woodland Drive in upper Northwest, where Savvas Savopoulos, his wife, young son and housekeeper were brutally murdered. Which gets us to the city’s response. Expanded police powers seem to be


With two killed in D.C. Friday night, homicide tally matches all of 2014’s

that the police force is understaffed, and they have repeatedly criticized Lanier for eliminating plainclothes operations that police once used to monitor outdoor drug sales, which have declined. Severing that connection to the streets, Burton said, has made it more difficult to gather information that could prevent violence. The chief has dismissed his assertion, noting that the increase in violence started before she made the change and that many of this year’s homicides have had nothing to do with drugs. Among those killed: Charnice Milton, a 27-year-old community journalist who was shot in Southeast in May as she was returning home from covering a community meeting at Eastern Market; Tamara Gliss, a 31-year-old mother who was shot during a Memorial Day cookout in Shaw; and Shaun Simmons, an 18-year-old who was about to start his senior year at Ballou High School when he was shot Aug. 1 in Congress Heights. Friday’s gunfire was reported across the city, from the 4400 block of Sixth Place NE near Catholic University, to 16th and R streets SE near Anacostia High School, to the 2400 block of 18th Street in Northwest. The bloody scene in Southeast Washington was a short walk from the grounds of St. Luke Roman Catholic Church on East Capitol Street, where Amari Jenkins, 21, was killed Aug. 18. What prompted Friday’s killings, in the 4900 block of B Street SE, is under investigation. A 45-year-old woman was at home Friday night when she heard the gunshots and came out to find James on the sidewalk. She held his head as his eyes rolled back, the woman recalled Saturday. She saw no one else offer help. “I’m trying to get him breathing,” she said, “but when I heard him gurgling, I was like, ‘It’s done.’ ” She spotted Johnson nearby, clutching a chain-link fence before he collapsed to the ground. He tried to talk. She told him to hold on. “I’ve known Johnson his entire life,” said the woman, who asked not to be identified out of fear for her safety. “I held him when he first came home from the hospital, and I held him when he took his last breath.” James went by “Shy” — short for Shaheed — but he was anything but. A few years ago, Khadijah Pettaway was walking home from her job at a hair salon when he approached her and asked her name. He


Skywatch: A full harvest moon with a total lunar eclipse

Forget July’s blue moon. For September’s full moon, you’ll probably see red. Catch a compelling, cosmic treat Sept. 27 and 28: It’s a full harvest moon featuring a total lunar eclipse. As Earth travels around the sun, the planet always casts a shadow. Late in September, the moon moves across that shadow, and we are in a perfect place to watch a total lunar eclipse. By the way, it’s the largest full moon of the year. The partial phase starts at 9:07 p.m. Sept. 27, when our lunar neighbor cruises into the Earth’s penumbral shadow, according to Fred Espenak, a NASA alumnus and noted eclipse expert. Over the following hour, the moon advances into the umbral shadow. At 10:11 p.m., the moon reaches totality, completely engrossed in the umbra, or the darkest part of the shadow — and that’s when skygazers may bask in an orange-red moon. (Espenak’s Web site: www.eclipsewise.com.) The reddish totality lasts 1 hour 12 minutes, according to Espenak, beginning at 10:11 p.m. and ending at 11:23 p.m. Entering the second partial phase, you’ll see the shadow depart the moon’s surface — and that partial phase ends at 12:27 a.m. Sadly, this is the last total lunar eclipse in the tetrad, which is a series of four total lunar eclipses in a row. The next tetrad series will be in 2032 and 2033, but there are an astounding six tetrads remaining in this century. Note that there’s a partial solar eclipse Sept. 13, but it’s a Southern Hemisphere event seen only from southern Africa, part of Antarctica and the Indian Ocean. Catch it live online at Slooh.com, where you also can see the total lunar eclipse Sept. 27 and 28, too. Spy planetary action in the morning: Wake up early when September ends, and Venus becomes an exquisite, minus-4.8 magnitude, that planet’s most brilliant point, before it slightly dims through the rest of the year, according to the U.S. Naval Observatory. In the planetary parade, Mars falls back from Venus in the eastern morning sky in September’s early days. Our neighboring red planet is a relatively dim 1.8 magnitude. Jupiter In the evening, find the ringed Saturn (zero magnitude, bright) in the south-southwestern sky. It sets after 11 p.m. now, and after 10 p.m. by mid-month. Breaking from summer’s heat, it’s time for a chill: Down-to-Earth events: ●Saturday — ●Saturday — ●Sept. 7 — ●Sept. 11 —


