U.S. deploys 80 troops to Chad to help find kidnapped Nigerian schoolgirls

of the geography, the actual size, just square miles, of what we’re trying to search.” Officials at the Pentagon would not say precisely where the new unit is based, but the French military has an air base in the Chadian capital, N’Djamena, near the Nigerian border. Washington and Paris have coordinated closely on security matters in Africa as the threat posed by militant groups there has prompted the United States to significantly expand its military footprint across the continent. Paul Lubeck, a sociology professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz who has done extensive research in Nigeria, said the country’s security forces are up against a formidable group in Boko Haram. “These guys are better organized, more highly motivated and have better arms than the Nigerian military,” he said. “The Nigerian military is decayed.” Additionally, because the Nigerian force has a history of brutality, U.S. military advisers face restrictions in the assistance they are able to provide. As part of an agreement reached this week, American military personnel are permitted to share some information — such as aerial imagery — but not all raw intelligence. As the United States steps up intelligence-gathering efforts there, Lubeck said, there’s the possibility that Nigerian forces could mishandle it. “Any time the Nigerian military attempts to intervene to release hostages, the hostages are killed,” he said. “You might get them the intel, but how to get them released safely is the real challenge.” U.S. Special Operations forces in Africa are engaged in a similarly challenging hunt for Ugandan warlord Joseph Kony, who leads a cult-like group in central Africa that has abducted children to use as sex slaves and soldiers. The abduction of the Nigerian girls went largely unnoticed outside Africa for weeks. But as Nigerians in the capital began protesting the deteriorating security in many parts of the country this month, the plight of the girls began making headlines in the United States and calls for their return gained significant traction on social media. Several U.S. lawmakers and first lady Michelle Obama have joined the cause, posting photos on Twitter using the hashtag #BringBackOurGirls. Rep. Edward R. Royce (R-Calif.), chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, issued a statement Wednesday calling the deployment a “step in the right direction.” He and others are urging the White House to do more. “U.S. security personnel should be in Nigeria advising and assisting those


Saisons: Beers originally made for drinking, not for getting drunk

Allagash Saison, from Allagash Brewing in Portland, Maine, is a good, straightforward example of the saison style. (Russell French/Allagash) Saison is for people who like to color outside the lines. It thumbs its nose at the style police. You can brew it as a low-alcohol summer quaff or a high-octane imperial beer. You can make it from 100 percent barley or as a multigrain ale with spices and fruit. You can mellow it in wine barrels or re-ferment it in the bottle with a funky yeast. The common denominator is that saisons are effervescent and crisp, full of prickly spice and fruit flavors, often fermented to near bone-dryness. They’ve been quenching thirsts for centuries in the French-speaking regions of Belgium, where they were handed out to saisonniers, farmhands hired on a seasonal basis. Traditional versions, intended for rehydration rather than intoxication, might contain less than 2 percent alcohol, according to Garrett Oliver, brew master for the Brooklyn Brewery. “Beer was not entertainment,” he said. “It was a staple food product.” Oliver was in town a few weeks ago to conduct a tasting of nine saisons for the National Geographic Society. The event marked the local premiere of Brooklyn Half Ale, a throwback to those kinder, gentler saisons of yore. Oliver formulated the beer not for thirsty field hands (how many farms are there in Brooklyn?) but for the Swedish market. There, a government retail monopoly called Systembolaget allows only beers with 3.5 percent alcohol and below to be sold in grocery stores. Brooklyn Half Ale, which gets its pepper-lemon character from a Belgian yeast strain and Sorachi Ace hops, will get its American debut this fall. In the meantime, you can try Allagash Saison from Allagash Brewing in Portland, Maine. A plain orange label bespeaks a good, straightforward example of the style. Allagash has specialized in Belgian styles since its inception in 1995, yet somehow has avoided brewing a saison on a regular basis. “I have no good explanation,” confesses brew master Jason Perkins. “It was a long time coming, for sure.” Perkins uses no spices. His beer derives its notes of black pepper, grapefruit and pineapple mostly from the yeast, and a little from the American hops and 10 percent malted rye in the grist. Perkins adds some oats to beef up the body. (A saison should be dry but not thin, he asserts.) He also throws in some


Virginia teen wins National Geographic Bee

Akhil Rekulapelli celebrates winning the National Geographic Bee. With him are contest moderator Soledad O’Brien and Gary E. Knell of the National Geographic Society. (Mark Thiessen/National Geographic) Akhil Rekulapelli, a Dulles, Virginia, 13-year-old, has won the National Geographic Bee, which was held Wednesday in Washington. The deciding question asked which African country is building a new capital called Oyala in a rain forest 65 miles east of the city of Bata. The answer: Equatorial Guinea. The question wasn’t especially tricky, Akhil told KidsPost. “I read about Equatorial Guinea and how they needed a new capital,” he said. “I also knew Bata was a major city there.” Akhil said his hardest question — about the home of the Mapuche people — came in the preliminary rounds. “I guessed Colombia, but the answer was Chile.” The eighth-grader at Stone Hill Middle School is a Geographic Bee veteran. Akhil came in fourth last year and competed at the state level for two years before that. He credited his parents and fifth-grade teacher with encouraging him. Prizes for winning the bee include a $50,000 scholarship and a trip to the Galápagos Islands with his family. Akhil said he would like to continue entering competitions in high school. “I’ve always been intrigued by Quiz Bowl,” he said. “I’d like to try ‘Teen Jeopardy.’ ” Akhil plans to study medicine then perhaps visit a few of the places he has studied with Doctors Without Borders, an organization that provides medical care overseas. “Geography can be a part of anyone’s life,” he said. The finals will air Thursday at 7 p.m. on National Geographic Channel and Nat Geo Wild.


Montgomery County Adopt-A-Pet

Pet of the week: Barkley, a 2-year-old male coon hound/Labrador mix. Barkley can be viewed at the adoption center in Derwood, Md. (Montgomery County Animal Services) Barkley, a 2-year-old male coon hound/Labrador mix, is available for adoption from the Montgomery County Animal Services and Adoption Center at 7315 Muncaster Mill Rd., Derwood. If you have lost a pet or are interested in adoption, animals can be seen at the adoption center from noon to 7 p.m. Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Friday, and noon to 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. To learn more about lost and adoptable animals, such as Barkley, and other programs and services, contact 240-773-5900 or visit www.montgomerycountymd.gov/asd, infomcasac@montgomerycountymd.gov or www.facebook.com/mcasac.


Former Virginia senator James Webb clarifies presidential comments

James Webb wants to participate in the world of politics and policy again, he said Thursday, but he’s not sure whether it will lead him to the presidential run he has suggested is possible. “We’re taking it a day at a time,” the former Democratic senator from Virginia said at the end of a lecture at the National Archives on Thursday. “I care a lot about the issues facing our country, and I’m going to be participating, helping people and doing things.” Webb, 68, retired from the Senate in 2013 and stepped out of the public sphere almost completely. His disappearance was a conscious decision, he said Thursday, part of a “healthy” desire to “take a break” and “get my independence back.” During that time, he wrote a memoir, “I Heard My Country Calling,” and while discussing the book in a radio interview Monday, he left the door open to a presidential bid. “Let me clarify it,” he said Thursday when asked about the comments. He affirmed that he’s “not saying I’m not” running for president but added that such a non-denial is often interpreted as more of a declaration than it is. He called it “kind of . . . a default answer.” James Webb retired from the Senate in 2013. (Katherine Frey/THE WASHINGTON POST) Given his independent streak and desire to mix public service with time to himself, it’s hard to imagine Webb entering the grueling spotlight of a modern presidential campaign. His comments took Virginia political observers by surprise, but former aides say he is not the kind of politician who would invent presidential aspirations merely to promote a book. When he ran for the Senate in 2006, Webb did not announce his candidacy against then-Sen. George Allen (R) until nine months before the election. So while he has not been laying the groundwork for a campaign, as supporters of former secretary of state Hillary Rodham Clinton have, that does not mean he won’t enter the race. Webb was careful Thursday, saying he was warned not to talk about politics in the building that houses the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Federal law prohibits “partisan political, sectarian, or similar” activity in the Archives. Yet in describing his new book, his 10th, the Vietnam veteran and former Navy secretary was also highlighting his leadership credentials. Webb said his father’s military career meant he was “raised from a


Exclusive: Lt. Gen. William Boykin, past Delta Force commander, hit with Army reprimand

procedures that may compromise ongoing operations.” The reprimand is the latest in a series of embarrassing incidents in which senior military officers have faced scrutiny for alleged wrongdoing. The military has been plagued by a string of such episodes since November 2012, when retired Army Gen. David H. Petraeus stepped down as director of the CIA after an adulterous affair with his biographer, Paula Broadwell, was discovered. The Army reprimanded past Delta Force commander William Boykin for sharing classified information in his book. (US ARMY/US Army) But Boykin says it’s not so simple in his case. The Defense Department first launched an investigation into his book shortly after it was published and determined in 2010 that he had not released any classified information, he said. The Army then reopened the investigation about two years later, after he publicly voiced objections to several Pentagon policies, including the ongoing integration of women into more jobs in the military, he said. The general, who retired in 2007, has a history of making controversial statements in which he has depicted U.S. military operations against Islamic extremist organizations such as al-Qaeda as a Christian fight against Satan, riling religious rights groups and organizations dedicated to the separation of church and state. The investigation by the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command into Boykin’s book ended Feb. 7, 2012, as his planned speaking engagement the following day at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, N.Y., faced a groundswell of opposition from religious watchdog groups and some veterans organizations due to previous comments he had made. Asked why he was reprimanded, Boykin questioned the Army’s motivation, insisting that he had received approval to write his book before it was released and that all information in it had been disclosed previously in other books, movies and news reports. “You draw your own conclusions,” Boykin told The Post. “Why would they reopen it? What was the purpose of reprimanding me basically five years after they started an investigation? Did it take that long to determine whether I had written anything classified?” A spokesman for the Army, George Wright, declined to comment on Boykin’s comments or to explain why the service waited so long to issue a reprimand for a book published in 2008. “The memo obtained through the Freedom of Information Act speaks for itself,” Wright said of the allegations against Boykin. The memo, signed by Gen. Lloyd J.


