Readers speak out on Secret Service, vets preference, clearances, diplomats

a few incompetent agents failed to do their job. The president says he has faith in the Secret Service: He may be the only one who does! — Pen Suritz, Arlington Security clearances After a column about the government’s efforts to reform the security clearance process , which remains a work in progress, this reader said the military should do a better job counseling resigning members about keeping their clearances. I have a top-secret clearance, and I agree that there needs to be many changes to the entire process. One of the things that the government has not done well is to inform the folks leaving the military about their clearances and how they need to handle them. Some folks in the military are not told to do their periodic reinvestigation while they are still in the service but are scheduled to leave soon. A soldier leaving the military with a soon-to-be-outdated clearance stifles his/her chances of getting a job because the clearance has not been renewed. Some soldiers do a similar thing by taking some well-deserved time off before starting to look for a job, and they are unaware that after two years of not picking up their clearance, they lose it and need to start all over again. — Sean Lee, Alexandria Veterans’ preference Following a column about a Merit Systems Protection Board report on problems with the federal hiring preference for veterans , this reader said the preference is too generous. I’ve been pondering some of the challenges the Department of Veterans Affairs faces as it strives to deliver medical care to veterans. It seems very generous that anyone who serves for 24 months and is released from service for anything less than honorable can receive health care forever. I realize that thousands do not take advantage of this benefit. Nevertheless, this is a huge entitlement and overly generous. A retiree, sure. A vet wounded in service, sure. PTSD, you bet. But anyone, no matter where he or she served or what he or she did? There should be some pre-qualifiers. No wonder VA can’t get to the ones in need. — Leslie Kingsley, Washington Diplomatic dangers In response to a column about the risks facing diplomats and others working abroad, this Foreign Service officer points to the dangers that come with the assumption that they are spies. Thanks for reminding readers that members of the U.S.


Wal-Mart adds in-store program to help customers compare insurance offerings

A Wal-Mart store in Duarte, Calif. (Damian Dovarganes/AP) Wal-Mart announced Monday that it will dive deeper into the health-care market, unveiling an initiative to allow customers to compare and enroll in health insurance plans in thousands of its stores. Wal-Mart is teaming with DirectHealth.com, an online insurance comparison site and independent health insurance agency, to set up counters in its stores where consumers can talk to licensed agents about plan options. “Our goal is to be the number one health-care provider in the industry,” said Labeed Diab, president of health and wellness for Wal-Mart U.S. “And the more we broaden our assortment, the more we broaden our offering, the more we educate the customer Wal-Mart is a great place to create a one-stop shop.” Over the past several years, Wal-Mart has moved to expand its reach beyond retail into the health-care sector, where Americans are spending an increasingly larger share of their dollars. Earlier this year, the Bentonville, Ark.-based company began opening primary-care centers at several of its locations. Hundreds of its stores include acute-care clinics that offer a basic menu of services, including flu shots and blood-pressure screenings. Wal-Mart made waves about eight years ago when it announced it would offer generic versions of some prescription drugs for just $4. Some Wal-Mart competitors are by some measures outdoing the big-box retailer with their forays into health care: CVS, for example, has more than 800 retail clinics, according to consulting firm Merchant Medicine. Walgreens has about 400 of them, while Wal-Mart has about 100. Wal-Mart first began hosting agents from individual insurers in its stores in 2005. The newly announced offering expands on that, with the agents able to guide customers through thousands of plans from hundreds of carriers. DirectHealth.com agents will receive a commission if they enroll an in-store customer in a health plan. Diab said Wal-Mart hopes this one-on-one service will become a gateway for customers to come to their stores for all of their health-care needs. “You’re educating the consumer on a very, very complex part of the [health-care] space,” Diab said. “And when you do that, they want you to take care of their prescription needs, their over-the-counter needs, their optical needs, the clinics.” The program, known as Healthcare Begins Here, kicks off Oct. 10 and will run in stores through Dec. 7, closely tracking with the Medicare open-enrollment period and partially overlapping with the open


Mexico finds mass graves with 28 bodies where students went missing

of political violence and mafia-style barbarity, human rights observers say, in which civilian protesters who have nothing to do with the drug trade are butchered by cartel henchmen as a favor to local authorities. Authorities uncovered a mass grave in an area where dozens of people were missing after clashes with police and armed men last week. “The fact that the police would think they could get away with killing so many students and burning their bodies is indicative of how bad the situation in Mexico has become,” said José Miguel Vivanco, the Latin America director at Human Rights Watch. He said President Enrique Peña Nieto has been more concerned with polishing Mexico’s public image than taking serious steps to address gross violations of basic rights. “By repeatedly failing to investigate disappearances and other abuses, this administration and its predecessor have created a climate in which impunity is the norm even for the most atrocious crimes,” Vivanco said. In a statement Monday, Peña Nieto promised that the massacre would not drift down Mexico’s black hole of unsolved crimes. “Mexican society, and the victims’ families, rightfully demand to find out what happened, that justice be done, and that those responsible are caught and no impunity be allowed,” he said. More than 22,000 people have disappeared in Mexico since December 2006, when then-President Felipe Calderón launched a military-led assault on the drug gangs. Often the missing have no ties to the smuggling business. But it is unusual for this type of mass killing to be the direct result of an act of political protest. At least 30 other suspects have been taken into custody in Iguala, including 22 local police officers and several alleged members of the Guerreros Unidos criminal organization. Mexican authorities say they are still searching for the mayor and the town’s top police official, who have possibly fled. Iguala is of strategic value to trafficking groups because it is located between the capital and the lowland Tierra Caliente coastal region notorious for methamphetamine labs and rural lawlessness. Small towns in southern Mexico such as Iguala also have a long history of radical and sometimes violent campus activism, including the temporary commandeering or “borrowing” of buses to transport protesters. The disappearance of the 43 students on Sept. 26 followed a day of chaotic and confusing events. According to state prosecutors and local news accounts, about 80 students from the local


Dallas Ebola patient receives experimental treatment

The family of Thomas Eric Duncan was devastated by the news of his death. The Ebola patient struggling to survive in a Dallas hospital has begun receiving an experimental treatment for the deadly disease. Thomas Eric Duncan, who traveled to Dallas from Liberia more than a week ago after having close contact with Ebola in the West African country, is receiving an investigational drug known as brincidofovir, Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas disclosed Monday afternoon. The medication is produced by Chimerix, a North Carolina-based biotech firm that describes itself as a developer of “novel, oral antivirals in areas of high unmet medical need.” On Monday, the company announced that it had made the drug available for emergency use in Ebola patients after requests from treating physicians and after receiving approval from the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA must sign off on the experimental use of unapproved drugs; there currently are no approved treatments or vaccines for Ebola. “Chimerix is committed to working with global health organizations and government agencies in the fight against the Ebola virus outbreak,” Chimerix’s president, M. Michelle Berrey, said in a statement. Brincidofovir is an antiviral drug developed to treat a range of DNA viruses, including those in the herpes family and adenovirus, which accounts for a sizable number of acute respiratory infections in children. The company, which also has sought to use the drug as a treatment against smallpox, said tests suggest it could prove effective against Ebola. Duncan, who remains in critical condition at the hospital, joins a handful of other Ebola patients who have received experimental drugs during the course of the current outbreak. Two U.S. missionaries infected this summer while working in West Africa were given doses of another unapproved drug, known as ZMapp. But the very limited supplies of that drug were soon exhausted, though the San Diego-based company behind it is trying to produce more as quickly as possible. Another experimental medicine by a Canadian company, Tekmira, also was used on another American doctor who was flown to Nebraska from West Africa for treatment. The company also has noted the limited supplies of that drug. It remains unclear what role the experimental drugs might have played in helping those patients who survived, but in recent days Duncan’s family has argued that he also should have access to any medications that might improve his odds. “We want him to live,”


A guide to Bubba Kush, Purple Urkle and the rest of the marijuana pharmacopeia

All marijuana is not the same, a new book says. (Bigstock) “Cannabis Pharmacy: The Practical Guide to Medical Marijuana” doesn’t read like your standard medical self-help book. Take, for example, Part 3, “Varieties of Medical Cannabis.” It begins in a traditional manner, by explaining why different varieties of weed might help different conditions. But it goes on to tick off their merits over 60 pages of names that sound like the track list for a ’70s album: Grand Daddy Purple is “excellent for bed rest and recovery,” Bubba Kush is “an outstanding choice for pain and nausea,” and Haze is good for daytime use “since it results in little cognitive impairment.” Each of 27 varieties is rated for ease of cultivation, aroma, taste, potency, duration, psychoactivity and other qualities. There’s also a brief history, letting you know, for instance, that Malawi Gold is that African nation’s third-biggest export, and Purple Urkle seems to be named for Steve Urkel, the most popular character on the old sitcom “Family Matters.” Part 4 runs through how cannabis might be used to treat several dozen medical conditions — including asthma, cancer, HIV/AIDS and schizophrenia — noting that the most common use to this point is, simply, to relieve pain. A lot of ground is covered in the rest of the book: the chemical makeup of marijuana’s active ingredients, how marijuana is metabolized, how it should be stored, common and uncommon adverse effects, conventional vs. organic options, advice on using it on the job. There are numerous drawings, graphics and charts. It’s all hard to evaluate. For one thing, in this new era of widespread medical marijuana use, “experts” tend to come from places other than the Mayo Clinic or the National Institutes of Health; like computer hackers, a lot of these people have developed their skills outside the mainstream. Michael Backes, who wrote this book, is described on its cover as the founder of “the first evidence-based medical cannabis dispensary” and a specialist in cannabis science and policy issues at a Southern California consulting firm. For what it’s worth, his impressively long appendix includes citations from the Lancet, the Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and scores of other journals and books.


