The enormous threat to America’s last grasslands

are one of the fastest declining [groups] of birds,” he added. “In some cases, when CRP was added to the landscape, for some of these species there was a reversal of the decline. Now, we’re seeing a reduction of CRP on the landscape, and that’s going to result in the decline of some grassland birds. We don’t have much grassland left in this area. Eventually you’re going to reach a point where [the grassland birds] disappear from the state completely.” The McCown’s longspur, a bird once found throughout most of North Dakota, is now known only on a single 640-acre piece of land in the state’s southwest. The western meadowlark, North Dakota’s state bird, has also declined. Statistical models run by the Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center have found that a loss of CRP land in the prairie pothole region also causes a significant reduction in amphibian habitat. When biodiverse grasslands are converted to one-crop farmland, pollinators also suffer. North Dakota is home to 600,000 of the country’s approximately 2 million registered beehives. Many North Dakota hives are taken to farms in places like California so crops can be pollinated. “As the landscape has begun to change, beekeepers have noticed a greater rate of mortality,” said Zac Browning, an apiarist near Jamestown. Pollinators provide an estimated $15 billion in ecosystem services — such as pollinating food crops — annually, said Clint Otto, an ecologist at the Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center. Of that amount, $12 billion alone can be attributed to honeybees. “Or, one in three bites of food,” Otto said. The prairie pothole region also serves as a significant carbon storage mechanism. Statistical models run by the U.S. Geological Survey show that a hypothetical loss of 100 percent of the region’s CRP acres could result in a release of more than 12 million tons of carbon into the atmosphere. It’s not just grasslands that have been uprooted — the region’s glacially formed wetlands are being drained to make room for corn and soybeans. The Fish and Wildlife Service also has money to purchase acres for conservation from landowners, called easements, where the service pays landowners to not plow, drain, burn, or fill certain tracts of prairie or wetland, indefinitely. But North Dakota’s oil boom has also eaten up a sizable chunk of this protected land. In the Fish and Wildlife Service’s Lostwood Wetland Management District — made up of


How Monday’s England-Slovakia soccer match just might influence Brexit

England fans gather on June 10, in advance of the team’s Euro 2016 soccer championship opening game in Marseille, France. England and Russia tied, 1-1. (REUTERS/Jean-Paul Pelissier) On June 23, U.K. voters will decide whether to leave or remain part of the European Union. In the three days before that vote, England, Wales and Northern Ireland all play their final group games in the 2016 European soccer championships. Do sporting results affect elections? Evidence from the past suggests that, for England’s 53 million voters in particular, the result of this coming Monday’s game against Slovakia could decisively influence an increasingly tight referendum. While England’s place in the next round is now all but assured, a loss to Slovakia would line up a potential quarter-final showdown with soccer powerhouses Spain or Germany. Defeat against Slovakia could not only hasten England’s exit from Euro 2016, but also may help to push it out of the E.U. How do sports affect politics? Every four years the UEFA European Championships come along, a month-long soccer extravaganza with 24 teams from Iceland to Turkey battling for the prize. This year, teams from three of the four British home nations are in France to compete in Euro 2016 (the Scots, sadly, missed out in the qualifying rounds). Some commentators have wondered whether the shared soccer experience might bond the United Kingdom and Europe more closely than ever before. After the June 11 violence between England and Russia fans after their teams’ first game in Marseille, that theory looks doubtful. Others have speculated that the tournament could bolster the British public’s sense of national identity, boosting the “Vote Leave” numbers in the referendum. Jumping on the flag-waving bandwagon, the Vote Leave campaign launched a promotion to give £50 million to anyone who could correctly predict all of the championship results. But a 2010 study by Andrew Healy, Neil Malhotra and Cecilia Mo suggests that the actual results of the games in the run-up to an election could significantly affect the vote. The authors found that in the 10 days after victories for U.S. local college football teams, the vote share for the incumbent president grew by up to 1.5 percentage points — a potentially decisive amount in a close-run election. The impact was even larger if the win was unexpected. Here’s why — a victory for their team put voters in a good mood, making them feel


The saga of Hong Kong’s abducted booksellers takes a darker turn

lies.” “Lam Wing-kee has blown apart the Chinese authorities’ story,” said Mabel Au, director of Amnesty International Hong Kong. “The Chinese authorities must come clean and admit the truth. The plight of the other booksellers still in mainland China is extremely worrying. They must be granted access to lawyers and where appropriate consular assistance.” Gui Minhai’s daughter, Angela Gui, testified before Congress about her father’s disappearance in May. Speaking to CNN on Thursday, she said that she hoped that after Lam’s release, she would soon have positive news about her father. “It makes me feel very worried because it’s been eight months and I still haven’t had any official confirmation that he is in detention,” she said. Daughter of HK bookseller Gui Minhai gives testimony at US human rights committee The Swedish Embassy in Beijing was last granted access to Gui on Feb. 24 and says it has repeatedly requested a new meeting — to no avail. “The information surrounding the disappearances of Gui Minhai’s colleagues, including recent developments, is alarming,” said an embassy spokesperson who was not authorized to be named. “Our efforts to reach clarity in what has happened to, and is happening to, Swedish citizen Gui Minhai continue unabated.” In January, Gui briefly surfaced on Chinese television, making a bizarre televised confession in which he claimed he had returned voluntarily to China to surrender over an 11-year-old drunken driving case. In a statement to the South China Morning Post, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Rep. Christopher H. Smith (R-N.J.), who jointly chair the Congressional-Executive Commission on China, said Lam’s account may have only confirmed what was widely suspected but was nonetheless important. “These abductions were illegal and have serious economic and security implications and call into question the future viability of the ‘one country, two systems’ model,” they said. “The charade must end and Gui Minhai should immediately be allowed to return to Hong Kong and his family.” On Friday, Britain said it was also “deeply concerned” by the treatment of Lee, calling his “involuntary removal” from Hong Kong to the mainland a serious breach of the agreement reached with China at the time of the 1997 handover of Hong Kong. “We continue to call for Lee’s liberty to be fully restored. We have offered support and remain ready to discuss his case with him,” said a Foreign Office spokesperson who was not authorized to be named.


Senate votes to scale back federal job preferences for veterans

veterans hiring system. These officials have expressed concern to McCain and other lawmakers that too many qualified non-veterans are getting shut out of federal jobs in deference to those who served but may not be qualified for some positions, according to Senate staff. [Memorial Day provides respite from VA controversies, even as new issue brews on veterans hiring ] The veterans language has flown under the radar in a bill with thousands of provisions. But it’s now fiercely opposed by leading service organizations, which had no idea until the legislation was on the floor that the Senate was moving to chip away at the government’s most visible effort to reward military service since the draft ended in the 1970s. “Is Congress now starting to dial back the goodwill the country’s shown toward veterans’ employment?” asked Lauren Augustine, senior legislative associate for Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, an advocacy group. “Are we now going to set a bad example to the private sector by limiting veterans preference in government?” [Veterans: Federal jobs can be a bad fit, so many of us leave] But McCain and other committee members are acknowledging privately that it is time for the well-intentioned policy to be tweaked, committee aids say. Preference for veterans has caused resentment and confusion among veterans and non-veterans over whether the leg up is applied fairly and whether it is bringing the best people into government. McCain, who spent five and a half years in a North Vietnamese prison cell during the Vietnam War, said in a brief hallway interview in the Capitol that he did not know about the policy change in the bill. But, aware of the sensitivity around hiring veterans, he said, “I’m sure we would never” erode preference policies. [Obama’s push to hire veterans causing confusion and resentment, officials say] McCain later clarified his position and reiterated his belief that the change would not undermine veterans’ preference. “We must balance the goals of rewarding those who are eligible for a federal hiring advantage with the needs of the federal government and notably the Department of Defense to attract and hire the best talent for a variety of important national security jobs,” the senator said in a statement. The defense bill “achieves this balance by ensuring veterans still have the ability to get a foot in the door for federal civilian employment, after which they stand on merit,”


Robots, swarming drones and ‘Iron Man’: Welcome to the new arms race

based in a nondescript office building in Arlington, Va., just down the block from DARPA. The low-profile agency employs 4,000 scientists around the world and funds research at universities and throughout industry. At any given time, about 12,000 projects are underway, and the agency produces 350 to 400 technical patents a year, said Rear Adm. Mathias Winter, the chief of naval research. In 70 years in existence, the agency has funded 60 Nobel laureates. “We want to do the impossible, can’t-be-done, there’s-no-way-that’ll-ever-happen problems,” Winter said in an interview. “That’s what scientists do. We do magic. And the engineers have to do the miracle.” Next month, the magic will come in the form of a swarm of 30 small drones that will fly together like a flock of birds, “break off a cadre to be able to potentially go attack something . . . and then come back and regroup and go,” Winter said. The Navy is unveiling a laser weapons capability that can be used aboard ships at sea. Lasers — yes, think Star Wars — are another priority. In 2014, the Navy deployed a $40 million, 30-kilowatt laser that was mounted on the deck of the USS Ponce in the Persian Gulf. Service members practiced taking out drones and small boats using a video-game-like controller. Now it is fully operational, and the Pentagon could record its first kill with a laser. The technology is moving fast, and by 2018, ONR plans to test a 150-kilowatt laser on a ship that will be five times more powerful than one on the USS Ponce. ‘Phenomenal advancements’ At DARPA, the Third Offset is viewed differently from the previous offset strategies, which gave the United States a firm lead over its adversaries for decades. This time, the effort is seen as much more dynamic, using technologies that evolve quickly over time, said Arati Prabhakar, the agency’s director. Sometimes that will come through software that’s easy to upgrade. Or through artificial intelligence, so that machines will be able to learn and adapt on their own. “Where are the breakthroughs going to come from?” she said. “A theme is if you combine access to leading-edge commercial technology and deeply integrate it with DOD [Department of Defense] secret sauce, that’s where you get phenomenal advancements in capabilities.” One example is DARPA’s 132-foot-long autonomous ship. From the outside, it looks like another military ship. But without a


