Debra and Marc Tice: Involve families in U.S. government’s hostage policy review

Journalist Austin Tice, who has contributed to The Washington Post and is currently unaccounted for in Syria. (Courtesy of Tice family) (Courtesy of Tice family) Debra and Marc Tice live in Houston. As the parents of an international hostage, our hearts are broken again by the tragic news of the death of Luke Somers in Yemen. This month’s failed rescue attempt once more brought into intense focus the need for the U.S. government to involve families in its policies and procedures for responding when Americans are taken hostage . On Aug. 14, 2012, when our son Austin Tice was taken captive in Syria while reporting on the conflict there, our lives were turned inside out. The oft-repeated cliche is “there is no handbook” for what we are going through. That hardly begins to express the challenges we face. In reality, no government policy and no established support network exist to help families navigate the many questions suddenly requiring an answer: questions regarding interaction with the government; questions about protecting Austin’s identity and assets; questions of managing a relationship with the media; questions about preserving some semblance of normal life for our family. All of these pale in significance to the biggest question of all: What can and should we do to get Austin safely home as soon as possible? Last month, the White House ordered a review of the U.S. government’s hostage policy. Many issues need to be addressed as part of this review. Former captives and families of hostages, along with the government entities responsible for bringing captive Americans safely home, must be involved in this discussion. As part of this process, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence should be ordered to coordinate efforts among all the agencies involved — both to improve inter-agency information-sharing and to Currently, according to the Web site Intelligence.gov, “Seventeen separate organizations unite to form the Intelligence Community. Each member agency operates under its own directive.” Each agency has a defined mission that prioritizes its objective. As it relates to hostages, the work of these agencies must be aligned with a single primary objective: the safe return of American citizens held overseas. Before leaving for Syria, Austin was living as an independent adult, with all the usual responsibilities and obligations. Over the more than 850 days that he has been held captive, we have learned that no policy safeguards the identity, assets


biggest question of all: What can and should we do to get Austin safely home as soon as possible? Last month, the White House ordered a review of the U.S. government’s hostage policy. Many issues need to be addressed as part of this review. Former captives and families of hostages, along with the government entities responsible for bringing captive Americans safely home, must be involved in this discussion. As part of this process, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence should be ordered to coordinate efforts among all the agencies involved — both to improve inter-agency information-sharing and to Currently, according to the Web site Intelligence.gov, “Seventeen separate organizations unite to form the Intelligence Community. Each member agency operates under its own directive.” Each agency has a defined mission that prioritizes its objective. As it relates to hostages, the work of these agencies must be aligned with a single primary objective: the safe return of American citizens held overseas. Before leaving for Syria, Austin was living as an independent adult, with all the usual responsibilities and obligations. Over the more than 850 days that he has been held captive, we have learned that no policy safeguards the identity, assets and obligations of our missing son. We face often insurmountable obstacles as we struggle to protect his online identity, secure his bank accounts, freeze his debts and in other ways try to ensure that he has a life to come home to. A comprehensive hostage policy should include a method for suspending a hostage’s obligations, such as rent, loans and insurance, as well as for preserving a phone number. In this digital age, it should also be possible for elements of a hostage’s online identity, including social media and e-mail, to be appropriately accessed and managed. There should be an immediate, comprehensive evaluation of any vulnerable assets, such as bank and credit card accounts. If these assets are not frozen, they must be appropriately monitored for any malicious activity. A clear and efficient mechanism needs to be in place to ensure that any stolen assets are returned or reimbursed to the hostage. Austin did not provide us with access to his online accounts. However, government agencies using subpoenas have been able to mine them for clues. Officials often refuse to share what they find with us; moreover, we cannot even be certain it is shared among relevant agencies. The information


For 40 years, Anchor has kept drinkers guessing with its Christmas Ale

the annual release (the brewery this year made about 7,000 barrels, or 98,000 cases, he estimates) so it sells out in a two-month window between early November and the start of the New Year. And if it doesn’t? You can do things with leftover beer that you can’t do with leftover turkey. Unsold Christmas Ale is transported to Anchor Distilling Company, where it’s turned into a 90-proof beer schnapps called Christmas Spirit (available only in California, unfortunately). The ultimate test for Our Special Ale, Carpenter believes, comes at the dinner table. “Does it really fit in with your holiday meal? Then you know it’s a success.” He found this year’s version a perfect complement to his wife’s turkey dressing, which he describes as “simply bread, celery, onion, mushrooms, poultry seasoning and lots of butter.” Every year, the label for Anchor Christmas Ale bears the image of a different tree. This year’s species is the giant sequoia, drawn by graphic designer James Stitt. Capable of growing over 300 feet tall and living 3,500 years, the sequoia is a symbol of permanence. What about the beer? Maytag liked to call his Christmas beer a “moving target,” believing that the constantly changing recipe would discourage imitators. But the shelves in the beer aisle today are groaning with seasonal releases. You’re almost a Scrooge if you offer just one. The holiday assortment from Flying Dog Brewery in Frederick, Md., contains four new beers, including an Oatmeal Raisin Stout and a Hazelnut Scotch-Style Ale, inspired by cookies from Otterbein’s Bakery in Baltimore. Boston Beer Co. has three spiced beers in its Samuel Adams winter variety pack (not including the gingerbread stout), and was readying Samuel Adams Cold Snap (a white ale with coriander, orange peel and plum) for a January launch. Even Anchor, for the first time, has a second winter seasonal on the market: a dark wheat ale called Anchor Winter Wheat. Might Anchor be tempted to retool its Our Special Ale? “I’m semi-retired, and it’s possible that a new brewer would want to do something different,” concedes Carpenter. “But it has such a popular following that it would disappoint a lot of people.” Kitsock is the editor of Mid-Atlantic Brewing News. A previous version of this column misspelled the name of Skyy Vodka. More from Food: Beer Column archive Hellbender Brewery plans its lineup Pabst bringing back Ballantine Saisons: Beers made for drinking


My client, a torture victim

FILE - In this March 23, 2011 file photograph, an Afghan detainee is seen through iron mesh inside the Parwan detention facility near Bagram Air Field in Afghanistan. Afghan and U.S. military officials have signed a deal to transfer oversight of the main U.S. detention center in the country to the Afghan government within six months. (AP Photo/Dar Yasin, File) (Dar Yasin/AP) Tina M. Foster is the founder and executive director of the International Justice Network. An entire section of the Senate intelligence committee’s executive summary of the CIA torture report focuses on the sadistic abuse of one of my clients. The excerpt, titled “CIA Headquarters Recommends That Untrained Interrogators in Country . . . Use the CIA’s Enhanced Interrogation Techniques on” Redha al-Najar, contains detailed descriptions of the specific methods of torture my client was subjected to while in CIA custody. Najar, a Tunisian citizen, has been detained without charge for 12 years. Though the U.S. government has never allowed my co-counsel and I to communicate with our client, our own investigation of his case revealed that, in 2002, unknown agents broke into his home in Pakistan, seized him from his family and “disappeared” him. Najar’s family had no idea what had become of him until they received a letter from him delivered by the Red Cross in 2003. It was not until five years later that the family learned that the International Justice Network was providing legal assistance to detainees; they asked us to act on his behalf. We filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus that year, by which time Najar had already spent five years in U.S. custody — first at so-called black sites, then eventually at Bagram air base in Afghanistan. Though we strongly believed at the time that he had been secretly detained and tortured by the CIA prior to being transferred to military custody, the U.S. government declined to provide this information. The Senate intelligence committee’s report confirms what we have suspected all along. The report reveals that Najar was tortured by the CIA for nearly 700 days. He was subjected to a laundry list of “enhanced interrogation techniques.” These included isolation in total darkness, sound disorientation techniques, sense of time deprivation, limited light, cold temperatures, sleep deprivation, blaring loud music for 24 hours a day, bad food, and humiliation and degradation such as being made to wear a diaper and having


D.C. police: 12-year-old boy struck by bullet while inside a Northwest D.C. home

A 12-year-old boy was struck by a bullet while inside a Northwest D.C. home Saturday night, D.C. police said. Police spokesman Officer Paul Metcalf said investigators believe the bullet was fired from outside the house in the 4600 block of Ninth Street NW, at 10:15 p.m. He said the boy was “conscious and breathing” Sunday morning. Investigators are searching for a gunman and a motive in the shooting. Metcalf said it was not clear if the boy lived at the home, and authorities have no description of the shooter. D.C. police ask that anyone with information contact the department at 202-727-9099. Anonymous information can be submitted to the department’s TEXT TIP LINE by messaging 50411.


New Orchestra of Washington embraces smaller-is-better movement

The New Orchestra of Washington. (Shannon Finney Photography) There have been times in history when composers and performers reacted to straitened economic and man-power conditions by thinking small. Heinrich Schutz produced his exquisite “Kleine Geistliche Konzerte” (“Little Sacred Pieces”) during the Thirty Years’ War; Stravinsky composed his chamber stage work “L’histoire du Soldat” during World War I; and today many orchestras are finding it economically necessary to trim their personnel. Now in its third season, Alejandro Hernandez-Valdez’s New Orchestra of Washington has constituted itself in the forefront of this smaller-is-better movement. It’s a lean, lithe, agile organization, more chamber than symphonic and flexible enough to take on a wide variety of repertoire (a couple of months ago they performed the chamber version of the Mahler 4th). On Saturday the orchestra fielded an outstanding group of 10 string-players for a program of early-20th-century British music at downtown’s United Church of Christ. Playing with the rich plummy sound so often associated with British contraltos, the sections, only two to a part (except for the three first violins), managed a gratifying unanimity that extended even to their vibratos. As a conductor, Hernandez-Valdez focused on shape and inflection, brought to life in the subtle contours and nostalgic glow of the Larghetto from Elgar’s “Serenade for Strings” and the Slow Dance from Vaughan Williams’s “Charter House Suite.” Playfulness and innocence, such a part of British folk music tradition, was also there — in abundance — as the ensemble danced through Vaughan Williams’s jolly Quick Dance and the Jig and the Finale of Gustav Holst’s “St. Paul’s Suite.” The program’s centerpiece and biggest challenge was the Benjamin Britten “Serenade” for French Horn and Tenor. The strings handled it masterfully; the soloists, tenor Robert Baker and horn-player Douglas Quinzi were uneven. Quinzi played his opening and closing solos with more muscle than assurance — with the kind of blips and bravado that can make an audience a little nervous — but more than made up for this with the delicacy and lightness of his lightning-like ornamental acrobatics in the inner movements. Baker, armed with a lovely, big, smooth voice, seemed more tuned in to an Italian dramatic idiom that encourages scooping up to pitches than an English one that expects a singer to be there at the beginning of the note. Reinthaler is a freelance writer.