Indictment of PLA hackers is part of broad U.S. strategy to curb Chinese cyberspying

The Washington Post’s Ellen Nakashima breaks down the significance of the Justice Department’s decision to charge the Chinese military with cyber-espionage against American companies. Two years ago, a senior official from the State Department and one from the Pentagon held an extraordinary four-hour meeting with their counterparts in Beijing. For the first time, the U.S. government confronted the Chinese government with proof that American companies were being hacked by the People’s Liberation Army to benefit Chinese firms. The officials presented extensive case studies of three companies in defense and other industries whose computers had been penetrated by the PLA, with details about what data was stolen, when and how. The reaction? “Shellshocked,” said one former official briefed on the meeting. “They said something like, ‘This is outrageous!’ ” a second former official said. “ ‘You’re here and you accuse us of such a thing? We don’t do this.’ ” There was a similar response Monday after Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. announced the indictments of five PLA members on charges of hacking to benefit Chinese industry. Attorney General Eric Holder formally announced the U.S. plan to bring charges against members of the Chinese People's Liberation Army for hacking into the computers of six organizations in western Pennsylvania. The Justice Department’s decision to charge Chinese officers was approved at high levels of government and was undertaken, department officials say, because talks had brought little progress. Both efforts — diplomacy and criminal prosecution — are part of a broader, previously undisclosed strategy by the Obama administration to hold China accountable for what officials say is a growing campaign of commercial cyberspying. “We’re talking about a major change in administration strategy and policy,” said a third former official who, like the others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss administration deliberations. The approach dates to early 2012. At a White House meeting, “the message was sent from the president himself,” one senior U.S. official said. “This was something that was very important, and he wanted options to push back on the theft of intellectual property by the Chinese.” The result was a series of measures taken by not only Justice and State, but also the departments of Defense and Homeland Security. The Pentagon, for instance, began last year to conduct defensive cyber-operations outside its networks to deter Chinese hackers. And a decision was made to confront the Chinese in public and


‘The Hornet’s Nest’ follows horrors of Afghan war through eyes of two correspondents

Father and son war correspondents Mike and Carlos Boettcher embed with U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan in the documentary “The Hornet’s Nest.” (Freestyle Releasing) It’s difficult to describe the horrors of war, and most soldiers returning from overseas may not want to dwell on them anyway. That’s why “The Hornet’s Nest” is such an important movie. The film follows longtime war correspondent Mike Boettcher and his son, Carlos, as they embed with troops in Afghanistan and end up in the midst of the chaos, dodging enemy fire and chronicling searches, rescues and deadly missions. Rarely is such a flawed movie still a must-see. Soldiers, veterans and their families — many of whom attended a recent screening — will (and did) find the movie cathartic. But those who don’t give a lot of thought to U.S. troops overseas need to watch to get an idea of what’s expected of our fellow citizens in daily combat. The movie begins in 2011 as the Boettchers board a plane for Afghanistan. Carlos has never been to a war zone, and Mike’s career has hampered the pair’s relationship, so father and son see this as a chance to bond, although a dangerous one. The Boettchers, reporting for ABC, put themselves in harm’s way again and again, and win an Emmy for their work. But the movie’s greatest flaw is that these two shouldn’t be the story; the rekindling of their relationship is less important than what they are in Afghanistan to cover. As a veteran journalist, Mike speaks with a studied air, so his voiceover narration and direct comments to the camera never sound off-the-cuff. A raw account of warfare would have been better with more observations from the men and women involved in battle. When soldiers are interviewed in the film, they respond in noble soundbites rather than candid observations. In that same vein, the score, which alternates between rousing and melodramatic, isn’t nearly as effective as the sounds of real combat would be. All that being said, the film is remarkable in scenes where the Boettchers show the soldiers’ harrowing jobs. At one point, medics rescue a young Afghan boy who has been injured by a roadside bomb; later, a soldier methodically goes about the business of finding a live explosive device; and they show us Taliban fighters unleashing streams of gunfire on the soldiers, drawing us into the center of the action. The


Wegmans opens its own caves to age cheese

says Cathy Gaffney, Wegmans’s director for specialty cheeses, deli and kosher deli. A cheese’s journey from Europe can take five to six weeks, during which time the partially ripened, chilled product might age a little more. But the stores had no idea in what stage of the aging process the cheese would arrive. Stores would then engage in a little “countertop affinage,” Meredith says, tasting the cheeses and deciding whether they were ready to sell. With the help of then-consultant Meredith, the Pittsford store seven years ago became the first location to install a misting case that keeps the store’s own ripened cheeses and others at their ideal state — in other words, not in shrink-wrap, which would suffocate them as it would any other living, breathing thing. The cases keep the cheese at about 40 degrees and the humidity at 90 percent. They’re now found at 13 Wegmans locations, including Fairfax and Germantown. Inside the Pittsford case, cheeses are displayed like jewels atop wood slats. Mist rolls under the glass of the sloped case in a near-constant flow. Shoppers approach the case in a steady stream, nibbling on samples and consulting with Lesio and her colleagues, “the concierges of the cheese case,” as Gaffney calls them. Staff expertise and customer tastes have come a long way since Gaffney, a born and bred “dairy princess,” started working with the cheese department 11 years ago. “I realized people were throwing away perfectly good cheese,” she says, recalling the ripening Camembert that was tossed as brie gone bad. Now, cheese staffers are well trained, even accompanying Gaffney to Europe on cheese-buying trips. Staff education also will take place in the cheese caves’ tasting room, in person and via webcast. “They say a picture is worth a thousand words,” Meredith says. “So is a taste.” The affinage operation is still in its infancy, but Gaffney and Meredith are hard at work on a 24-month plan. One notion centers around Banon, a creamy French goat cheese that matures while wrapped in chestnut leaves. Wouldn’t it be great, Gaffney and Meredith asked, if they could ripen their own Banon? The French supplier of the cheese wouldn’t sell Wegmans the chestnut leaves. Gaffney is now pondering how else to get them — even if it means growing their own trees. More from Food: Mac-and-cheese-o-matic DIY cottage cheese: Yes, you should More chefs making their own cheese


Deborah Madison on ‘New Vegetarian Cooking’: ‘I want to make it resonate’

than 1,600), and a new introduction. Out: soy milk and deep-frying. In: coconut oil and the slow-cooker. “I really want to make it resonate more in the times that we live in,” she told me when I called her at her Santa Fe home to talk about the new book. “There’s a whole new generation of young people who are looking for this kind of information.” Edited excerpts of our conversation follow. How does the book reflect some of the biggest changes in vegetarian cooking over the past two decades? There’s just been kind of an explosion of ingredients. Today you have almond milk, hemp, rice, coconut — all these non-dairy beverages. There are lots more possibilities for smoky flavors. Back then, if you were a vegetarian and you were trying to work smoke in and you didn’t want to use liquid smoke, your only choice was chipotle, so everything was hot. Now we have smoked paprika and smoked salt, even smoked tea. Ghee has suddenly become popular. It’s not a new ingredient, just new to many of us. Or coconut oil, people are nuts about that. I love it, too. Dairy has gotten so much better. We have access to grains we didn’t then: einkorn, farro, spelt. We have red and black quinoa. Certain things I took out. I’ve never been a fan of canola oil, and I am less and less — same with soy oil, same with corn oil. I thought, I’m just leaving them out, even if they’re organic or supposedly GMO-free. So many times those oils are rancid, and there are better fats to choose from anyway. And I always wanted to label the recipes that happen to be vegan, because so many people use this book because they’re cooking for somebody else — a child, a spouse or a family member — so why not make it easy? I didn’t try to turn things into vegan recipes; I just labeled things that just happened to be. Romesco sauce just happened to be vegan. Are there things that haven’t changed much, and you don’t think they will? What are the constants? It was a very interesting process to redo a book rather than write a new one. You want to rewrite everything, of course, and throw it away and start over, but in fact I have to recognize that a lot of people know this


Wine: Experiments in birds and leaves

who switched to winegrowing in 1988 but never abandoned his scientific curiosity, attended a viticulture forum in Germany where a professor from Geisenheim, Germany’s top viticulture school, was discussing the effects of climate change on grapes. Average sugar levels had increased over two decades, the speaker said, leading to higher alcohol levels, while other characteristics that contribute to flavor had remained the same. In other words, Germany’s wines were getting more powerful but not tastier. As grapes ripen, the speaker said, a certain part of the vine canopy contributes to higher sugar levels. So some effects of climate change could be counteracted, he said, by removing specific leaves from the vine in the weeks leading to harvest. Climate change isn’t a problem for New Zealand grapes, Forrest said, but he sensed there was a market for refreshing wines with lower alcohol. He had experimented in the winery with various techniques to reduce alcohol but always thought the resulting wines lacked character. And like many other growers, he had practiced leaf pulling as a way to improve air flow and sunlight exposure in the vines. Now he was eager to see whether he could use the technique to create something new by reducing alcohol levels naturally, in the vineyard. So he began experimenting with strategic leaf pulling about six weeks before harvest — what would be late July or early August here in the Northern Hemisphere. The result was the Doctor’s Sauvignon Blanc, which features the racy, grassy qualities of Marlborough wines with only 9.5 percent alcohol, about 25 percent less than average. The wine may not have the richness and body of Forrest’s regular sauvignon blanc, but it is unmistakably New Zealand savvy. “It’s a great wine for sitting on the patio on a hot summer day,” Forrest says. I agree. Forrest says he could see this technique being useful in hot years when sugar levels could spike in chardonnay or pinot noir. The New Zealand government has funded research on the technique by other growers. In addition to meeting a perceived market demand for wines with moderate alcohol levels, Forrest says, the technique has the potential to help other wine regions where climate change is affecting vintages. “You know where this could really make a difference?” he asked me, his eyes wide as grape clusters. “Napa!” McIntyre blogs at dmwineline.com. On Twitter: @dmwine. More from Food: Wine column archive


