Pope Francis is set to visit an Ireland where the Catholic Church is in steep decline

KNOCK, Ireland — The pilgrims still come, many on foot. The faithful still fill their plastic jugs with the healing holy water. The sick are anointed with oil. And by the thousands, they reach out to rub their rosary beads on the stone wall of the old chapel, where an apparition of the Virgin Mary appeared one stormy twilight in 1879, witnessed by 15 respectable residents of the village. Next Sunday, during a two-day visit to the country, Pope Francis will make his own pilgrimage to the Basilica Shrine of Our Lady of Knock, Queen of Ireland. He will see a modern-day complex with new youth and counseling centers, a museum and a hotel, surrounded by acres of manicured lawn, everything wired with fiber optics, WiFi and high-end acoustics for 21st-century supplicants. But Knock Shrine today is an island of faith in a sea of troubles for the Catholic Church in Ireland, which has seen its flock flee in droves and the authority of its once all-powerful clergy shaken — first as the country’s courts and legislature overturned bans on contraception, homosexuality and divorce and, more recently, in two stunning referendums. In 2015, Ireland became the world’s first country to approve same-sex marriage by popular ballot. In May, it swept aside one of the most restrictive abortion bans in the developed world in a landslide vote that marked its full emergence as a socially liberal state no longer obedient to Catholic dictates. Those two votes “illustrate how rapid Irish secularization has been — it has achieved in one generation what took centuries elsewhere,” said Crawford Gribben, professor of history at Queen’s University Belfast. In tandem with such dramatic social change, church attendance has withered. You can feel it on a Sunday morning in parishes across the country, where elderly priests presiding over rows of dusty pews distribute the Eucharist with shaky hands to a trickle of pensioners. Once the most Catholic country in Europe, Ireland is now a place where only about a third of adults attend church weekly, according to surveys. Irish Catholics have also been rattled by the explosive news from the United States, where a grand jury last week reported that hundreds of priest sexually abused 1,000 children in Pennsylvania. “You could say the church is at rock bottom,” said Richard Gibbons, the parish priest and rector of Knock Shrine. The sex abuse scandals “diminished our moral


The future of food: Scientists have found a fast and cheap way to edit your edibles’ DNA

risks. Such evaluations are needed, said Jennifer Kuzma, a professor of genetic engineering and society at North Carolina State University, to reassure consumers that gene-edited food is safe. Of particular concern is a type of genetic glitch called an off-target edit, or an inadvertent change to a plant’s DNA. These glitches occur both in the lab and in nature but rarely escape breeders’ notice, said Jeff Wolt, a recently retired professor of agronomy and toxicology at Iowa State University. If they did, however, the effects could prove dramatic: preventing growth, introducing allergens and toxins, or exposing the plant to disease. Plant researchers learned this the hard way in the late 1960s, when they developed a better frying potato that also inflicted severe nausea on anyone who ate it. “We need a mandatory regulatory process: not just for scientific reasons, but for consumer and public confidence,” Kuzma said. “I think the vast majority of gene-edited foods are going to be as safe as their conventionally bred counterparts. But I don’t buy into the argument that’s true all the time for every crop.” Consumer groups have also raised alarms over how gene- edited foods will be labeled. While Congress passed a law requiring food makers to disclose genetically modified ingredients in 2016, those rules will probably not apply to foods made with newer gene-editing techniques, said experts who had reviewed it. Calyxt has marketed its soybean oil to food-makers as “non-GMO,” citing the fact that it contains no foreign genetic material. But consumers are unlikely to accept this distinction, said Michael Hansen, a senior staff scientist at Consumers Union. Hansen argues that GMOs developed a negative reputation in part because biotech companies botched public outreach in the 1980s and 1990s. Should businesses repeat that mistake, he said, consumers will reject a promising technology. “I don’t understand why the companies don’t want to be labeled,” Hansen said. “Not labeling gives the impression that they have something to hide. And consumer acceptance will depend on that.” But the seeds of change are already — literally — in the ground. One hour south of Calyxt’s offices, the company’s gene-edited soybeans blanket a long, sloping hill on 62-year-old Bob Braun’s farm. Braun is one of 75 farmers growing Calyxt beans this season on 17,000 acres of farmland. By July, the plants are roughly knee-high and sporting pale lavender flowers. They are indistinguishable from the acres of


Reservations are finally making a comeback in D.C. But good luck trying to get a table.

make a reservation?” Consider the case of Elle, recently ranked by The Washington Post as the best new restaurant in the city. Getting a table there at prime time can be an impossible feat, even if you’re looking to dine on a Monday. Then there’s Fancy Radish, the new, raved-about vegetable-focused restaurant on H Street NE from the owners of Philadelphia’s Vedge and V Street. On April 23, the next available 7 p.m. reservation for two was two months and four days away. If you had your heart set on that time on a weekend, you’d have to wait 81 days — Friday, July 13. That’s a long time for the chance to dig into wood-roasted carrots or dan dan noodles. Ben Leventhal, CEO of the bookings service Resy, which handles the Dabney, Elle and dozens of other D.C. restaurants, sees the increase of customers who make reservations as a growing trend. “In casual dining, probably five years ago or more, you might have seen a restaurant that was 90 percent walk-ins,” he says. “Now that restaurant is 50 percent walk-ins.” Restaurateur Aaron Silverman has experimented with both concepts: walk-ins only and reservations only. He still considers his Rose’s Luxury, named the best new restaurant in America by Bon Appétit in 2014, a casual neighborhood spot, so reservations are taken only for groups of six or more. Everyone else has to get in line and wait. “Any night, literally anyone, no matter who you are, can score a table at 7:30 p.m. at Rose’s Luxury,” as long as they’re willing to show up early, he explains. Silverman’s second restaurant, Pineapple and Pearls, is a different animal: The four-star destination offers only a tasting menu, which costs $325 with alcohol pairings, and no walk-ins are accepted. That makes sense: At that price point, most diners aren’t dropping in on a whim. His newest arrival, Little Pearl on Capitol Hill, operates as a cafe by day and a wine bar by night. It’s a hybrid of casual and fine dining, Silverman says, and he commits about half of its seats to reservations, while leaving the rest for walk-ins. Ultimately, he admits, “there really is no perfect system.” Rose Previte — who owns Maydan and Compass Rose — agrees. She says some friends stopped going to Compass Rose, which doesn’t accept reservations, because they didn’t want to deal with potentially hours-long waits. (Parents


The Health 202: This Republican congressman released an ad touting his vote against Obamacare repeal. Yes, against.

But he said “it is unprecedented to ever see action" like the ones from drug manufacturers altering planned cost increases. “What we know is that manufacturers have come out and stated in some instances that they’re going to allow the blueprint to play out before they’re going to move forward with price increases,” he said. “We are tracking from the day of the launch of the blueprint and we do actually see a direct correlation to the reduction of prices to the blueprint.” — A new study has found that pregnant women who experience severe nausea and vomiting are more likely to use marijuana compared with women who don’t experience any symptoms. The research, which was published Monday in JAMA Internal Medicine, looked at data from more than 279,000 pregnant women from 2009 and 2016. It found that 5 percent of women overall who participated in the study had used marijuana while pregnant. But that rate jumped to 11 percent among women with severe nausea and vomiting and 8 percent among women with mild nausea and vomiting. But Stat News’s Megan Thielking reports the health impacts are not entirely clear. “Anecdotally, some patients — including pregnant women and people with cancer — have reported marijuana alleviates nausea,” she writes. “But the study didn’t determine whether pregnant women were using marijuana specifically to alleviate nausea and vomiting. It wasn’t designed to determine whether women used marijuana before or after they knew they were pregnant.” The research also only assessed women who were in the Kaiser Permanente Northern California health care system. — New York University’s move to provide free tuition for all medical school students may address a key question that arises in the growing conversation about single-payer health care. Vox’s Dylan Scott points out “And one concern about single-payer I’ve heard from doctors is regarding medical debt,” Dylan writes. “Yes, maybe they could live with a little less money. But the debts that many physicians leave school with are staggering: The median is $190,000. It could make life hard for a lot of people if they have to continue paying their loans while seeing their income cut. There could be a solution to this: Include free medical school tuition in a Medicare-for-all bill.” “An additional argument in its favor — aside from perhaps relieving some of the concern about provider payment cuts — is that free medical school for everyone


It’s time to tell students what they need to know

What’s the real value of a college education? For some people, that is calculated by the earning power that comes with a particular college degree. For others, it’s more about the satisfaction of a particular career, or about the social skills or intellectual rewards gained from the college experience. In every case, it is a life-altering decision with little data to inform it. Less data, in fact, than many other types of major long-term expenses and commitments, such as purchasing a home or buying a car. Prospective students and their parents deserve a better look at what they are signing on for, and they could get exactly that with either of two bipartisan bills in the Senate. The Wyden-Rubio Student Right to Know Before You Go Act and the College Transparency Act would require colleges to collect and share data about such things as college costs, post-graduation salaries, the percentage of students that go on to graduate school and how long it takes to graduate. The initiatives would give prospective students a great deal of information that could help many decide what college to attend. No one thinks that’s a bad idea, but many people — privacy advocates, congressional Republicans and private colleges — point out that the collection and dissemination of such student-level data could violate a ban written into the 2008 reauthorization of the Higher Education Act. Consequently, the bills have been stalled in the Senate, caught in the tension between two constituencies that mean well. One wants to improve consumer awareness and one wants to protect the privacy of individuals in an age when there isn’t much privacy left. It’s an increasingly familiar conflict between privacy and the public good, and because of a little-used cryptographic technology that has been used to solve similar clashes, it need not exist. Two years ago, well-meaning people in Boston wanted to know the pay disparity between women and men. The Boston Women’s Workforce Council recruited 69 employers, all of whom believed that publishing the difference in wages could help redress a long-standing social injustice, but none of whom wanted anyone else to see their payroll data. The effort, trapped in the same kind of limbo as the Senate bills, found a way out because of a complex algorithm conceived by theoretical mathematicians 30 years ago. Called secure multiparty computation, it could be used to answer questions about data from many


