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Can Yoshihiko Noda set Japan back on course?

about how long a lifeline to throw. Administration officials appreciate that Noda has moved the U.S.-Japan alliance back to the center of Japanese strategy after his predecessors flirted with “balancing” between China and the United States. Noda said Thursday that his “unshakable conviction” that the alliance is “the foundation of Japanese security” was only fortified by U.S. help during the March 2011 disaster. But U.S. officials are impatient with Japan’s leadership merry-go-round and its perceived inability to deliver on promises. They want Japan to pick up a big share of the cost of moving Marines from Okinawa to Guam and elsewhere in Asia and Australia (beyond the lengthening range of Chinese missiles, though that won’t be said aloud). Some officials, and members of Congress too, share unhappy memories of Japan’s blocking maneuvers in trade talks and want stiff terms for its entry into the regional negotiation. Even after a successful summit, Noda might not last. His disapproval rating, following the pattern of his predecessors, has soared from 19 percent to 59 percent since September. He’s paying the price for a general loss of confidence in Japanese institutions exacerbated by the government’s Katrina-like response to last year’s disaster. And much like the way Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) set Obama’s defeat as his top priority, a number of Japanese leaders, including rivals in his party, are more committed to bringing Noda down than to getting something done. So a certain U.S. reserve is understandable. Fortunately, many U.S. officials also understand that Noda’s failure is not to be wished for, and not only because he genuinely believes in the alliance. Noda in some ways represents a return to traditional Japanese leadership style: relentlessly uncharismatic, little-known personally even to Japanese, a consensus builder who moves more slowly than some backers would like to gather support for his proposals. When I asked about his hobbies, he mentioned judo. “I notice President Obama has been singing,” he said. “I can’t match that.” But after two relatively flamboyant but utterly clueless premiers, Noda’s solidity is welcome. Very untraditionally, he is not a product of Japan’s elite. He is the plain-spoken son of an enlisted soldier, with financial assets smaller than those of any previous postwar leader and atypically direct in explaining what he intends to do and why it needs to be done. If Noda could put it on a more sustainable path, Japan could better help

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Noda says Japan running out of time to increase taxes, restart reactors

social security system, he said. Noda acknowledged that such proposals are “not so popular among the people.” Nor are they uniformly supported by the ruling Democratic Party of Japan. The approval rating for Noda’s cabinet fell this month below 30 percent, a level from which Japan’s five previous, short-lived prime ministers never rebounded. Noda said it remains an open question whether politicians here can “stand firm for the national interest.” “In that respect,” he said, “I’m confronting a difficult situation.” Noda will arrive in Washington with little evidence of progress. Although Japan has spent almost two years debating participation in a regional free-trade pact that involves the United States, Tokyo hasn’t made a final decision. The Trans-Pacific Partnership would open new markets for Japan’s exporters, but it would also endanger the country’s domestic agriculture industry, long protected by high tariffs. Noda had hoped to be able to tell President Obama during their meeting that Japan would join the pact, but he acknowledged just days ago that he couldn’t, according to the Kyodo news agency. Negotiations also remain at a standstill on the relocation of an inner-city Marine air station in Okinawa, with leaders in Tokyo unable to soften local opposition to a proposed new site on a less populated part of the island. Analysts in Tokyo say that Noda will fight for the free-trade and base issues only if he resolves his stated top priority — raising the consumption tax. Noda, a former finance minister who took office seven months ago, has vowed to stake his political life on the tax increase, which would be used to fund mounting social security costs. When Noda’s cabinet submitted the tax bill last month, however, several members resigned in protest. The opposition, meanwhile, senses a political opportunity to force Noda from office over the issue and then begin the debate anew. “We must do what we have to do now, otherwise social security is unsustainable,” Noda said. “We cannot let that happen. Currently, we are covering the cost by issuing deficit-covering bonds, passing the burden to the future generation,” whose debts will be all the higher. Noda also laid out the case for restarting Japan’s nuclear reactors, despite majority opposition to atomic energy in the wake of the accident at the Fukushima Daiichi plant last year. Currently, Japan is operating just one of its 54 reactors; most of the rest came offline for

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Baltimore’s storied Berger cookies come to Washington

were a litmus test of sorts, a way of gauging if she, a lifelong resident of the D.C. area, had enough “Bawlmer” in her. She failed miserably on that front, merely scanning the ingredients before handing them back to me (though she helped make up for it with her prowess at darts). The hostess picked up one of the Berger cookies herself. “Now that’s a bit, umm, daunting,” she said, cautiously turning it over in her fingers. I had flashbacks of this dinner party when I discovered Berger cookies in a Giant Food store near my new home this past winter. Immediately, I wanted to buy every pack and take them home, where they would always, always be duly appreciated. Soon after, I discovered that Bergers have been penetrating the D.C. market, mostly through Giant stores, over the past year or so. Beginning this summer, they’ll start cropping up at Safeways. (Bergers have appeared on shelves in some small area shops and delis for a few years.) Why the recent southward migration? “Because there’s a lot of money down there,” says Berger owner Charles DeBaufre Jr. “And it’s close enough that these gas prices won’t kill me.” While I don’t begrudge DeBaufre the chance to make a buck, I do worry if Washington can ever fully appreciate the Berger cookie. After all, this is the same city that earned top honors as healthiest in the country, three years running, in the annual American Fitness Index. And it’s the same city that the legendary French bakery Paul (the same Paul that bakes some of its rustic breads for seven hours) fingered to open its flagship American bakery. Is this cosmopolitan region really ready to embrace a cookie that admittedly looks as if its fudge creme topping was slapped on by 5-year-olds hopped up on Mountain Dew? Perhaps what Washingtonians need to appreciate this iconic confection is proper entree, a primer of sorts. *** Lesson One: Don’t fear the fudge Many people pass off the Berger cookie as kissing cousin to the New York deli classic Black and White. Both desserts aredome-shaped, cakey cookies with icing covering their inverted, flattened bottoms. But any familial relations between these two treats begin and end with the unfrosted cookie, which, in both cases has the mouth feel and texture of a vanilla wafer crossed with sponge cake. For one thing, the cookie in the Black

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It’s time to toss the all-volunteer military

Since the end of the military draft in 1973, every person joining the U.S. armed forces has done so because he or she asked to be there. Over the past decade, this all-volunteer force has been put to the test and has succeeded, fighting two sustained foreign wars with troops standing up to multiple combat deployments and extreme stress. This is precisely the reason it is time to get rid of the all-volunteer force. It has been too successful. Our relatively small and highly adept military has made it all too easy for our nation to go to war — and to ignore the consequences. The drawbacks of the all-volunteer force are not military, but political and ethical. One percent of the nation has carried almost all the burden of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, while the rest of us essentially went shopping. When the wars turned sour, we could turn our backs. A nation that disregards the consequences of its gravest decisions is operating in morally hazardous territory. We invaded Iraq recklessly. If we had a draft, a retired general said to me recently, we probably would not have invaded at all. If there had been a draft in 2001, I think we still would have gone to war in Afghanistan, which was the right thing to do. But I don’t think we would have stayed there much past the middle of 2002 or handled the war so negligently for years after that. We had a draft in the 1960s, of course, and it did not stop President Lyndon Johnson from getting into a ground war in Vietnam. But the draft sure did encourage people to pay attention to the war and decide whether they were willing to support it. Resuming conscription is the best way to reconnect the people with the armed services. Yes, reestablishing a draft, with all its Vietnam-era connotations, would cause problems for the military, but those could never be as painful and expensive as fighting an unnecessary war in Iraq for almost nine years. A draft would be good for our nation and ultimately for our military. Thomas E. Ricks Next: Premium gas Read more from Outlook, including our 2011 spring cleaning. Friend us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter.

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Essay: We’ve seen photos before like ones of U.S. soldiers with Afghan corpses

in literature and history of the vengeful acts of warriors. Lee tells the story of Continental Army soldiers who were taken to a battleground in Wyoming, Pa., and shown the remains of soldiers who had been scalped and mutilated. They avenged this act a couple of weeks later in Newtown, N.Y., by skinning the legs of two dead Native Americans and turning them into boots. In World War II, the collection and curation of body parts, especially from the Pacific, were common, and human remains were often shipped home through the mail. Skulls and teeth were particular favorites. Germans made souvenirs from the remains of dead prisoners in concentration camps. The misuse of a body to commemorate what one has accomplished on the battlefield or to intimidate your enemy is deeply embedded in the human psyche, Lee says. Victorious warriors were celebrated for displaying the spoils of war, including scalps and skulls and heads on a pike. “It gets interesting when you have cultural mores that go against this,” Lee says. “Society agrees that it is unacceptable, and so you start getting rules about how you should treat the enemy.” But even the rules — even the widespread agreement that “This is not who we are,” as Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta said on Wednesday — can only stop so much from happening. The impulse of soldiers to photograph their dead enemies is driven by a number of factors, says Nancy Sherman, author of “The Untold War: Inside the Hearts, Minds, and Souls of Our Soldiers” and a professor of philosophy at Georgetown specializing in the ethics of war. “There’s relief that they’re alive and not dead. There’s also top-dog exuberance and pent-up revenge,” she says. Another factor, especially in places such as Afghanistan, is when these incidents take place among units that are operating in remote locations, she says. “There often isn’t adequate leadership,” Sherman says. “They need people reminding them and telling them that this isn’t how good soldiers respond. A lot of this goes to command culture, and the absence of it is what is apparent.” Lee agrees that these incidents come about at “moments in which normal sense of controls have slipped. But [in today’s military] it needs to be emphasized that this is a real minority.” So it is right that we are outraged. Horrified. Shaken. But there’s no reason we should still be surprised.

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Los Angeles Times reporter backs publication of photos of troops with dead Afghan insurgents

their publication. Others supported and cheered the soldiers’ behavior. Once again, the media’s role in portraying the brutality of war was in question. For his part, Zucchino, a Pulitzer Prize-winning foreign correspondent, says his newspaper made the right call after weeks of internal deliberation and pre-publication consultations with Pentagon officials. “It’s our responsibility to report fully on the mission in Afghanistan, and it was important to publish these photos to tell the full story of the war,” he said in an interview Thursday. “We’ve reported aggressively, including [articles] about the sacrifice and heroism of the troops. This is one more aspect.” Zucchino, 60, says he believes that his source’s motivation was exactly as he described in his original e-mail — that the soldiers’ actions violated the U.S. military’s general code of conduct. The source, whom Zucchino has promised not to identify, was a member of the 82nd Airborne, the division in which the soldiers in the photos served. Despite the soldier’s distaste for what the photos showed, “he also understood the state of mind of these guys,” Zucchino said. “Their buddies had been killed by [improvised explosive devices] and maimed. It’s something they live with every day.” At the same time, his source understood that the specific nature of the Afghanistan war might lead to these kinds of photos. “I’ve been embedded with Marines, and they complain all the time about how the enemy won’t engage in a direct fight,” Zucchino said. “So when [soldiers] come across their enemy or body parts, you can see the temptation to celebrate a little bit. They’re amped up, and they’re frustrated.” The release of the photos, which were shot in 2010, was another in a series of recent episodes that created massively negative reaction toward the U.S. presence in Afghanistan. In January, a video surfaced of Marines urinating on the bodies of dead Taliban fighters; in February, Afghans violently protested the burning of copies of the Koran on a U.S. base. Last month, a U.S. soldier was accused of killing 17 Afghan civilians in a shooting spree. Some American military sources have suggested that these events may have sparked apparent reprisals by Afghan troops against their foreign allies. Even so, Zucchino dismisses the Pentagon’s objections that running the photos might put Americans in Afghanistan at greater risk. “From my experience, the insurgents don’t need any extra motivation to attack us,” he said. “It’s

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‘Pink slime’ outrage goes viral in stunning display of social media’s power

I was about to unleash,” Siegel wrote on her blog. People, it seems, who for years gobbled down “lean finely textured beef” sat upright when they saw “pink slime.” The moniker went viral. The “yuck” factor repulsed consumers. Supermarket chains – including Safeway, Kroger and Food Lion – abandoned the product. Wendy’s took out newspaper ads assuring customers that it never has used the stuff. Even the plodding government bureaucracy leaped into action, granting schools the choice to stop using it in lunches next year. Systems big and small, including public schools in Montgomery and Fairfax counties, opted out. The episode damaged the fortunes of Beef Products Inc., the producer in South Dakota, forcing it to suspend operations in three of its four plants, though it pledged to keep paying its workers for now. A meat processor in Pennsylvania, AFA Foods, filed for bankruptcy protection this month, citing reduced demand for lean beef as a factor. Meanwhile, ground beef sales in March hit a 10-year low for the month, just as the grilling season was about to take off. The dramatic fallout signals yet again the power of social media to change the way political actors and businesses respond to public pressure, leaving them all vulnerable — for better or worse — to reputational slights. Some consumer groups watched the events unfold with a mix of admiration, jealousy and perhaps remorse. “It’s substantively not the most critical health issue, yet it was framed in such a way that the public outcry actually changed food policy in a matter of weeks,” said Sarah Klein, a lawyer at the Center for Science in the Public Interest. “If we could figure out the formula and apply it to serious public health issues, that would be amazing.” The yuck factor The phrase — pink slime — was born in a 2002 e-mail. Gerald Zirnstein, a USDA microbiologist at the time, came up with it in an exchange with his colleagues. Seven years later, the e-mail emerged in a New York Times article that questioned the product’s safety. Then nothing much, until last April. That’s when celebrity chef Jamie Oliver thrust pink slime back into the spotlight on his nationally televised show, “Food Revolution.” Before a live audience, Oliver took a chunk of beef trimming and demonstrated his take on how the product is made: He spun the trimming in a washing machine, doused it

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‘Pink slime’ outrage goes viral in stunning display of social media’s power

1981 that catered to meat companies. A decade later, BPI was the first to commercially sell lean finely textured ground beef using a technique of his devising that separated the meat from fatty trimmings. Roth, who worked in milk and ice cream factories early in his career, borrowed heavily from dairy plant technology when he created a process to reclaim the bits of beef left clinging to the trimmings after a cow carcass is cut up to make steak. BPI buys the refrigerated trimmings from slaughterhouses. It grinds them, warms them to slightly below the body temperature of a live cow, and then spins them at high speeds to cull the beef. The lean meat is then flash-frozen and sold to meat processors, enabling those firms to meet increased demand for lower fat grinds. The company began using ammonia gas in 2001, with the USDA’s blessing. When the gas hits the water in the meat, it turns to ammonium hydroxide and kills bacteria, the firm said. Through the years, some BPI critics balked at the safety claims and dismissed the meat as a salvage product that does not meet the government’s definition of ground beef. The New York Times report found that USDA initially did not test BPI’s beef, figuring the ammonia made it pathogen-free. Federal school lunch officials tested it anyway, found E. coli and salmonella numerous times between 2005 and 2009, and pulled it before it was served. But when the most recent controversy erupted, many rallied to the company’s side. USDA officials vouched for BPI’s meat. They said it has never been directly linked to illnesses or outbreaks since the government started testing it in December 2009. Of 7,000 samples that BPI provided to USDA school lunch officials in the past two years, none has tested positive for Salmonella or a deadly strain of E. coli, a government spokesman said. Bill Marler, a Seattle lawyer who has built a business out of suing meat companies, said BPI’s lean beef is safe enough. “It’s not any more or less dangerous than anything else in hamburger,” Marler said. Nancy Donley’s only child died from an E. coli infection. Yet the consumer activist also stands by the beef product. “It just sounds gross to people, but at the end of the day it’s beef,” she said. “Nothing is 100 percent safe ... but this product is misunderstood.” Ammonia, BPI’s defenders

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After ouster of Bo Xilai, questions surround China’s security chief

less visible, figures in the Chinese Communist Party, with control of the vast security forces and the judiciary, including all the prosecutors. He sits on the nine-member Politburo Standing Committee, which effectively runs the country as a kind of collective leadership; its other members include China’s president and prime minister. Zhou Yongkang, seen attending the National People's Congress in March, is reported to have been the only leading official to have argued against last week's striking decision to suspend Bo Xilai's membership in the 25-seat Politburo. (Andy Wong/AP) The speculation intensified this week with the release of an April 17 Xinhua editorial hinting that more high-level firings may be coming. “The investigation into Bo,” the editorial said, “serves as a declaration to all Party members that no matter what position one holds, Party members shall never place themselves over Party discipline and the law.” Chinese authorities have released little about their ongoing investigation into Bo, his wife, Gu Kailai, or other associates in his Chongqing inner circle who have been detained. In the vacuum of real information, citizens who have been closely following the saga through overseas Internet reports, and outside China-watchers, have been trying to glean information from the most innocuous signs, such as how much or how little a senior leader appears in the official media. Zhou’s past and present statements and appearances are being closely dissected for any hints of internal strife. For example, on March 8, during the annual meeting of China’s national legislature, Zhou made a highly-public appearance before the delegation from Chongqing, heaping praise on Bo and his achievements. Bo at the time was already reeling from his former police chief Wang Lijun’s flight to the American consulate in Chengdu, where Wang first outlined a dramatic tale of political intrigue, corruption and murder in Chongqing. But exactly a week after Zhou’s high-profile endorsement, Bo was removed as Chongqing Party chief. Zhou then disappeared for a week from state-run television and newspapers, leading to questions about whether he had been sacked — and the period coincided with persistent, unsubstantiated rumors of a rift in the top ranks, or the wild rumor that Zhou was leading a coup. Then a March 23 photograph showed Zhou meeting the visiting Indonesian foreign minister, seeming to temporarily dispel the rumors. Zhou’s most recent public appearance — on April 12, with the Shanghai Cooperation Council, and an April meeting with

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Our generals in Afghanistan need more accountability

what might ensue. The answer was not long in coming: chaos and a far uglier and more costly conflict than Americans had bargained for. Historians will probably place Franks in the company of Burnside and Hooker rather than Grant and Sherman. Yet, for whatever reason, Bush glossed over his field commander’s shortcomings, ordained him a great leader and awarded him the Medal of Freedom. Franks had neither won nor lost his war; he had merely mismanaged it and then moved on, washing his hands of the mess. Here was a troubling precedent. War induces barbarism, and the Iraq war proved no exception. Soon enough, egregious transgressions by U.S. troops surfaced. Abu Ghraib provides one especially notorious example; the massacre at Haditha another. But there were others, now mostly forgotten, at least by Americans — among them the Iraq insurgency’s equivalent of the Boston Massacre. In Fallujah on April 28, 2003, with Franks still in command, U.S. troops opened fire on Iraqi demonstrators, killing more than a dozen and wounding several dozen more. The Pentagon declared each of these an aberration. In each instance, extensive investigation singled out a handful of minions for punishment. In each, senior commanders escaped unscathed. (Abu Ghraib is the partial exception that proves the rule: In the scandal’s aftermath, a female Army Reserve brigadier general — not quite a member of the club — lost her star, a fate thus far shared with no male counterpart and no regular officer.) In an earlier day, this misconduct might not have mattered. When Sherman’s troops marched to the sea in 1864, few cared about any atrocities they might commit. The object of the exercise, after all, was not to win Confederate hearts and minds but, as Sherman succinctly put it, to “make Georgia howl.” Similarly, although the desecration of remains by U.S. troops today pales in comparison with the treatment visited upon Japanese dead during World War II, ensuring that Marines at Peleliu or Okinawa complied with the Hague Conventions did not figure as a priority. Their job was to kill. Yet, like it or not, our wars differ from those wars. The attenuated definition of command responsibility that prevailed after Sept. 11, 2001, not only let senior commanders off the hook; in wars where killing is not enough, it also compromised overall military effectiveness. Much to his credit, when Robert Gates became secretary of defense in 2006,

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The four-star educational opportunity I found there for the taking in D.C.

to explain the application process to the students seeking his nomination. I expected to walk into a small meeting room containing a few other guys, maybe even a girl, who were seeking the spot. I found a packed auditorium holding more than a hundred other candidates, all of them dressed as if they were interviewing at Goldman Sachs. Only one of these students would receive a coveted “principal nomination” to West Point from Wolf — the nomination that guaranteed admission if the applicant was determined to be qualified. I quickly realized that any admission hopes I had developed in the preceding weeks were naive. But I continued the application process with Wolf and started applications with Sens. Mark R. Warner (D) and James Webb (D). Three rejection letters quickly followed. Soon after this, and well after I had given up hope of admission to the U.S. Military Academy, I received a forwarded e-mail from my liaison officer, West Point’s local admissions representative. The e-mail, written by the regional admissions officer, explained that the District had not managed to find a resident who met the academy’s standards. Someone was needed to fill the spot. Within a matter of weeks, I acquired a nomination from D.C. Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D), despite hastily prepared application essays and a shaky interview with her service academy panel. I am now finishing my first year at the academy. I am the only Washingtonian in my class. Too often, I read about the lack of opportunities for the District’s youth or scan columns that complain about D.C. schools failing to provide opportunities to their students. Why, then, does Virginia’s 10th Congressional District manage to find more than a hundred interested applicants for the service academies, while the District struggles to fill its allotted spots? The military is not for everybody. The academies are not for everybody. But the fact remains: Educational opportunities do exist for D.C. youth and, at some point, it needs to become the responsibility of the individual to seek out those opportunities. Critics are too quick to complain about D.C.’s failing education system. After all, I’m proof that it doesn’t exactly take Goldman Sachs-level interview skills for a young Washingtonian to get a top-notch education free of charge. William Moore, Washington More Local Opinions Six Post readers on Discovery’s ‘victory lap’ L. Scott Lingamfelter: An outdated gun law Norman Leahy: Wolf votes present

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“The Taste of Tomorrow: Dispatches from the Future of Food” by Josh Schonwald

center of the industry; it’s the home base of companies like Fresh Express and Dole and Mann Packing, the Apples and Microsofts of the salad world. In other words, Salinas is not only where our leafy greens are grown; it’s where the decisions about our salads are made.” It was Fresh Express that “started introducing bagged salads to consumers in 1989,” extending the shelf life of delicate greens and posing real rivals to durable but usually tasteless iceberg lettuce. What, Schonwald wondered, is Salinas Valley looking to do next? A few people there believe that radicchio is the salad of the future. It comes in more varieties than the unappetizing red variety that pops up in salad bars and “spring mix” bags, but efforts to gain popular acceptance of those varieties have met with little success. Schonwald is optimistic about the overall future of salad, though, because the “agrigiants” of Salinas are quick to capitalize on changing tastes and to alter supply to meet altered demand. Disbelievers are referred to the nearest salad bar, where there’s a lot more in the lettuce bins than chopped romaine. It’s a very short step from agribusiness to agricultural genetics, which Schonwald used to call “Frankenfood.” But no longer: What he has seen has persuaded him to be “pro-agricultural biotechnology” and considerably more skeptical about the ideas of the “foodie mainstream,” some of which he finds “dangerously myopic” and “potentially destructive.” Schonwald would much prefer to eat organic vegetables and free-range chicken, as indeed would I, but he now knows that people able to afford such a diet are a minuscule percentage of the world’s population — albeit a disproportionately noisy one — and that the real issue is not how to make them happy but how to feed the world’s vastly less privileged hungry millions. Thus the move, still in its tentative early stages, toward in vitro growing of meat and the development of fish farms in immense inland warehouses. Whether meat produced in laboratories ever will catch on is problematic, but “warehouse fish farming” is the “fastest-growing segment” of aquaculture, itself “the world’s fastest growing source of food production.” Yes, I’d much rather be eating ceviche made with fresh Maryland rockfish, but more and more that is going to be a privilege rather than the daily norm. As Schonwald says: “As much as I want craft fish farming, and responsible open-ocean farming,