Local digest: Aug. 30, 2015

the region Supermoon lights up the sky this weekend A supermoon occurred Saturday night, with the moon nearly full and close to Earth. But the moon Sunday night should still be super enough. The term “supermoon” has been used to describe the unusual brightness of a full moon seen near its closest approach to Earth. The moon was full at 2:35 p.m. Saturday. It still will be nearly full when it rises Sunday night. It also will be relatively close and should still be uncommonly bright. — Martin Weil the District 5 women arrested on solicitation charges In a prostitution crackdown, D.C. police have been arresting men in connection with alleged solicitation of women for sex. On Friday, in an apparent expansion of the program, the police reported the arrests of five women on charges of soliciting men. The number of arrests in the program has risen to 246. — Martin Weil


Stop ‘aging’ that hoppy beer. It’s only getting worse.

it indefinitely.” As more breweries release limited-edition beers, the question has become not only what to drink, but when. Some beer lovers save rare bottles for a special occasion; others stockpile favorites to keep enjoying once they’re no longer available. And some want to cellar a beer. The problem is, time is not always a beer’s friend, especially if that beer is hoppy. Bill Sysak of Stone Brewing is aging more than 2,600 bottles of beer in his personal cellar. The secret to success is “really knowing your styles and proven performers, just like wine,” he says. (From Stone Brewing) When DC Brau customers tell Hancock about plans to age the sometimes-hard-to-find On the Wings of Armageddon Imperial IPA, “I try to dissuade them,” he says. “People don’t know that hops are the first thing to go.” Dogfish Head founder Sam Calagione says fans often tell him they’re aging My Antonia, a hoppy imperial Pilsener last made in 2013, or the sweet, fruity Chateau Jiahu. “I tell them, ‘If you’re saving it with the intention of drinking it someday, that day is today. Go home and drink it tonight: It’s not going to get any better than it is right now, and it might not even be that good.’” Not that other beers can’t be aged effectively. “Different styles improve in a positive manner, whether that’s over six months or six years,” says Bill Sysak, craft beer ambassador for Stone Brewing in California, who has emerged as a well-regarded expert in cellaring. “Some beers, I know how they’ll do. It’s really knowing your styles and proven performers, just like wine.” In fact, a number of beers are brewed with aging in mind. At DC Brau, that includes Exaltation, a strong dark Belgian ale released during the holidays that Hancock wanted to mellow when he formulated it. “It had a lot of herbs and ginger when fresh, and it tasted better with age,” he says. Dogfish Head has built its reputation on strong, flavorful beer that’s primed to be drunk the day it leaves the Delaware brewery but is formidable enough — high in alcohol and “more winelike in the complexity,” says Calagione — to be aged for years. For its World Wide Stout, an imperial stout that’s up to 20 percent alcohol by volume, “it wasn’t just ‘Let’s brew the strongest beer in the world,’ but ‘Let’s brew a beer


“Supermoon” seen Saturday (where it wasn’t too cloudy). Look again Sunday

A supermoon occurred Saturday night, with the moon both nearly full and nearer than usual to Earth. But the moon Sunday night should still be super enough. The term “supermoon” has been used to describe the unusually bright moon that may be seen when it is full or nearly full and at or near its closest approach to the earth for a given orbit. It was seen in parts of the Washington area, but clouds blocked it in other parts. The moon was full at 2:35 p.m. Saturday. It will be nearly full when it sets Sunday morning, and will still be nearly full when it rises again Sunday night. On Sunday night the moon will still be relatively close to the earth, and should again be uncommonly bright.