A year ago, a total solar eclipse captivated the nation. Here’s when it will happen next.

more patient. The next total solar eclipse to sweep across the Lower 48 will be on April 8, 2024. (It’s a Monday, so we recommend talking to your employer now to secure the day off.) It will begin over the Pacific, first passing through Mexico before tracing a path from Texas to Maine. This eclipse will be even more spectacular than last year’s. Why? The moon will be slightly closer to Earth, meaning it will appear just a bit bigger in the sky. Because of this, it will block the sun longer — creating a longer eclipse. It also means the umbra will be 110 miles wide vs. 70 miles wide last year. That will produce a slightly darker sky, with the 360 degrees sunrise closer to the horizon. The hues will be even more remarkable. Plus, the path can include more real estate! Some big-name cities will in the path, including Dallas, Little Rock, Indianapolis, Cleveland, Buffalo, Burlington, Vt., and Montreal. Even outside that list, 50 million people will be within a six-hour drive of the path, making this one of the most-accessible eclipses ever. In Texas, several cities will be skirted by totality, making it all the more important for folks to know exactly where they are in relation to the path. Take the Fort Worth Alliance Airport, for instance. The southern end of the runway will see about 10 seconds of totality. Just a few hundred feet away, the rest of the runway will only experience a partial eclipse. The same is true at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport. Likewise, if you live on Liberty Road in Aubrey, Tex., you’ll miss out. But walk to your neighbors on Bailey Lane, and you’ll be in luck. That’s how local the path of totality is, and why it’s so important to be within it. And if you’re at the Walmart off 410 in San Antonio, make sure to shop smart — the produce section is in totality, but the tire department isn’t. Even Niagara Falls will be in line for an amazing view just after 3:15 p.m. The luminous, milky-white tendrils of the solar corona will stretch overhead the falls, creating an otherworldly scene for just less than 3½ minutes. It truly will be “out of this world” — hence why it’s been my plan for many years to be married there on that day during totality. No stealing my idea!


The Washington Post to host summit on the future of spaceflight

On Friday, September 14, The Washington Post will bring together renowned scientists, key government officials, astronauts and other leaders in the space industry to examine the new “space race.” The “Transformers: Space” program will feature Chris Ferguson, Director of the Starliner Crew and Mission Systems at Boeing, who will make his fourth spaceflight when he and NASA astronauts take the new Boeing CST-100 Starliner commercial crew spacecraft to the International Space Station. Other speakers including NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine, former NASA Astronaut Leland Melvin, and Bill Nye, CEO of The Planetary Society will examine developments in research, technology, propulsion, design and mission planning as America takes a leading role in the future of spaceflight. Speakers include: More speakers to be announced. The program is produced in partnership with the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) and the Association of Space Explorers (ASE). This event is open to press and will be streamed on The Post’s site at wapo.st/transformersspace Media who wish to cover must RSVP. EVENT DETAILS Friday, September 14, 2018 9:00 AM – 11:00 AM (Doors open at 8:30 AM) The Washington Post Live Center 1301 K Street NW, Washington, DC 20071 Transformers: Space is produced with support from The University of Virginia


Dozens of companies compete for a piece of Va.’s limited medical marijuana market

had legalized marijuana for medicinal use, but only for a limited number of patients enrolled in a research study. Virginia’s law, meant to make marijuana available to patients with glaucoma and cancer, seemed far more sweeping. “My recollection was that no other state had done that,” said former congressman Rick Boucher (D-Va.), who was then a state senator and the chief sponsor of the bill. The medical marijuana measure, part of a broader package of legislation that eased first-offense penalties for possessing or growing small amounts of marijuana, drew little attention or controversy at the time. And it was soon forgotten, because it proved to be useless: It required patients to have a doctor’s prescription for marijuana, something doctors could not prescribe since it was illegal under federal law. The law drew attention nearly 20 years later, when Del. Robert G. Marshall (R-Prince William) led a repeal effort, but a Senate committee was persuaded to keep it on the books. As other states legalized medical if not recreational marijuana, Virginia resisted the trend. But law-and-order legislators started budging after a 2013 CNN documentary, “Weed,” showed the plight of a family seeking marijuana oil to control their daughter’s seizures. The program instantly reshaped the legalization argument into a family-values tear-jerker. Virginia legislators heard from a mother who had moved to Colorado so her daughter could obtain the oils there legally, leaving another daughter behind in Virginia until the strain on the family proved too much. In front of legislators at one hearing, a girl had a seizure. Even so, instead of legalizing the oil, Virginia lawmakers in 2015 passed a measure that would provide only an “affirmative defense” to shield epileptics and their guardians from prosecution. Provisions for producing the oils in-state had to be scrapped that year, forcing parents to rely on the black market or risk prosecution for buying the oils elsewhere and illegally transporting them across state lines. In the years since, the legislature has loosened the rules so that now the state is preparing for in-state production of the oils, authorized not just for epilepsy but for any medical condition that a doctor thinks can be helped. Patients will need a recommendation — rather than a prescription — from a physician, and both patient and doctor must register with the state. Jenn Michelle Pedini, executive director of Virginia NORML, said the commonwealth’s approach is among the strictest


After football death, U-Md. president faces crisis on ‘front porch’ of the university

A 19-year-old offensive lineman for the University of Maryland is dead after athletic trainers failed to give him proper treatment for heatstroke, officials acknowledge, during a spring workout. The state university system’s governing board has seized control of investigations into the football program. Restive alumni, faculty and students are expressing concern about a crisis in College Park. But U-Md. President Wallace D. Loh dismissed any questions about his job security as he confronts one of the most serious challenges of his eight-year tenure. “This is not about me,” Loh told The Washington Post in a telephone interview Monday. “As president, my job is to lead the institution. When there are difficult issues or easy issues, it’s my job to address them.” Jordan McNair’s death June 13 and subsequent allegations of a toxic and abusive atmosphere in the football program prompted Loh’s bosses to intervene. The University System of Maryland Board of Regents voted Friday to assume control of investigations that Loh had launched into the player’s death and the climate of the program. These developments have prompted calls for Loh’s exit from some quarters — including, on Monday, from U-Md. alumnus and retired professional football star Boomer Esiason. They also have rocked College Park days before students return for the fall term. “At this point, a lot of us are distressed,” said Christopher Walsh, a veteran professor of plant science. As chair of the University Senate, which represents faculty members and others, Walsh works closely with the administration. Loh has built a deep reservoir of support among state and local political leaders who value that U-Md. has maintained an international reputation as a research power and is drawing more interest than ever from potential students in and out of state. About 41,200 applied in 2017, up 18 percent in six years. The public university has raised $1.2 billion in private donations under Loh, including a record $219 million gift announced last year. Loh often refers to athletics as the “front porch of the university” — an element of campus life instantly recognizable to the public. But with the football program in crisis, Walsh said he feared “the university has lost its curb appeal.” Loh has taken several steps to address the matter. The university hired a sports-medicine consultant to review what happened to McNair and formed a commission with two retired judges and a former federal prosecutor to review the


Former students allege decades-old sexual abuse at Maryland private school

Parkinson’s disease, lives at an assisted-living facility in Massachusetts and requires round-the-clock care. A family member who serves as medical proxy said the disease causes hallucinations and makes it difficult for him to have a coherent conversation. “I believe you could interview him,” the family member said. “He’ll tell you something. I don’t know how much confidence I’d have whether it is true or not.” The Post reviewed a letter Perhonis wrote to Venton in 1976, which Venton said she kept partly because she feared him. “I hope you’ll come by at Thanksgiving and visit,” he wrote a month after she turned 18. “If you’re still interested in sleeping with me, I’ll be here — if not, I’ll still be here.” Venton said when she was a student she told a staff member — Paul Stoneham, who retired from Key in the past few years — about Perhonis, and Stoneham told her he already was aware of it. “He said, ‘I know, baby, I’ve got eyes,’ ” Venton said. Annie Applegarth, 58, said Stoneham “made a full-on aggressive attack” on her in 1977, when she was a junior, and “made every attempt to do a full-on aggressive rape.” Stoneham, who public records indicate is 70 or 71, did not respond to repeated phone calls and a letter sent to an address in Annapolis found in public records seeking comment. He also did not respond to a message left at an apartment in Annapolis where his name is listed on the directory. Applegarth also said two teachers exposed themselves to her at the school, including Dennard, who she said would sometimes “drop his pants” while bragging of his sexual exploits with other students. “Eric Dennard was a big proponent of showing how fabulous his penis was all the time,” she said. Applegarth said she reported the behavior to another teacher, but nothing was done. She said she was inspired to come forward after hearing the story of Larry Nassar, the former Michigan State University and USA Gymnastics physician who was accused by hundreds of women and girls and convicted of sexual assault last year. “Now I’m a 58-year-old woman who would like to hear, ‘I’m sorry,’ ” she said. Sarah Conway, 55, a former student, said she had sex with Dennard and a former female student, who also worked at the school, beginning in 1978 when she was 14. The arrangement,


The un-celebrity president: Jimmy Carter shuns riches, lives modestly in his Georgia hometown

proud of “keeping the peace and supporting human rights,” the Camp David accords that brokered peace between Israel and Egypt, and his work to normalize relations with China. In 2002, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts. “I always told the truth,” he says. Carter has been notably quiet about President Trump. But on this night, two years into Trump’s term, he’s not holding back. “I think he’s a disaster,” Carter says. “In human rights and taking care of people and treating people equal.” “The worst is that he is not telling the truth, and that just hurts everything,” Rosalynn says. Carter says his father taught him that truthfulness matters. He said that was reinforced at the U.S. Naval Academy, where he said students are expelled for telling even the smallest lie. “I think there’s been an attitude of ignorance toward the truth by President Trump,” he says. Carter says he thinks the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision has “changed our political system from a democracy to an oligarchy. Money is now preeminent. I mean, it’s just gone to hell now.” He says he believes that the nation’s “ethical and moral values” are still intact and that Americans eventually will “return to what’s right and what’s wrong, and what’s decent and what’s indecent, and what’s truthful and what’s lies.” But, he says, “I doubt if it happens in my lifetime.” On Church Street, Carter points out the mayor’s house with his left hand while he holds Rosalynn’s with his right. “My mother and father lived in that brick one,” he says, gesturing toward a small house across the street. “We use it as an office now.” “That’s Dr. Logan’s over here.” Every house has a story. Generations of them. Cracked birdbaths and rocking chairs on somebody’s great-grandmother’s porch. Carter knows them all. “Mr. Oscar Williams lived here; his family was my competitor in the warehouse business.” He points out the Plains United Methodist Church, where he spotted young Eleanor Rosalynn Smith one evening when he was home from the Naval Academy. He asked her out. They went to a movie, and the next morning he told his mother he was going to marry Rosalynn. “I didn’t know that for years,” she says with a smile. They are asked if there is anything they want but don’t have. “I can’t think of anything,” Carter says, turning to Rosalynn.


