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(Cornelia Li for The Washington Post)
Funds were raised. Donors and doctors were energized. Then things began to fall apart.
By Alicia Mundy
Rachel Sullivan chose a black Marchesa gown for the big night. Tall, with long brown hair and a can-do energy that inspires friends across the philanthropy world, the Washington native and mother of three had organized her latest Hope & Progress Gala to fund an effort especially dear to her heart. Since Sullivan founded it in 2001, the annual formal dinner-dance had helped raise money for Sibley Memorial Hospital, where two decades earlier she had survived a life-changing health crisis. But on this March night in 2018, the $500 tickets — as well as the $50,000 “Innovation” and $25,000 “Pioneer” sponsorships — were exclusively funding a passion project eight years in the making: a new Women’s Health Center at Sibley.
According to the Johns Hopkins-Sibley magazine, the center — which was intended to provide integrated and comprehensive care for the region’s women — would have an official groundbreaking that summer. But there were already tours available for donors to canvass the space on the fourth floor of one of Sibley’s buildings, where a large glass sign that said “Johns Hopkins Women’s Health Center” had been placed outside an office suite undergoing renovation.
Sullivan, then 53, had invited leading female executives and A-list donors from the area — such as Washington doyenne Sandy Bobb and former Xerox executive Debbie Warren — to rally around a cause that seemed perfectly suited to the moment. Women needed the support of other women; the #MeToo movement had recently underscored this point. In this spirit, Rachel, who along with husband Tom had already donated nearly $1 million to Sibley over the years, saw the Women’s Center as something that would “make a difference and would endure.”
The evening turned out perfectly. The 570 tickets had sold out early, and a number of D.C. power players chipped in. The Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium, across the street from the National Museum of American History on Constitution Avenue, was packed with tables full of Washington players and reliable local philanthropists. In the high-ceilinged ballroom, a surfeit of candles flickered on each table and floral arrangements towered above seated guests.
The formal part of the event began with remarks from a female emcee who described 2018 as “The Year of the Woman.” Sibley President and CEO Chip Davis exuded excitement when he took the mic. “We are announcing an extraordinary initiative for 2018, so extraordinary that tonight will probably be remembered in Sibley history as the birth of a great and lasting legacy — the establishment of the Johns Hopkins Women’s Center at Sibley Memorial Hospital,” he said, adding that the center “will open this summer in a phased approach.” Davis then introduced a special guest, Kevin Sowers, the newly appointed president of the Johns Hopkins Health System, which had acquired Sibley in 2010. Some Hopkins board members were also on hand.
Sullivan narrated a slide show on the Women’s Center. (“Imagine having a key that opens the door to all of your health needs. How empowering it would be.”) Then she and the incoming medical director of the center, Colette Magnant, a nationally renowned breast cancer surgeon, were supposed to kick off a live auction. But they’d learned that the gala had already raised some $900,000, so instead of opening the auction, they jointly announced, “Let’s skip the fundraising part tonight and just celebrate what all of you have done!” They signaled the band to begin playing, and Sullivan took the dance floor with Tom. “We were practically giddy,” she remembers.
Yet four years later, all that would exist of Sullivan’s effort was the wall-sized glass sign, still hanging as of August in front of some of Sibley’s gynecology offices. Sullivan now looks back at that March 2018 night not as a triumph, but as the moment after which Johns Hopkins betrayed her and her fellow donors’ trust, an allegation that Hopkins vehemently denies.
Hopkins would not grant interviews with the hospital executives named in this story, but it did respond to my questions with written statements. I called or emailed 39 of the top 65 donors to the Women’s Center. Of those, nine went on the record and shared their exasperation, and more than 20 others expressed similar frustration with Hopkins but declined to allow their names to be used. (Disclosure: In addition to being a longtime journalist, I sometimes write for corporations in the fields of health insurance, life insurance and real estate, contributing to opinion pieces authored by leaders of these firms. I also served as chief investigator for the Senate Budget Committee in 2017, working for the Democratic side, which was then in the minority. None of this work has in any way concerned Johns Hopkins Medicine or Sibley.)
As in many of the recent high-profile feuds between donors and nonprofits, at the core of this dispute is the question of what institutions owe donors who have given money for a specific project. The battle over the Women’s Center is also a distinctly Washington story: less about the money (just over a million dollars) than about who should be deciding what’s best for women at Sibley, the city’s most elite and highly rated hospital.
The cause of women’s health is deeply personal to Rachel Sullivan. In 1999, she was nine weeks pregnant with a fourth child when she learned during a routine medical checkup that she had breast cancer. Sullivan, who had grown up in Rockville, was a former stockbroker. “I’m tough,” she told me. “But I was scared. Really scared. I was 35 years old with three small children. I couldn’t talk.”
Sullivan and her husband, a lawyer turned businessman who’d made a fortune in the telecom merger rush of the late 1990s, set out to find a good oncologist fast. That’s when she recalled that on her child’s third-grade class trip, she’d met a fellow parent whose wife, Colette Magnant, was a noted breast surgeon with Sibley Memorial Hospital.
In Washington, the wealthy and powerful often end up at Sibley, located in the far western corner of Northwest D.C. Retail tycoon Herbert Haft died there in 2004 at the age of 84, just two weeks after a wedding ceremony in the hospital with his longtime fiancee. During the early 2000s, unknown to most of Washington, Prince Bandar bin Sultan of Saudi Arabia — a celebrity-diplomat — had a home on Sibley’s seventh floor, according to multiple former high-ranking employees and a former board member. His quarters (referred to by the hospital staff as the “Bandar wing”) were luxuriously decorated and included a gold-plated bidet. Cabinet members or their families from several administrations have landed there for rehab, secure in Sibley’s reputation for discretion.
However, Sibley did not start out as a celebrity care center. In the 1890s, it was a place to train nurses for the women’s Home Missionary Society of the Methodist Episcopal Church. Their mission was to serve the poor. Over the next century, it evolved into a boutique hospital with a reputation for having a true community vibe, caring nurses and top doctors — including Colette Magnant.
When the Sullivans contacted Magnant in 1999, she told them to be in her office the next morning at 7. “She didn’t know me,” says Rachel Sullivan, “but she immediately took over. She had a whole plan and she laid it out for us. It was calming, like she was holding my hand.”
The treatment was grueling. Sullivan had a partial mastectomy, eight sessions of chemotherapy, then a full mastectomy and hysterectomy. She was in remission in a year, but there was no fourth child. Out of this painful chapter, Sullivan and Magnant became close friends. “Rachel is down-to-earth, funny and she volunteers for everything,” Magnant told me.
About a year later, Magnant mentioned to Sullivan that she wished Sibley could afford one of the newer high-tech 3D mammogram machines. Sullivan had raised money before for her children’s schools. “This was my pay-it-forward moment,” she says. “I told Colette, ‘I owe you so much; let me help.’ ” That “help” culminated in a $1 million event at FedEx Field, the first of Sibley’s Hope & Progress Galas. It led to the state-of-the-art Sullivan Breast Center. Over the following years, the Hope & Progress Galas begun by Sullivan raised some $20 million; the Sullivans have hosted at least three of them. “If Rachel could save the world, she would do it,” says former Sibley CEO Bob Sloan. “When she develops an interest in a cause, she gives of herself as well as her resources.”
In 2010, Magnant and Sullivan were out walking together when Magnant floated an idea for a women’s health center. She explained to Sullivan that she was seeing “too much medicine in silos,” especially for women with complex health issues. For example, pregnant women with cancer have many conditions, some conflicting. She wanted to create a center where affiliated doctors coordinated treatment.