Beer of the Week: Bluejacket Space Cadet Pale Ale

red-wine barrel, or the whiskey-barrel-aged version of Mexican Radio, a sweet stout made with chili peppers that is “becoming one of our most sought-after beers,” Engert says, you’ll have to visit during the hours the Bottle Shop is open. Still, the coolers full of bottles are the main draw. Bluejacket doesn’t sell growlers, so if you want take beer home, this is probably the best way to do it. The bottles for sale and the beers on tap “won’t always coincide,” Engert explains. “Sometimes you’ll see bottles here before they’re on draft. If we have a Pilsener ready to go [on tap] but we don’t have a 42-degree draft line available, we’ll rack off a keg and bottle it over here.” Also, sometimes a beer will completely sell out on tap before the bottles are gone, or vice versa. There’s no bottling line, so bottles are filled by hand every Wednesday, which basically guarantees new choices when the weekend-only Bottle Shop opens on Friday. Because only about 70 bottles are filled with a particular beer each week, “everything is super fresh,” Engert says. There are no bottle-conditioned beers, which undergo a secondary fermentation in the bottle, but Engert plans to offer some in the future. Right now, the beer I’m most drawn to is Space Cadet pale ale, a collaboration with New Zealand brewer Ben Middlemiss. All the hops were grown in New Zealand, a nod to Middlemiss’s homeland and a nod to how trendy Southern Hemisphere hops continue to be. But this pale ale isn’t a citrus-fruit bomb: Although you’ll get lemon and citrus in the nose, this beer’s defining characteristic is a solid, biscuity malt base that blends nicely with the pine and tropical-fruit notes from the hops. The finish is dry — much dryer than I expected from the first whiff of the glass — and slightly bitter, mellowed by a bit of pineapple sugar. It’s also an easy-drinking 4.9 percent ABV. But don’t just take my word for it: Tasters are available at the Bluejacket bar if you’d like to have a sip before grabbing a bottle to go. Bluejacket Space Cadet: $10 per 750 ml bottle and $6 per pint at Bluejacket, 300 Tingey St. SE. 202-524-4862. www.bluejacketdc.com. Bluejacket Bottle Shop and Tasting Room is open 4 to 7 p.m. Fridays and 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays. More from Food: Beer Column


How to age beer the right way: Tips for choosing, storing and timing

Beer should be aged in a dark place, but not the refrigerator, says Stone Brewing’s Bill Sysak, who is aging more than 2,600 bottles of beer in his personal cellar. (Stone Brewing) Stone Brewing’s Bill Sysak says there are “no hard-and-fast rules” for which beers age best, but trial and error has produced some guidelines. First, when buying beer to age, avoid most IPAs, even strong ones. Because hops were used as a preservative when beer was shipped from England to India in the 19th century, some people wrongly believe that hops protect a beer as it ages. “The ultimate preservative is not hops,” Dogfish Head founder Sam Calagione says. “It’s alcohol.” With that in mind, some tips on which beers to choose: ■ Beer 8 percent alcohol by volume or stronger. It “has a better chance,” says Sysak. ■ Sour Belgian or Belgian-style beers, such as lambics and gueuzes — an exception to the stronger-is-better rule. “They have lower ABVs, but the flavors tend to really marry together,” Sysak says. Additionally, gueuzes, which are a blend of one-to-three-year-old lambics, already have some age under their belt. ■ Stouts, porters and Belgian ales. ■ Bottle-conditioned beers (even IPAs), which are bottled with yeast so that the beer undergoes a secondary fermentation as it ages.■ ■ Strong, malty brews such as Dogfish Head’s 120 Minute IPA (another exception to the no-IPAs rule), which clocks in around 17 percent ABV. It loses some hops as it ages, but mellows into what founder Sam Calagione describes as “a nose like a sweet marmalade” after a few years. ■ Barrel-aged beers (including IPAs) and those made with brettanomyces yeast, which can change the beer’s flavor over time. Next, here’s how to age the beer: ■ Find a dark space (to prevent sunlight from damaging the beer) that can be kept at “45 to 65 degrees, like a perfect wine cellar,” Sysak says. (A wine fridge is a suitable stand-in.) A range of 45 to 75 percent humidity is ideal. For long-term aging, keep your beer out of the refrigerator: It’s usually too cold, which slows down the aging process, and too dry, which is particularly bad for cork-stopped beers. If the cork dries out, off flavors can be introduced through oxidation. ■ Decide how long they might age. Calagione recommends aging beers in the 8 to 10 percent ABV range for up to three


Francis Sejersted, past chairman of the Nobel Peace Committee, dies at 79

From left to right: African National Congress President Nelson Mandela, president of the Nobel committee Francis Sejersted and South African President F.W. de Klerk in 1993. Mandela and de Klerk earlier jointly received the Nobel Peace Prize (GERARD JULIEN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES) Francis Sejersted, former chairman of the Nobel Peace Committee that hands out the coveted award in the Norwegian capital, died Aug. 25 at his home in Oslo. He was 79. His family announced the death but did not cite a specific cause. A professor who specialized in modern Norwegian history, Dr. Sejersted was chairman from 1991 to 1999 and a board member during the previous nine years. During Dr. Sejersted’s chairmanship, the prize was awarded to Nelson Mandela and South African President F.W. de Klerk, and to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, among others. The peace award is always announced in Oslo, in line with the wishes of prize founder Alfred Nobel. Five other prize categories are awarded in Stockholm. Francis Sejersted was born in Oslo in 1936. He earned several degrees from the University of Oslo, including a doctorate, and became a professor in social and economic history there. His books included “The Age of Social Democracy: Norway and Sweden in the 20th Century.” A look at those who have died. Survivors include his wife, the former Hilde Robberstad; and two sons.