What is chronic fatigue syndrome, and why aren’t we doing more to treat the illness?

says funding is determined by the number of researchers in a field, their experience in competing for NIH funding and other factors. HHS’s handling of the latest controversy has only intensified skepticism.The majority of committee members chosen to develop the new definition have no professional experience with the disease, says Derek Enlander, a CFS specialist at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. As he put it, “Do you want a podiatrist to treat your grandfather with lung cancer?” In addition, Klimas told me, “I’m afraid they’re about a year early.” If HHS had waited, she said, the agency could have developed a definition grounded in data. Several large studies (including one by the CDC) are collecting tissue from more than 1,000 patients and controls, looking for biological indicators that most effectively distinguish the two groups. Without that evidence, Klimas said, a committee might dismiss the results of the many small studies that point toward such indicators — a dismissal that could lead to yet another broad, confusing definition. (Klimas, now at Nova Southeastern University in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., accepted a position on the committee after she was interviewed for this article.) These disputes are heartbreaking when the needs of CFS patients are so great. Even the high-quality treatment I got from Klimas helped me only slightly. A year after I saw her, I heard from some patients who had significantly recovered from CFS through assiduously avoiding exposure to mold and other environmental contaminants. Although I considered the theory wacky, I was desperate enough to experiment. And for me, it worked. Two years later, I can go running, write articles and travel with my new husband. Every time I do, it feels like a miracle. But I don’t think it is. My recovery has almost certainly come through physiological changes in response to my avoiding mold. After spending two weeks in the desert with none of my own stuff to get clear of toxic molds, I found when I returned that my own home and belongings could cripple me within minutes. By staying away from any building or object that made me sick, I felt dramatically better and got healthier over time. The role of mold in CFS has received nearly no scientific study, just like many other promising areas of research in the illness. Yes, we need a sound, accepted definition, but we also need so much more. It’s time


Wake up early Wednesday to see a total lunar eclipse

The moon, as it looked in Manassas, Virginia, at the peak of a total eclipse in 2010. (Karen Bleier/Agence France-Presse via Getty Images) Stargazers and astronomy lovers will have a good reason to get up early Wednesday morning — there will be a total lunar eclipse just before sunrise. A lunar eclipse happens when the Earth’s orbit brings it between the moon and the sun, casting a shadow over the moon’s surface. Instead of glowing white, the way it normally does, the moon will appear a dim red or orange — that’s because of the way the Earth blocks the sunlight. Wednesday’s event will be the second lunar eclipse this year. According to Sean O’Brien, an astronomer at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum, the eclipse will begin around 5:15 a.m., and the moon will be completely in the Earth’s shadow by 6:30. The first half of the eclipse should be visible in our area as long as the skies aren’t too cloudy. If you’re already awake, or if your parent is able to wake you up early, the eclipse will be worth watching, O’Brien says. “What a great way to start your day,” he said. — Sarah Kaplan


Russia’s ‘deescalation’ in Ukraine doesn’t warrant the lifting of sanctions

are still working to set up a proposed buffer zone between Ukrainian and Russian forces. But many already are expressing relief that their frequently announced objective — “deescalation” — seems to be in reach. By that, they mean that Russian President Vladimir Putin does not appear to be aiming, for now, at sending his forces to capture new cities in eastern Ukraine or to establish a land corridor from Donetsk to occupied Crimea. Yet Mr. Putin is on the cusp of achieving all his major objectives. In addition to Crimea, he has captured a strategic slice of territory containing up to 10 percent of Ukraine’s population, creating a “frozen conflict” that he can use to keep the rest of the country permanently destabilized. He has bluffed Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and the European Union into postponing the implementation of an economic-association agreement that was the original cause of the conflict. He has pushed Ukraine’s economy into a free fall likely to intensify this winter, especially if Moscow fails to deliver supplies of gas or purchase Ukraine’s goods. If the Kiev government manages to hold successful elections this month and begins to find its footing, Mr. Putin can use his Donetsk clients to restart the war whenever he wishes. In the meantime, the Kremlin hopes that its “deescalation” will induce the European Union and United States to lift the economic sanctions they stepped up last month. To her credit, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, a crucial voice in any such decision, said last week that the union was “very far away [from] consideration to take back sanctions.” However, neither E.U. leaders nor the Obama administration have spelled out what conditions Moscow must meet to win a respite. That opens the door to letting Mr. Putin off the hook before he takes steps that are essential to preserving what remains of Ukraine’s sovereignty. These include withdrawing all Russian forces and military equipment from Ukraine and sealing the border between the countries, with monitoring by international observers. Ms. Merkel and President Obama should insist on these terms and make them public. Otherwise Mr. Putin will be encouraged to renew the aggression that already has proved fruitful for him. Read more on this issue: The Post’s View: Provide Ukraine with the military aid it needs to deter Russia’s aggression The Post’s View: On Ukraine, any bargain is a bad bargain The Post’s View: Making Mr.


NHTSA probes steering in Ford cars

next year’s harvest in Brazil, the world’s largest grower and exporter. Dry weather was forecast for the next 10 days after no meaningful rain fell over the weekend in Brazil’s main growing regions, Drew Lerner, president of World Weather in Overland Park, Kan., said in a telephone interview. Arabica-coffee prices have almost doubled this year . With damage worsening before spring began in the Southern Hemisphere, Brazil’s National Coffee Council has estimated that farmers may collect less than 40 million bags in 2015, creating the longest output slump in five decades. Starbucks and J.M. Smucker raised retail prices this year after futures surged 61 percent in the first quarter. Arabica coffee for December delivery climbed 6.9 percent to settle at $2.208 a pound on ICE Futures U.S. in New York, the biggest gain for a most-active contract since April 22. — Bloomberg News Also in Business ● Facebook has completed its acquisition of the mobile messaging service WhatsApp for almost $22 billion, up from the original $19 billion when the cash-and-stock deal was struck early this year, thanks in part to the rising price of Facebook shares. Facebook named WhatsApp co-founder and chief executive Jan Koum to its board Monday. ● Redbox and Verizon Communications plan to shut down their unprofitable online competitor to Netflix on Tuesday night. Launched publicly in March 2013, Redbox Instant charged $6 a month to stream movies online or a few more dollars a month to also pick up DVDs from 44,000 kiosks at convenience stores and supermarkets. ● Instagram has hired Marne Levine, Facebook’s vice president of global public policy, as its first chief operating officer. Levine will focus on keeping Instagram running smoothly as the app — which already has more than 200 million users — continues to scale. ● ● Boeing on Monday announced plans to start building some parts of its 777X commercial airliner in St. Louis, a move that Missouri Gov. Jay Nixon (D) said would add up to 700 jobs in the region. Boeing said it would expand its composites facility in St. Louis, which is home to its defense business, to manufacture some 777X parts now built by suppliers or at other Boeing locations abroad. ● Burger King is lowering its chicken-nugget prices to 15 cents each as fast-food chains compete to lure budget-minded customers. Starting Monday, a 10-piece nugget order will cost $1.49 for a limited time,


Media goes overtime on Ebola coverage, but not necessarily overboard

Members of the media set up outside of Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital in Dallas where Thomas Eric Duncan, who was the first to be diagnosed with Ebola in the United States, is in critical condition, on Oct. 1. (G.J. Mccarthy/AP) There’s a potentially deadly disease afoot in America, with no known cure and terrifying consequences for those infected. Ebola? Well, yes, but another bug has had far more wide-ranging consequences. Since an outbreak began in late summer, the enterovirus has sent thousands of people, primarily children, to hospitals in 43 states and the District. One strain, enterovirus D68, has apparently caused polio-like symptoms in some patients, leaving them unable to move their limbs. Four people who recently died tested positive for the disease, although the link between the virus and the deaths is unclear, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. You might not know all that from the news media’s reporting over the past few weeks. The enterovirus certainly hasn’t been ignored, but it’s a mere footnote compared with the oceanic volumes devoted to Ebola, a disease that has devastated parts of West Africa but has only one confirmed case diagnosed in the United States. CNN has been especially relentless, chasing down every conceivable Ebola angle and a few inconceivable ones, too. One segment explored the possibility of catching Ebola from a sneeze, a pet or a swimming pool (the expert answers: “really rare,” “no evidence for that” and “highly unlikely,” respectively). For the most part, the reporting on medical aspects of the disease has been straightforward and responsible, with many stories emphasizing the relatively low risks of infection. A few commentaries, meanwhile, have lapsed into xenophobia about the African sources of the disease. One Fox News pundit, Andrea Tantaros, offered this analysis last week: “In these countries they don’t believe in traditional medical care. So someone could get off a flight and seek treatment from a witch doctor who practices Santeria,” an Afro-Caribbean religion that includes ritual animal sacrifice. But even when the reporting is accurate, the sheer tonage of it raises a question about proportion and relative risk: Why is Ebola a media superstar when other diseases — say, enterovirus or the common flu — have more far-reaching and even deadlier consequences in this country? Sally Nuran, manager of the Ivy Apartments where Thomas Eric Duncan stayed after getting sick, responds to questions from reporters


during a news conference in Dallas on Oct. 2. (Tony Gutierrez/AP) The question is a familiar one to people involved in spreading the word about public-health threats. News reporting, they say, typically underplays some risks and overplays others. Mundane behaviors — smoking, overeating — don’t rate sustained media coverage yet are linked to preventable diseases that kill tens of thousands annually. Ordinary viruses, such as the flu, take a huge toll as well but don’t rate screaming headlines. “If any or all of these issues received the levels of media coverage and public concern that Ebola was receiving, thousands of annual deaths could be prevented,” said Jay Bernhardt, the founding director of the Center for Health Communication at the University of Texas. The volume of Ebola coverage, he said, “reminds me a lot of the over-the-top coverage of serial killers or celebrity scandals in that they are far out of proportion with the risk or relevance to the general population.” Social-science research has shown that intensive news reporting on certain diseases can distort public perceptions of their severity and the chances of contracting them. In a 2008 experiment at McMaster University in Ontario that was updated last year, researchers asked undergraduates and medical students their impressions of 10 infectious diseases. Five of the diseases (anthrax, SARS, West Nile virus, Lyme disease and avian flu) had received relatively more news media coverage than a second group of five. Result: The “high-media frequency” diseases were rated as more serious than the more obscure diseases by both the undergraduates and the medical students. Both groups overestimated the chances they would get one of the better-reported diseases. But that’s not to say that the media is “over-covering” a particular threat, said Meredith Young, the lead researcher on the studies, who now works at Montreal’s McGill University. “It really only is in hindsight that we can say whether a potential threat was over- or undercovered in the media and what the ‘real’ risk was of that particular infectious disease,” she wrote in an e-mail. That is, “did the threat materialize? Or did the media coverage help to prevent the threat” by warning of a potential contagion and mobilizing preventive action? Ebola’s preeminence in the news media probably has much to do with the primal fear it inspires and the popular-culture context from which it comes. While Ebola isn’t widespread or common, those who get it