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Russia’s tech-savvy opposition goes old school

to organize everything and decrease the confusion and miscoordination by 30 percent. And then we will win,” Alexei Navalny, an anti-corruption blogger and protest leader, wrote on his blog this past week. He called on supporters to build a “kind machine of propaganda,” in contrast to what he described as the Kremlin’s “evil machine of propaganda.” ‘The bubble can burst’ The opposition’s best opportunities, leaders say, are a series of mayoral elections, each one of which Navalny has said he hopes will turn into a “political crisis.” But elections in the Siberian cities of Omsk and Krasnoyarsk will be held in June, leaving relatively little time to prepare. A third election, in central Russian Nizhny Tagil, is scheduled for October. Those races are not about to eject Putin’s United Russia party from power nationally, but they could be enough to keep the Kremlin off-balance and give the opposition a toehold on local control that could help it launch larger efforts. Since last month, opposition candidates have won mayors’ offices in two cities — both after campaigning under tough conditions with no access to local media. And in Astrakhan, a city of 500,000 near the Caspian Sea, authorities were concerned enough about post-election protests that they flooded the city center with hundreds of riot police. “Astrakhan has been successful in proving that the bubble can burst at any moment in any place,” said Lilia Shevtsova, a political analyst and Putin critic at the Carnegie Moscow Center. “There’s such ferment going on.” The protesters there this month used tactics more reminiscent of the American civil rights movement of the 1960s than of wired 2012. The mayoral candidate, Oleg Shein, walked a group of two dozen journalists and supporters into a closed-door committee meeting at the regional parliament, surprising the journalists and the local politicians sitting around the table. The politicians quickly agreed to Shein’s demands that they take up his grievances before the full legislature. Shein, a veteran labor organizer and local politician, said the ploy was “absolutely spontaneous.” “If it hadn’t been for journalists, I don’t think it would have been possible” to win the concessions, Shein said. “When we have publicity, we can talk about developing democratic tools.” Days after Shein crashed the committee meeting, many of the city’s bus drivers were roped into the cause. They had been poised to go on strike because their contracts were expiring. Fifty

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Not all foreclosures are equal

was held, and have no role in servicing or maintaining the property,” Nicole Garrison-Sprenger, vice president of corporate public relations, said in a statement. “When we do own a property, we have a strong and comprehensive process in place to regularly inspect and maintain properties to marketing standards where we have legal access, regardless of their location.” Wells Fargo said in a statement that the bank “conducts all lending- and servicing-related activities in a fair and consistent manner without regard to race, and this includes maintenance and marketing standards for all foreclosed properties for which we are responsible. Regrettably, the complaint does not include specific property information that can allow us to investigate the circumstances in any of the markets they list.” The properties examined by the housing groups were evaluated on a 100-point scale. Points were subtracted for routine maintenance issues, including broken windows and doors, unshoveled snow, overgrown lawns and trash on the property. Although properties in predominantly white neighborhoods “were more likely to have neatly manicured lawns, securely locked doors and attractive ‘for sale’ signs out front, homes in communities of color were more likely to have overgrown yards littered with trash, unsecured doors, broken windows and indications of marketing as a distressed sale,” the report said. The report noted that properties in communities of color were 42 percent more likely to have more than a dozen maintenance problems compared with properties in predominantly white neighborhoods. In many cases, the report added, the deterioration occurred while properties were under bank ownership and could be attributed to lender neglect. By allowing inferior maintenance standards for properties in minority communities, the institutions are creating substandard communities where values will continue to decline, said Shanna L. Smith, president and chief executive of the National Fair Housing Alliance. “The investigation did not focus on people who lost their homes, but rather the homeowners living next door to or down the street from the vacant foreclosed property and the impact that poorly maintained foreclosure is having on their property values — their homeowners insurance costs, their increased property taxes to make up for the lost tax revenue from the foreclosures in their neighborhood,” Smith said. “It addresses the harm in economic and safety terms for the homeowners left behind in the neighborhood, particularly in communities of color.” Smith added that if banks don’t properly maintain their assets, many of the related expenses

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Pakistani militant Hafiz Mohammad Saeed seeks protection from bounty hunters

13, a 24-year-old Woodbridge resident and native of Pakistan was sentenced to 12 years in prison for providing material support to Lashkar-i-Taiba. He had trained at a Lashkar camp and pleaded guilty to producing a violent jihadist video after communicating with Talha Saeed, Saeed’s son. But cases against Lashkar-i-Taiba members in Pakistan drag on for years and have generally been unsuccessful. Some analysts attribute this to interference by the country’s Inter-Services Intelligence agency, or ISI, which U.S. officials say protects certain militant groups for its own ends, even as Pakistan’s army battles other insurgents trying to bring down the government. ISI does not deny directing Lashkar-i-Taiba militants in operations in Kashmir but says it ended contact with the group after 2001 and has not been involved in directing its operations since. In his book “Pakistan: A Hard Country,” researcher and analyst Anatol Lieven presents this case for why Saeed is a free man: “While the Pakistani authorities could do a great deal more to restrict and detain [Lashkar] activists and leaders, it is extremely difficult to put them on public trial — for the obvious reason that they would then reveal everything about the ISI’s previous backing for their organization.” Although U.S. officials portray Saeed as a terrorist on a par with fugitive Taliban leader Mohammad Omar, who also has a $10 million price on his head, the sentiment is far different in the court of public opinion — especially in the dusty alleys where Jamaat-ud-Dawa dispenses charity. The other day, in a Lahore storefront clinic with a tiny examination room made private with a worn brown curtain, neighborhood women received free antibiotics and fever remedies for their sick children from a pharmacy assistant named Abdul Majeed. Majeed also checked the blood pressure of one of the regular patients, a mother of seven who suffers from hypertension and diabetes. The 34-year-old housewife, who gave her name only as Mrs. Khalil, said she knew nothing about the bounty but did know certain other things about Saeed’s group. “They not only give treatment to people, but my own daughter is reciting the Holy Koran with them,” she said. “They cannot be terrorists.” More world news coverage: - Afghanistan, U.S. reach post-2014 pact - Iran says it recovered data from U.S. spy drone, plans to build copy - French presidential vote heads into runoff election - Read more headlines from around the world

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Slaying Still Haunts Eighth and H Streets;D.C. Neighborhood Hopes for Better Days

This article originally ran on March 23, 1986. The alley where Catherine Fuller was brutally murdered on a rainy afternoon nearly 1 1/2 years ago has been cleaned and dirtied again. On a recent afternoon, the park where her assailants met daily — young men known as the “Eighth and H Crew” — was sanctuary only to a man dressed in Army fatigues who muttered to himself and said his name was “John.” Three months after the trial of Fuller’s murderers, people in this Northeast Washington community speak of fear and the invisible scars of the tragedy, and real estate agents say people do not want to buy in the neighborhood. Yet there is excitement about a new merchants association and talk of entrepreneurs who view the H Street corridor as a place of economic promise. Residents welcome that future. But for now, they say, unemployment and crime are still high and there are no recreation facilities for teen-agers in the area. Most residents agree there have been no visible changes in the community since the day Fuller was killed. “We need to go back to the word of God! We’re gonna leave here one day!” an evangelist on the southeast corner of Eighth and H streets NE called through a bullhorn to passers-by one recent afternoon. Across the street a young man in a knit cap asked the same passers-by: “Want to buy a gold chain today?” Standing in front of Murry’s Steaks, a woman slipped her tank top to her waist to reveal her breasts. A little girl walked by on her way from school, a violin case strapped to her shoulder. The children who walk on H Street see a lot. Some people have known that for a long time; now everyone knows. This is the street with the infamous corner, the street with the alley where the 48-year-old Fuller, a mother of six, was brutally beaten to death, an area of the city that was mentioned on the news almost nightly during the six-week trial of nine young men and one woman charged with her murder. Residents, many of whom have lived in the working class neighborhood for two decades, live with the notoriety that a single brutal act by some of their young people has brought upon their neighborhood. “I’ve talked to real estate agents who say they’ve had people who don’t want to go

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Main Street needs Congress to lift credit unions’ business-lending cap

While the stock market is up so far this year, Main Street communities across the country are still anxiously waiting for the catalyst that will jumpstart their economies and create jobs. Small businesses nationwide have been stymied from expanding and adding new jobs. The limited availability of capital from banks has hampered their efforts. While credit unions — not-for-profit, member-owned financial institutions — have been devoting more funds to loans for small companies, they are prevented from doing more because of an arbitrary cap on their business lending. Recently, legislation was reintroduced by Sen. Mark Udall (D-Colo.) (S. 2231, Small Business Lending Enhancement Act) that would help small businesses gain access to much-needed capital by raising the member business lending cap credit unions currently face. Identical legislation (H.R. 1418) was introduced by Rep. Ed Royce (R-Calif.) and Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-N.Y.). At its most basic level, restricting credit unions on the amount of business lending they can provide undermines job creation. The Treasury Department and the National Credit Union Administration have both signed off on this common sense measure that could spur more than $13 billion in new lending and create more than 140,000 new jobs in the first year alone at no cost to taxpayers. Current data underscore the need for credit unions to offer more loans to their small-business members, particularly the smaller dollar loans which banks are not making. In a recent survey, credit unions reported that 44 percent of their portfolio was made up of loans of less than $100,000, compared with banks that only have 8 percent of their lending in this size category. Additionally, credit unions said loans between $100,000 to $250,000 were 20 percent of their portfolio, compared with 6 percent for banks. By contrast, business loans of more than $1 million make up 68 percent of the banks’ portfolios, but only 16 percent for credit unions. The federal government made several attempts to boost business lending through the 2009 stimulus bill, the 2010 Small Business Jobs Act and “credit enhancements” that pumped up the Small Business Administration’s loan guarantee rate. Yet none of these vehicles have made significant progress in improving small businesses’s access to capital. Of the $30 billion apportioned in the Small Business Lending Fund, only $4.8 billion was actually dispersed. Given the fact that these other attempts have fallen short, shouldn’t the government give small-business owners a chance to

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Some question whether sustainable seafood delivers on its promise

A worker cuts a steak from a piece of tuna at a fish market. Seafood counters used to be simpler places, where a fish was labeled with its name and price. Nowadays, it carries more information than a used-car listing. Where did it swim? Was it farm-raised? Was it ever frozen? How much harm was done to the ocean by fishing it? (Scott Eells/Bloomberg) Seafood counters used to be simpler places, where a fish was labeled with its name and price. Nowadays, it carries more information than a used-car listing. Where did it swim? Was it farm-raised? Was it ever frozen? How much harm was done to the ocean by fishing it? Many retailers tout the environmental credentials of their seafood, but a growing number of scientists have begun to question whether these certification systems deliver on their promises. The labels give customers a false impression that purchasing certain products helps the ocean more than it really does, some researchers say. Backers respond that they are helping transform many of the globe’s wild-caught fisheries, giving them a financial incentive to include environmental safeguards, while giving consumers a sense of what they can eat with a clear conscience. To add to the confusion, there are a variety of certification labels and guides, prompting retailers to adopt a hybrid approach, relying on multiple seafood rating systems or establishing their own criteria and screening products that way. As of Sunday, for example, Whole Foods stopped selling seafood listed as “red” by the Monterey Bay Aquarium and Blue Ocean Institute — including octopus, gray sole and Atlantic halibut — because these species are overfished or caught in a way that harms ocean habitat or other species. The move has sparked criticism from New England fishermen, who are now barred from selling to the upscale chain. Whole Foods also sells only pole- or line-caught canned tuna, which harms fewer species than conventional tuna-fishing methods. Target no longer sells farmed salmon — which has come under fire for consuming a disproportionate amount of forage fish and creating several other problems — and has pledged that by 2015 it will sell only fresh and frozen fish that are “sustainable and traceable.” Wegmans said it will not obtain seafood from the Ross Sea in the Antarctic, which many environmentalists say should be off-limits to fishing, and this fall it will start selling oysters from plots it has leased

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How D.C. can better deal with climate change

DISTRICT COUNCIL member Mary M. Cheh (D-Ward 3) celebrated Earth Day this year by proposing a series of measures meant to lower the city’s carbon emissions. But the bill is a reminder of how unnecessarily complex the city’s anti-climate-change policy already is. Ms. Cheh’s bill would exempt owners of local solar power infrastructure from personal property taxes on their facilities. Backers claim that the provision is necessary because companies that might want to erect solar panels on others’ property would be treated unusually harshly under the tax code. If that’s so, the council should investigate changing the law for anyone who finds himself in that bend in the tax code, not just solar developers. As it is, solar power benefits from unfair government preferences that the council should consider repealing. The District requires utilities to derive 20 percent of their electricity from renewable sources by 2020. Though such policies are supposed to encourage competition among renewables, solar power enjoys a “carve out” within the renewable mandate, guaranteeing a piece for that particular technology unless it proves extremely expensive. If the goal is to reduce emissions, policy should instead create an environment in which the cheapest low-carbon technologies win out, not the ones politicians favor. Ms. Cheh’s bill would also require stores to keep their doors closed while their air conditioning is switched on. Preventing such waste is obviously appealing. But the best way to lower emissions is to put a price on carbon or to set top-line goals without prescribing precisely how businesses must achieve them. This allows businesses to make their own decisions about the most efficient ways to save energy. The fight against climate change requires government to intervene, creating incentives for cleaner energy. But in that process, it’s easy for government to get too involved in deciding how we derive and use energy. If city leaders worry that the District isn’t moving toward green energy fast enough, they should first press for a more aggressive regional carbon-pricing scheme or to modify the city’s renewables mandate. More on this debate: Alexandra Petri: Do millennials care about Earth Day?

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Phasing out nuclear

CAN THE WORLD fight global warming without nuclear power? One major industrialized country — Germany — is determined to find out, and another — Japan — is debating whether to try. Both illustrate how hard it would be. To date, nuclear is the only proven source of low-emissions “baseload” power — that is, electricity that’s always on, day or night, powering round-the-clock elevators in Tokyo or office buildings in Munich. Yet both Germany and Japan are poised to prematurely shutter their large nuclear sectors, giving up all of that guaranteed, low-carbon electricity generation in an anti-nuclear frenzy, on a bet that they can multiply their generation of renewable electricity within a decade or two. Before the Fukushima Daiichi disaster last year, Japan derived a third of its electricity from nuclear power. Now, with all but one reactor offline, the country’s consumption of crude and heavy fuel oil for power generation has roughly tripled. Even with that backup fossil-fired power, though, the government worries that the electrical system will fail during peak summer demand if utilities don’t switch on reactors. The Financial Times’ Gerrit Wiesmann reports a similar situation in Germany, which has committed to closing all of its reactors, even as its power grid teeters and its electricity sector emits more carbon than it must after eight reactors shut down last year. With both countries making the paths to their emissions goals more difficult, anti-nuclear activists justify this mess by insisting that renewable energy sources will pick up the slack. But that raises major questions of feasibility and cost. Perhaps, a Japanese government report claimed, Japan could still reduce carbon emissions by 25 percent of its 1990 levels by 2030 without nuclear power. Yet even if that’s true, it’s hardly a reason to let all of that existing nuclear infrastructure and know-how go to waste. The report also notes that the country could cut emissions 33 percent if nuclear accounted for a fifth of the country’s generation, or even as much as 39 percent if Japan continued to derive a third of its electricity from nuclear. It’s also far from clear that cutting Japan’s emissions will be as easy as those numbers suggest. A separate government analysis indicated argued that the country would actually fall well short of 25 percent without nuclear. Not content to rely on optimistic predictions about renewables, Japanese utilities are already investing hundreds of millions of

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Mosquitoes, ticks and other insects will be plentiful this season, experts say

to die off.” Still, he suggests that it’s time for more people to get “tick smart,” particularly since the symptoms of Lyme disease and other tick-borne infections are often subtle and hard to diagnose. “The initial bite may or may not be known, and only 10 to 20 percent of people see the bull’s-eye rash for Lyme, for example,” says Beals, who recommends watching out for unexplained, sudden onset of symptoms such as fever, chills, chronic fatigue, joint pain and headaches that typically get worse over time. ‘The size of a poppy seed’ Another complicating factor is that the standard laboratory tests used to diagnose these ailments are notoriously unreliable. “Seventy percent of the time, for people with documented Lyme disease, routine tests don’t show it,” Beals says. As a result, the prevention of bites — which starts with knowing your enemy — is key. “This is not a great big tick that’s going to crawl to the top of your head. This is something the size of a poppy seed that crawls to your . . . nether regions — and who looks there?” says Mather, who also heads the University of Rhode Island’s TickEncounter Resource Center. He suggests a daily tick check whenever you’ve been out at a park, playing golf, gardening or in other areas that ticks frequent. Pay special attention to such spots as the back of your knee, your armpit area, around waistbands and underwear, and belt and bra lines. In addition, it’s essential to treat pets frequently with a reputable tick repellent. As for protection, Mather advises carefully following instructions for bug repellents. He adds that products containing DEET, which merely repel insects for a relatively short period, appear to be less effective than clothing or gear treated with permethrin, a chemical that can kill ticks and mosquitoes even after repeated laundering. Mather co-authored a study that found that summer-weight clothing treated with permethrin severely reduced the risk of tick bites: Overall, participants who donned tick-repellent garments were bitten about one-third less often as those wearing untreated clothes. Another small recent study found that outdoor workers who wore permethrin-treated garb received 93 percent fewer tick bites than other workers. Mather coats his family’s shoes with permethrin once a month: “It makes protecting yourself against tick bites — and also mosquitoes, to some degree as well — as easy as getting dressed in the morning.”

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Some junk food isn’t all that bad for you, dietitian says, but moderation is key

of potato chips. (And there’s a less greasy microwavable variety available.) If you like a daily drink, you’ll be happy to know that in a study of 18,000 men, Harvard scientists found that men who consumed one to two alcoholic beverages a day had a lower risk of heart attack than non-drinkers. As for what kind of drink to have, consider that pinot noir is an antioxidant-rich wine that won’t give you a beer belly. Although beef jerky is usually loaded with preservatives, it’s also high in protein, and it’s possible to find jerky made from grass-fed beef that has no preservatives. “Ounce for ounce, coconut contains more saturated fat than butter does,” says the article, by registered dietitian Jeff Volek. But it also boosts good cholesterol, so just look for the unsweetened kind. And finally, for those who worry about their love of chocolate, you can take solace in knowing that it contains flavonoids that improve blood flow to the heart. Regardless of their redeeming qualities, none of these qualify as healthful food, so moderation is key. Long distance running Say chi, and avoid injury “Chi Marathon,” by Danny and Katherine Dreyer In a grueling sport such as distance running, training harder can lead to injury, so training smarter is key. So say Danny and Katherine Dreyer — running and health coaches, respectively — who apply the principles of tai chi to running (and other activities). The idea, they say, is that with practice and focus, runners can use their minds to move energy, or chi, in their body to propel themselves forward, taking stress off the muscles and joints. If this sounds a little too spiritual, they also emphasize proper technique and biomechanically sound movements to help serious runners avoid pain and injury. You’ll learn about everything from posture and foot strike to conditioning and nutrition. A major focus of the book is race preparation, which the Dreyers strongly believe to be equal parts mental and physical. They even debate hot-button issues, such as sneakers vs. barefoot running and what not to do the night before a race. (Their advice: no massages or alcohol.) If you are a beginner or a casual runner, this book might be too intense, but if you’re a dedicated runner hoping maybe to try the Marine Corps Marathon one day, this might help you get to a new personal best. — Whitney Fetterhoff

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Music review: A Far Cry at Dumbarton Oaks in Georgetown

Are conductors really necessary? They’re expensive to feed, after all, and while they’re useful for holding large orchestras together, smaller groups might be better off just jettisoning them entirely. That, at any rate, was the takeaway from a lively and impressively precise performance Sunday night at Dumbarton Oaks in Georgetown by A Far Cry, a young, Boston-based string orchestra whose 17 members call themselves a “collective” and take a democratic, guaranteed conductor-free approach to chamber music. The group’s sense of freedom and enthusiasm was tangible in the opening work, the vivid “Battaglia” by Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber. It’s a series of musical scenes meant to evoke wartime, and Biber lets his imagination loose, instructing the players to engage in all sorts of “extended techniques” — even sticking paper between the strings to produce a snare-drum effect. The wildest moments come in a short-but-sour movement, in which each of the musicians plays in a different key — think Ives, with a 17th-century touch. The Criers brought the whole thing off with spirit and engaging wit. But the group’s unusual take on Beethoven’s String Quartet Op. 95 revealed some of the hazards of the leaderless approach. The Criers transcribed the work for string orchestra — quadrupling each of the parts, more or less — and though they handled the technical challenges well enough, it was never clear that adding more mass to the quartet really added to its power. The thing is all muscle and bone as it is; adding flesh only seemed to soften the edges and blur the details, where much of the interest lies. Despite fine ensemble work, you end up with the impression not of a riveting conversation among four individuals but, rather, almost of music by committee. Osvaldo Golijov wrote that he wanted his “Tenebrae” to sound “as an orbiting spaceship that never touches ground.” It does. This is music that floats in a netherworld of mist and shadow — it has the strange enchantment of falling into a dream — and the Criers’ collective approach produced a gorgeous, radiant reading. But it was in the much more complex “Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge,” by Benjamin Britten, that the ensemble showed just how skillfully they can navigate without a conductor. This was a superb, perfectly calibrated performance, full of subtle nuances and real power. Conductors, watch out: The collective approach works. Brookes is a

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At World Book Night, D.C. literacy advocates greeted with delight and skepticism

brought with them. Handing out free books is a way to be social, safe and do a good deed, says Carl Lennertz, the New York-based executive director (and only employee) of World Book Night U.S. “Book lovers, of which there are a lot, always talk to each other about the books they love,” he said, “and this is a chance to tell a total stranger.” The program is geared mostly toward adults and young adults. Sponsors, including Barnes and Noble, UPS and the American Booksellers Association, donated the books, and volunteers had to specify titles they wanted and where they planned to hand them out. According to Lennertz, everyone from police officers in Wichita to a cab driver in Duluth, Minn., were planning to give away books at locations such as food pantries, women’s shelters and nursing homes. In the District, more than 100 people signed up to pick up titles at Politics and Prose, where there was a book lover’s joy about the giveaway. At the Silver Spring Metro station, Politics and Prose floor manager Susan Skirboll had a pretty straightforward strategy for her giveaway approach: “I’ll try to look respectable and not like a total freak.” Skirboll calls the story she selected — “Kindred,” by the late science-fiction writer Octavia Butler — a book “everyone should read.” Though it contains a little bit of science fiction and fantasy, “it’s done in a way that’s kind of believable,” Skirboll said. “It talks about the slavery experience in a way I had never read before.” Skirboll was joined by her friend, Korey Rothman, a professor of musical theater at the University of Maryland, who was giving away “Bel Canto,” by Ann Patchett. The women were prepared to talk about the books with riders. They also were prepared, Skirboll said, “for people to think there’s a catch to it, for people not taking them because they don’t read, or for just plain old ignoring because we are city people and we ignore weirdos.” Gussie Lewis, who plans Politics and Prose’s children’s events, was giving away copies of “Because of Winn Dixie,” a tale of a young girl and her dog, to visitors at the Washington Animal Rescue League. She hoped the book would reach young people “who may not have been raised with a pet and may have seen dogs fighting. [The book tries] to teach how animals have feelings, too.”