From panda babies to stock market crashes, the news never stops

Oh, for the days when nothing happened in August, the days when a journalist could take a couple of weeks off secure in the knowledge that real news would cease to occur during the “silly season.” Not anymore. Today, the news cycle isn’t just 24/7, it’s 52/12. While My Lovely Wife and I were piloting a rental car along the windswept coast of northeast England — each of us reciting the mantra “Stay on the left, stay on the left” — news was breaking out back home, some of it happy, some of it tragic. The happiest news was that the National Zoo’s female giant panda, Mei Xiang, became a mother again. She gave birth to a giant panda — two, in fact. (And thank goodness for that. You can imagine the embarrassment if she’d had a giraffe, a Przewalski’s horse or a golden lion tamarin. Someone would have some explaining to do.) Sadly, one of the panda twins died. But from that unfortunate fact comes my idea for the perfect name for the surviving cub: Elvis. Elvis Presley was a surviving twin. His brother, Jesse Garon, was stillborn. Elvis The Chinese might not like it, but who cares? Frankly, I’ve had enough of the Chinese. They tried to destroy the world economy while I was on vacation. Washington’s beleaguered Metro system was in the news while I was gone, too. A report was released outlining how human error was behind the Aug. 6 derailment that left thousands of people scrambling for alternative transportation. I didn’t take the London Underground while I was in England this time (“Stay on the left, stay on the left”) but every time I’ve ridden it in the past, it’s been a model of reliability. It has three times as many stations and never seems to break down. I’ve decided that the people who oversee the Washington Metropolitan Area Transit Authority should just hire whoever it is who runs the Tube. Pay him whatever he wants, give him incredible power, then let him whip Metro into shape. Speaking of Metro, the transit center in Silver Spring may actually open soon, years late and millions of dollars over budget. Montgomery County and Metro are trying to recoup some of the cost overruns with a $166 million lawsuit against the designers and builders of the transit center. I know the concrete problems have supposedly been fixed, but


U.S. developing sanctions against China over cyberthefts

the sanctions on companies, individuals or entities that have harmed national security, or the nation’s economy or foreign policy. It’s not clear how many firms or individuals will be targeted, though one official said the Chinese firms would be large and multinational. Their activity must meet one of four “harms”: attacking critical infrastructure, such as a power grid; disrupting major computer networks; stealing intellectual property or trade secrets; or benefiting from the stolen secrets and property. It is that last prong, in particular, that has the potential to be quite effective, sanctions experts say. “Obviously, there’s no silver bullet,” said Zachary Goldman, a former policy adviser at the Treasury Department’s Office of Terrorism and Financial Intelligence and now executive director of New York University’s Center on Law and Security. But if the sanctioned companies are large and global, “they will effectively be put out of business.” In practice, he said, most significant financial institutions refuse to do business with individuals who have been sanctioned by the United States. “So any company that’s been targeted under this authority,” he said, “will likely find it very difficult to participate in the international financial sector.” The designations are being drawn up by a number of agencies, including the Treasury and Justice departments, the White House and the intelligence community. Evidence that the Justice Department has assembled over the past year or so in preparing possible indictments for economic espionage against Chinese companies and individuals is being used in support of the designations, officials said. Sanctions provide government officials a greater ability to protect classified sources and evidence than a criminal prosecution might. But, analysts point out, there likely will be significant pressure on the administration to release as much evidence as possible to back up its designations to convince skeptics. It is possible, some officials said, that entities or individuals from other countries besides China could be included in the sanctions package. The sanctions would not be imposed in retaliation for China’s hacks of the Office of Personnel Management databases, which compromised the personal and financial data of more than 22 million current and former government employees and family members. The data heists, which took place last year but were discovered this year, were judged as having been carried out for traditional intelligence purposes — not to benefit Chinese industry. Nonetheless, the severity of the OPM incidents helped convince wavering officials that firm