Amid terrorism fears in Europe, are security forces going too far?

intelligence service, MI5, acknowledged to prosecutors that Begg had told them of his plans before he traveled. Begg has made no secret of his hard-line Islamist sympathies, having operated a bookstore that was a hub for British jihadists in the 1990s and moving his family to Afghanistan in the summer of 2001 to live under the Taliban. But the 46-year-old has denied participating in violence or being affiliated with terrorist organizations. Both before and after this year’s arrest, he has been sharply critical of the Islamic State, expressing disgust at the group’s ritualized executions and disregard for civilian life. He even wrote a personal letter from prison to the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, urging him to release British aid worker Alan Henning. It remains unclear whether authorities delivered the letter; Henning was subsequently beheaded. Begg’s lengthy detention this year has only confirmed the suspicions of many Muslims in Birmingham, and across Britain, that their community is being unfairly targeted. “They feel like they’ve been vilified, demonized and stigmatized,” Awan said. “Moazzam Begg epitomizes the struggle.” On murky ground His case is not the only one that has raised hackles. Two 22-year-olds from Birmingham were sentenced by a judge to 12 years in prison this month after returning from the Syrian front lines. The judge, Michael Topolski, described the pair as “deeply committed to violent extremism.” But the men’s families said that they felt betrayed by the stiff sentences and that they had been promised leniency in exchange for cooperation. “This sends out the wrong message to other families who might have concerns about their sons and daughters, and now might not come forward,” the family of one of the men, Mohammed Nahin Ahmed, said in a statement. The security crackdown has extended even to those who never traveled to Syria. On Thursday, a 35-year-old mother of six, Runa Khan, was sentenced to five years in prison for posting statements and photos on Facebook. Khan’s posts included images of a suicide vest and expressions of hope that her young son would one day become a fighter. Security officials acknowledge that they are on murky ground when it comes to prosecuting Brits for alleged crimes committed in Syria, a country where Western governments have little visibility into events on the ground. Some officials have also called for a more robust debate over where to draw the line in prosecuting extremist language.


DC2024 Olympic bid to present its case to USOC board of directors

W. Russell Ramsey, right, chairman of Washington 2024, looks at a model of proposed facilities for D.C.’s Olympic bid along with board members Robert Hisaoka and Rosie Allen-Herring, president of the United Way National Capitol chapter. (T.J. Kirkpatrick/For The Washington Post) A five-person contingent will present a case to the 16-member U.S. Olympic Committee board of directors Tuesday morning for why the nation’s capital deserves to host the 2024 Summer Games. By the time the D.C. representatives return from Redwood City, Calif., they could know whether the USOC has chosen their bid over those of fellow finalists Los Angeles, San Francisco and Boston, to move forward to the International Olympic Committee. “We’re preparing for [a decision] to come as early as Tuesday,” said Russ Ramsey, chairman and CEO of the Washington 2024 group. “We’re also preparing for it to be pushed back to mid-January. We have not gotten any [firm timetable] from the board.” Ramsey, a businessman who has been hustling support for the D.C. bid since its official launch in September, will be D.C.’s lead presenter at the USOC board meeting and will be joined by vice chairman Ted Leonsis, the owner of the Washington Wizards and Capitals. With a maximum of five representatives allowed per bidding city, the D.C. group filled out its roster with D.C. Mayor-Elect Muriel Bowser, former NFL Commissioner (and DC2024 board member) Paul Tagliabue and Olympic gold medal-winning swimmer (and Bethesda native) Katie Ledecky. The USOC has scheduled a news conference for 4 p.m. Pacific time on Tuesday, at which it is expected to announce that it will, in fact, submit a U.S. bid to the IOC — which was not a given, as the U.S. passed on bidding for the 2020 Games. “The odds are good” the U.S. will put forth a bid, USOC Chairman Larry Probst told reporters following an IOC meeting in Monaco earlier this month. But the timing for naming the U.S. bid city is unclear. Most of the USOC board members will be hearing details of the four cities’ bids for the first time Tuesday, and while there is some sentiment for picking a winner by the end of year — because four board members’ terms expire Dec. 31 — it is possible the decision won’t come until well after the new year. The IOC will name the host city for the 2024 Summer Games in September 2017 in


Having received a public vote of confidence, Japan’s leader now needs to deliver results

So far, monetary loosening by the central bank and stimulus spending by the government have boosted the stock market and triggered a devaluation of the yen that has, in turn, delivered big profits to exporting companies such as Toyota. But the incomes of most Japanese are stagnant, while a consumption tax increase this year pushed the economy into a recession. Most important, the “third arrow” of Mr. Abe’s platform, structural economic reform, has yet to progress very far. The prime minister pledged in a post-election news conference to pressure companies to raise salaries, but a more effective, if less populist, action would be the passage of labor reforms to make hiring and firing easier. Similarly, Mr. Abe could accomplish a large piece of restructuring by completing free-trade agreements, including the Trans-Pacific Partnership with the United States and 10 other nations. The prime minister and his top aides have been saying they want to do just that — but in a key negotiating session with the United States in September, Tokyo offered no meaningful concessions in the critical area of agricultural subsidies. Mr. Abe had some reason to hold back, since President Obama was unable to win trade promotion authority from Congress, which will be needed for U.S. ratification of the TPP. But Mr. Abe’s renewed mandate and the Republican takeover of the U.S. Senate should change that calculus. Trade is one area where the incoming Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), and Mr. Obama appear inclined to cooperate. A clear signal that Tokyo is ready to move forward with the TPP — in the form of a more realistic position on agriculture — could help spur the new Congress to grant that authority. Mr. Abe may be tempted to diverge, as he has before, from the hard work of economic reform to a more divisive nationalist agenda. A useful reinterpretation of the constitution that would allow Japanese military forces more leeway in defending allies requires implementing legislation in parliament, which the government can be expected to seek. But Mr. Abe would be wise to avoid more political acts, like his visit a year ago to a shrine where Japanese war criminals are among those memorialized. Mr. Abe’s ambitions for a revitalized Japan will depend above all on the nation’s renewed economic health. Read more about this topic: Lally Weymouth: An interview with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe Richard Cohen: Will


World Digest: Dec. 15, 2014

SOUTH SUDAN U.N.: Fight has killed tens of thousands Tens of thousands of people have died in South Sudan in one year of warfare and the country’s leaders are puttingtheir “personal ambitions” ahead of the nation’s future, the U.N. secretary general said Monday. Fighting broke out a year ago in South Sudan’s capital, Juba, and spiraled nationwide. The battles often pit fighters loyal to President Salva Kiir, an ethnic Dinka, against those who support former vice president Riek Machar, an ethnic Nuer. There is no official death toll for the conflict, but U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said “tens of thousands” have died. The two sides have signed several peace deals, but none has succeeded in stopping the fighting. Government troops and armed youths have been battling in Upper Nile state in recent days. — Associated Press UKRAINE NATO, E.U. urged to provide more aid Ukraine’s prime minister on Monday asked NATO to do more to help his nation’s military, which has been unable to quell a pro-Russian insurgency, and called for an urgent increase in financial aid from the European Union. “It’s difficult for us to fight with a nuclear state that is armed to the teeth,” Arseniy Yatsenyuk said. He said that his government is committed to free-market and legal reforms but that Ukraine’s economy has been devastated by the ongoing conflict with Russia. A U.N. report said the fighting in eastern Ukraine has killed at least 4,707 people since mid-April, with more than a quarter of the deaths occurring since a cease-fire began in early September. — Associated Press SYRIA Islamist fighters capture 2 army bases Al-Qaeda-linked and other Islamist fighters seized two key Syrian army bases Monday in the northwest province of Idlib after two days of intense battles with government troops that killed dozens on both sides, activists said. The fall of the Wadi Deif and Hamidiyeh bases is a significant blow to the Syrian army, which had held on to them for more than two years despite repeated attacks by opposition groups. Hussam Abu Bakr, a spokesman for Ahrar al-Sham, a rebel faction in northern Syria, said his group captured the Hamidiyeh base. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said al-Qaeda-linked Jabhat al-Nusra and other rebel factions seized the Wadi Deif base, as well as the nearby Hamidiyeh base. The latest round of fighting came as European Union foreign ministers met in Brussels


Here’s how to set a running record: Take a look at the Guinness record book

(iStock) For most of us, it would be impressive enough just to run a marathon. For some runners, the elusive goal is qualifying for the Boston Marathon. And then there are those strivers for whom that’s not enough. They want the Guinness book of world records to memorialize their name. But they fear they’ll never beat the men’s marathon record of 2 hours, 2 minutes and 57 seconds or the women’s record of 2:15:25. For these ambitious types, Alison Wade of Runner’s World and Running Times suggests this: Put on a Maryland blue crab costume and run those 26.2 miles. If you finish in less than 3:55:13, you’ll break the Guinness record for “fastest marathon dressed as a crustacean (male).” Or find 73 friends to run with you in a group. If the 74 of you finish, you will beat the record for “most runners to complete a marathon whilst linked together.” Or maybe you can take advantage of your other skills and aim for “longest scarf knitted whilst running a marathon,” which is 12 feet, 1.75 inches; a photograph shows the current record holder, David Babcock, knitting as he runs. (The scarf is a pleasant shade of green.) Wade says scanning the Guinness book suggests a lot of other running records to attempt, but she notes that “the verification process will likely require some work.”