Ethical choices surround a potential Ebola vaccine

Relatives pray over a weak Siata Johnson, 23, who was waiting to enter the Ebola treatment center at the Island Hospital on October 6, 2014 on the outskirts of Monrovia, Liberia. (John Moore/Getty Images) Here is what officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the National Institutes of Health have been telling us: America has some Ebola infections (and is likely to see more), but America does not have an Ebola outbreak, which is extremely unlikely in a health system capable of basic public health measures (such as isolation and contact-tracing). So: Infections but no outbreak. Some in the media — splicing their own agendas into the Ebola virus — have used this response (variously) to criticize governmental doublespeak, diagnose institutional rot or slam immigration laxity. This is political and ideological scavenging. It also pits people with limited credibility on this issue against national experts who actually know their business (as opposed to locals who sometimes don’t). There is a time to question authority. And then there is a time to shut up and listen carefully to medical experts, who sometimes say complex and difficult things. Such attentiveness is about to become even more important. The Ebola outbreak in Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone (countries lacking effective health systems) is not contained; it is catastrophic. Photographers send back pictures like tourists in hell. Desperate attention will soon turn to an Ebola vaccine, for a specific reason. The first participant in a Phase 1 trial was injected at the NIH Clinical Center on Sept. 2. Twenty people are now in the study. This possible vaccine, as usual, is the result of money, brilliance and luck. Following the 9/11 attacks, the U.S. government began funding research on an Ebola vaccine in earnest (to counter the possibility of bioterrorism). The effort went slowly until about two years ago, when scientists chanced upon a new vector, or method of vaccine delivery: a chimpanzee virus. Injecting even a dead Ebola virus into a human being (one of the ways to produce an immune response) is too dangerous. So scientists have spliced just one gene of the Ebola virus — the one that codes for its outer coating, called a glycoprotein — into the DNA of a chimp adenovirus. After injection, this harmless virus infects a human cell, which, in turn, pumps out a lot of Ebola glycoprotein. The immune system responds as


Polio becomes ‘public health emergency’ in Pakistan as number of cases soars

A health worker administers polio vaccine to a child in Karachi, Pakistan, late last month. Pakistan has reached its highest rate of polio transmission in more than a dozen years. (Rehan Khan/European Press Agency) ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Over the weekend, Pakistan logged its 200th new polio case of 2014, the nation’s highest transmission rate in more than a dozen years. The spread has alarmed Pakistani and international health experts and is prompting fresh doubt about the country’s ability to combat this or future disease outbreaks. By Tuesday, the number of new polio cases in Pakistan stood at 202, and officials are bracing for potentially dozens of other cases by year’s end. Pakistan now accounts for 80 percent of global cases and is one of only three countries at risk of exporting the disease outside its borders, according to the World Health Organization. “It’s an emergency, a public health emergency,” said Ayesha Raza Farooq, the polio eradication coordinator for Pakistan’s government. “We want to limit the virus outside of our boundaries and want to work to control it in our boundaries, but it’s certainly a very challenging situation ahead.” Pakistan has struggled for years to shed its title as one of the last remaining countries with an active polio virus, mostly because of troubles it faces in vaccinating children. A polio worker administers vaccine drops to a boy in Karachi, Pakistan, in March. Pakistan’s polio eradication coordinator said that the nation’s growing polio crisis is a “public health emergency.” (Akhtar Soomro/Reuters) In far-flung areas of the country, some parents and religious leaders are skeptical of the vaccine, requiring considerable face-to-face outreach by vaccination teams. But the Pakistani Taliban and other Islamist militants have waged a brutal campaign against those teams, killing more than 50 health workers and security officials since 2012. The attacks began after it was discovered that the CIA had used a vaccination campaign to gain information about Osama bin Laden’s whereabouts. In May, after new polio cases in Iraq and Syria were linked to travelers from Pakistan, the WHO declared Pakistan’s polio crisis an “extraordinary event” mandating an immediate international response. Ebola is the only other disease that is currently designated by the WHO as a global public health emergency. In response to the WHO declaration, Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif vowed to redouble efforts to vaccinate children through house-to-house searches and checkpoints along major travel routes. Pakistan also


Local digest: News of the Washington region

THE DISTRICT Md. man fatally shot in Southeast A Maryland man was fatally shot Tuesday in Southeast Washington, D.C. police said. Officer Araz Alali, a D.C. police spokesman, said the victim was Ronnie Scharrod Edon, 19, of Forestville. Alali said he was found about 1:45 a.m. in the 2600 block of Birney Place SE. — Victoria St. Martin and Peter Hermann VIRGINIA County approves streetcar funding Fairfax County officials Tuesday approved the county’s share of design funding for a Columbia Pike streetcar, clearing another hurdle for the $333 million project, which has stirred strong opposition. Critics say the system would be too slow and costly. The vote by the county supervisors to approve $4.2 million in design and program costs follows Arlington County’s vote last month to allocate nearly $17 million toward engineering costs for the Columbia Pike project and about $9 million more for a separate streetcar in Crystal City. The Columbia Pike streetcar is expected to be completed in 2020. — Antonio Olivo Police: Man posed as officer to lure woman A man tried to lure a woman into his vehicle by impersonating a police officer during a fake traffic stop in Ballston, Arlington police said. They said that the man’s car had a rotating red dashboard light and that he showed a badge when he pulled her car over in the 4000 block of North 11th Street about 11:35 p.m. Saturday. Police said he told the woman to leave her car and come with him to the police station. However, she said she wanted a uniformed officer to come to the scene, and he fled. — Victoria St. Martin The Region Doctor exposed to Ebola discharged An American physician isolated at the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda after being exposed to Ebola in Sierra Leone was discharged Tuesday and did not show signs of the virus, the NIH said. The NIH said he was admitted to an isolation unit in its Clinical Center on Sept. 28 after returning from Sierra Leone, where he had been exposed by a needle stick. He had been a volunteer in an Ebola unit. While at the NIH, he developed a brief fever, which turned out not to be Ebola-related. The NIH said he was feeling well but will be monitored at home until expiration of the Ebola incubation period. — Julie Zauzmer and Martin Weil


How I learned to love running

Mike Plunkett, runs among tourists, along the Reflecting Pool while wearing his "How Am I Running?" shirt. (Doug Kapustin/For The Washington Post) Mike Plunkett runs among tourists along the Reflecting Pool while wearing his "How Am I Running?" shirt. (Doug Kapustin/For The Washington Post) “I think you run like a machine.” A bicyclist shouted this my way along the Mount Vernon Trail on a glorious Sunday morning. I smiled, said thank you and kept moving. This was after another bicyclist said I was running well, a few thumbs-ups from other runners and several tourists looking at me quizzically as I ran by. The compliments and looks weren’t uninvited. My bright yellow shirt asking “How am I running?” called out for critique. I’ll admit it: I was proud. My gait was getting a full range of motion and my stride was crisp. My arms and glutes were working in tandem to gain sufficient speed, and I was correctly landing on the balls of my feet. Most of all, I felt good. It felt good to run. This is a far cry from more than two years ago, when in the midst of struggles with depression and a spiritual malaise, a thought came to me. You’re going to run marathons, so you should get going. I hadn’t run since I was a teenager, but soon thereafter, I ran one block from the corner of 14th and Euclid streets Northwest to Meridian Hill Park and back. I was out of breath and in pain. The run was awful. Yet it was enough to keep me going. Since then, I have participated in a three-mile race, a half-marathon, a 200-mile running relay and marathons in Buenos Aires and the District. By this time next week, I’ll be in Toronto for the Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon. According to my running app, I have logged more than 1,600 miles. Along the way, I sought to figure out whether there is such a thing as the perfect running exercise. That mystical stretch or the yogalike position that increases speed and endurance, the exercise to end all running exercises. The question has practical implications. It’s my goal to run a sub-four-hour marathon in Toronto. My time in Buenos Aires was 4:55:01, and much of that was experiencing (as in, stopping to take pictures) my first marathon in another country. Training during the torturous 2013-14 winter got me to


D.C. news in brief

live in Wards 6, 7, and 8 can apply at 2100 Martin Luther King Jr. Ave. SE, Suite 404, from 9 a.m. to 4:45 p.m. weekdays. Applications are being taken through Monday for those with electricity disconnection only, from Tuesday through Oct. 28 for those with gas disconnection only, and Oct. 29 for those with electric, gas and heating oil disconnection. Applicants should take the disconnection notice, their most recent utility bills, a government-issued ID, proof of income for everyone in the home and social security documentation for everyone in the home. Appointments are not required for emergency assistance. Non-emergency appointments begin Nov. 13. For information, go to ddoe.dc.gov/liheap. DMV offers out-of-state overnight registration Non-District residents who regularly stay in the District overnight can now apply for a ROSA (registration for out-of-state automobiles) online. The ROSA exemption, which the Department of Motor Vehicles emphasizes is not a parking privilege, is valid for one year. A person cannot apply for the exemption until a warning ticket has been issued to their vehicle. The vehicle owner must adjudicate the ticket and supply nonresident documentation before applying. Required documents include the warning ticket; an original lease, deed or mortgage statement; a current utility bill and the vehicle registration card. For information or to apply, go to dmv.dc.gov. Columbia Heights Day festival is Saturday The eighth annual Columbia Heights Day, which will include live music and family events, will be from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday on 11th Street NW, between Park Road and Kenyon Street. Free activities include eating contests, performances by local musicians, a dunk tank, face painting, an adult tricycle race and a family fun field day at Harriet Tubman Elementary School. For information, go to www.columbiaheightsday.org or e-mail info@columbiaheightsday.org. D.C. Council confirms new DDOT director The D.C. Council recently confirmed Matthew Brown as director of the District Department of Transportation. Brown was appointed by Mayor Vincent C. Gray (D) to lead the agency in late April after the departure of then-director Terry Bellamy. Brown has served as a deputy director at DDOT, a managing director of WMATA’s Office of Management and Budget Service and as a project manager with the advisory firm Public Financial Management. He has a master’s degree in budget and public finance from George Washington University and a bachelor’s degree in political science from Texas Wesleyan University. For information, visit ddot.dc.gov. — Compiled by Terence McArdle