The Big Number: Most adults think marijuana can be good for health

Can marijuana be beneficial to your health? Most American adults — 81 percent — think so, according to new national survey results published online by Annals of Internal Medicine. The survey included responses from 9,003 adults considered a nationally representative sample. The believed benefits cited by the most people were managing pain (noted by 66 percent of participants), treating diseases such as multiple sclerosis and epilepsy (48 percent), and easing stress, anxiety and depression (47 percent). That said, 91 percent of respondents said they also believe that marijuana comes with risk, the most common being legal problems (cited by 52 percent), addiction (50 percent) and impaired memory (42 percent). The concern, though, is that people’s beliefs about the health benefits of marijuana are not necessarily in sync with accepted medical research, according to the experts who conducted the survey. For instance, they wrote, the effectiveness and safety of using marijuana to treat insomnia, anxiety and depression “have not been established, and possible harms exist.” They concluded that “the public may be underestimating [marijuana’s] long-term risks.” Because legalization of marijuana is spreading, with medicinal use now legal in 30 states and recreational use legal in nine, they stressed the need for additional research to more fully understand the health effects and safety of regular use of the drug. — Linda Searing


Arrests made in two D.C. homicides

including the killing of a woman whose body was found in the trunk of a burning car. Marcel Vines, 22, of Southeast was charged with first-degree murder while armed in the death of 23-year-old Kerrice Lewis of Hyattsville, who was found fatally shot Dec. 28, police said Wednesday. Lewis was found unresponsive inside a burning vehicle in an alley in the 800 block of Adrian Street SE, police said. She had been shot several times. In February, police arrested 23-year-old Ashton Briscoe in connection with Lewis’s death. They indicated at that time that they were looking for another suspect. Police on Tuesday announced a second arrest, in a homicide from April in the 3500 block of Georgia Avenue NW. Kevin Carter, 30, with no fixed address, was charged with first-degree murder in connection to the killing of Yusef Turner, 33. Turner, of Northwest, was found April 5 inside a business, police said. He had been beaten, they said, and he died the next day. On April 25, police arrested Keith Sweptson, 29, of Northeast and charged him with first-degree murder in Turner’s death. Police at that time released a photo of another suspect. — Michael Brice-Saddler VIRGINIA 17-year-old charged in fatal Pr. William crash Authorities have charged a 17-year-old in Virginia with reckless driving in a crash that killed a woman. Prince William County police said the crash occurred July 24 and injured Judy A. Isom, 67, of Centreville, who died 11 days later. Officials said they found that the teenager was at fault after crashing into the woman’s car at the intersection of Rollins Ford Road and Estate Manor Drive in Bristow. Police said the teenager, who was driving a 2018 Subaru Forrester, stopped at a stop sign and then hit Isom’s 2009 Chevrolet Malibu. Police did not release the teenager’s name. — Dana Hedgpeth Bomb threat closes Arlington Cemetery Arlington National Cemetery was evacuated for several hours Wednesday after a bomb threat. Officials at the famous Northern Virginia cemetery said that emergency services responded and that visitors and employees were evacuated from public areas and buildings about 9:30 a.m. The cemetery reopened by 3 p.m., said Barbara Lewandrowski, a spokeswoman. She said there were no reports of injuries and everyone was evacuated safely. The threat was made to the cemetery and not to a specific area of the 624-acre site. The threat remains under investigation. — Dana Hedgpeth


The silver bullet for student debt: Bankruptcy

were permitted to dispose of them with a Chapter 7 bankruptcy petition. That changed in 1978 when U.S. bankruptcy rules were overhauled. Defaults on student loans weren’t a significant problem — tuition was much lower then, and jobs awaited most graduates — and legislators simply decided that it was a bit much to expect the government to guarantee loans and then absorb the cost of bankruptcy. No one thought that we’d see anything like today’s student-debt levels or that bankruptcy rights for education loans would be desperately needed. In assessing 20 years of tuition increases, U.S. News & World Report found last year that tuition at national universities (defined as those with a full range of undergraduate majors and master’s and doctoral programs) spiked 157 percent for private institutions. At public national universities, out-of-state tuition and fees rose 194 percent, while in-state tuition and fees swelled 237 percent. Inflation across that period was 53 percent. As the cost of education mounted, so did the student debt load. Since 2006, the amount that Americans owe in education loans has tripled, to $1.53 trillion, according to the Federal Reserve. Once again, ill-advised government interventions played a role, including the 2005 Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act, which barred private student loans from protection, and the Affordable Care Act, which in 2010 largely made the government directly responsible for student loans. About 80 percent of student loans are owed to the feds. If many millennials have been radicalized, if they’ve given up on free markets, it’s hard to blame them. They’ve been slapped in the face by free markets in the form of the student-loan racket. What many young people need is relief from overwhelming debt burdens through bankruptcy. Private lenders would object, naturally, as would people who’ve struggled to pay off some or all of their student debt. Problems like that arise whenever a country transitions to a more efficient regime, but it shouldn’t get in the way of urgently needed reform. The U.S. deficit would increase if direct government loans were made dischargeable. But it’s not as though everyone would stop paying off student loans: Declaring bankruptcy comes at the price of damaged credit ratings and years of being unable to obtain loans or credit cards, or doing so at much higher interest rates. Most people who have jobs and are able to continue paying their loans would want to


What might Michael Cohen tell Robert Mueller?

Real estate deals, business arrangements, possibly other agreements with other individuals over the years. Cohen may be more knowledgeable about certain parts of Trump’s finances than Trump’s accountants or than is revealed in Trump’s tax returns. It’s hard to know. Remember, too, that Cohen’s testimony to Mueller would be important for another reason: It would add a new layer of understanding to a lot of what has been asserted by other witnesses. Cohen could describe his interactions with Trump before the Trump Tower meeting in a way that makes clear that other witnesses had lied to investigators from the FBI, giving them new leverage over those witnesses to try to get to the truth about what the campaign was up to. Or maybe Cohen knows something even more squarely in Mueller’s purview. Cohen is a prominent figure in the dossier of reports written by former British intelligence officer Christopher Steele, which was first published by BuzzFeed last year. This dossier has become a focal point of questions about Russian interference and any cooperation the Trump campaign may have provided. Trump’s defenders justifiably point out that the dossier is full of allegations for which there’s no outside evidence. It is, in short, a collection of things Steele heard from his sources meant to spur further investigation. In the context of this week’s developments, it’s worth walking through what Steele’s reports indicate about Cohen and the extent to which any of the assertions have been validated. Cohen, the reports claim, played “a key role in the secret TRUMP campaign/Kremlin relationship.” The documents allege that Cohen stepped into the role of primary liaison with Russia in August 2016 after Paul Manafort resigned from the campaign following new reports about his relationship with a pro-Russian politician in Ukraine. Cohen, a report from October reads, “was heavily engaged in a cover up and damage limitation operation in the attempt to prevent the full details of [Trump’s] relationship with Russia being exposed.” Per “a Kremlin insider” who spoke with Steele, Cohen met with “Kremlin representatives” in August or September of that year in Prague. That alleged meeting may have taken place at Rossotrudnichestvo, a Russian center for science and culture in the city. Attendees may have included Konstantin Kosachev, a member of the upper chamber of Russia’s legislature, and Oleg Solodukhin, who works for Rossotrudnichestvo. Steele’s reports indicate that the meeting was originally supposed to be


Russia keeps getting hit with sanctions. Do they make a difference?