Magnant told me that her vision was very much a local one, especially when it came to serving the larger D.C. community. “I wanted a program that would also have outreach to underserved women in places like Anacostia,” she says. Sullivan felt that the local service angle would appeal to donors such as herself, who both gave to Sibley and used it as their community hospital.
That same year, Sibley was being courted for acquisition by several health-care systems, including Johns Hopkins. While Sibley had long catered to Washington’s upper class, Hopkins’s patients include many of Baltimore’s indigent and uninsured. According to a former Sibley executive, Sibley had the cash Hopkins wanted, about three-quarters of a billion dollars in its reserves, foundation and endowments. Former Sibley employees told me that Sibley wanted the connection to a major player in medicine, because the economies of scale could help contain the rising costs of hospital insurance. Sibley, former employees also said, wanted an institution with a strong cancer program and a relationship with the National Institutes of Health. The deal was sealed that year. Like a marriage match in “Bridgerton,” Sibley got to carry Hopkins’s name, and Hopkins got its treasure. (“Our goal,” a Johns Hopkins Medicine spokesperson wrote to me, “was to unite two committed mission-minded organizations that shared a vision of providing both the highest-quality care and the greatest access for our patients.”)
Around 2016, Sullivan began rounding up friends and likely supporters for the Women’s Center. Just as Sullivan had expected, Magnant’s vision for a local focus became a strong attraction. “This was to be a Sibley-based center, a community project — that’s what was exciting and why donors were giving their money,” says Carin Sigel, a donor and health-care lawyer who has represented hospital systems and was on the center’s advisory council.
The numbers grew quickly. Cheryl New, one of D.C.’s leading divorce lawyers, joined as co-chair of the advisory council. Philanthropists such as attorney Elizabeth Downes, who was executive director of the Association of Independent Schools of Greater Washington and worked pro bono for the Children’s Law Center, became council members. A gift from Geico of $55,000 was accompanied by a personal donation of $20,000 from a senior vice president. “She is a grateful patient of Dr. Magnant and thinks the idea of the Women’s Center is something Geico should be a part of,” wrote the head of the Sibley Memorial Hospital Foundation in an email explaining the gift.
The council wanted Magnant, who headed Sibley’s breast cancer program, to be the center’s medical director, and Sumera Haque, a doctor who was working at the hospital as operations administrator for the breast surgery program, to be the director. A women’s rights proponent who had fled Pakistan to escape domestic violence and had been painted by no less than George W. Bush as part of his immigrant portrait series, Haque was excited about the job. In September 2018, she became administrative director of the Women’s Center.
In 2018 and 2019, Haque and Magnant flew to Pakistan on behalf of Johns Hopkins Medicine International to meet Shahid Hussain, a wealthy business owner who had an eponymous foundation and was chair of another large charity, the Business Hospital Trust, both of which contributed to Lahore’s Shalamar Hospital. Hussain was interested in expanding women’s health care in his country and setting up a women’s health center at Shalamar. “When I got to hear about the Women’s Center at Sibley Memorial, I thought this was something we should be doing,” Hussain told me by phone, adding, “I visited [Sibley] twice. … I wanted Shalamar’s own center to follow theirs.”
In January 2019, an official of Johns Hopkins Medicine International and interim Sibley CEO and physician Hasan Zia presented to Shalamar Medical & Dental College a proposed memorandum of understanding worth $500,000, calling for “on-site Observerships” at Sibley “and potentially other JHM locations” for Shalamar personnel. These would take place under the “Expert Team” of Magnant and Haque, who are identified as medical director and executive director, respectively, of the Women’s Center. The MOU also noted that Sibley “has recently opened the Johns Hopkins Women’s Health Center on its campus.”
According to the Hopkins spokesperson, that’s not quite right. “At the time when that agreement was drafted, the creation of a Women’s Health Center at Sibley was still underway,” the spokesperson wrote when asked whether the center was actually open. “Implementation planning [for the center] included two phases, and critical milestones for phase one had been met.”
In fact, despite the $900,000 raised at the gala, the donors and Hopkins were a long way from assembling the resources that would have been needed to sustain the center — an amount that everyone agrees would have been about $25 million. During an October 2019 breakfast meeting at Sibley for potential high-end donors to continue working toward raising the $25 million, some of the attendees — according to Sullivan and another member of the advisory council who was present — began tossing questions at Zia as he stood at a lectern. Though limited steps had been taken to get the center started — a receptionist had been answering the phone and giving out information — the donors had hoped for more progress by this point. “Rachel quickly nipped all those questions in the bud,” recalls one of the attendees. Sullivan says she did not want that specific meeting to end in a public airing of concerns about the center’s status. (“The agenda for that meeting clearly shows the concept for a women’s health center was moving ahead at that point and a lineup of speakers including Dr. Magnant gave an overview of plans for the project,” the Hopkins spokesperson wrote to me.)
But privately, Sullivan had her own doubts. In January 2020, she wrote to Sibley’s top leaders: “I’m often asked what has happened with the WC by those who attended the GALA a few years back. Just want to know how to respond thoughtfully and appropriately? Thank you please advise …!”
Sibley Foundation manager Carol Shannon wrote back that day: “In response to your question about how to respond to your friends who ask about the Women’s Center — I would share, ‘We continue to be a work in progress — great news is the construction is almost complete.’ ” But Sullivan was tired of walking past empty offices and the renovated waiting room on the fourth floor of Sibley — “tired of seeing that sign. It was laughable,” she says.
Then, the covid-19 pandemic erupted. And in June 2020, Zia sent a “Dear Colleagues” note that to Sullivan read more like a “Dear Jane” one. “As we navigate through this period, we are using this time as an opportunity to assess all of our clinical service lines. … The Women’s Health Center is one of the clinical areas for exploration. Subsequently, we have made the decision to pause further development of the center to allow Sibley the opportunity to better integrate our efforts with the health system and become part of a comprehensive plan for Women’s Health in the National Capital Region.”
The Hopkins spokesperson wrote to me that the decision to suspend development of the Women’s Center was simply a reprioritization: “As the pandemic progressed and we learned to navigate new realities, we realized that some of our projects — like large investments in a Sibley-specific experience or dramatic changes to a bricks and mortar space — were not actually the best way to meet patient and community needs.”
Sumera Haque was devastated. Starting in 2016, she says, she had put hundreds of hours of her own time into working on plans for the center’s operations. “They told me that since covid had postponed the Women’s Center, they did not need me,” she says. She left the hospital in June 2020.
On Nov. 23, 2020, Zia sent a letter that reached some executives, at least one VIP donor and, through the network, Sullivan. “Thank you for supporting Women’s health care at Sibley Hospital,” he wrote, noting that Sibley was hiring new doctors for breast, gynecologic and urologic cancer. “Additionally, I wanted to share with you that Dr. Colette Magnant is leaving the Sullivan Breast Center.”
Magnant — who, according to the former Sibley executive, was one of the hospital’s highest paid doctors — says she left over a contract dispute. Asked about this, the Hopkins spokesperson wrote to me: “It is against our policy to discuss employment details,” adding that if Magnant gave Hopkins permission to “disclose the details of her departure and her compensation package, then we can provide additional context.” Asked to respond, Magnant scoffed: “No.” Instead, she shared the 2020 contract she rejected, showing that it would cut her salary significantly and included a noncompete clause. “Would you sign this?” she asked.
For Sullivan and her allies, Magnant’s departure was a painful loss. Magnant “was Sibley breast care,” says donor Amy Lancellotta, director of a large mutual fund complex, “and she was the heart and soul of the Women’s Health Center project.”