Atlanta Symphony Orchestra struggles during second lockout in two years

also oversee the High Art Museum and Alliance Theatre in Atlanta, say that the ASO’s $2 million operating deficit on a $37 million annual budget has become a drag on the institution. Woodruff leaders want to balance that budget, either through salary cuts — the players are paid an average base salary of $71,256, according to the International Conference of Symphony and Opera Musicians — or player reductions. Two years ago, the ASO lost seven permanent positions, dropping to 88 players from 95. That prospect has led music director Robert Spano to take an unorthodox position. Usually, maestros remain silent during labor disputes. Spano has not, speaking publicly and, on Monday, privately meeting with Woodruff Center President Virginia Hepner and Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed (D). “This is not a normal labor dispute,” Spano said in a phone interview. “This is a question of whether Atlanta wishes to preserve its legacy of having a great orchestra or having a minor league orchestra. It’s not a question of payroll or health care or anything else. It’s a question of: Will Atlanta remain an important, major league orchestra?” ‘You only get this once’ The players have also been more aggressive. Almost daily, they fire off news releases accusing Woodruff managers of mismanagement. They say that the Woodruff Center’s problems are much larger than the ASO’s, noting that the institution is paying $8 million in interest each year on $172 million in loans for a series of projects, including the 2005 expansion of the High Art Museum. They have been particularly critical of the arts center for failing to listen to offers from symphony supporters who want to end the lockout by offering money. And they feel betrayed. Atlanta Symphony Orchestra musicians practice for a performance of Mozart's Requiem at the Conant Performing Arts Center at Oglethorpe University. (Michael A. Schwarz/For the Washington Post) This week, Laufer shared a recording from a meeting recorded in 2012 after the last deal. Romanstein, the ASO president at the time, is asked by a player whether there will be more cuts. “I don’t want to be the Baltimore Symphony,” Romanstein says on the tape. “We’re the Atlanta Symphony. My comment to the WAC board is that if we have to make a one-time adjustment in order to get things in financial balance, okay, you do that. But you only get this once.” Hepner, in an interview Monday,


Nobel chemistry laureate’s twisting path to molecular microscope breakthrough

Eric Betzig is one of three recipients of this year's Nobel Prize in chemistry. In 2011, he showed Reuters what his team at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute calls the “Bessel beam plane illumination microscope.” Correction: As a child in Ann Arbor, Mich., Eric Betzig told his family over and over that by the time he was 40 he’d have a billion dollars and a Nobel Prize. But Betzig was being a bit optimistic. He’s no billionaire and he didn’t win a Nobel prize until Wednesday, at the age of 54. “I failed on both fronts, more spectacularly on one front than the other,” he joked by phone from Munich, where he learned the news about the prize while attending a conference. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences awarded the 2014 Nobel Prize in chemistry to Betzig, a research group leader at Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Janelia Research Campus in Ashburn, Va., for contributions to modern-day microscopes. He shares the award with Stefan W. Hell of the Max Planck Institute for Biophysical Chemistry in Germany and William E. Moerner of Stanford University. The three are credited with using fluorescent molecules to give microscopes higher resolutions — turning microscopy into nanoscopy, and looking at living cells in detail. Betzig made something of a comeback: He received the award despite being estranged from academia and the sciences for seven years during the middle of his career. He owes his success to a super-powerful microscope he built on a friend’s living room floor. The Nobel Prize in chemistry goes to three men who revolutionized microscopy. Growing up as the son of an engineer, he was particularly captivated by the space race and had dreams of becoming an astronaut. “I can still tell you the names of the astronauts on every flight from Mercury to Apollo,” he said. He studied physics at the California Institute of Technology but, by the time he graduated in 1983, felt that the space craze was over. “My timing was just bad,” he said. Betzig went on to earn an MS and a PhD from Cornell University, where he studied applied and engineering physics. When he went looking for advisers and thesis topics, he found most of the topics too boring, he said. Then he found Aaron Lewis and Michael Isaacson, who were trying to create high-resolution images of cells too small for available microscopes to spot. Scientists believed


D.C. community calendar, Oct. 9-16, 2014

a National Park Service ranger, on a three- to four-mile run around the nation’s iconic memorials, about 10 minutes per mile. 8 a.m., Washington Monument Lodge bookstore, 15th Street and Constitution Avenue NW. Free. Survey lodge, 202-426-6841. Ward 8 farmers market, USS Monitor: symbol, landmark and sanctuary, Yoga for adults, “Doktor Kaboom: Live Wire! The Electricity Tour,” for age 7 and older, focusing on the power of electricity and blending theater with the wonders of scientific exploration. 11 a.m., 1:30 and 5 p.m. Saturday, 1:30 and 4 p.m. Sunday, Kennedy Center, Family Theater, 2700 F St. NW. $20. 202-467-4600. Cemetery tours, Yoga, Fall family festival, Excel basics, learn to identify and navigate through basic features and elements of the spreadsheet program, build a simple budget, format and edit data, create simple formulas and more; bring a flash drive to save class documents. 12:15 p.m., Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library, Computer Lab, Room 311, 901 G St. NW. Free. 202-727-0321. Carillon recital, carillonneur Edward M. Nassor performs. 12:30 p.m., Washington National Cathedral, Bishop’s Garden and other outdoor areas, Wisconsin and Massachusetts avenues NW. Free. 202-537-6200 or www.nationalcathedral.org . Chile pepper celebration, Portrait story days: Roy Lichtenstein, Kids Euro Fest 2014: trip to Scotland, Docent tour: Shakespeare at the National Portrait Gallery, Latino and Hispanic heritage, World War II talk, Guided bike ride, about three hours, led by a National Park Service ranger, with stops to discuss moments in American history; bring your bike, water and snacks; helmets required. 2-5 p.m. Saturdays-Sundays, Thomas Jefferson Memorial, 900 Ohio Dr. SW. Free. 202-426-6841. Walking with wheat, Building Mr. Lincoln’s memorial, “Conversation Piece ,” Rosie the Riveter, Hispanic Medal of Honor recipients, Kennedy Center music, singer-songwriters Andy Zipf, Derek Evry and the Beanstalk Library’s Ryan Walker perform. 6 p.m., Kennedy Center, Millennium Stage, 2700 F St. NW. Free. 202-467-4600. U.S. Navy Band bluegrass and country music concert, Latin American songs of love, Axelrod String Quartet concert, “Almost White: Forced Confessions of a Latino in Hollywood ,” Mavis Staples in concert, PearsonWidrig DanceTheater, Sunday, Oct. 12 Palisades farmers market, Enigma: Tidal Basin, Serene Sunday, Get it “write” study hall, Alienweeds: tapping the abundance of invasive plants, Georgetown Library yoga, taught by an instructor from Yoga Activist. 1:30 p.m., Georgetown Library, 3260 R St. NW. Free; registration required. 202-727-0232 or erika.rydberg@dc.gov . U.S. Marine Band concert, Kennedy Center Chamber Players concert, a performance of works by


Could you use social media to track Ebola or Enterovirus? Sickweather thinks so.

as widespread as the flu or even Enterovirus. So it would be a very weak signal to try to track in the U.S. If it does spread in the U.S., we will be tracking it and trying to provide early warning for it. If there were an outbreak, how would Sickweather track that? Initially it would probably show up via the symptoms of Ebola, such as high fever, body aches, things like that, which unfortunately are very similar to flu symptoms. So Ebola would show up as spikes in those related symptoms and we would start to overlay [the reports of symptoms with] what we know about official cases. We would then use that to determine where Ebola may be emerging next. You mention the Enterovirus, which has impacted many children across the country. Is Sickweather tracking that? Right now we’re tracking the symptoms of it and we’re seeing how people are being diagnosed with Enterovirus. We are doing an offline study right now that would show how those [symptoms and diagnoses] are all related, and retool our system to see how we can track for Enterovirus more specifically. That will happen much sooner than we would be tracking Ebola. Have you worked with public health professionals on this? Something that the CDC does have an issue understanding is the granularity of tracking illness at the community level in real time. We’ve been talking with the CDC, in fact, about how we can help in that surveillance. They have a project called Operation Dragon Fire that could be the mechanism in which we work together. It takes the CDC about two weeks to collect their data, and then the media picks up on it. That can be the entire viral lifecycle, two weeks, so at that point the disease has already spread and everything is more reactionary. In 2012, we were able to detect flu season six weeks before the CDC picked up on it. It was that success that gave us some attention early on. Is the flu coming to an area near you? Health start-up Sickweather uses Twitter and Facebook posts about symptoms to determine when and where an illness is spreading. Chief executive Graham Dodge said it could help track emerging threats like Ebola and Enterovirus. More from Capital Business: For a daily rundown of Washington area business news, sign up for the “CapBiz A.M.” e-mail newsletter.