Why U.S. generals don’t want advisers on the front lines in Iraq

In this July 23 photo, Iraqi Army soldiers with new U.S.-made weapons take combat positions at the front line in an eastern suburb of Ramadi, Iraq. (Uncredited/Associated Press) Bing West is a former assistant secretary of defense and combat Marine and has written three books about the war in Iraq. Is the United States at war? Even our top leaders do not know. At his nomination hearing last month to become the next Marine Corps commandant, Lt. Gen. Robert B. Neller was scolded by Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz). “I’m disappointed for you not to be in favor of us having forward air controllers on the ground” in Iraq, McCain said. McCain’s son The senator demanded bombing by front-line American advisers. In contrast, the general said that the key advisory task was to “ensure the right Iraqi officers were put in charge.” The difference is significant. To defeat the Islamic State, do you increase the bombing or change the leaders? Consider first the forward air controllers. A controller operates as part of a team of a dozen soldiers, plus vehicles, plus reinforcements on alert, plus aircraft for evacuations, plus logistics. To insert controller teams into the battles for Fallujah or Ramadi requires a commitment on the order of thousands of Americans. Then comes the hard part. Urban battlefields are compartmented by long corridors of houses. Forward air controllers must designate targets inside apartment complexes only a few hundred meters up the street. By definition, advisers and air controllers are working in support of Iraqi units. The terrorists will hold civilians as shields. So who is responsible for deciding the rules of engagement and the risks to civilians? Is it the Iraqi captain screaming “Bomb!” or the U.S. lieutenant who is advising? If the advisers are unwilling to bomb, they should not be there in the first place. If they do bomb, the American public must be prepared to witness a staggering amount of damage. In Fallujah in fewer than 20 days in 2004, the Marines launched 540 airstrikes and destroyed or heavily damaged about 18,000 buildings. In 2015, the Islamic State occupies a dozen cities. Those cities will be blasted. Al Jazeera and other networks will provide graphic coverage of the damage. Some scenes will shock. Iraqi soldiers will execute Islamic State terrorists while advisers watch. And what if an American is captured and burned alive? If we send in air


Russia’s truncheon

Ukrainian film director Oleg Sentsov looks on from a defendants' cage as he attends a court hearing in Rostov-on-Don, Russia, this month. (Stringer/Russia/Reuters) WHEN VLADIMIR Putin first became Russian president, a decade and a half ago, he promised to bring about what he called “dictatorship of the law.” It is an awkward phrase, but the meaning was clear: to bring order out of the tumultuous decade of the 1990s, for the law to reign supreme. Mr. Putin supervised the rewriting and modernization of many obsolete laws from the Soviet years. But as he turned more authoritarian, the law became just a tool. Mr. Putin followed a long line of predecessors in the Kremlin who have used the police and courts to punish their enemies and stifle dissenting views. Today, this is one of the profound failings of Mr. Putin’s rule — establishing the rule of law is a distant dream. The latest example was the sentencing in a Russian military court on Aug. 25 of Oleg Sentsov, a 39-year-old filmmaker, to 20 years in a prison camp after conviction on charges of terrorism in the Crimean Peninsula. Mr. Sentsov was active in protests against Viktor Yanukovych , the Russian-backed president of Ukraine, who abandoned his office in the face of widespread demonstrations last year. Russia seized Crimea from Ukraine soon after. Mr. Sentsov pleaded not guilty to charges by the Russian prosecutors of creating a radical nationalist group in Crimea and setting fire to the offices of pro-Kremlin organizations. Another Crimea activist, Alexander Kolchenko , an ecologist, was sentenced to 10 years as an accomplice. The trial was marked by irregularities; the main prosecution witness recanted in the courtroom and said his evidence had been extracted under duress. Mr. Sentsov said he had been pressed to confess but refused. “I am not going to beg for leniency,” he declared. “Everything is already clear. A court of occupiers cannot be just, by definition.” After the presiding judge read out the sentence and asked Mr. Sentsov and Mr. Kolchenko if they understood, the two men, standing in a glass defendants’ cage, started singing Ukraine’s national anthem, as many did during the protests against the president last year. The harsh sentences were clearly political, aimed at sending a message to anyone who might oppose the seizure of Crimea. This use of the law as a weapon is hardly isolated. It was employed against