In the wake of this news, Sullivan sent a sharply worded email to the head of Johns Hopkins Medicine and dean of its medical school, physician Paul Rothman. It was also addressed to Kevin Sowers, the health system president whom Sullivan and many donors had met the night of the 2018 gala. She wrote that the letter from Zia “has only served to deepen my concerns and those of others regarding the status of the Women’s Center. For those of us involved in the front lines of this endeavor, our integrity and reputation are now, unfairly, on the line.” She added, “We deserve a full accounting of where this project stands and where the funds reside.”
In early 2021, Rothman reached out and set up a video meeting with Sullivan and Hopkins’s capital region president. According to Sullivan’s notes from their half-hour conversation, Rothman told her that much of the original Women’s Center money had been spent. The Hopkins spokesperson wrote to me: “Half of the funds raised to date for the Women’s Center were spent before the June 2020 pause, primarily on personnel and related administrative support that was identified as necessary for the phase one development of the Center.” By the end of 2020, donations had totaled about $1.07 million. Just over $400,000 was spent on salaries — including a small percentage of Magnant’s salary and Haque’s full salary — while “[t]hree donations, totaling $162,000, were redesignated to other initiatives per our conversations with the three donors and the donors’ requests.”
Johns Hopkins is no stranger to fights with donors over the use of their contributions. In 2011, Hopkins was sued by members of the family that had owned Belward Farm in Montgomery County, Md. The family had sold the valuable property to Hopkins at a below-market price, rather than selling it much more profitably to large commercial developers, with the expectation that Hopkins would use it for a small, rural research center. Instead, Hopkins decided to build a large tech center. Family members ultimately lost their case because, a court said, their wishes were not made more specific in their written bequest.
Sullivan and other donors feel that, from the beginning, they made it amply clear that their contributions were “restricted funds,” meaning exclusively for the Women’s Center as they had envisioned it. They note that the cover of the brochure for the 2018 Hope & Progress Gala explicitly says, “Supporting the launch of the Johns Hopkins Women’s Center at Sibley.” In addition to donations, such as the ones from Geico and its vice president, that were marked specifically for the Women’s Center, Sullivan points to her 2020 email exchange with foundation manager Carol Shannon in which she asked if the center had “its own foundation fund.”
“The Women’s Center does not have its own foundation,” Shannon responded, “but does have a cost center like many departments at Sibley. The cost center is where restricted donations to the Women Center are directed.” Indeed, a Hopkins spokesperson confirmed to me that this is restricted money: “Donations made to the Sibley Women’s Health Center are, and have always been, in a restricted fund and have not been used for anything other than to support the initial steps in establishing a Women’s Health Center at Sibley.”
This concept is important to Sullivan and her allies because one of the best practices on restricted donations is that institutions must use the money as donors intended or give them the choice of reclaiming or redirecting it. Told that Hopkins sent letters to doctors and the advisory council saying the center was postponed, Doug White, a former director of the Fundraising Management Program at Columbia University who has written five books on charity scandals, says this step did not follow restricted-funds protocol. “Johns Hopkins has the right to postpone [the Women’s Center] or kill it,” says White, who consults on some of the country’s major philanthropy lawsuits as an ethics expert. “But, and this is important, even if the center’s on hold, if it is going to be different from what the donors planned and intended, Johns Hopkins should contact every donor, offering to either refund their money or redirect where their gift should go.”
Of the 36 donors I contacted in March, only two, Sandy Bobb and Elizabeth Downes, reported that Hopkins had given them the opportunity to re-designate their funds or get a refund. Most told me they had not been contacted.
“For 35 years,” says Dr. Colette Magnant, “I’ve been listening to women patients tell me what they need, and the answer was a center, a place for them in their community.”
“No one from Hopkins has contacted me, and I would like my money back,” Carin Sigel, who donated $5,000, told me in March. Early that month, Sigel says, a Sibley Foundation fundraiser called to ask if she would donate $5,000, as she did often, to the hospital. “I told her no, given that there is no Women’s Center.”
Lisa Friedlander, a lawyer and “angel investor” in Washington, told me in March that Sibley hadn’t contacted her. She, her husband and two friends attended the gala because they’d embraced the concept of the Women’s Center. “I’m not looking to get my money back,” she says. “What I was looking for was the center — in our community hospital. That’s what we gave for.”
Asked to comment on donors’ complaints that they hadn’t been contacted or given an opportunity to redirect their contributions, the Hopkins spokesperson responded: “While in hindsight, there could have been more communication with all donors about the status of the Sibley Women’s Health Center, we have communicated at length — and in the middle of a pandemic — with members of the Sibley Women’s Health Center Advisory Council to share status updates regarding the Women’s Health Center at Sibley and a path forward that would best meet the needs of our patients and community.”
On April 4, a couple of weeks after Hopkins’s response to me, Sibley Foundation manager Kristen Pruski sent out a lengthy email to all donors, titled “Women’s Health updates at Sibley & upcoming webinar.” Pruski thanked them for their commitment to the Women’s Center and gave them information about the many things Hopkins is doing for women. Near the bottom, the email says, “We look forward to answering any questions you may have and are happy to have a phone call to discuss the future of women’s healthcare at Sibley or your contribution more specifically.” (“NOT AN INVITATION TO GET MY CONTRIBUTION BACK!!” thundered Sigel in a recent email to me. Said the Hopkins spokesperson: “It is worth noting that no donors chose to re-designate their donation or seek a refund after this email.”)
The spokesperson for Hopkins noted to me that, in addition to the three redirected donations, “[o]ne donation was returned in 2020.” The spokesperson also pointed out that Hopkins has continued to expand services for local women through new clinical providers of urogynecology and gynecology at Sibley, as well as through the Maternal Health Access Program, “which works to address disparities in maternal and neonatal morbidity in D.C.”
Champions of the center, however, contend that by turning away from its original concept of a bricks-and-mortar site Hopkins is not serving the needs of Sibley’s female patients. “For 35 years I’ve been listening to women patients tell me what they need, and the answer was a center, a place for them in their community,” says Magnant. “They could come to talk with doctors who would coordinate their care and meet other specialists who would collaborate with their team. They’d see other women with similarly complex conditions.” Hopkins, Magnant adds, “didn’t care about the Women’s Center. They have bigger plans.”
On a Sunday morning in February, Sullivan sits in her living room in Potomac, Md. — where sunlight floods through a 20-foot-tall Palladian window — and rifles through a black braided leather bag. It’s much bigger than a tote: nearly 24 inches wide and 20 inches tall and so stuffed with documents and folders that Sullivan has trouble putting papers back into it. This is her “Sibley” bag, crammed with printouts of more than 1,000 emails from 2016 to the end of 2021, room layouts and architect drawings, speeches, talking points, financial statements, and the plans for raising the remainder of the $25 million.
Sullivan is dressed in what she calls her regular clothes — sweatshirt, leggings and Bombas sneaker socks — a far cry from the ballgown and heels she wore in 2018 to celebrate what she thought would be the beautiful future of the Women’s Center. She’s astonished by what she sees as the hospital system’s disrespect toward the local donor community and patronizing attitude of “we know best.” “I don’t want my money back,” says Sullivan, whose contributions totaled about $150,000. “I just want them held accountable.” Her voice getting stronger, she adds, “This was a women’s health-care project … and it was slapped down.”
Meanwhile, Johns Hopkins is growing in D.C. — and around the globe. As Washington Business Journal wrote early this year, the hospital system is “kicking off 2022 with aggressive plans to plant more roots in Greater Washington.” In March 2021, Hopkins filed zoning permits for a new medical office and surgery center on the Belward Farm land; in February, Hopkins opened a clinic in McLean, its first foray into Northern Virginia, and it has plans for a larger site in Arlington.