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U.S. meeting with China to avoid unfolding murder case

— and much to lose — from involvement in the unfolding tale of political shenanigans and privilege at the highest levels of China’s Communist Party. The scandal that brought down the powerful and charismatic Bo, widely considered to have been a rising star, has moved far from where it began with Heywood’s untimely death. “This is a huge, big deal story, in terms of China’s internal evolution,” said a former U.S. official. “Our curious little bit part in it has no long-term implications.” “It’s their dirty linen, not ours,” another former official said. Both spoke on condition of anonymity out of what they said was reluctance to be seen as sources on such a sensitive subject. Some U.S. involvement, however, may be unavoidable, as reports have circulated about questionable financial dealings by members of Bo’s family. His son, Bo Guagua, a 24-year-old student at Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government, has been stalked by reporters in Cambridge and chastized on Chinese blogs for a profligate lifestyle. Media reports here and in Britain have alleged that Heywood, who was close to Bo and his wife, was moving Bo family funds abroad. Any cash transfer of more than $10,000 to U.S. banks would have been reported to American authorities. “Unless there is law-enforcement information ... about financial holdings abroad, then this is a domestic affair,” said David Shambaugh, director of the China Policy Program at George Washington University. For Britain, the scandal has become more difficult to publicly avoid. By January, Foreign Office officials were aware of gossip, emanating from the British expatriate community in China, that Heywood had not died of natural causes. His body had long since been cremated. But Foreign Secretary William Hague said he was not informed of the suspicions until Feb. 7. On that day, British diplomats in Beijing received word of Wang’s revelations from the U.S. Embassy there, Barbour said. Hague told Parliament last week that the government had repeatedly sought information from China, but received no answer until April 10, when Britain was informed “that an investigation into Neil Heywood’s death had begun and that proper judicial process would be followed.” Staff writer Steve Mufson and staff researcher Lucy Shackelford contributed to this report. More world news coverage: - Mexican immigration in reverse, study says - E.U. suspends most Burma sanctions - Sudan warplanes bomb South Sudan - Read more headlines from around the world

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Planetary Resources has a plan to mine asteroids

This computer-generated image provided by Planetary Resources, a group of high-tech tycoons that wants to mine nearby asteroids, shows a conceptual rendering of satellites prospecting a water-rich, near-Earth asteroid. The group's mega-million dollar plan is to use commercially built robotic ships to squeeze rocket fuel and valuable minerals like platinum and gold out of the lifeless rocks that routinely whiz by Earth. One of the company founders predicts they could have their version of a space-based gas station up and running by 2020. (AP Photo/Planetary Resources) (AP/AP) The tech world is abuzz with news of a new venture that’s earned the backing of high-profile names such as Google Chief Executive Larry Page, Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt, director James Cameron and Ross Perot Jr., according to a report from Wired. The new company, Planetary Resources Inc., is dedicated to mining asteroids for precious metals and sending what they find back to Earth. The company is the brainchild of co-founders Eric Anderson, who also founded the space tourism company Space Adventures, and Peter Diamandis, the man behind the X Prize foundation. Diamandis has talked about asteroid mining in the past, most notably in a TED talk in 2005. “The Earth is a crumb in a supermarket full of resources,” Diamandis told an audience at Oxford University at the time. He said that the government is “unable to take the risks required to open up this precious frontier” and that entrepreneurs are the ones with the resources and willingness to lead the drive into space. Other partners in the venture include former NASA Mars mission manager Chris Lewicki and planetary scientist and veteran NASA astronaut Tom Jones, according to a release obtained by MIT’s Technology Review. The Wired report says that the two men are most interested in minerals from the platinum group of metals: platinum, palladium, osmium and iridium, which are important for the production of medical devices and renewable energy technology. The company is announcing more about its plans at 1 p.m. Eastern; the Associated Press reports that Planetary Resources is expecting to launch its first series of private telescopes to begin looking for the best targets for mining. So what do scientists think about the project? The Mercury News gathered its share of skeptics, including Purdue University planetary geologist Jay Melosh, who said that the venture simply isn’t cost-effective. Physicist Michio Kaku told ABC News that he believes that

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3 more Secret Service employees ousted

Three more employees of the U.S. Secret Service are on the verge of losing their jobs as part of the brewing Colombia sex scandal, the agency said Tuesday. Two employees will resign, two others have been cleared of the most serious charges, but will face administrative action and be removed from their current positions; a fifth will be relieved of his security clearance, meaning he can no longer work for the Secret Service, but could be employed by other federal agencies. The employee has the right to appeal the decision, the agency said. “The Secret Service is committed to conducting a full, thorough and fair investigation in this matter, and will not hesitate to take appropriate action should any additional information come to light,” the agency said in a statement. The decision means the Secret Service has determined the fates of the 12 employees implicated in the scandal, though several could still appeal the decision. Last week, six other employees either resigned, were fired, or permitted to retire. Another agent was cleared of wrongdoing but will face administrative action. Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan is closely reviewing the agency’s code of conduct and is considering enforcing a curfew on agents and officers when they are on the road, according to Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), who spoke with the director Tuesday. “If you give football players curfews, it makes sense you’d give curfews to people protecting the president,” Cummings said. Cummings said Sullivan also told him that the Secret Service has concluded that no White House staffers were involved in the sex scandal. Homeland Security Committee Chairman Peter King (R-N.Y.) once again voiced support Tuesday for the agency’s ongoing investigation. “This is the first major part of the investigation and it seems to have been completed very effectively and expeditiously,” King said. “Obviously, we’ll continue to investigate to see whether anything else has occurred. We’ll also have to look at trying to determine whether this was an aberration and what procedures can be implemented to minimize the possibility of it ever happening again.” King said he thinks it would be a good idea for the director to consider bringing in outside advisers to help assess overall agency operations now. “Everyone is focused on the investigation, because the longer you wait, the easier it is for people to get confused and to forget details,” King said. “All the emphasis was put this

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Life Your Way blogger Mandi Ehman gives advice on running an efficient, happy home

saves you time and money. If you stock up on frozen foods at the right time, you don’t have to clip coupons or go to five different grocery stores. Or if you take time before Christmas or before a birthday party to declutter the toys, it’s a lot easier to fit those new toys in. What are your daily strategies for clutter control? We clean up almost every night so it’s not building on top of yesterday’s clutter; it’s just today’s clutter. We can get it cleaned up in 30 minutes and the house is as good as new. What’s your favorite timesaving strategy for decluttering? Set a timer, and say that I am going to declutter for 15 minutes today. Go through a drawer in your kitchen and say, “Which of these utensils have I not touched in the last six months?” Do it slowly and don’t try to force yourself to get rid of everything at once. How does having less stuff save you money? Being organized can pave the way to spending less money because you know what you have and what you need. The book’s home tips are organized by room. Let’s talk about the kitchen: How do you keep the counters clean and the fridge full? Create zones in your kitchen. You have your coffee pot here — you should have your coffee mugs and your coffee nearby. At the end of the day, almost all of my advice comes down to ‘just have less stuff.’ You don’t need an individual tool for every little thing out there. One of your kitchen-cleaning strategies is to clean the fridge before you go grocery shopping. Who wants to deal with that when you get home and have bags everywhere? I take time to clean it out and reorganize, and wipe down the shelves. Then, when I come home, things can be put away right away. How do you keep your grocery bill down? Decide when brand names are worth it to your family. I try the generic brand once so that we know why we’re paying more for something. I also love to shop at Amazon.com because you can buy in bulk and sometimes even save money over warehouse stores. We love Amazon so much that we started a blog to share deals that we find, called Jungle Deals [www.jungledealsandsteals.com]. As for the other rooms of the

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D.C. news briefs

Broadband Summit will address access Connect.DC, a community outreach program of the D.C. technology office, has scheduled a day-long Community Broadband Summit at 10 a.m. Saturday in the Thurgood Marshall Academy Public Charter High School, 2427 Martin Luther King Junior Ave. SE. The event will include a town hall meeting on broadband access, community forums on the new D.C. digital inclusion centers, high-tech exhibitors and technology workshops. The office anticipates nearly 500 participants at the summit. Research based on the 2010 Census shows that broadband adoption averages below 40 percent in wards 5, 7 and 8 but nearly 100 percent in other wards. Recently, Connect.DC opened two digital inclusion centers. One, a pilot program at University of the District of Columbia Community College Shadd campus, 5601 East Capitol St. SE, has offered computer training to ex-offenders. The other, at Riggs LaSalle recreation center, 501 Riggs Rd. NE, offers digital literacy courses to D.C. residents. The office plans to add more centers through partnerships with other city agencies. To register for the summit or for information, go to www.connect.dc.gov. DDOT to discuss bike lanes, facilities The District Department of Transportation has scheduled a public meeting on its Innovative Bicycle Facility Research Project and on a proposed protected bike lane for L Street between 25th and 12th streets. The meeting is from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. next Thursday at the Reeves Center, second floor community room, 2000 14th St. NW. The bicycle project analyzes three bike facilities: bicycle signals and bike boxes at 16th and U streets and New Hampshire Avenue NW, the two-way cycle track on 15th Street NW between E and V streets, and the center median bicycle lanes on Pennsylvania Avenue NW. The proposed L Street protected bike lane will be separated by flexible posts and placed on the north side of the road. The same type of posts were used on 15th Street to provide greater protection for bicyclists. For information, go to www.ddot.dc.gov. Richard Dreyfuss to speak at Law Day Oscar-winning actor Richard Dreyfuss will speak at the Library of Congress on Tuesday as part of the Law Day activities. For seven years, Dreyfuss has been an advocate for civics education. In 2010, he founded the nonprofit Dreyfuss Initiative, which aims to revitalize civics education in public schools. “We must teach our kids how to run our country with common sense and realism,” Dreyfuss said. The program

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Track and field: Annandale’s Ahmed Bile has sights set on boys’ mile at Penn Relays

lot of time kicking the soccer ball around. He earned a spot on the Atoms’ JV squad as a freshman. Bile, who was born in New Mexico and moved to the area in 2001, only joined the cross-country and indoor track teams as a sophomore because his father recommended it. They were a good way to build his endurance, Abdi said. He saw rapid improvements in the 1,000. His first time out he ran 2:48. Two races later at the Northern Region championships he was runner-up in 2:36. In the three short years since he started running, Bile has won two AAA state titles in the 1,000; a 1,600 meters title (4:09.48); and two state cross-country championships. He has covered so much ground in so little time. “He reads the race really, really well and times his effort,” said Chantilly Coach Matt Gilchrist, whose Chargers compete in the Concorde District and region against Annandale. “There’s no wasted energy. Ahmed doesn’t show any real weaknesses. “In the end he’s going to walk away as one of the greatest athletes the region has ever seen. I hope people appreciate just how good a three-sport athlete he really is.” Abdi appreciates just how well his son is developing, but mostly from afar. He spends much of his time these days 8,000 miles away in Somalia. His homeland lies on the eastern shoulder of Africa and it has been torn apart by war and poverty. Abdi, the first Somali to win a gold medal in a world-class event, is hoping to put it back together through his efforts with Somali Comprehensive Development Association, a non-profit he helped establish that focuses on creating youth development programs. Development becomes less of a thing when he talks about the athletic growth of his son. He considers it a delicate matter that shouldn’t be rushed and praises his wife of 22 years, Shadia Hajinur, for doing the lion’s share of the work when it comes to raising their three children. “The whole credit goes to her,” Abdi, a two-time NCAA 1,500 meters champion at George Mason, said. “I have a small role. She made him the person he is. “In terms of athletics, I see many possibilities for Ahmed. But all those possibilities need patience. They need no pushing at this point. Right now, I want him to not overtrain, get an education and, you know, enjoy life.”

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The Post’s position on nuclear power reflects a pragmatic approach to energy that is seldom heard but needs to be supported. Germany’s instant political rejection of nuclear power in its future after the Fukushima accident will cost it in pollution from coal-burning plants, and in the electricity it will need to buy from France’s nuclear fleet. Japan’s response to reconsider nuclear power is more understandable, but time will bring perspective, and the Japanese will continue their nuclear power program to fulfill their energy needs. Nuclear power in the United States remains safe, and we are enhancing the protections against Fukushima-type extreme natural events even though we do not face the same level of threats as does Japan. And most important, the first new generation of reactors since the 1980s are now being built in Georgia and South Carolina. These are designed to provide long-term reactor cooling by natural processes, for days, even if no electricity is available. Michael Corradini, Madison, Wis.

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VA mental health system sharply denounced at hearing

services possible. “The plan that was ultimately developed gamed the system so that the facility met performance requirements but utterly failed our veterans,” said Tolentino, a former Navy corpsman who went to work at the Manchester facility in 2009. One manager directed the staff to focus only on the immediate reason for an appointment and not to ask the veteran about any other problems because “we don’t want to know or we’ll have to treat it,” according to Tolentino. “VA is failing to meet its own mandates for timeliness and instead is finding ways to make the data look like they are complying,” said Murray, who requested the report. “It’s mind-boggling,” said Sen. Scott Brown, (R-Mass.), who raised concerns that the long waits that veterans seeking mental-health services face leaves them at heightened risk for suicide. “We fully embrace that our performance measures need to be revised,” William Schoenhard, deputy under secretary for health for operations and management, told the committee. The data was often based on available appointments, rather than the patient’s clinical needs, according to the inspector general’s office. If the patient was given an appointment two months later because of a lack of openings, the veteran would still be recorded as having been seen within two weeks of the desired date. The office issued reports in 2005 and 2007 raising similar concerns that the VA was using faulty data to calculate wait times. “This has been an issue for many years and hasn’t been resolved,” John Daigh Jr., assistant inspector general for health-care inspections, told the committee. Under pressure to reduce waiting times for veterans, the VA announced last week that it plans to hire 1,600 mental-health workers, an increase of more than 9 percent. But the VA already has about 1,500 vacancies in mental-health specialties, positions that have been hard to fill given better pay in the private sector. “How are you going to ensure that 1,600 positions . . . don’t become 1,600 vacancies?” Murray asked. Schoenhard said the department is studying ways to better recruit and retain mental-health professionals. “In the interim, you have soldiers who are killing themselves,” Brown said. Tolentino, who said his complaints “largely fell on deaf ears,” resigned from the Manchester facility in December. “Ultimately, I could not continue to work at a facility where the well-being of our patients seemed secondary to making the numbers look good,” he said.

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Ernest ‘Chick’ Callenbach wrote ‘Ecotopia,’ an influential novel about an environmental utopia

and majored in English, earning a bachelor’s degree in 1949 and a master’s degree in 1953. In 1955, after a short stint in Paris studying at the Sorbonne and watching four movies a day, he moved to California and was hired as an assistant editor for UC Press. He became the editor of Film Quarterly in 1958 and led the magazine for 33 years. In the early 1970s, the farmer’s son found his disgust with consumer society rising. He was particularly upset at the way the country disposed of sewage by burning or dumping it. He wanted to write a magazine article about the problem but abandoned the project after realizing that he could not offer a practical solution. Instead, he began to imagine what would have to change for the country to embrace new approaches. He wound up writing “Ecotopia,” where citizens recycle almost everything, anything that can’t be reused is banned, walking or magnetic-levitation trains are the main modes of transportation, and the few cars allowed are electric. Mr. Callenbach was the first to admit that literary style was not the chief merit of the book, which he once described as “half-novel, half-tract.” The manuscript was rejected by 25 publishers, who, according to the author, believed that ecology was a passing fad. With money raised from friends, he formed Banyan Tree Books and sold out the first couple of printings. After Bantam picked up “Ecotopia” in 1977, Mr. Callenbach called his novel “the little book that could,” his wife said. Besides his wife, Christine, survivors include two children and five grandchildren. Mr. Callenbach wrote several other books, including “Living Poor With Style” and “Living Cheaply With Style.” He followed his own precepts: He bicycled to work for many years, drove a used car for 17 years, landscaped with native plants and grew his own vegetables. He bought his clothes from thrift shops until “used” became “vintage” and prices went up. Proof that “Ecotopia” had a cult following came soon after it was published when he discovered that a kind of “Ecotopian lending library” had sprung up. In 1977, Mr. Callenbach said he came across one copy that had been inscribed by 20 borrowers in places such as Portland, Ore.; Missoula, Mont.; and Alberta, Canada, before it was returned to the original owner. “That wrecks my royalties,” Mr. Callenbach observed, “but it does save trees.” — Los Angeles Times

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D.C. area ethnic markets: Emily Wax explores

in Afghanistan, with a knowing smile on his face, would pull into a bakery to buy us naan bread — oval, hot and as long as my arm. I wasn’t sure I could find anything like those markets again, but a Rockville strip mall houses Yekta Supermarket, a beautiful, well-organized Iranian and Middle Eastern food bazaar with an entrance that has Persian-style mosaic tiles lining the floors. The store has an adjoining restaurant called Yekta Kabobi (www.yekta.com), which serves Persian dishes. Sahel Dadras, 35, and her sister Sougol Mollaan, 37, run the shop, along with their mother, Laila. Their late father, Yadi Dadras, opened the store in 1979. He previously had worked in Iran with his uncle Haj Samad, a reputable grocer in Tehran who operated the largest grocery store in the city, Sahel told me. Because of recent sanctions that forbid the United States from importing large-scale products from Iran, their father worked on sourcing specialty fruits and vegetables. Persian cucumbers, figs and tart tangerines are flown in from California, which has a large Iranian community and weather similar to Iran, making the produce taste similar. “His vision for Yekta began as a place where Iranian immigrants could shop for products reminiscent of loving memories from back home,” Sahel said, adding that Yekta means “one of a kind” in Persian. I visited right before the Iranian New Year last month. The front of the store was lined with Persian sesame and chickpea cookies and nuts and almond baklava, “different than the Greeks, who use walnuts,” Sahel said. The freezer was stocked with saffron and rose water ice cream, all made locally. (Order it or ask about their supply before you venture there.) And in the back: dozens of varieties of naan. It wasn’t straight from the oven. But when I took the long bread home and toasted it, I was surprised at how authentic it tasted. I wanted to call my driver and tell him. 1488-B Rockville Pike, Rockville. 301-984-1190. www.yekta.com. Indian shampoo and bling-y saris My search for my favorite Indian items started in a tiny butcher and grocery shop called Halal Meat and Grocery. It’s run by a Muslim Indian merchant who sells the Koran in Spanish and Arabic along with statues of the elephant-headed deity Lord Ganesh, the remover of obstacles. From the outside, the shop’s not much to look at. But inside I found many

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Obama reelection campaign to target a new voter set: military families

in 2008 against Sen. John McCain (Ariz.). Foreign policy has remained largely on the margins of campaigning so far. But Biden pushed the administration’s unfolding argument into view Thursday with a sharp assault on Romney’s qualifications to be commander in chief. Biden’s principal message is that that Romney, a former Massachusetts governor and business executive, has failed to adapt his foreign-policy views to a time when social media, international terrorism, trade and demographic change are remaking the world. The vice president described Romney’s policies as “dangerously divorced from today’s realities,” accused Romney of being “mired in a Cold War mind-set” and said his foreign -policy positions on Russia, Iraq, missile defense and nuclear arms are “clearly and consistently stuck in the past.” In addition to the Obamas’ visit to Fort Stewart to greet troops, veterans and military families, the president will sign an executive order establishing new protections against predatory educational institutions trying to take advantage of those who qualify for the G.I. Bill and other programs. Michelle Obama also will travel to New Mexico on Tuesday to meet with service members and families. Both trips have been billed as official events unrelated to the campaign. But the reelection team in Chicago made clear Thursday that it plans to tout Obama’s policy accomplishments and his efforts to improve and promote services for veterans and their families. “The president and the campaign believe that this is one of the most important issues out there as we bring more than 2 million men and women home from serving in Iraq and Afghanistan and deal with the issues they face as returning veterans,” said Rob Diamond, who served in Iraq and is the Obama campaign’s vote director for veterans and military families. “We are out there talking about that, engaging veterans, educating them, making sure they understand how much has been done.” Obama’s celebration of the drawdowns in Iraq and Afghanistan opens him to criticism from his opponent, who has accused the president of weakening the country’s position in the world and compromising national security by pulling out too soon. Romney’s campaign made clear Thursday that it does not intend to cede foreign policy as an issue, despite poll numbers showing that much of the country agrees with Obama’s approach. Romney has criticized Obama for not securing an agreement to leave U.S. troops in Iraq to effectively confront Iran over its nuclear program

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With Bo Xilai’s ouster, China’s premier pushes reform

revolutionary hero, Bo Yibo, had been widely assumed to be in line for one of the seven vacant slots on the Standing Committee, the elite body that effectively runs the country. But Bo’s downfall began Feb. 6, when his former police chief and onetime right-hand man in Chongqing, Wang Lijun, entered the U.S. Consulate in Chengdu, 200 miles away. Wang, who initially sought a meeting with British diplomats, told the Americans that Bo’s wife, Gu Kailai, was involved in the death of a British businessman, Neil Heywood, whose body was found in a Chongqing hotel room Nov. 15, 2010. Wang remained at the consulate for more than 24 hours but was eventually taken by top Chinese security officials to Beijing, where he remains out of sight. Chinese authorities have said that Bo was removed from the Central Committee and the Politburo and is being investigated for “serious violations” of the party’s discipline rules. His wife and a household aide have been detained on suspicion of killing Heywood after falling out over a financial dispute, according to the official version. Beyond that official version, little is known. Overseas and online media have offered numerous but sometimes conflicting versions of exactly what went on in Chongqing and what central government authorities are investigating. But in his March 14 news conference, Wen made clear that he had linked what he called “the Wang Lijun incident” to a broader agenda. Answering a question about Chongqing and Wang’s flight to the consulate, Wen said, “We’ve taken the major decision of conducting reform and opening up in China, a decision that’s crucial for China’s future and destiny.” Some analysts said Wen appeared to be using the Chongqing incident as an opportunity for “housecleaning,” to remove Bo and others considered opposed to further economic opening before he steps down as prime minister this year. “Wen Jiabao feels he has an obligation to get rid of this troublemaker,” said Cheng Li, an expert on Chinese elite politics at the Brookings Institution in Washington. Wang Kang, the Chongqing academic who was visiting Beijing this week, added: “Wen Jiabao seized this chance, turning a bad thing into something good.” Researcher Zhang Jie in Beijing contributed to this report. More world news coverage: - Nuclear communication system could be used for cybersecurity - Israeli general: Iran will not build nuclear bomb - Murdoch: ‘I failed, and I am very sorry about