Scientists spot the oldest oxygen ever found in the universe

cosmic reonization. Eventually the universe hit a critical mass of hydrogen-processing stars, and it started to look like the incredible star factory we know and love. We can't actually see the birth of these first stars, because all that hydrogen was pretty opaque, so scientists are always trying to push further and further back in time. A color composite image of a portion of the Subaru XMM-Newton Deep Survey Field. The red galaxy at the center of the image is the most distant galaxy, SXDF-NB1006-2. (NAOJ) When it was discovered in 2012, SXDF-NB1006-2 was the oldest, most distant galaxy ever observed. That record has since been broken several times, but it still gets us about as close to the dark ages as we can get. The galaxy was first spotted by the Subaru Telescope because of the glow of ionized hydrogen being given off by its young stars, but follow-ups with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) radio telescope revealed the glow of ionized oxygen as well. The galaxy doesn't contain much oxygen — just around 10 percent of the oxygen found in our own sun — but that's to be expected. "The small abundance is expected because the Universe was still young and had a short history of star formation at that time," study author Naoki Yoshida of the University of Tokyo said in a statement. "In fact, our simulation predicted an abundance ten times smaller than the Sun. But we have another, unexpected, result: a very small amount of dust." SXDF-NB1006-2's oxygen content could only be supported by the existence of several stars over a dozen times more massive than the sun. The lack of dust hasn't been explained, but it may have allowed these stars to shine their ultraviolet light out into the void, helping them push reionization forward. "SXDF-NB1006-2 would be a prototype of the light sources responsible for the cosmic reionization," study author Akio Inoue of Osaka Sangyo University said in a statement. Studying galaxies like this one in even higher resolutions may finally illuminate the dark ages of our universe. Read more: Scientists just got one step closer to answering one of biology’s greatest mysteries Meet Earth’s ‘quasi-satellite’ — a tiny asteroid that’s followed us for a century Hold on tight: The universe is expanding faster than we thought Scientists discover a giant planet that orbits two suns — and could have habitable moons


The Washington Post announces the 2016 Top Workplaces

The Washington Post recognizes the best places to work in the Washington D.C. area in its third annual Top Workplaces survey. The 150 organizations on the list were the highest ranked among surveyed employees. They include public and private companies, nonprofits, schools and even a federal agency. Just over 3,000 companies were invited to participate. More than 52,000 employees responded to survey questionnaires. The Washington Post hosted an awards ceremony on Thursday, June 16 for the 150 recognized companies. A special edition magazine will be included in Sunday’s Washington Post, in addition to The Post’s Sunday magazine. The following companies were ranked in the top three in the large, mid-size and small company categories: Top Three Large Companies: - Hitt Contracting - WilmerHale - Great American Restaurants Mid-Size Companies: - St. Stephen’s and St. Agnes School - Applied Data Predictive Technologies - Aronson Small Companies: - Falken Industries - Moss Building & Design - Studio Bleu Dance Center You can view the full list of the top-scoring organizations and additional content here. The Washington Post is now seeking nominations for 2017. Entries can be submitted here.


Senate votes to extend draft registration to women – but they would have done better to end it for men

be forced to register for Selective Service, as men must do now. Failure to register could result in the loss of various forms of federal aid, including Pell grants, a penalty that men already face. Because the policy would not apply to women who turned 18 before 2018, it would not affect current aid arrangements. “The fact is,” said Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona and the chairman of the Armed Services Committee, “every single leader in this country, both men and women, members of the military leadership, believe that it’s fair since we opened up all aspects of the military to women that they would also be registering for Selective Services.” The bill is an understandable extension of last year’s Pentagon decision making women eligible for virtually all those combat positions from which they were previously excluded. If women can now serve in almost every role in the military, there is no longer any plausible reason to discriminate on the basis of sex when it comes to draft registration. If Congress does not put an end to sex discrimination in this field, there is a good chance it will ultimately be invalidated by the courts, possibly as a result of one of the law suits challenging male-only draft registration currently making their way through the legal system. But while the Senate’s desire to end sex discrimination in military policy is commendable, they have chosen the wrong way to do it. It would be far better to end draft registration for both sexes than to extend it to cover women. That would simultaneously end one of the last vestiges of open sex discrimination in federal government policy, and free young Americans of both sexes from the potential imposition of forced labor. While we do not currently have a draft, the continued existence of mandatory draft registration makes it politically and administratively easier to reinstitute it in the future. In addition to promoting liberty, a military staffed by volunteers rather than forced laborers is also likely to perform better on the battlefield and make generals and politicians more careful about wasting lives. Both men and women should be eligible to serve in the armed forces in any positions they are qualified for. But neither should be forced to do so. By abolishing draft registration for both sexes, Congress could simultaneously enhance gender equality, liberty, and national security. Hard to top that!


Sheet lightning rips across the sky over Washington, D.C. (Photos)

For a brief moment, the low cloud-cover broke and a lightning bolt was visible over Washington, D.C., June 16, 2016. Most of the lightning flashes were obscured by clouds resulting in sheet lightning. (Kevin Ambrose) Low clouds filled the sky over Washington on Thursday night as thunderstorms moved over the District. The low clouds persisted during the storm, from start to finish, and obscured the lightning flashes and hid most of the lightning bolts. But even though most the thunderstorm’s lightning bolts were not visible, the light from the lightning flashes still lit up the sky. This type of intra-cloud lightning is called “sheet lighting.” As the line of thunderstorms approached Washington, winds from the east developed accompanied by a low bank of clouds and a rapid drop in temperature. At times, the top of the Washington Monument would briefly disappear in the clouds and the jets taking off from Reagan National Airport would quickly enter the cloud deck and vanish after takeoff. The weather conditions were definitely not great for lightning photography. As the storm moved in, for a brief moment there was a break in the low cloud cover and a bolt of lightning became visible. I was lucky to catch that strike — it was the only one I saw during the entire storm. Rain blew sideways into the Lincoln Memorial for over an hour. I ended up soaked and my umbrella was turned inside out by the strong winds. My camera survived this time, at least. Heavy rain and wind persisted after the thunderstorms pushed east and dissipated. I rushed to my car through the blowing rain to make the drive home. This was one of my more unpleasant storm chases but at least I was able to capture one lightning bolt with my camera. That’s really my ultimate goal. Just give me one lightning bolt to photograph and I’m happy with the chase even with a soaking and a wind-blown chill. The sky lights up over Washington with sheet lightning. The bolt was obscured by clouds. (Kevin Ambrose) Puffy, low clouds are illuminated by sheet lightning. It was a bright flash. (Kevin Ambrose) Very low clouds over Washington are partially illuminated by sheet lightning. The city lights also illuminate low clouds.(Kevin Ambrose) The line of thunderstorms approach Washington with mammatus clouds. In addition, low clouds have just started to push across the sky from


It’s the first new U.S. nuclear reactor in decades. And climate change has made that a very big deal.

and rather than presenting any major technological departure, it uses a design quite consistent with the current U.S. fleet of 99 reactors. “Novel’s not typically the kind of word that you look for in nuclear,” said Joe Grimes, the TVA’s chief nuclear officer. In contrast, two new nuclear units being built by the Southern Company, in Georgia, and two more under construction in South Carolina, will employ a new, more-streamlined technology called an “advanced pressurized water reactor,” which is thought to be an even greater safety improvement over older technologies. Watts Bar has made safety strides in another way — it was the first U.S. plant to fully comply with the Nuclear Regulatory Commissions’s new orders after the 2011 Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster in Japan. The regulations require more backup generation and other safety features on site in case of an unexpected catastrophe. Yet that has not stopped critics from faulting aspects of the plant’s layout, including the use of an “ice condenser” design around the reactor — amounting to buckets upon buckets of ice hanging in a chamber, hopefully to provide an added layer of defense in case of a major reactor problem. In the environmental community, though, reaction to the new reactor appears fairly muted. “From a safety standpoint, which is our focus, the plant seems in good condition,” said David Lochbaum, head of the Nuclear Safety Project at the Union of Concerned Scientists. Lochbaum also praised the TVA’s openness in its engagement with the public over the new reactor, a process in which he participated. “Watts Bar 2 is going to be one of the last nuclear power plants built in the United States,” added Jonathan Levenshus, a representative of the Sierra Club’s Beyond Coal campaign in Tennessee. “Right now, wind power and solar energy are so much cheaper than new nuclear plants.” But Levenshus did not critique Watts Bar 2 in particular on safety or other grounds; he was simply pessimistic about the future of nuclear power in general. When Watts Bar 2 comes fully online, Grimes said, the TVA will move from a portfolio that is 34 percent powered by nuclear energy to one close to 40 percent — a change sure to drive down greenhouse-gas emissions substantially. TVA spokesman Scott Brooks said it is not clear precisely how much the new reactor will help Tennessee comply with the Obama administration’s Clean Power Plan (assuming