But the project that makes Sullivan and Magnant shake their heads has nothing to do with the D.C. area. In April 2021, Hopkins International signed what the Hopkins spokesperson described to me as “an updated agreement” with Shalamar Hospital in Pakistan and Shahid Hussain, on behalf of the Business Hospital Trust. In exchange for the $500,000 fee, Hopkins, this version of the agreement said, would provide “Observerships” in the United States for Shalamar personnel and “consultative services” including “supporting workshops and implementation support with the long-term goal of developing a comprehensive Women’s Health Center at Shalamar.” The updated agreement doesn’t mention the Women’s Center at Sibley. The Hopkins spokesperson wrote to me that the old MOU from 2019 was now “outdated.”
“Hopkins is benefiting from the contacts ... Sumera and I met with in Lahore discussing Sibley’s Women’s Center,” says Magnant. She adds that “in the bigger picture, I am gratified that the women of Pakistan are going to get this important and innovative health-care project.” But good news in Pakistan does not resolve questions about what took place — and what could have been — in D.C. “What about at Sibley? What about us?” Sullivan says, looking at the photos of the smiling faces of Hopkins folks on Shalamar’s website. She sighs and says, “Do you think Hopkins will send them our glass sign, too?”
Alicia Mundy is a reporter in Washington and author of two books on major health-care controversies, including “Dispensing With the Truth,” about the fen-phen diet drug disaster.
How a 23-Year-Old Phenom Named Kingfish Became the Future of the Blues
Sarah Palin Has Long Been Ridiculed. I Wanted to Tell a Different Story. | 2022-09-07T14:45:48Z | www.washingtonpost.com | The battle over the women’s center at D.C.’s Sibley hospital - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2022/09/07/womens-center-sibley-hospital/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2022/09/07/womens-center-sibley-hospital/ |
Over the past two weeks, a pair of dangerous maritime events unfolded in the still-steamy, late-summer waters of the Arabian Gulf. Iran twice intercepted and captured American unmanned sea drones, held them until challenged by the US Navy, and ultimately returned them, albeit grudgingly.
What is driving the Iranian desire to capture these high-tech vessels? And, alongside the successes of drones supplied to Ukraine by the US and its allies, what does it tell us about the future of warfare?
Going back two decades to my time as a strike group commander centered on the aircraft carrier Enterprise, I’ve been a strong advocate for this type of innovation. We were given several experimental vessels developed by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and used them for surveillance of the northern Gulf to stop shipments of weapons, drugs and terrorists.
One big advantage is that lacking a crew, these sea drones don’t need to come to port for rest and recuperation, and there are no embarked personnel who could be injured or killed by an opponent. The 23-foot Saildrone Explorers briefly taken by Iran are solar- and wind-powered and thus don’t need refueling. (Disclosure: I have been an adviser to Saildrone Inc.)
The Navy has created Task Force 59 to bring unmanned capability to the Navy’s Fifth Fleet, which oversees the Gulf and the waters of the Red and northern Arabian Seas. It is led by Commodore Michael Brasseur, an extraordinary innovator who was part of my team at the Navy’s think tank, Deep Blue, after the Sept. 11 attack on the Pentagon.
Second, America’s rivals are going to want to capture its drones, not simply destroy them, in hopes of reverse-engineering the technology. The US military will have to thwart or react quickly to such captures. Still, some will fall into enemy hands: Placing strong defensive systems on these platforms isn’t currently feasible at a cost that makes sense. An alternative would be self-destructive capability — either explosive or software-based — that can be activated when a signal connection is lost.
Third, the Pentagon needs to recognize the importance of overarching connectivity. The linkages between sea drones, overhead unmanned vehicles, space systems in low-earth orbit, and teams of special forces such as Navy SEALS are crucial.
The Fifth Fleet recognizes that the Iranians will continue to try and capture experimental drones. It must be given resources and aggressive rules of engagement needed to protect these valuable unmanned systems while they push the envelope of experimentation. Drone piracy is here to stay.
• The World Must Avert a Nuclear Disaster in Ukraine: The Editors
• China, Russia and Iran Are Slowly Ganging Up on the US: Hal Brands | 2022-09-07T15:16:25Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Iran’s Drone Piracy Shows How Naval Warfare Is Changing - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/energy/irans-drone-piracy-shows-how-naval-warfare-is-changing/2022/09/07/31fa83ae-2eb6-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/energy/irans-drone-piracy-shows-how-naval-warfare-is-changing/2022/09/07/31fa83ae-2eb6-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
Amazon’s decision to impose a three-day delay before posting customer reviews of shows has the internet all abuzz. Variety (which broke the story) describes the policy as “a new weapon in the battle against internet trolls.” The idea is to take the extra time to sort through the posts before deciding which ones are legitimate.
Before we get to the trolls, let’s consider the cynics, who wonder whether the change, apparently in place since mid-August, is designed to protect the site’s projected $1 billion investment in its “Lord of the Rings” prequel.
OK, companies want to profit. But I’m skeptical of the claim that the money spent on “The Rings of Power” is driving this decision.(1) Amazon has long used machine learning tools to tweak average ratings on its site, downgrading posts by those thought to be trolls, and elevating others — especially those who have actually purchased the relevant product. Somehow, the republic has survived. So when Amazon says it’s undertaken a troll hunt in order to improve the accuracy of ratings of shows, I’m inclined to take the company at its word.
But is the policy really necessary? And will it help? The answers depend in part on a third question: Why do trolls troll?
Let’s start with online reviews. In theory, their function is to resolve an information asymmetry. In general, sellers have more information than buyers, a challenge that makes buyers wary. Common solutions include branding (if you visit McDonald’s, you know what to expect) and warranties (if you’re unhappy, return the product for your money back). Another is examination of the product in the store, which is impossible online.
Thus the importance of reviews. In online ratings, everyone can play. In a perfect world, those star ratings and user comments would help resolve the asymmetry by giving potential buyers the perspectives and opinions of actual buyers. Alas, the world isn’t perfect, and neither are online reviews.
Challenges are everywhere. The most obvious is bias. The data show that buyers who fall at the extremes are more likely to post. Users who hate the product will post a low rating. Users who like the product post at the high end. Users at the high end tend to be more numerous, because the group includes those whose disposition toward the product was favorable prior to purchase. Meanwhile, the moderates don’t bother to play: Hardly anyone posts in the middle. The result is the famous J-shaped curve, which renders both mean and median ratings meaningless.(2) (Consumers are evidently aware of the bias, and try to adjust for it.)
Trolls, whether humans or bots, present a different problem. Always at the top of the comment threat, frequently angry and dismissive, often writing in highly offensive terms, trolls are familiar to anyone who has ever gone on the internet. A traditional view holds that the online troll takes pleasure not only from the expression of unreasoning hostility but also from posting first, so their ratings are at the top. What matters is finding and outraging an audience. In that sense, a useful physical-world analogy is vandalism.
Trolls are also said to delight in causing consternation and even pain among other users. Some researchers argue that trolling suggests a particular personality type, that even offline those who engage in the behavior tend toward “everyday sadism.” Under this theory, Amazon’s decision to impose a lag period on posts might well work to eliminate the extremes, at least at the low end. For the troll, the waiting period might drain the exercise of its fun.
But is the research correct? Recent work suggests that day-to-day variation in the mood of the user, as well as the tone of prior posts on the same site, influence the tone in which the user posts. The more hostile comments already are, the more likely the user is to join the trolls.
If this view is correct, what we see as trolling might be simply the complex response to a set of emotional stimuli. The catharsis is not so much gaining an audience as the posting itself. In that case, being forced to wait won’t make much difference.