White House says Obama will sign a bill widening sanctions on Russia

at Russia’s defense and energy sectors, and requires Obama to impose conditional sanctions on the defense sector should Russian state-controlled firms sell or transfer military equipment to factions in Syria, Ukraine, Georgia or Moldova without the consent of the governments in those countries. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov did not betray any alarm about the sanctions effort by Congress. During an interview with France 24, a television network, he said it would depend how it would “be applied in practice.” He said, “It provides for some specific things, I believe, to be done automatically, but it also provides for something to be left to the president’s discretion. “Congress is a very special group of people. More than 80 percent of them never left the United States,” he said. “They live in their own world, so I’m not amazed about this Russophobia which is being demonstrated by the Congress at the moment.” The legislation coincides with an accelerating economic crisis in Russia, brought on not only by Western sanctions but by the plummeting price of oil. Russia’s central bank hiked interest rates Monday night to 17 percent in an effort to stop the slide in the currency, the ruble. Earnest said “the bite on the Russian economy is only becoming stronger.” He said “ultimately it will be up to President Putin whether these economic costs are worth it to him and to the Russian people.” In London, Secretary of State John F. Kerry said that Russia had made “constructive moves” in recent days. “It goes without saying that the purpose of the European-U.S.-et al effort with respect to sanctions was to make it clear to Russia, to President Putin, that there are costs attached to the unilateral annexation of Crimea and the continued support for separatists within Ukraine,” Kerry said. “I don’t think that what is happening is just related to the sanctions. I think it is much broader, more complicated than that. It has to do with other issues with respect to the Russian economy, and oil prices, obviously, have also played a significant role in this.” Top White House economist Jason Furman says the Russian economy is “on the brink of crisis.” The ruble plunged against the dollar on Tuesday. Kerry said that “these sanctions could have been lifted months ago. These sanctions could be lifted in a matter of weeks or days, depending on the choices that President


Obama moves to normalize relations with Cuba as American is released by Havana

prisoners. In simultaneous remarks in Havana, Cuban President Raúl Castro affirmed his government’s willingness for dialogue on “profound differences” between the countries, “particularly on issues related to national sovereignty, democracy, human rights and foreign policy.” Castro said that “Obama’s decision . . . deserves the respect and acknowledgment of our people.” Obama and Castro — who spoke by phone Tuesday, the first such exchange between leaders of the two countries since the 1959 Cuban revolution — thanked Pope Francis and the Vatican, which they said were instrumental in promoting their dialogue, and the government of Canada, where secret talks that began in June 2013 were held. In addition to reopening an embassy in Havana, the administration plans to significantly ease trade and financial restrictions, as well as limits on travel by Americans to Cuba, by using its regulatory and enforcement powers to evade limits imposed by a congressionally mandated embargo. Americans will be permitted to send more money to Cuban nationals, use their debit and credit cards in Cuba, and bring $100 worth of Cuban cigars into this country. U.S. exports to Cuba will be made easier, and additional items will be authorized. U.S. banks will be allowed to open correspondent relations with banks in Cuba. The administration also said it would launch a review of Cuba’s status as a state sponsor of terrorism, a designation it feels Havana may not deserve alongside Sudan, Syria and Iran, and would work with Congress to ultimately lift the trade embargo and other sanctions. While Obama said the Cubans had also agreed to expand Internet access and other freedoms, and to release 53 political detainees, Castro did not mention any of those measures in his televised speech. Coverage of the momentous announcement in Cuba’s Communist Party media was limited to the reestablishment of diplomatic relations and the release of three Cuban spies imprisoned in the United States. In addition to Gross, who the Obama administration said was freed on humanitarian grounds after five years, the United States exchanged the three Cubans for an unnamed U.S. intelligence asset said to have been held in Cuba for two decades. The inclusion in the deal of the U.S. spy, a Cuban national, appeared to have been the break that allowed it to go through. Cuba had long offered to release Gross in a swap for its imprisoned intelligence agents; the administration had long refused on the


National Chamber Players perform free and ‘unique’ concerts in Alexandria

from around the country. Guest performers are often colleagues and friends of the musicians in the group, such as Baltimore Symphony Orchestra violinist and violist Jonathan Carney and pianist Rohan de Silva of New York. This month’s performance featured 13 musicians, including NSO viola players Daniel Foster and Abigail Evans, and cellist Eugena Chang. Kenneth Slowik, artistic director of the Smithsonian Chamber Music Society, performed on viola da gamba, and Episcopal’s choral director, Brandon Straub, played harpsichord. For the musicians, playing in the group is a way to enjoy a collegial atmosphere with like-minded friends. “We get to play with the people we want to play with, that we get along with personally and in a musical way,” Lee said. “It’s a lot of fun — everybody [who] plays in this series is usually pretty close friends, and it’s been that way since we started it. “ Episcopal High School, which funds the concerts, is hoping to draw more music lovers to the free performances. “We open the concerts to the public out of appreciation for our musicians — we really want to give them the audience they deserve. People who come to the concerts are just blown away,” said Ginger Peabody, who runs the National Chamber Players’ programs out of the school’s arts department. Members of the chamber group said the school’s Pendleton Hall boasts some of the best acoustics in the area. “Everybody who plays there is shocked at how good the acoustics are,” Lee said. “I think it’s probably the nicest venue next to Coolidge [Auditorium] in the Library of Congress, in terms of chamber music.” “It’s our home away from home,” said Teri Lee, an NSO violinist and James Lee’s wife. “The people here are fantastic — all the people that come from the NSO, friends who fly in from Juilliard, from around the country and around the world — it’s one big happy family.” In most performances, the musicians play without a conductor. “This is small chamber music; it’s intimate,” Teri Lee said. “We’re following each other instead of following a conductor.” The group will have a conductor, though, for its March performance , a chamber music adaptation of Mahler’s “Das Lied von der Erde.” The concerts, which give the musicians a chance to let loose, have featured some unconventional performances alongside more traditional offerings. Chamber music adaptations of “Purple Haze,” George Gershwin music ,


Montgomery County Animal Watch

This case was received recently by the Montgomery County Animal Services Division. For information, call 240-773-5900. This number provides recorded information on topics such as the new animal services and adoption center’s hours and location in Derwood, adoption and licensing procedures, and lost-and-found and field services. Pit bulls attack dog The Guide Dog Foundation for the Blind Adoptable cats at no-kill shelter: Gaithersburg Adopt or foster rescue dogs: Rockville Reduced fees for cat adoption: Germantown — Compiled by Lisa M. Bolton


Sen. Kaine tours site of catastrophic rocket explosion

while governor of Virginia, and he credits the site with enlivening a struggling regional economy. About a half-dozen workers were in the process of what an official described as “surgical demolition” of the launch system during Kaine’s visit. Two of the four lightning rods that border the launchpad had been knocked out; signs and grass around the site were burnt black. Wearing hard hats, Kaine and state Sen. Lynwood W. Lewis Jr. (D) took a short tour of the aftermath with officials and engineers, who emphasized the lack of major damage from debris. “This is one of the best-kept secrets in Virginia,” Kaine said afterward from the ramp of the launchpad. He noted that “vastly more rockets have been shot out of Wallops Island” than from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California or Kennedy Space Center in Florida, although unmanned. “It’s becoming a deeper and deeper part of the economy.” Kaine defended the inclusion of funds for a private enterprise in the federal budget, saying that Orbital’s mission is a national one. The rocket that exploded had food, water and other supplies that were headed for the International Space Station, part of a $1.9 billion contract with NASA. The company intends to complete that contract with four more launches; it will start testing late next year with a rocket built by a veteran NASA contractor. “The missions that are flown from here are very necessary,” Kaine said. Repair costs for the $120 million launchpad were estimated to cost up to $20 million, but other parts of the facility will need refurbishing and repair. The failure, attributed to a faulty engine, raised questions about the company’s use of decades-old Russian rocket engines mothballed during the Cold War. The company is purchasing new Russian engines to replace them, according to Aviation Week. It also reignited debate over the Obama administration’s decision to cede most space travel to private companies. The Federal Aviation Administration is tasked with overseeing a fast-growing industry with few rigid guidelines. Kaine argued that the system worked Oct. 28, with the coordination between NASA, Orbital and firefighters as well as the structural soundness of the site helping to contain the damage. “What was it like?” he asked one of those firefighters, who joined the group at the launchpad Wednesday. The senator was in the middle of votes at the U.S. Capitol at the time. “Uh, bright,” the firefighter responded.