DC-3 is not grounded: Matchbox is relaunching it as an airport concept

In reporting this week's $20 Diner on Haute Dogs & Fries in Alexandria, I spoke with Andrew Kim, co-founder of the Matchbox Food Group, which recently closed its wiener-centric DC-3 on Barracks Row. Matchbox has decided the hot dog concept will work better in airports, which cater to captive travelers, than on the streets of Washington, where locals can grab a dog for spare change. The beloved corndog from DC-3 is still available. . . at Dulles International. (Fritz Hahn/The Washington Post) "There's just more room for success in airports," Kim told me. "There are more people walking by at DC-3 in airports than on Eighth Street" on Barracks Row. Matchbox has signed a contract with OHM Concession Group to open DC-3s in airports around the country. The first opened about a month ago at Dulles International Airport, and OHM is planning to open a second location at BWI, Kim says. "I think it's going to be a good partnership," Kim says. "I still get to make all the decisions for the brand." Matchbox had to retool the menu to cater to its new market. No more cotton candy and ice cream. The airport menu also features breakfast sandwiches for those early-morning travelers, including a breakfast sausage on hot dog bun, breakfast burritos and other items. [Don’t fly hangry. Here’s your guide to food at the D.C. area’s three airports.] OHM operates a variety of major concepts at airports, where restaurant employees must pass painstaking background checks to work in post-security areas. Matchbox trained OHM workers in the ways of DC-3 on Capitol Hill and sent some staff members to Dulles to oversee operations during its rollout. But after that, Matchbox must trust that OHM will be a responsible steward of DC-3, just as Chick-fil-A, Dunkin' Donuts, Good Stuff Eatery and other chains must trust OHM when they license their brands. "That's the dice you have to roll," Kim says about airport licensing deals. "When you give your keys to somebody whom you may not know, you hope [your car] comes back in one piece, with no scratches." Right now, OHM has carte blanche to open more DC-3s in airports, Kim says. The sky is apparently the limit in terms of future locations. "There is no endgame," Kim says. "I think right now it's just about building a brand. It's not that much skin off of our back." Further reading


recently closed its wiener-centric DC-3 on Barracks Row. Matchbox has decided the hot dog concept will work better in airports, which cater to captive travelers, than on the streets of Washington, where locals can grab a dog for spare change. The beloved corndog from DC-3 is still available. . . at Dulles International. (Fritz Hahn/The Washington Post) "There's just more room for success in airports," Kim told me. "There are more people walking by at DC-3 in airports than on Eighth Street" on Barracks Row. Matchbox has signed a contract with OHM Concession Group to open DC-3s in airports around the country. The first opened about a month ago at Dulles International Airport, and OHM is planning to open a second location at BWI, Kim says. "I think it's going to be a good partnership," Kim says. "I still get to make all the decisions for the brand." Matchbox had to retool the menu to cater to its new market. No more cotton candy and ice cream. The airport menu also features breakfast sandwiches for those early-morning travelers, including a breakfast sausage on hot dog bun, breakfast burritos and other items. [Don’t fly hangry. Here’s your guide to food at the D.C. area’s three airports.] OHM operates a variety of major concepts at airports, where restaurant employees must pass painstaking background checks to work in post-security areas. Matchbox trained OHM workers in the ways of DC-3 on Capitol Hill and sent some staff members to Dulles to oversee operations during its rollout. But after that, Matchbox must trust that OHM will be a responsible steward of DC-3, just as Chick-fil-A, Dunkin' Donuts, Good Stuff Eatery and other chains must trust OHM when they license their brands. "That's the dice you have to roll," Kim says about airport licensing deals. "When you give your keys to somebody whom you may not know, you hope [your car] comes back in one piece, with no scratches." Right now, OHM has carte blanche to open more DC-3s in airports, Kim says. The sky is apparently the limit in terms of future locations. "There is no endgame," Kim says. "I think right now it's just about building a brand. It's not that much skin off of our back." Further reading • Haute Dogs & Fries review: What a good dog! • Don’t fly hangry. Here’s your guide to food at the D.C. area’s three airports.


Main Street Morning: This Japanese start-up wants to create artificial meteor showers on-demand

EPA/DANIEL REINHARDT Welcome to Main Street Morning, The Washington Post’s daily collection of news affecting entrepreneurs, start-ups and small businesses with a special focus on policy and government. Here’s what’s affecting my small business, my clients and other entrepreneurs today. Washington - Justices side with a veteran-owned small business over the Veterans Administration. - The House passes bills to combat the radicalization of Americans by terrorists. - Why the I.R.S. fails to crack the small business tax nut. - A Senator’s report finds “fundamental concerns” about the Red Cross’ finances. The Economy - Small businesses, the bedrock of the U.S. economy, continues to grow faster than GDP, according to an analysis. - Software adds more than $1 trillion to the U.S. economy, a new report says. - May’s consumer prices rise less than expected. The Elections - Oprah endorses Hillary Clinton. - A cashier refuses to serve Trump’s backers. - A middle schooler is going crazy viral after giving a hilarious, hilarious, hilarious graduation speech impersonating the presidential candidates. People - This is the number one hiring challenge cited by U.S. small business owners. - What Millennials really want in an office. Management - Why Microsoft buying LinkedIn is good for coworking. - Here’s what happened to all 53 of Marissa Mayer’s Yahoo acquisitions. - Microsoft scores its first-ever pot partnership. - Samsung buys a cloud infrastructure provider. - Uber agrees to pay $7.5 million to settle a background check suit. - Dropbox says it is cash flow positive and is in no rush to go public. - Volkswagen plans to make 30 electric car models in 10 years. Entrepreneurs - This CEO combined tragedy, passion and business savvy to create his legacy. - An ex-officer turns her love of jewelry into a business of making watches for the Republican National Convention. - For Clint and Alison Eastwood, directing is a family business. Sales Marketing - Facebook now knows when you visit a store because of its ads. - Why this tech company is giving 100 people free money. Start-ups - A start-up raises $4 million to help small retailers ship goods like Amazon Prime. - These are 12 resources to help you start and grow your travel business. - Here are three things besides money you need to start a successful business. Technology - Whirlpool is putting smart recipes on its WiFi ovens. - Microsoft boosts its chatbot future


IOC lauds IAAF’s decision to ban Russian track and field team from Rio Games

Russian track and field athletes may not get much help from the IOC in making it into the Rio Games. (David J. Phillip/AP) The International Olympic Committee backed the banning of Russia’s track and field athletes from the 2016 Games and promised “further far-reaching measures” in the run-up to Rio. The statement, which came after a conference call among executive board members, affirmed the right of track’s world governing body, the IAAF, to determine eligibility for international competitions. Some Russian athletes had hoped the IOC might make exceptions for athletes who have never tested positive, or those who were whistle-blowers who contributed to multiple reports of systemic, state-sponsored doping. IOC vice-president John Coates of Australia told the Associated Press Saturday that he did not expect the IOC to overrule the IAAF’s decision. “I’d be very, very surprised,” he said. “It’s an international federation’s right to suspend a national federation and I don’t think we would overturn that at all.” The Russians can appeal the IAAF’s decision to the Court of Arbitration for Sport. The IOC is holding an Olympic Summit on Tuesday at its headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland, where it promised to announce further anti-doping measures. “The IOC will initiate further far-reaching measures in order to ensure a level playing field for all the athletes taking part in the Olympic Games [in Rio],” the statement said. Among the topics to be discuss at the summit: countries whose anti-doping organizations are considered non-compliant by the World Anti-Doping Agency. If the IOC is serious about ensuring a “level playing field,” it may imposes sanctions of its own. In addition to Russia, Kenya is considered non-compliant and has endured a series of drug scandals of its own, including suggestions that as many as 40 doping violations were reported in the past four years. However, WADA approved the country’s amended anti-doping laws Saturday, paving the way for Kenya’s powerful distance runners to compete in Rio. When the bill is approved by Kenya’s president, the country will be considered in full compliance with WADA.


The case for sports boycotts

The 1980 Moscow Olympics were boycotted by over 60 nations because of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. Insights on Law and Society For decades, people of goodwill have debated whether liberal democracies should boycott Olympic Games and other sports events held under the auspices of repressive governments. Apartheid South Africa was the target of a long-standing sports boycott that denied it the right to even participate in most international sports events, much less host them. Sixty-two nations, including the United States, boycotted the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow, in protest of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. More recently, human rights activists called for a boycott of the 2014 Winter Olympics, held in Sochi, Russia, in protest of the Russian government’s oppression of gays and lesbians…. The standard argument against boycotts is the traditional idea that international sports events should be kept free of politics. The problem with this theory is that the Olympics and other similar events are virtually always used as propaganda tools by host governments, as happened with Nazi Germany in 1936, the USSR in 1980, and Vladimir Putin’s regime in 2014. For this reason, it is nearly impossible to make them genuinely politically neutral. The only realistic options are either to allow repressive regimes to use the Games to burnish their public image, keep them from hosting in the first place, or forestall their propaganda by means of a boycott that undercuts the Games’ public relations benefits for the hosts. The case for boycotts is particularly strong in cases where the hosts commit human rights violations that are directly connected to preparations for the sports event: [S]ome [host] governments commmit serious human rights violations in the very process of preparing for the games themselves. For example, China forcibly displaced some one million people in order to prepare facilities for the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. Brazil displaced many thousands in order to build new stadiums for the 2014 World Cup. Even if it is wrong to boycott in protest of “unrelated” human rights violations, the international sports community should not tolerate abuses that are an integral part of the sports event itself. As I also point out the article, the best solution to this problem is to deny repressive regimes the right to host in the first place by bringing pressure on the International Olympic Committee and other similar bodies. The same goes for governments that plan to