Thus we face a difficulty. If the 72-hour hold is meant to deter the trolls, well and good. But if, as the company has intimated, the waiting period is to allow it to weed out the trolls, then maybe not.
Whether done by humans or a sophisticated AI or (presumably) both, the effort will inevitably run into trouble distinguishing between the user who really, really hated the program and the user who’s just trying to cause trouble. There’s a risk that the process might simply turn the familiar J-shaped curve into a unimodal distribution where the surviving reviews are heavily biased toward the positive end.
I’m not saying that will happen. Amazon’s a smart company and, based on past experience, might well get the balance right. But just in case, let me propose some alternatives.
First, Amazon might try to swamp the trolls by persuading the silent majority to get involved in rating streaming video and other products. How might it do so? Studies show that financial incentives increase the number of individual reviewers. That strategy avoids the challenge of choosing what to take down.
Second, Amazon might deny the potential troll the reward that comes from venting. Instead of waiting three days to post user ratings, make users wait three days after viewing a show before rating it. Not only might the trolls get bored and go haunt some other site; the ratings might be more accurate, because they’re informed by a period of reflection.
Finally, Amazon might do nothing. No posting delay, no troll hunts, no baby-bathwater problem. I recognize the risks. When a high-profile project like “Rings of Power” garners strong reviews from critics and such weak reviews from viewers, there’s reason to be suspicious about who’s posting. But the premiere had an astonishing 25 million viewers on its first day. I think it will survive a few trolls.
(1) Full disclosure: I like J.R.R. Tolkien and I like Amazon’s version.
(2) The common (if illegal) practice of purchasing positive reviews is a separate issue. | 2022-09-07T15:16:32Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Not Even Trolls Can Ruin ‘The Rings of Power’ - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/not-even-trolls-can-ruin-the-rings-of-power/2022/09/07/624d5d8e-2eba-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/not-even-trolls-can-ruin-the-rings-of-power/2022/09/07/624d5d8e-2eba-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
Travelers line up at a TSA screening area at Austin-Bergstrom International Airport in Austin, Texas on Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2022. An early morning power outage at the airport caused flight delays that continued even after electricity was restored. The airport reported it lost power shortly before 5 a.m., and soon after said flights had been stopped. The lights were back on by 8 a.m., but airport officials told passengers that flights would be delayed. (Austin-Bergstrom International Airport via AP) (Uncredited/Austin-Bergstrom International Airport) | 2022-09-07T15:16:38Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Power outage at Austin airport leads to flight delays - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/power-outage-at-austin-airport-leads-to-flight-delays/2022/09/07/6ca5cdca-2eb5-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/power-outage-at-austin-airport-leads-to-flight-delays/2022/09/07/6ca5cdca-2eb5-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
Back in the 1980s, London’s “Big Bang” revolutionized stock trading and put it at the forefront of global financial markets. Following Britain’s departure from the European Union in 2020, the government has aspirations for another kind of “Big Bang”: jettisoning EU rules that it sees as holding back innovation and economic growth. A new financial services bill, published in July, isn’t on the same scale as the changes more than three decades ago, though the inspiration is similar. It aims to make stock listings easier while relaxing regulations in areas such as insurance and even crypto assets. It could also include “call-in” powers to make the Bank of England and other regulators more accountable to politicians.
1. Why the bill?
The aim is to improve and simplify finance rules to suit the UK’s economy, modifying EU law that was moved onto the UK statute book and was drawn up for what was a 28-country bloc of nations. The Financial Services and Markets Bill runs to more than 300 pages and is the biggest set of financial services reforms since those introduced in 2000 by Tony Blair’s Labour government, which created significant consumer protections.
2. What’s included?
The bill ranges from reforms to company listings and capital markets rules to measures to help consumers cope with technological change. Parts of the EU’s vast MiFID II rules, designed to protect investors and improve the functioning of financial markets, will be unraveled, such as the cap on trading in so-called dark pools, or private venues, to try to tempt share trading back from Amsterdam and shore up London’s business. Looking to the future, certain types of stablecoins, digital assets designed to hold a steady value, will be regulated as a form of payment. The bill also introduces a secondary objective for financial regulators to promote economic growth, after their primary aim of ensuring safety of the financial system.
3. What’s the timetable?
The legislation will be debated in parliament in detail from September and examined in committees in both the House of Commons and Lords. It’s due to become law in April or May 2023. Now that City of London firms and their lobbyists have seen the wording, they will get to work, seeking to influence it with the aim of adding some proposals and removing others.
4. How does the Tory party leadership race affect it?
The bill coincides with the Conservative Party’s election to choose a new leader, who would automatically become prime minister. Liz Truss, the foreign secretary, was leading Rishi Sunak, the former chancellor of the exchequer, in early August, having won support from the right wing of the party and Brexiteers. That group is likely to want measures to implement their vision for Brexit, including cutting financial red tape and reducing the size of the state. There could be calls for less focus on consumer protection and more emphasis on freeing firms to pursue faster growth.
5. How might a new Prime Minister change the bill?
Truss is likely to give ministers the power to overturn some financial regulators’ decisions if she becomes prime minister, a move that could set up fresh tensions with the Bank of England. Allies of Truss say she favors “call-in” powers to allow the government to block or change the actions of financial regulators, including the central bank’s Prudential Regulation Authority and the Financial Conduct Authority. Her position means whoever wins the leadership race supports the mechanism. Sunak argues that such powers are needed to ensure politicians -- not “faceless regulators” -- are accountable for regulatory decisions. When Nadhim Zahawi replaced Sunak as chancellor in July, he backed away from adding the “call-in” power to the bill, but it could still be added as the legislation makes its way through Parliament.
6. Could this hit Bank of England independence?
At the heart of the debate about the call-in power is politicians’ attitudes to the BOE, which is the UK’s ultimate financial regulatory authority as well as the setter of interest rates. The central bank is having a difficult time. There is rising criticism across government of its handling of inflation, which may escalate as cost-of-living problems intensify. Truss, the foreign secretary, has said she wants to revisit the BOE’s mandate and explore how to ensure policy makers meet their goal to keep inflation down, triggering debate about the central bank’s independence.
There are plenty of people from the world of economics, government and finance who believe the BOE’s independence is crucial, both over monetary policy and regulation, whose remit includes consumer protection, competition and safety of the financial system. Andrew Bailey, the BOE’s governor, himself has warned of the hit the UK’s reputation could take internationally if there are inappropriate permanent infringements on the BOE’s freedom to act. His supporters also warn that diluting the central bank’s ability to make decisions will lead to an inappropriate rise of the power of politicians in regulatory policy, and influence by their financial donors.
8. Do the regulators need regulating?
Even for backers of the BOE, there is recognition that the bill should lay out some new oversight. That’s because before Brexit, the PRA -- the part of the BOE which oversees the financial system -- and the FCA, which focuses on consumer protection, operated according to directions set by people elected democratically to the European Parliament. Much of the decision making passes to the regulators themselves as part of the shift of EU rules to UK law. Many in Parliament, as well as lawyers, economists and industry figures, want some checks to be introduced over regulators, who are not democratically elected. Ideas vary from monitoring by lawmakers on the Treasury Select Committee helped by experts, to the courts taking an active role, to greater powers for the government.
9. How could power be balanced?
There are deep disagreements over how the new oversight powers should be framed and how far they should go. While the government hasn’t yet given itself a “call-in” power in the bill, it did include a right to order the regulators to carry out a review of their actions, conducted by a third party that has to be acceptable to the Treasury. The BOE was given independence in 1997. As part of the legislation, the government had the power to intervene in monetary policy in emergencies, but fears that might happen have been muted due to the risk of market turmoil that would result.