Local digest

— Susan Svrluga Crime museum prepares to close Facing tough competition from the free Smithsonian museums in Washington, the National Museum of Crime and Punishment in Chinatown has announced that it will be closing at the end of the month. The museum, which opened in 2008 and charges $21.95 for an adult ticket, said its property manager is forcing the museum out of its three-story building on Seventh Street NW across from the National Portrait Gallery. Janine Vaccarello, the chief operating officer of the museum, said that as part of its lease, the building owners have had the right since 2013 to ask the museum to vacate if it does not meet certain sales thresholds. Vaccarello would not disclose details of the museum’s finances, but said, “we had our challenges, but we were making it.” “We would have liked to do better, but D.C. is a tough market,” Vaccarello said. “We weren’t planning on going anywhere. We always tried to do a lot within the community. It is sad; we are really sad.” The future of the crime museum is uncertain. Vaccarello said the museum would search for other spaces in the area, or would look to partner with another organization and for a place to sell its paraphernalia. — Perry Stein MARYLAND Child dies after being left in car A child died in Baltimore County after her foster mother left her in a car outside a church, county police said Monday. Cpl. John Wachter said the police department’s homicide unit investigates all child deaths. But as of Monday, 10 days after the car incident, the girl’s death is not being probed as a homicide. That could change after the state medical examiner’s office completes its work, Wachter said. Police said in a statement Monday that the 13-month-old girl, Paris Bena Hall, was with her foster mother on Aug. 21. The woman worked at Shiloh Baptist Church in Edgemere and intended to take the child to the day care next to the church. She parked, had a conversation in the church parking lot, then walked into the church. Wachter said police do not know how long the woman was inside. They know that when she went outside at about noon, she found the child and called 911. The girl was in cardiac arrest and the woman attempted CPR. The child died at a hospital later that day. — Julie Zauzmer


National news in brief: Wal-Mart is cutting some worker hours

Retail Wal-Mart cutting some worker hours Wal-Mart Stores, in the midst of spending $1 billion to raise employees’ wages and give them extra training, has been cutting the number of hours some of them work in a bid to reduce costs. Regional executives told store managers at the retailer’s annual holiday planning meeting this month to rein in expenses by cutting worker hours they’ve added beyond those allocated to them based on sales projections. The request has resulted in some stores trimming hours from their schedules, asking employees to leave shifts early or take longer lunches, according to more than three dozen employees nationwide. The reductions started in the past several weeks, as many stores enter the busy back-to-school shopping period. Wal-Mart chief executive Doug McMillon is trying to balance a desire to improve service — partly through increased spending on his workforce — against investors’ pressure to keep profits growing. Labor costs, which rose after Wal-Mart increased its minimum wage to $9 an hour in April, have weighed on earnings, which missed analysts’ expectations last quarter. At the same time, Wal-Mart is trying to maintain low prices to fend off rivals. The reduction in hours is taking place only in locations where managers have overscheduled workers, staffing the store for more time than they have been alloted, said Kory Lundberg, a spokesman for Bentonville, Ark.-based Wal-Mart. The reductions won’t affect efforts to better staff stores, shorten checkout lines, and improve cleanliness and stocking, he said. — Bloomberg News Technology India investigates Google search results A lengthy investigation into whether Google has been abusing its dominance of Internet search to stifle competition in India is moving into its next phase. The preliminary findings of the three-year-old probe have been submitted to the Competition Commission of India and to Google. The inquiry revolved around complaints filed by several Web sites contending that Google has been unfairly highlighting its own services in its influential search results at the expense of its rivals. The allegations are similar to other accusations of illegal self-promotion in the United States, Europe and other parts of the world. The Mountain View, Calif., company has until Sept. 10 to respond to the preliminary findings in India, although that deadline could be extended. Google says it is confident it will be cleared of wrongdoing in India. Google is also facing allegations in Europe that it rigged its shopping results


Man is identified as person of interest in the slaying of AU graduate in Shaw

Andre Dudley, 19. (Courtesy of D.C. Police) A person of interest was named Monday by D.C. police in connection with the fatal shooting of an American University graduate in the Shaw area of Northwest Washington. Police said in a statement that Andre Dudley, 19, was a person of interest in the Aug. 15 shooting in the 1800 block of 7th Street NW in which Matthew Shlonsky was killed. Police have said Shlonsky was not the intended target. A man identified as Marcus King, 19, a resident of the Shaw area, has been arrested in the Shaw shooting and charged with second-degree murder. Several people have been described as persons of interest. But it appeared that Dudley was the first person to be identified by name as a person of interest. There was no indication that he had been charged with any crime in connection with the shooting. In their statement, police said Dudley was charged in a warrant in a burglary in the District three days before the shooting. The incident occurred Aug. 12 in the 4200 block of Argyle Terrace NW, and Dudley was charged with second-degree burglary, the police said. No address was given for Dudley.