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. Lab mix attacks mixed breed: Reduced fees for cat adoption: Germantown Adoptable cats at no-kill shelter: Gaithersburg Gaithersburg Adopt or foster rescue dogs: Rockville — Compiled by Lisa M. Bolton


Instagram-worthy Washington: 9 favorite spots to shoot

used to have its share of wildly colored houses. The brick would be splashed with such colors as pink, purple and mustard yellow, and the trim was selected not to be complementary but for the visual dissonance it would inspire. These days, you can spot such a house here and there in the District, but those that haven’t been replaced with massive condos mostly have gotten a few coats of gray or beige paint and have learned to blend in. Then there’s 12th Place NW, a one-way nook of a neighborhood which, between W Street and Florida Avenue, somehow packs in brightly hued homes like crayons in a box: teal, powder blue, fire-engine red, plum and forest green on one block that’s a dream to photograph, even on a rainy day. The hard part? Finding a way to capture them all in one shot. — L.R. The Capitol Columns in the National Arboretum. (Instagram photo by Johnny White) National Arboretum Photographed by Johnny White, Oct. 5, 2014 Follow him @49thstate The National Arboretum is a green haven on the outskirts of the District’s bustle. Although it’s rich in everything from azaleas to boxwoods, the National Capitol Columns (first used on the East portico of the Capitol building in 1828) are a standout historical landmark begging to be photographed. Johnny White, a Virginia-based freelance photographer, shot a richly vibrant picture of the columns Oct. 5 during a District gathering for Instagram’s 10th Worldwide InstaMeet. White says he wanted to compose a shot that would represent the day. The symmetrical reflection of the columns, along with puffy white clouds across a clear and stunning blue sky, make this shot noteworthy. “I’m pretty fond of symmetry, so I am always looking for that perfect shot,” White says. — M.E. Instagram, from a pro perspective Giant panda cub Bao Bao explores an enclosure at the National Zoo. (Instagram photo by Matt McClain) Washington Post photographers travel near and far on assignment, and their images offer glimpses into local life — Bao Bao at the National Zoo or a truck covered in petals on a rainy spring day — and of the world at large. For them, Instagram is another way to share what they see. Here’s a sampling of our photographers’ 2014 Instagrams from around the Washington area. For more, follow us on Instagram @washpostphoto. Related: Life, liberty and the pursuit of a #selfie:


Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra offers enthusiasm, but program is lacking

The Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra, founded 91 years ago, is touring the United States for the first time, an upscale affair with dates at major halls in Chicago, Cleveland, New York and, this past Wednesday, here at the Strathmore. The orchestra has some strong players, is mostly youthful and has clearly forged a homogeneous style. It was certainly a different vibe than what one gets from our nearby orchestras. Granted, they were on tour, trying to put their best foot forward, but the involvement and energy often seen in the musicians’ faces was unusual. It was difficult to fairly evaluate the BPO because of artistic choices by its music director, Muhai Tang — an experienced opera conductor in Europe. (His biography mentioned no U.S. appearances.) The repertoire was mostly slam-bang stuff, requiring little finesse, and Tang let the brass and timpani play full out at all times, with more important lines often lost in the din. But the strings played with admirable vigor, all the way to the back stands, and in the Sibelius Symphony No. 2 the music finally gave them spots to sing out freely. The woodwinds were cleaner and more expressive than the brass, with a particularly limpid clarinet. Aside from his indifference to balances, Tang seemed like an efficient leader, communicating without excess and with a generally good rhythmic bounce. But I hope the BPO is playing a lot of Haydn, Mozart and Debussy when not on tour because they will never become a top-tier group riding such noisy fare as Aram Khachaturian’s “Masquerade Suite,” the “Legend of Ohrid” by Stevan Hristic, Mikhail Glinka’s “Russlan and Ludmilla” overture or the “March on the Drina” by Stanislav Binicki (the latter two were encores). It is fine for a musical group, particularly one from a part of world unfamiliar to most of us, to share some of its culture. But any orchestra worth its salt will try to display range, and there was little of that here. On an additional sour note, the ushering staff at Strathmore seems to need a refresher course on late seating; patrons were allowed to trickle in throughout the first half, a continual annoyance. Battey is a freelance writer.


Patrick Modiano, winner of this year’s Nobel Prize in Literature, is a paradox

Jewishness, the Nazi occupation and the loss of identity are recurrent themes in his novels. Patrick Modiano, winner of this year’s Nobel Prize in literature, is a paradox. He writes bestsellers but shuns the media. His novels sound autobiographical, yet his declared subject is a historical period that ended just before he was born. His style is clear and simple, but it masks complex time frames, unreal scenarios and a narrator who often seems to know little about the story he is in charge of. He is a household name in France but almost unknown outside his own country. This is one reason why the recipient of this year’s literature prize may come as something of a surprise to the world at large, if not to his faithful and numerous Francophone readers. Even for those of us who have been reading and loving his books for several decades, this honor establishing him as a “grand man of letters” seems somehow not to fit the media-shy author. Can it really be that this recluse — famously inarticulate on the French literary program “Apostrophes” and always reluctant to give interviews — has been dragged into the limelight to be given the greatest literary accolade of all? Modiano himself has always played down his own achievements, as well as the status of his chosen medium, the novel. In 1975, after four successful novels, Modiano — in a rare interview — claimed that the novel was an “anachronistic” genre that had ”slipped away” from public view. His heroes are known for slipping away, too; they’re shadowy, furtive figures modeled on himself (they tend to be tall, dark, shy and not good at interviews). In storylines that are reminiscent of classic detective novels, his heroes set off on their searches into the past, trying to solve mysteries rooted in the period of the Occupation, Modiano’s avowed obsession. The Occupation of France by the Nazis during World War II — along with the collaboration of many French nationals and the murder of French Jews — is a dirty pocket of French history that was not much discussed following the Allied victory. After Charles de Gaulle inaugurated the Fifth Republic, the general tendency was to stop talking about les années noires. It was only authors of a later generation — such as Modiano, whose guilt was inherited rather than personal — who proved able to explore this


At a Namibian sanctuary, you don’t just see the wildlife — you care for them

grab dinner. I carried the plate back to my tent and ate with one hand — the other was keeping Mina in place. Later, I mastered the art of brushing my teeth and washing my face without waking my cargo. I crawled into my sleeping bag, frequently peering at her cuddled against my chest. I silently screamed to myself: “I have a baby baboon in my bed!” I imagined that 11 other people that night were shouting a similar exclamation. Mina slept soundly, shifting only a few times. Once, she moved to my right side, leaning up against me, bottle dangling from her little lips. Later in the night, she ventured down to my feet, where she warmed my legs like thick socks. Eventually, she traveled north again. In the distance, the lions roared and the jackals cackled. I tightened my hold on her. Though we had just met, Mina took after me. She was not an early-morning person either. However, we had a big day ahead of us. So, with Mina still under my sweater, I tiptoed out of bed and walked over to the dining hall. She popped her head out like a periscope, checking out the passing scenery. In the kitchen, I started to prepare her bottle when I felt her slipping and then . . . off she went. Monkey on the loose. She climbed onto the rooftop, her saggy diaper barely hanging on. I called for reinforcements. “We have a rogue baby with a nappie,” a staff member reported into his walkie-talkie. A monkey whisperer arrived and caught her by the tail. I followed the pair into the enclosure, removing Mina’s diaper and performing my maternal obligations. I tried to say goodbye to my little monkey, but Mina had already returned to her natural state, reuniting with her baboon family and leaving me to watch from the outside. More from Travel: Travel Guide If you go Getting there N/a’an ku sê wildlife sanctuary is about 40 miles from Windhoek. Southern African Airways and British Airways offer two-stop service from Washington Dulles. Volunteering there The sanctuary offers two lodging options: shared rooms for up three people and large tents for up to two people. Shared bathrooms. Stays range from two weeks (minimum) to three months. Cost: $950 for two weeks, including lodging, three meals a day, laundry, airport transfers and volunteering duties. Information www.naankuse.com — A.S.


Pabst bringing back Ballantine as a craft brew

and fermentation was moved to stainless steel. Ballantine IPA was a still-quaffable but more middle-of-the-road beer when Pabst pulled the plug on the brand in 1996, shuttering its Milwaukee brewery. Jump to 2012. Deuhs was applying for his present position at Pabst. “They asked me a pre-interview question: How could Pabst get into the craft beer market? I said, you already have the answer: Ballantine IPA. “I worked on it a good solid two years,” he said, whipping up 24 test batches in a 10-gallon brew pot in his home north of Milwaukee. “I’d be telling you a fib if I said I found a recipe in a box in the basement, but I did have some analytical data going back to the 1930s.” He also interviewed older drinkers who remembered the original. Reconstructing historic beers always involves compromise. Bullion, the key hop variety in the original Ballantine IPA, isn’t grown to any significant extent today. Deuhs devised a complex formula involving eight types of pelletized hops and two varieties of hop oil that he obtain from a British company called Charles Faram. The hop distillate was so pungent that a liter and a half sufficed for a 70-barrel batch. The jury is out on whether the oaken tuns at the Newark brewery imparted any significant flavor to their contents. “They were lined with pitch, but the pitch was pretty thin, so some of the wood character came through,” Deuhs surmised. No wooden vessels were available at Cold Spring Brewing in Minnesota, where he brewed the IPA in rented tanks. He tried to duplicate the original process, however, by circulating the beer through a steel tank filled with oak spirals. Deuhs wasn’t interested in challenging West Coast IPAs for bragging rights to the world’s hoppiest beer. Ballantine IPA is well balanced by several varieties of specialty malt. But it gets a bitter floral perfume from English Target hops and an immensely resiny flavor from American varieties such as Cascade and Columbus. One old-timer commented to Deuhs that it was “pretty much right on, except for missing a hint of spruce.” At 7.2 percent alcohol by volume and 70 bitterness units, it approximates the measurements of the original. Deuhs, 51, was a youngster when Ballantine’s Newark brewery was boarded up. But bottles of the original Ballantine IPA are floating around. This writer sampled one at a beer memorabilia show in the