MOSCOW — The West’s sanctions on Russia have morphed from pinpoint economic strikes into a years-long war of attrition. Washington has been leading the way this year, punishing Russia for actions in Syria, Ukraine and cyberspace, as well as for general “worldwide malign activity.” Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin has been building up his country’s economic defenses, putting a priority on long-term stability over policies that could spur growth. The upshot: Sanctions are already crippling Russia’s long-term economic prospects. But in the short term, it is far from certain that even the implementation of tougher measures could provoke a crisis severe enough to have a serious impact on Russian politics. “Sanctions haven’t broken the country’s macroeconomic stability,” said Alexandre Abramov, a finance specialist at Moscow’s Higher School of Economics. “But sanctions are cutting off the path to development. In terms of accelerating growth rates, enacting effective structural reforms — sanctions are sapping the country of these possibilities.” In recent months, the United States has slapped economic restrictions on Russian people or entities on at least six occasions — the targets including cyber contractors, Internet trolls, a Russian bank, business tycoons and a shipping agent in a Far Eastern port accused of servicing North Korean vessels. The latest move came Tuesday with sanctions against shipping companies accused of selling oil to North Korea. Fresh sanctions over the poisoning of a former Russian spy in England and a new sanctions bill being considered in the U.S. Congress could deliver an even more serious blow. All that comes on top of sanctions on sectors of Russia’s economy and on individuals that the Obama administration and the European Union put in place after the Ukraine crisis erupted in 2014. In all, the Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control lists 491 Russian people and entities, compared with 146 from China and 335 from Iran. The sanctions have stunted Russian economic growth and sapped the urban middle class of wealth and opportunity. But with unemployment low and inflation in check, the sanctions so far have done little to undermine the country’s fundamental economic stability. Now that even tougher measures seem all but inevitable, the government is hoarding its budget surplus and boosting its reserves to safeguard its economic stability. In the process, Putin is doubling down on a trade-off that seems likely to help him survive the near-term pain of sanctions while harming Russia’s economic


Britain’s foreign secretary calls on Europe to be more like Trump in dealing with Russia

“our British colleagues have pretty high self-esteem.” Despite Britain’s plans to leave the European Union, Lavrov said at a news conference in Sochi, it was “trying to dictate foreign policy to the E.U.” “Now it turns out that London wants to dictate foreign policy with regard to Russia to Washington, as well,” he said. The visit here by Hunt, who served for many years as Britain’s health minister, is his first since becoming foreign secretary in July. He replaced Boris Johnson, the Brexit hard-liner who resigned in anger over the soft, pro-business strategy pursued by Prime Minister Theresa May in leaving the European Union. In addition to punishment for the Salisbury attack, the Trump administration separately imposed two new sets of sanctions Tuesday against Russian companies related to North Korea and to Russian intelligence. The Treasury Department levied sanctions on two companies based in Vladivostok for using their Russia-flagged ships to conduct ship-to-ship transfers of oil to ships bound for North Korea. Such ship-to-ship transfers are prohibited under United Nations Security Council resolutions. The Treasury Department also targeted two companies that supplied underwater diving equipment to Russian government agencies, including the Federal Security Service (FSB), which has been under sanctions since 2016. Meanwhile, Sigal P. Mandelker, Treasury’s undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, told Congress that U.S. sanctions against Russia overall have had a significant impact on the Russian economy and blocked hundreds of millions of dollars in Russian assets in the United States. “Our efforts, taken together with our partners across the U.S. Government and around the world, are guided by a clear understanding of the threat Russia poses to the United States and to our friends and allies,” she said in remarks prepared for delivery to the Senate Banking Committee. “The breadth and brazenness of Russia’s malign conduct demands a firm and vigorous response,” Mandelker said. The administration has placed sanctions on 217 Russian-related people and companies since 2017, which she said included close Putin associates and a “veritable ‘who’s who’ of Russia’s most prominent companies.” The British call to continue and increase sanctions against Russia came a day after the software giant Microsoft uncovered fresh attempts by Russian hackers, with ties to the Russian military intelligence agency, to create fake websites to mimic two conservative Washington think tanks, the Hudson Institute and the International Republican Institute. Microsoft said the latest attempts were mounted by the same Russian


One man’s effort to make D.C.-area rooftops a little greener

the agency prepare for and respond to oil spills. He has also always loved cooking and, more recently, growing his own food. While working for the EPA and living in a rental house with a childhood best friend, he began planting vegetables in his backyard. Schneider remembers the day his hobby became something more. He was sitting on the balcony of a friend’s Navy Yard apartment after a Nationals game, looking out at the roof of a large office building, when he had an idea. “It was probably like 10,000 feet of just blank space, and I was like, ‘Well, that would be cool if we could do something with that roof, grow vegetables or something,’ ” Schneider said. So Rooftop Roots was born. Initially, the plan was to grow vegetables and give them to food banks. Over time, though, Schneider’s vision shifted. He also learned, through trial and error, what to do — and what not to do — when setting up a rooftop garden. Walking around the roof at Potomac Yard, one of the first community gardens he built, Schneider rattled off an inventory of past mistakes. Always make sure the roof is easily accessible on foot. Never build in a spot that doesn’t have water access. He said he has learned which plants do well on rooftops and which don’t. Rooftop Roots focuses on vegetables that grow to smaller sizes, meaning they need less soil depth, and permit multiple harvests. That list includes tomatoes, lettuce, herbs, peppers, okra, cucumbers, squash, green beans, beets, collards — and, this fall, it will expand to “kalettes,” a hybrid plant bred from kale and Brussels sprouts. His wife, who works at local farmers markets, discovered the crossover veggies at work and mentioned them to her husband. This is how it often goes, both say: Miller figures out what people are buying and tells Schneider, who grows it in his community gardens. The couple joke that they have a symbiotic relationship. In many ways, they are in sync: Both are drawn to brown earth and leafy green vegetables. Both want to spend their lives around vegetables. Both want more people to grow their own food. “We’re educating people that not everything comes from the grocery store and looks amazingly beautiful and is picture-perfect, but look, homegrown food — even if it sometimes has a few blemishes — tastes a million times better


Katie Ledecky visits Nationals Park during rare break from pool

After this current break, a two-week stretch that is nearly over, Katie Ledecky will not rest until she finishes competing in the 2020 Summer Olympics in Tokyo. So the five-time Olympic gold medalist has to fit a lot into this short time away from swimming. The Bethesda native has spent time with friends. She has hung out with family. She has spent time at the pool — of course — and she visited Nationals Park on Wednesday night. Ledecky, who recently wrapped up her first summer as a professional swimmer, was the centerpiece of the Nationals’ first Swim Night. Before Washington faced the Philadelphia Phillies, Ledecky walked to the mound with two young swimmers. Then Erin Gemmell, the daughter of Bruce Gemmell, Ledecky’s coach at Nation’s Capital Swim Club in Bethesda, threw out the first pitch with Ledecky at her side. The 21-year-old Ledecky waved to cheering fans, took selfies with others on the field and spent a few minutes discussing the summer behind her and the competition that lies ahead. “It hasn’t been too different,” Ledecky said of her transition from amateur athlete to pro. “Most of the summer was just training and competing. I had two big meets over the last month, so it was mainly just preparing for that and doing everything I could to compete well on the international stage. “Now I have a couple weeks here at home, so it’s fun to do things like this.” Next Ledecky heads back to Palo Alto, Calif., to train and take classes as a junior at Stanford. By turning pro, she forwent competing for the Cardinal this coming season. But she will continue to compete with herself and the expectations that await at the world championships in 2019 and the Olympics after that. With the addition of the women’s 1,500-meter race to the 2020 Olympics, Ledecky has another event to train for and conquer. “I’m obviously really happy it was added,” Ledecky said. “It was a long time coming, and it gives me another event and another challenge. It’s hard to swim both the 200 and the 1,500, so it’s a really good challenge for me every day in training to work on both the shorter events and the longer events, including an event that’s 700 meters longer than an 800, which is what it typically has been. I’m excited. I’m excited to have it on the international


Britain seeks to calm fears of ‘no-deal’ Brexit doomsday — and worries over BLTs, sperm donors and civil unrest

LONDON — No need to panic. Or maybe there is — just a little. Britain on Thursday offered a snapshot of a nation trying to come to grips with a possible “no-deal” exit from the European Union — meaning it would be cut loose without any prearranged pacts on trade, travel and security with its longtime partners. British officials have long promised this was unlikely, because it would introduce a mountain of costly red tape, tariffs and friction at the borders. But the government has now released its first “technical notices” on how British citizens and businesses might be wise to prepare for the country’s possible crash out of the E.U. next year without a divorce settlement in place. For weeks, there has been a string of doomsday scenarios in the British news media about what could happen if Prime Minister Theresa May’s negotiators fail to strike an agreement with Brussels. There has been speculation — floated by think tanks, business lobbies and hospital administrators — a “no-deal Brexit” could create total havoc. Imagine, they say, days-long traffic jams at the ferry ports and Euro-tunnel; empty shelves at the grocery markets; shortages of fuel and medicines; chaos at the airport immigration booths; and police locked out of cross-border databases about terror suspects. There have also been stories about a “sandwich famine” and the British Army — seriously — being deployed to suppress civil unrest. Last month, the British Sandwich Association warned a no-deal Brexit could affect the range of luncheon items on offer if it became harder to import out-of-season ingredients with a short shelf-life, like lettuce and tomatoes. It did not help matters that, on Thursday, the government itself also warned the 3,000 or so units of donor sperm from Denmark delivered to Britain each year might also be slowed down — as transports of human tissue and cells, in a no-deal scenario, would require new written agreements with the relevant E.U. licensed establishments. “Let me assure you that, contrary to one of the wilder claims, you will still be able to enjoy a BLT after Brexit, and there are no plans to deploy the army to maintain food supplies,” said Brexit Secretary Dominic Raab after the release of 148 pages in 25 advisories, the first tranche of 80 documents on a possible no-deal world. But Thursday’s advisories — even after being reportedly softened by the government — still


Eight bodies — two dismembered — found in streets of Cancun, Mexican officials say