D.C. primary election date to remain a moving target

WASHINGTON, DC - APRIL 1: Council member Muriel Bowser greets supporters at an Election Day Rally on Tuesday April 1, 2014 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Amanda Voisard/For the Washington Post) (Amanda Voisard/For the Washington Post) The District’s primary election date will remain in flux for the next four years, first moving to June, then to September as city lawmakers continue searching for a way to prevent a repeat of this year’s record-low voter turnout in April. The D.C. Council on Tuesday approved a plan to hold a combined local and federal primary in June 2016. Two years later, in 2018, the city’s next mayoral primary would flip to September under the bill, which now heads to Mayor Vincent C. Gray (D) for his signature. D.C. was forced to move up its traditional mid-September primary to comply with a federal law designed to give overseas members of the military 45 days after a primary to receive and return absentee ballots for a November general election. To meet that requirement, the council decided last year to overhaul its election calendar, moving its primary up five months, to April. Some lawmakers voted for that change believing it would bring an added benefit of making the city’s choice in presidential years more consequential. But the city’s first experience with the new date did not go well. On April 1, when council member Muriel E. Bowser (D-Ward 4) upset the incumbent, Gray, turnout was the lowest the city had seen in at least three decades. That was partially viewed as a reflection of broad public apathy toward D.C. politics amid continued scandal. But the early-in-the-year timing was at least partly to blame, having caught many residents by surprise. Mayoral candidates debated in January and February, often in front of sparse crowds and on snowy nights that more closely resembled caucus season in Iowa than the District’s traditional summertime political season of festivals and parades. Council member Kenyan R. McDuffie (D-Ward 5) pushed last month to move the primary as close as possible to its original date in September. He argued that a primary on the first Tuesday in September, with accelerated ballot counting, would allow 45 days until the general election, complying with the federal law. McDuffie’s plan cleared a first vote of the council this month, but members Vincent B. Orange (D-At Large) and Jack Evans (D-Ward 2) continued to raise objections. Orange


Five Marylanders dead of cold-related causes, first weather deaths of the season

Five people died of causes related to cold weather in Maryland between Dec. 9 and Dec. 15, the first weather-related deaths of the season in the state. According to a report from the state department of health, the victims included two men between the ages of 18 and 44, one in Anne Arundel County and one in Frederick County, and three people over 65 — a woman in Carroll County, a man in Prince George’s County and a man in Wicomico County. The report did not include more information about the victims or about their specific causes of death. It said that the lowest temperatures during the week were just below freezing, with wind chills dipping to near 20 degrees Fahrenheit. Throughout the 2013-2014 winter weather season, 15 people died in Maryland due to cold-related causes, such as hypothermia and frostbite, the health department said in a statement. The statement warned that homeless people, elderly people and drug and alcohol users were at greatest risk of cold-related illness. At the D.C. Department of Health, Mahlori Isaacs said that no weather-related deaths have been reported this season. Virginia Department of Health spokeswoman Lorrie Andrew-Spear said that the computer system which keeps track of deaths in the state was not working Wednesday.


Small business advice: What your company can learn from the rise of craft beer

Here are some lessons small business owners in other sectors can learn from the rise of craft beer. (Marvin Joseph/THE WASHINGTON POST) In the midst of the recent recession, more than 4,500 craft beer makers disrupted a centuries-old industry. Craft beer sales soared between 2007 and 2012 and now make up 14.3 percent of the $100 billion-dollar beer market. Some of that may be due to the fact that some people took the concept of “having a cold one” during hard times to a new level. When Chip Town and his daughter Jacqui both lost their jobs, for instance, they used the unplanned time off to pursue a shared love of home brewing, eventually opening Rinn Duin Brewing in New Jersey. But beyond the growth of craft brewing as a hobby and an entrepreneurial endeavor, the industry has two fundamental characteristics that have propelled a 17.2 percent increase in sales at the same time overall beer sales have declined by 1.9 percent — that is, innovation and collaboration. Brewers today are pushing every extreme. Nano-breweries only serve a handful of people or restaurants, for example. Samuel Adams’ Utopias has pushed the limit on alcohol content at 27 percent and retails for $125. Unique brewing techniques, surprising ingredients and innovative products have unlocked an approach to beer that rivals the wine industry for classification. And as experiments succeed, brewers don’t hoard their secrets. Many smaller breweries build on loans and advice from larger peers. In fact, during a recent specialty hops shortage, Samuel Adams even sold its supply to smaller competitors at cost. So how can you implement this level of innovation and collaboration as strategies for growth in your business? Here are a few suggestions: Don’t follow the big guys Giants like Anheuser-Busch InBev and MillerCoors are boxed into cost structures and product styles. Forced to worry about mass appeal, their innovation is primarily limited to packaging and distribution models while craft breweries are free to challenge the fundamental nature of beer. Instead of focusing on the big corporations in your industry, use your size to your advantage and enjoy the freedoms that come with being small. Highlight the ‘friendly’ in friendly competition Small business owners can get bogged down in the details of their own enterprises, but it’s much more effective to develop a community that can offer advice, mentorship and the occasional adult beverage for commiseration or victory


At Chez Billy Sud, the confit is crisp and the bread is as warm as the room

Osteria Morini on the Capitol Riverfront and the Hiltons’ first pastry chef. Giving rise to her airy cream puffs, three to a plate, are ice creams that change with the season. Winter celebrates salted caramel, marshmallow and coffee, all wonderful. Plump spiced apples and lush brandy caramel mean no crumbs left behind on the apple tart. The star of the lot is a play on cafe au lait, a cup layered with coffee mousse, milk ice cream and creamy mocha cremeux. Drink up! (So to speak). Profiteroles are filled with seasonally changing ice cream, including salted caramel, coffee and toasted marshmallow. (April Greer/For The Washington Post) Does cosseting service make a meal taste better? Chez Billy Sud suggests the answer is oui — for the most part. An oversalted tower of dressed greens and shaved radishes and an oily fish soup that doesn’t taste much of the sea signal a kitchen that doesn’t nail everything all the time. But the restaurant’s strengths outnumber its flaws, evinced by the challenge of booking a table at prime time most nights, a problem that spring and an outdoor patio should mitigate. With few exceptions (Bourbon Steak, 1789) Georgetown has not been feeding us very well in recent years. The debut of the splashy Fiola Mare on the waterfront last year and the expected arrival of former Palena chef Frank Ruta at the Grill Room in the Capella Washington D.C. hotel this month suggest things in the neighborhood are looking skyward. Restaurants with star power are nice. But so is a slip of a dining room where the duck confit always crackles and an hour or two feels like Paris, only friendlier. 2 1/2 stars Location: 1039 31st St. NW. 202-965-2606. www.chezbillysud.com. Open: Lunch 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Tuesday through Friday; dinner 5 to 10 p.m. Sunday and Tuesday through Thursday, 5 to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday; brunch 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Closed Monday. Prices: Dinner appetizers $5 to $15, main courses $17 to $29. Sound check: 77 decibels/Must speak with raised voice. Brendan L 'Etoile is the executive chef of Chez Billy Sud in Georgetown. (April Greer/For The Washington Post) The Royal Tenenbaum cocktail at Chez Billy Sud is a mix of Plymouth Gin, Zirbenz, Cocchi Americano and a rosemary sprig. (April Greer/For The Washington Post) For stories, features such as Date Lab, Gene Weingarten and more,


Big business gets generous

salad chain's 2013 Sweetlife Music + Food festival. (Kayla Rocca/Sweetlife 2014) Seaton Elementary School students cut apples at the salad chain's 2013 Sweetlife Music + Food festival. (Kayla Rocca/Sweetlife 2014) Sweetgreen One Thursday a month, before the boys’ and girls’ soccer teams at Seaton Elementary School in the District took to the field, the players got a little boost to help them conquer the opposing team: a big bowl of salad. That’s the day when employees from their local Sweetgreen, a District-based chain of salad shops, would come to school to teach a lesson on nutrition and healthy eating. Then, students could build their own salads from vitamin-rich ingredients. “The school joke was we always won because we had salads before the game,” said Sarah McLaughlin, a teacher whose students took part in the program. The monthly session was part of Sweetgreen in Schools. The program delivers a five-part curriculum to elementary school students with lessons on planting vegetables, seasonal eating and plant anatomy. The more than 30 fourth-grade students at Seaton who took part in the program created rap songs about vegetables, wrote letters to local farmers, and competed to create the tastiest salad. “It’s changing their perspective on healthy food,” McLaughlin said. “It’s something to look forward to, not to dread.” Sweetgreen co-founder Nicolas Jammet describes the program as a companywide effort. For instance, the general managers of local stores lead many of the lessons, and work alongside teachers to adhere to school curriculums. “Everyone in the company gets to be part of it,” Jammet said. “Our team members on the ground in the stores get to be part of it.” Founded in 2010, the Sweetgreen in Schools program expanded this year to include workshops at 14 locations in each of the company’s regional markets — Washington, New York, Philadelphia and Boston. A total of 2,500 students have taken part to date. That number is expected to grow to 3,500 next year as Sweetgreen opens new restaurants. New York-based FoodCorps, an organization that teaches children about nutrition, was recruited to help scale the program. Sweetgreen raised $18.5 million from investors “As our company grows our impact also grows,” Jammet said. — Steven Overly ThinkGeek Employees of Silver Spring-based United Therapeutics conducted a week of volunteer work in December in communities where the life sciences company has offices. Locally, those efforts included packing hundreds of meals for Food &


Peru’s climate talks conclude without a big accord in reach

countries, particularly developed ones. This was always an unrealistic strategy. The failure of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol showed that getting rich, developed countries to honor a strict, centralized and binding global treaty was nearly impossible. Getting developing nations to make legally binding international emissions commitments was even more difficult. Though they have become major emitters, they have insisted that the West bear much or all of the emissions-cutting burden. In Copenhagen, world leaders managed to scrape together only a few last-minute pledges, saving face but not the planet. Since then, climate negotiators have tried a more bottom-up approach, encouraging governments to bring whatever they can to the table. That approach got its fullest articulation yet in Lima this month. One hundred ninety-six countries agreed that each of them — not just developed nations — would submit some sort of emissions pledge over the next six months. The document negotiated presses governments to be as specific as possible, including with information that would make it easy to compare one pledge to another and to justify why they shouldn’t or can’t do more. There are serious drawbacks. Developing nations such as India balked at requiring extensive information on pledges — their time frames and emissions measuring methodologies, for example. Third-party observers likely will be able to fill in many of those gaps. But they won’t be able to conduct adequate monitoring and verification of reported emissions reductions — a necessity that must be worked out. In addition, pledges likely to come in over the next half-year will almost certainly be too modest to ensure that the world keeps its temperature rise below 2 degrees Celsius. Later rounds of talks and pledges will have to increase the world’s ambition. The flexibility of the broad, voluntary plan leaves room for growth and improvement. More important, the scheme stands a chance of doing what no U.N. climate effort has accomplished: institutionalizing the expectation that all major emitters stake their international reputations on contributing. If it becomes the first of many rounds of meaningful international agreement, it will be a success. Read more about this topic: David Ignatius: The moral issue of climate change Carly Fiorina: Companies shouldn’t cave in to the demands of climate change activists The Post’s View: A climate for change: America should not wait while the world warms The Post’s View: A climate for change: The country’s sinking debate over global warming