‘Brexit’ could send shock waves across U.S. and global economy

On June 23, Britain faces a fateful decision: whether or not to leave the European Union. And the world will be watching. Britain's departure from the European Union could send shock waves across the global economy and threaten more than a trillion dollars in investment and trade with the United States. International policymakers are ramping up their warnings of the dangers of a British exit - popularly known as "Brexit" — from the political and economic alliance that has united Europe for the past four decades. Voters in Britain will decide whether to leave or remain in the European Union in a referendum on Thursday, but financial market volatility has already spiked as polls show a growing desire to abandon the partnership. The decision carries hefty consequences for American businesses, which employ more than a million people in Britain. The United States is the largest single investor in Britain, and many firms consider it the gateway to free trade with the 28 nations that make up the E.U. A Brexit would jeopardize their access to those markets, potentially reducing revenue and forcing some firms to consider relocating their European operations elsewhere. That has put corporate America onto the front lines of the campaign to keep the union together, with several of Wall Street's biggest names donating substantial sums to the effort. A Brexit would be "bad for the U.K., it would be bad for Europe, it would be bad for the world, including the United States," Angel Gurría, secretary general of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, said in an interview. "You already have enough uncertainty in the world today. We don't need more." The International Monetary Fund on Friday issued one of the most dire forecasts to date, calling the impact of Britain's departure from the European Union "negative and substantial." The fund predicted that a Brexit could reduce economic growth by up to 5.6 percent over the next three years in its worst-case scenario. The gloomy outlook is driven by an expected sharp decline in the pound and severe disruptions in trade as the nation is forced to renegotiate deals with countries across the continent, potentially on worse terms. Those concerns were echoed by policymakers around the world last week. The Bank of England called the referendum the "largest immediate risk facing U.K. financial markets, and possibly also global financial markets." Finland's finance minister dubbed Brexit a


dwarfed by the $588 billion in U.S. investment there, in sectors ranging from banking to manufacturing to real estate. Likewise, Britain has plowed nearly half a trillion dollars into the United States and employs more than a million workers here. Those deep ties mean that trouble on one side of the Atlantic easily can migrate to the other shore. The heavy-equipment giant Caterpillar exemplifies the dilemma facing American businesses in Britain and the potential ripple effects of the referendum. The company manufactures heavy machinery and is headquartered in Peoria, Ill. More than 55 years ago, it opened its first facility in Britain, and now Caterpillar has 9,000 employees and 16 plants there making equipment, such as backhoe loaders and mini hydraulic excavators. Much of that production is exported throughout Europe and other parts of the world, eased by the E.U.'s open market and standing trade agreements. A Brexit would undermine an economic alliance that the company has called "fundamental" to its business: Roughly a quarter of Caterpillar's sales and revenue comes from its European business and the more limited operations in Africa and the Middle East. "Britain ought to stay in," Doug Oberhelman, chief executive at Caterpillar and chairman of the board at the U.S. Business Roundtable, said last week. "Keeping that market together as a whole is better than not having it together." Brexit backers, however, say the E.U. creates burdensome regulations that have hurt British innovation and competitiveness. Last month, a group of 250 business leaders signed a letter supporting an exit, and the head of one of Britain's largest business groups resigned his post after receiving fierce criticism for appearing to sympathize with the leave campaign. Campaigning resumes ahead of Britain's referendum on European Union membership after the killing of Labour MP Jo Cox. Still, many Brexit supporters are not executives but employees. A recent YouGov survey showed that leaving the union was popular among older, conservative, blue-collar laborers — many of whom live in Peterborough, where Caterpillar runs a plant manufacturing diesel engines. In April, British Prime Minister David Cameron visited the factory to address skepticism over the benefits of the European alliance. "I don't think we should risk jobs. I don't think we should risk our economy," Cameron told workers at the factory. "We shouldn't risk the investment that a company like this brings into Britain." Other big U.S. businesses have thrown their weight behind


The fascinating tribal tradition that gave Obama his last name

was born in a small village in Central Nyanza," he wrote in a financial aid application to American universities. "My father earned the living for the family by cooking in European homes. My mother worked on our land to help provide our food." What neither the letters nor the article mentions, though, is that Obama Sr. was born into the Luo tribe, historically Kenya's second-most powerful after the Kikuyu. The Luos are part of an ethnic continuum of peoples stretching from Sudan to Tanzania who speak similar languages. Their population is concentrated on the eastern edges of Lake Victoria. I spent the summer of 2010 in Nyanza province, working for the Kenya Medical Research Institute. The institute wanted to catalogue all of their patients across the region, which numbered in the hundreds of thousands. Most were Luo. One aspect of Luo culture made the cataloguing process almost impossible: the last names of the tribe's members. Instead of inheriting a family last name, most Luos are bestowed one that reflects the circumstances of their birth, and, as such, many are extremely common. For instance: All baby boys born at dawn are given the last name Onyango. Midnight boys get Oduor. Dusk? Odhiambo. And girls get female equivalents: Anyango, Aduor and Adhiambo. Sets of male twins have the same last names: Opiyo for the elder, and Odongo for the younger. Opiyo (or Apiyo) would traditionally suckle his mother's right breast, and Odongo the left. Children who follow twins are given Okello, which means "to follow after." Other Luo last names are not based on the timing of the birth but on other circumstances in that family's life. And not all of them have to begin with an O or an A, though almost all do. If the father was having a land dispute during his wife's pregnancy, and he won, the baby might be given the surname Loch, or "victory." A final subset are ancestral names that are specific to one family. This is where we find Obama. These ancestral names are passed from generation to generation, like many European last names, but unlike most Luo last names. They often denote a defining characteristic of that family, though that characteristic may have faded with time. They begin with "O" and don't have an "A" variant. Obama means "bent over," or "limping," in the Luo language. Some people in Nyanza say that Obama's


Jim McMahon, Leonard Marshall say marijuana can help NFL players

Jim McMahon speaks at a Players Against Concussions event in 2014. (Eugene Gologursky/Getty Images for Players Against Concussions) Quietly, the NFL has shown interest in the campaign that Eugene Monroe has waged to raise awareness of medical marijuana as an alternative to opioid painkillers, and a Super Bowl winner has chimed in with the same message. Jim McMahon, who won Super Bowl XX with the Chicago Bears, said that the plant has helped him cope with the early onset of dementia as well as severe headaches, memory loss, depression and other issues that have been linked to the kinds of concussions he suffered over the years. “There’s so many uses to this plant,” McMahon said at last week’s Cannabis World Congress and Business Expo in New York (via the New York Daily News). “Hundreds of thousands of people are dying from [painkillers] and there’s not one case of people dying from the hemp plant.” Leonard Marshall, who has neurological issues and formerly played for the New York Giants and Jets and Washington Redskins, agreed, saying, “My quality of life has improved because of this.” Monroe’s vocal advocacy comes at a time of increasing awareness of the toll of addiction to opioids and shifting attitudes about the legalization of marijuana. Recently, Jeff Miller, the NFL’s senior vice president for player health and safety, and neurological surgeon Russell Lonser, a member of the league’s head, neck and spine committee, spoke with researchers Monroe has backed with $80,000 in funding. “They are interested in learning more about the potential for cannabinoids to help current and former players, as is evidenced by them taking the call, and also expressed a desire to learn more,” Marcel Bonn-Miller, an adjunct assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania school of medicine, told The Post’s Adam Kilgore recently. “They are definitely showing genuine curiosity, and they are definitely not throwing up roadblocks.” Marijuana, however, remains on the NFL’s list of banned substances. “It’s an NFL policy and we believe it’s the correct policy, for now, in the best interest of our players and the long-term health of our players,” Commissioner Roger Goodell said a Super Bowl press conference in February. “I don’t foresee a change in that clearly in the short term.” It may help save the NFL, though. Research has suggested but not yet proved that cannabis may play a role in preventing and treating concussions. Cannabidiol,


Why Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen is building the world’s largest airplane

of conversations and lots of business discussions. No company is ruled out.” Vulcan Aerospace is mostly focused on launching unmanned vehicles, Beames said, and betting on new space startups popping up as venture capitalists start to see the commercial value in space. “Paul’s thing is to nourish the mavericks,” he said. “They’re the ones fueling the future.” Beames said there was a “detailed strategy” approved by Allen that was based on sound business practices. A “revolution” in technology that is making once-massive satellites tiny, some no bigger than a shoebox, would fuel demand, he said. Just as computers went from massive mainframes to palm-size gadgets, satellites will get smaller, more affordable. And that, in turn, will open a new launch market, where speed and convenience, not qualities that are now associated with space launch, are key. “We are at a pivot point in history in terms of the advent of the micro satellite,” he said. “Just like the micro computer, the utility is unbounded. It’s very, very similar to the revolution of the personal computer that began in the late ’70s and early ’80s.” In collaboration with Burt Rutan, Paul G. Allen led the team that completed the first manned private spaceflight on SpaceShipOne, which won the Ansari XPRIZE in 2004. From left to right, Brian Binnie, test pilot for SpaceShipOne, Paul G. Allen and Burt Rutan. (Vulcan) For Allen, Vulcan Aerospace represents his second foray into space. He backed Scaled Composites, then run by the legendary Burt Rutan, which won the $10 million Ansari X Prize in 2004 by flying a manned spacecraft twice beyond what’s considered the edge of space. The flight was a historic achievement — the first commercial vehicle to fly to space — and now SpaceShipOne hangs in the Smithsonian’s Air and Space Museum alongside the Spirit of St. Louis, which Charles Lindbergh piloted for the first trans-Atlantic flight. But Allen was notoriously fearful about the dangers in manned flight, and found it “hard to handle” that someone’s “life hung in the balance,” he recalled in his memoir, “Idea Man.” Allen eventually licensed the technology behind SpaceShipOne to Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic. “Seeing up close what’s involved in spaceflight gave me pause,” he wrote. “I’m not an edge walker. I’ve never done a parachute jump, for example.” It seemed as if he was done with space. Then in 2011, he announced that he planned to