Elephant road trip ends at National Zoo: Trek from Calgary covered 2,400 miles

Three female Asian elephants from Calgary, Canada - Kamala, 39, Swarna, 39, and Maharani, 23 - arrived at the Smithsonian National Zoo on Friday. The National Zoo’s three new Asian elephants arrived in Washington on Friday morning aboard a convoy that carried the animals on a 2,400-mile journey from Calgary, Canada. The convoy, which left Calgary on Tuesday, was made up of two flatbed trucks carrying the elephants and two RVs carrying zoo keepers and veterinarians. The elephants, in three big gray containers, arrived at 10:55 a.m. escorted by a zoo police car with flashing lights. The three female elephants will be added to the zoo’s existing herd of three females and one male. The zoo said it could take several hours for the metal containers carrying the elephants to be unloaded by crane at the elephant compound and for them to be coaxed into the elephant barn. Parts of the zoo were shut down during the process, and walkways were blocked with security vehicles, bike racks and police tape. Kamala, Swarna and Maharani lined up in their enclosure at the Calgary Zoo. These three female elephants traveled to their new home at the National Zoo. (Bill Quayle/Calgary Zoo) Zoo officials were reluctant to say much about the arrival until the elephants had been safely moved into their new enclosure. The new arrivals will expand the size of the zoo’s elephant herd and provide a laboratory for study of elephant behavior. The zoo recently completed a $56 million, state-of-the-art facility for the care and exhibition of endangered Asian elephants. The newcomers — Kamala, 39, Swarna, 39, and Maharani, 23 — join the zoo residents Ambika, 66 , Shanthi, 39, Bozie, 38, and Kandula, 12. Kandula is the lone male. David Rubenstein


What’s that rustling in the yard? Yes, it might be a black bear. The animal’s comeback in MD.

opposed by animal rights groups, which warned that the bear population might go into decline again. But well fed and well hidden among the hardwoods, the bears have only increased. Organized opposition to the hunt declined accordingly. The state has gradually expanded the hunt Spiker says the hunt is a “crucial tool” for managing the bear population. “Our goal with the hunt has been to allow the bear population to increase but at a controlled rate.” It is a matter of balancing bear fecundity and bear mortality, and so far it has worked. From 2004 to 2011, the year of the most recent count by the DNR, the bear population doubled, from 500 to 1,000. Monitoring bear mortality is a matter of simple addition: the number of “seasonal” deaths, or bears killed in the hunt, plus the number of “unseasonal” deaths, mostly motor vehicle collisions, about 50 every year. The result has been an annual mortality rate of about 20 percent. Monitoring bear births — there is an average of 31 / 2 cubs per sow every year — is another matter. Counting bears Every year since the 1980s, state biologists with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources have conducted a count of bear cubs, known as the spring reproductive survey. About 20 sows have been fitted with collars that transmit radio signals for monitoring purposes. The survey’s methodology is simple: Track down half of them, and count their cubs. Over the long term, it provides a picture of bear population trends. There is only a narrow window of opportunity for the survey: when the cubs are old enough to be taken out of the den to be counted but their mothers are too groggy to get worked up about it. On a recent spring day in the Indian Springs Wildlife Management Area in Washington County, Spiker and a team of biologists and veterinarians went in search of Bear 1081, identified in department records as a 13-year-old sow, and, they hoped, a new litter of cubs. The signal on 1081’s collar led them to the general vicinity. From there, the den was a dead giveaway: a hollow log, covered in brambles. They found the mother awake, in the hibernating state referred to as torpor, sitting in a slouch, nursing her young. A dart to the shoulder, fired from a specially equipped gun, sent her back to sleep before she had


SpaceX CEO alleges revolving door exists in national security launch business

SpaceX chief executive Elon Musk answers questions in front of the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft at the SpaceX Rocket Development Facility in McGregor, Tex. (Duane A. Laverty/AP) SpaceX chief executive Elon Musk, waging an increasingly ferocious battle to gain a larger share of the national security launch business, has accused one of his main competitors of hiring a high-ranking Air Force acquisitions official in exchange for awarding a lucrative contract without competition. In a series of tweets Thursday night, the billionaire entrepreneur drew attention to the hiring of the former Air Force official, Roger Correll, by Aerojet Rocketdyne, which supplies rocket engines to United Launch Alliance. Even though they are separate companies — ULA has many different suppliers — Musk conflated them in his statements and once again called for an investigation into the contract. “V likely AF official Correll was told by ULA/Rocketdyne that a rich VP job was his if he gave them a sole source contract,” Musk tweeted. “Reason I believe this is likely is that Correll first tried to work at SpaceX, but we turned him down. Our competitor, it seems, did not.” Glenn Mahone, a spokesman for Aerojet Rocketdyne, said the allegations “are completely without merit” and that Correll received “the necessary clearances and approvals from the Department of Defense.” Last month, Musk, the co-founder of PayPal and Tesla Motors, sued the government over a multibillion-dollar contract for 36 rockets to launch defense payloads, such as spy and GPS satellites, into space. The contract was awarded to ULA, a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin. But Musk has said the contract should have been competitively bid and has called on the Air Force to cancel the contract and to allow SpaceX to compete for it. Discoveries in our solar system and beyond. Although SpaceX is still in the process of acquiring the proper certification to allow its Falcon 9 rocket to participate in the program, Musk said his company could perform the work far more cheaply. In a statement, ULA said: “At the time of the initial acquisition process in 2012, the contract award in June 2013, and even today, ULA is the only government certified launch provider that meets all of the unique . . . requirements that are critical to supporting our troops and keeping our country safe.” The Air Force, citing the ongoing litigation, declined to comment. The tension over the contract


Gray asks council to approve D.C. United soccer stadium deal

building in Anacostia that could generate spin-off development in an area with the city’s worst unemployment rate. The deal values two acres of stadium land owned by Akridge at $21.1 million. The company would pay the balance of the $55.6 million price to acquire the Reeves site. Lew agreed to a similar trade with Pepco, which also owns Buzzard Point land. Under a combination cash and land deal, Pepco would acquire a city-owned lot near the Walker-Jones Education Campus off North Capitol Street that is currently a community garden. The city would get a decommissioned Pepco facility on Buzzard Point. The final part of the deal involved the acquisition of properties owned by businessman Mark Ein and owners of Super Salvage, an employee-owned, 62-year-old scrap yard. Lew declined to disclose the terms of the deals for those properties, saying they were still being finalized. Ein and Super Salvage President Steve Middelthon issued a statement saying, “We agreed to take a significant discount from the price of the property that was just sold across the street in order to get this stadium built if that is what the residents and taxpayers of Washington decide they want.” Gray also requested approval from the council to use eminent domain, should it become necessary. Most council members said they would wait to comment until they get the full details on Tuesday. Council member Jim Graham (D-Ward 1), however, immediately criticized the valuation of the Reeves Center as “ridiculous.” “That’s not what properties go for on U Street,” he said. For the current year, the city property is assessed at $128.5 million. The Office of the Chief Financial Officer estimated recently that the building was worth around $73 million, but a 2011 CFO report found it could be worth as much as $186 million. Graham and Bowser also expressed concerns about the loss of municipal offices that are a symbol of the city’s role in the civil rights struggle. The Reeves Center was one of the first major new buildings built after the 1968 riots. Graham said he feared a loss of hundreds of daytime employees and thousands of visitors to city offices there could make the area more of a bedroom neighborhood. Bowser was highly critical of the land-swap during her successful bid for the Democratic nomination. She said she would rather see capital improvement dollars go to schools than to a soccer stadium.


Elephant road trip, without potty stops, ends in D.C.: Trek from Calgary covered 2,400 miles

was closed off Friday as the elephants were unloaded. “Unloading elephants is logistically very challenging and demanding,” said Pamela Baker-Masson, the zoo’s spokeswoman. Indeed, the job was not completed until about 4:30 p.m. The zoo said the elephants can now be spotted on the new stationary elephant cam, if they wander into its focus. The arrival of the elephants is the latest step in the National Zoo’s push to become a state-of-the-art center for Asian elephant research and home to a large herd of the endangered animals. “It’s incredibly exciting,” said Baker-Masson. “We’ve planned, we worked on this for many, many, many months. Even beyond that, prior to that, the vision was to have a very large herd at the Smithsonian National Zoo.” The elephants, which weigh a total of 22,500 pounds, traveled in three containers that the National Zoo shipped to Calgary last year to familiarize the animals with them. The RVs carried keepers, curators, veterinarians and the National Zoo’s registrar, Laura Morse, to handle border-crossing paperwork. “You get a whole bunch of elephant people together in any room, and it’s a good time,” Brandie Smith, a senior curator who organized the Washington logistics, said at the zoo last week. There were periodic halts at truck stops, but no overnight stays, zoo officials said. And the elephants were not allowed out of their containers. The wood shavings were designed to absorb waste. The move was handled by a transportation company that specializes in moving elephants, Smith said. Some of the elephants’ favorite toys were brought along from Calgary, including a 300-pound ball and the popcorn blowers that were used to spray popcorn, which the elephants like to munch. The zoo announced in August that it was getting the three elephants, boosting the size of its herd from four to seven and providing a laboratory for the study of elephant life and society. The three females from Calgary arrived a year after Bozie, another female, was shipped to Washington from the zoo in Baton Rouge last May. The Calgary Zoo announced in 2012 that it was closing its elephant exhibit because of its cold climate, its inability to expand and its desire to give its elephants the benefits of living in larger herds. It chose the National Zoo as their new home. The newest arrivals are Kamala, 39, Swarna, 39, and Maharani, 23, Kamala’s daughter. On Tuesday in Calgary, they


