Your health records are supposed to be private. They aren’t.

I wrote about in The Washington Post. When she went to what was supposed to be a secure website to check the results of a paternity test she’d purchased at a local pharmacy, she stumbled upon 6,000 other people’s test results. She complained to the federal regulator that enforces HIPAA, but she was told that the lab wasn’t covered by the law — when it was drafted in 1996, its authors probably hadn’t imagined such things as over-the-counter paternity tests. Stokes gave up when she was told to contact a different agency. I met Kenneth Chanko, whose dad, Mark, was rushed to NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center in 2011 after being struck by a sanitation truck. Unbeknownst to his family, a real-life medical show, “NY Med,” was filming in the hospital at the time. The following year, Mark Chanko’s widow was watching the show on ABC and realized that the blurred-out man dying on the TV screen in her living room was her husband. No one had told the family — or asked for permission. The Chankos filed a lawsuit against the hospital and the TV network, as well as a complaint with the Department of Health and Human Services’ office for civil rights, which enforces HIPAA. The lawsuit was dismissed and is being appealed to New York’s top court. The complaint with the civil rights office, filed in January 2013, is pending. In the meantime, New York City’s hospitals voluntarily agreed this summer not to allow commercial filming of patients without their permission. I talked to Edie McGee, a lawyer for a federal agency who lives in Maryland and whose name was leaked to the press in 2003. She had just returned from China after adopting her daughter when she came down with an upper respiratory infection. Doctors suspected she had the SARS virus. Before the lab results even came back, a Washington Post reporter showed up at her door, and other media outlets wanted interviews, too. And I spoke with a woman named Frances whose diagnosis with a sexually transmitted disease was plastered on Facebook by a former friend who worked at the Indiana hospital where she received treatment. “PLZ HELP EXPOSE THIS HOE!” the public post said. The hospital apologized, but Frances now drives miles out of her way to go grocery shopping so she can avoid people in her town. I was surprised by just how


Judge green lights whistleblower claim against USDA by pesticide researcher

(AP Photo/Andy Duback, File) A prominent scientist in the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service has just cleared the first hurdle in an ongoing whistleblower claim against the agency. Last week, Judge Patricia M. Miller rejected the USDA’s request to dismiss research entomologist Jonathan Lundgren’s complaint as “frivolous.” The USDA had argued that Lundgren’s complaint was based purely on “speculative and unsupported” allegations. Miller, an administrative judge with the Merit Systems Protection Board, also set a Jan. 6 status conference for the case and ordered both parties to come prepared to talk about a possible settlement. [Suspended USDA researcher says agency tried to block his research into harmful effects of pesticides on bees, butterflies] Lundgren’s whistleblower claim alleges that supervisors acted to “deter and impede” his work after he began to conduct research and give interviews suggesting pesticides pose a threat to pollinators, like butterflies and bees, according to a statement by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), which filed the complaint on his behalf. The population of honeybees, which pollinate roughly one third of the food Americans eat, has been in steep decline for a decade. “We were very pleased to receive Judge Miller’s ruling,” says Laura Dumais, the PEER attorney representing Lundgren, “as we feel Dr. Jonathan Lundgren has a very strong case.” Lundgren, who didn’t respond to a request to be interviewed for this article, appears to be in the process of leaving his government job behind. In December, he launched a crowd funding campaign to support Blue Dasher Farm, which he describes in an accompanying video and open letter as an attempt to conduct independent research. He also takes thinly veiled shots at USDA, talking up the need for “truthful science communicated plainly on topics like pesticide risks.” Christopher Bentley, director of the USDA-ARS Information Staff, said he cannot comment on active litigation. But he said, “USDA actively fosters a culture of excellence and transparency in our scientific agencies and takes allegations regarding scientific integrity very seriously.” PEER, an alliance of scientists and other professionals working on environmental issues, recently alleged in federal court that Lundgren’s experience is part of a wider pattern, claiming 10 USDA scientists had been ordered to “retract studies, water down findings, remove their name from authorship and endure long, indefinite delays in approving publication of papers that may be controversial.” That suit seeks to force a change in a USDA directive that requires


Abu Aardvark’s 2015 Middle East Book Awards

am closing out the year, I’d like to shout out to all the contributors to The Project on Middle East Political Science, and especially its consistently excellent POMEPS team (and Monkey Cage editors): a fond farewell to Mary Casey and Cortni Kerr, and a hearty welcome to Lauren Baker and Stephanie Dahle! Once again this year, POMEPS offered more than 300 unique opportunities to scholars, including Monkey Cage publications, workshops, panel presentations, book launches, book and article workshops, and small research grants. Like the Monkey Cage more broadly, the enthusiastic and deeply informed public engagement of the POMEPS community of scholars decisively disproves the popular stereotype of academics retreating from the public realm. For a sample of the work POMEPS scholars have been doing this year, I would recommend downloading all the volumes in the POMEPS Studies series. Two especially outstanding examples are “International Relations Theory and a Changing Middle East” (based on a workshop at Aarhus University in Denmark for a workshop co-hosted by Morten Valbjorn with two dozen scholars from the United States, Europe and the Middle East assembled) and “Islamism in the IS Age” (based on a workshop at George Washington University). Note: This year’s awardees join an illustrious list of past honorees: Stéphane Lacroix’s “Awakening Islam: The Politics of Religious Dissent in Contemporary Saudi Arabia” and Wendy Pearlman’s “Violence, Non-Violence and the Palestinian National Movement” in 2011. The 2012 list featured Nathan Brown’s “When Victory is Not an Option,” Laurence Louer’s “Shiism and Politics in the Middle East,” Joseph Sassoon’s “Saddam Hussein’s Ba’th Party: Inside an Authoritarian Regime,” and Bassam Haddad’s “Business Networks in Syria.” In 2013, the winners were Adria Lawrence’s “Imperial Rule and the Politics of Nationalism: Anti-Colonial Protest in the French Empire,” Raphaël Lefèvre’s “Ashes of Hama: The Muslim Brotherhood in Syria,” Madawi al-Rasheed’s “A Most Masculine State: Gender, Politics, and Religion in Saudi Arabia,” Frederic Wehrey’s “Sectarian Politics in the Gulf,” and Carrie Rosefsky Wickham’s “The Muslim Brotherhood: Evolution of an Islamist Movement.” In 2014, the awardees were Zaid al-Ali, “The Struggle for Iraq’s Future: How Corruption, Incompetence and Sectarianism Have Undermined Democracy,” Melani Cammett, “Compassionate Communalism: Welfare and Sectarianism in Lebanon,” Michael Herb, “The Wages of Oil: Parliaments and Economic Development in Kuwait and the UAE,” Tarek Masoud, “Counting Islam: Religion, Class and Elections in Egypt,” and Toby Matthiesen, “The Other Saudis: Shiism, Dissent and Sectarianism.” Congratulations to all the authors!


Top health issues you need to pay attention to in 2016

Activists hold signs containing the image of Turing Pharmaceuticals CEO Martin Shkreli in front the building that houses Turing's offices, in New York, Thursday, Oct. 1, 2015, during a protest highlighting pharmaceutical drug pricing. (AP Photo/Craig Ruttle) Runaway drug prices. Is the public outcry so strong that 2016 will be the year when the government or industry comes up with a way to ease the burden on patients? [CEO who raised price of old pill more than $700 calls journalist a ‘moron’ for asking why] [Most popular Washington Post health stories of 2015] 'Joseph S. Gbembo leans over the grave of his mother, Sia, at the cemetery in Foya, Liberia, where four members of the family who died in the Ebola epidemic now lie. The Gbembo family lost 17 people to Ebola. (EPA/Daniel Berehulak/the New York Times) "Post-Ebola syndrome"/Other globe-trotting viruses. If all continues to go well, international health officials will likely declare the epidemic over sometime in mid-January but have warned there may be continued flare-ups. How serious will these be and will our health system be able to handle them — and any other infectious diseases that nature throws our way? [British nurse's rehospitalization, reports of blindness and other 'post-Ebola syndrome' complications haunt survivors] Global public health officials are closely monitoring the spread of Zika virus, a pathogen first discovered in Africa 70 years ago and that is suspected of being responsible for thousands of babies being born in Brazil with brain damage. No one has been infected in the United States, but the virus has been found as close as in Panama and Honduras in recent months. Will Zika be the next West Nile? [Brazil declares emergency after 2,400 babies are born with brain damage, possibly due to mosquito-borne virus] President Obama speaks during a news conference in the White House, Friday, Jan. 30, 2015, in Washington, calling for an investment to move away from one-size-fits-all-medicine, toward an approach that tailors treatment to your genes. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster) Personalized medicine/diets. [Obama touts ‘lifesaving’ potential of personalized medicine] The centerpiece of the plan involves creating a $130 million national database that contains the genetic profiles, medical histories and other data of a million or more Americans. Through high-speed computer algorithms, researchers hope to identify why some people respond well to certain treatments while others don't at all. While nothing will change overnight, the idea of more tailored treatments


medicine] The centerpiece of the plan involves creating a $130 million national database that contains the genetic profiles, medical histories and other data of a million or more Americans. Through high-speed computer algorithms, researchers hope to identify why some people respond well to certain treatments while others don't at all. While nothing will change overnight, the idea of more tailored treatments will likely make its way to more community physicians and patients in 2016 transforming the way we think about our own health care. Ever wondered why that diet plan that helped your girlfriend lose so much weight is actually making you gain weight? There's also increasing evidence that points to the need for a more tailored approach to dieting. Some researchers are experimenting with algorithms that take hundreds of factors about a person and turn them into individualized meal plans. [This diet study upends everything we thought we knew about ‘healthy’ food] Rosalind Picard, MIT professor and chief scientist at Empatica, and Matteo Lai (L), CEO of Empatica, wear the company's Embrace devices while talking at MIT in Cambridge, Mass. (Brian Snyder/Reuters) You tracking. One major issue that will continue to be debated in 2016 is the role of government oversight in this exploding market of devices and tests that are aimed at empowering consumers. The issue made some headlines in 2015 after the Wall Street Journal reported that Theranos, the Silicon Valley darling estimated to be valued at a whopping $9 billion, may have overhyped its pinprick blood test technology that its founder had promoted as a way for consumers to learn more about themselves without having to go through a doctor. [The revolution will be digitized: Spearheaded by the flood of wearable devices, a movement to quantify consumers’ lifestyles is evolving into big business with immense health and privacy ramifications] Read more: Beware the rule-following co-worker, Harvard study warns Happiness won’t help you live longer (but unhappiness won’t kill you either) The myth of sugar-free drinks, candy: Study shows they can wreak havoc on teeth, too Neighbors file ‘extraordinary, unprecedented’ public nuisance lawsuit against autistic boy’s family Most popular Washington Post health stories of 2015: A mother tells her story of how she lost her darling daughter a few weeks short of her 29th birthday when she stepped in front of a train in Baltimore. For more health news, you can sign up for our weekly newsletter