Report suggests forest-cutting can immediately harm climatic patterns

deforestation, even at small, localized levels, can change the climate. “Farmers in one place are connected to farmers in another. Countries are connected to each other,” Lawrence said. “We don’t want to wait until the climate system has shifted so we can measure it on the ground.” Cattle graze in a deforested section of the Amazon basin in the northeastern Brazilian state of Maranhao. (Mario Tama/Getty Images) She said there is a possible “tipping point” of 30 to 50 percent deforestation for the Amazon and Central Africa. Deforestation beyond that could invite disaster. “Tropical deforestation on many scales influences local, regional and even global climate. Deforestation-driven changes to water availability and climate variability could have strong implications for agricultural production systems and food security in some regions,” the report says. “Significant large-scale deforestation in any of these regions could have impacts on agriculture — across the world there will be regions that suffer,” Lawrence said. About 20 percent of the Amazon has been deforested. And scientists have noticed changes in its climate. “Among these effects are drastic, widespread decreases in forest transpiration, changes in the dynamics of clouds and rain, and the extended duration of the dry season,” said a report released in October by Brazilian scientist Antonio Nobre, who is associated with the National Institute of Space Research. Lawrence also found evidence of an extended dry season in the Amazonian state of Rondonia. “There is no doubt that the warming due to deforestation is measurable,” she added. “Anyone who has walked from a forest into an adjacent field will tell you that. Models confirm that effect at larger scales as well.” But where scientific opinion diverges is on how forests affect climate. In Brazil, where the country’s most economically important southeast region has been hit by a devastating drought, this question has particular resonance. The “biotic pump” theory, developed by Anastassia Makarieva and Victor Gorshkov from the Petersburg Nuclear Physics Institute in St. Petersburg, Russia, and their colleagues, argues that forests with high levels of atmospheric condensation draw in air and water from the ocean — creating aerial rivers of moisture. If the forest is thought of as a well, deforestation makes that well shallower. “As we make it more shallow, the first thing we will notice will be the largest fluctuations,” Makarieva said. “This picture is very much in line with what is happening in Sao Paulo right


Full text: Statement from the U.S. Department of Justice on its investigation into Sony hack

The following is a statement from the U.S. Department of Justice on the status of its investigation into the cyber attack targeting Sony Pictures Entertainment. *** Today, the FBI would like to provide an update on the status of our investigation into the cyber attack targeting Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE). In late November, SPE confirmed that it was the victim of a cyber attack that destroyed systems and stole large quantities of personal and commercial data. A group calling itself the “Guardians of Peace” claimed responsibility for the attack and subsequently issued threats against SPE, its employees, and theaters that distribute its movies. The FBI has determined that the intrusion into SPE’s network consisted of the deployment of destructive malware and the theft of proprietary information as well as employees’ personally identifiable information and confidential communications. The attacks also rendered thousands of SPE’s computers inoperable, forced SPE to take its entire computer network offline, and significantly disrupted the company’s business operations. After discovering the intrusion into its network, SPE requested the FBI’s assistance. Since then, the FBI has been working closely with the company throughout the investigation. Sony has been a great partner in the investigation, and continues to work closely with the FBI. Sony reported this incident within hours, which is what the FBI hopes all companies will do when facing a cyber attack. Sony’s quick reporting facilitated the investigators’ ability to do their jobs, and ultimately to identify the source of these attacks. As a result of our investigation, and in close collaboration with other U.S. Government departments and agencies, the FBI now has enough information to conclude that the North Korean government is responsible for these actions. While the need to protect sensitive sources and methods precludes us from sharing all of this information, our conclusion is based, in part, on the following: Technical analysis of the data deletion malware used in this attack revealed links to other malware that the FBI knows North Korean actors previously developed. For example, there were similarities in specific lines of code, encryption algorithms, data deletion methods, and compromised networks. The FBI also observed significant overlap between the infrastructure used in this attack and other malicious cyber activity the U.S. Government has previously linked directly to North Korea. For example, the FBI discovered that several Internet protocol (IP) addresses associated with known North Korean infrastructure communicated with IP addresses that were


Deltek: States dealing with cloud and security now, broadband and wireless later

(Capital Business) States frequently pay lip service to the importance of emerging technologies. But what IT tools and services do they most value? Some of the best tools for ascertaining this — outside of Deltek’s contracting database — are the annual lists of top priorities and technologies released by the National Association of State Chief Information Officers. The two lists, which document expected state policy priorities and emerging technologies for the upcoming year, tap straight into the organization’s membership and can best be described as a look at what issues are keeping CIOs up at night. Prior lists successfully foreshadowed booms in cloud computing and cybersecurity contracting 12-18 months in advance. Each year, Deltek tracks the newest versions of NASCIO’s lists and performs trend analyses on the past seven years of data. This year, we created a set of weighted rankings to track all priorities and technologies listed by state CIOs, ranking them by their relative importance and staying power from 2009-2015. This separates flashes in the pan (like “Green IT”) from IT projects that states truly value over time. Additionally, this data incorporates most of the Great Recession, highlighting which technology purchases may be more “recession-proof” than others. During the past seven years, the top three categories — cloud computing services, security and consolidation optimization, respectively — have been interconnected, each fueling the rise of the other two. Consolidating and optimizing existing IT practices has been a yearly top three CIO priority since Deltek began tracking the survey in 2009. This year’s third-place ranking is its lowest ever, and the message from CIOs is clear: centralize, downsize and increase efficiency. Cloud computing services offer a way to achieve all three of these goals. The ability to outsource the hosting of entire software systems or data warehouses to a third party allows states to reduce their use of computer servers, consolidate data centers, reduce personnel costs and reap a host of other cost-saving measures. Finally, if you’re going to jump onto the cloud bandwagon, you’re also going to inherit the number one headache that comes with it: security. What about the “next” big contracting trend? Business intelligence and analytic tools appear to be a big priority for states in the next few years. Together, mobile services, networking and broadband weigh on the minds of CIOs, reaching sixth, seventh and 11th, respectively, in our aggregate rankings. Together these three priority technologies


Congressmen who moved to block D.C. marijuana initiative: hypocritical or helpful?

Harris (R-Md.), in expounding his rationale to negate the District’s vote to legalize the possession of marijuana, wrote with his co-author that “Many studies have shown that use of marijuana can have a wide range of negative effects. . . . Marijuana is the illicit drug most frequently found to be a factor in car accidents, including fatal ones.” According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2012 the licit drug alcohol was a factor in one-third of all traffic-related fatalities . Illicit drugs such as cocaine and marijuana were involved in 18 percent of all fatal accidents, but these drugs were often used in combination with alcohol. There is no clear-cut study available to date of marijuana alone causing traffic fatalities. It is interesting to note that, in his last election, Mr. Harris received $5,000 from the National Beer Wholesalers Association, more than $3,000 from Diageo, a liquor manufacturer and distributor, and $1,000 from the Distilled Spirits Council. Otts Laupus, Ellicott City ● I agree with Reps. Andy Harris and Joe Pitts. A ballot initiative on marijuana is not the way to change the law. Marijuana remains a harmful drug, and its legal status should be determined by scientific research and findings. For 40 years, drug lobbies and pro-drug enthusiasts have pushed for marijuana decriminalization and legalization as a way to open the door to ending the drug war and freeing up other harmful substances. Why? Because those drugs make the users feel good — despite their harmful effects — and the users want to continue to feel good at lower prices. Legalization of marijuana in the United States would have an adverse effect on drug abuse in other countries, which often have much stricter marijuana laws. In legalizing marijuana, the U.S. government would have to abrogate its international treaty obligations with more than 100 countries, suffering a global disgrace. As the United States is the largest consumer of illicit drugs, the U.S. government has been the biggest promoter of international drug controls. If we pulled out of our commitments, the drug laws of other countries would quickly fall apart. Drug abuse throughout the world would skyrocket. Malcolm Lawrence, Chevy Chase ● Colbert I. King’s Dec. 13 op-ed column, “The threat to D.C. home rule can’t be ignored,” asserted that the District was caught “flat-footed” by the language in the federal spending bill that blocked voter Initiative


Local digest: Dec. 20, 2014

in 2005 that is used primarily by women. Police say Freundel planted secret cameras in the bath to record women. The suit says the unnamed woman is 24 and converted to Orthodox Judaism in February after years of study with Freundel, whom she considered a “father figure,” the suit said. The suit alleges that Freundel’s alleged voyeurism was “foreseeable” to the defendants because the Orthodox rabbi had been accused of other things, including abusing his authority with converts and encouraging them to take “practice dunks,” something that has no basis in Jewish law. — Michelle Boorstein MARYLAND Nurse admitted to NIH for Ebola is released A nurse who had been hospitalized at the National Institutes of Health after being exposed to Ebola was released from the Bethesda clinical center, showing no sign of the virus, the NIH said Friday. The nurse never tested positive or showed any symptoms of Ebola, the NIH said in a statement. On Dec. 11, the nurse was admitted to NIH Clinical Center’s special clinical studies unit, which had previously treated one Ebola patient and one other health-care worker exposed to the disease who did not develop it. The NIH statement said that the nurse will spend the rest of the 21-day monitoring period for Ebola at a private residence in Virginia. — Julie Zauzmer Police investigating Temple Hills killing A man was found dead in a warehouse Friday afternoon, and Prince George’s County police are investigating the death as a homicide. Officer Harry Bond said police received a call about an assault on the 4800 block of Stamp Road in Temple Hills about 12:20 p.m. When they arrived, they found the victim dead of apparent trauma to the body. Bond said police did not know what weapon was used and did not have any information about an assailant. — Julie Zauzmer Driver in Pr. George’s is killed in crash A driver was killed when she crashed into the back of a stopped tow truck in Prince George’s County on Thursday night. County police said Friday that the driver was headed west on Sheriff Road in Fairmount Heights when her car hit a tow truck readying to make a left turn onto 61st Avenue. Police said that the driver’s name would be released once her family is notified. The tow truck driver and a passenger in the truck were not injured, police said. — Julie Zauzmer