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Chen Guangcheng, blind Chinese lawyer-activist, escapes house arrest

broker a cease-fire in Syria. The Obama administration put up a wall of silence in the hours after Chen’s escape became public Friday morning. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland, pressed repeatedly by reporters at the department’s daily news briefing, said only: “I don’t have anything for you on that subject.” Asked more generally about China’s treatment of Chen, Nuland said, “We have always had concerns about this case.” Chen ran afoul of authorities after he filed a class-action lawsuit in 2005 accusing officials of enforcing the one-child population law by forcing thousands of women to undergo late-term abortions and compulsory sterilization. He has been in and out of prison in recent years. After his last prison release, in September 2010, he was taken to his farmhouse in Dongshigu village and kept under unofficial house arrest, surrounded by armed thugs in plain clothes who prevented Chen and his wife from leaving and blocked journalists and activists from visiting. If Chen turns out to be sheltered by U.S. diplomats, it would present the Obama administration with the second thorny diplomatic issue with China in recent months. On Feb. 6, former Chongqing police chief, Wang Lijun, spent more than a day at the U.S. consulate in Chengdu. In that case, Wang left the consulate — of his own volition, according to U.S. diplomats — and was immediately taken into custody by Beijing central government security officials, but only after revealing a tale of internal intrigue, scandal and murder that led to China’s biggest political crisis in two decades. Wang, who as police chief led an often-brutal anti-crime drive in Chongqing, is being held incommunicado by Chinese security agents as part of a wide investigation into purged Communist Party official Bo Xilai. “There is a series of dots that connect up here with these embassy episodes where the United States keeps getting drawn into China’s internal affairs,” said Orville Schell, director of the Center on U.S.-China Relations at the Asia Society in New York. “With the Wang Lijun thing, the United States has been very prudent and careful to not say anything. That’s the proper response. But with Chen Guangcheng, there’s no way they can’t say something because you have Hillary Clinton heading over there.” There are several examples of temporary refuge given at U.S. diplomatic installations around the world but “posts may not grant or in any way promise ‘asylum’ to any foreign

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Postcard From Tom: Indian Accent, a jewel box of a restaurant in New Delhi

is a pale pink dip coaxed from tomato pickle. Diners also get tweezers for extricating the hot crab from its pliant vase. Butter chicken, ubiquitous on restaurant menus in the Indian capital, gets a rich lift from crushed roasted peanuts and peanut butter, a texture combination that demonstrates the chef’s pan-Asian culinary training. The entree is sandwiched between fenugreek crackers and served with a vivid salad of onion, mint, beet and carrot by a waiter who playfully upends a chai glass over the plate. I’ve had Indian breads stuffed countless ways over the years, but it wasn’t until a spring dinner at Indian Accent that I encountered quarter-size nan sharpened with blue cheese and larger pillows of bread plumped with pumpkin and cheddar cheese. Mehrotra refers to his style as “Indian food with an international accent,” or the other way around. However you view his elegant and entertaining cooking, the chef comes from an unlikely background and is doing something that few of his peers have attempted, says Vir Sanghvi, a respected Indian print and television journalist and my recent guide to the country’s dining scene. According to Sanghvi, most Indian chefs are steeped in the ways of the French; Mehrotra, by contrast, was schooled in pan-Asian techniques by Thai master chefs in London. Even the venue for his cooking is uncommon. Most high-end Indian restaurants in New Delhi are found in large hotels that are “designed to appeal to foreigners who want to enjoy a good Indian meal without venturing too far,” says Sanghvi, who gave Mehrotra his namesake chef of the year award in 2010. Flanked by an expansive lawn visible from the serene dining room, the Manor houses a mere 15 guest rooms in a part of the city where ambassadors and titans of industry reside. Indian Accent was preceded in its space by a restaurant from the Michelin-starred London chef Vineet Bhatia. That concept foundered. Says Sanghvi, “Delhiites were not ready for Vineet’s style of modern Indian cooking.” They’ve since warmed to Indian Accent. To win the confidence of what Mehrotra calls his toughest audience — his fellow middle-class Indians — he never mixes two styles of regional Indian cooking on the same plate. Also, “if I can give a reason why I’m doing” something different with a traditional dish, he says, “fusion is successful.” I appreciate the little story that accompanies most dishes, especially if

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Our all-volunteer military should stay that way

Elliot J. Feldman, a Washington lawyer, was a special project officer and consultant in the Defense Department during the Reagan administration. Those suggesting that the United States return to military conscription — including Thomas E. Ricks, writing recently in The Post, and my former boss at the Pentagon, Lawrence Korb — surely have honorable intentions. But they should know better. They cast a historical eye toward Vietnam and Korea, but they seem to have forgotten why we resorted to an all-volunteer armed force. The reasons applicable in 1972 are even more compelling today. Among the reasons Ricks, Korb and others have cited for the change they propose is the extent to which our armed forces have been broken by the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, producing tragedy in those countries and within our military. They also note the detachment from civil society that our troops experienced during these wars. The concluding argument is always the same: Had the troops been conscripted, we would have ended these wars more quickly because the American people would have objected sooner to the futility of the missions. Without such democratic pressure, they assume (and without reference to the decisions of the Obama administration), national leaders will not easily withdraw. These observations are seriously flawed. There may be no historical precedent for the professionalism and success, within their missions, of the all-volunteer U.S. forces since their creation. The most important problems have arisen from policies of stop-loss (effectively an unofficial selective draft) and the abuse of reservists, who did not expect to spend prolonged periods in combat. These problems are partly attributable to the size and scale of the armed forces, which were dictated by the economics of a volunteer force. Such criticism assumes that with a draft we could have maintained a much larger force, but that is not the case. The economics of training and equipping a much larger military would have been as challenging, compounded by the famous problems of morale and efficiency with conscripted soldiers — lessons we supposedly learned in Vietnam. The truth is that missions must correspond to capabilities, not that we can redesign capabilities for ever-expanding missions. Another flawed rationale in calls to restore the draft is that Americans would be more mindful of misbegotten wars. Here the amnesia about Vietnam is distressing. Americans supported that war by significant polling margins for more than five years, until nearly

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Why homeowner bailout plans don’t work

once within their means, but now these homeowners don’t need a loan modification — they need work. With unemployment stuck at 8.2 percent, millions of Americans are in this terrible position. Recent data from the Mortgage Bankers Association indicate that almost 4 million mortgages in the United States are at least 90 days delinquent or in the foreclosure process. A loan modification can’t help someone who doesn’t have a job. Political constraints have forced government housing programs to target homeowners who need limited assistance. Even this use of taxpayer money has angered many Americans who sacrificed to live within their means: Why should their tax dollars support those less prudent? This political constraint is the fundamental reason more homeowners have not been saved. Unless as a nation we are willing to spend substantial taxpayer dollars to help those who need a lot of housing assistance, any new foreclosure program, even the latest silver bullet of principal write-downs, is likely to have only limited reach. It is important to note that we did not constrain ourselves this way when we used the Troubled Assets Relief Program to stabilize the financial system. If the federal government had limited TARP funds to banks that needed moderate assistance, several large banks would have failed, bringing down the financial system. Those bailouts were also politically unpopular, but we overrode political concerns for the sake of preventing another Great Depression — and sparked tremendous political backlash as a result. In effect, because of both political constraints and limited resources, bailout recipients had to be deemed systemically important or not that troubled. Those deemed not critical to the system and deeply troubled have not been helped by government programs. Unfortunately, many individual homeowners have fallen into this category. Given this political reality, we need either to agree, as a nation, to spend substantial taxpayer dollars to reach more homeowners, or the federal government should focus on programs to quickly move troubled homeowners to affordable rentals and, most important, focus on pro-growth economic policy to create jobs. The urgent need for decisive action was highlighted by Friday’s disappointing economic data. The economy grew at only a 2.2 percent rate in the first quarter, down from 3 percent the previous quarter and below expectations. Most alarming, however, is that this growth was achieved largely by consumers saving less to spend more: The personal savings rate fell from 4.5 percent

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BSO at Strathmore: A captivating self-contained drama

Conductor Jun Markl made Schumann’s oft-maligned orchestration sound ingeniously fresh. (Christiane Höhne) Conductor Jun Markl kicked off Thursday’s Baltimore Symphony Orchestra concert at Strathmore Hall with a jolt of adrenaline, treating the overture to Weber’s “Euryanthe” as a captivating self-contained drama. There was tension underlying the rapid string figurations — the Baltimore strings here superbly disciplined and woodsy of tone — and an urgency to the crisp attacks he coaxed from all sections of the orchestra. Markl’s reading of Schumann’s “Rhenish” symphony proved just as individual, with lyrical passages taking on an autumnal glow and big moments filled with bustling energy. This is a conductor who isn’t afraid to mold phrases and play with tempos for expressive effect. His attention to the score’s atmosphere — letting troubling inner voices dart up through the music’s grand surface, or spinning a legato line through shifting brass chords to create an almost regal flavor — made Schumann’s oft-maligned orchestration sound ingeniously fresh. Beethoven’s Violin Concerto was just as lovingly shaped, and Markl’s genial account suited the ravishingly pure and lovely playing of violinist Arabella Steinbacher. Steinbacher is a superb technician — a quality displayed as much in her encore of Kreisler’s fiendishly difficult Recitativo and Scherzo as in the concerto itself. What made her playing so special was her poised and natural way with phrasing (complemented by a serene, almost patrician physical bearing), her ability to float pianissimo notes and ethereal harmonics like a dream, and her sure command of musical architecture. In a month in which Strathmore featured Joshua Bell’s beautiful rendition of the piece, Steinbacher’s reading distilled even more magic. Banno is a freelance writer.

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Chen Guangcheng, escaped Chinese dissident, is subject of diplomacy with U.S., activists say

end of the day, he is going to have to leave China or leave the embassy and see what he faces.” Chen’s escape and the possible involvement of the U.S. Embassy in sheltering him come at an already challenging time for China’s Communist rulers, who are grappling with the gravest political crisis here since the Tiananmen Square crackdown of 1989. The firing of and investigation into once-rising star Bo Xilai, the former Chongqing party secretary, and the arrest of Bo’s wife on suspicion of murder have exposed high-level corruption and leadership rifts just months ahead of what was supposed to be a carefully choreographed hand­over of power this fall. The Chen case could push human rights issues to the forefront of this week’s talks, which are supposed to focus on issues such as trade, currency appreciation, Iran sanctions and North Korea. Another contentious issue at the talks could be a letter the White House legislative affairs director sent Friday to Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.), assuring him that the administration would give “serious consideration” to Cornyn’s proposal to sell new F-16C/D fighter planes to Taiwan. Cornyn, whose state includes plants belonging to the fighter-jet manufacturer Lockheed Martin, had earlier lifted his hold on Mark Lippert’s appointment as assistant secretary of defense for Asian and Pacific security affairs, a post that has been vacant for more than a year. So far, however, both the United States and China have maintained a cautious silence on the Chen affair. Asked about it Friday, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Cui Tiankai said simply, “I have no information to give you.” Associates detained Meanwhile, further details emerged about Chen’s journey over the past week. Hu Jia said he and Chen met in the same room in Beijing where Chen recorded the video, broadcast on YouTube, in which he calls on Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao to protect his family and investigate corruption in Linyi city, in Shandong province, where Chen’s home village of Dongshigu is located. Hu described wearing a raincoat for concealment when he went to meet Chen at a safe house and said that to avoid being tracked, he did not take a cellphone. He said that after their meeting, which lasted more than an hour, Chen moved to a new secret location. “We discussed where was a safe place for him in Beijing,” Hu said. “But we couldn’t figure out any absolutely safe place in

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In Everglades, tracking pythons may provide clues to vanishing wildlife

bounty hunters with guns and machetes into the park. Bounty hunters are great at capturing snakes — when they find them, which is rare. Hunters are also known to execute small native snakes, mistaking them for python hatchlings. “Someone could tell you there are 10 pythons in this area, and you could walk all day and not see them,” Smith said as he leaned on a truck, dirty and tired after wrestling Python 51 and leading the team on a two-mile hike with her live 140-pound body draped over their shoulders. Pythons prefer warmth, but many in the Everglades have managed to survive hard freezes, leading some biologists to worry about their ability to adapt and travel north. The snake has already been swimming and slithering south toward the Florida Keys. Once pythons are established, trouble seems to follow. A study co-authored by Hart, Mazzotti and other researchers showed that when pythons started to appear in large numbers in the late 1990s and early 2000s, mammals in the southernmost part of the Everglades started to disappear. For the study, researchers traveled nearly 40,000 miles over 11 years, observing wildlife in the southern area. They found that 99 percent of raccoons, 98 percent of opossums and about 88 percent of bobcats were gone. Marsh and cottontail rabbits, as well as foxes, could not be found. Nearly every news report blamed pythons, but the study — “Severe Mammal Declines Coincide with Proliferation of Invasive Burmese Pythons in Everglades National Park” — did not conclude that. It said more research was needed. “You have to ask the question,” Mazzotti said. “Has a crime occurred? Yes, mammals have declined. Do pythons have a motive? You bet, they have to eat. Do they have the means? They’re like vacuum cleaners on mammals. But then you have to do a much better job of looking at cause and effect.” Mazzotti is also examining the impact of humans, who have drained water for development. “What’s happened in the Everglades is that the depth of water has been completely screwed up by humans, and we have to ask the question if hydrology is related to the disappearance of mammals.” Using data collected from recaptured pythons, Hart is testing her own theory. Although humans rarely see well-camouflaged pythons, she wonders whether vanishing marsh rabbits see them all the time, just before their world goes black. “I used to see

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on site, the company has experimented with technology from Square and eBay’s PayPal unit. Those products let them track preferences of specific customers. “Even at a very early stage, we’re able to drive a lot of foot traffic and customer traffic to wherever we’re popping up,” Scholnick said. That’s how Schmendricks, named after the Yiddish word for a stupid person, sold out its launch party. While it has a growing fan base, the bagels aren’t cheap. The company charges $3 each, compared with $1 to $1.50 at most of the local stores. Cream cheese, which they buy in stores and then flavor themselves, is an extra dollar. Ethan Kurzweil, a Boston-area native, is willing to pay the premium. He compares it to buying an artisan chocolate versus a supermarket candy bar. “They have to brand themselves as a different category — they are a bagel and nothing else is a bagel,” said Kurzweilwho became an early Schmendricks customer through his venture connection to Scholnick.“If I’m going to eat the carbs, it’s not really about the money. It’s about the food experience.” Schmendricks’ bagels are modeled after the Bagel Hole in Brooklyn, Kover’s childhood store. The baking is left to Scholnick’s wife, Deepa Subramanian, who quit her job as a corporate lawyer last year to become the single full-time employee. A native of India, Subramanian had never tasted a bagel until coming to the United States for college. She jumped at the opportunity for a career change. “Once we nailed down the product, I was really excited about a shot at being an entrepreneur,” said Subramanian, who was a software developer at Salesforce.com before going to law school. “I’ve never produced anything in my life that is this tangible.” She now wakes at 4 a.m. to have bagels ready for breakfast delivery at nearby start-ups and law firms. She’s making thousands of bagels a week, with evening help from the rest of the team. That includes the fourth founder, Dagny Dingman, who’s married to Kover. They expect to hire someone soon to help meet rising demand and give Subramanian more time to work on social marketing, meeting cafe owners and trying to build the business. “It’s not the best use of my time spending eight or nine hours a day baking,” she said. “I’m really intrigued to see how I’m going to manage people. I’ve never done that.” — Bloomberg News

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Saving Chen Guangcheng

Bob Fu is founder and president of the China Aid Association, a Texas-based Christian human rights organization campaigning for Chen Guangcheng’s freedom. The blind lawyer Chen Guangcheng climbed over the back wall of his home April 22 — and escaped nearly six years of torture, malnutrition and isolation. During his detention, Chen became a global star, his dark glasses emblematic of the embattled movement of human rights defenders in China. Chen is my hero and friend. He is under the protection of the U.S. Embassy in Beijing. His status and safety present a pivotal test for freedom in China and for U.S. credibility as a defender of freedom. Chen’s escape was planned carefully for many months. The actor Christian Bale was the most prominent person who tried to visit Chen during his years of house detention, but hundreds of Chinese citizens sought a similar audience and were forcibly turned away by police. Chen’s most passionate supporters were the Chinese netizen community. One netizen, He “Pearl” Peirong, provided logistic support for Chen’s escape, picking him up in Shandong province — where Chen and I both hail from — and taking him to Beijing. I am awed by the courage of those who helped Chen escape. Pearl told me she is willing to die with Chen because he is such a “pure-hearted courageous person.” I was talking to her last week when she said “guo bao lai le,” that state security had arrived. Now, she is under arrest at an undisclosed location, and her blog has been erased. Chen is often described as a “dissident,” but that is a misnomer. Despite years of brutal treatment for seeking to bring attention to those victimized by China’s “one-child” policy, he has never established a political party or organization. He has never advocated overthrowing the Communist Party. In the video he posted online after his escape, he says that the injustices his family experienced “hurt the image of our Party.” And the first thing he told me after escaping was that he wanted the outside the world to know that he was not going to leave China but to “fight to the end for the freedom of my family. . . . I want to live a normal life as a Chinese citizen with my family.” Chen’s escape prompted a predictable brutal response. After police in Shandong realized — four days after Chen got away

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Yuri Bashmet and the Moscow Soloists Chamber Orchestra at the Music Center at Strathmore

Conductor and violist Yuri Bashmet. (Oleg Nachinkin) Viola virtuoso Yuri Bashmet founded the Moscow Soloists Chamber Orchestra two decades ago, which quickly established itself through Grammy-winning recordings and worldwide tours. On Friday evening, Bashmet and company presented a strange and, at times, irritating concert at the Music Center at Strathmore. First, the programming. The MSCO is a string orchestra, for which there is a wealth of original literature ranging from Antonio Vivaldi to Arvo Part. None of the six works offered came from this broad category; everything performed was an arrangement, adulteration or corruption of the original. Why wouldn’t a world-class group want to showcase its unique repertoire? Then there’s the question of whether the MSCO has a conductor. Bashmet’s directing style could be called collaborative or superficial. His gestures tend to be horizontal and airy and lack detail. The players watch one another more than Bashmet, but many entrances were still sloppy. When Bashmet took up his viola to perform as soloist in the Brahms Clarinet Quintet, he dropped any pretense of leadership, standing motionless even during long rests, leaving the group to hang together as best it could. The MSCO also brought cellist Mischa Maisky along as soloist, although it didn’t have the necessary wind players for the Tchaikovsky Nocturne or the Haydn Cello Concerto in C Major. The solution? Simply do without. This appallingly cavalier attitude from a professional ensemble — just play and hope no one notices — was of a piece with its interpretations. To trim a long first half, Bashmet left off most repeats in the Schubert Death and the Maiden Quartet (a partial Mahler arrangement, which the composer sensibly abandoned halfway through as unworkable). The famously slow movement began faster than I’d ever heard it, then immediately slowed for the first variation. At the end, it slowed even further, the coda ending in a crawl. Did the musicians not understand it was the same material, now unrecognizable? The tragedy of all this was that much of the playing was impressive. Maisky is truly a master, with an industrial-strength sound, although he doesn’t draw the long lines of his illustrious teacher Mstislav Rostropovich. Bashmet is justifiably hailed as one of the world’s finest violists; what a pity we had to hear him in such an ill-advised misfire. While Brahms sanctioned the substitution of the viola in his clarinet quintet, he never intended this tightly

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The joy of innovation

reservation system through which they can arrange for five-course tastings at one of five partner restaurants, including Fiola and Bibiana, for $135 a person. “Our value proposition is connecting curious dinners with innovative chefs,” said Jill Richmond, who co-founded The Coterie with Nick and David Wiseman. “What underpins what we do, especially with the fireside dinners, is providing connections that are more meaningful than just having a great experience at a restaurant.” Richmond, a consultant at the World Bank, started the culinary salon under the name No. 68 Project in London in March 2010. When her job led her back to the states a year later, she revived the project as a nine-week pop-up restaurant in the District. The underground scene Area foodies are dispelling the notion that Washington is too conservative to embrace experimental concepts. Underground dinner parties, where guests are not allowed to disclose the location or the host’s identity, have been gaining popularity in the past two years. Dinner requests are growing at the Web site for underground restaurant Chez La Commis. Tom, the chef who requested anonymity to maintain privacy, started sending out e-mails to friends of friends in January to try out his creations. A public relations executive by day, budding chef by night, Tom serves six-courses, with three wine pairings, for $40 out of his home in Clarendon. Word got out in the blogosphere about his dishes, such as crab salad with cucumber granite, and foodies started e-mailing requests to attend his clandestine supper club. “Because there is no barrier aside from the cost of ingredients, you can get as creative as you want,” Tom said. “When you free people from the formal setting of a restaurant, the atmosphere becomes more lively. That matches the type of food I put out.” What started out as a once a month event now occurs three to four times a month. “This is an investment in finding out whether I can eventually do my own restaurant,” Tom said. Meals on wheels No recent restaurant trend has garnered quite the attention as food trucks have. The new era of curbside cuisine, rife with gourmet concepts, has spawned well over 100 mobile vendors in the region since 2009. “The evolution of mobile food service now has been fueled by the sustained period of economic weakness,” said Hudson Riehle, senior vice president of research at the National Restaurant Association. “Consumers

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Germany struggles with homecoming of Afghanistan veterans

of troops in Afghanistan — 5,350 troops were stationed there at the beginning of the year, before the drawdown started, and more than 300,000 German troops have served in foreign operations since reunification in 1990. Since then, more than 100 have died. The simple passage of time has made discussions about veterans less fraught. Few members of the World War II generation are around to raise awkward questions about how they fit into the broader plans. De Maiziere — the son of a prominent general who was active in World War II and postwar West Germany — has said that he intends honors to go only to members of postwar Germany’s military, which was established in 1955 and whose size is still limited to an internationally agreed upon maximum. No greeting at the airport Among regular Germans, the discussion has not provoked the heated debate that might have occurred a decade ago. Instead, many seem ready to accept the plans for more recognition for the military. Still, no one is suggesting military parades down Unter den Linden, the broad Berlin boulevard that was built to accommodate that purpose. “There’s a need for peace and peacefulness,” said David Habedank, 31, a chef who was visiting the New Guard House on Unter den Linden on a recent afternoon. Once a monument to the German military, it is now a memorial “to the victims of war and tyranny.” “It’s okay to honor not a passion, but a kind of work,” Habedank said. But soldiers who have served in Afghanistan say that there remains a stark divide between how their country treats them and the reception that their American, British and other counterparts get upon returning home. “If you look at the U.S. guys, you look at the day they return from Afghanistan or Iraq. In Germany, there’s no one who is greeting them at the airport. There’s no comparison,” said Andreas Timmermann-Levanas, head of the Association of German Veterans, who served in Bosnia and Afghanistan and has pushed for a veterans day. Treatment of veterans in the United States is far from perfect, he said, but the country has a broader awareness of the areas that need improvement. “You discuss the problem, because you know the problem,” Habedank said. “We still don’t know the whole problem.” And sometimes, as a result, soldiers fall through the cracks. “I lost everything: house, car, family,” said

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Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng escaped. Will the U.S. support him?