Checkpoint’s most-read military stories in 2015 — from heroism to Jade Helm 15

for the U.S. military and prompted a review. 3. Bowe Bergdahl, once-missing U.S. soldier, charged with desertion Bowe Bergdahl, the U.S. soldier who walked off his base in Afghanistan in 2009 and was held captive by insurgents for five years, provided a long saga in 2015 that will continue into the new year, as the Army court-martials him for alleged misbehavior before the enemy in desertion. The details of Bergdahl’s case became more clear after the Army held a preliminary hearing in San Antonio in September that depicted the soldier as disillusioned with his unit and self-deluded about his abilities as a fighter. A general who investigated his case, Lt. Gen. Kenneth Dahl, testified then that he did not believe Bergdahl left his base to join the Taliban but wanted to cause a crisis by disappearing so he could later reappear and air his grievances before a general officer. In another story that didn’t quite crack the Top 10 on Checkpoint but came close, it emerged in December that while facing court-martial, Bergdahl spoke at length to a filmmaker and then approved their recorded conversations appearing in an ongoing popular podcast, “Serial.” In the first episode, Bergdahl said he compared himself to the fictional action hero Jason Bourne. “Doing what I did is me saying that I am like, I don’t know, Jason Bourne…. I had this fantastic idea that I was going to prove to the world that I was the real thing,” Bergdahl said. “You know, that I could be what it is that all those guys out there that go to the movies and watch those movies, they all want to be that, but I wanted to prove that I was that.” 2. I’m a veteran, and I hate ‘Happy Memorial Day.’ Here’s why. Sometimes, it isn’t breaking news that captivates readers but thoughtful reflection on the world in which we live. A guest post by Marine Corps veteran Jennie Haskamp published just before Memorial Day did that, expressing anguish that too many people don’t understand that the real meaning of the holiday is to honor fallen U.S. service members. “I’m angry,” she wrote. “I’ve come to realize people think Memorial Day is the official start of summer. It’s grilled meat, super-duper discounts, a day (or two) off work, beer, potato salad and porches draped in bunting. But it shouldn’t be. It’s more than that.” The piece


PM Update: A chill in the air for celebrations, then a crisp and sunny New Year’s Day

The monuments glow during 2015’s final nights. (Kevin Wolf via Flickr) We made it through another year of interesting (and sometimes wild) weather in Washington. What started as a cold and snowy winter ended on an extremely warm note. Now we have a phenomenal forecast to close the year — crisp, clean air and sunny skies. I can’t ask for anything better. Thanks, as always, for letting us be your source for weather in D.C. and beyond. See you in 2016. Through Tonight: Tomorrow (New Year’s Day): See David Streit’s forecast through the weekend. And if you haven’t already, join us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter and Instagram. For related traffic news, check out Dr. Gridlock. Want our 5 a.m. forecast delivered to your email in-box? Subscribe here.


Charlottesville mourns a moving landmark, ‘Running Man,’ after he is hit by an SUV

and embarked on projects, such as building furniture out of cardboard. He loved drama and going to the theater. Once, when he and Parker were gathering discarded two-by-fours for a project, Weber began quoting lines from “Henry the VIII,” reminded of a scene in the play. Sometimes when he ran, he would recite long passages by Shakespeare, Parker said. He was intense and direct; he could wear people out pretty quickly. “Social mores were not in his top 100 priorities,” Parker said. “They were below ankle weights.” Weber had a staggering collection of ankle weights, Parker said, and read avidly about running technique, nutrition, anatomy and biology. Weber seemed to enjoy his work recording audio versions of textbooks, and had a beat-up old car that he kept fixing so he could get to Richmond to compete in marathons. The Honda from the 1980s looked like it had been through Baghdad, one friend said, but the motor was meticulously maintained. He could run a marathon in less than three hours. He hoped one day to win the marathon in Richmond. He told NBC 29, when they did a feature on him last month, that his life was held together with petroleum jelly, duct tape, Shoe Goo, and cotton string. He would put thousands of miles on a pair of sneakers and keep patching them up even when they were worn to threads. He loved the roads near U-Va. in Albemarle County. “I kind of feel like maybe I’m in a landscape painting or an Ansel Adams,” he told NBC29. “Maybe a runner’s worldwide angle shot. After 16 or 17 miles, you’ve got the breeze flowing through you and the bales of hay in the background, and it takes on a mildly surreal character.” He also told them that he was sometimes lonely, but that he considered the people who stopped Running Man to talk his friends, even though he didn’t know their names. “Even though he was not a social person I think he tremendously enjoyed the persona, what he became to the people in that area,” Catron said. “He liked that people knew him, identified with him.” “Being a long-distance runner is probably the loneliest sport you could have,” Catron said. “You don’t compete against anybody — you just go out and run.” “We all need an out,” he said, “whatever it is that we do.” Philip Weber (NBC29 WVIR-TV)


Trump rallies thousands in Mississippi with anger at media, Iran deal

al-Shabab, which had spliced his endorsement of a temporary "shutdown" of Muslim immigration into a lengthy recruitment video. Outside the Mississippi Coast Coliseum and Convention Center — on TV news — the video was a major story. Inside, it played no part at all. A recruitment video released by the Somali-based al-Qaeda affiliate al-Shabab includes a clip of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump calling on the United States to bar Muslims. Trump's audience, heavy on military veterans, could not quite understand the latest fuss that had distracted the hated mainstream media. Many were aware that Hillary Clinton had falsely credited Trump with appearing in ISIS recruitment videos. ("My colon clenches when I hear her name," confessed a 52-year-old Gulf War veteran named Richard Coyne.) But few had taken any time on a holiday weekend to view it, and fewer could figure out why to trust a terrorist group on what was or wasn't offensive. "Of course they'd fear Trump more than they fear Obama," said JoAnn Trest, 37, an Air Force veteran who fought in Iraq. "Who fears Obama? They've hated us from the get-go." Jacob Canova, 46, a Gulf War veteran, surmised that if the video was legitimate, it was produced out of fear. "ISIS would rather have Obama," he said. "A lot of these terrorists will do anything they can to antagonize us, and they know, if we have a strong American president, that veterans wouldn't hesitate to go back in and fight. It looks like it's getting closer to the point where our military leaders will say, you know what, we've got to push him aside." Trump's campaign was more cautious about the video than Trump's constituency. It stayed silent on the video for most of the day, until Trump himself was asked about it by "Face the Nation" anchor John Dickerson. The Republican front-runner largely brushed off the question, saying that radical groups had "used other people, too," in their propaganda videos. "What am I gonna do?" he asked Dickerson. "I have to say what I have to say." Doing that had paid rewards in Mississippi. Trump's visit effectively shut down a small strip of the Gulf Coast, snarling traffic for hours and opening abandoned parking lots to desperate drivers. For those who managed to park, a line snaked around the convention center hours before the rally's 7 p.m. start time. Some Trump fans, only lightly


The 5 most intriguing developments in politics and gender in 2015

boot camp on Feb. 26, 2013, at the Marine Corps Recruit Depot Parris Island, S.C. (Scott Olson/Getty Images) 1) The Pentagon cleared women to serve in all combat roles In early December, Defense Secretary Ashton B. Carter announced that women would be allowed to take on the full range of combat jobs, making them eligible to also join the nation's elite military units. That's the Navy SEALs, Army Special Forces and so forth. The decision came despite the objections of many military officials. However, the United States has long deployed women to do military jobs that put them in or very near combat. That means that before Carter's announcement, women faced many of the risks associated with war but have not had access to all the military's training and career opportunities. Despite the officials' objections, the United States is not breaking new ground here. Not at all: There are at least 11 other countries who already allow women in all combat roles and some that require women and men to participate in compulsory military service. That said, this one is probably not a settled matter. In 2009, the British government commissioned a comprehensive study of the matter and has not allowed women to take on all combat roles. In the United States, a number of congressional Republicans have expressed serious reservations about the policy change. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Rep. Mac Thornberry (R-Tex.), who chair the Senate and House armed services committees, have both said that the change all but requires Congress to consider altering the laws that govern and make possible the draft. Right now, only men must register with Selective Service. Look for this debate to continue in 2016. It will raise some very interesting questions about gender, culture, ability and the obligations of citizenship. This combination made from Aug. 6, 2015 photos, shows Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and Fox News Channel host and moderator Megyn Kelly during the first Republican presidential debate at the Quicken Loans Arena, in Cleveland. (John Minchillo/ AP) 2. Donald Trump suggests Megyn Kelly's period shaped her questions at a debate Many of Trump's comments venture into, shall we say, unusual territory for a presidential campaign. This, of course, includes Trump's more recent use of the term "schlonged" in a description of Hillary Clinton's 2008 presidential campaign loss. But back in August, you will recall that Trump described Fox News's Megyn


4 big things state legislatures will take up in 2016 (including driver-less cars!)