With its pick, Nobel Committee draws renewed attention to India-Pakistan conflict

a bullet to the head during a Taliban assassination attempt in her native Swat Valley. She was targeted for her outspoken advocacy of female education — a cause she has championed relentlessly ever since, in spite of further threats. Speaking from the British city of Birmingham on Friday, she reveled in the committee’s decision to share her prize with an Indian, 60-year-old Kailash Satyarthi, who has spent decades crusading against child slavery. “One is from Pakistan, one is from India. One believes in Hinduism, one strongly believes in Islam,” she said in a statement to the world’s media that she gave only after finishing her usual school day, having learned of the award from a teacher Friday morning. “And it gives a message to people, gives a message to people of love between Pakistan and India and between different religions.” The selection of Yousafzai and Satyarthi was heralded by leaders on both sides of the line dividing India from Pakistan. It was a rare occasion when both populations could celebrate the same event. Abdus Salam was the first Pakistani to win a Nobel Prize, when he captured the physics award in 1979. Satyarthi is the first Indian-born Nobel Peace Prize winner; Mother Teresa, a naturalized Indian citizen, won the Peace Prize in 1979. But it was less clear whether the Peace Prize will actually change any of the underlying dynamics in a dispute that has never ended since India and Pakistan were violently partitioned from one another in 1947. “It’s a timely reminder that this conflict hasn’t gone away. There are a lot of conflicts in the world, but here’s one between two nuclear powers that seems to be flaring up,” said Gareth Price, a senior research fellow at the London-based think tank Chatham House. Price said the prize will probably have “less impact than it should.” That’s because India has signaled its intention to focus first on improving relations with Nepal and Bangladesh, while Pakistan endures the latest round in a decades-long internal struggle between its military and civilian leadership. Neither Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif nor Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi immediately jumped at the chance to accept the winners’ invitation for the pair to attend the December awards ceremony at Oslo City Hall. Satyarthi, speaking on Indian television, called the joint award “a big statement” about India-Pakistan relations but acknowledged there would be no quick breakthroughs. “It


In Pakistan’s Swat Valley, Malala’s peace prize seen as slap at Taliban

2009,” he said. “But I see this award as a sign of smile on our faces.” Not all agree. In the past, some in Mingora have criticized Yousafzai’s worldwide fame, denouncing events such as a 2013 address at the United Nations as manipulation by the West. Threats have prevented Yousafzai from returning home since her recovery. A look at the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize winners and other recipients throughout the years. One girls’ college in Mingora was named after Yousafzai shortly after the attack, but the students protested that they could be vulnerable to violence. The name was removed. “Some people are silent, as they don’t like her and her father, but others are quiet due to the possible threat from the militants,” said Aftab Ali, a 41-year-old businessman. Yousafzai’s first cousin, Mahmood ul Hassan, 34, said he received a call from the girl’s mother, Toor Pekai, moments after the Nobel was announced. “Malala’s Noble award is a clear message from Swat that we are peaceful and peace-loving people,’’ he said. “Once Swat was notorious for the terrorism and militancy, but now the world will call Swat as the hometown of Noble peace award winner.” He dismissed the possible threats from militants, saying the uplifting message was far greater than the fears. “Death and life is in the hands of God,” he said, “but the pride Malala won is unforgettable.” In the rest of Pakistan, the reaction to the prize appeared relatively muted. In an eastern part of the country — far from Yousafzai’s home region — many people said they did not even recognize her name. But the country’s president, prime minister and powerful military congratulated her as Pakistan’s second Nobel winner. Abdus Salam, a researcher in theoretical physics, won the Nobel physics prize in 1979. “Except for terrorists, all Pakistanis want their children in school,” wrote Maj. Gen. Asim Bajwa, the chief military spokesman, on his Twitter account. A seventh-grade girl at a private school in Mingora, Hadeeqa Bashir, recalled meeting Yousafzai — then a young teenager — during a peace rally. The 13-year-old Bashir called the Nobel a reward for her “sacrifices and struggle.” A social activist, Fazal Maula Zahid, 47, envisions a time when Yousafzai can return. “We want Malala to establish the first Swat women’s university,’’ he said, “and change Swat into the valley of education.’ Tim Craig in Lahore, Pakistan, contributed to this report.


McAuliffe and Stone Brewing Co. toast craft beer deal

RICHMOND — Stone, the country’s 10th largest craft brewer, will invest $74 million to build a brewery, restaurant, garden and retail store in Richmond. Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) said Virginia beat out 20 other states to land the deal, which is expected to add to the capital’s growing craft beer cred and create about 290 jobs. McAuliffe and company officials announced the deal at a news conference that ended with the mansion doors being thrown open for an early afternoon beer reception. The governor jokingly lamented that he “had to drink a lot of beer” to woo the San Diego-based company to open its first East Coast outpost in Richmond, in a part of the city east of downtown. The 200,000 square-foot brewery and distribution facility is expected to be operational in late 2015 or early 2016, with Stone Brewing World Bistro & Gardens opening one to two years later. The 30,000 square-foot restaurant will feature locally grown organic food as well as a large landscaped garden. The company’s commitment to sourcing its ingredients locally will spur agricultural research and the production of hops, a “huge potential cash crop for our agricultural producers,” said Todd Haymore, Virginia’s secretary of agriculture and forestry. When company officials came to Richmond to negotiate earlier this year, the governor entertained them with a Kegerator he had installed for the occasion in the 200-year-old Executive Mansion. McAuliffe also served up a $5 million grant from the Governor’s Opportunity Fund and a $250,000 grant from the Governor’s Agriculture and Forestry Industries Development Fund, contingent on Stone’s procurement and use of Virginia-grown products. All that helped Richmond lure what BeerAdvocate magazine twice dubbed the “All-time Top Brewery on Planet Earth.” Pat Tiernan, Stone’s chief operating officer, said he and other brewery honchos were so grateful that they dressed up for the occasion. “We wore our good jeans,” he told the mostly suit-and-tie crowd.


NSO, Zinman offer a blurred look back at Central Europe

David Zinman (Priska Ketterer/Priska Ketterer) David Zinman should be better known. He regularly appears with the world’s leading orchestras, has served as artistic leader of major institutions like the Aspen Music Festival and School and is a familiar face in the D.C. region, having led the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra as music director for 12 seasons. Yet he somehow doesn’t seem, to me at least, to get the kind of renown his taut, forceful conducting deserves. There were yawning rows of empty seats at the Kennedy Center Concert Hall on Thursday night, though the program, which featured him and the pianist Angela Hewitt, was one I had been looking forward to quite eagerly. In the event, though, the sleepiness of the hall pervaded the evening. Zinman is a polymath: His recorded Beethoven symphony cycle with Zurich’s Tonhalle Orchestra had the crackle and verve of historically informed performance, but he’s also an avid champion of the contemporary. The program ran the gamut from Schoenberg to Mozart to Strauss. Well, that isn’t, actually, such a huge gamut, though the name “Schoenberg” may still have the power to keep some people away. And the National Symphony Orchestra, rather than helping delineate Zinman’s clean lines and sometimes generous tempi, sounded mushy and inexact, leaving the listener with the impression of a workmanlike but not inspired evening. One of the points of the program was to show the links between Strauss, whose orchestral works audiences tend to love, and Schoenberg, who scares them. The Schoenberg work was the “Five Pieces for Orchestra,” a big, full, rich, wide-ranging piece that pushes at the limits of tonality but does not, to ears more than a century after it was written, depart from its essential late-Romantic identity. The “Five Pieces” were written in 1909, before Schoenberg had developed the twelve-tone system, and they are as hyperexpressive and allusive as any large-scale Germanic orchestral work of that time, with driving rhythms to open the work, the shimmer of celesta to evoke the past, and blocks of different orchestral timbres juxtaposed in the central movement, called, simply, “Farben” (color). You could hear echoes of Strauss in the size and the textures and some of the fragments of melody that keep rising out of the tangle — just as, in Strauss’s “Also Sprach Zarathustra,” equally big and sprawling and written some 13 years earlier, you can hear references back to Wagner. In


Malala Yousafzai shares Nobel Peace Prize

Malala Yousafzai talks about girls’ rights in Nigeria on July 14. Malala, 17, was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for her efforts of behalf of girls. (Wole Emmanuel/Agence France-Pres via Getty Images) Taliban attack survivor Malala Yousafzai became the youngest Nobel winner ever as she and Kailash Satyarthi of India won the Nobel Peace Prize on Friday for working to protect children from slavery, extremism and child labor at great risk to their own lives. Malala, 17, said she was surprised when a teacher interrupted her school day with news that she had won. “I felt more powerful and more courageous because this award is not just a piece of metal,” she said in a news conference after school. “This is really an encouragement for me to go forward and to believe in myself and know that there are people who are supporting me.” Malala was shot by a Taliban gunman two years ago for insisting that girls as well as boys have the right to an education. Surviving several operations, she continued both her activism and her studies. Satyarthi has worked since 1980 to end child slavery and child labor. “Child slavery is a crime against humanity. Humanity itself is at stake here. A lot of work still remains, but I will see the end of child labor in my lifetime,” Satyarthi told the Associated Press at his office in New Delhi, India. Nobel Prize Committee Chairman Thorbjoern Jagland said it was important to reward both an Indian Hindu and a Pakistani Muslim for their common struggle for education and against extremism. “There is a lot of extremism coming from this part of the world. It is partly coming from the fact that young people don’t have a future. They don’t have education. They don’t have a job,” Jagland said. Raised in Pakistan’s beautiful, but dangerous Swat Valley, Malala was 11 years old when she began championing girls’ education, speaking out in TV interviews. The Taliban had overrun her home town of Mingora, terrorizing residents, threatening to blow up girls’ schools, ordering female teachers and students to wear burqas, robes that cover all but the eyes. She was critically injured on October 9, 2012, when a Taliban gunman boarded her school bus and shot her in the head. She survived through luck — the bullet did not enter her brain — and by the quick intervention of