week. There were periodic halts at truck stops, but no overnight stays, zoo officials said. And the elephants were not allowed out of their containers. The wood shavings were designed to absorb waste. The move was handled by a transportation company that specializes in moving elephants, Smith said. Some of the elephants’ favorite toys were brought along from Calgary, including a 300-pound ball and the popcorn blowers that were used to spray popcorn, which the elephants like to munch. The zoo announced in August that it was getting the three elephants, boosting the size of its herd from four to seven and providing a laboratory for the study of elephant life and society. The three females from Calgary arrived a year after Bozie, another female, was shipped to Washington from the zoo in Baton Rouge last May. The Calgary Zoo announced in 2012 that it was closing its elephant exhibit because of its cold climate, its inability to expand and its desire to give its elephants the benefits of living in larger herds. It chose the National Zoo as their new home. The newest arrivals are Kamala, 39, Swarna, 39, and Maharani, 23, Kamala’s daughter. On Tuesday in Calgary, they were coaxed into their containers, which then were lifted onto the trucks by a construction crane. Kamala and Maharani were placed on one truck, Swarna on the other. Police escorted the convoy out of town. In Washington, the process was reversed. A crane lifted the containers from the trucks and placed them at the entrance to the zoo’s new elephant barn, where the newcomers will be quarantined in a special area for 30 days. “They’re beautiful, absolutely beautiful,” Smith said of them. The Canadians joined the National Zoo’s other females, Bozie, 38, Ambika, 66 — the second-oldest Asian elephant in the country — and Shanthi, 39. The zoo also has a male, Kandula, 12. The zoo hopes the females can be kept together. The male is kept separately. “Ideally, we’ll have a single kind of matriarchal herd,” Smith said. “They’ll get to know each other, and they’ll establish a dominance hierarchy,” she said. “But it might not happen. . . . Maybe it will be two separate groups. Ultimately, we’re going to let them tell us what they want to do.” Several keepers from the Calgary Zoo made the convoy trip and will stay in Washington to ease the new


Focus on Russia as Ukraine’s presidential election nears

of the general staff, said Friday that the troops have started to withdraw, a claim Putin has made several times in recent weeks. The Pentagon agreed for the first time that there had been some “small-scale” troop movement away from Ukraine and evidence of preparations for more. But “tens of thousands of ready troops along that border . . . still are escalating the tension there in Ukraine, and we continue to call for the removal of all those troops,” said Rear Adm. John F. Kirby, the Pentagon’s press secretary. Fighting continued in at least two areas of eastern Ukraine on Friday, where pro-Russian separatists — armed, financed and directed by Moscow, according to Washington and its allies — have occupied public buildings and declared an independent republic. Last week, Secretary of State John F. Kerry said the United States and its principal European partners agreed that “if Russia or its proxies disrupt the election,” the allies would “impose sectoral economic sanctions as a result.” The Obama administration has said it is “ready” with a new round of greatly increased punitive measures against major Russian economic sectors, including defense, energy, banking and mining. U.S. officials said that action, if warranted, could come as soon as late next week. But on the eve of the vote, the allies offered no firm definition of what would constitute sanctionable disruption and whether it would have to be undertaken by the Russians themselves or their Ukrainian “proxies.” What Russia says after the vote, in terms of fulfilling Putin’s pledge to work with a future government, is seen as equally important, even if there is no direct interference in the election itself. Finding common ground in Europe on sanctions has been “extremely difficult,” said the senior diplomat, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the situation frankly. While values unite the two sides of the Atlantic, he said, interests sometimes diverge. The United States does about $25 billion in annual trade with Russia; the European Union about $450 billion. Former Soviet satellites, including the Baltic states and Poland, are eager for harsh measures. Some E.U. members, including Greece and other smaller states whose economies are still suffering the effects of near-bankruptcy, fear the fallout from a cutoff of Russian tourism and trade. German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose leadership is seen as decisive, said in a visit to Washington early this month that her government


‘Smart pills’ with chips, cameras and robotic parts raise legal, ethical questions

chip technology inside a body, for instance? How will patients be assured that the technology won’t be used to compel them to take medications they don’t really want to take? Could law enforcement obtain data that would reveal which individuals abuse drugs or sell them on the black market? Could what started as a voluntary experiment be turned into a compulsory government identification program that could erode civil liberties? In 2002, when silicon chips containing their medical records were injected into some Alzheimer’s patients, it was deeply unsettling to privacy advocates. Several states subsequently passed legislation outlawing the forced implantations, and the technology never took off. Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Washington-based Electronic Privacy Information Center, said he worries about the coercive use of the chips — whether they are implanted for a few months or permanently, or are swallowed and last in the body only about a day. “There’s something very troubling about a chip being placed in a person that they can’t remove,” he said. Proponents of the technology, however, say the devices could save countless lives and billions of dollars in unnecessary medical bills. Eric Topol is the director of the Scripps Translational Science Institute in La Jolla, Calif., and has written a book about the digital revolution in health care. He said he believes the science is moving so quickly that many of these gadgets will be ready for commercial use within the next five years. “The way a car works is that it has sensors and it tells you what’s wrong. Why not put the same type of technology in the body? It could warn you weeks or months or even years before something happens,” Topol said. Refining the technology The ingestible chip that Snodgrass is using — it was the first smart pill to be approved by the Food and Drug Administration and the European Union, in 2012 and 2010, respectively — is still being tested by a handful of doctors and hospitals, as the company continues to refine its software. Proteus officials say they hope to make it more widely available within the next few years. Britain’s National Health Service has begun using the technology with heart patients to figure out whether it can increase compliance with prescribed medication. Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis has said it would seek FDA clearance to use the Proteus chips in the medications it makes for transplant


Tough emissions cuts would prove the U.S. is serious about climate change

THE ENVIRONMENTAL Protection Agency will soon unveil its most anticipated new rules in a generation, the shape of which will help determine how well the United States responds to the threat of climate change. There will be fierce debate about them before they become final. Critics will try to undermine the effort by insisting that the rules be weak, poorly designed and unnecessarily expensive. Instead, the EPA should make them ambitious, fair and flexible. Congress failed to pass a comprehensive climate change policy in 2010, leaving the EPA at the center of the federal anti-carbon effort. Congress decades ago empowered the agency to regulate a range of air pollutants under the Clean Air Act, so it can apply various extant authorities to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions without further congressional action. One set of rules, already released, limits the construction of power plants that would produce too much carbon dioxide, all but banning new, noxious coal-fired power stations. That’s good. Now comes the big one: The EPA is poised to demand cuts from existing power plants. They are responsible for nearly half of the nation’s greenhouse emissions. The agency is reportedly ready to require carbon emission reductions in the power sector of about 25 percent by 2030. It is still determining whether the baseline from which the reduction will be measured will be carbon dioxide levels in 2005 or in a more recent year. The more recent the baseline, the tougher the standard will be to meet, since emissions have been declining. The EPA should use the toughest baseline it can justify based on the marginal cost of reducing carbon dioxide under its program. That will depend on the outcome of another major dispute: How flexible will the rules be? The EPA wants to set broad emissions goals for states, then allow state governments and power companies flexibility in meeting them — by installing new technologies at power plants or investing in efficiency or renewable energy off site. Critics contend that the EPA can’t do that under the Clean Air Act. The extent of EPA authority will be decided in court. But there is no doubt about what the better policy would be. Instead of limiting the EPA to plant-by-plant mandates, it is far better to demand deeper emissions cuts but offer the power sector leeway to meet them inexpensively and creatively. A node of opposition is coalescing around the


Hotel ready to unveil new rooftop terrace, pool

land that produces some of the world’s greatest long-distance runners. It also produces lots of employees for Colonial Parking, which is one of the charity event’s biggest backers. Woldu, who came to the United States from Ethiopia in 1971, is looking to raise $300,000 for an orphanage in Addis Ababa. But he is starting out small, hoping to attract 100 runners to pay $150 each to enter the race, which starts at 8,000 feet above sea level. Reaching $300,000 “is a long shot,” said the parking maven, who now serves as a top adviser to the chairman of the Forge Co., which is Colonial’s parent company. “Like anything else, you start with baby steps.” He reminded us that the New York City Marathon, one of the largest in the world, started small, too, with a reported 127 runners circling Central Park in 1970. The orphanage is for children of parents who died from AIDS virus. In some cases, the children themselves have HIV. Colonial is one of the largest employers of Ethiopians outside of Ethiopia. Silver Diner Accountant to try hand at running a blow-dry bar Laurie Tucker Tucker, a graduate of the University of Maryland at College Park, is buying a franchise from Toronto-based Blow Blo Dry Bar. The half-hour blow session spruces up women — and men — at a fraction of the price of a traditional salon. Tucker will continue to work at Aronson part-time. She paused to answer a couple of questions from the Buzz. Why on earth are you giving up a six-figure job to open a hair place? I am ready for a change. I am ready to spice my life up a little bit. This is also my girly time, so this is fun. What advice do you have for other professional women who yearn to run their own business? Go for it. It’s an amazing experience. I’m learning every day about lease agreements, franchise agreements, picking out a construction company to do the buildout, getting all the licenses, interviewing prospective employees. It’s exciting. What has been the most difficult part of the learning curve? Juggling everything from accounting to expenses to just being a good manager. It’s very demanding. You definitely need a business background. Sounds scary. It’s scary and exciting at the same time. If I screw up, it all comes back to me. Then I can jump back into accounting.