Officials in Mexico said Tuesday that they discovered eight bodies in multiple locations across Cancun, a popular beach resort city — and magnet for American tourists — on the Yucatán Peninsula. At least one victim had been bound before being shot, while another was apparently killed while lying in a hammock, the Associated Press reported. Other victims were dumped on the streets, dismembered and stuffed into plastic bags, or left inside an abandoned taxi, according to the news agency. All the bodies were found outside the resort city’s beachside hotel zone, according to the AP. The grisly discoveries were at odds with Cancun’s reputation as a resort haven in the Mexican state of Quintana Roo, one that has typically been shielded from the violence that has plagued other parts of Mexico. The U.S. State Department on Wednesday issued an updated travel advisory for Mexico after news of the bodies was announced, advising travelers to “exercise increased caution in Mexico due to crime.” While other news outlets have reported that the travel advisory was issued because of the killings in Cancun, a State Department spokesman said Thursday that the updated advisory was related to a security alert by the U.S. Consulate in Ciudad Juárez, in a different state than Quintana Roo. A Level 2 travel advisory is in place specifically for Quintana Roo, and it cites an increase in homicide rates for the state compared with the same period in 2016. “While most of these homicides appeared to be targeted, criminal organization assassinations, turf battles between criminal groups have resulted in violent crime in areas frequented by U.S. citizens,” the advisory reads. “Shooting incidents injuring or killing bystanders have occurred.” It’s not the first time this year that a Mexican tourist destination has been shaken by reports of violence. Last month, five people were killed and three injured in a shootout that occurred after gunmen ambushed police in Cancun, the Associated Press reported. In March, the State Department closed its consular office in Playa del Carmen, another popular resort city on Mexico’s Caribbean coast, and issued a security alert for the city after receiving “credible information” about a threat. Nevertheless, Mexican officials insisted that Playa del Carmen was safe and that all tourism would continue as normal. Last month, an American tourist was killed by a stray bullet in Mexico City during a drive-by shooting. That shooting occurred when Tatiana Mirutenko


Is the Smithsonian’s Udvar-Hazy Center the better Air and Space Museum?

it brought a swift end to a war that would have cost even more lives had it continued. The nearby placard was also mute on these topics. That’s too bad, because just before the tour stopped by, I overheard British-accented children debating whether the bomb had killed a hundred people or a thousand. The tour group moved on to a corner of the museum where a dozen or so German World War II aircraft are parked. The sight of that sea of swastikas painted on airplane tails turned my blood to ice. (I’m Jewish, and my great-grandfather emigrated from Germany just before the war — though you don’t exactly need a personal connection to have a major emotional response to the Holocaust.) “The captured German stuff is really something else,” our guide said. He pointed out one technological marvel — the first jet bomber, an Arado Ar 234 B-2 Blitz. Then he moved his laser pointer to another, the Dornier Do 335 A-0 Pfeil, one of the fastest propeller-driven aircraft ever built. “With aircraft like this, why didn’t Germany win the air war?” our guide asked. “The answer is, they came along too late. They were running out of pilots. They were running out of fuel, and they had ‘quality control’ issues,” he said, making air quotes. The Nazis used slave labor to build the airplanes, and some concentration camp prisoners intentionally sabotaged the parts, our guide explained. Looking around the hangar, it suddenly dawned on me that most of these marvelous machines were built for killing or spying. In search of something more uplifting, I made my way to the spaceflight hangar, where I found my first tour group standing beside the space shuttle Discovery. “Discovery went 39 times into space and back,” the guide said, adding that, in its astonishing 30-year career, the shuttle made major contributions to science — for instance, putting the Hubble telescope into orbit in 1990, and delivering parts, crew members and scientific equipment to the International Space Station on several occasions. As I made the lengthy trip home from the museum, my mind buzzed with questions — about U.S. history, about the role of war in advancing technology, and about how ambitious scientific endeavors can be a rallying point for international cooperation. I guess that’s the hazard of visiting an incredible museum like Udvar-Hazy; it stays with you long after you’ve gone home.


D.C. rodent complaints are at an all-time high. How is the city handling all the rats?

seen a decrease in rodent activity. Brown, who has been killing rats in the District for three decades, has nine pest-control workers and four code enforcement officers in the division. The last time Brown said the division saw an increase in staff size was under Mayor Anthony A. Williams, who convened a rat summit in 1999 that was reportedly the first of its kind in the county. “We’re getting our shopping list today, and on Oct. 1, we’re going to start pushing buttons,” Brown said, noting the date of his department’s budget increase, as he strolled down an alley spotting rat burrows where his staff then sprayed rat poison. Advisory Neighborhood Commission member Barbara Rogers said she asked Brown to visit her largely residential Northeast neighborhood near the Maryland border because of the rats she and her neighbors see at night. “We’re not talking about small rats,” Rogers said. “We’re talking about big rats . . . We want to stay on top of this.” About five miles south of Rogers’s home, Colleen Gallopin was dealing with a rat problem so bad that she said “it got to the point of absurdity.” Gallopin, 39, who lives off the H Street corridor in Northeast, said rodents created a “rat highway” between their burrows in her neighbors’ backyards and the bustling H Street restaurants. “Every night before bed I would just sit and watch them run across back and forth, and I could count 50 or 60 in a night,” said Gallopin, the executive director of a healthcare nonprofit organization. She and her neighbors watched as their gardens were destroyed. She mostly stopped letting her young children play in the backyard. She called 311 twice, and inspectors arrived and treated her property, but to no avail. The rats continued to make their nightly trek through her backyard. She said the rat population seemed to decrease only after she and four other neighbors coordinated this summer to hire a private pest control company and worked with their Advisory Neighborhood Commission member to ensure restaurants improved their trash storage. “This is not an individual issue — we can’t address it house by house . . . and we need to think about it on a larger scale,” she said. “There will always be rats. I don’t have a problem with that. We share the city. But there needs to be a balance.” Aaron Steckelberg


New sanctions on Russia for nerve agent attack will go into effect Monday

risk more draconian actions that theoretically could lead anywhere from elimination of all U.S. commercial bank financing to the severing of diplomatic relations. Those are among the measures that are spelled out in the 1991 Chemical and Biological Weapons Control and Warfare Elimination Act. The State Department posted a notice Friday in the Federal Register outlining the measures. Russia has denied involvement in the March attack against Sergei Skripal, a former Russian spy living in Britain, and his daughter, Yulia. Both survived exposure to the Soviet-era nerve agent Novichok, although a British woman later died from exposure to residue of the toxin left on a perfume bottle. In prohibiting U.S. foreign assistance, defense sales and military financing, government credit, and national security-sensitive exports to Russia — all mandated in the legislation — the posted notice carves out exceptions for humanitarian aid and technology related to commercial air safety and space cooperation. It says that licenses for excepted exports will be approved on a case-by-case basis. Those restrictions and exceptions are already in place for most exports, under sanctions imposed for Russia’s activity in Ukraine and the annexation of Crimea, as well as interference in the 2016 U.S. election. U.S. Export-Import Bank activity in Russia has been under a formal hold because of Crimea. The administration has resisted a push by lawmakers for even more stringent sanctions, as President Trump has called for more cooperation with Russia on a range of foreign policy issues. But Trump, in an interview with Reuters this week, said he has no intention of lifting existing sanctions. White House national security adviser John Bolton said on a visit to Ukraine that “the sanctions remain in force and will remain in force until the required change in Russian behavior.” Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Friday that “all options are on the table” in terms of a response to the sanctions, according to the Interfax news agency. “Many have been saying that Russia should stop supplying the United States with rocket engines, aircraft titanium, and uranium concentrate. But that’s shooting ourselves in the foot,” he said. “We should get ready for the United States’ eventual decision to stop or significantly reduce its purchases of such Russian products. We should not jump the gun,” Ryabkov said. “There will be no rapid change for the better in any event, given the sentiment in the United States today.” karen.deyoung@washpost.com


A decorated soldier’s immigration status forced her out of the Army. Now, she’s being sworn in as a citizen.

5. Last week, Sea and her legal team learned the government had accepted the veteran’s naturalization application. She will be sworn in Friday in Los Angeles. And although her own status has now been resolved, she told The Post it’s bittersweet. Dozens of other foreign-born service members who were promised a path to citizenship have been discharged or had their status frozen in recent months — part of what critics call a move by the Trump administration to sideline immigrants within the military. “It really sucks that there are other soldiers like me going through this situation,” Sea said this week. As The Post reported Under MAVNI, “lawfully present” noncitizens were promised a path to citizenship through military enlistment. Sea became an Army health-care specialist, flourishing in the service both stateside and in a posting in South Korea, where she worked as an ambulance aid driver and pharmacy technician. “SPC Sea has the drive and professionalism needed to bring the U.S. Army to new heights,” a supervisor wrote in a character assessment. “She represents the best that the Army has to offer: a smart, agile young leader capable of handling immense challenges with marked success.” Despite Sea’s success in the service, roadblocks emerged in her application for citizenship. Her initial 2014 application was denied when officials discovered a fraudulent document in her initial F-1 student visa. The error stemmed from the school where she had obtained the paperwork. Called the Neo-America Language School, at the time Sea obtained her visa, the establishment was listed as an approved program by ICE. In reality, the school’s owner was rubber-stamping visas with the help of a corrupt U.S. Customs and Border Protection agent (both were later indicted by federal authorities). In Sea’s case, a date had been changed regarding when she originally entered the country. Sea claimed she did not realize the bad information was in her application, but when she reapplied through MAVNI, her second application remained in limbo, forcing Sea to file a lawsuit against the government this summer to act on her citizenship request. Following the lawsuit, Sea was informed she would be honorably discharged from the service after more than four years in the military. She did not want to leave. The military was going to be her career. “Her application had been pending for over two years, and they provided no justification for why it was pending that


Are protests in Africa politically or economically motivated? This new book has answers.