Afghanistan war deaths

Afghanistan war deaths Total number of U.S. military deaths since 2001 and names of the U.S. troops killed recently in the Afghanistan war, as announced by the Pentagon: 2,356 In hostile actions: In non-hostile actions: Fatalities 1,846 510 Tallies may be incomplete because of lags in reporting. Cmdr. Christopher E. Kalafut Sgt. 1st Class Michael A. Cathcart Spec. Joseph W. Riley Staff Sgt. Matthew R. Ammerman Spec. Wyatt J. Martin All troops were killed in action in Afghanistan unless otherwise indicated. Total fatalities include four civilian employees of the Defense Department. They also include service members killed in other locations involved in Operation Enduring Freedom, including Guantanamo Bay, Cuba; Djibouti; Eritrea; Ethiopia; Jordan; Kenya; Kyrgyzstan; Pakistan; Philippines; Seychelles; Sudan; Tajikistan; Turkey; Uzbekistan; and Yemen. A full list of casualties is available online at washingtonpost.com/nation SOURCE: Defense Department’s defenselink.mil/news The Washington Post


In a strategic valley, a glimpse of Afghan troops’ future after most U.S. forces leave

month, Afghan soldiers in Helmand province barely fended off a Taliban assault on Camp Bastion, a former British base handed over to the Afghans in October. And in Kabul, Taliban suicide bombers have unleashed a wave of deadly attacks in recent weeks, despite the presence of thousands of Afghan soldiers and police. “It is going to be tough,” said Lt. Gen. Joseph Anderson, who departed this month as the last U.S. commander to lead combat operations in Afghanistan. “The criticality for the [Afghan forces] is how they use this winter to reset, rearm, re-fit and to get ready for 2015.” But in the Chak Valley, as in other parts of the country, the fighting season has stretched into the cold winter months, bringing no respite for the besieged Afghan forces. Fighting over Wardak Wardak has long been contested territory. The Taliban and the Haqqani network, a Taliban affiliate linked to al-Qaeda, have had a presence here for years. In the spring of 2013, then-President Hamid Karzai ejected all U.S. Special Forces from Nerkh district, which borders Chak, after accusing American soldiers of involvement in war crimes. That summer, the coalition handed control of Wardak to Afghan forces. Soon after, the Taliban overran the Chak Valley. This year, Lt. Col. Mohammad Dawood — the U.S.-trained commander of the Afghan army’s 4th Infantry Brigade, 6th Battalion — launched an ambitious offensive against the Taliban. Initial American air support scattered the militants. Then, Dawood targeted village after village, slowly forcing the insurgents to retreat. More than 50 of his brigade’s men have been killed in combat here and in other parts of the province. “This is a very dangerous area to control, but somehow I have managed,” said the ruddy-faced Dawood, who first tasted war combating the Soviet occupation in the 1980s. In an interview, Taliban spokesman Zabiullah Mujahid said that the Taliban still rules most of the valley and that Afghan forces have influence only over the district center. What is clear is that any territorial gain here is fragile. The battalion’s 300 soldiers are stretched thin across the valley, deployed in several small outposts. A week ago, the Taliban fired rockets at one outpost. Days later, they attacked another. “Every part of Afghanistan is important for us, but Chak district is more important than other areas,” Mujahid said. “It is close to Kabul and easy for our mujahideen to carry out


DHS-backed security start-up to enter commercial market

George Mason University, where Stavrou is a computer science professor. The six-person team is staffed mostly by graduate students. DHS granted George Mason University $250,000 in 2013 to create a system that will let government agencies inventory apps they had vetted. The department plans to renew funding to the university so Kryptowire can process more apps designed for consumer use, including from the Google Play, Amazon and iTunes stores, said Vincent Sritapan, program manager for the cybersecurity division of the Homeland Security Advanced Research Projects Agency. The Defense Department’s Advanced Research Project Agency awarded Kryptowire funding in September 2013 to develop an authentication program that could use individuals’ “cognitive biometric” characteristics to identify them — their unique gait, keystroke touch or fingertip screen swipe, for instance, instead of a password. Kryptowire’s technology complements the department’s “car wash” prototype from last year — a service for vetting and reviewing mobile applications before they are uploaded to app stores, Sritapan said. When looking at an internal messaging app, for instance, Kryptowire might examine which networks it connects to and how secure they are, or whether it leaks the user’s location information. It can also compare applications to detect potential copyright infringements. If more businesses use security checks such as Kryptowire before deploying apps, their users may be exposed to fewer security risks, Sritapan said. And if Kryptowire’s system can access publicly available apps designed for commercial use, federal agencies and departments can vet those applications for internal use instead of developing their own, he added. Adam Salerno, a mobile security engineer with Vienna consulting firm Veris Group, uses Kryptowire’s vetting software for some of his customers, which include the Justice Department, the Defense Information Systems Agency and commercial businesses. Some of his customers select apps based on the level of risk they’re willing to take, he said. “Certain companies . . . might not care about certain risks more than they do others,” he said. “They might say, ‘We really don’t want someone to have our GPS location,’ or they might say, ‘I don’t care about that, but I really don’t want any [personally identifiable information] going out.’ ” Although DHS doesn’t receive royalties from Kryptowire’s sales, it could be worth the investment if the system becomes a standard way to evaluate mobile applications, Gliedman said. “Once it’s [more widely] available, you can then compel anyone who wants to sell to the


The District has more grocery stores. But a growing number of residents can’t afford food.

Volunteers Heidi Trott, Wendy Hatch, Stephanie Anderson and Peyton Pabst fill bags with food for seniors at the Capitol Area Food Bank in Washington. (Bonnie Jo Mount/The Washington Post) Correction: By the time Lloyd Cummings arrived at his desk on this December morning, the voice mail had already begun to fill with messages from the hungry. “I need help . . .” “I hope this is the right number . . .” “Someone told me this is the number I need to call to get food. Could you call me back?” Cummings operates the phones at the Capital Area Food Bank’s hunger hotline, which the region’s hungry residents call to find a place that will provide them with free groceries in a pinch. Rapidly changing D.C. neighborhoods that were once food deserts are blossoming with grocery stores, with residents in Logan Circle and Shaw debating their allegiance to Giant or Streets or Trader Joe’s — all of which opened within 12 months of each other. In that same year, however, a more sobering story also emerged in the District: The calls from hungry residents needing immediate help finding food jumped 57 percent. The increase, totaling nearly 5,000 calls, far eclipsed that of many other major cities, according to a survey of about two dozen cities released last week by the U.S. Conference of Mayors. Philadelphia had a 20 percent increase in calls. The number of requests barely budged in Chicago. San Francisco and Los Angeles had decreases of 4 and 5 percent, respectively. In the Washington region, according to the survey, clients said they had been unable to keep up with the escalating cost of living, especially housing. More than half said they stretch what they buy — watering down juices and eating leftovers past their expiration dates. At the end of the month, two out of every three clients said, it was impossible to both pay rent and buy groceries. So the pace at the hotline increases at month’s end. Food stamps have run out. Unemployment checks have been spent. Rents rise. And calls pour in. Callers said they heard about the hotline from a church or a friend or a social worker. On this day, Cummings started his shift at 9 a.m., but the first message had come in at 8:53. Another call at 8:55. Then, 9:04, 9:05, 9:06 and 9:12 — a pace so hectic that he


Could a new wave of boutique coffee, beer and bao buns remake ‘Silver Sprung’?

are hoping for. “As neighborhoods change character and get redeveloped, the thing that’s hard to avoid is having a certain blandness and sameness,” said Don Hague, senior vice president for development for Home Properties, which operates the residential building above Bump ’n Grind and is the coffee shop’s landlord. National chains, he concedes, don’t usher vibrancy into neighborhoods. They give off a kind of eau de Columbus, Ohio. At Bump ‘N Grind, the vinyl records are the owners’ passion, but they expect that the food and coffee will be what fills the house and pay the bills. (Sarah L. Voisin/The Washington Post) In New York’s once admirably ratty hipster neighborhood of Williamsburg, that’s exactly what artists are afraid of: With an Apple store and J. Crew due to open in months, they just staged an elaborate, histrionic funeral for their enclave. (Even as some whispered that it might actually have died when all those condos and investment bankers moved in a decade ago.) Hope springs In Silver Spring, things could be working in reverse. Bump ’n Grind closely follows the arrival of a new Montgomery County brewery and, a few doors down, a shop selling bao buns. This summer, Julie Verratti and a handful of others opened Denizens Brewing, a brewpub that lobbied successfully to see the laws changed so that it could compete as a brewery and bar. The task force just happened to be doing some serious hand-wringing about why the coveted 21-to-34 set was moving to Petworth and Arlington and Alexandria but not to MoCo. Standing in the way, Diegel said, was bars’ requirement to close earlier than those in the District. And getting a license to open a bar was next to impossible. But that’s changing, opening the door, perhaps, for more Denizenses, more Bump ’n Grinds. From a business perspective, it makes sense to head north of the District. For a shop the size of the storefront they were standing in front of on East-West Highway, Liehr said, “there’s no way we would have gotten close to securing a space in [the District] with the backing of the landlord. It would have been too expensive for us.” And there would have been a lot of competition. With five or six busy coffee shops in as many blocks, 14th Street is basically one giant “third space.” But in Silver Spring, there’s more than enough love to