will spend January trying to fast-track bills such as increasing penalties for selling fentanyl, a painkiller up to 100 times as potent as morphine that the Concord Monitor's Allie Morris reports is responsible for up to half of New Hampshire's opioid deaths this year. Lawmakers are also considering stepping up prescription-drug monitoring and education programs for residents prescribed opioid painkillers. And in Massachusetts, Gov. Charlie Baker (R) and Boston Mayor Marty Walsh (D) sent a letter to lawmakers urging them to limit first-time opioid prescriptions to 72 hours and give first responders and doctors more latitude to work with patients suffering from addiction. Drugs, more broadly speaking, will be a major issue outside New England, as well. In Indiana, there's a big-money battle brewing over whether to require a prescription for a common cold medicine that can also be used to make methamphetamine. The Associated Press reports that Indiana is the leading state in meth lab discoveries, and the GOP House speaker has made making it more difficult to get pseudoephedrine a priority, to the concern of the powerful pharmaceutical industry. And even though Ohio voters said no to a November ballot initiative to make both recreational and medical marijuana legal, polls there show that there's support for medical marijuana. The AP reports that GOP leaders in the House and Senate are considering ways to move forward to legalize it — probably without the controversial pot monopoly that was on the ballot this fall. The pot issue has moved quickly in recent years, and that could continue at the state level in 2016. 3. Policing reforms Demonstrators march through Chicago. (Scott Olson/Getty Images) The federal government has no jurisdiction over local policing, which means it's up to the states to figure out how to respond to the concerns of high-profile police shootings, allegations of police brutality and racial disparity that racked much of the country in 2015. And because police shootings dominated the news this year, "the moment is here" for policing reform, Samuel Walker, a policing expert at University of Nebraska at Omaha, said in a recent interview with the Pew Charitable Trusts. Pew's Sarah Breitenbach reports that civil rights advocates will push state legislatures to take up reforms that many abandoned last year. But it won't be easy. After the 2014 shooting death of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Mo., state lawmakers considered at least 50 policing proposals but


What Benghazi family members say Hillary Clinton said about the video

her conversation with Clinton, the then-secretary of state made no mention of a video, but did refer to a “spontaneous protest.” “She said we had to be sorry for the Libyan people because they are uneducated, and that breeds fear, which breeds violence, and leads to spontaneous protests and acts of violence,” Quigley said in an interview with The Fact Checker. “The point was that it was not a planned thing; it just happened.” Quigley said that “it seemed strange to tell us to have sympathy for the Libyan people. It really struck me as my heart was breaking.” There was another moment at the reception that Quigley remembered with clarity. Ali Aujali, the Libyan ambassador, “leaned into me and said, ‘We are going to get the people responsible for this attack.’ It was the first time anyone had said that to me. I so needed to hear that. Nobody else took that line at all. It was so refreshing at that moment, so much what I wanted to hear.” (Woods, in his Lars Larson interview, also mentioned that he had met a Libyan official: “I’m not mad at anyone, so it’s not a matter of revenge or anything like that. You know, Hillary said, ‘We’re going to go, and we’re going to take care of these people that were responsible for your son’s death.’ You know, like I told the Libyan — I think it was the president that was there in the hangar — total forgiveness.” ) Clinton did not mention a video None of the other family members who agreed to be interviewed said Clinton made any reference to a video. Indeed, other family members have been puzzled by the confident assertions of Woods and Smith. “It was absolutely never mentioned, and it is totally new to me,” said Jan Stevens, the father of U.S. ambassador Christopher Stevens. “She gave us her sympathy. We had a great deal of talk about the problems of the world, the college her daughter attended. It was very small talk, nothing substantive.” Barbara Doherty, the mother of Glen Doherty, recalled that Clinton “was very sincere, I remember her crying.” Clinton spoke to family members individually, she said. “She had just come back from Africa and talked about the women there and the conditions they were under,” Doherty said. “It was not political at all. That would have been totally inappropriate. That


After mysterious disappearance, Hong Kong publisher claims he is in China ‘cooperating with authorities’

Cartoon by South China Morning Post's veteran political cartoonist Harry Harrison, January 2016. Reproduced with permission of South China Morning Post. The Hong Kong publisher whose disappearance has caused a major rift between Hong Kong and Beijing has written to a colleague to say that he is in China, where he is "cooperating with the authorities with an investigation." Lee Bo, whose publishing company specializes in books critical of Beijing’s Communist Party leaders, vanished Wednesday in what lawmakers and experts say looks increasingly like an illegal abduction by Chinese police. He is the fifth member of the Mighty Current publishing house to vanish, amid reports that it was planning a gossipy book about the love life of Chinese President Xi Jinping. In a fax to a colleague at Causeway Bay Books, a subsidiary of Mighty Current, Lee claimed to have traveled to China "by my own means, to cooperate with an investigation carried out by relevant department," calling his situation "good" and "normal." But the handwritten fax, published by Taiwan's Central News Agency, raised as many questions as it answered, because Hong Kong police have said that they have no record of Lee passing through immigration, and his wife has said that he was not carrying any travel documents with him when he vanished. In China, "assisting the authorities with an investigation" frequently equates to detention, suspicion of criminal activity and, sometimes, even torture. With the case garnering considerable international attention, the suspicion remains that Chinese police abducted Lee and that Chinese authorities pressured him into sending the fax in an attempt to calm the situation. On Monday, his wife, Sophie Choi, went to Hong Kong police to withdraw her earlier complaint, according to Hong Kong's Ming Pao newspaper. "I think it's a charade performed under duress," said Claudia Mo, a lawmaker with the pro-democracy Civic Party. "He has obviously been smuggled out, but his wife has got the message that keeping a low profile would help his release, because the Chinese would save face." Lee’s disappearance is seen as an assault on Hong Kong’s cherished principles of freedom of expression and autonomy from Beijing, as well as a sign that China is becoming increasingly bold in its efforts to track down and abduct dissidents and opponents outside its borders. On Monday, Hong Kong’s chief executive, Leung Chun-ying, said it was “not acceptable” for Chinese police to operate independently in


A new way of calculating distant stars’ gravity could help us find alien worlds

The key to finding Earth-like worlds is learning all about their host stars. (NASA) Researchers believe they've come up with a new, more accurate method for determining the strength of surface gravity on distant, faint stars. And painting more accurate pictures of stars is vital to studying the alien worlds that orbit them. "If you don't know the star, you don't know the planet," University of British Columbia's Jaymie Matthews, a co-author on the research published Friday in Science Advances, said in a statement. You have to determine the strength of gravity on a star's surface before you can calculate its size and mass, assuming the star isn't close enough to measure directly. When scientists go looking for alien exoplanets — ones that sit far outside our solar system — they rely entirely on those planets' host stars. Measuring the way a star's light appears to flicker and dim from Earth's perspective allows scientists to calculate an astonishing number of things about the planets transiting around that star, including whether it's the right size and distance from its star to hold liquid water. But to make those calculations, you need accurate stellar measurements. Otherwise, you might misjudge the size of a planet. That's a problem when you're looking for worlds that could host life as we know it, since you want to track down planets that are small and rocky like Earth. Lots of the stars imaged by the Kepler space telescope are too far away or dim for scientists to study the planets around them effectively. That's where the new technique, called the autocorrelation function timescale technique (timescale technique for short) comes in. Led by University of Vienna's Thomas Kallinger, researchers from Europe, Canada and Australia determined that using the timescale of variations in a star's brightness might be more accurate for determining gravity than the degree of brightness itself. When they tested the timescale method on stars that are close enough to be studied with standard techniques, they found it to be about six times more accurate than the flicker method, which was developed in 2013 to study distant, dim stars by measuring the brightness of short variations caused by the bubbling of the star's gas. As techniques like these continue to improve, scientists will be able to confidently study increasingly distant worlds, widening our net in the search for life. Read more: Why NASA’s top scientist is


Little Sesame, a hummus-focused DGS Delicatessen spinoff, opens Tuesday

Update, Jan. 4: Original post, Dec. 9: Enter -- open? -- Little Sesame, a new venture from DGS Delicatessen co-owner Nick Wiseman. The hummus shop is scheduled to open in January on the lower level of the Dupont Circle deli, in the restaurant's former private dining space. The winter squash hummus bowl from Little Sesame. (Lavanya Ramanathan/The Washington Post) Wiseman is launching the project with the support of his friend, Israeli-born chef Ronen Tenne. The two met during their time together at Michael White's Alto in New York. They'd go out for falafel after work, but Tenne said he was "always was a bit frustrated with the quality of the hummus in the States." (Courtesy Little Sesame) To make their ultimate hummus, Wiseman and Tenne are using organic chickpeas from Montana. They're importing their tahini (sesame paste) from Israel -- after tasting about 30. The recipe also includes water, lemon juice and "some other things we won't tell you," Tenne said. Here are a few more tidbits to know about Little Sesame, scheduled to open in early January: - Hummus is the main attraction. People tend to think of hummus as a condiment here, Wiseman said. Not so at Little Sesame, where it forms the basis of a meal ($9 to $12) that also will include a salad dressed with a sumac-honey dressing and warm pita. "It fills you up, it's simple, it's cheap," Tenne said of the shop's signature item. (We've seen this idea before: Remember the 2014 hummus pop-up in Georgetown?) - Vegetables are king. The menu will feature one hummus bowl with a meat-based topping (the first will be chopped pastrami). The four or five others will feature vegetables, with initial offerings including beets, squash and fried cauliflower. "Center-of-the-plate vegetables are definitely a big thing now," Wiseman said. - It won't be large. The space is about 600 square feet and will seat 16 people at communal tables. It will be a bit like "the hole in the wall kind of places" Tenne said are popular in Israel. - The sesame isn't just for savory. Little Sesame will serve vanilla ice cream with tahini and sesame brittle ($5). Little Sesame, 1306 18th St NW. 11:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday. Opening Jan. 5. eatlittlesesame.com. Related items: DGS Delicatessen opens in the Mosaic District What most people get wrong about making hummus


The hunt to unmask the new ‘Jihadi John’