Baltimore Symphony Orchestra welcomes musicians new and old at Strathmore

Ray Chen gives a dazzling performance with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra at Strathmore. (Chris Dunlop) The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra welcomed back a seasoned maestro and offered a dazzling debut artist Saturday at Strathmore. Hans Graf, a musician of high distinction, led the orchestra in Rachmaninoff’s dour, overstuffed Symphony No. 2 and offered a mature counterweight to violinist Ray Chen’s fripperies in the Tchaikovsky Concerto. Graf, who was Christoph Eschenbach’s successor as music director of the Houston Symphony, appears regularly with both the BSO and the National Symphony. He is undemonstrative but is clearly on top of and inside the score, never putting a foot wrong. Although some may wish for more anguish and passion in a work like the Rachmaninoff, Graf’s “let the music speak for itself” approach pays dividends. Climaxes are graded over time — smaller ones kept in proportion — and the sense of holding something in reserve gives the sprawling piece a momentum that more emotional conductors miss. He clearly has the respect of the players, who gave a disciplined and committed account of themselves. And there was crackling excitement on the rare occasions where Graf lit into the music, like the second movement’s fugue section or in the finale with the ominous descending scales going at different speeds. There was certainly excitement at the conclusion of Chen’s performance. This winsome virtuoso, in his mid-20s, brought a large crowd to its feet, and the cheers would not stop until he vouchsafed an encore. He has a big, penetrating sound and complete security all over the instrument (with a killer flying staccato, as his Paganini encore demonstrated). His performing style was that of an adolescent in a particularly intense game of air hockey. But as conductor John Barbirolli once said of the legendary Jacqueline du Pre, “I love youthful excess! If a young player doesn’t have it, what are you going to pare off when they get older?” Chen has a lot to pare off and a lot to learn about respecting what a composer wrote and sculpting phrases of sustained, logical beauty, but he certainly has the gifts to become a major artist. Battey is a freelance writer.


Family of Iraq veteran forms nonprofit center in D.C. to research unexplained illnesses

a civilian advocate for ailing veterans and service members like Tom, “the private nudge” outside the government box, Jeanne Sullivan said. “What we’re really concerned with . . . is not so much what he died of,” Dan Sullivan said. “But how he was treated when he was alive.” ‘It was more than that’ After the 1991 Gulf War, thousands of returning veterans began suffering from an array of baffling symptoms. They included fatigue, joint and muscle pain, gastrointestinal and respiratory problems, memory difficulties, depression and anxiety. A report last year by the Institute of Medicine, the health arm of the National Academy of Sciences, found that one-third of ’91 Gulf War veterans — an estimated 175,000 to 250,000 people — said they experienced such symptoms. No exact cause was apparent. Dust? Fumes? Poisons? Pesticides? Medications? The phenomenon became known as Gulf War syndrome. Doctors preferred the term “chronic multisymptom illness” or “Gulf War illness,” arguing that there was no real syndrome, rather a spectrum of symptoms. The government spent millions studying and treating those affected, and research and treatment continue. The Sullivan Center has been raising seed money — $250,000 so far — for research into possible causes and treatments of such undiagnosed illnesses. In April, the center announced a $10,000 matching challenge grant to Georgetown University Medical Center for continued research into a possible Gulf War illness biomarker that could be found in a blood test. “At this point in time, my aim is to help people,” said James N. Baraniuk, the professor in the Department of Medicine who is to receive the grant. “If we can identify abnormal physiology, identify biomarkers . . . and then find specific treatments . . . then we will have helped them.” Last year, Pentagon-funded studies at Georgetown suggested that veterans suffering from Gulf War illness have postwar brain abnormalities not seen in those unaffected by the malady, which may cause its symptoms. “These novel findings . . . provide validation for many veterans who have long said that no one believes them,” researcher Rakib Rayhan said at the time. So what did Tom Sullivan have? “At first blush, there seems to be a tie [between Tom Sullivan’s story and] what potentially we saw following the ’91 Gulf War,” Craig Postlewaite, director of force readiness and health assurance at the Defense Health Agency, said in an interview. Indeed, when the more


Appointment of deputy heir to throne stirs controversy in Saudi Arabia

become king.” Some of the dismay has found a public airing on Twitter, which is better known in the Middle East for its role in fomenting social unrest but here also has found a niche as an outlet for disgruntled royals. “He was picked for this post because he is easily used,” tweeted an account known as @mutjahidd, which has 1.4 million followers and is thought to belong to a palace insider because its information often is accurate. The griping may merely reflect sour grapes among those left out in a looming transfer of power, or perhaps just the increased opportunities afforded by social media for tensions to come to light. It has become clear, however, that Muqrin’s elevation is unpopular in at least some quarters, foreshadowing the strife that many fear will erupt as the older generation of the royal family passes away. The controversy goes to the core of what is perhaps the biggest question hanging over the future stability of this family-run, oil-rich country, which does not have a clearly defined succession process in place. The founder of the Saudi state, King Abdul Aziz ibn Saud, decreed only that his first son would inherit the throne, and over the subsequent six decades the succession passed from brother to brother roughly in order of their age. Soon, however, the last of the current line of brothers (of which there were at least 35) will die, necessitating a transfer of power to the brothers’ sons — the third generation of the family. Given that there are scores of princes in that category, the potential for discord is high. Whoever inherits the throne is likely to anoint his own brothers as future heirs, thereby cutting out multiple cousins from access to the throne and the patronage it provides. In light of Saudi Arabia’s strategic significance as the world’s biggest supplier of oil and a close ally of the United States, the succession dispute is of “considerable concern,” said Simon Henderson of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “The identity and character of the future king is not known, and the circumstances under which he becomes king are likely to be contentious,” he said. “That introduces instability to Saudi Arabia.” The issue also is growing in urgency as Abdullah enters his 90s. He breathed with the help of a respirator throughout his two-hour meeting with Obama in March, and he


The true VA scandal is shared across the federal government

everyone wants to be pro-veteran, and the proposed congressional solution — allowing any VA senior executive to be fired at will, with no due process and no protection for whistleblowers — is particularly appalling. But the trajectory was similar when it involved the Federal Emergency Management Agency and Hurricane Katrina or the Internal Revenue Service and the tea party or the Department of Health and Human Services and HealthCare.gov. Such “scandals” will recur, likely with increasing frequency, as long as government leaders ignore the underlying problem: a personnel system that has not been upgraded to suit the 21st-century knowledge economy. “Name an organization that is succeeding largely under the same system it had in 1949,” says Max Stier, president and CEO of the nonprofit Partnership for Public Service. “It doesn’t exist.” It is a cumbersome system that can’t recruit or compete for talent and doesn’t reward top performers or punish poor ones. Some of the resistance to change is political: Democrats rely on government unions that are suspicious of merit-based policies, and Republicans are suspicious of government altogether. But Mr. Stier says the bigger obstacle to reform is structural. Political leaders want to influence policies that will bear fruit while they are in office. Civil service reform is hard work, requires sustained attention and would pay off mostly in future presidential terms. Beyond his anger at times of crisis, does Mr. Obama care? “I don’t see it,” Mr. Stier said. “The administration as a whole has not led on these issues.” Congress’s contribution, meanwhile, is a “combination of neglect and destruction.” Taking the VA back to the days predating the Pendleton Act of 1883 — yes, 1883 — is only the latest example. Some agencies do a better job, proving that even with all the political obstacles leadership makes a difference: NASA, the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. But these are islands. Less than 6 percent of the federal workforce is younger than 30 , compared with 23 percent in the country. As the public workforce ages and retires, dysfunction will increase, unless someone gets serious about attracting and retaining talent. Read more about this issue: Eugene Robinson: Heads need to roll at the VA Dana Milbank: VA Secretary Eric Shinseki needs to go Michael Gerson: Political corruption at the IRS Elijah R. Cummings and Sander M. Levin: Leave politics out of IRS reform


This summer, NASA will begin keeping an eye on your garden

But there has always been a big, fiery problem: the sun. The sun is, in most ways, a nice thing to have around. It makes life possible by supplying energy to our planet. From an observational standpoint, though, it can be a major pain. There are huge swaths of the universe that we simply cannot see because the brightness of the sun obscures our view. Discoveries in our solar system and beyond. In much the same way, the sun was thought to make it impossible to measure global photosynthetic fluorescence. The signals we want to observe are subtle and represent a narrow slice of the electromagnetic spectrum. The sun’s broad-spectrum rays were presumed to overwhelm the wavelengths of plant fluorescence, making them virtually impossible to detect. That’s where NASA’s Joanna Joiner of the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., and Christian Frankenberg of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., came in, with their innovative use of an electromagnetic phenomenon known as Fraunhofer lines. In the early 19th century, German optician Joseph Fraunhofer noticed that, in between the beautiful bands of colored light that emerged from a prism, several dark lines appeared. That’s because, by the time sunlight reaches Earth, molecules in the atmosphere have absorbed certain wavelengths of light. In other words, our atmosphere blocks out the sun in certain wavelength bands of the electromagnetic spectrum. Joiner and Frankenberg realized that they could look for plant fluorescence in the bands of the electromagnetic spectrum where the sun’s light has been dimmed. Data from the Japanese Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite, which was launched in 2009, confirmed their hunch. Although the OCO-2 project was already in motion by the time Joiner and Frankenberg made their breakthrough, adding fluorescence readings will massively amplify the satellite’s ability to carry out its carbon-measuring mission. A detailed map of photosynthetic activity and carbon absorption will better inform conservation efforts. It is widely believed that tropical forests absorb approximately 20 percent of global carbon emissions from fossil fuel combustion. But where else is carbon absorption highest? If the satellite data detect other areas of intense photosynthetic activity, we ought to be working hard to preserve them. The carbon-uptake map should also help settle some long-running disputes. Conventional wisdom once held that old-growth forests were bad at carbon sequestration, because they seemed to be finished growing. Some analysts suggested that turning those trees into houses or