What Russia’s Olympic ban means for Vladimir Putin

Ahead of the Olympic Games in Rio, Russian President Vladimir Putin says there has been no state involvement in doping violations and warns there should be no collective punishment. Russia is the first country in the history of the Olympics to have an entire team — track and field —banned from participating in the Games because of doping. Individual athletes, especially those who have trained for years outside Russia, may be able to argue their way back in. But senior officials from the International Olympics Committee have made it clear that they will not overturn the team ban announced by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF, the body responsible for worldwide track and field oversight). The ban will have little direct effect on the rule or popularity of Russian President Vladimir Putin, for example in the upcoming parliamentary elections this September. Russian officials are already spinning this as just one more example of the West unfairly beating up on the Russian state for the actions of rogue individuals. Russian media sources are also practicing the “what-about-ism” for which they are famous, highlighting corruption elsewhere in Olympic sports and arguing that Russia is not unique. (Of course what makes Russia unique is the overwhelming evidence provided by the World Anti-Doping Agency that Russian state authorities—including the FSB, the domestic intelligence organization that took over from the Soviet KGB—have continued to willfully abet cheating, even after the first report was filed against them six months ago.) Putin’s control of the media, as well as the Russian public’s ho-hum attitude toward corruption (as evidenced by its non-reaction to the recent Panama Papers revelations), means that short-term repercussions will be minimal for the regime. However, in a broader sense this may have consequences. It is the first real action by the outside world that has brought Putin’s two vital leadership goals into conflict with each other. Putin’s first major goal is to go down in history as the man who made Russia great again after three humiliating setbacks. The first was the collapse of the Warsaw Pact alliance and then of the Soviet Union itself. The second was the expansion of NATO and the ability of the United States to launch air strikes and wars without Russia’s UN Security Council approval. The third was the chaotic capitalism and mafia-style violence that embarrassed Russia in the 1990s. As Deborah Welch Larson and Alexei Shevchenko


unique is the overwhelming evidence provided by the World Anti-Doping Agency that Russian state authorities—including the FSB, the domestic intelligence organization that took over from the Soviet KGB—have continued to willfully abet cheating, even after the first report was filed against them six months ago.) Putin’s control of the media, as well as the Russian public’s ho-hum attitude toward corruption (as evidenced by its non-reaction to the recent Panama Papers revelations), means that short-term repercussions will be minimal for the regime. However, in a broader sense this may have consequences. It is the first real action by the outside world that has brought Putin’s two vital leadership goals into conflict with each other. Putin’s first major goal is to go down in history as the man who made Russia great again after three humiliating setbacks. The first was the collapse of the Warsaw Pact alliance and then of the Soviet Union itself. The second was the expansion of NATO and the ability of the United States to launch air strikes and wars without Russia’s UN Security Council approval. The third was the chaotic capitalism and mafia-style violence that embarrassed Russia in the 1990s. As Deborah Welch Larson and Alexei Shevchenko have argued, Putin’s drive to restore Russia’s great power status is the simplest (and hence probably the best) explanation for his actions in Ukraine, Syria, the Arctic and elsewhere. Putin’s second major goal is to hold on to power for as long as possible, using the informal network of connections that secure his place at the top. Those networks in turn depend on corrupt bargains to keep them going. As Alena V. Ledevena shows, the Russian system today is based on circles of mutual backscratching and extortion (or what is known in Russian as the krugovaya porukha). Each actor in the circle knows that his or her livelihood hinges on everyone else’s silence about past or continuing illegal activities. Once the beans start getting spilled, the whole circle risks falling apart, since everyone who is outed for bad behavior has an incentive to take someone else down with them. There is evidence that Russian athletes were forced to dope and then pay officials to cover it up in order to be included on Russian teams, providing levers for mutual incrimination. At least one Russian runner, Liliya Shobukhova, winner of the 2010 London Marathon, was reported to have given 450,000 Euros


have argued, Putin’s drive to restore Russia’s great power status is the simplest (and hence probably the best) explanation for his actions in Ukraine, Syria, the Arctic and elsewhere. Putin’s second major goal is to hold on to power for as long as possible, using the informal network of connections that secure his place at the top. Those networks in turn depend on corrupt bargains to keep them going. As Alena V. Ledevena shows, the Russian system today is based on circles of mutual backscratching and extortion (or what is known in Russian as the krugovaya porukha). Each actor in the circle knows that his or her livelihood hinges on everyone else’s silence about past or continuing illegal activities. Once the beans start getting spilled, the whole circle risks falling apart, since everyone who is outed for bad behavior has an incentive to take someone else down with them. There is evidence that Russian athletes were forced to dope and then pay officials to cover it up in order to be included on Russian teams, providing levers for mutual incrimination. At least one Russian runner, Liliya Shobukhova, winner of the 2010 London Marathon, was reported to have given 450,000 Euros to “senior Russian officials” to mask her doping, and to have later accepted a partial “refund” in exchange for accepting an IAFF suspension. Her case involved international IAAF officials too. These weren’t just Russians, but those banned for life from the IAAF as a result included IAAF treasurer (and former president of the Russian branch) Valentin Balakhnichev, and Alexei Melnikov, a senior Russian coach. French authorities then seized 1.8 million Euros that Balakhnichev held in a Monaco bank account. The Western sanctions following Russia’s aggression in Ukraine may have been based on the hope of making Putin’s krugovaya porukha crack, but that didn’t happen. Putin rejiggered some financing, gained a useful outside whipping boy (the West) to blame for his regime’s own structural economic mistakes, and convinced his cronies to wait for Western unity to crack. While the sanctions contributed to some part of Russia’s current economic malaise, and may have prevented even further Russian military actions in Ukraine, they have not threatened Putin’s hold on power. In contrast, the Olympic ban might make the first real chink in the regime’s armor — not because of its surface-level reputational effects, but because it puts Putin’s two chief goals at odds.


American Legion: Pentagon officials ‘turned their backs’ on veterans to get around hiring them

of letter the American Legion’s June 20 letter to 435 House members. A little-noticed provision of the massive defense bill the Senate passed last week would eliminate the preference veterans get once they are in the government and apply for another federal job. Former service members would still go to the head of the hiring queue. Top defense officials pressed Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, for the change, Senate aides said, to ensure that qualified non-veterans are considered equally with veterans for specialized, hard-to-fill positions. [Obama push to hire veterans into federal jobs brings resentment] The language, which will now head to conference with the House as part of the larger defense bill, would apply government-wide. It would affect thousands of veterans, many of whom get a foot in the door with an entry-level position and then seek jobs at other agencies. The Defense Department and other agencies have sought for several years to tweak the veterans’ preference law, a cornerstone of President Obama’s push to reward retired troops from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Starting in 2009, Obama boosted the “extra credit” veterans get to give them a greater edge in getting federal jobs, setting hiring goals for them at each agency. [Why is it so hard to get a federal job? Here’s one reason] But the policy has led to frustration at many agencies that qualified non-veterans are getting shut out of federal jobs in deference to those who served but may not be qualified. Almost one in two hires to full-time, permanent federal jobs was a veteran in fiscal 2014, according to the Office of Personnel Management, which has not yet made more recent data public. Excerpt of American Legion letter to House members on veterans preference [Memorial Day provides respite from VA controversies, even as a new issue brews] The American Legion said Congress would be eroding the contract between the country and its soldiers, who can lose valuable years building civilian job skills while they serve and deserve equal footing with non-veterans once they leave the military. Barnett noted that veterans get extra points only “when prospective candidate qualifications are in equipoise,” meaning when a veteran and non-veteran are equally qualified for the job. The American Legion has plans for an emergency appeal this week to its 2.2 million members to write letters to their members of Congress


The Daily 202: Senate will vote down new gun laws today because of an intensity gap that favors the NRA

following the incident, including assault, and he could face up to a decade in prison if convicted," per CNN. - A 64-year-old Ohio gun store owner was killed after a student in his concealed carry class accidentally set off his firearm. The bullet traveled through the wall from an adjacent room. (Peter Holley) - A New Hampshire car dealership unveiled a controversial “buy a car, get an AR” sales gimmick that offers buyers an AR-15 assault rifle with the purchase of a vehicle. (Peter Holley) - A woman was mauled by a bear while running a marathon through a New Mexico wildlife preserve. Other runners helped until emergency crews arrived. She suffered non-life-threatening injuries to her head and neck. Authorities are trying to find the animal to euthanize it and test it for rabies. (AP) -- Marco Rubio is widely expected to announce he’s running for reelection to the Senate at some point before Friday. A boat flying a large "In" flag, campaigning to remain in the EU, sails by the British Houses of Parliament to meet a flotilla of boats from the group "Fishing for Leave" on the river Thames in London last week. A Brexit flotilla of fishing boats sailed up the Thames with foghorns sounding. (Niklas Halle'n/AFP/Getty Images) THE "BREXIT" VOTE IS THE MOST IMPORTANT STORY OF THIS WEEK: -- Trump explained his support for Britain leaving the European Union in an interview with The Sunday Times of London: -- Two fresh polls suggest support has swung back toward the “remain” category following the Thursday assassination of British MP Jo Cox: -- Key insight: “Emotional ties to Europe likely won’t be on Brits’ minds." -- The generational divide is a major fault line. -- The prospect of the Brexit alarms our Baltic allies, especially Estonia, SUNDAY SHOW HIGHLIGHTS: -- Trump said it’s time for the United States to “start thinking about” racial profiling: “I think profiling is something we’re going to have to start thinking about as a country,” he said on CBS’s Face the Nation. "It’s not the worst thing to do. ... -- The RNC’s new Hispanic media spokeswoman declined to say whether she’s comfortable defending Trump: IS IT REALLY TOO LATE TO BLOCK TRUMP FROM GETTING THE NOMINATION? -- There were 1,000 participants on a Stop Trump conference call last night. Organizers announced plans to raise money for staff and a possible legal defense


Marijuana’s biggest adversary on Capitol Hill is sponsoring a bill to research … marijuana