Islamic spokesman in Britain. Dhar was also a childhood friend of Mizanur Rahman, another Choudary protege, whom British and U.S. officials now describe as a charismatic online recruiter for the Islamic State. Rahman had converted Dhar, the London-born son of Indian Hindu immigrants, to Islam when Dhar was 19. Dhar, along with Choudary and Rahman, was arrested in September 2014 on suspicion of belonging to Islamist groups banned in Britain and for “encouraging terrorism.” Choudary and Rahman face an upcoming trial on related charges. But Dhar skipped bail and moved with his wife, Aisha, and four children to Syria, representing a trend of entire families moving to live in the Islamic State. A month later, he posed in Raqqa, the Islamic State’s self-styled capital, with his newborn son in one hand and an assault rifle in the other. Dhar went on to become one of the Islamic State’s most high-profile online personalities. Last May, he was listed as the author of “A Brief Guide to the Islamic State (2015),” an almost comically absurd travel guide comparing Islamic State territory to a “plush holiday resort” with a wide array of chocolates available: “Snickers, Kit Kat, Bounty, Twix, Kinder Surprise, Cadburys – yes, yes we have it all.” “If you thought London or New York was cosmopolitan then wait until you step foot into the Islamic State,” the guidebook states, with no apparent irony. Also last year, Dhar was identified as the author of a lengthy defense of Jihadi John, which was reported by the Telegraph. In the article, he said violence committed by the Islamic State is no worse than violence committed by coalition forces fighting it. "Even though we have been force-fed by the media to believe that the Islamic State is 'barbaric' and 'medieval', if you want to torture an Islamic State soldier, bomb an Islamic State building or perhaps nuke Raqqa, all of a sudden such behavior is deemed perfectly rational," he wrote. "You are not barbaric for wanting this, on the contrary, you are civilized and educated.” He added: "Yes, violence can be justified -- bombs, bullets, knives, air strikes etc. are needed for the right enemy and we should not be made to feel ashamed about it.” Despite the heated rhetoric, up until now, at least, there has been little or no evidence that Dhar is involved in the military side of the Islamic State’s operations.


Christie: The world is ‘a dark and dangerous place right now. In every corner that we look.’

Jeb Bush and Ohio Gov. John Kasich to continue his campaign. He has climbed in recent polls thanks in part to a tough-talking focus on national security, despite his lack of foreign policy experience. Instead, he's focused on his law-and-order past as a federal prosecutor and his current work as a governor. "This president came in under a theory that Secretary Clinton shares, which is that America is the cause of violence in the world. America is the cause of unrest in the world. That if we just give some nice speeches and treated people nicely that they would reciprocate. It has turned out to be foolishly wrong. Foolishly wrong," he told the crowd. "When America retreats from its role of leadership in the world, a vacuum is created and that vacuum is filled by bad people with bad intentions," the governor added. "Putin, the Mullahs in Iran, the communists in China, the crazy man in North Korea. And the terrorist organizations like ISIS that are now reconstituting and rebuilding Al Qaeda in Afghanistan." "We have the Saudis fighting in Yemen, breaking off diplomatic ties with Iran. We have the Emiratis downgrading their relations with Iran. And this all the result of a foreign policy team that in their first year got a Nobel Peace Prize. Let me just say, that it’s always been my feeling that that prize is a joke, but now, with Barack Obama in possession of it and the world being in the condition it’s in, the Nobel Peace Prize would be a leading indicator on foreign policy failure – not success," he said. During his first 100 days as president, Christie said he would invite top American allies to the White House to do two things: Vent about the last eight years and talk about how the U.S. should reshape its position in the world. The meetings would begin with the leaders of Canada, Mexico, Great Britain, France, Germany and Israel, he said. "Our allies won’t misunderstand me either," he added later. "They will understand that when I make a promise I keep it and that I expect the same of them. And as long as I keep my word, I’m going to expect that they keep theirs too. And that if they don’t there will be ramifications for that. "We have a guy in the Oval Office who we don’t know. He’s been serving


‘Jihadi Junior,’ young boy in new Islamic State video, identified by grandfather

daughter, Grace “Khadijah” Dare, 24, radicalize while at college in London. She moved to Syria in 2012, and she was soon praising the beheading of American journalist James Foley, saying she wanted to be the first woman to behead a hostage and posting photos of her young child holding an AK-47. Talking to Channel 4, Sunday Dare had harsh words for his daughter. “She’s going to come back and face the music because she has let herself down,” he said. The boy known as Jihadi Junior is far from the only young person in the service of the Islamic State. Last year, an Australian extremist tweeted a photo of a 7-year-old boy, thought to be his son, holding a severed head in Syria. “That’s my boy!” the photo’s caption said. [Australian jihadist who tweeted gruesome photo has long history of mental illness] For children in a war zone, the Islamic State has an allure. The men in black are, at least, somewhat organized. “When [the Islamic State] came to my town … I liked what they are wearing, they were like one herd,” a child told the advocacy group Human Rights Watch in 2014. “They had a lot of weapons. So I spoke to them, and decided to go to their training camp.” Human Rights Watch, which reported on interviews with 25 children fighting in Syria, said that children living with militant groups grow up fast. “One doctor described treating a boy between 10 and 12 years old whose job it was to whip prisoners held in an ISIS detention facility, according to the adult fighter who brought him,” it wrote, using an acronym for the Islamic State. Meanwhile, the “new” Jihadi John — identified by the BBC, which talked to an unnamed “official source,” as British man Siddhartha Dhar — has posted at least one photo of himself holding a gun in one hand and and his newborn son in the other. Born in Britain, Dhar, also known as Abu Rumaysah, was known for his radical views before he was arrested for allegedly encouraging terrorism, according to the BBC. He fled to Syria in 2014 while on bail. “As a Muslim I would like to see the U.K. governed by the Sharia,” he told the BBC in 2014. “It is far superior to democracy. I don’t really identify myself with British values. I am Muslim first, second and last.”


The myth of healthy fast food: One chain’s salad has more fat than a Big Mac

Sweetgreen restaurant in Bethesda, Md., on Oct. 28, 2010. (Jeffrey MacMillan) If you’re worried you packed on the pounds from all those holiday treats and feasts there’s a new style of restaurant beckoning you to the lighter side. Chains like Native Foods, Sweetgreen, Laughing Planet and Lyfe Kitchen are making a splash by dishing out plant-based meals quickly, holding prices down and emphasizing ethical eating with animal welfare and environmental sustainability. Proponents have dubbed them “healthy fast food” and dream they may solve the crises of obesity, factory farming, and global warming one value meal at a time. If it sounds too good to be true, it is. Not one healthy food chain can match fast food’s speed and convenience, nor can they compete on cost. Even worse, healthy fast food can cast a “health halo” over consumers, leading them to unwittingly order meals as unhealthy as their fast-food counterparts. The root problem is whole foods are ill-suited for fast food. Fresh vegetables and most fruit are delivery vehicles for nutrients, fiber and water. They are low in calories, fat and protein, so you have to eat a lot to fill up. As such, fresh foods are more expensive, laborious and wasteful to ship, store and prepare than slapping frozen burgers on the grill. The resource-intensive nature of vegetables, and hence expense, was also indicated by the recent Carnegie-Mellon study that found per calorie, lettuce generated three times as much greenhouse gas emissions as bacon did. It’s why we need to eat a lot of produce to fill up. Forget the five-a-day rule. An active 20-year-old male, for example, should eat 13 servings of fruit and vegetables a day, according to the Centers for Disease Control. Those factors, and taxpayer subsidies, keep fast food cheap and fresh foods pricey. At McDonald’s, the average check is $4.75. At Lyfe Kitchen it’s “around $15.” Native Foods and Veggie Grill are probably in the same range as nearly all their entrees are north of $9. The salads at Sweetgreen, which is so trendy these days it merited a profile in the New Yorker, are even pricier at $9.50 to almost $14 with tax. The difference is starker based on cost per calorie, with Sweetgreen’s salads five to 13 times more expensive than a McDouble from the dollar menu. Fast food is also fast to make, buy and eat. Drive-thru orders account for 57


Hackers caused a blackout for the first time, researchers say

the lights out," Hultquist said. He described the group as "Russian," but declined to connect it to a specific government or group. Other destructive cyberattacks in the past have been attributed to government actors -- such as attacks on Iranian nuclear facilities thought to be the result of a collaboration between the U.S. and Israel, or the Sony Pictures entertainment attack blamed on North Korea. But experts warn that, while is easy to come to circumstantial conclusions about cyberattacks, it can be very difficult to pin down who was responsible -- or even what exactly happened. And there have been false alarms about cyberattacks on infrastructure in the past. In 2011, experts said that a pump failure at an Illinois water plant appeared to be caused by foreign hackers. However, it was later reported that there hadn't been any malicious activity: Instead, a remote login to the plant's computers systems from a contractor traveling in Russia was mistakenly connected to the issue. "It's easy to assume this threat actor is controlled by the Russian government and they intentionally shut down power in this region in Ukraine, but evidence to prove that conclusion is very difficult to obtain for various reasons," said Tom Cross, chief technology officer at cybersecurity firm Drawbridge Networks. The picture can often become clearer as more information trickles out, but the public and even some of those investigating may not be operating with all the facts, according to Cross. "When a plane crashes, the FAA publishes all of the details about the incident. That makes sense because we pilots want to know what to do to avoid the next crash," he said. "In our industry, when something like this happens, some information comes out and some doesn't." Not everyone necessarily has an interest in fully disclosing the attacks because it might embarrass them or give new information to attackers, Cross said. But he argues that the more people know the details about the attack, the better the security industry can prepare for the next one. "People should operate with an abundance of caution and assume the threat is real while demanding technical detail and evidence," he said. Assuming that the hackers did take out the power in Ukraine, there was a silver lining, according to Cross: The grid seems to have rebounded quickly. "The world didn't end here -- they did get power back up," Cross said.