10. What are the likely flashpoints?
The first battleground between the government and regulators is already here. Insurers, and some in government, want a set of capital rules known as Solvency II liberalized to free up billions of pounds that could be pumped into other investments. They could include infrastructure projects ministers want to pursue to improve regions outside London and the South East, that have been a Conservative promise in the wake of Brexit. The PRA is prepared to roll back some Solvency II rules. But in one area, known as the matching adjustment, a calculation that calibrates how well a long-term asset such as an infrastructure investment matches a liability like paying pensions, it actually wants the regulations to become stricter.
11. Could this bill have broader implications?
A fight with financial regulators could reverberate more widely in British society. An agenda to shake things up could take in the British Broadcasting Corporation, the state broadcaster, which is set to be subject to a government review between now and 2024, with questions about its independence likely to be prominent. Its regulator, Ofcom, could also be in the line of fire, as could the Competition and Markets Authority, which may become a target for those who want a push for fast growth and a lighter touch around consumer protection. | 2022-09-07T15:16:56Z | www.washingtonpost.com | What Britain Is Targeting in a Post-Brexit City - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/what-britain-is-targeting-in-a-post-brexit-city/2022/09/07/590091ce-2eba-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/what-britain-is-targeting-in-a-post-brexit-city/2022/09/07/590091ce-2eba-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
Niou won’t mount third-party challenge in N.Y.’s 10th district
New York Assemblywoman Yuh-Line Niou speaks during a rally at City Hall on April 17, 2019, in New York. (Mary Altaffer/AP)
Democrats will avoid a protracted fight for New York’s newly redrawn 10th Congressional District after New York Assemblywoman Yuh-Line Niou said she would not mount a third-party challenge to former federal prosecutor Daniel Goldman in November.
In a lengthy video posted late Tuesday, Niou, who came in second in the Aug. 23 Democratic primary, conceded the race to Goldman and said she would not run on the Working Families Party line in the general election, as many progressives had urged her to do.
Niou trailed Goldman by only about 1,300 votes before absentee ballots were counted, and her supporters had pointed out that she and the third- and fourth-place finishers split the progressive vote, giving the more moderate Goldman a path to victory. Niou had avoided conceding and said she was weighing a run on the Working Families Party line, but on Tuesday she said she would focus her energy elsewhere.
“Enough of the absentee ballots have been counted, and we are conceding the primary, and I will not be on the WFP line for the general,” Niou said in her video. “We simply do not have the resources to fight all fights at the same time, and we must protect our democracy now.”
Niou vowed that she and her coalition of volunteers and supporters would instead throw their efforts into “keeping insurrectionists from taking control of Congress” and ensuring Democrats retained majorities in the House and Senate — while noting that that was the “bare minimum.”
“We need better Democrats. We don’t need just a majority,” Niou said. “What we need is a working families majority, congressional majorities that will deliver on what the majority of Americans need and want: health care for all, child care, elder care, paid family leave, real student debt relief and fixing how we pay for college in the first place, affordable housing. A Congress that will actually care about us because it will finally be made up of us.”
Niou’s video was not an endorsement of Goldman, a Levi Strauss & Co. heir whom she criticized for spending millions of his own money on the race.
“We have a Congress that has more millionaires than there are people of color or working-class people,” she said. “Oligarchy is a system where people with economic power use that power to grab political power, which they in turn use to consolidate even more economic power. Let’s call it by its name and commit ourselves to dismantling it.”
Though the Democratic primary race results won’t be certified until Sept. 14, several party leaders — including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) — emerged to endorse Goldman shortly after he was declared the winner. In most years, the winner of the Democratic primary could safely be presumed the eventual winner of the general election in the overwhelmingly Democratic district.
In addition to Goldman and Niou, the field of Democratic primary candidates included Rep. Mondaire Jones (D-N.Y.), who moved to the newly redrawn district to run after Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (D-N.Y.), the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, switched to running in Jones’s old district; New York City Council member Carlina Rivera; New York Assemblywoman Jo Anne Simon, and former congresswoman Elizabeth Holtzman. At one point, former New York mayor Bill de Blasio also was part of the field before he withdrew from the race in July.
A chaotic redistricting process in New York created the diverse new district, which covers much of Lower Manhattan — including Chinatown, Wall Street and the Lower East Side — and parts of Brooklyn. In her campaign, Niou, who is Taiwanese American, frequently emphasized that the new district included two Chinatowns, one in Manhattan and one in Brooklyn. She received endorsements from several progressive groups and state lawmakers, as well as from the Working Families Party.
The New York Times endorsed Goldman, who was the lead majority counsel in the first impeachment trial against President Donald Trump. One of his TV ads features a clip of him testifying before the House Judiciary Committee before declaring: “Dan Goldman proved the case against Trump.”
He has said protecting democracy would be among his top priorities if elected.
“Voters know what’s at stake,” Goldman tweeted last month. “We need to protect our democracy and our fundamental rights. Everything is on the line, and we need members of Congress who have been on the front lines standing up to authoritarianism on the radical right.”
Azi Paybarah and Eugene Scott contributed to this report. | 2022-09-07T15:17:27Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Yuh-Line Niou won’t mount third-party challenge to Daniel Goldman in New York’s 10th district - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/newyork10-niou-goldman-wfp/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/newyork10-niou-goldman-wfp/ |
A new set of rules is designed to ensure the independence of corporate employees assigned to work on behalf of the government
The Boeing logo is seen on the side of a 737 Max. (Peter Cziborra/Reuters)
Long before the Max disasters, Boeing had a history of failing to fix safety problems
In the years since, the agency has made changes that include approving individual employees assigned to companies’ safety units. The FAA has also assumed more direct responsibility to review planes manufactured by Boeing — including the 787 Dreamliner, which has been plagued by quality control problems. | 2022-09-07T15:18:14Z | www.washingtonpost.com | FAA finalizes safety rule change sought after 737 Max crashes - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/transportation/2022/09/07/faa-boeing-oversight/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/transportation/2022/09/07/faa-boeing-oversight/ |
A woman was killed by a shark Tuesday while snorkeling in the Bahamas during a vacation with her family, local authorities said.
The victim, who authorities have not identified, was a 58-year-old woman from Pennsylvania, Royal Bahamas Police Force Superintendent Chrislyn Skippings told the Associated Press.
“It’s unfortunate,” Skippings said.
Earlier that day, the family — passengers traveling aboard Harmony of the Seas, a seven-night Royal Caribbean cruise — booked a private snorkeling tour with a local company that took them to Green Cay off Nassau, Skippings said during a news conference.
While snorkeling, family members witnessed what they identified as a bull shark attacking the woman, Skippings said. The family alerted the tour company, then the party of about five to seven people. Boat operators pulled the woman from the water, authorities said.
Shark bites are rare — but two just happened on the same day in S.C.
The woman suffered injuries to her upper body.
“Sadly, the guest passed away after arriving at a hospital for treatment,” a Royal Caribbean International spokesperson told The Washington Post in a statement. “Royal Caribbean International is providing support and assistance to the guest’s loved ones at this time.”
The cruise departed from Port Canaveral, Fla., on Sunday.
Despite the attention shark attacks receive each summer, they are rare. Last year, the Florida Museum of Natural History’s International Shark Attack File investigated 137 alleged interactions humans had with sharks worldwide. Of those, 73 were deemed unprovoked shark attack bites on humans and 39 were catalogued as provoked bites.
If a shark were to get near you, the Florida-based organization recommends keeping eye contact with the shark and slowly moving away. If it’s possible, the swimmer should leave the water.