Wildlife plus airports equals $187 million in damaged planes

a wide margin, are most likely to collide with planes, most of the species aboard Noah’s Ark also have run afoul. Alligators, iguanas, terrapins, pigs, horses, cows, caribou, moose, elk, bears, coyotes, beavers, minks and a yellow-bellied marmot are among 47 nonflying animals that have had encounters with airplanes, federal officials said. The fence around Darrah’s airport stands nine feet tall, and the three strands of barbed wire add another three feet to it. That’s enough to keep the deer out, but a wandering bear is another matter. “That’s the problem with bears,” said Michael J. Begier, national coordinator for the airport wildlife hazard program at the Department of Agriculture’s Wildlife Service. “They can climb pretty readily. That’s something we’re starting to see more of in different parts of the country. In the East, there have been more incidents of bears finding their way onto a runway.” For decades, swelling suburbs have sought to preserve green swaths of open space that give the illusion of country living. They also are a haven for wildlife — deer, coyotes, the occasional bear and all manner of other animals. Wide-open suburban spaces also attract airports. Two of the region’s biggest — Washington Dulles International and Baltimore-Washington International Marshall — are in suburban counties. The third, Reagan National, is hemmed in on all sides, but wildlife thrives in the surrounding area. Although animals and airplanes have coexisted since man’s first hankering to fly, the 2009 “Miracle on the Hudson” was an eye-opener for a lot of people about the perils of the relationship. The jetliner flown by Capt. Chesley B. “Sully” Sullenberger made a perfect landing in the river after a collision with a flock of Canada geese killed its engines. Birds like wide-open fields like runways, where predators have a tough time sneaking close, and they like to fly. Airplanes like runways and flying, too. They collided a record 11,315 times last year, and there have been 138,257 collisions recorded in the nation since 1990, according to federal reports. The list of types of birds that have collided with planes could rival “The Birds of America,” the seminal 19th-century work by naturalist and painter John James Audubon. But among four-legged animals, deer are the most common. Since 1990, there have been 1,070 collisions between planes and deer, far more than coyotes (443), terrapins (41), alligators (19), cows (11), elk (11), moose (5), horses


Five myths about Ebola

assurances help calm people’s nerves but may be overstated. No system of protection is 100 percent. The Spanish government has concluded that Ramos got infected as she was removing her protective suit, touching her face before disinfecting her hands. Like Ebola, the SARS virus spreads in hospitals, primarily through physical contact with contaminated fluids. As SARS spread across Asia in 2003, some hospitals, including in Hong Kong, had large numbers of health workers infected, while nearby facilities with similar populations of SARS patients had no employee infections. Here's how the virus spreads and how contact tracing works to stop outbreaks. Hubris is the greatest danger in wealthy countries — a sort of smug assumption that advanced technologies and emergency-preparedness plans guarantee that Ebola and other germs will not spread. It was hubris that left Toronto’s top hospitals battling SARS in 2003, long after the virus was conquered in poorer Vietnam. It was hubris that led the World Health Assembly in 2013 to cut the WHO’s outbreak-response budget in favor of more programs to treat cancer and heart disease. And it is hubris that causes politicians to routinely slash public health budgets every time the microbes seem under control, only to cry out in desperation when a new epidemic appears. 2. Post-9/11 emergency preparedness has the United States ready to fight Ebola. In the years after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, and the anthrax mailings to political and military targets, the George W. Bush administration ordered a massive overhaul of bioterrorism preparedness. From the CDC and Defense Department down to rural community clinics, doctors, nurses, hospitals and rapid-response teams went through drills imagining the arrival of pandemics or terrorist bioattacks. Routines were put in place that supposedly prepared every health department in America for the arrival of a highly contagious disease. Military and health agencies were given billions of dollars to create rapid diagnostics, vaccines and cures for highly pathogenic organisms. On every list of biological organisms of concern was Ebola. So it is reasonable to assume that billions of dollars and countless exercises later, the United States is prepared. But most of the training — both military and civilian — imagined the biological equivalent of an attack, in which something evil is found; responders from police, fire and health departments swoop in wearing hazmat suits; and boom: The infected people are identified, isolated and treated, and the danger to


Malala Yousafzai says she yearns to be ‘normal,’ despite fame — and now Nobel

with widespread Pakistani social and religious mores, particularly in rural areas, that can stifle girls’ education, marry them off at an early age and keep them secluded in their homes. Here are 16 of the most famous winners of the Nobel Peace Prize — and when they won the award. Such tension between secular and religious rules remains barely muted in Pakistan. Officials of a Pakistani private school association have called Yousafzai a tool of the West whose views cloud the minds of Muslims. The group reiterated a ban on her autobiography, “I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban,” in its 40,000 member schools. On Friday, in Yousafzai’s home town of Mingora, several residents spoke proudly of how the Nobel win could transform the Swat district’s image to a peaceful one — but others were subdued, even fearful. “Some people are silent, as they don’t like her and her father, but others are quiet due to the possible threat from the militants,” said Aftab Ali, a 41-year-old businessman. After the Pakistani army routed the Taliban from Swat, Yousafzai’s identity became known. Wide media exposure put her life at risk; she openly traveled to and from the Khushal Girls School and College that her father founded. Going home after class on Oct. 9, 2012, she and two classmates were shot by a Taliban gunman. The attack raised a groundswell of admiration for her sacrifice. As her celebrity grew, her name was put forward last year for the Nobel Peace Prize. But the Nobel committee decided not to award it then, after weighing the impact of the prize on a teenager. “The committee took its time,” Geir Lundestad, director of the Norwegian Nobel Institute, said in a video interview posted on the official Nobel Prize YouTube Channel. “And the committee has been remarkably impressed. “But of course, it’s true, she’s a girl, she’s 17 years old,” he added, “and this will dramatically change her life, and we hope for the better.” Residents of children’s rights activist Malala Yousafzai's hometown in Swat, Pakistan, celebrated her becoming the youngest ever Nobel Peace Prize recipient. Divisive force Yousafzai has been embraced by Hollywood and even appeared on “The Daily Show.” Like pop stars, she is instantly recognizable by one name — Malala. Average teenager? Hardly. She spent her 16th birthday addressing the United Nations and her


Toronto Detectives Raced to Stop Virus

TORONTO, May 10 -- The disease investigator was anxious. A terrifying, invisible illness was spreading like a predator in the city. It was already days ahead of him, and the detective knew he had just hours to catch up with it before it killed again. But on this day in mid-March, Mark Bartlett had few clues to work with. Public health officials in Toronto had only recently begun to suspect that the disease here might be associated with the one that was already ravaging parts of Asia and had just been given a name: severe acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS. Bartlett and a health inspector, Henry Chong, both from Toronto Public Health, entered a suburban townhouse looking for clues to what killed one of its residents, a 78-year-old woman who had recently visited Hong Kong. They also were hunting for airline tickets or anything else that would indicate whether she had transported a deadly disease to Toronto on a jet from Hong Kong, where SARS cases were numerous, and who else might have been on that plane. Their search and those conducted by other public health officials around the city eventually led to the containment of SARS in Toronto, not by solving the scientific mystery surrounding the disease but by tracing the people who were carrying it. Old-fashioned, gumshoe detective work -- finding people and isolating them -- was instrumental in stopping the disease’s spread. Toronto had become the epicenter of the biggest outbreak of the virus outside Asia. Twenty-three people died in the city, more than 300 were infected -- half of them health care workers -- and 10,000 were quarantined. Before the danger was considered to have passed, public health investigators worked morning to night, interviewing hundreds of people, probing their faulty memories, backtracking, looking at diaries, using a police database, breaking into buildings -- following any lead that might reveal the path of the killer disease. “If we didn’t contain it, it had the potential to spread,” said Colin D’Cunha, Ontario’s commissioner of public health. “One simply could not predict the consequences of that. We had the opportunity to catch it in Toronto, and if we didn’t catch it, it had the potential to spread in North America.” In Toronto, where more than half the population was born elsewhere, public health officials thought they were prepared to deal with contagions brought from countries where infectious diseases have


What history tells us about hosting the Olympics

a massive, multibillion-dollar industry that can distort a local and even national economy. Hosting an Olympics invites influence-peddling, sweetheart deals, environmental damage, bad development, corruption and even human rights abuses (Beijing in 2008, Sochi in 2014, Brazil now). The shady deals uncovered for the $169 million Lake Placid games pale next to the scandal that sullied the $2 billion 2002 Salt Lake City Olympics: International Olympic Committee members took bribes from the local Olympic committee. The $55 billion 2014 Sochi Games were the most expensive and were considered the most corrupt. The history of ethical “challenges” in the District, Richmond and Annapolis does not bode well. ●The Olympics typically lose money, go way over budget and have no economic “legs.” Potential host cities often say the games will break even, bring permanent economic development and spur long-term job growth. But Olympics typically lose money at taxpayer expense and leave no long-term economic benefits. A 2012 Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology working paper analysis of Summer and Winter Olympics and World Cups found that economic benefits went to the construction and building materials industry up to three years before the event and disappeared a year after the games. The analysts conclude that, “contrary to the conventional claims by mega sports organizers, it appears that there are no significant long-run economic gains from hosting such mega sporting events.” Another 2012 study of the Olympic Games from 1960 to 2012 found they went over budget every time, by at least double. The University of Oxford researchers conclude that “to host the Olympic Games is to take on one of the most financially risky [types] of megaproject that exists, something that many cities and nations have learned to their peril.” A few Olympics have been profitable: Los Angeles (1984), Barcelona (1992) and Seoul (1998). The 2012 London Olympics were, too, but those were the third Olympics held there, and some venues were reused. The worst case is Athens (2004), where the Olympics helped bankrupt the country. ●Cities are rejecting the Olympics: Krakow, Poland; St. Moritz and Davos in Switzerland; Munich; Stockholm; and Oslo. Stockholm and St. Moritz officials said they couldn’t justify the cost. ●The Olympic “PR bump” is fantasy. Proponents say hosting an Olympics brings world attention, tourists and goodwill. Does Washington lack for name recognition? Are we short on tourists? And, like it or not, our city’s “brand” is set