African Politics Summer Reading Spectacular: “Political Protest in Contemporary Africa,” by Lisa Mueller, a political scientist at Macalester College. Mueller was in Malawi in 2011 when students at the University of Malawi were protesting the government of Bingu wa Mutharika, which had harassed Blessings Chinsinga, a professor of political and administrative studies, after he taught about the Arab Spring in one of his courses. Mueller writes about an August 2011 protest that she observed as it unfolded. Mueller’s study of protests in Africa shows that there are two forces driving them: political grievances among the middle class and material grievances among the poor. Mueller argues that political grievances largely determine when protests will occur, while material grievances largely explain who is likely to participate in the protests. Mueller uses military analogies, likening the middle class to the “generals of the revolution” and the poor as the “foot soldiers of the revolution.” To make her case, Mueller draws on Afrobarometer survey data collected in 31 African countries and interviews she conducted with protest leaders in Malawi, Senegal, Burkina Faso and Niger, as well as citizen surveys she collected in urban Niger. Her analysis also draws on historical documents, secondary interviews and protest leaders’ public statements from across Africa south of the Sahara. Her original data best capture the interesting divergence in ideology in protest coalitions. Her chapter examining protests in Niger shows that while protest spokespeople and the international media framed the 2009-2010 uprisings in Niger as a defense of constitutional democracy, Mueller’s survey of urban Nigerians showed that economic grievances (rather than dissatisfaction with the president) had a stronger relationship with Nigerians’ decisions to protest. The divergent motivations for African protests are also evident in a protest slogan’s evolution in Senegal in 2011. Originally, activists from the M23 movement rallied for people to take to the streets with the slogan, “Don’t touch my constitution.” (Then-president Abdoulaye Wade was seeking changes in Senegal’s Constitution to keep his grip on power; he lost his reelection bid in 2012.) But as M23 sympathizers protested in Dakar by burning flammable objects, they singed wooden stalls of street vendors, aborting M23’s coalition with the poor. Street vendors recast the battle cry to “Don’t touch my table!” Mueller takes a fresh approach to studying protests. Her primary goal is not to explain variation in protest frequency or protest participation (though her book still teaches us quite


This weekend’s Sturgeon Moon is the last full moon of summer

The warm evenings and nights are a big part of summer’s magic. Although we would always suggest you gaze skyward as often as possible, this weekend is an especially good time to so do. The weekend’s Sturgeon Moon is the final full moon of summer. “The August full moon is often called the Sturgeon Moon, according to the Old Farmer’s Almanac, because sturgeon (a type of fish) are more easily caught in August and early September,” Jesse Emspak writes at Space.com. While this year’s Sturgeon Moon is technically full at 7:58 a.m. Sunday, after sunrise on the East Coast, both Saturday night and Sunday night will feature 99 percent or greater illumination. Even Friday evening, the moon will be nearly full as it rises shortly after 7 in the east-southeastern sky. You’ll continue to want to look to the east-southeast in the nights to come. Moonrise will be about a half-hour later each night this weekend, which translates to 7:39 p.m. Saturday in the Washington area and 8:11 p.m. Sunday. The proximity of moonrise and sunset, just before 8, promises great opportunities to catch both celestial events in short order. The sunrise-moonrise coupling coincides with what’s known as the “blue hour,” when the soft light makes for a great time for photography. This year’s Sturgeon Moon aligns nicely with the planetary party that is now ongoing. Shortly after sunset, you can catch the nearly full moon teamed up with Mars, Saturn, Jupiter and Venus stretching across the southern horizon. Most of the country should pick up an opportunity to peep the moon at some point in the nights ahead. The cloudiest regions for Saturday and Sunday night are in the central and northwestern parts of the Lower 48. Other places might not get two totally clear nights, but they should at least get part of one clear night. In the Washington area, both nights should offer some clearing. The cloudier of the two may be Saturday night. Temperatures will be on the cool side for a summer Saturday night, dipping to the 60s for lows. It will be slightly milder Sunday evening and night. Both will be more than comfortable. The only thing left to do is look up once the day is done. See you out there!


Explaining the seemingly inexplicable

According to “Simple experiment, profound meaning,” Margaret Wertheim’s Aug. 12 Book World review of “Through Two Doors at Once,” by Anil Ananthaswamy, the quantum world is “even stranger, more intractable, and more of an assault on common sense than hitherto imagined.” Yet there is a simple solution called quantum field theory, as formulated by Julian Schwinger (not Richard Feynman), that describes a world made of fields and only fields. In quantum field theory, what we call “particles” are really units of field called quanta, and fields are perfectly capable of passing through both slits at once and then, like a particle, collapsing into an atom in the detector. Despite the efforts of physicists such as Nobel laureates Frank Wilczek (“evidently, Nature has taken the opportunity to keep things relatively simple by using fields”) and Steven Weinberg (“the basic ingredients of nature are fields; particles are derivative phenomena”), Art Hobson (“there are no particles, there are only fields”), and Schwinger (six papers on “The Theory of Quantized Fields”), this wonderful theory is mostly ignored or forgotten. I call this a physics tragedy. As I wrote in my book “Fields of Color,” “perhaps one day the physics community will finally abandon the [quantum mechanics] ship made of particles floating on a sea of paradox for smoother sailing on the seas of quantum fields.” Rodney Brooks


The change agents bringing tradition-bound NASA into the future

NASA reached out to industry for suggestions, said Mike Gold, vice president of regulatory at Maxar Technologies, one of the companies to study the power and propulsion module. “Load and go is just another example of an evolution that is occurring across the agency where we are seeing NASA embrace commercial practices and commercial experience in a wide variety of programs,” he said. A new approach to fuel For years, the thinking was that you fuel the rocket, make sure it’s stable and then allow the astronauts on board. That would limit their exposure to a disaster. That’s how the space shuttle program did it. And that’s how Boeing, which also has the contract to fly astronauts for NASA, plans to fuel its rocket. But SpaceX likes to do things differently. To get more power out of its Falcon 9 rockets, it chills its propellants, liquid oxygen and refined kerosene, to extremely low temperatures. As a result, they become denser, allowing SpaceX to pack more fuel into its rockets, giving them more performance. But because the fuel is so cold, it can warm up quickly, which is why it needs to be loaded at the last minute. The company, which has never flown humans to space before, says that safety is its top priority and notes that the Falcon 9 also comes with an escape system that would allow the Dragon spacecraft to quickly fly away from the rocket booster in the event of an emergency on the pad or during flight. “We would never have proposed it had we thought that it was a less safe way to go,” Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX’s president and chief operating officer, told reporters this month. “The vehicle has more margin when we load the fuel quite close to liftoff.” She added that the astronauts are “protected by the launch escape system. They’re protected by the heat shield between Dragon and the rocket.” Since its rocket exploded while being fueled in 2016, the company has notched 33 successful launches in a row using this fueling technique and has completed dozens more engine test fires. In a statement, Kathy Lueders, the manager of NASA’s commercial crew program, said the agency decided to go along with SpaceX’s plan after conducting “an extensive review of the SpaceX ground operations, launch vehicle design, escape systems and operational history. Safety for our personnel was the driver for this analysis,


The U.S. is overly paranoid about China’s tech rise

one of the largest pools of STEM graduates in the world. The devotion of significant resources to research and development and human capital has in turn enabled China to reap some of the early fruits of innovation. China now tops the world in new patent filings. As the first country to receive more than 1 million patent applications in a single year — a record the World Intellectual Property Organization said reflected “extraordinary” levels of innovation — China accounts for almost 40 percent of the global total and more than that of the United States, Japan and South Korea combined. China has also significantly boosted venture capital investment, which supports the commercialization of emerging technologies. While the United States attracts the most investment worldwide (nearly $70 billion), venture capital investment in China rose from approximately $3 billion in 2013 to $34 billion in 2016, climbing from 5 percent to 27 percent of the global share — the fastest increase of any economy. China’s start-up ecosystem is both vast and vibrant; it has successfully incubated more tech unicorns than any other country except the United States. Too often, U.S. critics claim that Chinese industrial policies like Made in China 2025 are behind the country’s ascendancy in tech. In fact, virtually none of China’s leading tech firms, such as Alibaba, Baidu and Tencent, are state-owned or meaningful beneficiaries of state support. They are all founded and led by smart and risk-taking private entrepreneurs, just like their Silicon Valley brethren. Tellingly, many Chinese tech start-ups have received U.S. venture financing. And Chinese technology companies and venture firms have made significant investments in U.S. start-ups. Sadly, the virtuous two-way venture capital flows are now in jeopardy because of Washington’s growing paranoia about China. As impressive as China’s innovation and progress may be, however, it is premature to declare that China has caught up with the U.S. tech industry. Interventionist government bureaucracy, stodgy state-owned enterprises, a rigid school system and — above all — harsh restrictions on individual freedoms continue to stifle independent thinking and creativity and constrain China from realizing its full innovation potential. While China is well positioned to succeed in “strategic” industries such as semiconductors, pharmaceuticals and commercial aircraft due to its vast pool of engineering talent and the size of its domestic market, so far it has remained a laggard. China has failed to develop an indigenous chip industry despite a


Did the Myanmar military plan its ethnic cleansing of the Rohingya in advance?

maintains, local Rohingya burned down their own homes and faked evidence of atrocities against themselves in order to vilify the troops and turn world opinion against the government. As you might have guessed by now, there’s just one problem with this story: It isn’t true. Over the past year, a number of independent observers have accumulated overwhelming evidence that the assault on the Rohingya was fully premeditated, an “orchestrated campaign” carefully planned in advance. In September, in the midst of the operation, Myanmar military chief Min Aung Hlaing publicly referred to the embattled Rohingya as a “problem,” “a long-standing one which has become an unfinished job” — a job, it seems, that he and his fellow officers were determined to complete once and for all. Why is this important? Because human rights law treats premeditation as a crucial element in the definition of genocide — a word that even usually cautious United Nations officials soon found themselves using as the campaign proceeded throughout the fall of 2017. As a human rights lawyer who has spent years working in Myanmar, I’ve had many occasions to witness firsthand the discrimination and hatred that the Rohingya have long been forced to endure. Even though most of them have lived in Myanmar for generations, members of the overwhelmingly Muslim group have been purposefully vilified by the Myanmar government and other members of the Buddhist majority as illegal immigrants from neighboring Bangladesh. For the past four decades the Myanmar government has denied the Rohingya citizenship, basic civil rights (including freedom of movement) and even the right to choose what they should be called. Now, it seems, the Myanmar military had decided to “finish” the job of excluding the Rohingya from national life for good. Reuters journalists have since provided one of the most thorough accounts of the military’s advance preparations for its effort to drive the Rohingya out of Myanmar. The reporters obtained evidence that the military had already deployed its most brutal infantry divisions across the region by August 10 — well before the insurgent attacks. The units sent had already earned dark reputations for their ruthless counter-insurgency campaigns against other ethnic minorities. The journalists detailed the disturbingly raw ethnic hatred of the brigades’ troops: “Crush the [Rohingya], buddy,” one soldier’s friend wrote. “Will do,” the soldier replied. The dramatic military influx “stoked fear and tension across a volatile region,” the journalists noted. In


Possible measles exposure in Loudoun County, Va.