time sunlight reaches Earth, molecules in the atmosphere have absorbed certain wavelengths of light. In other words, our atmosphere blocks out the sun in certain wavelength bands of the electromagnetic spectrum. Joiner and Frankenberg realized that they could look for plant fluorescence in the bands of the electromagnetic spectrum where the sun’s light has been dimmed. Data from the Japanese Greenhouse Gases Observing Satellite, which was launched in 2009, confirmed their hunch. Although the OCO-2 project was already in motion by the time Joiner and Frankenberg made their breakthrough, adding fluorescence readings will massively amplify the satellite’s ability to carry out its carbon-measuring mission. A detailed map of photosynthetic activity and carbon absorption will better inform conservation efforts. It is widely believed that tropical forests absorb approximately 20 percent of global carbon emissions from fossil fuel combustion. But where else is carbon absorption highest? If the satellite data detect other areas of intense photosynthetic activity, we ought to be working hard to preserve them. The carbon-uptake map should also help settle some long-running disputes. Conventional wisdom once held that old-growth forests were bad at carbon sequestration, because they seemed to be finished growing. Some analysts suggested that turning those trees into houses or furniture would make room for newer trees to absorb more carbon. More recent findings, however, suggest that old trees continue to breathe in carbon at high rates. OCO-2’s data will shed light, so to speak, on the relative photosynthetic activity of old and new forests. The data will also provide an early warning system. In 2005, for example, a drought severely hampered the Amazon rain forest’s ability to absorb carbon, but scientists didn’t realize the full scale of the impact for several years. Satellite fluorescence data could have identified the situation almost as it was happening. There may not be much we can do to stave off a drought in the Amazon, but there are other ways the data can be used. A decline in photosynthesis rates, as identified by falling fluorescence, could alert farmers to crop failure much earlier. It could help planners manage irrigation resources, as well as alert global relief organizations to potential famines before they happen. Managing a garden from space sounds a bit futuristic, but horticulture is about to enter the space age. From now on, you’re not just trying to impress the neighbors with your green thumb. Related: Special space series


During the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln blew off steam by looking at the stars

Earth’s nearest star was rising in the sky and warming the morning air when I visited the U.S. Naval Observatory on Friday. I parked in front of Building 1 — completed in 1893, it’s among the oldest structures on the campus, which is off Massachusetts Avenue NW — and made my way upstairs to a high-ceilinged office where Kirk Benson sat behind a desk. It wasn’t Kirk’s desk. Or his office. He works at the Stennis Space Center in Mississippi, where his title is precise time and astrometryprogram manager and where he supports the Naval Observatory. But he comes to Washington a few times a year, and he had invited me over to talk about Abraham Lincoln. As the 150th anniversary of the Civil War ticks along, we’re hearing a lot about Lincoln. Kirk is fascinated by one aspect of the president that not everyone is familiar with: Lincoln’s interest in the heavens. “I never knew Lincoln was an amateur astronomer,” Kirk said. Then last year, the Naval Observatory celebrated its own Lincoln-related event: a visit the president made in 1863 to peer through its new 9.6-inch reflector telescope. This aroused Kirk’s interest in Lincoln and the stars. Back then, the Naval Observatory was on 24th Street NW, in Foggy Bottom. It was an easy walk or carriage ride from the White House. On Aug. 22, 1863, Lincoln rode over, and Asaph Hall, the observatory’s astronomer, showed him the moon and the star Arcturus. The telescope that President Abraham Lincoln peered through at the U.S. Naval Observatory during the Civil War. This was at the original location of the observatory, in Foggy Bottom. (Office of Medical History, ) A few nights later, Hall heard a knock at the door. It was Lincoln, back with a question: Why had the moon been upside-down in the telescope’s eyepiece? Hall explained that the observatory’s telescope worked differently from the surveying instruments and terrestrial telescopes Lincoln was accustomed to. Satisfied with the answer, Lincoln gave his thanks and left. “He was an inquisitive guy,” Kirk said. “He didn’t just blow it off and not worry about it. He wanted to know.” Kirk took celestial navigation classes when he was a midshipman at the Naval Academy. His first duty station in the Navy was aboard the USS Ouellet, a frigate based in Pearl Harbor. For a time, he was the ship’s navigator. “Back then —


Local Digest: News in the Washington area

THE DISTRICT Police investigate recent stabbings District police continue to investigate a series of robberies and stabbings that occurred over the Memorial Day holiday. Between Sunday night and Monday afternoon at least seven people were robbed across Washington either at gunpoint or after being threatened with a knife, according to the District police Twitter feed. None of the incidents were fatal, said police spokesman Paul Metcalf. Three of those crimes took place in the city’s Southwest section. In one incident Monday afternoon, a person who was approached by two men in their 20s was stabbed on the 1300 block of First Street SW. About four miles away, a man was found stabbed Sunday night on Forrester Street, near Martin Luther King Jr. Avenue SE. A few hours later, someone was stabbed in the 1300 block of Canal Street SW, police said. — Antonio Olivo MARYLAND Police: Man dressed as woman robs bank Prince George’s County police are looking for a man who detectives suspect was dressed as a woman as he robbed a Bowie bank Friday, authorities said. The robber entered a TD Bank in the 4300 block of Collington Road about noon and suggested to a teller that he had a weapon, police said. The teller then gave the man cash, and the man left, police said. In surveillance photos, the robber is shown wearing a skirt and scarf and holding a purse as he walked out. Police are offering up to $1,000 for anyone with information that could lead to an arrest and indictment. Police ask anyone with information to call 301-772-4905. To call anonymously: 1-866-411-8477. — Lynh Bui VIRGINIA Deputy is charged with raping inmate An Alexandria deputy sheriff was arrested Tuesday evening and charged with rape in connection with the alleged sexual assault of a female inmate at the Alexandria detention center early Tuesday, the sheriff’s office said. They said the deputy, Bryant Pegues, 52, of Oxon Hill, was discharged from the sheriff’s office, where he had worked since 2007. The sheriff’s office provides security at the detention center. The sheriff’s office said it learned of the alleged assault after the woman provided information to another deputy. — Martin Weil


Noma chef Daniel Giusti keeps the world's top restaurant running

local restaurants, whether Peter Pastan’s Obelisk near Dupont Circle or Maestro in Tysons Corner, where Fabio Trabocchi set the standard for Italian fine dining. The Clyde’s kitchen became a kind of surrogate father to the teen. “In a lot of ways, I think he thought it was super cool that all these guys paid attention to him,” Guattery says. “He became part of the crew very quickly, even though he was only 15 or 16 years old.” Even before graduating from the CIA in 2004, Giusti worked an externship at Aureole, chef Charlie Palmer’s restaurant in New York, where he met Matt Orlando, future chef de cuisine for Noma. Neither New York nor Italy, where Giusti kicked around after culinary school, panned out, so he winged it back to Washington and helped Guattery open Clyde’s of Gallery Place, a 23,000-square-foot operation that was the dining equivalent of nearby Verizon Center: big, meaty and designed for sports nuts. Giusti was pining for more, however, and split for Las Vegas, eventually landing at Guy Savoy, the haute French restaurant with two Michelin stars. The economy’s crippling effect on Guy Savoy’s operations, though, made Giusti receptive to another pitch from Guattery: Come back to the mid-Atlantic and serve as head chef for the Clyde’s location in Broadlands, Va. Giusti instead proposed that he lead the kitchen at 1789, where the chef had given notice. Guattery bit, even though he would be handing over Clyde’s fine-dining flagship to a chef who had never before managed a kitchen. Giusti was just 24. It turned out to be a forward-thinking move. Giusti changed purveyors, bringing in obscure citrus fruits from the West Coast and whole animals from EcoFriendly Foods in Virginia. He even helped relax the jacket requirement for men. Giusti tried to transform the old battle-ax into something hipper, which did not always endear him to veteran staffers. But not even his first head chef position could hold Giusti’s interest for long. Three years in, he was ready for the next challenge. He wanted to work at Noma, and he was willing to do it for nothing. A worrier mentality To witness the ease with which Giusti moves around Noma’s pristine black box of a kitchen, you’d never imagine how difficult his journey was to reach this lofty perch. At 6 feet, 5 inches, Giusti towers above most of his younger cooks, which no doubt


Notable deaths in the Washington area

the National Institutes of Health in the field of apheresis, the process of collecting platelets used for blood transfusions to people with cancer and other illnesses, died May 20 at a hospital in Baltimore. She was run over by a horse during a wedding ceremony, said a granddaughter, Kimberly Tavenner. Mrs. Dowling was born Regina Ferguson in Cumberland, Md., and she spent her early career as a nurse at Cumberland Memorial Hospital. She later joined the NIH Clinical Center, whose apheresis clinic was named in her honor after her retirement in 1990. She volunteered at the Mercy Health Clinic and was a member of Trinity United Methodist Church, both in Germantown, Md. She moving last year to Hanover, Md., from Germantown. Robert W. Doyle, antitrust lawyer Robert W. Doyle, 66, a former Federal Trade Commission official and antitrust lawyer who was a founding partner in 2006 of the law firm Doyle, Barlow and Mazard in Washington, died May 18 at a hospital in New London, Conn. The cause was a heart attack, said a daughter, Michaela Doyle. Mr. Doyle, a Washington resident, was a Philadelphia native. He spent more than 20 years at the FTC, rising to deputy assistant director of the Bureau of Competition before leaving the agency in 1998. He then was a partner at several law firms, including Arent Fox, before starting his private practice. His expertise in antitrust law extended to matters affecting industries including telecommunications, insurance, supermarkets and health care. He was an advisory board member of the American Antitrust Institute and a co-chair of the Temple University law school alumni club of Washington. Philip H. Highfill Jr., GWU professor Philip H. Highfill Jr., 95, who retired from George Washington University in 1989 as a professor of English literature, died May 17 at his home in Bethesda. The cause was pneumonia, said a son, Philip H. Highfill III. Dr. Highfill was born in Petersburg, Va. He was an assistant professor at the University of Rochester before joining the GWU faculty in 1955. He was an author and editor of “A Biographical Dictionary of Actors, Actresses, Musicians, Dancers, Managers and Other Stage Personnel in London, 1660-1800,” an award-winning 16-volume work that began appearing in 1973 and has become a standard reference in theater history studies. He was a consultant in literature at the Folger Shakespeare Library from 1965 to 1968 and was a past president of