with their Chinese counterparts when they raise human rights issues. Their Chinese interlocutors are all too practiced at shape-shifting the discussion toward general issues and away from the specific immorality of imprisoning at home without charge people such as Chen Guangcheng or Liu Xia, wife of the 2010 Nobel Peace Laureate Liu Xiaobo, who himself remains in jail. The fourth round of the U.S.-China Strategic and Economic Dialogue is to begin next week in Beijing. Important things are achieved at these discussions. In the 2007 talks, then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson took up my case and pressed his Chinese counterparts to issue me a passport and allow me to return to the United States. After five years in prison and four months in a prison at large, I left China a “free man” without need of additional travel documentation. Next week’s talks could allow Chen Guangcheng to step out of hiding and fly off to freedom in the United States. But for that to happen, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and/or Secretary of State Hillary Clinton must raise Chen’s case and make that specific request. To those who claim that this is not the appropriate forum, I would say that the genesis of the talks lies not in the enormous trade imbalance or the resultant current accounts deficit. No, it’s the China-China human rights deficit that created the need for these talks. China’s export success is rooted in removing economic and political rights from the vast majority of Chinese citizens and sticking them with poor working conditions, ultra-low wages and the peonage that most Chinese workers experience. It vastly enriches an elite minority who control or are associated with state-sponsored entities. Simply put, it is the Chinese political system that creates the economic system and trade imbalances the dialogue seeks to redress. That is the source of the export colossus U.S. companies and workers now engage on unequal terms. Repair the rights deficit, and you begin to repair the trade deficit, the trust deficit, the moral deficit and the political deficit. The question is: Will U.S. leaders raise the issue at the table next week and stand up for people like Chen Guangcheng? Read more on this issue: Yang Jianli: Obama should speak up for human rights in China Yang Jianli: Liu Xiaobo’s seat in Oslo shouldn’t be empty The Post’s View: A pivotal moment for U.S. role in Chinese human rights

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Ex-CIA counterterror chief says Pelosi ‘reinventing the truth’ about waterboarding

evidence to contradict Pelosi’s claims. So she got away with it — until today. In his new book, “Hard Measures,” Rodriguez reveals that he led a CIA briefing of Pelosi, where the techniques being used in the interrogation of senior al-Qaeda facilitator Abu Zubaida were described in detail. Her claim that she was not told about waterboarding at that briefing, he writes, “is untrue.” “We explained that as a result of the techniques, Abu Zubaydah was compliant and providing good intelligence. We made crystal clear that authorized techniques, including waterboarding, had by then been used on Zubaydah.” Rodriguez writes that he told Pelosi everything, adding, “We held back nothing.” How did she respond when presented with this information? Rodriguez writes that neither Pelosi nor anyone else in the briefing objected to the techniques being used. Indeed, he notes, when one member of his team described another technique that had been considered but not authorized or used, “Pelosi piped up immediately and said that in her view, use of that technique (which I will not describe) would have been ‘wrong.’ ” She raised no such concern about waterboarding, he writes. “Since she felt free to label one considered-and-rejected technique as wrong,” Rodriguez adds, “we went away with the clear impression that she harbored no such feelings about the ten tactics [including waterboarding] that we told her were in use.” So we’re left with a “he said-she said” standoff? Not at all. Rodriguez writes that there’s contemporaneous evidence to back his account of the briefing. Six days after the meeting took place, Rodriguez reveals, “a cable went out from headquarters to the black site informing them that the briefing for the House leadership had taken place.” He explains that “[t]he cable to the field made clear that Goss and Pelosi had been briefed on the state of AZ’s interrogation, specifically including the use of the waterboard and other enhanced interrogation techniques.” Rodriguez asks, “So Pelosi was another member of Congress reinventing the truth. What’s the big deal?” The big deal, he explains, is “the message they are sending to the men and women of the intelligence community who to this day are being asked to undertake dangerous and sometimes controversial actions on behalf of their government. They are told that the administration and Congress ‘have their back.’ You will forgive CIA officers if they are not filled with confidence.” Rodriguez compares Pelosi’s

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Matchmaker waits in the wings as zoo resumes the panda mating game

proportion of the genes in the population come from him.” The stud book is peppered with “308s” under the heading “sire.” Pan Pan has fathered at least 32 cubs, including Tian Tian. He has sired multiple cubs a year — an amazing seven in 1997, including three sets of twins. This was great for Pan Pan but bad for the panda gene pool. Tian Tian, No. 458, has a less distinguished record. He has sired only the illustrious Tai Shan, who was born at the National Zoo in 2005 and lives at a panda reserve in China. Ballou said China thus far has not consulted National Zoo officials on genetic issues or replacement pandas. But it could in the future. “They have all the information,” he said. “We’ve been working with them now for 10, 11 years . . . so they have the tools and information they need to decide.” But if the Chinese want to consult, Ballou said he could crank out some good genetic matches in a few minutes. “Sure,” he said. “I could do that.” It is uncertain whether China, which has dozens of pandas in its reserves, would consent to replacements. Last year, Chinese and U.S. officials agreed to extend the pandas’ stay in Washington for five more years. The agreement replaced a 10-year lease that expired Dec. 6, 2010. The new agreement expires Dec. 6, 2015. According to zoo spokeswoman Pamela Baker-Masson, to open talks with China about new pandas the zoo would have to demonstrate all the work that has been done to try to produce cubs in Washington, and how it has come up short. The zoo would then make a recommendation “for one to go back, two to go back,” she said. Ballou said there are probably scores of female pandas that would be genetically suitable for Tian Tian. “Then you would narrow it down by age,” he said. “Then there would be a decision: ‘Well, do we want to have a female that’s a proven breeder or not?’ That would narrow it down.” More would depend on the institution where the panda is located. Ballou could probably narrow it down to four or five females. Read more from The Washington Post: D.C. Council set to vote on furlough makeup pay Glen Echo’s trash is one man’s treasure Occupyers plan May Day protests Silver Spring transit center price tag rises again

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Astronaut joins effort to profit from harvesting raw materials in space

Planetary scientist and Northern Virginia resident Tom Jones — Brian Vastag To date, no one has figured out how to make money from space. How will Planetary Resources do so? It begins by finding the resource-rich destinations in near-Earth space. Those are the asteroids. The company’s initial steps will involve a small and affordable search telescope to identify nearby asteroids. The next step will then measure their reflected sunlight to figure out their composition. Isn’t a lot of this work already being done by NASA? Are there undiscovered asteroids? Oh, yeah. NASA is funding at about $6 million a year a search program for the largest asteroids, the ones that are global hazards. By accident, we’ve found about 8,500 total near-Earth objects. But we think there are about a million big enough to both be a hazard and a resource, because they do come close to the Earth. So there’s a huge job ahead of finding the undiscovered asteroids. And I think NASA’s funding is such that the pace is too slow. Partnering with the commercial sector is a great thing for the country to do. What valuable resources do asteroids contain? The most valuable thing will be water. There’s a class of asteroids that contains up to 20 percent water by weight. We know this from meteorites. If we can find those asteroid types, simply by concentrating sunlight on the dirt on their surface you can extract distilled water. That could make rocket fuel, breathing oxygen, drinking water. It goes hand in hand with lowering the cost of future space exploration. At the same time, we might find rare, strategic metals that could be returned to Earth. That’s a long way off. So the first step after identifying the right asteroids would be exploiting them in space. That’s right. By doing so you enable exploration and you lower the cost of doing anything in space, which helps everything from tourism to setting up industrial concerns in space. What hardware might the new company send into space? First, a small telescope. The next thing you do is build small, prospecting robots. I’m talking shoe-box-size spacecraft that piggyback on an existing booster for some other mission. You get a cheap launch, then use solar electric or ion engines to get out to an asteroid. There the robot will sniff and scratch — that’s prospecting. How did you get involved? My interest

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I was in the Merchant Marine from 1944 to 1947. What Roberto Loiederman said about the Merchant Marine was true back then. But what has been known, down the ages, is that these truths are only a part of the greater story. There are men, and now women, who go to sea, accept its vicissitudes and do no evil acts. They remain anonymous. There are also men, and women, who go to sea, drink and consort improperly, and then go home to a pattern of domestic rectitude. Their divorces and scandals, when made public, do great damage to families and to the Merchant Marine. Now, we have discovered, the Secret Service is embroiled in a mess involving drinking and prostitutes. I have always been proud of my service, but I have found that bad novels and a scandal-seeking media speak no good of those who serve quietly. Bryant Hopkins, Arlington

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An Earth friendly reading list

Environment-themed kids books include, from far left, “Life in the Ocean,” “The Lorax Pop Up!,” “How to Raise Monarch Butterflies,” “Marty McGuire Digs Worms!” and “Out of the Way! Out of the Way!”. (Deb Lindsey/FOR THE WASHINGTON POST) With spring in full swing, “Out of the Way! Out of the Way!” By Uma Krishnaswami and Uma Krishnaswamy (Groundwood Books, ages 4-6). This book uses charming illustrations and poetic language to tell the unlikely story of how a tree grows in a sprawling city in India. “Life in the Ocean: The Story of Oceanographer Sylvia Earle” By Claire A. Nivola (Farrar, Straus and Giroux Books for Young Readers/Frances Foster Books, ages 6-9) Sylvia Earle is one of the most important pioneers in the exploration of the deep sea. Her work has helped broaden our understanding of the oceans and the creatures that live in them. What makes this book exceptional is the way it uses Earle’s own words to describe the sea. Challenging the traditional image of whales as “big and fat and ponderous and lumpy,” Earle declares, “Whales are like swallows . . . like otters. . . . They move in all directions. . . . Rollicking, frolicking creatures, doing all this wonderful dancing in the sea.” “Marty McGuire Digs Worms!” By Kate Messner and Brian Floca (Scholastic Press, ages 6-9) It’s hard to think of cafeteria composting as the topic for a good chapter book, but Messner and Floca pull it off. It’s the characters who make this book entertaining, whether it’s Marty’s wildlife rehabilitator mom or her inventive Grandma Barb, who thinks both worm slime and duct tape have essential uses. “How to Raise Monarch Butterflies: A Step-by-Step Guide for Kids” Reading about insects is one thing; learning to raise them is another. Pasternak has written a clear, practical and family-friendly guide to raising butterflies, which includes plenty of compelling scientific information along the way and ends by explaining what we can do to save their habitat. “The Lorax Pop Up!” By Dr. Seuss, with pop-ups by David A. Carter (Robin Corey Books, All ages) Perhaps you saw the movie version of “The Lorax,” but we all know that the original book is better than the movie. This pop-up version can give kids of all ages a new appreciation of Dr. Seuss’s pro-environment message. — Juliet Eilperin

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Chen Guangcheng must weigh loss of stature against protection of U.S. asylum

in 1989, is an investment manager and possible successor to Warren Buffett. Shen Tong, who also fled in 1989 and runs a successful software company, has devoted most of his time in recent months to plotting strategy for the Occupy Wall Street movement. “The U.S. was not only my home, but it stood for something admirable or even inspirational,” Shen said, recalling how he felt when he first arrived. “That hasn’t been true for a while.” The Occupy movement has given him a chance to participate, as did the Tiananmen demonstrations. “In some ways, this is what I came for,” he said. Wei Jingsheng, a Beijing zoo electrician who spent 18 years in prison for writing that China could not modernize economically without political modernization, makes speeches and has done talk shows on Voice of America. But he has struggled to rally support and has bickered with other exiles since arriving in 1997. He runs a foundation in Washington and lives on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. “I think I have been more effective in the United States than if I had stayed in a Chinese jail,” Wei said in an interview Monday. “That’s not true for most people sent to exile. Most are trapped by the need to make a living. They effectively are disappeared from this world.” At times, China’s exiles have floundered. In the early 1990s, the author Orville Schell wrote a profile of exiled Tiananmen student leader Wu’er Kaixi, who was then running a Ranch House restaurant off a freeway near San Francisco International Airport. The late Fang Lizhi made a poorly received, dogma-laden speech in broken English at the Council on Foreign Relations when he was allowed to leave the U.S. Embassy in Beijing for exile, and later went to teach at the University of Arizona. Xu, who was 59 when he arrived, said adjusting to the United States has been difficult in some ways. Learning English and finding work was hard. “Not being able to go back to China for so long has been a very negative experience, because China has been the home that nurtured me for so long,” he said. And he misses his relatives. “Even though my parents have passed away,” he said, “I can’t go tend to their graves.” But he said the growth of the Internet has made it easier for exiles to have an impact in China. He is still

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U.S., China to launch high-stakes economic, security talks despite diplomatic tension

discouraging Iran and North Korea from developing nuclear weapons, and there have been signs the Chinese are listening. China signed on to a U.N. statement condemning a recent North Korean rocket launch, and it has cut back on oil purchases from Iran. But observers say it is hard to predict whether the momentum from earlier talks can be maintained in light of Chen’s escape from house arrest last week. The activist lawyer is believed to be receiving shelter and protection from U.S. diplomats in the Chinese capital, highlighting U.S. concern about China’s human rights record — concern that often puts China on the defensive. Frisbie cited worries that the sensitive diplomatic issue could preoccupy officials on both sides. “The Chen situation could overwhelm all of it,” he said. “This is a bit of a test of the relationship’s maturity, to see how they will handle this.” According to a confidant of Chen’s, U.S. diplomats are trying to work out a deal with Chinese officials under which Chen might be able to leave China for the United States. Officials remained silent on Chen’s situation as Clinton traveled to China overnight Monday and Tuesday. But in a White House appearance Monday, Obama urged China’s leaders to do better on human rights, saying, “China will be that much more prosperous and strong as you see improvements on human rights issues in that country.” Chen’s status “is going to be a complication, but we shouldn’t forget that the [U.S.-China] relationship is built around critical security and economic issues,” said Jeffrey Bader, the John C. Whitehead senior fellow in international diplomacy at the Brookings Institution. Even before Chen’s dramatic flight from his village, the political situation in China had been shaken in recent weeks by the scandal surrounding fallen party chieftain Bo Xilai, whose wife has been named a suspect in the murder of a British businessman. Clinton is unlikely to bring up Bo’s name in the talks, analysts said. But reports alleging corruption in Bo’s inner circle have already posed a challenge to Chinese officials, with the apparent details of Bo’s operation undermining the image the party likes to project of a political leadership that moves flawlessly in lockstep. More world news coverage: - Political asylum is a tough call for Chen - Scores dead in India ferry sinking - Images after Osama bin Laden’s death - Read more headlines from around the world

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depicted Bo Xilai’s case as an isolated incident. They have said the party’s central disciplinary committee, in charge of enforcing rules on more than 80 million party members, is investigating Bo for “serious violations,” reportedly including corruption and abuse of power. Bo’s rule in Chongqing The investigation of Bo began when his former police chief and right-hand man, Wang Lijun, left the city of Chongqing and entered the U.S. Consulate in Chengdu, 200 miles away. Wang stayed at the consulate for more than 24 hours, revealing a tale of corruption, mistrust and alleged murder involving Bo, his wife, Gu Kailai, and his aides. Wang was then taken by central security agents to Beijing. But stories of Bo’s ruthless methods, particularly during his crackdown on organized crime, have been circulating for years. And Bo’s measures to revive “red culture,” including ordering Chongqing television to broadcast only “patriotic” programs during prime time and organizing mass singalongs of Mao Zedong-era revolutionary songs, were widely covered in China’s media, and even attracted some criticism. During his tenure in Chongqing, Bo became so toxic to party leaders that from the time he was appointed local party chief in November 2007 until his sacking in March, neither President Hu Jintao nor Premier Wen Jiabao visited Chongqing. Yet Bo was never publicly chastised or reined in by his bosses in Beijing. In a March 14 news conference, Wen wagged his finger while he rebuked Chongqing’s authorities over the Wang Lijun incident and told them to “seriously reflect.” Wen also warned against a return to the violence of the Cultural Revolution, which lasted from 1966 until Mao’s death in 1976. That was seen as a direct repudiation of Bo’s “red revival” campaign. But despite his stern tone, some analysts noted that Bo was earlier considered to be in line for a spot on the all-powerful Politburo Standing Committee during a leadership transition later this year. The central government was forced to act against Bo only because Wang’s unusual public flight to the consulate forced its hand. A question of power Wang Xiangwei, chief editor of Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post, wrote in a column Monday that the two incidents together — Chen’s escape and Bo’s fall — show the need for the central government to exercise more control over local authorities. Wang said Chen had done the right thing by exposing how officials in Linyi City, where

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Pentagon report cites limited gains in Afghanistan

be one of the most violent provinces in Afghanistan. In Kandahar province, attacks increased by 13 percent as U.S. and Afghan troops contested districts that have long been controlled by the Taliban. The picture was mixed in the east: Attacks there fell by 8 percent over the past six months, but the report attributes some of that drop, which occurred after the end of the fighting season, to one of the coldest winters in Afghanistan in the past 10 years. The biggest question facing U.S. commanders is whether the Afghan government will be able to hold onto gains made by U.S. troops over the past three years. A major area of concern has been the ineffectiveness of the Afghan government, which has been hampered by corruption as well as shortages of trained civil servants. “Setbacks in governance and development continue to slow the reinforcement of security gains,” the report said. As U.S. military personnel reduce their numbers and focus more on shifting responsibility to the Afghan army and police, the resources available to improve Afghan governance are expected to decline. The report seeks to make a positive out of a recent spate of negative news, including the accidental burning of Korans and the defiling of insurgent corpses by U.S. personnel. Noting that the relationship between coalition troops and the Afghan government has “endured significant shocks,” the report praises Afghan forces for containing the violence that erupted after the Koran burnings. Smaller-scale protests, however, continue to occur with some regularity throughout the country. Scores of Afghans launched an anti-American protest in Afghanistan on Tuesday over the killings of three children during a gun battle between U.S.-led forces and Taliban insurgents. The children were killed after the Taliban attacked a group of U.S. forces and Afghan police who were meeting with local residents in the Shah Joy district of the southeastern province of Zabul province Monday, provincial officials said. Afghan and U.S. officials concluded that the children were killed by insurgents’ bullets. But protesters nonetheless railed against foreign forces, whom they blamed for the casualties. Separately, two children were reported killed by a roadside bomb Monday in eastern Paktika province. Special correspondent Sayed Salahuddin in Kabul contributed to this report. More world news coverage: - China’s crises spotlight local abuses - Afghans blame U.S. for child deaths - Images after Osama bin Laden’s death - Read more headlines from around the world

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Good to Go: Hawthorne Homemade Organic Juice Bar & Market

Institute for Food and Health, and a third investor. Inside their tiny storefront in Northwest are a three-stool bar where customers order; a refrigerated case holding a few vegetables and prepared foods; shelves stocked with pantry items; and a produce stand that Jo Anna Hawthorne says was custom-built from old wood she salvaged from the shuttered Hawk ’n’ Dove on Capitol Hill. That last item “really gives it a market feel,” says Hawthorne, a former real estate agent and spa manager. “It’s brought people into the store.” The shop’s produce offerings are local, sustainable and organic whenever possible, Hawthorne says. For example, free-range eggs, herbs, arugula and mixed greens come from the Farm at Our House in Brookeville, Md. The wheatgrass is grown by Hawthorne herself. She’s also the one who created the juice bar recipes; her sister put together the food menu. The staff is small, so it can take up to 20 minutes to order and get your food and juices. We liked the vibrant green Abundant Energy juice ($7 for 12 ounces; $8 for 16 ounces), served in biodegradable cups or take-away Mason jars (an extra $2). It gets its color from a mix of seasonal greens and romaine lettuce, but the prominent flavors are green apple, lemon and celery. At first, we mistook the Raw, Raw, Raw Turnip-Nut Green Wrap ($8.95) for a side salad. It’s a small portion of turnip-cashew crunch, almond spread, parsnips, carrots and other ingredients, wrapped in collards. Although deliciously punched up with a citrus-tarragon vinaigrette, this would be a very light lunch. Hungrier customers should try the panino of Turkey Hill smoked turkey breast, cheddar cheese, plum tomato and guacamole on multigrain bread ($9.95), served — as are all of the sandwiches — with a small side of Napa cabbage slaw. Yolanda’s mostly vegan soups have included a garlicky zucchini-potato-basil bisque ($4.50 for 12 ounces; $5.95 for 16 ounces; $8.95 a quart). Jo Anna also offers juice cleanses ($99 to $195). The shop seats eight inside and four outside. Hawthorne says she might add a picnic table out front when the weather improves. And with the approach of summer, other changes are in store: “I’m adding tomatoes . . . to the juice bar — people love that — and cucumbers,” she says. “I’ve been waiting for them to come in season.” — Rina Rapuano Hawthorne Homemade Organic Juice Bar Market

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SpaceX launch of Dragon capsule to space station to put NASA strategy on display

interfere with the space station’s systems. In late April, the company pushed the launch back another week to run more computer simulations of the docking. Monday’s launchpad test was delayed by an hour by a computer glitch. Still, SpaceX is ahead of other private space companies. It has already successfully launched one Dragon capsule that orbited Earth and landed safely on target, in the Pacific Ocean, in December 2010. A NASA analysis published last year found that SpaceX developed its Falcon rocket for about a third of what NASA would have spent. Orbital Sciences Private contractors have built rockets for NASA in the past, of course, but the new companies have been given much freer rein to design and operate their vehicles under fixed-price contracts. The SpaceX venture is especially significant because its capsule — unlike any other cargo carriers under production or available from other nations — was designed to return to Earth rather than break up in the atmosphere. That would allow scientists to have their experiments returned, another capability the United States gave up when it retired the shuttle. (The Russian craft that now ferry astronauts to and from the space station return only crew members, not cargo.) A successful flight would also aid SpaceX in its race to become the first commercial company chosen by NASA to carry astronauts to and from the station. SpaceX is competing with space stalwart Boeing and two newer companies, Sierra Nevada and Blue Origin (founded by Amazon chief executive Jeff Bezos), for NASA contracts to carry crew. Space experts are watching the launch carefully for indications of how far commercial space has come, but they do not necessarily expect the capsule to dock. “If Dragon fails at launch, that’s a bad thing that will get people concerned,” said John Logsdon, professor emeritus at the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University. “But if it gets close but can’t dock, I would say that’s a setback but not a tragedy,” he added. “If they’re able to get close or even dock, then it would do quite a bit for commercial space — a real validation for those in NASA who set this in motion.” While that view is common among officials involved in the effort, it is not necessarily the view of the SpaceX employees trying to make it work. Encountered at dinnertime at a restaurant near the SpaceX hangar at

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Fallout from ruling that pit bulls are ‘inherently dangerous’

Erica Carter’s move from Pasadena, Calif., to Baltimore was difficult, she said, not because of the lack of housing options, but because many places would not allow her pit bull Bailey. Though Carter has settled into a rental near Patterson Park, she said the search was daunting. And she fears it will only get worse with her next move after last week’s Maryland Court of Appeals ruling that pit bulls are inherently dangerous animals. The court’s decision could have far-reaching implications for landlords and dog owners who rent. Landlords could opt to ban pit bulls or all dogs to avoid future liability, or they could see increased insurance costs, industry experts said. In turn, as pit bull owners have difficulty finding housing, animal advocates fear more dogs will be left at shelters. The ruling — in a civil case brought by the family of a child attacked by a pit bull in Towson in 2007 — means victims don’t need to prove a dog’s owner knew it had a history of being dangerous. They just need to show that the owner or landlord knew a dog is part pit bull to make a claim. “That’s absolutely ridiculous,” Carter, 20, said as she watched Bailey trot happily through the mud with a pack of other dogs at the Canton Dog Park. “Pit bulls get judged by their look and the actions of other people,” she said, referring to owners who train pit bulls to fight. A court ruling in Maryland found that pit bulls and dogs that are part pit bull are “inherently dangerous.” Howard Carolan, 28, who brought his pit-mix Annie to the park, was surprised by the ruling. He said he and his fiancee recently rescued Annie. “That’s got to be half the dogs in the city,” he said of pit mixes. “We just got this girl. She’s been sweet,” he said. He added, however, that the ruling “does concern me about keeping her.” Carter said she would never give up her dog. “I plan on adopting more,” she said. But many are concerned about the ruling’s impact on pit bull ownership. “We’re getting calls from people who are getting calls from their landlords telling them to move out,” said Jen Swanson, executive director at the Baltimore Humane Society in Reisterstown. She said the humane society has been advising callers that leases are legally binding contracts and landlords can’t