Invasive Asian carp could overtake Lake Erie, study finds

Conservationists know, however, that it's simply a matter of time. So they have to ask — when Asian carp start breeding in the lake, just how much damage will they do? In the new study, which used food-web models, researchers found that the decrease seen in other species might not be as great as one would expect. In fact, some species might even see a population increase should foreign fish move into the neighborhood, because the carp would take care of their more direct competitors for them, and their young would provide an abundant food source for any fish-eating fish. But other species, including prized sport species like walleye and rainbow trout, would see a sharp decline. The best way to beat an invasive species is to eat it. Asian carp have been fished for commercial sale, but most of the market is in China. While the fish are reportedly delicious, they're very bony, making for a tough filleting process and a surprisingly low yield of meat for such a large fish. In any case, they're certainly not easy substitutes for the popular sport fish that currently fill Lake Erie. Asian carp, which grow quickly and can eat up to 20 percent of their body weight each day, could come to make up 34 percent of the total fish weight in the lake, making them the most abundant fish in terms of biomass. “It’s very sobering,” Marc Gaden, spokesman for the Great Lakes Fishery Commission, told the Associated Press. “Lake Erie is one of the most productive inland fisheries in the world. It wouldn’t be as valuable by any stretch of the imagination if one out of every three pounds of fish were Asian carp.” It's a staggering ecosystem shift, but it's nothing compared with what's happened in the Illinois River, where some areas are now 60 percent Asian carp. In the Illinois River, Asian carp have actually become a hazard to human health: Recreational boaters have been hit in the face by leaping fish. A startled silver carp can jump up to 10 feet out of the water, and the impact has been compared to being hit with a fast-moving bowling ball. These issues could arise in the Great Lakes as well. Thousands of fish leap out of water at same time - Slow Mo! "Model results suggest the most likely intensity is severe — who wants a third


The Hotlist: 11 things to see, eat, drink and do in January 2016

Bei Bei, arrived in August, but his adoring public has only been able to watch him eat, sleep and play with his mom, Mei Xiang, on the Panda Cam. That changes this month, when the National Zoo officially opens the panda house to the general public on Jan. 16. Expect lines, crowds and a sleepy panda cub. But above all, expect to say "aaaaaaw." 3001 Connecticut Ave. NW. Panda House is open 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. daily. Free. Mary Phinney (Mary Elizabeth Winstead) and Jedediah Foster (Josh Radnor) star in "Mercy Street," which premieres on PBS on Jan. 17. (Photo by Antony Platt for PBS.) 'Mercy Street' premieres on PBS, "Mercy Street," a fact-based PBS drama set in an Alexandria hospital during the Civil War, makes its television debut Jan. 17. And although the six-episode series wasn't filmed in Old Town, you can best see what inspired the show at the Carlyle House. The historic mansion's exhibition "Who These Wounded Are: The Extraordinary Stories of the Mansion House Hospital," which opens Jan. 19, shares the story of the wealthy Green family and their hotel-turned-hospital. For a deeper dive, D.C. Military Tours offers the Mercy in Alexandria walking tour, which delves into the Civil War history that inspired the show. Carlyle House, 121 N. Fairfax St., Alexandria. $3-$5. D.C. Military Tours, 703-407-6663. Tours start at Alexandria Visitors Center, 221 King St., Alexandria. $12-$15, age 12 and younger free. The Sovereign opens, Think of the Sovereign as the ChurchKey of Belgian beer bars. Beer expert Greg Engert is stocking the new Georgetown destination from Neighborhood Restaurant Group with 50 draft lines and 300 bottles. Peter Smith, formerly the chef at PS7's, is handling the "playful" menu, which will include a variety of mussels. The two-level building, formerly home to Champions and Blue Gin, has received an extensive makeover. 1206 Wisconsin Ave. NW. Canadian teenager Alessia Cara will perform at the 9:30 Club this month. (Photo by Meredith Truax.) Alessia Cara at 9:30 Club A few years ago, Canadian teenager Alessia Cara started uploading acoustic covers of songs by Adele, Amy Winehouse and Justin Timberlake to YouTube. Her soulful, stripped-down renditions led to a deal with Def Jam, which released her breakout single, “Here,” last spring. Since then, the antisocial anthem (built on a sample of Isaac Hayes’ “Ike’s Rap II”) has been racking up Spotify and YouTube streams. Considering that Cara


Craft brews hit the friendly skies

Perhaps one day you’ll be able to get a pint of DC Brau’s Alpha Domina Mellis on your flight. (Steph Harding Photo/Courtesy of DC Brau) Beer lovers rejoice! After years of less than stellar offerings (no offense Budweiser) airlines are riding the craft brew wave. According to Travel Pulse’s Paul Thompson, more and more are offering the kind of specialized brews that passengers have come to expect when they’re on the ground. Back in 2011, when he first looked into beer offerings, Thompson found that only two U.S. carriers, Alaska and Virgin America, offered craft beers. But that’s changing. Thompson said part of the reason is that the popularity of craft brews has grown, which means production has increased exponentially, making it possible for smaller brewers to produce enough beers to satisfy the needs of a big airline. And as airlines seek to build loyalty among customers (hoping perhaps that you’ll pay a little more if you like them better than the other guy) better beer offerings might curry favor with travelers. The move also dovetails with today’s foodie culture where folks want to know more about where and how their food and beverages are produced. Where to get food from a ‘Top Chef?’ Try the airport But even though more airlines are offering better options for beer lovers, not all live up to a true aficionado’s expectations. According to Thompson, using a scoring system developed by the beer-rating site, Beer Advocate, Delta Airlines scores the highest– 73.6– with offerings that include Blue Moon Belgian White and Sweetwater 420 Extra Pale Ale. Alaska Airlines comes in second with a score of 71.8. Among the Seattle-based carriers offerings: Alaskan Freeride APA and Kona Longboard. Perhaps this will make up for those delays and cramped seats?


Inaction on global warming is as reckless as drunken driving

required to avoid ever doing anything that could possibly harm others — there’s no way to avoid every possibility — but we do have a duty to take reasonable precautions to prevent avoidable damages. [Other perspectives: Pope Francis was right on climate change] Defining what is reasonable in a particular context can be difficult, but it generally involves consideration of the foreseeable risks and the burden of installing preventative measures. As to climate change, the question is whether we have taken reasonable precautions in light of the available evidence. There’s room for debate about when the dangers of climate change became clear enough to elicit a response, but the evidence definitely arrived well before the end of the 20th century. Given that the risk from climate change is high and foreseeable, it seems clear that reasonable precautions are called for (and have been for some time now). Economists who have studied climate change carefully disagree with each other about just how fast we should reduce carbon emissions. Some say we should start out with modest emissions reductions; others call for immediate, stringent limitations. Still, taking into account the costs of reducing emissions and the risk to the planet, they all agree that reductions are necessary. At the risk of oversimplification, one might boil this down to a simple mandate to phase out emissions from coal as soon as reasonably possible. Coal is the But more important, emissions from coal cause more than climate change: They are the source of severe health problems. Even in the United States, which has been requiring improved pollution control for coal plants for decades, emissions continue to result in Continued reliance on coal for energy is as foolish as drunken driving. We should develop alternatives as soon as possible, even in developing countries. As always, the standard should be what is reasonable — somewhere between shutting down coal plants today and waiting for new technology that could save us. You might question comparing carbon emissions to ordinary careless behavior. It’s certainly true that identifying who is the injured party in a car accident is easier than defining who is suffering from the additional boost our own actions are giving climate change. But how can we justify carelessly harming others simply because it is difficult to identify who will be hurt? Explore these other perspectives: Robert Brulle: America has been duped on climate change John Nagle:


One U.S. soldier killed, two wounded in Helmand province, Afghanistan

Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said a U.S. trooper was killed and two others wounded in Afghanistan's Helmand province after they came under fire while accompanying Afghan special operations forces. An American soldier was killed and two others were wounded Tuesday during a joint U.S.-Afghan Special Operations mission near the town of Marja in Helmand province, Afghanistan, the Pentagon said Tuesday. The U.S. casualties came amid an uptick in fighting in the restive province in recent weeks as Taliban forces have attempted to regain control of key towns such as Sangin, Marja and the provincial capital of Lashkar Gah. In December, Afghan army troops and police were surrounded by Taliban forces in the town of Sangin in a move that prompted a deputy governor in Helmand to use social media to plead for help from the government in Kabul. [A year of Taliban gains shows that ‘we haven’t delivered,’ top Afghan official says] According to a U.S. defense official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss operational matters, some Afghans were wounded in the operation as well. The official said two helicopters were sent in to evacuate the wounded, but after landing, one helicopter struck a wall and was disabled. It is still stuck on the ground, while another helicopter was waved off because of heavy ground fire. The helicopters involved were two HH-60 Pavehawks, according to Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook. “This is an ongoing situation, there is still a fight going on in the immediate surroundings,” Cook told reporters Tuesday afternoon. Cook added that because of the fighting the Pentagon doesn’t “have all the details surrounding what’s taking place.” In Afghanistan, Pavehawks operate predominately with U.S. Air Force Pararescue Jumpers, an elite special operations group trained in combat search and rescue. “We are deeply saddened by this loss,” Brig. Gen. Wilson Shoffner, a spokesman for U.S. forces in Afghanistan, said in a statement. “Our heartfelt sympathies go out to the families and friends of those involved.” In the wake of heavy fighting and steep Afghan casualties, the United States deployed Special Operations troops to assist their beleaguered Afghan counterparts, though the extent of their operations has not been publicized. In addition to the U.S. troops, the British government also dispatched a small team of advisers to the province — a place that bore the brunt of Britain’s casualties in the years prior to the British withdrawal


Zimbabwe plans to export more elephants to China, and no it won’t say sorry

The advocacy group Elephants DC provided this photo of an elephant caught in the wild and held at Hwange National Park in February. Zimbabwe has sold dozens of the young elephants to China. (Elephants DC) Zimbabwe is planning to export more elephants to China – and it won't say sorry for doing so. "We will not apologize to anyone," Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri, Environment, Water and Climate Minister, told reporters from the Herald on Sunday. "Not even once because they are our elephants and our people live with a huge population of elephants and bear the trouble of interacting with them." In the past, Zimbabwe's policy of exporting its wildlife to China has drawn the ire of conservationists, who note that here is a high demand for the ivory that can be taken from elephants' tusks in China. Last June, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) ruled that a deal to sell 24 animals to China was illegal, but it went ahead anyway. When the animals arrive in China, they are due to arrive Chimelong Safari Park in Guangdong Province of China. While some reports say that the wild animals are used in circus-style performances in the park, Muchinguri-Kashiri told reporters that she had visited the park and it wasn't so bad. "I am satisfied that the animals are in good shape and being well taken care of," she said, later adding that there was a drought in Zimbabwe and the elephants would likely die unless they were exported. "It is better we sell them, especially to those who can take good care of them. Whatever our detractors say, we don't mind." China and Zimbabwe have a close relationship, with the African state recently announcing that it would adopt the Chinese yuan as an official currency — part of a deal in which Beijing will also cancel about $40 million in debt. Zimbabwe was the first stop on Chinese President Xi Jinping's tour of Africa this month, with Zimbabwe's longtime President Robert Mugabe greeting him by saying: "China is Zimbabwe's all-weather friend." Speaking to reporters, Muchinguri-Kashiri admitted that the new plan was partly about money (conservationists estimate that elephants can be sold for roughly $50,000 each; Zimbabwe has already sold around 100 to Beijing). "We are here in China to also look at anti-poaching and surveillance technology like drones and helicopters because the poachers