Health officials in Loudoun County, Va. warned Friday night that people may have been exposed to measles at two spots in the county on two days this month. According to the county health department the warning was issued out of an abundance of caution. They said they were making a coordinated effort to identify anyone who may have been exposed. In their announcement, the health officials listed the following sites and times where exposure to an infected person may have occurred. Inova Medical Center at 205 Hirst Road, Purcellville, VA, on Friday, August 17, 2018, from 8:00 to 11:30 a.m. 2 Riverbend Building at 44084 Riverside Parkway, Lansdowne, VA, on Monday, August 20, 2018, from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. Describing the illness as highly contagious, the officials said measles is spread through coughing, sneezing, and contact with secretions from the nose, mouth, and throat of an infected individual. In the present incidents, people might develop symptoms as late as Sept. 10. Infection symptoms begin with fever, watery eyes, runny nose and coughing. Later a rash spreads over the body. Those who have been vaccinated have a “very low” risk of infection, the health department said. But it said those who never received the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine “may be” at risk of infection. Unvaccinated residents who think they may have been exposed to measles at these two locations on the occasions indicated, on the dates and during the time frames indicated, were asked to call 703-771-5512 and leave contact information . The health department said it would follow up. Martin.Weil@washpost.com


Paul Manafort’s trial in D.C. to take 3 weeks, probe Ukraine lobbying world

House counsel Gregory Craig, who this year left his job as of counsel at the law firm Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. The exhibit list also mentions items citing “OVD” and “Oleg,” which appear to be references to Oleg Deripaska, an aluminum magnate and ally to Russian President Vladimir Putin who employed Manafort as an investment consultant. The list also appears to refer to many of the purchases of high-end clothing and consumer electronics that were discussed in the Virginia trial as prosecutors there laid out their case about Manafort’s income and wire transfers from foreign accounts. For the trial in Washington, the government said it expected to complete its work in 10 to 12 trial days — similar to the 12 days of testimony it presented in Alexandria — and to use three of the same expert witnesses: two FBI forensic accountants and an Internal Revenue Service agent. A list of all witnesses who might be called was not part of the filing Friday. Manafort’s attorneys did not commit to put on a defense but told the court that if they did, their presentation could take three or four days. Mueller’s prosecutors, led by Andrew Weissmann, wrote, “The government hereby gives notice as required” that in the unlikely case Manafort reverses himself and decides to testify in his Washington trial, “the government intends to offer for purpose of impeachment the defendant’s prior convictions in the case United States v. Manafort.” Manafort’s defense said it had not had time to review the government’s exhibits, reserved its objections to all of them and declined to agree to 23 proposed joint “stipulations” of undisputed facts that could be presented to a jury without argument, including some to which both sides agreed in Alexandria. “At this time, there are no agreed upon stipulations,” wrote Manafort’s defense, which is led by Kevin M. Downing. U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III declared a mistrial on the 10 remaining charges in Manafort’s trial in Alexandria and gave the government until Aug. 29 to decide whether to retry Manafort. A juror who spoke publicly after the Virginia verdict said that all but one of the jurors wanted to convict Manafort on all of the 18 charges he faced. Manafort opted to face trials in two jurisdictions on charges brought by the special counsel rather than consolidate the bank- and tax-fraud case into the District case. spencer.hsu@washpost.com


Ethiopia’s reforming prime minister runs into a roadblock of ethnic unrest

Fresh off a successful U.S. tour and a string of daring political reforms at home, Ethiopia’s youthful new prime minister is riding a wave of popularity in this strategic East African nation, the continent’s second-largest. At the same time, however, the country has been racked by new outbreaks of ethnic unrest, with aid agencies reporting more than a million people driven from their homes just this year, mostly by violent conflict. Seeking to safeguard his efforts to transform the once-authoritarian nation, Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed, 42, has departed from his usual rhetoric of love and reconciliation to insist that security is a top priority. “There are groups that are working in unison to cause chaos in different parts of the country,” Abiy told reporters Saturday. “They are triggering peoples’ emotions to this end.” Last week, days after Abiy spoke of the rule of law as “the glue and foundation” of social harmony, 300 people were arrested in Ethiopia’s Southern regional state for taking part in violence and 500 more in the Oromia region. It was three years of anti-government protests spearheaded by the Oromo people, Ethiopia’s biggest ethnic group, that helped bring Abiy, an Oromo, to power in April after his predecessor resigned. The protests stopped, but they have been replaced this summer by clashes between groups looking to settle age-old disputes about land. The most serious took place in the south between the Gedeo people and the Guji Oromo, precipitating massive displacement. July also saw clashes between Muslims and Christians in the Bale area of Oromia and mob attacks on ethnic minorities including Tigrayans and Somalis. This month, a man was lynched in the Oromo town of Shashemene by a mob convinced he was carrying a bomb. Then there was the grenade tossed at Abiy during a June 23 rally and the possible assassination July 26 of the project manager of the landmark dam Ethiopia is building on the Nile River. Visiting Republican Rep. Christopher H. Smith of New Jersey, who has been critical of Ethiopia’s rights record, said the United States must support the country during this period. “It’s breathtaking what’s happening here. It’s got to be sustained,” he said Thursday in Addis Ababa. “We have to make sure a flare-up, even a serious one with large loss of life, doesn’t become an undoing of a trajectory that I think will lead to peace and reconciliation.” Ethiopia is


Caught in crossfire, attorney calls Maryland athletics a ‘dysfunctional viper pit’

the program in the wake of Jordan McNair’s death stemming from a team workout and media reports that suggest coaches fostered an abusive, unhealthy culture. On Friday afternoon, the school announced the commission would include former Maryland governor Robert Ehrlich; Redskins vice president of player personnel Doug Williams; former congressman and Maryland basketball star Tom McMillen; alumnus and sports broadcaster Bonnie Bernstein; and Frederick Azar, the chief of staff at Campbell Clinic Orthopaedics in Memphis. The sexual assault allegation, which led to the expulsion of a football player, according to three people familiar with the case, predates McNair’s death and the recent allegations surrounding the program. “The University System of Maryland (USM) is committed to investigating and resolving all allegations of sexual misconduct in a timely, thorough and impartial manner,” a spokesman for the University System of Maryland said in a statement Friday evening. “The information related to these distressing and unacceptable events will certainly inform the work of the commission created to investigate the culture of the University of Maryland, College Park football program, and ultimately any steps the Board of Regents determine are necessary as a result.” The commission has no stated timetable to wrap up its probe, and if Jackson’s comments are any indication, the panel will have plenty to sift through. Jackson told The Post that he has worked with Maryland athletes for the past three years on issues related to eligibility. He was handling a case involving a Maryland basketball player when he was contacted last summer and hired to represent two football players accused of sexual assault. He was eventually paid $15,000 for his work on the case before he was told his services were no longer needed. A school spokesman said the money came from Anderson’s discretionary account with the University of Maryland College Park Foundation. “I did my job,” Jackson wrote on Facebook, “represented Maryland student-athletes well and strongly resent being pulled into an administrative civil war. In over two decades, I have never worked in a more uncomfortable, chaotic and unstable environment in a collegiate athletic department. “Every employee seemed to [figuratively] carry daggers that they were prepared to thrust into the backs of their co-workers,” he continued. “University of Maryland student-athletes deserve better.” School officials were quick to dismiss and rebut Jackson’s criticisms. “This viewpoint, expressed by someone who has not worked with the Athletics Department since 2017, doesn’t represent


Four decades since the last papal visit, a very different Ireland greets a very different pontiff

When Pope John Paul II landed in Ireland in September 1979, he stepped off his Aer Lingus flight and bent down to kiss the ground. An Irish national news broadcaster said at the time that children were cheering so loudly, they drowned out the sound of the plane’s roaring engines. “The older people, some of them carrying babies, holding them up so that they can whisper in their ears, when they in turn are old, they can say to their children they were here on this day,” the RTE broadcaster said. The pontiff’s brief visit to the island was one of the largest gatherings in Ireland’s history: Some 2.7 million people came out to see him, lining the streets to watch him pass and later cramming into Dublin’s Phoenix Park, where he performed Mass for more than 1 million people. Diarmaid Ferriter, a professor at University College Dublin, called it a “massive national mobilization.” Rob Savage, a professor at Boston College, said Pope John Paul II was like “a rock star.” “That’s how Ireland saw that pope,” he said. On Saturday, almost 40 years since the last papal visit, Pope Francis will greet a vastly changed country. Pope John Paul II’s arrival in 1979 came at a fraught time for Ireland. The predominantly Catholic country was deeply affected by the dark period known as the Troubles, a decades-long conflict in Northern Ireland that ultimately left at least 3,600 dead. Around a month before the pope landed, the Irish Republican Army bombed Lord Louis Mountbatten’s boat, killing him and one of his grandsons. He was Queen Elizabeth II’s cousin, and that same day, a separate IRA bombing killed 18 British troops in Warrenpoint, Northern Ireland. Pope John Paul II’s visit to Ireland came early during his time as the leader of the Catholic Church, at a moment when much international attention on the country had to do with the unabated conflict. For some, the pope’s visit may have offered a momentary reprieve from so much negative coverage. “This was the world looking in while he was there for a reason other than us shooting each other in Northern Ireland,” said Anne Dolan, a professor at Trinity College, Dublin. The pope initially planned to visit Northern Ireland on the same trip but security concerns held him back. He made it only as far as Killineer, close to Drogheda near the border. He