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Montgomery County animal watch

These were among cases received by the Montgomery County Animal Services Division. For information on shelter hours and location, adoption and licensing procedures, rabies clinics and low-cost neutering, call 240-773-5960. Chickens at large Hop, skip and a thump Dog gets spooked, circles home: Shelter has adoptable cats Gaithersburg — Compiled by Lisa M. Bolton

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In Maryland, a rare reversal of suspensions for two lacrosse players

Easton High School lacrosse players Casey Edsall, left, and Graham Dennis in May, after their suspensions. Last week, the Maryland State Board of Education expunged their disciplinary records. (Kim Hairston/BALTIMORE SUN) The search was a surprise. The high school lacrosse team in Easton, Md., had boarded its bus when the principal and other administrators arrived, announcing that gear bags would be checked. A tip had come in about athletes carrying alcohol. Near the front of the bus, Graham Dennis, then a 17-year-old junior, asked whether he should remove the pocketknife he always used to cut and tighten strings on his lacrosse stick. It was tucked inside his oversized duffel bag, along with cleats, pads, socks, duct tape and medical supplies. That question — to which he says he gave little thought — set off a year-long odyssey in school discipline that ended this month with a rare outcome: The state stepped in and reversed a local school board’s decision on student punishment. In a unanimous ruling, the Maryland State Board of Education expunged the disciplinary records of two lacrosse players suspended from school after the search in April 2011. The state board also raised questions about a decision to call the police on Dennis, who was led away in handcuffs for having two small knives. His teammate Casey Edsall, also a 17-year-old junior, was suspended for having a lighter, used to seal the frayed ends of strings. School officials deemed it an explosive device, his family said. “This case is about context and about the appropriate exercise of discretion,” the state board said in its ruling — stressing that knives and lighters do not belong on campus but that Talbot County school officials went beyond their own rules in punishing the students. It was a blow to the get-tough culture of zero tolerance that has taken hold in U.S. schools in the past 20 years. And for Maryland, it is another moment in the discipline spotlight. In February, the state board drew wide notice for proposals to reduce suspensions and require districts to remedy racial disparities. A vote is expected within the next few months. “What we’re seeing is that Maryland is stepping up in a leadership role and putting common sense back into discipline,” said Judith Browne Dianis, co-director of the Advancement Project, a civil rights group. On Maryland’s Eastern Shore, the decision culminated an often-frustrating quest for the

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What’s new in gluten-free beers: Less twang

sticky sweetness and slightly earthy flavor. “It’s our slowest-moving beer,” Warwick confesses; he runs through about a half a barrel a week. “But it’s drawn in new regulars,” he adds, along with their friends who happily down Rock Bottom’s other beers. Although pleasant enough, most gluten-free beers don’t precisely replicate the flavor of a barley brew and might not find many adherents in the general population. That rankled Terry Michaelson, chief executive of the Craft Brew Alliance based in Portland, Ore. “Beer in our society is a connector, something for sitting down with friends and laughing and sharing.” Michaelson, whose celiac disease was diagnosed 12 years ago, set out with brew master Joe Casey (whose wife is similarly afflicted) to formulate a beer that would appeal to celiacs and non-celiacs alike. About a month ago, Widmer Brothers Brewing (one of the alliance’s member breweries) released Omission Gluten Free Lager and Pale Ale. These beers are made with barley that has most of the gluten removed through a proprietary brewing regimen. The golden lager is crisp and refreshing, with a lemony hop character. The amber-colored ale is full of resiny hops with lots of caramel malt for balance. Neither has a twang or funk that would peg it as gluten-free. Here’s the catch: They’re available only in Oregon. Michaelson wants to go nationwide, but there are regulatory hurdles. The federal Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau has authority over most alcoholic beverages. But beer made without barley isn’t covered by its definition of “malt beverage,” and oversight defaults to the Food and Drug Administration. The FDA allows breweries to label these beers “gluten-free” if they contain fewer than 20 parts per million of gluten. Omission labels claim the beer contains 6 ppm or fewer of gluten. But to ship a barley-based beer out of state, says Michaelson, the brewery needs label approval from the Tax and Trade Bureau. And the bureau does not currently allow any statement about gluten content on the labels of these beers, says specialist Tom Hogue, the agency’s director for congressional and public affairs. The bureau, Hogue added, is drawing up guidelines that will permit some statement about gluten content to let the buyer make an informed decision. Asked when those guidelines would be released, he answered, “We’re working to get them out as fast as we can.” Kitsock is editor of Mid Atlantic Brewing news.

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In defense of Chen Guangcheng

THE DEAL UNDER which Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng left the U.S. Embassy in Beijing on Wednesday was bold, risky and potentially groundbreaking for human rights in China. It could also prove disastrous. By late Wednesday, Mr. Chen, who was then in a Beijing hospital, was telling Western news organizations that his decision had been forced by threats to his family and that he wished to exit China for the United States. That may or may not reopen a six-day crisis over his status. What’s clear is that the Obama administration now bears moral responsibility for Mr. Chen’s freedom and welfare. The blind, 40-year-old activist aspired to be — and could still become — a model for Chinese who seek to promote the rule of law and respect for human rights. Having studied the checkered history of dissidents who found asylum in the United States, Mr. Chen told U.S. officials and his supporters that he wished to remain in China. His aim was to force senior government officials to end the illegal persecution of his family by authorities in his village and province and to allow him to continue his work as a human rights lawyer. To their credit, U.S. diplomats in Beijing retrieved Mr. Chen after learning he had escaped from his village and brought him into the embassy — an act that infuriated the Chinese government. By early Wednesday, the diplomats believed they had brokered a bargain under which Mr. Chen would be reunited with his family and allowed to attend law school in another city. Were it to follow through on those promises, the regime would break with a pattern of relentlessly hounding dissidents and human rights activists, a number of whom have been illegally confined to their homes. The progress this would represent, and Mr. Chen’s professed desire to remain in China, made the deal a risk worth taking. But it also put the Obama administration under obligation. Having strongly encouraged Mr. Chen to accept the Chinese offer, the administration must ensure that he is treated fairly — or appear naive and feckless. Already Mr. Chen’s supporters and human rights groups are suggesting that the Americans pressured him into a bad deal because of their desire not to disrupt a U.S.-China strategic dialogue that began Wednesday evening. U.S. officials sound credible when they insist that Mr. Chen never asked for asylum and was never told that the

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SpaceX launch is delayed again; company trying to send capsule to space station

Commercial space company SpaceX is delaying the launch of a new cargo capsule to the international space station because of software issues, officials said Wednesday. Already three months behind its initial schedule, the launch of the company’s Dragon spacecraft had been set for this coming Monday, but the company and NASA are continuing to test and verify the software, said SpaceX spokeswoman Kirstin Brost Grantham. “We’re working with NASA to complete the software verification process, and we hope to announce a new launch date soon,” she said. If SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket cannot launch from Cape Canaveral by May 10, the company will have to wait at least until late in the next week to try. A Russian Soyuz spacecraft is slated to lift off from Kazakhstan on May 15 with three new space station crew members, and it will need to be safely docked at the station before the Dragon can attempt to approach. The SpaceX launch is a critical moment for NASA’s new strategy of paying private companies to deliver cargo to the 16-nation orbiting outpost, which is slated to operate through at least 2020. SpaceX has a $1.6 billion NASA contract to fly 12 cargo missions to the station. Orbital Sciences of Dulles holds a similar contract and is developing a rocket for a test flight this summer from Wallops Islands, Va. While the SpaceX mission is explicitly a test, the Dragon capsule will carry 1,100 pounds of food, water and other supplies to the space station. Since NASA retired the space shuttle last year, the agency has relied on spacecraft from Russia, Europe and Japan to resupply the station. Interest in the mission is high. Grantham said 430 media representatives had signed up to watch the launch, a “very large number for an unmanned flight,” she said. More on this story: SpaceX, NASA prep milestone launch

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One of two controversial ‘bird flu’ papers is published

of chickens, mostly in Asia. People are rarely infected, but when that happens they are likely to die. Since 2003 there have been 602 human cases and 355 deaths. In the lab, Kawaoka started with an H5N1 strain that had killed several people in Vietnam in 2004. He isolated the gene for “hemagglutinin,” which is most responsible for contagiousness. He put into it two mutations that allow the flu virus to attach more easily to cells in a person’s throat. He then combined that doctored gene with the “normal” genes from the strain of H1N1 flue that caused the human flu pandemic in 2009. Two more mutations in hemagglutinin appeared during lab experiments and after ferrets — which stand in for people in flu studies — were infected with the virus. Together, the four mutations made the engineered virus transmissible through the air, although it didn’t kill the ferrets who caught it, or even make them very sick. Whether “wild” bird flu virus containing them would be both contagious and deadly isn’t known. However, the experiment has given scientists an idea of what mutations to look out for — which was the purpose of the research from the beginning. One of the mutations is already widespread in H5N1 strains circulating in the Middle East. Some of those strains also carry a mutation in a different gene that makes growth in human cells easier. “These viruses may be several steps closer to those capable of efficient transmission in humans and are of concern,” Kawaoka and his colleagues wrote in their Nature article. A second paper, by Dutch scientist Ron A. M. Fouchier, that made a more contagious bird flu virus using other methods, is awaiting publication at the journal Science. The National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity, a panel of independent experts that advises the federal government, in December asked the two journals to hold off publishing the papers while researchers and governments thought about how to handle this kind of research. In late March the board looked at the experiments more closely and said it no longer opposed publication. Read more from The Washington Post: - U.S.-China deal on legal activist seems to unravel - Police: Death of NFL great Junior Seau appears to be suicide - President Obama’s former girlfriends share stories, letters in new biography - Edvard Munch’s ‘The Scream’ sells for record $119.9M at New York auction

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Chinese dissident’s fate in limbo as diplomatic deal appears to fray

as they talked — also were moved by his story, he said. “I probably was in 30 or 40 hours of conversation with him,” Campbell told CNN in an interview broadcast from China. “Every single discussion was about the possibility of how to go back and live a more normal life in China and what we could do to help in that effort. Never once did he talk about asylum or coming to the United States.” As the hours passed, Chen would ask about famous dissidents from recent history, including former South African president Nelson Mandela. Chen seemed particularly curious about the experiences of Aung San Suu Kyi, a Burmese pro-democracy activist who spent years under house arrest, Campbell said. “He asked me many questions about her,” he recalled. “He asked me, ‘Does she ever feel low? Did she ever question her choices?’ ” Worried about family By Tuesday, all sides appeared to have settled on an unusual deal that would allow Chen to relocate to a city near Beijing, where he could attend law school under Chinese guarantees of protection. Jerome A. Cohen, an American lawyer long acquainted with Chen, said that when the two spoke by phone, the activist was nervous but eager to move forward. Chen “was open to this idea of going out and studying law and trying to make a career again outside Shandong province,” said Cohen, a law professor at New York University and an expert on Chinese law. But he acknowledged that such a move would be “very, very dangerous,” given the chances of being detained again. “We went back and forth,” Cohen said. “He was worried about his family.” By Wednesday, U.S. officials began to put the plan into place. Campbell, in a statement, said Chen freely decided to leave the embassy after being assured that his wife and children were safe and waiting at a Beijing hospital. “After twice being asked by [U.S. Ambassador to China Gary] Locke if he was ready to go, he said, ‘Zou’ — let’s go,” Campbell said. “We were all there as witnesses to his decision, and he hugged and thanked us all. Locke phoned The Washington Post’s Beijing bureau at 3:20 p.m. local time to say he was in a van with Chen, stuck in traffic but en route to the hospital. The ambassador then handed the phone to Chen, who introduced himself: “This is

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Montgomery County preparing to clean up Gude landfill

From their back yards, residents can see deer in Montgomery County’s old Gude landfill in Rockville, which they hope will soon be turned into a park. (Marvin Joseph/THE WASHINGTON POST) When Keith Ligon and scores of his neighbors moved to the Derwood section of Rockville, they didn’t mind that their new homes sat near a towering landfill. After all, county officials had pledged in the 1980s to convert the closed garbage dump into a giant park, with tennis and basketball courts, an archery range and other recreation facilities. Nearly a quarter-century later, they are still waiting for that park. But now there is a more pressing concern: The landfill off East Gude Drive is leaking toxins. In March, state and Montgomery County environmental officials finalized a study of the hazards associated with the trace amounts of harmful chemicals seeping into groundwater and the methane gas venting into the atmosphere. The leakage does not pose an imminent health threat, said Peter Karasik, a manager at the county’s Department of Environmental Protection. Because people and wildlife do not come in contact with the contaminated groundwater, he said, any perceived risk is “more of an emotional and psychological burden.” Still, neighbors are worried that the chemicals will harm the environment, and they have created a Web site that links to groundwater studies and gas-monitoring data from the site, just north of downtown Rockville. (The Washington Post) The county, which has sunk hundreds of thousands of dollars into the old landfill, is considering spending an additional $412,000 to figure out how to clean it up. The county is “going to put together a remediation plan, and we intend to stay involved and keep on top of their efforts,” said Nick Radonic, one of Ligon’s neighbors. The Gude [pronounced GOO-dee] landfill, the county’s oldest, opened in 1965. After accumulating enough garbage to fill more than 70 tractor-trailers, it shut down in 1982 and was covered with two feet of soil. Now it resembles a rolling, verdant pasture, populated with deer and the occasional enthusiast flying electric airplanes. The only hints that it is a dormant landfill are the rows of pipes that vent the methane and the signs that prohibit smoking and open flames. Shortly after the landfill closed, developers started to put up single-family houses nearby. Home buyers liked the neighborhood’s proximity to the Shady Grove Metro station, and the developers distributed county schematics

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Defense procurement problems won’t go away

In June 1986, after a year-long investigation, then-President Ronald Reagan’s Blue Ribbon Commission on Defense Management — later known as the Packard Commission — filed a final report. It was established to investigate Pentagon procurement after an enormous increase in defense spending and the discovery of the infamous $435 hammer and $600 toilet seat. The panel was chaired by David Packard, co-founder of Hewlett-Packard Co., and deputy defense secretary in the Nixon administration. Its declaration: “The Department of Defense’s acquisition system continues to take longer, cost more and deliver fewer quantities and capabilities than originally planned.” Among causes listed were “stifling burdens of regulation, reporting and oversight.” Last month, a Defense Business Board task force, established a year ago by the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Adm. James A. Winnefeld Jr., reported exactly the same “unacceptable” finding. The task force conclusion came after a study that included 221 interviews and review of 300 past studies and commission findings. Its declaration: The Defense Department “acquisition system continues to take longer, cost more, get less and oftentimes not what is needed.” What can be more boring than reading about yet another set of recommendations for fixing a system that over the past decade has seen the Defense Department flooded with funds. It’s been so flush that it could walk away from $50 billion worth of “weapons that either did not work or were overtaken by new requirements given the average 15-to-18 year development cycle,” according to the Punaro task force report. And — yawn — the overruns are hardly over. This is in spite of the need to reduce defense spending. More yawn-inducing reality: The Government Accountability Office recently reported current major weapons systems will show a cost growth of $135 billion before they are fully integrated into the system. Boring and frustrating. It was time to do something 26 years ago. The only major lasting memorial to the Packard Commission is its recommendation for an undersecretary of defense for acquisition. The Pentagon has had one since that time, but the problems remain. “Today there is no rational system whereby the Executive Branch and the Congress reach coherent and enduring agreement on national military strategy, the forces to carry it out, and the funding that should be provided — in light of the overall economy and competing claims on national resources.” This was the Packard Commission more than two

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Activist Chen Guangcheng wants to leave China with Hillary Clinton

BEIJING — In a telephone interview early Friday, Chen said he does not blame American officials for his plight after leaving the U.S. Embassy under a deal they helped strike. But he accused Chinese officials of reneging on their promises to fully restore his freedom. A few hours later, he made a dramatic call into a congressional hearing, telling lawmakers in Washington through the cellphone of a human rights activist that he wanted to travel to the United States to rest and that he was most worried about “the safety of my mother and my brothers.” Chen said he wanted to travel to the United States, but only temporarily, perhaps to study. “It’s not a one-time-only decision,” Chen told the Washington Post from his hospital room. “It doesn’t mean I won’t come back. As a free person, I believe I am endowed with the right to leave China when I want to and come back anytime I want.” China’s foreign ministry said Friday that if the well-known activist wanted to leave the country to study, he had to apply through the Chinese government like other ordinary citizens. “Chen Guangcheng is currently being treated in hospital,” the spokesman, Liu Weimin, said in a statement. “If he wants to study abroad, he can apply through normal channels to the relevant departments, according to the law, just like any other Chinese citizen.” With the fate of Chen and his family uncertain, the Obama administration drew sharp criticism Thursday for its handling of the crisis. U.S. officials expressed concern and frustration at not being able to meet with Chen. But granting him any assistance — much less safe passage to the United States — has grown far more complex and difficult since his departure from the U.S. Embassy on Wednesday, six days after escaping de facto house arrest in his village. Once Chen left the sovereign soil of the embassy, the leverage of U.S. officials went with him. Now he is under the control of Chinese authorities, who on Thursday blocked all access to the activist. “We haven’t had either a diplomat or a doctor in to see him,” said one U.S. official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to be more candid. “There’s plenty of anxiety about what’s going on.” The official said that U.S. diplomats had extraordinary difficulties even trying to telephone Chen on Thursday and that their two calls with

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Chen says China not honoring agreement, wants to meet U.S. diplomats

going to investigate,” Chen said. “I want to believe him. But at the same time, I need to observe what they do in the end.” He added, “I can’t judge yet.” The conversation lasted about 15 minutes, and Chen sounded relaxed, cheerful and full of energy — a sharp contrast to earlier interviews on Thursday when he was reported to have sounded frightened. He said he was being treated well at Chaoyang hospital and that he and his family received three meals, all on time. He said he, his wife and two children were together in one room and that no one was there watching over them. Chen said he is still recovering from a cracked bone he suffered from climbing over a wall during his dramatic escape from house arrest on April 22. He also said he received a colonoscopy and a biopsy Thursday and was awaiting the results. He said he hoped that his wife, Yuan Weijing, can also get a full medical exam because she received scars from brutal beatings at the hands of local thugs in their home village. Chen said he would like to travel to the United States, but only temporarily, to rest and perhaps study. But he said he did not want to remain in the United States permanently — and he chastised journalists who he said had misinterpreted his words. “Many reporters misquoted me, and even wrote things I never said,” Chen told The Post. “It’s not a one-time-only decision,” Chen said of his desire to leave China for the United States. “It doesn’t mean I won’t come back. As a free person, I believe I am endowed with the right to leave China when I want to and come back anytime I want.” “In the past seven years, I didn’t have a real weekend,” Chen said. “I was very stressed. I want to relax. I want to rest more. Maybe I will study something there because in the past seven years, I didn’t have chance to enrich my knowledge.” He said he also wanted to continue “to promote social progress and judiciary system improvement in China.” “The society must become more and more fair in the future,” Chen said. “It’s just a matter of time. It depends on how many people make efforts, and how big the efforts we make.” Washington Post researcher Zhang Jie in Beijing contributed to this report.

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KSM trial will put military commissions to the test

Benjamin Wittes is a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a member of the Hoover Institution’s Task Force on National Security and Law. He will be covering the KSM arraignment for the Lawfare Blog. When Khalid Sheik Mohammed and four others are arraigned Saturday in a military commission at Guantanamo Bay on charges of orchestrating the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, it will be the public’s first glimpse in several years of the 9/11 mastermind. The event holds the promise of long-delayed justice and will renew debate over the interrogations of the operation’s key planners. But the arraignment represents more than the possibility that we might hear once again from the flamboyant and mesmerizingly evil KSM. It is also likely to serve as a make-or-break test for the military commissions system, a system in which the Obama administration has — despite its initial instincts and ongoing misgivings — invested considerable prestige and energy. I have sat through every minute of every recent commission hearing, and the system looks nothing like the kangaroo court of human rights groups’ caricatures. The media will no doubt have a field day if KSM makes things unruly Saturday — as he very well might — but any spectacle should not obscure a larger truth about the tribunals in which he and his co-defendants will face trial: Quietly and gradually, the commissions have become a real court. More than a decade ago, the Bush administration launched the military commission system on the theory that commissions would deliver swift, streamlined justice for major terrorist figures. But the commissions’ development was stunted by a combination of early structural and legal flaws, litigation, staffing and personnel problems, and, at times, inadequate political commitment and attention. Despite the commissions’ obvious underperformance, however, opponents never succeeded in killing off the system. Even as the commissions foundered, Congress repeatedly insisted on their availability, and sometimes primacy, for certain kinds of cases. (In one bill the House passed last year, for example, Congress sought to require the use of commissions in all terrorism cases involving foreign nationals.) The result has been a peculiar stalemate in which the commissions have been allowed to neither succeed nor fail. This weekend’s arraignment marks the beginning of the third major effort to bring the 9/11 conspirators to justice. The Obama administration dropped earlier military-commission charges against them when it decided in late 2009 to bring the 9/11

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Chen Guangcheng case shows outsize expectations of U.S.-China diplomacy

John Pomfret, a former Beijing bureau chief for The Post, is writing a book on the history of interactions between Americans and Chinese. BEIJING The past two months in China have revealed something profound about the outsized expectations that China and the United States have for each other and the often-feeble returns on what many call the most important bilateral relationship in the world. Many Chinese place the United States on a pedestal that looms even higher from the capital of a nation facing a deep crisis in belief. The Chinese vest the United States with a moral authority that Americans are flattered by but are often loath to accept. For its part, the United States, in need of a hand around the globe, wants China to start acting like a superpower. But the Chinese — for tactical reasons or otherwise — reject the responsibilities inherent in big-power status even as they, too, are beguiled by the attention. Ever since aggressive young U.S. merchants first washed up on China’s shores and earned the sobriquet “the new people,” the two sides have expected great things from each other. But over the 229 years that Americans and Chinese have interacted, they have rarely been satisfied. And yet irrationally, almost magnetically, they keep coming back to each other for more. The current cycle began in February, when the first of two very different Chinese men sought shelter in a U.S. diplomatic outpost. The first one, Wang Lijun, is a policeman famed for his brutality but also known as someone who had run afoul of his political godfather — once one of the most powerful men in China, Bo Xilai. On Feb. 6, Wang left Chongqing, where he had overseen a reign of terror against Bo’s enemies, and drove 200 miles to the U.S. Consulate in Chengdu. There, Wang requested protection because he feared for his life. He apparently had been investigating Bo’s wife in connection with the murder of a British businessman. The upshot of Wang’s day-long stay in the consulate sent shock waves through China’s political hierarchy. Bo was purged from the party. His wife, Gu Kailai, was arrested. And the Americans handed Wang back to the Chinese. Why did Wang seek U.S. help after laboring for years in the belly of a system that, according to its internal documents and even some public speeches, views the United States as an “enemy”?