The 10 edgiest innovation ideas of 2016

A long exposure photograph shows the SpaceX Falcon 9 lifting off, left, from its launch pad and then returning to a landing zone, right, at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Reusable rockets could lead to the start of a new age of space exploration. (Mike Brown/Reuters) At the end of every year, Edge reaches out to the smartest people on the planet and asks them a single question in an attempt to find the ideas and concepts that are changing the world of science. This year’s two-part question was: “What do you consider the most interesting recent [scientific] news? What makes it important?” Not surprisingly, this year’s set of 197 responses converged around a few key themes – the human brain, the human genome, space exploration and artificial intelligence. Based on these responses, here are 10 of the edgiest innovation buzzwords that have the greatest potential to change the trajectory of innovation in 2016. 1. The wisdom race Given all the apocalyptic scenarios we’ve been hearing about artificial intelligence over the past year, it’s not surprising that there’s been a lot of thinking about how to prevent one of those scenarios from actually occurring. Max Tegmark — the MIT physicist and cosmologist who has used mathematics to explore whether humanity might be living inside the equivalent of a Matrix-style computer simulation — calls this the “wisdom race.” What he has in mind here is a counterpart to the AI arms race, a “race between the growing power of technology and the growing wisdom with which we manage it.” With the introduction of most new technologies, humans are reactive rather than proactive, says Tegmark. Think of how the invention of fire led to fire alarms and fire extinguishers, or the invention of the automobile led to seat belts and air bags. What’s needed with AI is a more proactive approach so that we aren’t forced to learn from our mistakes later. “Either win the wisdom race and enable life to flourish for billions of years,” says Tegmark, “Or lose the race and go extinct.” 2. Reusable rockets At the end of 2015, both SpaceX and Blue Origin demonstrated the ability to return rockets safely to earth after use. That could be big for the future of space exploration, opening up a New Space Age fueled by cheaper costs and reusable rockets. As science historian George Dyson points out, “The launch


The 10 edgiest innovation ideas of 2016

business has been crippled, so far, by a vicious circle that has limited the market to expensive payloads — astronauts, military satellites, communication satellites, and deep space probes—consigned by customers who can afford to throw the launch vehicle away after a single use.” From this perspective, says Dyson, “Reusable rockets are the best hope of breaking this cycle and moving forward on a path leading to low-cost, high-duty-cycle launch systems where the vehicle carries inert propellant, and the energy source remains on the ground.” 3. Blockchain technology If you thought blockchain technology was only for cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin The implementation of blockchain technology across financial assets such as currencies or mortgages is just the beginning, says Swan, “This means that all human interaction regarding the transfer of value, including money, property, assets, obligations, and contracts could be instantiated in blockchains for quicker, easier, less costly, less risky, and more auditable execution.” Blockchain technology, says Swan, could even lead to new models for governance, given its focus on distributed consensus. In fact, investor Marc Andreessen thinks the blockchain could be the biggest invention since the Internet itself. 4. Optogenetics Optogenetics is a relatively new field of biotechnology that gives researchers the ability to transform brain activity into light and light into brain activity. Optogenetics made headlines at the end of 2015, when Karl Deisseroth and Edward Boyden won a $3 million Breakthrough Prize in the life sciences for their pioneering work in the field. Using optogenetics, suggests Christian Keysers, a Dutch neuroscientist, it could be possible to use light to trigger feelings or emotions, to change what’s happening inside the brain, to treat depression, or perhaps even to wipe out or implant memories in others (along the lines of Total Recall). The potential for optogenetics is just now being understood: “Being able to record and manipulate brain activity will change who we are. It will serve as an interface through which computers can become part of our brain, and through which our brains could directly interface with each other.” 5. Neuroprediction Neuroprediction, which is the use of human brain imaging data to predict how a person will feel or behave in the future, almost sounds like something straight out of Minority Report. Thought crimes, anybody? If you accept the fact that human thoughts and choices are based on underlying biological processes, though, it might be possible to predict future behaviors


Scientists found a nearby black hole burping out gas

American Astronomical Society. These blasts of matter that black holes expel, which scientists believe help regulate the size of the holes and create new stars nearby, can be hard to catch. In fact, it was only in late November that a research group claimed to have caught the entire process (the entire star meal, if you will) with belch included. "Our observation is important because this behavior would likely happen very often in the early universe, altering the evolution of galaxies. It is common for big black holes to expel gas outward, but rare to have such a close, resolved view of these events," Schlegel said. The black hole studied in November was a staggering 300 million light years away, but the super-massive black hole observed by Schlegel and his colleagues is in our cosmic back yard: It's just 26 million light years away in the Messier 51 galaxy system. The black hole sits in the center of a small spiral galaxy that's working on merging with a second, larger spiral galaxy. It's likely that this cohabitation gave the black hole some gaseous material to chow down. Black holes aren't very discerning eaters: They consume anything that comes past the point of no return known as the event horizon. Using NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, the researchers spotted twin arcs of X-ray emissions from the black hole in question, which they believe to be the aftereffects of a big meal that happened millions of years ago (the jets, they say, would have taken 1 million to 6 million years to reach their current positions). They also noted a burst of colder hydrogen gas in the trajectory of the jets, suggesting that the hot burp had "snow plowed" other gasses into shape on its way out into the galaxy. “This activity is likely to have had a big effect on the galactic landscape," co-author Christine Jones of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics said in a statement. Read More: Looking for alien civilizations? Check these star clusters, scientists say. Stephen Hawking believes he’s solved a huge mystery about black holes Scientists just smashed the distance record for quantum teleportation Scientists just caught a black hole swallowing a star — and burping a bit back out This is what it looks like when a black hole tears a star apart The new biggest thing in the universe, and why it’s a headache for scientists


The quest to hack trees and beat climate change

group delivered beautiful mock-ups, but so far little else has come from it. Finding funding is a challenge. “You don’t want to be the first person to pay,” said Kimberly Poliquin, the director of SHIFTBoston. “Scientists have figures, but you don’t know if that’s going to be the reality once you built it.” Capturing and storing carbon isn’t yet the type of expense that local governments and organizations can slide into their budgets. The cost of the technology is dropping, but not to a point where it’s affordable to install “forests” of these systems. Poliquin estimates an upfront cost of $350,000 for an artificial tree, but she expects prices to come down considerably. She hopes to develop a prototype of such a tree in one or two years. There’s plenty of interest in removing carbon from air. One method is to capture carbon directly from the smoke stacks of power plants. Another method — which the Boston project targeted — is pulling carbon out of open air, where it isn’t present in as much density. In theory, one square kilometer of artificial trees could remove 4 million tons of carbon a year, according to the Center for Negative Carbon Emissions, which is developing a technology to work in open spaces. Seven large-scale projects to capture and store carbon at power plants will arrive in 2016 and 2017. Most are in the United States and Canada. But much more growth is needed before carbon capture and storage makes an impact on climate change. According to the Global Carbon Capture and Storage Institute, the 15 large-scale projects operating around the world can capture 28 million tons of carbon dioxide per year. To keep climate change in check, we’ll need to process 4 billion tons in 2040 and 6 billion in 2050. The Center for Negative Carbon Emissions is developing technology that it says is 1,000 times as effective as trees, per unit of biomass. The group is located in the desert because their technology responds well to warm, dry air and requires less energy in that environment. Operating in cooler climates such as Boston would add expenses. Once the technology is fully built out, they expect to remove a ton of carbon dioxide for about $100 a ton. Their long-term estimate is less than $30 per ton. As is, there’s no resemblance to a tree as scientists including those at Arizona State


Course by course, Washington restaurants are changing their fine-dining game

table -- it becomes less intimidating. (Masseria also offers an eight-course chef's table menu.) The fact that Masseria is somewhat off-the-beaten-path and not near many other restaurants gives it more of a destination feel. Unlike other neighborhoods, diners don't have many nearby options to pop in and out of, so Stefanelli wanted to design an experience that would make an evening of the excursion. Some chefs are building their special-occasion dining on the opposite premise: That diners want to put themselves entirely in the hands of the chef. That kind of experience is what Eric Ziebold will be going for at Métier. Unlike Kinship, his a la carte dining room that just opened near Mount Vernon Square, its fancier sibling will feature a tasting menu, which offers a set price and a set menu (allowing for allergy modifications, of course). Fiola just rolled out this option, too, with a $120 six-course "chef's decadence" menu. At CityZen, the fine dining restaurant in the Mandarin Oriental hotel that Ziebold ran for 10 years, diners could choose a prix fixe or tasting menu. Ziebold learned that people were using the tasting menu for a more celebratory evening, which is what he wants to replicate at Métier. Dining there will be "about having a night out," he said. "You're wanting to put your customers in a position that they're along for the ride... All the details are going to be worked out for them." Ziebold is still working out those details, but expect seven courses for $150 to $200. Several other projects in the works will follow a similar model, including Pineapple and Pearls, Rose's Luxury chef-owner Aaron Silverman's second restaurant, where dinner will run at least $100 per person. Shaw Bijou, from former New York chef and current "Top Chef" contestant Kwame Onwuachi, will serve more around 17 courses on its tasting menu. Like Trabocchi and Ziebold, Stefanelli attributes restaurants' willingness to turn themselves over to multi-course experiences as a reflection of the national and local dining scene. "There's been a beautiful evolution to the city," Stefanelli said. "People are going out, and they're eating, and they're being adventurous." Related items: Fabio and Maria Trabocchi are opening a Van Ness restaurant devoted to pasta He's the celebrity chef, but she's running the show Fiola Mare: Fall Dining Guide 2015 Luca Trabocchi: A 10-year-old with a passion for cooking, and parents who foster it