As of Tuesday afternoon, the beach where the attack happened was closed off “for any type of snorkeling activities,” Skippings said at the news conference. It is unclear when and if the beach will reopen, she added. Skippings did not provide details of the attack. | 2022-09-07T15:18:20Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Pennsylvania woman killed by bull shark while snorkeling in Bahamas - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/09/07/bahamas-bull-shark-attack-snorkeling/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/09/07/bahamas-bull-shark-attack-snorkeling/ |
In Borneo, Indonesian and Australian archaeologists uncovered the remains of a young hunter-gatherer whose lower left leg had been amputated. (Video: Tim Maloney)
The latest discovery — in a remote region of eastern Kalimantan, the Indonesian portion of the island of Borneo — challenges the view that “advanced medicine was beyond the capacity of these early foraging and hunting societies,” Tim Maloney, an archaeologist at Australia’s Griffith University and one of the project’s lead researchers, told reporters Wednesday. “It rewrites our understanding of the development of this medical knowledge.”
Screams, torture and so much blood: The gruesome world of 19th-century surgery
“It was a huge surprise that this ancient forager survived a very serious and life-threatening childhood operation, that the wound healed to form a stump, and that they then lived for years in mountainous terrain with altered mobility — suggesting a high degree of community care,” said Melandri Vlok, a paleopathologist at the University of Sydney. | 2022-09-07T15:18:26Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Borneo hunter-gatherer survived oldest known amputation, research finds - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/oldest-amputation-surgery-borneo-hunter/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/oldest-amputation-surgery-borneo-hunter/ |
‘Vampire’ grave shows 17th-century fear of women who don’t ‘fit in’
The remains of a female “vampire” with a sickle across her throat have been unearthed at an archaeological site in a 17th century cemetery in Bydgoszcz, Poland. Photo taken Aug. 30, 2022. (Courtesy of Mirosław Blicharski)
Her burial reveals “paranoia” and “fear” around vampires — and the “gender politics” at the time, Stacey Abbott, author of “Undead Apocalypse: Vampires and Zombies in the 21st Century,” told The Washington Post on Wednesday.
Despite the 17th century medical community’s relative lack of scientific knowledge about communicable diseases or mental health, the burials were performed with a great degree of “pragmatism” to prevent the dead from rising from the grave, Abbott said. “Coming back as a vampire was a fate worse than death.”
“This is not a vampire, but a revenant. All cultures have a belief in the ‘undead,’” he explained, describing them generally as “people that have led violent lives or died violently or have not been buried with the proper funeral rites.”
Newly published Charles Dickens letters reveal he was ‘a bit of a diva’ | 2022-09-07T15:42:21Z | www.washingtonpost.com | 'Vampire' grave in Poland shows 17th-century fears of women - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/poland-vampire-grave-unearthed-sickle/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/poland-vampire-grave-unearthed-sickle/ |
The state’s power grid, at the forefront of America’s energy transition, is under threat from an unprecedented September heat wave.
By Evan Halper
Electrical transmission towers at a PG&E electrical substation during a heat wave in Vacaville, California, on Sept. 6. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg)
California narrowly avoided widespread blackouts Tuesday, with millions of residents keeping the grid afloat by jacking up thermostats and shutting off appliances amid an unprecedented September heat wave in a state that has positioned itself as a national leader on climate.
The residents were not the only ones feeling the heat, as temperatures set records across the state, climbing to 109 in San Jose and 116 in Sacramento. The lawmakers and regulators behind the state’s emphatic embrace of green energy also felt it.
The state’s wobbly grid, with a history of disrupting political careers, has once again become a fresh target for critics of California’s climate-forward energy policies. The same state that is rushing to rid its roads of gas-powered vehicles was this week pleading with electric car drivers not to recharge during peak hours. Meanwhile, aging natural-gas fired generators that California wants to eradicate are being leaned on heavily to keep the lights on. And the state is scrambling to postpone the closure of a nuclear plant that officials earlier said sun and wind power would make obsolete.
Yet California is doubling down — arguing the culprit of its energy woes is not the aggressive pace of its transition but the climate change that transition is designed to confront.
As the sun set Tuesday, millions of Californians received alerts on their cellphones warning the grid was in peril and “power interruptions may occur unless you take action.”
The phone alerts were credited with averting blackouts. Power use dropped substantially minutes after they were sent. But Californians like Naomi Sussman, a 32-year-old researcher in Los Angeles, resented that it got to that point. She said it is another case of the state tasking individuals “with managing large structural problems,” as government and the biggest corporate energy users shrug off responsibility.
The grid will face more stressful moments this week as the heat wave persists in parts of the state, but Tuesday was expected to present the toughest challenge.
Californians pulled a record amount of energy from the grid on Tuesday, as the punishing September heat wave pushed air conditioning use far beyond the levels regulators had forecast. Modeling by the Energy Commission had suggested there was only a 1 percent chance of the kind of heat the state is experiencing this week.
Some Californians are grappling with the question of whether these power disruptions are a temporary blip as the state meets the challenge of extreme temperatures — or the new normal.
“I don’t remember this many days this hot in a row,” said David Plenn, 70, longtime owner of the Dinosaur Farm toy store in South Pasadena. Contemplating what’s coming, Plenn said: “Now we’ve got all E-cars, the grid is not holding. … Someone better be working on that.”
Californians have long been among the earliest adopters of climate-friendly technologies: Nearly half of the country’s electric cars are registered in the state, and it is moving to phase out new gas-powered cars by 2035. Just last week, the legislature passed a flurry of bills aimed at making the state carbon neutral by 2045. When the state asked residents to reduce their electricity usage Tuesday afternoon, they heeded the call.
Continued disruption of the power grid, though, threatens to weaken public enthusiasm for such measures. Replacing natural-gas-fueled plants with less consistent wind and solar energy is a balancing act, and even some leaders of that transition say lawmakers and regulators have at times allowed their policy ambitions to cloud their judgment.
“California has to be coldly realistic about matching its loads and resources,” said Bob Foster, a former chair of the board governing California’s grid operations. “You can’t just wish it to be so. You have to be very realistic. They are on the right path, but maybe in a little bit too much of a hurry.”
The state’s energy infrastructure is under unprecedented stress. Aging transmission lines are fraying and unreliable, hydroelectric power is in short supply amid drought, neighboring states that California has looked to for supplemental power have less to spare as heat domes settle over them, too.
“The root of the problem here is that climate change keeps surprising us and being worse than we thought,” said Severin Borenstein, director of the Energy Institute at the University of California at Berkeley’s Haas School of Business. “People who live in areas where we never thought air conditioning would be needed are now installing it. That is where all the problems are coming from on days like these.”
He said the inconvenience of temporary blackouts is nothing compared to the upheaval and displacement climate change is causing around the world. “This is trying to avoid those catastrophic changes,” he said. “It is not going to be without bumps”
But even some of the most enthusiastic clean energy boosters are frustrated by how things are playing out in the state this week. Advocates in the state’s underserved urban communities were dismayed to see restrictions on factories using diesel generators lifted so they could be fired up to ease stress on the grid.
“We’ve known for years this kind of heat wave was coming,” said Ari Eisenstadt, a campaign manager with the California Environmental Justice Alliance. “We can’t keep saying this is unprecedented — when we know it will happen next year, too — and act surprised and then say, ‘let’s turn up those generators which spew toxic pollution into low income communities of color.’”
The fight to save energy by controlling your thermostat (and pool pump)
Eisenstadt said the state’s problem is not green energy but its halting embrace of the innovations that unleash all of green energy’s potential.