D.C. police arrest suspect in fatal shooting of child, have warrant for another

Police have arrested one of four suspected gunmen in the fatal shooting of 10-year-old Makiyah Wilson, who died in a barrage of 70 bullets fired into a courtyard as she went to buy ice cream, the District’s police chief and mayor announced Saturday. The person arrested was identified as Qujuan Thomas, 20, of Southeast. He was charged with first-degree murder while armed and is expected to make his first court appearance on Monday. Authorities said they have identified a second suspect in the case — Quentin Michals, 21, of Southeast — and have issued a warrant for his arrest on a first-degree murder charge. Makiyah’s mother, Donnetta Wilson, said she learned of the arrest on the same day she participated in a walk in her daughter’s honor. “I’m glad that they are working on it,” she said of the investigation. “Now that some progress is being made, it just comforts me a little more.” Saturday’s arrest was the first break in the case, and it came weeks after the District’s police chief and mayor asked for help from the public and increased a reward to $45,000 for information in the killing. The shooting occurred about 8 p.m. on July 16 in the 300 block of 53rd Street NE, in Clay Terrace. At the time Makiyah was killed, Thomas was on two years’ probation after pleading guilty in December to being part of an armed robbery of a man in Southeast, online court records show. He received a suspended sentence and was credited with the roughly five months he had served awaiting trial before being released on probation, the court records show. In May, he was arrested in Prince George’s County on drug charges and released on bail, according to the records. That county arrest prompted a June hearing to review his D.C. probation, but it was postponed until Sept. 7 because Thomas’s Maryland case was ongoing, court files show. Attorneys representing Thomas in the District and in the Maryland cases could not be reached on Saturday. Family members of Thomas also could not be immediately located Saturday. Police have not divulged a motive but said they are investigating a neighborhood dispute. A video of the shooting released by police shows four masked gunmen — one with an assault-style weapon — jumping from a stolen black Infiniti and opening fire in several directions near the courtyard. Four people, including Makiyah’s sister,


U.N. report calls for Myanmar generals to be prosecuted for genocide, war crimes

a case against two Reuters journalists who have been jailed since December on charges of breaching the Official Secrets Act in the course of reporting on the killings of Rohingya men in Inn Din, in Rakhine state. A verdict in their case was widely expected Monday but was postponed until Sept. 3. The fact-finding mission has drawn up a list of alleged perpetrators who it believes must be prioritized for investigation and prosecution. These start with the commander in chief, who has avoided any sanctions or specific condemnation from international governments, including the United States and European Union. The mission’s report also named deputy commander in chief Soe Win and four other military commanders who led divisions that carried out the operations in Rakhine state and elsewhere: Aung Kyaw Zaw, Maung Maung Soe, Aung Aung and Than Oo. Maung Maung Soe was among the first to be sanctioned by multiple countries and was fired by the Myanmar military in June in a move widely seen as a way for more-senior leaders to show they are taking some responsibility for last year’s actions. He led the Western Command, which oversees Rakhine state, until November. According to a former high-ranking military official, the decision to fire him was made by Min Aung Hlaing himself but was unpopular among officers who believed he was made a scapegoat to protect more-senior leadership. Min Aung Hlaing, meanwhile, has continued to host international visitors and leaders and has not been hit with sanctions from any foreign country. The U.N. fact-finding mission, established by the U.N. Human Rights Council, recommended that the Security Council refer the situation in Myanmar to the International Criminal Court, or create an ad hoc international criminal tribunal, and impose an arms embargo on Myanmar. The U.N. Security Council meets Tuesday, but observers say it is unlikely that any decisive action will come from that body. China, a permanent member of the council and Myanmar’s northern neighbor, has defended Myanmar since the start of the crisis and pledged development aid in line with the government’s strategy in Rakhine, seeing it as a way to regain leverage lost since Myanmar embarked on warmer relations with the West. Min Aung Hlaing recently visited Russia — another of the council’s permanent members — where he shopped for arms. The U.N. fact-finding mission will present a fuller report to the Human Rights Council on Sept. 18. shibani.mahtani@washpost.com


Something is rotten in Maryland’s football program

Sally Jenkins’s jarring Aug. 22 Sports column, “In McNair case, it’s not the heat; it’s the stupidity,” used words rarely seen in Sports: “kill,” “berserk,” “deranged,” “kill rate,” “unhinged dictators.” But they were the right words, and they needed to be said. Jordan McNair died because of an outdated notion of machismo, one that superseded the coach’s responsibility to the health of his players. This was enabled by attitudes — on the part of universities and their executives, players, players’ parents and society at large — that unquestioningly defer to athletic coaches’ decisions. This must change. They are not all-knowing and, as seen here, are capable of acting in ignorant and reckless ways that take lives. Their power must be reined in. Michael Fruitman I’m a University of Maryland It feels as though Maryland is stuck on a mean point of corruption — not corrupt enough to compete with large football schools but corrupt enough to kill a 19-year-old. To this, add the reality that many football players are doing irreparable harm to their brains. Maryland should set an example and be the first land-grant public university to drop football. What’s the academic interest to its students and the taxpayers, anyway? How about taking all that energy and money and directing it toward an actual academic endeavor? Michael Garland


Authorities demand answers after a British couple die suddenly on vacation in Egypt

a “sudden failure in the heart muscle and respiratory failure.” Susan Cooper, 63, was taken to a hospital five hours later in “a state of fainting” and died shortly after 5 p.m., also apparently from heart failure. But their daughter refuses to believe her parents died of natural causes. They were both in great health, she said. Several guests had complained of stomach ailments after eating the hotel food, various British media outlets reported. The sudden deaths led Thomas Cook to evacuate more than 300 of its clients from the resort, and fly many back to the United Kingdom, British media reports said. "I watched them die before my very eyes, and they had exactly the same symptoms,” Omerod told Sky News. “I believe something suspicious has gone on. I don’t believe anyone has entered the room, but something has happened in that room that caused them to be taken away from us.” Sven Hirschler, a spokesman for Deutsche Hospitality, which owns the Steinberger hotel, told the BBC that the illness levels among the more than 1,600 guests were not unusual. He added that John Cooper had complained of low blood pressure and been treated by the hotel’s doctor the day he died. Thomas Cook’s top executive told Sky News on Sunday that its experts were testing the food, water and air conditioning units in the couple’s hotel and would have the results within 10 days. “There is no evidence that it is a carbon monoxide poisoning,” said chief executive Peter Fankhauser. “We have no evidence, but I don’t want to rule out anything before I really know the cause.” Adding to the mystery were comments made by the governor of the Red Sea province, Maj. Gen. Ahmed Abdullah, on Sunday. Speaking to reporters, he said, “there was a strange odor in the room” of the Coopers, according to a Facebook post by his office. He added that Egyptian authorities had sent specialists to inspect the ventilation and air conditioning systems. Tourism in Egypt has fallen sharply since the Arab Spring uprisings in 2011 that ousted Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Terrorist attacks, including the downing of a Russian passenger jet filled with Red Sea tourists in 2015, have further deterred tourists. Since then, there have been several smaller terrorist attacks targeting tourists. The arrest of a Lebanese tourist this year for posting comments critical of Egypt has not helped either.


The Daily 202: What John McCain learned from his Democratic mentor

making progress on resolving their differences on the North American Free Trade Agreement and could wrap bilateral talks as early as today, clearing the way for Canada to rejoin negotiations -- North Korea’s main newspaper accused the U.S. of plotting a military invasion against the country while pursuing dialogue “with a smile on its face.” The comments come after Trump halted Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s planned trip this week to Pyongyang, citing a “lack of progress” in denuclearization. -- Defense Secretary Jim Mattis sent a memo to Trump in May imploring him to prioritize U.S. advancement of artificial technology to keep pace with China and other countries. THERE'S A BEAR IN THE WOODS: -- Michael Cohen's attorney Lanny Davis backed away from assertions that his client can “prove” Trump had advance knowledge of Russian efforts to undermine Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. -- Congressional Republicans have circulated a spreadsheet outlining the investigations they expect Democrats to launch if they retake the House and obtain subpoena power. The list includes topics such as Trump’s tax returns, his family businesses and the firing of FBI Director James Comey. -- Retired Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz said -- Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) warned Trump against firing Attorney General Jeff Sessions, saying that doing so “would be the first domino to fall” in dismantling the Russia investigation. -- The president’s approval rating stayed steady following a plea deal by Cohen and the conviction on eight counts of former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, according to NBC-Wall Street Journal polling. -- Trump uses his recurring mantra of “no collusion” to “minimize and trivialize” the Russia probe, -- The decline in financial regulation and fraud investigations made it easier for Cohen and -- The case of a Columbia professor’s 1956 disappearance could have major implications on Mueller’s ability to publicly release information about his investigation. SOCIAL MEDIA SPEED READ: The Internet was dominated by tributes to McCain this weekend. The senator’s family grieved: McCain’s hometown paper recognized his legacy: McCain’s MLB team held a moment of silence for him: Former presidents marked the end of an era: One of McCain’s close friends reflected on his loss: The House speaker said McCain had earned the honor of lying in state at the Capitol: From a Democratic senator: From a former Democratic attorney general: From a former CIA director: From the former commander of U.S. Army