Hundreds of advocates for marijuana legalization rallied and smoked pot outside the White House in April. (Photo by Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post) Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.) is Congress's most vocal opponent of legal marijuana, having single-handedly spearheaded a provision blocking legal pot shops in the District of Columbia in 2014. Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.), on the other hand, was recently named Congress's "top legal pot advocate" by Rolling Stone. The two lawmakers couldn't be farther apart on marijuana policy, but they're teaming up this week to introduce a significant overhaul of federal marijuana policy that would make it much easier for scientists to conduct research into the medical uses of marijuana. As Harris described it in an interview, the bipartisan Medical Marijuana Research Act of 2016 would "cut through the red tape" that currently makes it exceedingly difficult for researchers to obtain and use marijuana in clinical trials. As federal law currently stands, only one facility in Mississippi is allowed to produce marijuana used for research. "Because of this monopoly, research-grade drugs that meet researchers’ specifications often take years to acquire, if they are produced at all," Brookings Institution researchers wrote last year. Beyond those difficulties, researchers wanting to work with the drug need to have their work approved by the Drug Enforcement Administration, the Food and Drug Administration and, in some cases, the National Institutes on Health. Those hurdles, and the amount of time it takes to jump over all of them, deter many researchers from doing work on marijuana. In one typical case, it took a team of scientists seven years to get full approval to conduct research into using marijuana to treat post-traumatic stress disorder among veterans. But the bill sponsored by Harris, Blumenauer, Rep. Sam Farr (D-Calif.) and Rep. H. Morgan Griffith (R-Va.) would allow many more growers to produce marijuana for research. It would also remove levels of federal review for marijuana research projects and specify shorter windows for federal approval of the projects. Crucially, it would also change the criteria by which the federal government allows marijuana research to proceed. "The federal government must grant an application for [approval] unless it's not in the public interest, rather than assuming it's not," Blumenauer said in an interview. "Reversing that presumption is huge." Marijuana is currently listed under Schedule 1 of the federal Controlled Substances Act, the most stringent category of regulation. This bill would not


brexit


John Oliver explains the ‘insane’ Brexit vote to the rest of the world

John Oliver breaks down what Brexit is all about. ("Last Week Tonight With John Oliver"/YouTube) Brexit. You've probably heard that word and seen it circulating on the Internet recently. But is it clear to you what Brexit is all about? The buzzword is a reference to a vote that will take place Thursday on whether Britain should leave the European Union. Britain's potential exit could have huge ramifications, not only for Europe but also for the world. And in his latest segment from "Last Week Tonight With John Oliver," the British comedian breaks down what Brexit is all about and why Britain's potential exit from the European Union would be, in his opinion, "insane." As Oliver points out, President Obama and the leaders of India, Japan and China have all stated that they are against Britain's leaving the bloc. And a major supporter of Britain's leaving is the U.K. Independence Party (UKIP), a right-wing party best known for its strong anti-immigration stance. Yet, as Oliver shows, misinformation and distrust of authority have clouded the way people understand what a post-Brexit economy could look like. Watch the clip below: Brexit: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) Read more: Killing in Britain spawns a reckoning over rhetoric on eve of E.U. vote Europe On eve of vote, Brits search their hearts for Europeanness and come up empty 'Brexit' could send shock waves across U.S. and global economy On June 23, Britain faces a fateful decision: whether or not to leave the European Union. And the world will be watching.


A rare coincidence: The full ‘Strawberry Moon’ meets the summer solstice

Nearly full “Strawberry Moon” on June 19. (George Jiang via Flickr) It’s a once-in-a-generation pairing: the start of astronomical summer and emergence of the full “Strawberry Moon.” This coming together hasn’t happened since 1967, recalled by some as the “Summer of Love,” and won’t occur again until June 21, 2062 (using Universal Time), according to EarthSky.org. Slooh.com is streaming the rare event live. The Strawberry Moon’s name originates from the collection of strawberries by Native American Algonquin tribes, according to the Old Farmer’s Almanac. The moon officially reached 100 percent fullness at 7:02 a.m. Eastern Monday —about 11.5 hours before the evening solstice (6:34 p.m. Eastern). Monday evening — about two hours after the solstice — the moon rises, almost fully illuminated, in the eight o’clock hour (8:41 p.m. Eastern in D.C.) along the East Coast. While the sun is high in the sky at this time of year, the moon hangs low. “Even at its loftiest at 1 a.m, it’s downright wimpy-low,” writes Bob Berman of the Old Farmer’s Almanac. “This forces its light through thicker air, which also tends to be humid this time of year, and the combination typically makes it amber colored.” The “Honey Moon” at dusk, June 19, over Washington, D.C. (Jim Havard via Flickr) The golden-orange hue given off by this low-suspended moon is the reason that one of its alternative names is “Honey Moon.” It also sometimes called the “Rose Moon” and “Mead Moon.” Police say around 23,000 people flocked to England’s Stonehenge to catch sight of the oranges, pinks and yellows of the sunrise marking this year’s summer solstice.


Scientists announce important Zika milestone: First vaccine ready for human trials

Stella Guerra performs physical therapy on an infant born with microcephaly at Altino Ventura Foundation in Recife, Brazil. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) Since the World Health Organization declared Zika a public health emergency in February, teams of scientists from all over the world have been attacking the virus from many different angles. They have made advances in understanding the structure of the virus, the historical path of the mosquitoes that carry it and the risk to babies still in the womb — important knowledge, but of little immediate practical use. Now, the discoveries have finally led to something that might be able to stop the pathogen: a vaccine. Pennsylvania vaccine maker Inovio Pharmaceuticals and South Korea’s GeneOne Life Sciences said Monday that they had received approval from U.S. regulators to start testing a DNA vaccine, known as GLS-5700, on humans. The early-stage study will include 40 healthy subjects. It is primarily designed to assess the safety of the vaccine but will also measure the immune response generated by the injection. Zika, part of the flavivirus family of viruses that includes West Nile, dengue and yellow fever, is believed to be responsible for causing thousands of babies to be born with shrunken heads in Brazil and elsewhere. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recently detailed the cases of six babies born with the condition in the United States. Inovio “We are proud to have attained the approval to initiate the first Zika vaccine study in human volunteers,” Kim said in a statement. “As of May 2016, 58 countries and territories reported continuing mosquito-borne transmission of the Zika virus; the incidences of viral infection and medical conditions caused by the virus are expanding, not contracting.” Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, has said he believes the world’s best hope against Zika is a vaccine and that, because of previous research on West Nile and dengue, a Zika vaccine should take less time to develop than vaccines for many other infectious diseases. The challenge is that Zika is unique among its related viruses because the others don’t invade the nervous system or developing fetuses because of blood-brain and placental barriers. Researches who examined the virus’s structure with an electron microscope recently explained to The Washington Post what it is about its structure that might make it so dangerous: It shares a basic structure with all flaviviruses: Genetic


Nepali guards were a benign presence in tough Afghanistan. Now they’re being targeted.

am okay, and I will come home." At least 14 Nepali and Indian security guards were killed in the attack. Five Nepalis and four Afghans were wounded, the Interior Ministry said. No combat troops from Nepal have been among the foreign forces deployed to Afghanistan by the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and its allies, but the government in Kathmandu has provided hundreds of them to help guard compounds and perform other routine armed duties, through contracts with foreign governments. Nepal also provides thousands of peacekeepers for U.N. missions in some of the world's most dangerous places. This year, it has stationed more than 4,300 peacekeepers in 15 countries, including Haiti, South Sudan, Syria and Congo. Nepal is the fifth-largest provider of U.N. peacekeeping forces, after Ethiopia, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Contributing governments are paid substantial annual fees for sending troops and police for U.N. operations. Last month, Nepali forces were left to protect U.N. staffers in Libya, which has been devastated by conflict since the 2011 toppling and death of dictator Moammar Gaddafi, when the Italian government dropped plans to send several thousand troops there. News reports from Italy said that instead, Nepali peacekeeping troops would be sent in to bolster the U.N. Support Mission in Libya. Nepal is still recovering from a devastating earthquake one year ago. In some cases, the forces have ended up inadvertently harming or engendering resentment among the civilians they are supposed to protect. In Congo, Nepali peacekeepers have been accused of being too passive in the face of violent threats to peace. Nepali forces make up a majority of the 20,000 troops deployed there to maintain order amid civil war and militia violence. But local critics have called them "helicopter tourists" who fly over conflict zones and stand guard along roads but often fail to intervene when militias attack villages. In 2014, Human Rights Watch castigated the U.N. operation in Congo for failing to respond to an attack that killed 30 people. In Haiti, Nepali troops were accused of being the source of a cholera epidemic in 2010 that killed 8,000 people and sickened hundreds of thousands. The peacekeepers had been sent there as part of a U.N. disaster-response team to keep order after a massive earthquake. Read more: Italy backs out of U.N.’s Libya mission, so Nepali troops will go instead Cholera outbreak in Haiti in 2010 tied to U.N. peacekeepers, report says


Beer tastes best when it’s freshest, so try these 10 brewery happy hours

On Wednesday nights, 3 Stars Brewing sells all draft beers for half-price in its brewery tasting room. (Photo by Fritz Hahn/The Washington Post) The best place to drink beer is obviously at a brewery. The ales and lagers are far fresher than at your local bar, and if you fall in love with a new IPA, for example, someone on site can tell you all about the malt and hops that provide its flavor. Washington's brewing scene is more crowded than ever, and an increasing number of breweries are acting like bars, offering happy hours and events to lure more patrons into their taprooms. Check out these 10 brewery and brewpub happy hours and you won't have to pay full price for your beer all week. Sunday Monday Lost Rhino Retreat Tuesday [Local beer is easy to find: The definitive guide to D.C.’s best breweries] Wednesday Right Proper Need another reason to visit the brand new Atlas Brew Works tasting room or the sidewalk beer garden? All growler fills are half-price on Wednesdays between 4 and 10 p.m. Thursday Friday Daily [A guide to the D.C. area’s most underrated bars]