How to tell if your international neighbor sets off a nuke

explosion looks a lot more like a traditional atomic bomb, not a more devastating thermonuclear explosion. How can they tell? And what evidence do we have that North Korea actually set off a nuclear blast? Experts use a combination of methods to identify nuclear weapons tests. You can separate them into a few key categories: seismic analysis, scanning for radioactive gas, and listening to sound waves underwater. [Eight countries. 2,055 nuclear tests. 71 years.] Seismology There are hundreds of sensors around the world designed to pick up the seismic activity associated with nuclear weapons. From decades of research, we know that nukes set off underground create vibration patterns that can be easily distinguished from earthquakes, drilling or other activity. But countries like North Korea go to great lengths to minimize the disruption their tests cause, making it harder to confirm using seismic analysis alone. What the network of sensors is really good at is helping to triangulate, or pinpoint, the location of a nuclear test. Atmospheric sampling One of the telltale signs of a nuclear explosion is radiation. If the testers are trying to cover their tracks, there may not be large pieces of radioactive evidence. But there may be radioactive gases that can seep through earth and rock and escape into the atmosphere. So in the wake of a suspected nuclear test, watchdogs will "sniff" the atmosphere for xenon, which doesn't bind easily to other elements and makes it easier to link to a nuclear test. By analyzing wind patterns, experts can even work backwards to find the source of the xenon they've detected. [This is the Air Force's radiation-sniffing plane] Acoustics Much like the underground seismic sensors, there's also a network of underwater microphones designed to listen for nuclear-related vibrations. Because sound travels incredibly well underwater — this is the same logic that powers sonar — experts can pretty easily identify sudden, violent disruptions against the backdrop of ordinary ocean noise. How To Detect A Secret Nuclear Test At the moment, however, all we truly know is that North Korea claimed to have blown up an H-bomb, that scientists detected a 4.9-magnitude seismic event and that Japan has sent jets to sniff around for radioactive isotopes. Investigators may not find any xenon gases to speak of, as was the case after North Korea's test in 2009. In 2013, researchers could only pick up inconclusive amounts of the material.


Secret plan shows the IRS wants to ‘get out of the business of talking with taxpayers,’ advocate says

(Daniel Acker/Bloomberg News) Doing business with the Internal Revenue Service of the future will feel a lot like doing business with an online retailer or your bank. You’ll file your taxes online and be notified through a secure email account that the IRS got them. Questions, payments — even audits — will be communicated to you electronically. No more letters in the mail. The IRS says its jump to widespread automation sometime in the next five years will be a necessary act of catching up to the modern world. But a new report issued Wednesday by the national advocate for taxpayers alleges that the IRS of the future will more or less wipe out taxpayers’ interaction with a human being, either on the phone or in person. “Based on our internal discussions with IRS officials, [we have] been left with the distinct impression that the IRS’s ultimate goal is ‘to get out of the business of talking with taxpayers,'” National Taxpayer Advocate Nina E. Olson wrote in her annual report to Congress. “The widespread expectation is that traditional taxpayer services – telephone assistance and face-to-face assistance — will be scaled back dramatically,” she wrote. Olson, the congressionally designated watchdog of the IRS, says the evolving IRS plan has “many positive components” that would speed information to taxpayers and handle many of their interactions with the agency. But she warned that relying on technology and tax preparers to answer questions also could be dangerous, by creating a “pay to play” system where the only taxpayers who will get face-to-face or other personal services are the ones who can afford to pay for it. The report cites the agency’s “future state” plan to use online accounts for the 150 million individual taxpayers and 11 million businesses seeking help and information as its number one “most serious problem for taxpayers” this year. Olson calls this a secret plan that IRS officials have not, and should, release to the public. And she says the public should, but has not, been consulted on its development. Olson says the plan for online accounts will put taxpayers at a huge disadvantage if they are poor and don’t have access to the Internet, feel uncomfortable discussing sensitive financial matters online or need to resolve issues that are not “cookie cutter” questions that can be resolved by talking to a person (or computer) on line. The plan says “little


Looking for alien civilizations? Check these star clusters, scientists say.

million stars packed into 100 light years, you don't need the odds to be that good in order for a few Earth-like planets to show up. If one happened to be the right size and distance from a host star that was capable of warming up a planet without obliterating it, life similar to our own could theoretically evolved. The possibility of life that Di Stefano and her co-author Alak Ray of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research, in India, present is just that – a possibility. No one is claiming that these planets exist, or that they'd definitely harbor life if they did. But if they do – well, that's where things get cool. The reason Di Stefano wants us looking at globular clusters is that the culture of spaceflight for an intelligent species that evolved there would be radically different from our own. Interstellar travel would be far more plausible for species evolving out in a globular cluster, and interstellar communication would be a breeze. "The Voyager probes are 100 billion miles from Earth, or one-tenth as far as it would take to reach the closest star if we lived in a globular cluster," Di Stefano said in a statement. "That means sending an interstellar probe is something a civilization at our technological level could do in a globular cluster." And our planet is only 4.5 billion years old, so the hypothetical planets in these far-off clusters could have taken their sweet evolutionary time and still be well past the point we're at now. Alternatively, everything over there could have already evolved, lived, and gone extinct. But that's less exciting to think about. Because the closest globular cluster is thousands of light years away, this thought experiment will probably remain a thought experiment and nothing more for the foreseeable future. But as telescopes get more powerful, and scientists develop increasingly sophisticated ways of using them, we could very well direct our attention to these star-packed regions to look for signs of interstellar traffic. Read More: Why NASA’s top scientist is sure that we’ll find signs of alien life in the next decade ‘Alien megastructure’ continues to not be aliens in latest study Stephen Hawking announces $100 million hunt for alien life Scientists found a nearby black hole burping out gas Radio pulses from space have stumped scientists for years. Now we may be close to solving the mystery.


Consumer Electronics Show 2016: Are we in an innovation lull?

The Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas is the largest of its kind, featuring thousands of exhibitors. LAS VEGAS -- Scan over the highlights of this year's Consumer Electronics Show (CES), and you may get a slight feeling of deja vu. Many of the coolest gadgets this year are the same as the coolest gadgets last year -- or the year before, even. The booths are still exciting, and the demos are still just this side of crazy. It's still easy to be dazzled by the display of drones, 3D printers, virtual reality goggles and more "smart" devices than you could ever hope to catalog. Upon reflection, however, it's equally easy to feel like you've seen it all before. And it's hard not to think: Are we in an innovation lull? In some ways, the answer is yes. For years, smartphones, televisions, tablets, laptops and desktops have made up a huge part of the market and driven innovation. But now these segments are looking at slower growth curves -- or shrinking markets in some cases -- as consumers aren't as eager to spend money on new gadgets. Meanwhile, emerging technologies -- the drones, 3D printers and smart-home devices of the world -- now seem a bit too old to be called "the next big thing." Basically the tech industry seems to be in an awkward period now. "There's not any one-hit wonder, and there will not be one for years to come," said Gary Shapiro, president and chief executive of the Consumer Technology Association (CTA). In his eyes, however, that doesn't necessarily mean that innovation has stopped. It's just grown up a little. "Many industries are going out of infancy and becoming adolescents," Shapiro said. For instance, new technologies that are building upon existing technology haven't found their footing well enough to appeal to a mass audience, because, in many cases, they need to work effectively with other devices to realize their full appeal. Take the evolution of the smart home, for example. Companies are pushing it hard but make it almost overwhelming even to dip a toe in the water for the average consumer, because there are so many compatibility issues to think about. No average person wants to figure out whether their favorite calendar software works with their fridge or whether their washing machine and tablet get along. Having to install a different app for each smart appliance


Pentagon identifies Army Special Forces soldier killed in Afghanistan

courtesy Washington National Guard) McClintock belonged to Alpha Company of 1st Battalion, 19th Group, a National Guard Special Forces unit based out of Fort Lewis, Wash. Special Forces units like 19th group have been a staple of the war in Afghanistan since the first U.S. ground troops landed there in late 2001. Their primary job is training local military units and fighting alongside them in what is know as “Foriegn Internal Defense.” Even though U.S.-led combat operations officially ended in 2014, small pockets of special forces units have continued to operate with Afghan forces in a mentoring role, while other counterterror units have remained in Afghanistan to prevent the resurgence of terror groups like al-Qaeda. Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook told reporters Tuesday that the Special Forces soldiers were advising and assisting Afghan special forces troops when they came under fire. “Staff Sergeant McClintock was one of the best of the best,” Maj. Gen. Bret Daugherty, commander of the Washington National Guard, said in a statement Thursday. “He was a Green Beret who sacrificed time away from his loved ones to train for and carry out these dangerous missions. This is a tough loss for our organization, and a harsh reminder that ensuring freedom is not free. We stand with Staff Sergeant McClintock’s family, and will provide ongoing support during the grieving and healing process.” McClintock, a Special Forces engineer sergeant, joined the Army in 2006 as an infantryman and shortly after basic training was assigned to the 1st Calvary Division where he deployed to Iraq, according to biography released by the Washington National Guard. After his first deployment he bounced around between various units before attending Army Special Forces selection in 2009. Upon completion of Special Forces training he was assigned to 1st Special Forces Group, where he then deployed to Afghanistan in 2012. He left active duty in 2014 and was subsequently assigned to 19th group.His awards include four Army commendation medals, the Combat Infantryman Badge and now the Purple Heart. He leaves behind his wife and a 3-month-old son. The heavy fighting in Marja comes as the Taliban once again spreads throughout southern Afghanistan. The Taliban, a predominantly Pashtun group, started in Helmand province before taking over other parts of the country in the 1990s, only to be toppled in the months following the Sept. 11 terror attacks. In recent weeks, fighting has been so intense in


The shadowy JSOC general expected to be next leader of America’s special operations forces