One day, robots may work in zones too dangerous for humans

to be pulled from the rubble and repaired. Another got wedged in a gap, stalled until a crew could tug it out by its safety tether. A third lost communication, broke loose from its tether and was never seen again. Machines at Fukushima faced similar problems. In the days following the earthquake, researchers from around the world sent ground-based and aerial robots to Japan to try to reach spots where humans couldn’t safely travel. DARPA sent all it had, Pratt remembers. But training power plant personnel to use the robots took time. And once inside the plant, muddy steps, tight stair landings and a severed communication cable thwarted the machines’ progress. “We did everything we could, and it still wasn’t good enough,” Pratt says. A far cry from C-3PO Years before Fukushima, Japan — a country known for its advanced robotics — had actually developed robots to respond to nuclear emergencies. After a power plant accident in 1999, engineers created six huge, treaded robots to open doors, turn valves, carry heavy loads and even clean up radiation. But these bots weren’t maintained well enough for use at Fukushima. Even if they had been ready to go, they may have been too big and heavy — more than 440 pounds — to be useful, engineer Keiji Nagatani and colleagues reported in the Journal of Field Robotics in 2013. A smaller robot, designed for disposing of explosives, was the first to enter Fukushima’s reactors, about a month after the disaster. Shin-height and light enough to be carried on a soldier’s back, the robot, called the PackBot, uses treads to haul itself over bumpy turf. A skinny arm mounted with a gripper claw and a camera lets the robot grasp and see. In the days following the Fukushima earthquake, iRobot, the Massachusetts company that produces the PackBot, rushed to add radiation and chemical sensors to the bots. The sensors came in handy: Plant workers used them to find places inside the plant where humans could safely explore. But maneuvering the robots through the darkened plant was at times impossible. Though the machines could open doors, the bots’ operators had to use two PackBots to do so: one to turn the handle and the second to aim its camera at the first. What’s more, the robots struggled to climb the plant’s slick metal stairs. After the PackBot failed to make it up a few


Bombings threaten Kabul’s nascent civic and cultural life

“Historically, Afghanistan was always a moderate Muslim society, and today its people are against Talibanism,” said Abdul Hamid Mobarez, a prominent writer, commentator and former minister of culture and information who lived in France as a refugee during the civil war and Taliban eras. “They have no chance of succeeding.” On the surface, city life has gone on as usual, with constant traffic jams and cart vendors shouting in crowded bazaars. In poorer districts, the main security concerns are a surge in street crime and a growing narcotics trade. But in affluent residential and business areas, the wave of targeted terror has created a spookier feeling. Uniformed and plainclothes police guard almost every intersection, and everyone has a story about the friend who was en route to a building that came under siege, or whose house was a block from an explosion. “The sense of terror is absolutely present now across the city,” said an Afghan official of a U.N. agency who asked not to be named. “People have a new feeling of coming together against a common enemy, but they are also angry at the lack of security and leadership. They feel if we had a proper government in place, this wouldn’t be happening.” Some of the blame is focused on President Ashraf Ghani, who since taking office Sept. 29 has not named new heads of the national intelligence police or the Defense and Interior ministries, nor the rest of his cabinet. Critics say this has left a dangerous void in combating crime and terrorism, especially as NATO forces finalize their withdrawal from the country. Ghani has repeatedly promised to begin naming top officials, but his aides said it has taken time for Ghani and his former rival, chief executive Abdullah Abdullah, to put together a team that balances ethnic, political and professional demands. But some analysts said that a new bureaucracy was unlikely to put a serious dent in the Taliban’s aggressive campaign. “The enemies of Afghanistan are doing this on purpose to give a bad name to the new government,” said Moeen Marastial, an independent politician who served on Ghani’s campaign team. He said the wave of attacks is mainly a response to the security agreement signed between the U.S. and Afghan governments this fall that allows 10,000 U.S. forces to stay through next year. Yet although its principal target remains Afghan and foreign troops, the Taliban


Detailed information can make it easier for a doctor to diagnose your health problems

(iStock) Physical complaints can be difficult to articulate, especially when they are vague or intermittent. Like a car’s problems that vanish when you take it to the mechanic, symptoms often elude us when we’re at the doctor’s office. But when you can’t explain your symptoms, you increase the chances of unnecessary tests, needless trial-and-error treatments and even misdiagnosis. Orly Avitzur, medical adviser to Consumer Reports, finds it much tougher to get at the root of a problem when a patient tells her that she has “trouble walking and it hurts all over” than when she provides a clear description, such as: “Over the past six months, I’ve had low-back pain and heaviness in my legs that gets worse after I walk two blocks, then improves when I sit down.” Though it’s sometimes difficult to express why, when or even where you hurt, knowing which questions your doctor will ask — and thinking about how to answer them — can help you get a quick, accurate diagnosis. Avitzur offers this advice on how to prepare for your office visit: Use the alphabet formula Your doctor will ask for several pieces of information. To figure out how to answer, remember the letters O-P-Q-R-S-T and jot down the answers before your appointment. Onset. Place. Quality. Radiation. Severity. Time and triggers. Keep a symptom diary Identifying triggers can be challenging. Avitzur often asks patients with migraines to track their headaches in a journal, online or in one of the mobile apps available for this purpose. That helps reveal patterns that casual observation might miss. When the diary includes detailed attention to diet, for example, patients may discover a clear link between their symptoms and eating specific foods. Other patients discover a connection with weather, realizing that their migraines correspond to changes in barometric pressure. And many women find a correlation with their menstrual cycles that is so precise that they can actually treat them preventively on vulnerable days. Diaries also help in tracking non-pain symptoms, including those related to allergies, asthma, heart failure, Parkinson’s disease, psoriasis and many other conditions. Because you are not depending solely on memory, your doctor gets a more accurate view. Take a picture or video In medicine, a picture truly is worth a thousand words. Photographs and videos record physical findings — intermittent rashes, tremors or muscle twitches — and can document an infection after surgery. That visual evidence


White Milwaukee police officer will not face charges in shooting of black man

of the event. — Associated Press MILITARY General to decide next step for Bergdahl A four-star Army general in North Carolina will determine whether or not to bring charges against a U.S. soldier who went missing in Afghanistan in 2009, Army officials said Monday. Service officials said the results of an investigation of Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, who was recovered in May in exchange for five Taliban detainees, has been forwarded to Gen. Mark Milley, the commanding general of U.S. Army Forces Command at Fort Bragg, N.C. Milley will determine what will happen next for Bergdahl, with the options ranging from no further action being taken by the Army to the soldier being court-martialed. Army officials declined to provide any additional information. The investigation will likely determine whether Bergdahl deserted his patrol base in Afghanistan in 2009 and what kind of treatment he faced after being taken prisoner by insurgents. — Dan Lamothe CALIFORNIA Water usage cuts upheld by court Federal officials acted properly when they cut water extraction from California’s Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to protect fish and orca species at the expense of farmers and other water users in central California, a U.S. appeals court ruled on Monday. The unanimous decision by a three-judge panel of the San Francisco-based U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit upheld a 2009 opinion by the National Marine Fisheries Service to force the cutbacks in water use, which have been in effect since then. — Associated Press ARIZONA Drugs used for lethal injections to change Arizona officials said Monday they are changing the drugs they use in executions after an inmate in July gasped repeatedly over the course of nearly two hours while being put to death. According to a letter from Department of Corrections Director Charles Ryan to Gov. Jan Brewer (R), the department no longer will use the combination of midazolam, a sedative, and hydromorphone, a pain killer. Instead, the agency will try to obtain sodium pentothal, the powerful but obsolete sedative that was used in most lethal injections in Arizona until it became difficult to obtain, and sodium pentobarbital. If the state cannot obtain those drugs, it will use a three-drug combination that includes midazolam and potassium chloride, among others. The July 23 execution of Joseph Rudolph Wood called into question the efficacy of the drugs used after it took nearly two hours for Wood to die. — Associated Press


When we were small: Panera Bread

We ended up buying them out in November 1993, seeing it as a second leg of our business. In the bigger picture, I thought of it as our gateway into the suburban marketplace. Did the Saint Louis Bread Company locations look and feel anything like the Panera stores we walk into today? No, it was different. The look was different, it had tile and Tiffany lamps and bread cases everywhere. And the product line was essentially lunch, with mostly salads paired with this wonderful bread. Why turn it into something new? We left it alone for a couple of years. We studied the market, and what we learned was that there were these increasingly large niches of consumers who wanted to feel special in the world in which they lived. You have to understand that by 1990, consumer brands had been completely consolidated, and the mantra in corporate America was dominate your industry, be No. 1, 2 or 3, and then get the hell out. What that led to was a few companies with large market shares competing on advertising dollars and shelf space. The reaction was the development of what we call these specialty categories. In beer, it was craft breweries. In coffee, it was the specialty coffees. And we thought that the same thing was going to happen in the food service industry, and it became what we now know as fast casual dining. It was for people who wanted to feel better about their food and who were willing to pay a little bit more for something that was worth a lot more. So that was my vision, and we spent the next couple years building it. We renamed the stores Panera, and we redefined it around specialty food. We took the lunch business and we added specialty soups and salads, and then we went after the breakfast business. How did you come up with the name Panera? We made it up. I don’t have a cousin Joey Panera. As we started to move outside of St. Louis, we learned that people identified St. Louis with Clydesdale horses and beer, and that Saint Louis Bread Company probably wasn’t the name we wanted to take to Portland, Oregon, or Portland, Maine. We wanted a name that was an empty vessel we could put personality into, and that’s how we ended up with Panera. So at that point, you