Top researchers just demolished a huge fear about legal pot

held an event titled "Big Marijuana: How corporations and lobbies will shape the legalization landscape." But in conjunction with the event, a pair of Brookings researchers who study marijuana policy released a report that pours a lot of cold water on the notion that marijuana legalization will usher in "Big Tobacco 2.0." "The Big Marijuana rubric is more misleading than helpful as a guide to policy," Brookings' John Hudak and Jonathan Rauch write, "because it oversimplifies and stereotypes what is in reality a continuum of business scales and structures." Hudak and Rauch point out that the marijuana industry, as it exists today, is made up of a scattershot patchwork of business models: A marijuana business can be a legal home grow in Ft. Collins, Colorado; a cancer-patient cooperative farm in Humboldt County; a pop-up clinic in San Francisco’s Lower Haight; an antiseptic dispensary in Bristol, Connecticut, staffed by a board certified pharmacist; a wellness center in Washington, D.C., owned by a rabbi; a vertically integrated chain of dispensaries that relies on a set of large grow facilities to supply its consumers; a maker of edibles and oils in Boulder, Colorado; and many more variations. In short, there's no Philip Morris of pot. And the broad diversity of state-level regulations -- to say nothing of the ongoing federal prohibition -- make the emergence of such a player highly unlikely. "The analogy to Philip Morris and the R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company (RJR) in their buccaneering days is, we believe, a caricature. Caricatures don’t make for good policy," Hudak and Rauch warn. Beyond that, citizens, policymakers and the public health community are not likely to forget the hard-learned lessons of the past decades' fights against Big Tobacco. "Legal marijuana percolates in a policy environment that has been informed and shaped by the country’s bitter experience with tobacco," Hudak and Rauch argue. "Within the marijuana industry, Big Tobacco is an object lesson in what not to do." At the Brookings event, SAM's executive vice president Jeff Zinsmeister argued that it will be "very difficult to break the market forces that inevitably lead Big Marijuana to act like Big Tobacco." Zinsmeister said that if marijuana is legalized at the federal level, the marijuana industry "would consolidate very rapidly." And he pointed out that in such a scenario, the existing tobacco industry could simply start buying up marijuana businesses and rolling them up under their existing


The rise and fall of Europe, in maps

If Britain votes to leave the European Union, its departure from the geopolitical bloc will have seismic consequences. The concerns are legion: Will a Brexit -- as Britain's putative exit from Europe is called -- trigger an economic meltdown? Will Scotland choose to abandon a Britain unshackled from Brussels? Will the rest of Europe be able to stick together? The last question is a real fear for some. Last week, Germany's foreign minister warned that a Brexit would put Europe's "decades-long, successful integration effort" at risk of "disintegration." The European Union is unique in history with its embrace of liberal, democratic values. After centuries of wars and bloodshed, here was the solution for a lasting, fruitful peace: a confederation of European states, most of which would also agree to open borders and a joint currency. That picture looks less rosy now, given the growing traction of Euroskeptic politics in many parts of the continent, not least in Britain. This is hardly the first time, of course, that a great continental political project has faltered or collapsed. WorldViews charts almost two millennia of European history through some of its most ambitious empires and alliances. Roman Empire At its height, the Roman Empire stretched from the windswept moors of northern England to the desert wastes of Syria. Under the Pax Romana, much of what’s now Europe was knitted together by roads, bureaucracy and politics. A common language – Latin – was chiseled on monuments and temples across the realm. Cults to eastern gods – Mithras, for example, or Isis – spread far and wide. Men born in places such as Spain and the Balkans could aspire for glory and prominence in Rome. The empire was a continental power where before none had existed, and even after its collapse and disarray by the 5th century A.D., its imprint had a profound hold on the course of European history. The kingdom of Charlemagne, 814 Under the Frankish warlord Charlemagne and his Merovingian predecessors, Western Europe saw its first marked political integration since the waning of Rome. The Franks subdued Germanic tribes in forests east of the Rhine and battled Muslim armies pushing north from Spain. From his capital at Aachen, in what’s now Germany, Charlemagne ruled over a vast domain that at its peak may have encompassed 10 million to 20 million people. An intervention into papal politics saw him crowned as “emperor of


PM Update: Showers possible after midnight, with strong to severe storms a risk Tuesday

(Kit Case via Flickr) As summer officially wanders into town this evening, it arrives to a table set nicely today. High temperatures near and above 90 degrees felt quite summerlike in these last moments of spring. We’ll have to see if we topped out at 90 in the city, but if we did, that’s two in a row. That would leave open the chance for our first heat wave of the season being cemented tomorrow should we do it again. Amidst the heat there are growing storm chances ahead. Through tonight: Tomorrow (Tuesday): See my 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. Pollen update: Tuesday storms: Storm outlook for Tuesday. (Storm Prediction Center) The National Weather Service Storm Prediction Center outlook has much of the southern half of our area under a “slight” (2 of 5) risk of severe weather. The rest of the area is included in a “marginal” (1 of 5) risk. While the current outlook focuses most heavily on D.C. and to the south, the trend has been for this area to shift north a bit as we close. I think there’s a pretty good likelihood the whole area will be under a slight risk tomorrow. Simulated radar at 5 p.m. on Tuesday per the afternoon hi resolution NAM. (Pivotal Weather) Assuming morning clouds and showers break soon enough, our best odds of storms come between about 4 and 10 p.m. They’ll develop and move in from the northwest. Given the energetic winds aloft, the most likely severe weather impact is isolated to scattered damaging wind. Isolated large hail is also a risk, and the tornado threat should be rather low. Any storm can contain frequent lightning and heavy rain. We’ll have more details on the storm threat tomorrow.


Would ‘Brexit’ break up the U.K.? Here’s a close look at Scottish sentiment.

A Brexit flotilla of fishing boats sailed up the River Thames into London on June 16 with foghorns sounding, in a protest against E.U. fishing quotas by the campaign for Britain to leave the European Union. (Niklas Halle’n/Agence France-Presse via Getty Images) Many commentators argue that the upcoming Brexit referendum in Britain, on membership of the European Union, could hasten the breakup of Britain. Scotland had a referendum only two years ago on whether it should leave the United Kingdom and become independent. Some pro-E.U. commentators have argued that the cause of Scottish independence might get a new breath of life if Britain leaves the European Union. Scottish voters, they argue, might feel a closer bond to Europe than to England, leading some people who voted no to Scottish independence two years ago to change their points of view. Scotland’s ruling SNP party might then run a new referendum and win it. However, for this to be plausible, the pro-Scottish independence camp would have to keep together its existing coalition after Britain left the European Union, while persuading enough people who voted no on independence last time to change their vote to yes. Opinion survey evidence suggest that this may be difficult. The Scottish electorate is divided on Europe For years, Scottish politicians such as former prime minister Alex Salmond have argued that Scotland should look to the example of Ireland – an independent country that, until recently at least, did well by being part of the European Union. Such arguments have led to a general perception that people who want Scottish independence are also pro-Europe. This perception is mistaken. An analysis of survey data from the British Election Study shows that people who voted for Scottish independence had mixed feelings about Europe and democracy. Some voters shared the cosmopolitan social democratic vision espoused by the leadership of the pro-independence campaign. Others did not. Issue position probability by electoral group<br />Source: British Election Study We can distinguish at least four groups in the Scottish electorate. Civic nationalists, like the Independence campaign’s leadership, are pro-egalitarian, anti-austerity and unhappy with the state of democracy in Britain. Classic nationalists are not particularly concerned about issues such as austerity and income inequality, but do want independence. Labour Party loyalists (so named here because many of this group identify with the Labour Party) do not want independence, but do have some concerns about income inequality.


Military retirees have a revolving door to civilian Pentagon jobs. The Senate voted to shut it.

to comment, but his staff referred a reporter to the committee report. The change, along with another provision of the defense bill that would scale back hiring preferences for veterans applying for federal jobs from outside the government, represents the biggest changes to the Obama administration’s push to reward veterans. Increasingly, hiring managers and members of Congress are concerned that the leg up given to veterans is not always bringing the most qualified candidates to federal agencies. The provision on military retirees directs the Defense Department to report by January on how many were hired to civilian jobs in 2015 and 2016, whether they were officers or enlisted personnel and how many men and women were in the overall pool of applicants for civilian jobs. Defense officials also would have to report on something that right now is hard to quantify — how the soft landing enjoyed by military retirees “has impacted . . . the ability of the Department and the military services to consistently hire best-qualified individuals for federal service,” according to the committee report. Defense Department officials declined to comment, because the legislation is pending. The proposed change is drawing mixed reactions from veterans groups. The Military Officers Association of America is in opposition, spokesman Jonathan Withington said in a statement. “Existing policy is consistent with the country’s obligation to provide career opportunities to those who served, especially disabled veterans,” he said. But the American Legion, the country’s largest service organization, said it supports putting retirees back on equal footing with civilian job candidates. “We support closing this loophole, because now if a military job becomes vacant it won’t be refilled by another military personnel,” said Louis Celli Jr., the Legion’s acting legislative director. The current system is “degrading the fighting force,” he said. And the current system benefits senior officers at the expense of junior ones, Celli said, by allowing them to walk into civilian jobs without competing for them. Someone who retired at a more junior rank would benefit from the extra points given to veterans competing for civilian jobs, he said. “Senior military members seem to have the market cornered on these plush positions,” Celli said. “You’ve got these retired generals who get full retirement benefits and they start a second career, just like that.” A spokesman for the House Armed Services Committee said lawmakers have not yet taken a position on the proposal.