BSO and Folger collaborate on unique staging of ‘Midsummer’

Marin Alsop conducting the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra during a dress rehearsal. (Chris Lee) At a first rehearsal, a veteran thespian like Marcus Kyd expects to get cued by a fellow actor, a stage manager or — worst case-scenario — a disgruntled director who expected him to arrive with his lines memorized. But Saturday afternoon’s rehearsal for “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” was not your normal first rehearsal. There, in the largest theater Kyd has every performed, he realized that his cues would also be coming from a formidable conductor and more than three dozen string players. Kyd is one of seven actors who will be featured in this weekend’s production of Shakespeare’s comedy. It’s a production unlike anything he has done before. In collaboration with the Folger Theatre, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra is producing a semi-staged version of Shakespeare’s comedy integrated with Felix Mendelssohn’s incidental music for the play. “We have to weave in and out of the orchestra, as if the musicians are our scene partners,” Kyd said during a break. He was already fatigued from practicing a myriad of entrances and exits. “You have to think of the instruments as other actors.” The concert will be staged Thursday at Strathmore Music Center in North Bethesda, and Friday through Sunday at Meyerhoff Symphony Hall in Baltimore. Typically, when an orchestra performs “Midsummer,” it hires a celebrity to read selected lines from the play between movements. But conductor Marin Alsop wanted to do more. Expect elaborate costumes, evocative lighting and a chaise lounge carrying Titania (Linda Powell) to descend from the rafters. “ ‘Midsummer’ works beautifully with just a single narrator,” Alsop said. “But having more then just one personality really adds a lot more dimension for the audience.” Frank Britton. (Courtesy force/collision) This is the first time in Alsop’s seven-year tenure at the BSO that she has undertaken a theatrical staging of this magnitude. She needed help, and through the Folger, looped in Edward Berkeley to direct. Four of the seven actors that Berkeley cast — Kyd, Katie deBuys, Kate Eastwood Norris and Cody Nickell — are Folger regulars, chosen for their ability to play multiple parts. Kyd, a self-professed Shakespeare junkie, will play Lysander, Flute and Peaseblossom. He’s drawing upon his experience not only from acting at the Folger, but producing “bootleg” Shakespeare with Taffety Punk Theater Company, a local troupe that annually puts on a Bard play with


Chat Leftovers: Where to buy pasteurized eggs

But as efficient as we are, we can’t get to every single question, and that’s where I come in. Case in point: This leftover question from last week’s chat: Where can I get pasteurized eggs in the Washington area? Safeway used to carry the Davidson’s brand but apparently no longer does. Harris Teeter also carried them for a while, but the ones I’ve called do not now. I have seen on the Web that one can pasteurize eggs oneself, but I am leery. Any thoughts on that? Wow, that question turned out to be tricker than I thought. First, to my surprise, I too had trouble finding stores that sell them. Second, I ran into a slight communication problem: When I called to ask about pasteurized eggs, a few stores assured me they carried them, but later I realized that they thought I was talking about “pastured” eggs. Big difference. Okay, so. As most of us know, raw eggs carry a slight — very slight — risk of salmonella. To be completely safe, some people like to use pasteurized eggs in foods where the eggs won’t be cooked — tartares, for example, or mayonnaise, or cocktails. Many sources recommend pasteurized eggs for pregnant women or people with compromised immune systems. As far as larger grocery chains are concerned, it seems that Harris Teeter is a good bet. I don’t know which stores you checked, but I called several and found the Davidson’s Safest Choice in stock. The handful of Fresh Markets in our area also carry that brand. I checked several Giant Food stores in the District, Maryland and Virginia and found none. Ditto for Whole Foods. Wegmans does not mention them in its handy online listing of products. I called a Safeway and was assured that though the stores have indeed stopped stocking Davidson’s, they sell a Safeway house brand. But I dropped by two Safeway stores in Arlington and found no evidence of any pasteurized eggs there. I’ll be happy to have someone from Safeway tell me I’m wrong, but I think the store employee misunderstood the question. Or maybe the employee didn’t realize I meant eggs in the shell; all grocery stores seem to sell pasteurized egg whites in containers. Those could be useful for such things as meringues and mousses, except pasteurized whites don’t whip up as nicely as the raw ones. Now, as to pasteurizing


Full transcript of President Obama’s commencement address at West Point

nobody ever did that for me when I was in school. I know you join me in extending a word of thanks to your families. Joe DeMoss, whose son James is graduating, spoke for a whole lot of parents when he wrote me a letter about the sacrifices you’ve made. “Deep inside,” he wrote, “we want to explode with pride at what they are committing to do in the service of our country.” Like several graduates, James is a combat veteran, and I would ask all of us here today to stand and pay tribute not only to the veterans among us, but to the more than 2.5 million Americans who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as their families. (Applause.) It is a particularly useful time for America to reflect on those who’ve sacrificed so much for our freedom, a few days after Memorial Day. You are the first class to graduate since 9/11 who may not be sent into combat in Iraq or Afghanistan. (Cheers, applause.) When I first spoke at West Point in 2009, we still had more than 100,000 troops in Iraq. We were preparing to surge in Afghanistan. Our counterterrorism efforts were focused on al-Qaida’s core leadership -- those who had carried out the 9/11 attacks. And our nation was just beginning a long climb out of the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. Four and a half years later, as you graduate, the landscape has changed. We have removed our troops from Iraq. We are winding down our war in Afghanistan. Al-Qaida’s leadership on the border region between Pakistan and Afghanistan has been decimated, and Osama bin Laden is no more. (Cheers, applause.) And through it all, we’ve refocused our investments in what has always been a key source of American strength: a growing economy that can provide opportunity for everybody who’s willing to work hard and take responsibility here at home. In fact, by most measures America has rarely been stronger relative to the rest of the world. Those who argue otherwise -- who suggest that America is in decline or has seen its global leadership slip away -- are either misreading history or engaged in partisan politics. Think about it. Our military has no peer. The odds of a direct threat against us by any nation are low, and do not come close to the dangers we faced during


and we have to continue to protect sources and methods, but when we cannot explain our efforts clearly and publicly, we face terrorist propaganda and international suspicion, we erode legitimacy with our partners and our people, and we reduce accountability in our own government. And this issue of transparency is directly relevant to a third aspect of American leadership, and that is our effort to strengthen and enforce international order. After World War II, America had the wisdom to shape institutions to keep the peace and support human progress -- from NATO and the United Nations, to the World Bank and IMF. These institutions are not perfect, but they have been a force multiplier. They reducing the need for unilateral American action and increase restraint among other nations. Now, just as the world has changed, this architecture must change as well. At the height of the Cold War, President Kennedy spoke about the need for a peace based upon a gradual evolution in human institutions. And evolving these international institutions to meet the demands of today must be a critical part of American leadership. Now, there are lot of folks, a lot of skeptics who often downplay the effectiveness of multilateral action. For them, working through international institutions, like the U.N. or respecting international law, is a sign of weakness. I think they’re wrong. Let me offer just two examples why. In Ukraine, Russia’s recent actions recall the days when Soviet tanks rolled into Eastern Europe. But this isn’t the Cold War. Our ability to shape world opinion helped isolate Russia right away. Because of American leadership, the world immediately condemned Russian actions, Europe and the G-7 joined with us to impose sanctions, NATO reinforced our commitment to Eastern European allies, the IMF is helping to stabilize Ukraine’s economy, OSCE monitors brought the eyes of the world to unstable parts of Ukraine. And this mobilization of world opinion and international institutions served as a counterweight to Russian propaganda and Russian troops on the border and armed militias in ski masks. This weekend, Ukrainians voted by the millions. Yesterday, I spoke to their next president. We don’t know how the situation will play out, and there will remain grave challenges ahead, but standing with our allies on behalf of international order, working with international institutions, has given a chance for the Ukrainian people to choose their future -- without us firing


countries like Egypt, we acknowledge that our relationship is anchored in security interests, from peace treaties to Israel to shared efforts against violent extremism. So we have not cut off cooperation with the new government, but we can and will persistently press for reforms that the Egyptian people have demanded. And meanwhile, look at a country like Burma, which only a few years ago was an intractable dictatorship and hostile to the United States. Forty million people. Thanks to the enormous courage of the people in that country, and because we took the diplomatic initiative, American leadership, we have seen political reforms opening a once- closed society; a movement by Burmese leadership away from partnership with North Korea in favor of engagement with America and our allies. We’re now supporting reform and badly needed national reconciliation through assistance and investment, through coaxing and, at times, public criticism. And progress there could be reversed, but if Burma succeeds we will have gained a new partner without having fired a shot -- American leadership. In each of these cases, we should not expect change to happen overnight. That’s why we form alliances -- not only with governments, but also with ordinary people. For unlike other nations, America is not afraid of individual empowerment. We are strengthened by it. We’re strengthened by civil society. We’re strengthened by a free press. We’re strengthened by striving entrepreneurs and small businesses. We’re strengthened by educational exchange and opportunity for all people and women and girls. That’s who we are. That’s what we represent. (Applause.) I saw that through a trip to Africa last year, where American assistance has made possible the prospect of an AIDS-free generation, while helping Africans care themselves for their sick. We’re helping farmers get their products to market to feed populations once endangered by famine. We aim to double access to electricity in sub- Saharan Africa so people are connected to the promise of the global economy. And all this creates new partners and shrinks the space for terrorism and conflict. Now, tragically, no American security operation can eradicate the threat posed by an extremist group like Boko Haram -- the group that kidnapped those girls. And that’s we have to focus not just on rescuing those girls right away, but also on supporting Nigerian efforts to educate its youth. This should be one of the hard-earned lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan,


Ex-NFL linemen discover that weighing 300 pounds or more is no asset in life after football