Peace Prize recipient Kailash Satyarthi has long campaigned against child labor

Indian children’s rights activist Kailash Satyarthi spoke at the 2013 Global Conference on Child Labour. Satyarthi is the joint winner of the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize along with Taliban attack survivor Malala Yousafzai. NEW DELHI – His family hoped that he would cut back on child-trafficking raids when he turned 60, but just last month he directed the rescue of 23 children from a tiny basement factory in New Delhi. On Friday, the longtime advocate was sitting behind a desk at his small office in the capital when he learned from a journalist’s telephone call that he had won the Nobel Peace Prize. Satyarthi, the first Indian-born recipient of the honor, will share the award with Malala Yousafzai, the young Pakistani who became an education activist after the Taliban shot her on her way to school. Satyarthi said it was a “great honor” and a “happy moment” for India, as well as for the children he had long worked to save. In a brief interview, he called for the “globalization of human compassion.” “I am quite hopeful that this will help in giving greater visibility to the cause of children who are the most neglected and most deprived, and that this will also inspire the individuals, activists, governments, business houses and [corporations] to work hand-in-hand to fight it out,” he said. “The recognition of this issue will help in mobilizing bigger support for the cause.” News of the award set off a raucous celebration at Satyarthi’s Bachpan Bachao Andolan (Save the Childhood Movement) office and a ripple of national pride throughout India. Here are 16 of the most famous winners of the Nobel Peace Prize — and when they won the award. The joy was tempered by critics who said they resented the Nobel Prize committee lumping India’s honoree with Pakistan’s, as if the adversarial nations were parties in an arranged marriage. Yousafzai later said that she and Satyarthi had spoken by phone and agreed that they would invite their respective prime ministers to the awards ceremony in Oslo. Experts predicted that Satyarthi’s long-shot honor — he was chosen over favorites including Pope Francis — would probably focus attention not on geopolitical affairs but India’s still-endemic problem of child labor. In India, children are not allowed to work in industrial jobs or other hazardous fields, but an estimated 50 million still toil in industries that make fireworks, carpets, bangles and


American suicide bomber’s travels in U.S., Middle East went unmonitored

claims as exaggerated but have been unable to completely reconstruct his path. In videos and pictures released after his death, Abusalha is seen smiling and posing with a kitten. But the recordings also provide a glimpse into how he was groomed to commit suicide. He speaks reverently of the footage of other “martyrs” that he was shown by those overseeing his indoctrination, particularly one showing a “Russian sister of ours” who carried out a suicide attack in Afghanistan. “This video that I watched from the sister inspired and touched me,” Abusalha said, reciting a religious passage that she had spoken in her own suicide video promising paradise for “that person who has spilled his blood” for Allah. The FBI remained unaware of Abusalha’s radicalization and return to Syria until mid-December, when a source told the bureau about his plan to fight for al-Nusra. The bureau opened a full-blown investigation and added Abusalha to terrorism databases and, eventually, to the U.S. no-fly list. In May, in their final phone conversation, Abusalha’s mother told him to stay in Syria and find a wife. Later, she explained feeling trapped, according to family members. If he stayed in Syria, she knew that he could be killed in battle or captured and executed. But if she turned to the FBI, any prospect of her son returning home would probably also mean a prison term. Abusalha did not tell her that he had already committed himself to a different fate. Instead, he saved his farewell message to her for a video that would be released after his death. “Mother, I love you, mom,” he said. “Stay strong for Allah.” The camera follows the armored, explosive-laden truck until it disappears on the horizon. Moments later, an enormous explosion fills the frame. The family learned about Abusalha’s death when they saw the footage on news networks, and they were soon inundated by calls from reporters. The FBI arrived the next day and interviewed Abusalha’s mother for four hours. They also questioned Stewart, who was no longer welcome at the mosque in Fort Pierce, in Orlando. He later bragged to a friend that he got a free McDonald’s meal for agreeing to talk, and that “a huge burden has been lifted off me.” The government has assembled a chronology of Abusalha’s case, but U.S. officials acknowledge that parts of that timeline, particularly in Syria, remain blurred. Since then, other


Simple vote on legalizing marijuana in D.C. is not so simple

rules allow each grower’s crop to increase from 95 plants to 500 and greatly expand the list of chronic and serious conditions for which physicians can recommend marijuana. As a result, the fastest-growing categories of conditions for which Kahn’s clients seek relief are gunshot wounds and epilepsy. At $560 an ounce, Kahn’s Sativa Afghani is about a third more expensive than it would be on the black market, according to dealers. But many people “want to feel like law-abiding human beings,” Kahn said, and are willing to pay a premium for safe, homegrown pot. Still, although Kahn, 62, supports the initiative, he’s not sanguine about making the drug so easily available that people can get it without counseling on the right strains, dosages and forms of ingestion for their conditions. “It’s hard to imagine how marijuana could be safely used without some kind of educational program,” he said. “It’s not the kind of product any adult should be able to just buy off the shelf.” Legalization would help shift the supply chain toward local growers, Kahn said: “If you buy on the black market now, you’re not going to suffer major legal consequences, but you bought that from the Mexican cartel. A long, heavy chain of misery is attached to that half-ounce of marijuana.” Kahn has no illusions about the District becoming a landscape of storefront pot shops anytime soon. And he doubts that many people would grow their own even if it were legal to do so. “Growing marijuana is not the easiest thing to do, as I have learned,” he said. “It takes four months to grow, and it’s a lot of work.” As of Oct. 6, 1,362 D.C. residents had registered with the city Health Department to get medical marijuana. Many thousands more buy pot on the black market; about 14 percent of city residents have used marijuana in the past year, compared with 11 percent nationwide, according to federal surveys. Some buy on the street, and some have connections, such as a Northwest man in his 50s who has been selling in the District for 25 years. The man has mostly professional clients — lawyers, government contractors, lobbyists, journalists — who come by his home at appointed hours to make their purchases. He supports legalization and doesn’t worry about losing business if the trade goes legit. “It’s almost a pointless vote,” he said, “because Congress would


Washington area business diary for week of Oct. 3

Short takes on the week's announcements and deals. Expansions Southlake, Tex.-based Del Frisco’s Restaurant Group said it has opened a Del Frisco’s Grille at 11800 Grand Park Ave., North Bethesda, MD 20850. Reston-based WashingtonFirst Bank has opened a branch at 1356 Chain Bridge Rd., McLean VA 22101. New York-based fashion retailer Kate Spade & Co. has opened a Kate Spade Saturday store at 3061 M St. NW, Washington, DC 20007. Funding Herndon-based Exostar, a developer of business-to-business collaboration software, said it has received a $5 million investment from the Merck Global Health Innovation Fund. Moves Greenbelt-based real estate services company Bozzuto Group said it has moved its headquarters from 7850 Walker Dr., Suite 400, in Greenbelt to 6406 Ivy Ln., Suite 700, Greenbelt, MD 20770. Communications software contractor TWD & Associations said it has moved its headquarters from 2800 Shirlington Rd., Suite 400, to 1751 Pinnacle Dr., Suite 900, McLean, VA 22102. Public affairs firm DDC has moved its headquarters from 174 Waterfront St., Suite 500, in National Harbor to 805 15th St. NW, Suite 300, Washington, DC 20005. The firm also closed its office at 1250 I St. NW and moved those employees to the new headquarters. Start-ups & new businesses Lou Kerestesy — Compiled by Shawn Selby


Contracts awarded for the week of Oct. 13

21st Century Software 360 Patriot 4371 Elite Tech Group Accenture Accenture ACG Systems Affigent Affigent Agile Defense Airtec Airtec Akira Technologies Alion Science and Technology Alion Science and Technology Alliance Micro Altum Alvarez Associates Alvarez Associates American Systems American Truck Bus Arc Tech Athena Construction Group BAE BAE BAE BAE BAE BAE BAE BAE Bell Boeing Bell Boeing Berger Cummins Joint Venture Booz Allen Hamilton Brainscope Briefcase Systems Development Bytecubed Bytecubed C Services CACI CACI Calibre Systems Carahsoft Technology Carahsoft Technology Carahsoft Technology Chemonics International Chenega Decision Sciences CJW-Desbuild Joint Venture Clark Energy Group Clark Energy Group Clearing Computer Sciences Corp. Computer Sciences Corp. Concrete Services Corps Solutions Credence Management Solutions Dark Mountain Innovations Deloitte Consulting Development Alternatives Dextera Discount Tree Service Distributed Solutions Dowty Propellers DRS Technology Services Ecology Services Edifice Group Effective Communications Strategies Elzy Technology Emcor Government Services Executive Information Systems Exelis EYP FCN Federal Prison Industries Fedstore Fedstore First Division Consulting Fisher Bioservices Gallup GE Aviation Systems GE Aviation Systems General Dynamics Giant Oak Goldbelt Glacier Health Services Grunley Construction GXM Consulting Halfaker and Associates Halfaker and Associates Harris Information Technology Services Harris Information Technology Services Harris Information Technology Services Hewlett-Packard ICF Ideal Innovations I Impaq International Impaq International IMS Government Solutions InDyne Infolink Management Services Informatics Application Group Information Systems Worldwide Information Technology Solutions and Consulting Institute for Defense Analyses Integra Government Services Integrated Federal Solutions Integrated Technologies Group Integrity Applications International Business Machines Intralox Iron Bow Technologies Iron Brick Associates Jacobs Engineering Group JBS International John C. Grimberg Co. John C. Grimberg Co. John C. Grimberg Co. John C. Grimberg Co. Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory JTS CM Services Karcher Group Kennell Associates Landmark Technologies Leidos Leidos Leidos Leidos Leidos Leidos Lockheed Martin Longview International Mantech Engineering Mantech ManTech Manufacturing Engineering Systems Masslight Mayvin Consulting Group McKenna Principals McKenna Principals McKinsey Co. Medicomp Systems Medstar Health Research Institute Meltech Microtechnologies Millennium Millennium Mitre Mortgage Assistance and Acquisition Group Most Investments The National Disability Institute of the District won a contract worth up to $5.8 million from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau for education and training services. NCI Information Systems NCI Information Systems NCS Technologies Nexgen Communications Nexgen Communications Nisga’a Data Systems Noblis Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman Northrop Grumman NVE