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China strikes deal that would allow Chen Guangcheng to study abroad, U.S. says

no indications that Chen would be leaving with her, as he at one point had said he would like to do. Chen’s own changing wishes and ability to broadcast them through the media have repeatedly flipped carefully scripted plans and scrambled the negotiations. For Chen and his relatives, the stakes of his decisions could not be higher, given the threat they face. While Chen’s immediate family — his wife and two children — may be allowed to leave under the new deal, Chen has repeatedly expressed worries for the safety of his mother and brother. “It would be pretty hard to have all these other people” leave with him, said New York University law professor Jerome A. Cohen, a friend of Chen’s who helped arrange a fellowship for him at NYU that became a crucial component of the deal. As someone traveling to the United States to study, Chen would be leaving ostensibly “for a few months of rest and study” and not to emigrate, he noted. Chen’s lack of a passport may also prove to be an obstacle. The Foreign Ministry, in its Friday statement, said that if Chen “wants to study abroad, he can apply through normal channels to the relevant departments, according to the law, just like any other Chinese citizen.” But in Chen’s case, that would mean having to return to his home province, Shandong, to obtain the necessary documents. Chen was beaten severely in Shandong and kept under unlawful house arrest for more than a year and a half. U.S. officials expressed hope for the new deal, but some also displayed caution. In a closed phone briefing with human rights groups, one high-level State Department official acknowledged that Washington was relying on “good-faith assurances” from the Chinese government, according to several who were on the call. “They were very careful not to describe it as a guarantee,” said one of those briefed, who requested anonymity in order to describe the conversation. “There seems to be a lot of caution given what happened the first time around.” But in Beijing, a senior administration officials told reporters: “We believe that this process will proceed accordingly, and we have high confidence in its course.” State Department officials said they were encouraged because diplomats had much better telephone access to Chen on Friday than the previous day. Chen spoke with Locke for 20 minutes, officials said, and met in

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Japan’s last reactor to shut down, leaving country nuclear-free for first time since 1966

been restarted. Political and business leaders fear the economic toll of summer energy shortages, but critics of Japan’s nuclear policy say authorities in Tokyo have not done enough to improve nuclear safety standards and break up the traditionally cozy ties between government and industry. Japan’s cabinet said last year that the country needed a new nuclear safety agency that is “trusted domestically and internationally,” and Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda had hoped to have the new agency in place by April 1. But politicians are still squabbling about how the new agency will operate and the extent to which it will coordinate with the cabinet. Experts say it could be months before Japan creates the new watchdog. Meanwhile, Noda and industry minister Yukio Edano have been pushing to restart two reactors in sparsely populated Fukui prefecture, north of Osaka. The Nos. 3 and 4 units at the Ohi nuclear plant have already passed stress tests — computer simulations designed to test defenses against emergency scenarios. And government officials made several trips from Tokyo last month to meet with local governors and townspeople, arguing for a restart. The Ohi reactors are operated by the Kansai Electric Power Co., the Japanese utility most dependent on nuclear power. Without restarts, the utility company — providing power to Japan’s industrial heart — will be 16.3 percent short of peak demand this summer, according to government-released data. “If a reliable, stable supply of electricity is not certain, domestic manufacturers have to think about moving to other countries, which in turn would lead to a hollowing out of industry and a loss of domestic employment,” Takashi Imai, chairman of the Japan Atomic Industrial Forum, said at a conference last month. “The national economy would clearly suffer.” But a deep resistance toward nuclear power carries on in the wake of last year’s Fukushima crisis, which displaced roughly 100,000 people. Some 67 percent in Fukui prefecture, according to a recent Asahi newspaper poll, oppose the restart of nuclear reactors. Sixty-three percent say they do not trust the government’s safety standards. The mayor of Osaka, Toru Hashimoto, one of Japan’s highest-profile politicians, has also become a torchbearer for the anti-nuclear group. He recently knocked the central government, saying it was “absolutely unreasonable” that authorities have deemed it safe to reactivate the Ohi reactors. Hashimoto said Japan must create a new nuclear watchdog and improve safety standards before reconsidering atomic power.

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Brig. Gen. Mark Martins, lead prosecutor in 9/11 case, in fight of his career

Commissions Act of 2009, prosecutors are barred from using any evidence derived from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment, and cases will be built on a host of other material. Critics in the human rights community “perform an invaluable role of accountability,” Martins said in a recent interview, adding that they are sometimes focused on “a vision of rights” that is not attainable. “I believe there is a narrow category of cases where military commissions are the appropriate choice and the best choice.” He said a hearing would be closed temporarily only to protect “sources and methods,” not to shield the government from any embarrassment stemming from the past actions of any agency. “I very much see the job in the tradition of the public prosecutor — dedicated to implementing the law, not winning at all costs,” Martins said. “There is definitely a vigorous debate [about commissions], but I’m seeing people who are listening. I’m hearing people say, ‘I didn’t know that.’ ” Last year, in the face of fierce congressional and local opposition, the Obama administration abandoned plans to move the trial of Mohammed and his alleged co-conspirators to Manhattan. Officials at the Pentagon immediately began to scout for what Goldsmith called a “game-changer” — a figure with the kind of national security and intellectual chops to engage with the civil liberties establishment. “Mark Martins is one of the finest and smartest officers in the U.S. military,” said Jeh Johnson, general counsel at the Defense Department. “I urged his appointment because Mark was involved in the reforms we developed in 2009, and I knew he would bring the right sense of military justice and care for the credibility of the system.” Martins, 51, grew up in the military, the son of an Army neurosurgeon who became the head of neurosurgery at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. After a year at the University of Maryland, Martins was admitted to the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, where he graduated at the top of the Class of 1983. He was awarded a Rhodes Scholarship and went to Oxford University, where he studied politics, philosophy and economics from 1983 to 1985. After a couple of years in the infantry and study at Harvard Law School, Martins rose through the ranks. He served as trial counsel at Fort Campbell, Ky., where he was assigned to a battalion of the 101st Airborne Division

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Washington sorely lacking in riverfront eateries

May is a wonderful time to stroll or bike along Washington’s waterfronts and enjoy the riverscapes — shoreline parks replete with trees, shrubs and flowers, boats plying the Potomac, sunlight bouncing off the river’s shimmering surface. At riverside cafes, you can pause, relax and enjoy a bit of food and drink while admiring scenic vistas. Oh, wait a minute! What cafes? Except for Washington Harbour in Georgetown, the capital has no riverside cafes to speak of. How can a city as large as Washington have miles of shoreline and shoreline parks yet so few places, at or near the water’s edge, to sit and socialize while sipping a drink, snacking or dining? The recently completed, handsomely landscaped Georgetown waterfront park, situated between the Potomac River’s edge and the Whitehurst Freeway, is more than a quarter of a mile long. Stretching westward from Washington Harbour and ending close to Key Bridge, it offers ample, well-deployed riverside promenades and pathways. But often there are no more than a few dozen people in the park. Why doesn’t the park include an eatery or two in attractively designed pavilions with commodious decks or terraces overlooking the river? Such pavilions, appropriately sized, designed and located, also could be built along riverfronts in East and West Potomac Parks, and in parks along the Anacostia River. Pavilions not only could provide great views and assorted refreshments, but they also could offer additional amenities — most notably public restrooms — so lacking in Washington’s hundreds of acres of waterfront parkland. A constellation of periodically spaced riverside destinations within parks makes more sense today than ever before. Great numbers of people who work or live in downtown D.C. would appreciate and regularly patronize waterfront eateries, as would tourists visiting D.C. in the spring, summer and fall. Today thousands of Washingtonians and tourists willingly walk, bike or use transit, eliminating the need for on-site parking to serve eateries situated in waterfront parks. In fact, pavilions can be located within reasonable walking distance of nearby Metro stations, bus stops or vehicular drop-off points. Using state-of-the-art architectural strategies and technologies, pavilions in parks can be designed to be exceptionally green and have a near-zero carbon footprint. Pavilions can lightly touch the land, minimally disturbing their sites. Sunlight can be readily harvested to produce electric energy and solar heating. Generously glazed exteriors enhance views while illuminating interior spaces using daylight rather than electric

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Activist Chen Guangcheng’s ordeal pushes U.S. and China down familiar path

diplomats once he left the U.S. Embassy. U.S. diplomats have been barred since Thursday from visiting Chen in the hospital, although an embassy doctor was able to see him Friday. Chinese security agents have thronged the ward where he is being treated for a broken foot suffered during his escape and a previous stomach ailment. Chen, who originally insisted he did not want to leave China, now says he wants to fly to the United States, preferably with Clinton, who was in Beijing for an annual round of high-level strategic and economic talks and was due to leave Saturday. China — the United States’ biggest creditor, with holdings of Treasury bonds worth about $1.2 trillion — also appears to feel let down. It angrily accused the United States of violating unspecified international laws and interfering in China’s internal affairs by granting Chen entry “via abnormal means” to the U.S. Embassy in Beijing. It also demanded an apology, a demand that U.S. officials have rejected but which is part of what, over the years, has become a familiar ritual of Sino-U.S. crises. China also demanded — and didn’t get — an apology after one of its military jets collided with a U.S. Navy reconnaissance plane off the coast of southern China in 2001, an incident that badly dented, but didn’t upend, relations. As in the past, both sides seem eager to limit the scope of the current fracas, though each is crimped by domestic politics ahead of a U.S. presidential election in November and a once-in-a-decade leadership transition due around the same time in Beijing. Chinese leaders don’t have to worry about voters but do need to deflect accusations of being soft on foreigners, a frequent refrain among neo-Maoist nationalists, who have been particularly agitated since the ouster in March of one of their idols, Chongqing’s populist Communist Party boss Bo Xilai. Chinese microblogs and Web sites have frothed with debate in recent days over whether Chen is a tragic hero or a foolish traitor. Much of it is coded, because Chen’s name is banned for online searches, as is the phrase “left of his own volition,” the official description of Chen’s departure Wednesday from the U.S. Embassy. The Obama administration is also under pressure, with speakers at a congressional hearing on Chen’s ordeal Thursday demanding a wholesale rethinking of relations with China. “America missed an opportunity in Tiananmen. Will this

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For start-ups, patents can be a gold rush

across continents. As patent battles heat up, many start-ups are also making the trip to the patent office. And an upcoming change in how the government awards patents could cause a stampede. Historically patents have been awarded to the first inventor of a technology. But starting in March, they will go to the first person who files a patent for a particular invention — a change that could front-load the costs for a young company. A well-prepared, comprehensive application can cost a company between $5,000 and $15,000. Under the first-to-file rule, the time element of a patent application becomes essential, which may cause the application costs to eat into start-ups’ cash flow at unpredictable times. But if they hope to be the next AOL, that might just be a cost start-ups have to swallow. “Companies are really going to have to keep an eye on it,” said Bao Tran, a San Francisco patent attorney. “They can’t afford to just relax or think, ‘a year from now, if this makes it to product, we’ll hire a law firm.’ ” A ‘currency’ for technology Stephanie Hay is a prototypical patent-savvy start-up exec. The entrepreneur co-founded the Arlington-based FastCustomer, which connects people with other companies’ customer service without waiting on hold. Hay’s team regularly checks in with the company’s patent lawyer, whom she describes as “almost like part of the team.” The company runs ideas past the lawyer whenever it has a tech development that may warrant an additional patent. “The most important thing is to make sure we protect ourselves on an ongoing basis,” she said. “It’s not ‘set it and forget it.’ ” Lawyers and investors say that many start-ups are wising up to the value that patents confer on start-ups. Patents are used both as a bargaining chip in negotiations with venture capitalists and as a way to woo potential buyers. In the venture world, they’re seen as value that can live on beyond the life of an actual company, as Eastman Kodak has discovered. “Patents are the currency that we’re using to identify assets that are really important to a business,” said John Calvert, an adviser at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. “It used to be that a business could say how many mills it has with which to produce bolts of cloth. These days, your patent portfolio is equally important.” Academic studies have shown that start-ups that

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Elizabeth Warren says she’s Native American. So she is.

do with blood quantum. Members must meet requirements set by the tribe in consultation with the Bureau of Indian Affairs. (Elizabeth Warren is not enrolled in a tribe and doesn’t seem to have sought such status. She doesn’t claim an Indian identity, just Indian ancestry.) Indians who are not enrolled in a tribe aren’t eligible for the aforementioned programs and benefits, including casino profits, education assistance, hunting privileges and housing. Indians make up a spectrum — for some, not claiming an Indian identity would be positively strange; for others, the claim is hard to accept since there is so little blood and possibly no cultural connection behind it. Most Indians exist between these two poles. Claimed or not, to be Indian and to grow up in a tribal community often meant that what you inherited was a lack of adequate health care, education and opportunity. For decades, federal policies — including war, compulsory boarding schools and relocation programs that moved Indians from reservations to cities — waged a brutal campaign meant to eradicate tribes and acculturate Indians. If that effort had been successful, no one would want or be able to claim a connection to a tribe. Instead, some Indians remain proudly unassimilated — or with only blood to show. Regardless of why Warren claimed minority status (she said she did it in hopes of meeting people with similar heritage), to be a woman from Oklahoma of working-class upbringing — and to want not only to walk the halls of power but to help build them — you have to press whatever advantage you have. Doing so might seem distasteful to those who’ve never had to do it because they were born into privilege and power. But beyond the question of whether Warren “gamed the system,” isn’t the question of her identity and its deployment suggestive of something else? Doesn’t it show us that whatever its sins, America’s virtues have won — that we have become a plural society? If someone with Indian blood, no matter how little, is a Harvard professor and stands a chance of being elected to the Senate, might that suggest that the American experiment is working and that we live in a meritocracy? No, not yet. An Indian identity has become a commodity, though not one that is openly traded. It has real value in only a few places; the academy is one of them.

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Medical marijuana meets hostility from Obama administration

Rob Kampia is executive director of the Marijuana Policy Project. During the 2008 campaign, Barack Obama raised hopes among those who support medical marijuana by pledging to respect state laws on the issue. But his administration has reversed course and massively escalated the federal government’s attacks on medical marijuana businesses, most of which are legal under their states’ laws. This is perplexing because medical marijuana is far more popular than Obama is. A Washington Post-ABC News poll from January 2010 found that 81 percent of Americans supported legalizing medical marijuana. A CBS News poll from October found that 77 percent of Americans support allowing doctors to prescribe marijuana for serious medical conditions. By contrast, the president’s approval rating last October hovered around 42 percent — and is currently about 47 percent. The shift has been clear. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. announced in March 2009 that the Obama administration would end the Bush administration’s practice of raiding medical marijuana providers that violated federal statutes. A memo from the Justice Department later that year said the department would not prioritize prosecutions of individuals acting in compliance with state medical marijuana laws. Through 2010, that policy seemed to work. California, Colorado, Maine and New Mexico took steps to regulate the distribution of medical marijuana at the state and local levels. Other states had similar plans in the works. But last year the tide turned. Obama’s Justice Department authorized a series of letters from U.S. attorneys across the country threatening to “vigorously” prosecute individuals acting in compliance with state medical marijuana laws. In some cases the U.S. attorneys suggested that government employees who help regulate their states’ medical marijuana systems could be prosecuted for “facilitating” a crime. There was more. The IRS cracked down on medical marijuana dispensaries, refusing to allow them to deduct such standard business expenses as rent and payroll. Last September the National Institute on Drug Abuse refused to provide federally grown marijuana to a Food and Drug Administration-approved research protocol seeking to measure the extent to which marijuana helps combat veterans with their post-traumatic stress disorder. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives outlawed gun sales to medical marijuana patients. And federal prosecutors in California announced that they would crack down on dispensaries across the state, saying that they intend to seize the property of landlords who lease space to these businesses that are legal under state

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The ‘fake pot’ threat

year to declare the five chemicals used to make these products — JWH-018, JWH-073, JWH-200, CP-47,497 and cannabicyclohexanol — illegal. Those chemicals, the agency said, represent “an imminent threat to public health and safety.” They have been designated Schedule 1 substances, a classification reserved for material with a high potential for abuse that has no currently accepted medical use in the United States. So does that mean the bags for sale at convenience stores around town are illegal? Not necessarily. The chemical ingredients are banned. But without testing the ingredients in the bags, it’s hard to say whether the products are outside the law. What’s more, the manufacturers of synthetic drugs are cagey. They can easily change a product’s name or switch ingredients to mask their intended purpose. So where does that leave us? The alarm sounded by District parents is being heard across the country. The DEA cites emergency-room physicians’ reports of individuals who have ingested K2 and other fake-pot drugs experiencing convulsions, vomiting, disorientation and anxiety attacks. Federal investigators are seeking manufacturers and suppliers of these drugs; their focus is not on retail outlets like those I visited. Some states have banned synthetic “fake pot” drugs. The District has not. K2 is not just a city or emergency-room problem. The Post reported last year on the use of synthetic marijuana at the Naval Academy, where at least eight midshipmen were expelled for using it. Navy investigators got a break when, as reported, a midshipman smoking synthetic marijuana began having seizures. What’s a parent to do? Make clear to your children that smokeable“fake pot” is a synthetic product arguably more dangerous than marijuana. Next, demand that local authorities crack down on the purveyors of that stuff. Clemson University chemist John Huffman told ABC News in 2010, “Anybody that tries [K2] is like playing Russian roulette. You don’t know what you’re getting. It’s just insane. Anybody who uses it is out of their tree.” Huffman should know. What began as research — an undergraduate developed K2 in Huffman’s lab — has led to several banned chemicals (including JWH-018, JWH-073 and JWH-200) bearing Huffman’s initials. That’s dangerous stuff that our nation’s capital can do without. kingc@washpost.com Read more from Opinions: George F. Will: Should the U.S. legalize hard drugs? Mary Speck: Latin America’s new strategy in the war on drugs Martin Austermuhle: Will the D.C. Council regulate medical marijuana to death?

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Supermoon, meteors to put on a show over Washington area Saturday

An unusually big and bright moon, often described as a supermoon, will beam down over Washington on Saturday night from a sky through which shooting stars will streak. Astronomers say Washington area residents may be able to view both these spectacles, depending on the weather. Clouds are in the forecast, but it was not certain how much of the sky they would obscure or for how long. The term “supermoon” was coined to describe a moon that is both full and at its closest point to the Earth in its elliptical lunar orbit. The combination of being full and close will make the moon seem unusually large and luminous. At its closest approach, or perigee, the moon will be about 221,800 miles from Earth on this orbit. Perigee distances vary from month to month. The average Earth-moon distance is about 239,000 miles. In the Washington area, the moon will rise in the east about 7:55 p.m. About three hours and 40 minutes later, it will be perfectly full and at its closest point to Earth. Meanwhile, Earth will pass through debris from Halley’s Comet that might produce 40 to 60 meteors an hour. In addition to any clouds, the brightness of the moon might make meteor viewing difficult. Would-be viewers were urged to keep the moon at their backs.

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Chen Guangcheng’s family and friends face tempest of retribution

to return home. “The autumn harvest is not finished yet, so the settling of accounts hasn’t really started,” said Bob Fu, an exiled Chinese activist who runs a group called ChinaAid. From his base in Texas, Fu helped engineer Chen’s flight from Shandong, a heavily rural and acutely conservative province in eastern China. Chen had been under house arrest there since 2010, an extra-legal detention ordered by local officials infuriated by his efforts to challenge their use of forced abortions and other measures through the courts. Chen’s escape, and his ability to evade authorities in Beijing as he moved between safe houses before taking refuge with U.S. diplomats, was a major embarrassment to China’s vast security apparatus, which, according to official budget figures, gets more funding each year than China’s military. American officials have come under withering criticism, particularly from political foes of President Obama, for their handling of the Chen saga. Under a tentative deal struck Friday during a visit to Beijing by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, U.S. diplomats say they believe Chinese authorities will allow the self-taught lawyer to study law in New York. Chen, however, has voiced growing alarm about the fate of his family and those who assisted him. “He is most worried about my safety, He Peirong’s safety and that of other friends who helped him escape from illegal detention in Shandong,” read a Twitter-like message posted by Guo Yushan, a friend who was involved in Chen’s flight and was seized by police late on April 27 for several days of questioning. He, too, is now free. Appeal for a nephew Chen, meanwhile, has pleaded for security forces to leave family members still in Shandong alone, including his mother and brothers. A nephew, Chen Kegui, is missing and thought to have been arrested. He reportedly attacked and injured security officers who rushed into his father’s house and started beating those inside on the night of April 26. A Shandong lawyer, Liu Weiguo, was threatened by local security agents after he offered to defend the nephew, according to Chen. “I want to appeal for my nephew,” said Chen in a telephone interview from Beijing’s Chaoyang hospital Sunday. “He injured those people because they raided his house without any permission. He acted in self-defense.” Chen said his mother, whose movements had been restricted, is “at home and can go out freely. But her heart is

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Chen Guangcheng’s family and friends face tempest of retribution

foreign media about Chen’s case. “It is not a small incident. It is a big incident,” Jiang quoted a security officer as saying. He was eventually released and allowed to go home, but his apartment building is being closely monitored. “There is a car parked downstairs with five or six people in it,” Jiang said. ‘A big freeze’ Nicholas Bequelin, a Hong Kong-based researcher for Human Rights Watch, said those who have been targeted by security forces in connection with Chen’s flight to the U.S. Embassy are victims of “the default reaction when something big happens: a big freeze aimed above all at information control and preventing unexpected developments.” Any more serious “payback,” he added, “will come later, as part of a package of measures designed to prevent the repetition of a similar incident.” That is what happened after the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989, when thousands were rounded up and sent to jail for their roles in a pro-democracy movement the party termed a “counterrevolutionary rebellion.” Fang Lizhi, an astrophysicist targeted in June 1989 for arrest and possible execution, escaped punishment by taking refuge in the U.S. Embassy in Beijing. He remained there for more than a year before being allowed to leave China, first for Britain and later the United States, where he taught physics. He died at 76 last month at his home in Tucson. The current backlash, said Bequelin, is more akin to the party’s response to the award of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2010 to Liu Xiaobo, a dissident literary critic serving an 11-year sentence for “subversion.” Liu’s wife, Liu Xia, who was placed under house arrest at the time of the award, is missing. “Everyone was ‘grounded,’ ” Bequelin said, “but ultimately, the party basically decided no one was to be punished” with formal prosecution for Liu’s Nobel Prize. Ongoing efforts by authorities to regain control of the flow of information have led to stepped up pressure on foreign journalists. The Foreign Correspondents Club in Beijing reported that about a dozen accredited foreign reporters who had made visits to the hospital where Chen is recuperating were summoned Friday to the visa department of the Public Security Bureau. They were told that they needed permission to report there, the correspondents club said, and were warned that their visas would be revoked if they “break this rule again.” Correspondent Keith Richburg and researcher Zhang Jie

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Cove Point means business

Daiichi meltdown, which left the country scrambling to find fuel for backup power plants. Japanese companies are investing hundreds of millions of dollars in natural gas projects and have paid 10 times the American price for imports. The opportunity here is obvious: The United States should export some of its bountiful stocks of natural gas to Japan and other countries with fewer supplies and high demand. That is why Dominion Resources wants to retrofit its Cove Point facility to service exports as well as imports. It’s no surprise that Sumitomo Corp., a Japanese energy outfit, is already in contract talks to use the retrofitted terminal, pending regulatory approval of exports to Japan. But the Sierra Club has declared that it opposes the retrofit of Cove Point. The organization claims to have an unusual amount of leverage over Dominion, in the form of a 2005 agreement with the company on what it can do on the site. Dominion fires back that it can make the changes it needs on the terminal’s existing footprint. Even if the language ends up not favoring Dominion, logic still would. Though environmental groups worry about hydraulic fracturing, the process drillers use to extract unconventional gas, the right response is to push for proper oversight for all energy firms, not to punish one company for trying to provide a reasonable service that others will succeed in furnishing in coming years. In fact, with the Interior Department and the Environmental Protection Agency both out with sensible new rules over the past few weeks, approving projects such as Cove Point should be seen as a win for everyone, environmentalists included. Though it’s possible that allowing exports might raise natural gas prices somewhat in America, doing so would also improve the country’s trade deficit, produce returns on domestic energy projects, increase state and federal tax revenue, support construction and maintenance jobs, reduce the leverage of gas-rich international bullies such as Russia, provide nations such as Japan a lower-emissions alternative to burning lots more coal and oil, and, as Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda indicated at the White House last week, tighten trade ties with America’s leading Asian ally. On the other hand, those docks could also continue to sit, empty. More on this debate: The Post’s View: Can natural gas help stop global warming? Rep. Ed Markey: Export natural gas, export U.S. jobs The Post’s View: Sending natural gas abroad

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Keeping veterans off the unemployment rolls

We also need to help our veterans address another roadblock to employment: access to treatment for the trauma of war. Some of those returning from combat zones suffer from depression, trauma and post-traumatic stress. These are treatable conditions, and we’ve learned a lot about how to help people cope with them. But many vets never get the treatment they need — and the families who suffer alongside them, and whose support is essential to successful treatment, are ineligible for care from the Department of Veterans Affairs. Without proper support, it is little wonder some vets have trouble finding or holding down jobs. When they are unable to find work, they can also lose their homes. Twenty percent of New Yorkers sleeping on the streets are veterans, according to the city’s Department of Homeless Services. Many of these men and women fought for us in the mountains of Afghanistan and the deserts of Iraq. It is unacceptable that they are now homeless. The struggles our veterans face are such that 18 of them commit suicide every day, according to recent reports. That is more than 6,500 suicides per year. As of last week, 6,414 U.S. service members have died in Iraq and Afghanistan. In other words, suicide kills as many of our troops in one year as our enemies have killed in the past decade. Addressing the challenges of our veterans must be a national priority. After our country was attacked on Sept. 11, 2001, these young men and women stepped forward to serve. They volunteered to put on the uniform knowing the dangers that come with military service. Because of their courage, we have gone nearly 11 years without another successful terrorist attack on our soil. Americans are grateful for their service — but our gratitude is not enough. The Robin Hood Foundation is convening a summit of military and business leaders, mayors, members of Congress, veterans and others on Monday to address veterans’ challenges in finding the work, homes and treatment they need. Every veteran deserves the chance to provide for his or her family. Every veteran deserves access to treatment for the trauma he or she experienced while defending us. And every veteran deserves the chance to live a life of dignity in the country whose freedom he or she helped secure. These young men and women fought for us. Now it’s our turn to fight for them.