Nate Self, a soldier who served under Thomas in Afghanistan in early 2002, in his memoir, “a no-frills operator, a former track star with strawberry-blond hair, piercing eyes, complex thoughts, and plain words.” The first thing he did with new officers was take them on a five-mile run and give them assigned reading: “Gates of Fire,” a novel about the famous last stand of 300 Spartan hoplites at Thermopylae, and a chapter written by a Navy SEAL colleague, William McRaven, about the 1970 Son Tay prison raid in North Vietnam. Thomas spent much of the twelve years that followed in and out of Afghanistan and Iraq, serving as a senior JSOC staff officer and deputy commander before doing a stint as the top military liaison at the CIA. Stanley McChrystal, the retired general who was JSOC’s longest-serving commander, waxed poetic in his book “My Share of the Task,” gushing about Thomas’s “amazing vision, unwavering loyalty, and personal courage.” The only year of the war on terror during which Thomas didn’t spend time in Afghanistan was 2008, according to information Army officials shared with the press when he gained his third star last year and took command of JSOC. That was the year Thomas spent overseeing U.S. troops in Iraqi city of Mosul, where he survived a head-on attack on his armored vehicle by a car bomb. “I loved working for him,” said an Army colonel who asked not to be named because he served under Thomas in JSOC units. “When leaders say they provide top cover, some really do it and some pay lip service. Tony Thomas really does it. When I was working for him and I screwed up, what he expected me to do was come clean, tell him what I was doing about it, and he took care of the rest. That was liberating, especially in an Army that often has a zero-defects mentality.” “I think over the years he’s been challenged a bit with some of his peers and superiors because of his candor and bluntness,” the colonel added. McChrystal hints at that too, noting that when the two were captains together in the Rangers in the late 1980s, their “relationship was initially strained.” In a 2008 blog post, former Ranger Andrew Exum, who served under Thomas in Iraq, remarked admiringly on the more senior officer’s “reputation for pissing important people off.” Suggesting his famous candor,


This galaxy has two black holes – and one of them is very strange

1 million to 1 billion times the mass of our sun depending on the size of the galaxy itself. So the newly merged galaxy has two black holes, which isn't a surprise. One of them looks the way researchers expected it to. But the other had fewer stars around it than one would usually find. Lead researcher Julie Comerford of the University of Colorado Boulder presented her findings on Tuesday at the annual meeting of the American Astronomical Society. A preprint version of her group's upcoming paper on the work is available online. “One black hole is starved of stars, and has 500 times fewer stars associated with it than the other black hole,” Comerford said in a statement. “The question is why there’s such a discrepancy.” It's possible that this black hole is just an odd duck: It could be a rare “intermediate” mass black hole, with a mass just 100 to 1 million times greater than that of the sun. There are small, stellar black holes just a few times more massive than the sun, but scientists suspect there must be medium-sized ones, too. To date, black holes as "medium" as 50,000 times more massive than our sun have been spotted. But it's hard to confirm their existence, or even figure out where scientists should go looking for them. It could be that one of the two original galaxies that formed the merger – the one that hosted this strange black hole – was actually a dwarf galaxy. Some researchers suspect that dwarf galaxies are more likely to play host to supermassive black holes that are relatively tiny, but this isn't universally accepted. Alternatively, the merger itself could have stripped away some of the black hole's starry entourage. The gravitational force of two galaxies intermingling would have been massive, and might have caused some of the material surrounding the black hole to disperse. In any case, it's clear that this merged galaxy has something going on that we haven't seen before. Read More: Looking for alien civilizations? Check these star clusters, scientists say. This is what it looks like when a black hole tears a star apart Stephen Hawking believes he’s solved a huge mystery about black holes The new biggest thing in the universe, and why it’s a headache for scientists Scientists just caught a black hole swallowing a star — and burping a bit back out


In ‘Serial’ podcast, new details about Bowe Bergdahl’s torture emerge

Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, second from right, leaves the courthouse with his defense attorney, Lt. Col. Franklin Rosenblatt, left, after an arraignment hearing for his court-martial in Fort Bragg, N.C., on Dec. 22. REUTERS/Jonathan Drake After escaping into the Pakistani wilderness and being recaptured, Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl’s treatment in captivity took a turn for the worse: He was placed in a cage, moved repeatedly and tortured by a man who sliced his chest repeatedly with a razor blade, he said in an interview published Thursday. Bergdahl’s comments appeared in the newest episode of the podcast “Serial.” The razor cuts were done slowly, to inflict maximum pain, he said. “Don’t think one or two cuts at a time. Think, like probably, 60 to 70 cuts at a time,” he said. “And they did it slowly.” Bergdahl’s participation in the podcast has provided an episodic window into his five years in captivity as the Army moves forward with his court-martial for walking away from his infantry platoon’s tiny combat outpost in Afghanistan’s Paktika province late on June 29, 2009. He was captured by the Taliban within hours the following morning and held for the next five years over the border in Pakistan by the Haqqani network, a powerful militant group affiliated with the Taliban. [Disillusioned and self-deluded, Bowe Bergdahl vanished into brutal captivity] Bergdahl, 29, faces charges of desertion and misbehavior before the enemy, and up to life in prison if convicted. He was recovered by a Special Operations team in Afghanistan in May 2014 in a controversial prisoner swap approved by the Obama administration in which by Taliban officials were released into the supervision of the Qatari government. Bergdahl walked away from his base deliberately to cause chaos so that he could get the attention of a general, he has told investigators since his recovery. He planned to air grievances about his unit, he said. His mental capacity at the time he disappeared has been called into question by a panel of psychiatrists, Bergdahl’s legal team said in the September hearing. The last two “Serial” episodes — one released Thursday, and one published Dec. 24 — have more closely examined Bergdahl’s captivity and escape attempts. The details have not been verified in great detail by the U.S. military, but Terrence Russell, a defense official who has interviewed more than a hundred Americans held in captivity overseas, said during a preliminary


Main Street Morning: Mastercard debuts a grocery delivery app

thing that ever happened to advertising. Start-ups - A hardware start-up raises over $1.5 million on Kickstarter. - A new project promises $10,000 and guidance to women who create start-ups. - A wedding planner seeks to launch a co-working space for the planners, photographers and other small business owners who cater to the wedding industry. Technology - An “interactive family robot” tells bedtime stories and teaches yoga. - A new point of sale service for restaurants raises $30 million. - The price for the Oculus Rift Virtual Reality Headset is set at $599. - New pinball machines will debut at the CES show this week. - Under Armor plans to wire athletes up from head to toe. - MasterCard debuts a grocery ordering app for a smart fridge. Online - T-Mobile’s first Windows 10 mobile phone is big and cheap. - Amazon starts 2016 with three price cuts. - Internet Explorer 8, 9, and 10 will reach their end of life next week. Social Media - How “being wasted” on Facebook can hurt your chances of getting a loan. On This Day in 1959 - The U.S. recognized the new Cuban government of Fidel Castro. Around the Country - Burbank, California’s City Council plans to consider a pot business ban, medical marijuana dispensaries are set to debut in New York State and Denver’s zoning rules are sending marijuana businesses to poor neighborhoods. - A Napa Valley, California insurer celebrates 125 years in business. - Californians purchased 28,000 new flood policies in anticipation of El Nin᷈o. - Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker will not pardon a man convicted with his nephew in a case dramatized in the television documentary “Making a Murderer,” despite online petitions seeking their release, his office said on Wednesday. - If a lobby group in Mississippi succeeds in getting legislation passed in the 2016 session, large chains like Walmart and Kroger could run local wine and liquor sellers out of business. Around the World - Norway leads the world in electric car market share. - Netflix launches in 130 new countries, including India and Russia. Small Business, Big Impact - Lexington, Kentucky mourns the passing of an equestrian competitor and stable owner. Gene Marks owns the Marks Group, a Bala Cynwyd PA consulting firm that helps clients with customer relationship management. Follow Gene Marks and On Small Business on Twitter. News we should know about? Email us here.


What D.C. restaurants have finally changed about the way they treat vegetables

in vegetables from diners, who he thinks are changing their diets for health, environmental and ethical reasons. So, Maupillier -- an avowed meat lover -- decided his menu would place an emphasis on vegetables. "I'm following what I believe is the right trend. I don't want to be catching up in 10 years," said Maupillier, who devotes a half-dozen of his medium-size plates to produce. Garrison chef Rob Weland also is making an effort to emphasize the fruits of the Earth, in part because he wants to showcase the turnips, radishes and mushrooms he's sourcing locally. "I'd like them to be more of a feature than a side dish," Weland said. "I don't think of them as side dishes." Sushiko in Chevy Chase recently unveiled a labor-intensive vegan omakase menu These fine dining restaurants, however, may be catching up to vegetable-focused fast-casual spots such as Sweetgreen and Chaia, which for years have served as gateways into a greener diet. Nick Wiseman, co-founder of DGS Delicatessen, the pastrami-curing restaurant in Dupont Circle, is getting in on the action with his new hummus and veggie-focused spinoff, Little Sesame, on the lower level of DGS. "Center-of-the-plate vegetables are definitely a big thing now," he said. Sure enough, winter squash, beets and cauliflower play starring roles in his hummus bowls. [Can vegetarians dine in meat-centric D.C. restaurants?] "I definitely think the climate for vegetable dishes is changing and getting more elevated," said Genevieve Villamora, co-owner of Columbia Heights Filipino spot Bad Saint. "I think the standard seems to be evolving. The standard is, 'Is this a good dish? . . . Would this appeal to any person?' " The vegetable section of the menu, she said, is "not just the penalty box for people who don't eat meat." The Carrot Scale Maybe your New Year's resolution is to incorporate something green into your diet. (Once a week. So your doctor stops bothering you.) Or maybe you've been espousing a raw diet since, well, famed semi-vegan Bill Clinton was still the president with the predilection for Mickey D's. The fact is that some of us are finally ordering Brussels sprouts, while others could eat sorrel and sumac-spiced carrots every day. So how accessible is the meatless fare at this spate of new vegetable-loving restaurants? It all depends on how adventurous you're feeling. Use our scale, ranging from beginner to advanced, to determine which restaurant is