Faneca was surprised at how easy activity was now that he no longer weighed so much. He was alone on a run once, and where he normally turned back, he kept going, three miles turning into seven. Then there he was attending an NFL game, when he told a few former trainers that he had run 10 miles a few days earlier — and that he was planning to run a half marathon, and the trainers told him that would be easy. “I wasn’t looking for easy,” Faneca says now. He hired a speed coach and ran longer and farther, abandoning his plans for the half marathon and instead focusing on finishing a full 26.2 miles. Faneca says he believes he redirected his competitive nature into a new activity, which many players are unable to do as they wait for one more NFL contract. He says finding new physical challenges immediately after retirement was the difference between his story and so many of uncontrolled weights. And like Davis, he says he heard little during his playing days about how to drop weight after he retired. “We’re already gone. We’re out of sight, out of mind,” says Faneca, who at 37 now weighs about 215 pounds. “It’s just another aspect of what we do to ourselves as professional football players that nobody really wants to think about or the league, especially, would want to talk about.” In February, Faneca crossed a finish line in New Orleans after 3 hours 56 minutes of running — a solid time for any first-time marathoner and one that might’ve seemed impossible when Faneca was 100 pounds heavier. Afterward, he bought a bicycle and began looking up triathlons and Iron Man races. “Literally the next day,” he says, “I was like: What’s next?” A new goal Back when he played, Brown thought his size was an asset. He was quick and strong, and running backs came to fear him. The fines and anxious weigh-ins — he used to plead with friendly teammates to sneak a hand under a cheek or belly roll to fool the scale and save a few dollars — were small prices for glory. But like all players, Brown’s career ended, in 1969, and he eventually ballooned to 448 pounds. Brown says most of his former teammates have died, many with heart problems or diseases related to the amount of weight they carried.


David Ignatius: Obama’s foreign policy repeats some avoidable mistakes

proposal, not least because it builds on one of the best responses by President George W. Bush’s CIA to Sept. 11, 2001. The Bush administration deservedly gets blamed for the CIA’s torture of suspected terrorists, but people often overlook the big intelligence gains that came from helping friendly services build counterterrorism capabilities that could go places (and recruit sources) the U.S. couldn’t. Obama is smart to formalize this approach. The maiden test of this fund will be in combating the spiraling growth of al-Qaeda in Syria and Iraq (and its even more extreme cousin, which calls itself the “Islamic State” in those two countries). Obama signaled that he will offer counterterrorism help to friendly governments in Jordan and Turkey, and to the not-so-friendly, Iranian-backed government in Iraq. The most creative idea Obama is considering is training entire units of the Syrian opposition so that they could operate as teams to stabilize liberated areas in northern and southern Syria. That’s worth doing. For all Obama’s deliberation about increasing aid for the moderate Syrian opposition, it’s telling that the White House still hasn’t disclosed whether its assistance will be in the form of an overt, “Title 10” military training program, led by U.S. Special Operations forces, or remain a covert CIA paramilitary effort. Obama is said to have decided for the open military approach, which would probably include training entire units, but he doesn’t want to scare off key Arab partners, such as Jordan, which are nervous about so visible a program. Obama was at his best explaining why his policy to contain Russian aggression in Ukraine was correct. Recognizing that America didn’t have military options to stop President Vladimir Putin, Obama used partners, alliances and sanctions. “Our ability to shape world opinion helped isolate Russia right away,” he said, describing the path to Sunday’s successful election, which Putin had wanted to torpedo. It was almost a declaration of victory. If Obama can craft his partnerships to contain al-Qaeda, he will have created an important legacy. Administration officials privately suggest Obama would revisit the question of residual counterterrorism forces in Afghanistan in 2016 if the al-Qaeda threat there returns. I hope so. Read more from David Ignatius’s archive, follow him on Twitter or subscribe to his updates on Facebook. Read more on this issue: The Post’s View: President Obama binds America’s hands Elliott Abrams: Obama explained why his foreign policy hasn’t worked


OHIO Executions off till Aug. 15 Ohio executions have been put on hold for 21 / 2 months after a federal judge allowed more time for arguments over the state’s new lethal-injection procedures. The order, in place until Aug. 15, delays executions scheduled for July and August while attorneys prepare filings about the state’s decision to boost the dosages of its lethal-injection drugs. Tuesday’s order by Columbus federal Judge Gregory Frost affects the state’s latest death-penalty policy change, which was announced in late April. The procedure update followed the Jan. 16 execution of Dennis McGuire, who repeatedly gasped during the record 26 minutes it took him to die. — Associated Press HEALTH Human-to-human MERS fear unfounded Health officials at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Wednesday that an Illinois man did not contract MERS from an infected business associate after all. The case, announced May 17, was believed to have been the first instance of human-to-human transmission of the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome coronavirus on U.S. soil. But upon further analysis, it wasn’t, said David Swerdlow, the epidemiologist who is leading the CDC’s response to MERS. Initial blood tests “indicated the possibility that the unidentified Illinois resident had been previously infected with MERS-CoV,” Swerdlow said. But now that the results of a more definitive test are in, the CDC has concluded the man was never infected. Public health officials investigated the Illinois man after a health-care worker from Saudi Arabia was diagnosed with MERS in Munster, Ind. The Indiana patient was the first person with a confirmed case of MERS in the United States. The Illinois man aroused suspicion because he had two business meetings with the Indiana patient in the days before he was hospitalized. — Los Angeles Times MAINE Anti-gay-marriage group fined Maine’s ethics panel fined a national anti-gay-marriage group more than $50,000 Wednesday and ordered it to reveal the donors who backed its efforts to repeal the state’s gay marriage law. The Maine Commission on Governmental Ethics and Election Practices found that the National Organization for Marriage violated campaign finance laws by failing to register properly as a ballot-question committee and file financial reports in the 2009 referendum that struck down gay marriage. Same-sex unions were legalized by voters in 2012. Under Maine law, groups must register if they raise or spend more than $5,000 to influence a statewide ballot question. NOM gave nearly $2


Obama makes his mark on the appeals courts

trapdoor spider Aptostichus barackobamai, are newly discovered species that will live on forever with Obama’s name attached to them. So the decision to name a baby tiger after Obama isn’t exactly the same thing — it’s not so different from your neighbor naming his dog or hamster Obama. But these tigers are an endangered species, which makes them special. And they’re ridiculously adorable. Five cubs were born at the White Zoo in Kernhof, Austria, several weeks ago. The four females were named Lali, Lela, Lila and Lula. The fifth, a male, was named Obama. The zoo owner, Herbert Eder, in an e-mail to the Loop, gave an explanation in halting English. “This little fellow is similar walking as your President of the United States and he has the same smiley face. And Obama is looking very intelligent with wonderful steel blue eyes. We hope, that Mr. Barack Obama is not angry, when we have now a second Obama in Austria. We like him and it is lovely sign of respect to your President. We would be very happy, if Mr. President would hear about that and maybe he send us greetings from the White House. If not, . . . when he is maybe visiting Austria in the future, our guest of honour in the White Zoo Austria flying by Air Force One to meet Obama no. 2!!” Quote of the week Secretary of State John Kerry was amused Wednesday morning during an interview on the “Today” show when asked about Edward Snowden’s assertion about his current living situation. In an interview with NBC’s Brian Williams that aired Tuesday night, Snowden, the former National Security Agency contractor, said the United States had “trapped” him in Moscow. “So when people ask why are you in Russia, I say, ‘Please ask the State Department,’ ” Snowden told Williams. Kerry chuckled when “Today” host Savannah Guthrie told him Snowden blamed the U.S. government for his new life in Russia. She asked whether Snowden had a point. Though we’re only halfway through the week, Kerry’s response earned him the Loop Quote of the Week crown. “For a supposedly smart guy, that’s a pretty dumb answer, frankly,” Kerry said. “If Mr. Snowden wants to come back to the United States today, we’ll have him on a flight today. We’d be delighted for him to come back.” — With Colby Itkowitz The blog: washingtonpost.com/intheloop. Twitter: @InTheLoopWP.


Army staff sergeant accused of numerous sex assaults in Afghanistan and Missouri

is accused of sexually assaulting four women and assaulting eight others by touching them inappropriately, said Wood, the base spokeswoman. The case has received little attention until now, but it could serve as further kindling in the long-burning debate about how sexual-assault cases should be handled in the military. Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.), who represents Fort Leonard Wood, has been among the most vocal lawmakers in pressing for an overhaul of the military justice system when it comes to sexual-assault cases. In December, Congress passed a bill she sponsored that would remove military commanders’ ability to overturn sexual assault convictions, give victims their own independent lawyer and require a dishonorable discharge as a minimum sentence for any service member convicted. An additional law that grants even more rights to victims was passed in March by the Senate. An official in McCaskill’s office said Tuesday that she is aware of the case and tracking it but that “it wouldn’t be appropriate to comment on it right now as the trial is ongoing.” Sanchez’s alleged crimes date to when he was deployed to Afghanistan between March 2011 and March 2012, according to charging documents. At one point during that time, authorities said Sanchez raped a female service member in a temporary housing unit that had been set up for women on a base in eastern Afghanistan. Sanchez also is accused of attempting to spy on one female soldier while she was showering in Afghanistan, and watching another naked female service member while she weighed herself in a closet, prosecutors say. Those incidents allegedly occurred at Outpost Dandar, in Kunar province. While in Afghanistan, Sanchez also kept up a steady stream of obscene commentary aimed at his female colleagues, military prosecutors said. “I know you guys are married, but it’s okay if you have a deployment buddy,” he allegedly told one lower-ranking soldier while raising the prospect of sexual contact. “If you give me two minutes, it will be the best two minutes of your life,” he told another woman, according to the charging documents. The case against Sanchez has similarities to a sex scandal at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas that erupted after a single complaint was filed in 2011. Dozens of female recruits were the victims of sexual assault or other crimes by their military training instructors, an investigation on the base later found. Craig Whitlock contributed to this report.