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Taking magnetic resonance imaging down to the nano scale

securely, and to advance the technology of computing. “Jake has made fundamental contributions in all three of these areas,” said Lukin, Taylor’s former professor and now a colleague. “He is one of the most creative young scientists I have ever seen. He thinks about problems in unusual ways and comes back with new and novel ideas.” (Curt Suplee/National Institute of Standards and Technology) William Phillips a NIST fellow and a Nobel Prize winner in physics, said Taylor’s ideas are at “the cutting-edge of theoretical physics.” But Phillips said Taylor does more than come up with novel theories. He said Taylor “thinks about reality and the practical application of his complex work,” and is engaged in a wide array of experiments that could have “great technological importance” for electronics and communications systems used by consumers and industry. One of Taylor’s major accomplishments has been the use for the first time of diamond-tipped sensors that can perform magnetic resonance tests on individual cells or on single molecules, a sort of MRI scanner at the microscopic or nano-scale. No one had previously thought diamond crystals could be used for this purpose and in the way devised by Taylor. The physicist now has patents pending on the unique process and is conducting experiments that have shown success in the laboratory. The work raises the possibility that physicians one day will be able to use the technology to detect diseases at a far earlier stage, and that drug companies may be able to devise more effective medications because of the precise information that will flow from the advanced imaging technology. Without Taylor’s “pioneering” contributions, said Lukin, “this field of experimentation would not exist.” Taylor also is experimenting with another magnetic imaging process that works with increased speed and sensitivity, and could allow patients with pacemakers or individuals with shrapnel embedded in their bodies to obtain scans that now might be too risky. Today, the technology poses dangers to individuals who have magnetic metals in certain sensitive locations in their bodies. Another Taylor innovation centers on the development of technology for the next generation of Internet routers that rely on light as opposed to electrons to communicate information. The information carried by the router would be immune to the environmental noise and defects encountered with currently available technology, representing an advance over today’s telecommunication applications by increasing bandwidth and reliability, and by reducing energy usage and

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Taking magnetic resonance imaging down to the nano scale

the microscopic or nano-scale. No one had previously thought diamond crystals could be used for this purpose and in the way devised by Taylor. The physicist now has patents pending on the unique process and is conducting experiments that have shown success in the laboratory. The work raises the possibility that physicians one day will be able to use the technology to detect diseases at a far earlier stage, and that drug companies may be able to devise more effective medications because of the precise information that will flow from the advanced imaging technology. Without Taylor’s “pioneering” contributions, said Lukin, “this field of experimentation would not exist.” Taylor also is experimenting with another magnetic imaging process that works with increased speed and sensitivity, and could allow patients with pacemakers or individuals with shrapnel embedded in their bodies to obtain scans that now might be too risky. Today, the technology poses dangers to individuals who have magnetic metals in certain sensitive locations in their bodies. Another Taylor innovation centers on the development of technology for the next generation of Internet routers that rely on light as opposed to electrons to communicate information. The information carried by the router would be immune to the environmental noise and defects encountered with currently available technology, representing an advance over today’s telecommunication applications by increasing bandwidth and reliability, and by reducing energy usage and costs. A patent is pending on this process and experiments are underway. In addition, Taylor and colleagues are testing new theories that could help make inroads into much faster computing than now possible, an area of great interest in the world of quantum physics. Taylor said that working at NIST provides him with the resources he needs, a stimulating environment and the freedom to take risks, think boldly and work on issues that can have a big impact for technology and the nation. “It is a thrill to do something that no one has dreamed up or done before,” said Taylor. “The long term implications of some of these projects could be huge. It’s what gets me up in the morning—the feeling I can really change the world, at least in small steps.” This article was jointly prepared by the Partnership for Public Service, a group seeking to enhance the performance of the federal government, and washingtonpost.com. Go to http://washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/fedpage/players/ to read about other federal workers who are making a difference.

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U-Md. Symphony Orchestra gets out of its chairs, giving music a visual life

Jennifer Forni, soprano; James Ross, conductor; and Yvette Smith, mezzo-soprano practice during a dress rehearsal for the University of Maryland Symphony Orchestra and the University of Maryland Concert Choir's performance of “Auferstehen.” (Andrew Blais/Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center) We often hear that orchestral music’s problem in the modern world is that it lacks a visual element. And we often see attempts to address this involving video screens, animations or even the computer-generated geometric forms you can play along with your music on iTunes. But what the University of Maryland Symphony Orchestra and choreographer Liz Lerman offered Friday night to open a program titled “Auferstehen” (“revive” or “resurrect”) blew all that out of the water. The piece was Debussy’s “Prelude to the Afternoon of a Faun.” It began when a group of young musicians, barefoot, in street clothes, holding their instruments, walked out onto a stage that was empty but for a couple of harps and a few strategically placed stools for the cellists. They lay down, sleeping, frozen; until the solo flute made her entrance, walking out from the wings and moving through the silent ranks like the Pied Piper, stirring the others awake, drawing them into the music after her. If you saw this on video, you’d assume it was dubbed; orchestra musicians can’t play and move at the same time. Never assume; these Maryland students could. Having memorized the score, they walked around the stage with naturalistic ease, grouping in small constellations or moving en masse, eddying and flowing with the music. Now everyone massed into two antiphonal groups that took turns driving each other back; now the crowd parted to release a solo clarinet who crossed center stage for her few phrases in the sun before melting back into the throng. The other reason you’d think it was dubbed is that the playing was so good: increasingly confident, vividly expressive, and without the kinds of balance problems you might assume would result from letting musicians wander all over the stage. Freed from the black-clad anonymity of the orchestral status quo, allowed to assert their own identities, the musicians took responsibility for one of the most remarkable collaborations I’ve seen. You probably couldn’t do this with a professional orchestra. The Maryland program’s “Music in Mind” series, of which this concert was a part, deliberately explores different ways of approaching the experience of concert music, often with collaborators from

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Feinstein, Rogers say Taliban ‘stronger’ since surge

The leaders of the House and Senate intelligence committees said Sunday they believe that the Taliban has grown stronger since President Obama sent 33,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan in 2010. The pessimistic report by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) challenges Obama’s assessment last week in his visit to Kabul that the “tide had turned” and that “we broke the Taliban’s momentum.” Feinstein and Rogers told CNN’s “State of the Union” that they aren’t so sure. The two recently returned from a fact-finding trip to the region, where they met with Afghan President Hamid Karzai. “President Karzai believes that the Taliban will not come back. I’m not so sure,” Feinstein said. “The Taliban has a shadow system of governors in many provinces.” When asked if the Taliban’s capabilities have been degraded since Obama deployed the additional troops two years ago, Feinstein said: “I think we’d both say that what we’ve found is that the Taliban is stronger.” More than 1,800 U.S. troops have been killed in the decade-long war. About 88,000 service members remain deployed, down from a peak of more than 100,000 last year. More troops are expected to leave by the end of summer, with all combat troops gone by the end of 2014. Persistent violence has threatened to undermine Obama’s effort to show progress in stabilizing Afghanistan at a NATO summit later this month in Chicago. On Sunday, an Afghan soldier killed a NATO soldier before being fatally shot by return fire in southern Afghanistan, the latest in a series of attacks against foreigners blamed on government forces within their own ranks. NATO confirmed that one service member was killed by an attacker wearing an Afghan army uniform in the country’s south and that coalition forces returned fire and killed the gunman. But the alliance provided no details, saying an investigation was underway. Feinstein said she would like to meet with Pakistan’s leaders to discuss the need for more help to break up the Haqqani insurgent network on the Afghan border. Congress has passed various restrictions on U.S. aid to Pakistan after Osama bin Laden was found hiding within its borders. A recent defense policy bill would withhold 60 percent of military aid if the defense secretary can’t show that the money will be effective in fighting the Taliban and ensuring that Pakistan helps with efforts to counter roadside bombings. Rogers said he

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Manassas post office building in limbo

is definitely worth more than what it fetched at auction recently. The stately brick building on Church Street has been home to the Old Town post office since the 1930s, provides easy access to downtown businesses and is a place where friends can run into one another. But the building was part of a mortgage Ponzi scheme when Linda Sadr bought the property in 2006 from the city. Sadr was convicted in June of making false promises to help homeowners having mortgage troubles, and the building was seized as a part of her assets. The post office is housed in the front of the building, but other areas can be utilized for purposes such as office space. Manassas residents Miguel Pires, owner of Carmello’s restaurant, and Chris Salisbury, who owns construction-related businesses, weren’t sure what they would do with the building if they were able to buy it. They placed a winning bid of $385,000, well below the listed price of about $700,000, and thought they had gotten a great deal. But there was one thing Pires and Salisbury didn’t count on: The feds rejected their bid. They offered to go up to $400,000, but that was also deemed too low. Pires said that the building’s interior has fallen into disrepair and needs a lot of work. He said the asking price was too high. “We just want to see something go in that building,” Pires said in an e-mail. “It is disappointing that it will stay empty even longer now.” Lynzey Donahue, a U.S. Marshals Service spokeswoman, said sale proceeds go toward paying back Sadr’s victims. A low sale price “is not doing any favors to the victims,” she said. The property remains listed for $674,900, she said, adding that “the auction was an additional method to try to sell the property.” The deed stipulates that the space for the post office must stay with that agency and that the city has the right to buy the property first. Manassas officials have said that they might do so, if they feel the post office is threatened. Pires and Salisbury say they have no problem with the post office staying put. Authorities have a lot of leeway to negotiate in this situation, Donahue said, and plan to take their time. “They’re not in a huge rush,” she said. “They want to do the best they can for the sale price.”

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Federal Faces: Jacob M. Taylor

Jacob M. Taylor Position: Physicist, National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) Best known for: Government work: Motivation for service: Biggest challenge: NIST physicist Jacob Taylor (Curt Suplee/NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF STANDARDS AND TECHNOLOGY) Quote: “ — From the Partnership for Public Service For a full profile, go to The Fed Page at washingtonpost.com/politics/federal-government.

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Where are the jobs? Ask the patent trolls.

patent assertions. This isn’t based on the strengths of the patents; many of these are among the weakest and least defensible. When the most-litigated patents go to trial, slightly fewer than 11 percent of patent holders win their cases, compared with 47 percent of those that were litigated just once. And most-litigated patents aren’t also filed by the original inventors: nearly 64 percent are by what academics call “non-practicing entities”—in other words, patent trolls. These win an even lower percentage of their cases, coming in at 8 percent. Technology industry heavyweight Brad Feld says that software patents represent a destructive force in the startup world. Companies have to worry about being sued the moment they have achieved first success. Instead of focusing on building their startup, they worry about hiring lawyers. Public corporations are also paying a heavy price. To quantify this, in Sept. 2011, Boston University School of Law professors James Bessen, Michael Meurer, and Jennifer Ford analyzed stock market data and patent lawsuits. They determined between 1990 and 2010, the victims of these lawsuits, which were mostly technology companies, lost half a trillion dollars in wealth, forcing companies to divert substantial resources from production to litigation support. They found that software patents, including those on “business methods and financial processes,” were the most litigated because they have “fuzzy boundaries.” They are written in vague language and their scope is not clear. So technology companies can’t easily find them or understand what they claim. This gives the trolls an opportunity to extort money. Clearly, the laws need revision. Feld says that software patents should be completely abolished—that in the modern era of computing, the best defense is speed to market, execution, and continuous innovation. But Lemley says that things aren’t so clear cut. It’s true that most of the problems in the patent system can be traced to software patents, he says. But, in a world where electronics are integrated into most everything, it’s not clear we can simply eliminate them, in part because it’s hard to know what a “software patent” actually is. A better approach is to stop patentees from broadly claiming to own any program that performs a particular task, rather than patenting the actual program they developed. Lemley explains that patent law was meant to promote innovation by giving inventors the exclusive right to their inventions. But lawyers, he says, have been broadening the claims

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China expels al-Jazeera reporter as media relations sour

Higgins, a Chinese speaker and former student at Shandong University, who was nominated in 2009 to become Beijing bureau chief. Last fall, three Republican congressmen, complaining about constraints on U.S. media expansion in China, introduced the Chinese Media Reciprocity Act, which would limit the number of visas the State Department is permitted to issue to journalists working for Chinese state media. The bill is currently with the House Judiciary Committee’s subcommittee on immigration policy and enforcement. There has been a sharp rise in the number of Chinese journalists, nearly all employees of state media, working in the United States at a time when Beijing has been delaying or rejecting applications by journalists for U.S. media wishing to work in China. The Voice of America, which gets government funding and falls under the supervision of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, a bipartisan panel, has been waiting for more than three years to expand its Beijing bureau from two to four reporters. “There is a very alarming disparity between the number of Chinese state media workers whom we grant visas to and the number of visas the Chinese grant to their American counterparts,” Rep. Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.), one of the sponsors of the proposed legislation, said when the bill was introduced. Rohrabacher said that during the 2010 fiscal year, about 650 Chinese citizens working for party-controlled news organizations entered the United States on journalism visas, while only two American journalists working under the Broadcasting Board of Governors had received permission to work in China. Tara Setmayer, a spokeswoman for the congressman, said Tuesday that reciprocity has not improved since then. Also Tuesday, the Associated Press quoted Chen, the rights activist, as saying that the Chinese government had quietly promised him that it will investigate abuses he says he and his family suffered at the hands of local authorities. Chen told the AP on Monday that an official has visited him in his Beijing hospital four times, including to take a statement last Thursday. “After he took my statement, he said they would launch an investigation as long as there are facts, and that if there are facts about the illegal actions, then the issue definitely would be openly addressed,” Chen said. Correspondent Andrew Higgins in Hong Kong and staff writer William Wan in Washington contributed to this report. More world news coverage: - Syrians vote in parliamentary elections - Clinton asks India

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Senate panel investigates drug companies’ ties to pain groups

As the Senate Finance Committee launched an investigation Tuesday into the relationship between makers of narcotic painkillers and the groups that champion them, a leading advocacy organization said it was dissolving “due to irreparable economic circumstances.” The American Pain Foundation, which described itself as the nation’s largest organization focused on patients’ pain, was the subject of a December investigation by ProPublica in The Washington Post that detailed its close ties to drugmakers. The group received 90 percent of its $5 million in funding in 2010 from the drug and medical-device industry, ProPublica found, and its guides for patients, journalists and policymakers had played down the risks associated with opioid painkillers while exaggerating the benefits from the drugs. It is unclear whether the group’s announcement Tuesday evening — that it would “cease to exist, effective immediately” — was related to letters senators Max Baucus (D-Mont.), the finance panel chairman, and Charles Grassley (R-Iowa) sent earlier in the day to the foundation, drug companies and others. In the letters, the senators cited an “an epidemic of accidental deaths and addiction resulting from the increased sale and use of powerful narcotic painkillers.” That class of drugs includes popular brand names like Oxycontin, Vicodin and Opana. Growing evidence, they wrote, suggests that drug companies “may be responsible, at least in part, for this epidemic by promoting misleading information about the drugs’ safety and effectiveness.” The American Pain Foundation’s Web site carried a statement Tuesday night saying its board voted May 3 to dissolve the group because it couldn’t stay “operational.” The foundation did not respond to requests for comment Tuesday. The senators are targeting a who’s who of the pain industry, seeking extensive records and correspondence documenting the links, financial and otherwise, between them and the makers of the top-prescribed painkillers. The senators’ letters also cite reporting by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and MedPage Today that found the companies’ close ties extended to physician societies and academic research groups. The letters went to three pharmaceutical companies — Purdue Pharma, Endo Pharmaceuticals and Johnson & Johnson — as well as to five groups that support pain patients, doctors or research: the American Pain Foundation, the American Academy of Pain Medicine, the American Pain Society, the Wisconsin Pain and Policy Studies Group, and the Center for Practical Bioethics. The Federation of State Medical Boards, the trade group for agencies that license doctors, received a letter, as

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Japan to provide $12.6 billion to Tepco, operator of tsunami-ravaged nuclear plant

An employee stands in front of Tokyo Electric Power Co.'s Kawasaki Thermal Power Plant in Kawasaki City. Bailout gives government control of the massive utility company as it continues recovery from tsunami disaster. (Tomohiro Ohsumi/Bloomberg News) TOKYO — The move, which had been widely expected, will prevent the Tokyo Electric Power Co., known as Tepco, from collapsing. With the newly authorized public funds, the company can decommission the stricken reactors at the plant on Japan’s northeastern coast, pay compensation to the tens of thousands of people who fled as radiation spread and provide electricity to its 45 million customers. The bailout also gives the government a majority share of the former monopoly, a change that will formally take place after Tepco’s annual shareholders meeting next month, according to the Kyodo news agency. Tepco will be forced to follow a restructuring plan that includes electricity rate increases, management changes and $41.4 billion in cost-cutting measures over the next decade. “Without the state funds, [Tepco] cannot provide a stable supply of electricity and pay for compensation and decommissioning costs,” said Industry Minister Yukio Edano, who approved the takeover plan. Tepco fell into financial crisis last year after a triple meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi plant, where primary and backup cooling systems were knocked out by the 9.0-magnitude earthquake and ensuing tsunami of March 11, 2011. The company, much-criticized for its safety oversights at the plant, will need decades to decommission the now-stabilized reactors, as well as trillions of yen for cleanup. The government, policy experts say, could use its control of Tepco to spearhead changes in Japan’s traditional system of electricity distribution, long dominated by regional monopolies whose charges are among the world’s highest. The government could open the electricity grid to competitors, a step Edano has advocated. The industry minister had also threatened to allow Tepco to fail if it did not agree to a management overhaul. Tepco has selected a new government-approved chairman, Kazuhiko Shimokobe, a bankruptcy lawyer and corporate restructuring specialist. Shimokobe recently oversaw the Nuclear Damage Liability Facilitation Fund, a public body created to help Tepco pay compensation to nuclear evacuees. Tepco remains the sole provider of electricity for a large swath of eastern Japan, including Tokyo. The utility, according to its government-submitted recovery plan, wants to restart seven idled reactors at its Kashiwazaki Kariwa nuclear plant, on Japan’s western coast. In the aftermath of the March 11

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D.C. wellness calendar, May 10-17

HIV testing Art therapy for seniors Affordable Care Act and Health Benefit Exchange update “Aging in the Community” Tracking disease through DNA research BodyWise Dance program Whitman-Walker programs open house “Hand, Wrist or Elbow Pain?” Legal planning for Alzheimer’s Red Cross needs volunteers — Compiled by Gerri Marmer Submit an item

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Chinese activist Chen Guangcheng, confined to hospital, awaits word on his fate

BEIJING — In a brief telephone interview Wednesday, Chen also said that he is still waiting for the Chinese government to keep a promise that he said it made to him to investigate and prosecute the local officials who had held him unlawfully in his farmhouse in Dongshigu village, in the eastern province of Shandong. Chen said he expects to be allowed to leave the country for a time to study in the United States, according to the tentative deal reached by Chinese officials and U.S. diplomats during a visit here last week by Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. Chen said that the passports he and his wife hold have expired and that he has not been told whether they can be renewed. He said no Chinese officials have come to discuss the matter with him. “Changing a passport should be easier than applying for a new one,” Chen said. The activist also said that he has not seen any U.S. Embassy staff members since Friday. “I can’t say I’m not worried,” he said, but added: “I’m just letting nature take its course on whether I can go abroad. As long as things don’t move too slowly.” Chen left the U.S. Embassy, where he took refuge after a dramatic April 22 flight from Shandong, a week ago. Since then, he has been confined to Beijing’s Chaoyang hospital, where he is being treated for broken bones in his foot, an injury he suffered while escaping. Police and plainclothes guards have blocked U.S. diplomats, friends, supporters and journalists from entering the hospital to see him, and his wife, Yuan Weijing, and their children have mostly been barred from leaving his room. On Wednesday, Chen reported some small signs of progress. He said that since Monday, his children have been allowed to play in the hospital’s outdoor courtyard for half an hour each morning and afternoon. He said his wife “still has trouble going out, but she has made it,” noting that she has periodically been allowed outside to meet with U.S. diplomats. He has been permitted only one brief visit with the diplomats Friday, despite Chinese officials’ earlier assurances of regular access to him. U.S. diplomats have been able to speak with Chen by phone. Journalists have been warned that they risk expulsion from China if they try to enter the hospital to see Chen. Hospital authorities said Chen is under