Top local business stories of 2014

space companies. NASA’s shift to privately run operations paved the way for companies such as billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Dulles-based Orbital Sciences to win multi-year contracts to resupply the international space station. Stalwarts such as Boeing and Lockheed Martin found themselves pitted against upstarts such as SpaceX for critical contracts, such as one to ferry astronauts to the space station. NASA sent a clear signal about the future of commercial spaceflight when it awarded the contract to both Boeing and SpaceX. But the going wasn’t always smooth. Although 2014 showed that commercial space companies are here to stay, the year was not without setbacks for these new entrants. Musk clashed with Boeing, Lockheed, the Air Force and Orbital Sciences on separate occasions, and he criticized the government’s ways of doing business, which he called unfavorable to new entrants. SpaceX even sued the Air Force over its ability to compete for military satellite launch contracts. At the same time, the company worked with the Air Force to achieve the necessary certifications. Meanwhile, Orbital Sciences saw its Antares rocket explode because of engine trouble during a routine launch to resupply the space station. The rocket was powered by Soviet-era AJ26 engines, which sparked a debate about the nation’s continued reliance on the decades-old technology. Orbital said it would speed up the development of a new propulsion system for Antares as a result. Meanwhile, SpaceX’s reusable rocket prototype exploded over Texas during a test flight, while Virgin Galactic, British billionaire Richard Branson’s space tourism company, lost a pilot when its spacecraft crash landed in the Mojave Desert during another test flight. — A.J. People look at office buildings in Washington, D.C. through a window on the tower at the Old Post Office in 2011. (Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post) Office market declines Can the Washington office market get any worse? For all the good news immediately following the recession, when the Washington region came roaring back via a congressional stimulus package, two wars’ worth of defense spending and better-than-average job growth, things have stalled since then. As the federal government winds down the wars and prepares for a second round of sequestration, the market for office space in the Washington area has withered. And thanks to more efficient use of office space — that is, less space per employee — even private companies that are growing or staving off cuts are taking


As delicious as ever, Marcel’s buffs its shine

The staff prepares the newly renovated dining room for evening service at Marcel's. (Scott Suchman/For The Washington Post) Fine dining was dealt a blow in Washington last year when first the Dining Room at Palena and then CityZen in the Mandarin Oriental went dark. The cloud comes with a silver lining. Palena chef Frank Ruta was recently recruited to take over the Grill Room in Georgetown, and Eric Ziebold of CityZen announced plans to roll out two upscale restaurants under one roof near Mount Vernon Square come fall. Lost amid the tears and tributes was the news that another of the city’s top tables, Marcel’s, recast itself over summer and fall. Tired of his French-Belgian restaurant in the West End being labeled old hat, Robert Wiedmaier, executive chef and owner, ordered up a fresh look for his property of 16 years, a lifetime in the fickle restaurant industry. If you haven’t supped at Marcel’s since its makeover, completed last month, you haven’t dined at Marcel’s. If ever there was a case to be made for the relevance of comfort and ambiance in the dining equation, this enhanced restaurant is it. Can I show you around? White leather stools, a rich marble bar and a cupboard lined with sparkling stemware make for a newly glam lounge. In the dining room, fresh gold-green carpet cushions your stroll, chandeliers suggest starbursts and the chairs are so plush, the chef jokes that his servers ought to wear gloves to touch them. The prime perch remains Table No. 25, set in an alcove and facing a gold-framed mirror that reflects Marcel’s stage set of a kitchen, ablaze with copper pots — and cooking talent. A pheasant pot pie with potato puree with shaved truffles has been featured as a rotating offering. (Scott Suchman/For The Washington Post) Chef Robert Wiedmaier’s menu allows diners to create their own tasting menu. (Scott Suchman/For The Washington Post) Marcel’s signature boudin blanc, plump with pheasant, foie gras and chicken, and supernal lobster bisque, sheathed in golden pastry, haven’t gone anywhere (well, anywhere but some diners’ hips). Joining the crowd-pleasers of late have been rotating creations — pot pie made noble with pheasant, butter-poached skate wing shaped into a cylinder and stuffed with minced mushrooms — that keep it contemporary. Possibly the most tradition-bound restaurant in town and one of the handful to still ask men to wear jackets, Marcel’s nevertheless


D.C. police identify Northwest Washington man as victim in Petworth shooting death

D.C. police have identified a man who was shot and killed Tuesday night in Petworth as Daniel Joseph Hinton, 21, of Northwest. Hinton was shot in the 900 block of Delafield Place NW. Officers received a call for a report of a shooting in the area about 6 p.m. When they arrived, they found him unconscious and suffering from multiple gunshot wounds. D.C. Fire officials found “there were no signs of life,” according to police. D.C. police are offering a reward of up to $25,000 for information related to the case. The incident comes on the heels of other recent shootings in or near the Petworth area. Also on Tuesday, there was another incident where a man, sitting in a car near 9th and Jefferson streets NW, about a half mile to the north of Delafield Place, heard shots. After leaving the area, he found that his car had been struck, police said. A few minutes after the Jefferson Street incident, a man sitting in his car in the 1200 block of Ingraham Street was approached by four people, and two or three began shooting into the vehicle, police said. They said the occupant of the car was hit in the legs, and taken to a hospital where his condition was reported as stable. In the same general area earlier this month, a child was wounded when shots were fired into a house in the 4600 block of 9th Street NW. The next day, robbers shot a man a few blocks away in an alley on Emerson Street. D.C. Police spokesman Alali Araz said in an e-mail Wednesday morning that it was not known at this time if any of the recent incidents are related. They remain under investigation.


Bao Bao touched a hot wire and spent lots of time up at tree

The Washington National Zoo's year-old giant panda cub Bao Bao on Dec. 15. (Kate Patterson/For The Washington Post) (Watch live: Panda cam showing Bao Bao in a tree) Famed panda cub Bao Bao had a rough day Tuesday, touching a “hot wire,” an activated wire used to keep her in her containment area at the Smithsonian’s National Zoo. She climbed a tree, and after that,she wouldn’t come down. Zookeepers let her stay Tuesday night in the treetop, where she feels safe, the zoo wrote in a Facebook post. They also let her mother, Mei Xiang, stay outdoors with her, and a keeper stayed at the panda house all night in case the pandas decided to come inside. But as of Wednesday’s Facebook post, they were still out there. The post said she was fine, and that the staff was confident that she would descend when ready. Late Wednesday night it appeared from peering at video that she had, but this could not be confirmed.


2014 Year in Review: Washington’s best, worst and most memorable moments

in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Astrid Riecken for The Washington Post) The District’s best taco joint is not some celebrity chef outpost that stuffs fried chicken inside a warmed tortilla that the kitchen can’t even be bothered to make itself. No, Taqueria Habanero ’s aim is at once more modest and more ambitious than that: Owner and chef Dio Montero wants to channel the flavors of his native Puebla, giving the dishes on his concise menu the respect (and fresh ingredients) they deserve. Start with his tacos, served on house-made tortillas, and don’t stop till you get enough. 3710 14th St. NW (Metro: Georgia Ave.). 202-722-7700. — Tim Carman Best meal for less than $10 Where the magic happens: Robert Sonderman, owner of DCity Smokehouse, and his Rebel smoker. (Photo by Amanda Voisard for The Washington Post) At $9.25, the Brisket Champ at DCity Smokehouse is a sandwich that even Lone Star State barbecue fanatics could love. Pitmaster and co-owner Robert Sonderman layers his smoky, lip-smacking brisket between slices of Texas toast and tops the meat with crispy fried onions and house-made pickles. This unwieldy beast is Sonderman’s chef-driven tribute to the classic brisket sandwich found at any reputable Texas smokehouse. You might even call it an improvement on it. 8 Florida Ave. NW (Metro: NoMa). 202-733-1919. www.dcitysmokehouse.com. — Tim Carman The departed We said farewell to some of Washington’s most beloved institutions this year. Palena (Photo by Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post) Everyone from Cleveland Park neighbors to members of the city’s chef community came to the final night of service at Frank Ruta’s 13-year-old restaurant in April. Ruta was forced to close the restaurant because of unpaid rent, but Palenaphiles weren’t left wanting for long: Ruta, a former White House chef, popped back up at Bread Furst near Van Ness, where he cooked a series of weekly feasts. He’ll take over the kitchen of the Grill Room at the Capella Hotel in the new year. The Passenger (Photo by Amanda Voisard/The Washington Post). We’ve always known this day would come, but time has finally run out after five years of amazing cocktails from the Passenger and its bar-within-a-bar, the Columbia Room. With redevelopment in store for their block of Seventh Street NW near the convention center, the bars will close on Jan. 1. What made the Passenger unique? The talented cast of award-winning bartenders who could conjure outstanding cocktails


CDC reports potential Ebola exposure in Atlanta lab

killed more than 7,500 people in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone, and to improve domestic preparedness against Ebola. More than 170 CDC infectious disease specialists are in West Africa. Frieden returned late Saturday from his second trip to the region. After the summer’s incidents, the CDC temporarily banned transfer of all biological materials from its labs, conducted a wide-ranging safety review, appointed a new director of lab safety and created an outside lab safety advisory group. The CDC labs conduct some of the world’s most sophisticated research into infectious diseases. At congressional hearings, Frieden vowed to improve the agency’s overall safety culture as well as put in place stronger oversight measures. In the June incident involving live anthrax, more than 80 workers may have been exposed after employees unknowingly sent samples of the bacterium from one CDC lab to other CDC labs. During the anthrax investigation, agency officials learned about several other instances in which deadly pathogens had been improperly sent to other laboratories over the past decade. No one became infected or fell ill in those incidents, and all the organisms were safely disposed of, officials said. The most serious of those previously undisclosed incidents took place in March, when a CDC lab in Atlanta sent a sample of flu virus contaminated with the deadly H5N1 influenza virus, a much-feared bird flu strain, to a U.S. Department of Agriculture laboratory in Athens, Ga. CDC staff members failed to report the incident to top leaders at the time. Biosafety experts have criticized the lack of coordination and oversight at laboratories inside and outside the federal government that conduct research on microbes that could be used as bioterrorism agents. “Such events like this are absolutely unacceptable even once. When they occur multiple times, you have to ask yourself what systems are in place to prevent this from happening,” Michael Osterholm, director of Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy at the University of Minnesota, said in an interview Wednesday. “To err is to be human. We expect that to happen in any kind of high-tech setting,” Osterholm said. “So what you do is build in a set of procedures and checks and balances. They need to be in place to account for human error.” Read more: CDC: 75 scientists may have been exposed to anthrax Smallpox vials found in storage room of NIH campus CDC says it improperly sent dangerous pathogens