Why Brexit would be a history-defining, irreversible mistake

gyrations in markets induced by relatively small fluctuations in the perceived chance of Brexit and by the very high prices commanded by out of the money options. The truth is that even with all the regulatory changes that have been put in place, we do not know for sure how the financial system will respond. A return of systemic risk as large losses lead to cascading liquidations cannot be ruled out. At a time when central banks have far less ammunition than they did in 2008, the consequences could be grave. Third, Brexit will undermine confidence and increase uncertainty. No one knows what the new structure will be or how soon it will emerge. Quite likely Brexit would lead to changes not only in Britain’s relationship with Europe but also within Europe itself. While businesses wait to see what happens, they will hold off on new investment. Some will decide that it is much safer to base European operations outside the U.K. Others will simply avoid hiring until matters are clear. There exist contingency plans to move hundreds of thousands of financial sector and other workers out of the U.K. If matters play out slowly, they may be acted on. Given adverse markets, huge uncertainty, the likely absence of either expansionary fiscal policy (because of government policy commitments) or incrementally expansionary monetary policy (because of lack of room to cut rates), I believe Brexit would likely be followed by a recession in the U.K. Fourth, Brexit would quite likely have large contagion effects. So irrational and dangerous an act in a traditional bastion of mature democracy would prompt a global reassessment of the likelihood of dangerous populist policy. The result could be large and destabilizing asset price declines and capital flows toward assets like gold and the Swiss franc. A vicious cycle of falling asset prices, reduced confidence and further declines could ensue. I am reminded of the Smoot-Hawley tariff and the Depression. No direct calculation of its impact can explain more than a tiny part of the Depression. But it may have been a psychological tipping point. Brexit, too, could have global effects that dwarf its direct impacts. None of this certain. But prudence dictates the avoidance of needless risk. Remain is the only rational economic choice. On June 23, Britain faces a fateful decision: whether or not to leave the European Union. And the world will be watching.


Now we know what happens to teens when you make pot legal

in life. Opponents have often claimed that marijuana legalization would lead to more kids smoking pot, with all the negative health consequences that would entail. But the scant data available until now hasn't borne this out. Voters in Oregon, Alaska and the District of Columbia voted to legalize marijuana in the 2014 midterm elections. They joined Colorado and Washington, which did so in 2012. So could other states follow suit in 2016? The Washington Post's Niraj Chokshi breaks down the possibilities. National surveys The latest data from Colorado includes 2015, reflecting two full years of the legal marijuana market's effect. These numbers give the strongest indication yet that fears of skyrocketing adolescent use have not materialized. "These statistics clearly debunk the theory that making marijuana legal for adults will result in more teen use," Mason Tvert, director of communications for the Marijuana Policy Project, said in a statement. "Levels of teen use in Colorado have not increased since it ended marijuana prohibition, and they are lower than the national average. Elected officials and voters in states that are considering similar proposals should be wary of claims that it will hurt teens." Smart Approaches to Marijuana, a group opposing legalization, has pointed out that the most recent federal surveys show that teen marijuana use rates in Colorado are among the highest in the country. But this latest survey, conducted by the state of Colorado, shows that teen use rates in that state are about average. Why the discrepancy? A few places where cannabis is farmed for medical or recreational use. For starters, this latest survey polled a much larger sample of Colorado students, 17,000, than the federal survey, which polls fewer than 400 Colorado teenagers in a given year. That much larger sample could produce a more accurate estimate than the smaller numbers in the federal drug survey. There's a simple reason why legalization may not be having much of an effect on teen marijuana use — adolescents already report that marijuana is widely available. Nationally, roughly 80 percent of 12th-graders say that pot is easy to get. The kids who want to smoke weed are probably already doing so — and legalization would do little to change that. Legalizing marijuana in Colorado was supposed to help undermine the black market. Instead, it's had almost the opposite effect. PostTV brings you into the world of black market weed dealers to explain.


10 ways to help kids take risks in a world of ‘No’s’

dirty towel, and I giggled when he explained plant reproduction. I still remember the “male” pollen-laden stamen, the “female” egg-holding pistil and all the 14-year-old boys joking about flowers getting it on. Mr. H. kept me after class one day. He sighed and told me he was taking me off the honors science track. There was no point, he explained, because I would never make it to physics. I might even bomb chemistry. It never occurred to me to question his wisdom. In fact, he gave me an easy out. Why try if it was hopeless? The following year, I didn’t do any of the chemistry homework or take notes in class. I never enrolled in physics. I had no idea I liked science until I took a mandatory geology course my sophomore year of college. The world tells kids “No, you can’t” in endless ways. They hear it from adults, peers and even from themselves. As a parent and school counselor, I see how easily kids can be derailed. At times, I catch myself discouraging my children from chasing ill-fated goals. My advice may be loving, protective or even sound. But it is equally likely to be premature, misguided or limiting. I try to check myself, to remember that children are perpetually learning and maturing. Setbacks are a necessary part of that journey. As I send my eighth-grade students — and my own son — off to high school, I want them to take risks and move forward with optimism. Here are 10 key things to teach kids that will help them overcome negativity and quiet their internal defeatist voices: Bet on yourself. Don’t let anyone clip your wings. Seek forgiveness, not permission. Plant yourself where you can grow. Illegitimi non carborundum. When one door closes, open it again. Be vulnerable. Don’t define yourself by the external. Practice positive self-talk. Let others do the rejecting. Phyllis L. Fagell is a licensed clinical professional counselor at the Chrysalis Group and a school counselor in Bethesda. She tweets @pfagell. Like On Parenting on Facebook for more essays, advice and news. You can sign up here for our newsletter. You can find us at washingtonpost.com/onparenting. You might also be interested in: Top 10 skills middle school students need to thrive, and how parents can help What children can teach us about change, growing up Let’s wake up and have a parenting revolution


Australian Paralympian is second athlete to be robbed in Rio in less than a month

in Santa Teresa, a Rio neighborhood. Echavarri and his companions were unharmed but he told the Associated Press that cellphones “and other minor electronic gear” were taken. Tesch, a gold medalist in sailing in London and a silver- and bronze-medalist in basketball, added that she and Sarah Ross, the team physiotherapist, are shaken but unharmed. “Sarah said some swear words at the man and then screamed for help. I didn’t say anything because there was a gun,” Tesch said. “We’ve already had conversations about if anything happens, just give them what they want. Sarah didn’t see the gun. Her guy didn’t have a gun.” The incident ended when the men ran off, but a curfew for Australia’s nearly 400 Olympic and Paralympic athletes is under consideration, according to the Australian Olympic team’s Chef de Mission. “We will look closer to the time, day to day and on an hour by hour basis, whether there will be no go zones, and areas and restrictions of times, and even curfews that we may need to put in place,” Kitty Chiller told the Sydney Morning Herald. Muggings are common in Rio and the AP reports that about 85,000 soldiers and police will provide security, more than double the number in London four years ago. With Rio’s economy struggling, about 20 percent of the budget for the Games (roughly $550 million) has been cut by Rio organizers. Chiller called for additional security. “We’re demanding that the level of security forces, which number about 100,000, is reviewed and also we are also asking that they are deployed earlier prior to Games time, especially around training and competition venues,” she said (via BBC Australia). “It’s not an isolated incident. It’s got to a point now that steps and measures are taken to ensure that all our team members who go to Rio for the Olympic Games next month are safe.” Echavarri told the AP that a mistake contributed to the May 20 incident and warned that athletes should be alert to their surroundings. “We were a bit naive, a bit too daring and we are lucky to have survived,” Echavarri said. “We were too confident, and being confident in Rio is not a good thing. We made a big mistake. We should have caught a taxi, taken a car and avoided a thing like this. We have to be careful, but the city needs more policing.”


Political similarities across the pond

Candles surround a photo of Labour MP Jo Cox before a vigil in her memory in George Square on June 17 in Glasgow, Scotland. (Jeff J. Mitchell/Getty Images) In England for a few days, this American sees similarities between English politics and ours. Here, the political conversation in cabs, Uber cars, pubs and on the street is about immigration, income disparity and violence. Britain’s vote on “Brexit” is Thursday, and polls have it close. In Britain these days, you are either “in,” preferring to stay in the European Union, or you’re “out,” supporting exit. To get a street-level view of the Brexit debate, take a cab and get the “out” side of the argument; uncontrolled immigration is destroying the economy by allowing cheap, unregulated labor (read thousands of new Uber drivers) to unfairly compete. Take an Uber, and you will hear the driver’s puzzlement at the passion for exit and concern that it will lead to new regulations to restrict his ability to make a meager living. At two street fairs, one in Camden, the other in Marylebone, you can also hear the two sides. In raucous Camden, the “out” side is working the crowds; in posh Marylebone, a neighborhood filled with expensive shops and fancy prams, the “ins” have it. To simplify, the “ins” are doing well in an economic structure where goods, money and people can move freely across borders. Those favoring an exit, having seen their incomes and prospects restricted in recent years, are all about loss and grievance. Their bitterness and disdain for the status quo is captured in the stick-on lapel button that displays: “I’m out.” In recent days, it seemed as if the “exit side” was gaining ground. Prime Minister David Cameron may have unwittingly helped the “outs” when his government made claims about the dire fiscal consequence of Brexit. It sounded like political blackmail and alienated even those inclined to support his pro-E.U. position. But then, last Friday, British Member of Parliament Jo Cox was murdered by a man who shouted, “Britain first,” as he stabbed her repeatedly and then shot her point blank in the head. This horrible act caused the “outs” to suspend their campaign temporarily and left them concerned that this deranged act might taint their cause as one steeped in political violence. Some of what is happening here is all too familiar to an American, right down to a