Electric cars, many energy economists say, are likely to help stabilize California’s power system in the future: Their batteries serving as storage vessels for wind and solar power that could be fed back into the grid as needed. New technologies are meanwhile coming online that enable renewable energy to be stored and redistributed on an industrial scale, using batteries that are the size of a small cottage.
Some energy scholars say California would have more than enough capacity if it harnessed its resources better. But outdated energy market rules make it tough for power providers to tap into all the potential resources.
“There is more power out there than we need to stabilize the grid on these few days a year it is under stress,” said Rajit Gadh, director of the Smart Gird Energy Research Center at UCLA. “We just need to get the control systems and the infrastructure in place, and give people incentives.”
One model that is working involves 4,500 California owners of Powerwall batteries, a product built by Tesla for homeowners to store their rooftop solar energy for use as backup power in the event of an outage. The systems turn out to also be useful for the grid, with owners selling utilities the power stored on extreme heat days.
An app built by Bay Area Powerwall owner and electrification advocate Rick Davis tracks the amount of electricity the batteries send back to the grid. It shows big potential for the future, if the cost of the Tesla product comes down and it is owned by more than just early adopters.
The state has also reconsidered its planned 2025 closure of the Diablo Canyon nuclear plant, which supplies about 6 percent of the state’s electricity. After Gov. Gavin Newsom (D) warned there may not be enough renewable energy available to reliably backfill all that power, lawmakers last week voted to push the plant’s retirement date back five years and lend its owner, Pacific Gas & Electric, up to $1.4 billion to keep it operating.
The state at the same time also signaled that the move should not be interpreted as a retreat from California’s green energy ambitions, with lawmakers passing several sweeping and costly climate measures along with it. Among them is a mandate for the state to become carbon neutral by 2045.
The measures were big victories for Newsom, who has signaled he may have presidential ambitions. But if there is one lesson California politicians have learned it is that when the power grid goes down, their political fortunes tend to go with it. The threat of blackouts is expected to persist in California for at least the next few years, as the state works to shore up its power systems.
“It’s sobering,” said Robert Weisenmiller, a former chair of the California Energy Commission. “There is not much room to screw up. | 2022-09-07T16:21:32Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Voluntary power cuts helped California avoid blackouts during heat wave - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/09/07/california-heat-wave-climate-electricity/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/09/07/california-heat-wave-climate-electricity/ |
Barr’s quest to dismantle Trump’s classified-document defenses
Former attorney general William P. Barr (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
The continued revelations about Donald Trump’s handling of sensitive government documents at Mar-a-Lago have brought often disparate and speculative defenses from his allies. The lack of public details about the investigation makes mounting a defense difficult, so any number of things have been thrown at the wall: the idea that Trump was actually cooperating with the government, the baseless idea that the FBI planted documents, the oversimplified and unsubstantiated idea that he had declassified these documents, the idea that this is merely a “document” or “storage” issue, etc.
But as those attempted defenses have proliferated, a perhaps unlikely source has stepped forward to rebut many of them: Trump’s own formerly loyal attorney general, William P. Barr.
Here’s a sampling of Barr’s comments over the past week, along with the Trump defenses they rebut.
The defense: Trump declassified the documents
Barr: “I don’t believe he did.”
“I, frankly, am skeptical of this claim that ‘I declassified everything.’ I think it’s highly improbable. … If in fact he sort of stood over scores of boxes, not really knowing what was in them, and said, ‘I hereby declassify everything in here,’ that would be such an abuse, and — that shows such recklessness that it’s almost worse than taking the documents.”
The defense: Trump might have had a valid reason to take them
Barr: “I can’t think of a legitimate reason why they should have been — could be taken out of government, away from the government if they are classified.” (Barr added there was “no justification” for taking such documents.)
“There is no scenario, legally, under which the president gets to keep the government documents — whether it’s classified or unclassified. If it deals with government stuff, it goes back to the government.”
The defense: The search is unprecedented — what about Hillary Clinton?
Barr: “People say this was unprecedented. But it’s also unprecedented for a president to take all this classified information and put them in a country club, okay?”
The defense: Trump was cooperating before the DOJ sprang a search on him
Barr: “They [the government] jawboned for a year, they were deceived on the voluntary actions taken, they then went and got a subpoena, they were deceived on that — they feel. The facts are starting to show they were being jerked around, so how long do they wait?”
“There’s some evidence to suggest that they were deceived. … And none of that really relates to the content of documents. It relates to the fact that there were documents there, and the fact that they were classified and the fact that they were subpoenaed and never delivered.”
The defense: The government took other documents that weren’t classified
Barr: “What people are missing is that all the other documents taken, even if they claim to be executive privilege, either belong to the government because they are government records — even if they are classified, even if they are subject to executive privilege. They still belong to the government and go to the [National] Archives.”
The defense: The ruling for a special master shows Trump had executive privilege
Barr: “The opinion, I think, was wrong, and I think the government should appeal it. It’s deeply flawed in a number of ways.”
“I think if DOJ appeals, eventually it will be overturned. I hope they expedite it, but it could take several months to get that straightened out.”
“I don’t think the appointment of a special master is going to hold up. But even if it does, I don’t see it fundamentally changing the trajectory. In other words, I don’t think it changes the ballgame so much as maybe we’ll have a rain delay for a couple of innings.”
“[Judge Aileen Cannon] didn’t address the only question that’s in dispute, which is, can the former president have standing to say that the investigators don’t even get to look at the documents — the classified documents that he wrongfully had at Mar-a-Lago? That’s the only question. And she dodges it.”
Barr becomes the latest key Trump ally to step forward to break with him and undercut his defenses for his actions. And in the past, perhaps not coincidentally, those red lines have often pertained to issues of national security and foreign policy. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis ultimately broke with Trump over the president’s plans to withdraw from Syria and the Lafayette Square photo op. Former secretary of state Rex Tillerson said Trump tried to do illegal things and wasn’t disciplined enough. Former national security adviser John Bolton spoke out about the Ukraine scandal and Trump’s handling of Russia. Ambassador to the European Union Gordon Sondland confirmed a quid pro quo in the former. And after Jan. 6, 2021, several key figures, including Cabinet secretaries, resigned, with some (including, most notably, Barr) providing key testimony against Trump to the House select committee.
Nearly all of these personal evolutions have raised the hackles of Trump critics who long wondered where these people were during the many controversies that preceded their breaking points. Certainly, there is some value in reputation management now that Trump is out of office. Barr is also promoting a book. And perhaps nobody went further for Trump, and in controversial ways, than he did in his short stint as attorney general.
But that also reinforces the significance of what Barr is saying now. This is the guy, according to a judge’s finding, who misled about and spun the Russia investigation in a way that accrued significantly to Trump’s benefit. This is the guy who took an extraordinarily broad view of presidential power, but even he is now saying a president can’t do that.
He might have an agenda — specifically, preventing the GOP from nominating a former president he doesn’t want at the top of the ticket in 2024. But he’s providing some of the most significant rebuttals of the idea that Trump’s retaining these documents is a nothingburger and that the FBI search was overzealous. And he’s also, importantly, doing so on Fox News. | 2022-09-07T16:38:58Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Barr's robust rebuttal of Trump's defenses in the Mar-a-Lago investigation - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/barr-rebuttal-trump-documents/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/barr-rebuttal-trump-documents/ |
Trump’s classified Mar-a-Lago documents, cataloged
Pages from an FBI property list of items seized from former president Donald Trump's Mar-a-Lago estate and made public by the Department of Justice, are photographed Sept. 2. (Jon Elswick/AP)
When the FBI arrived at Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort a month ago, they should not have found any documents marked classified.
This isn’t simply an observation about the behavior of former presidents and the extent to which Trump appears to have flouted rules governing the retention of documents. It is, instead, a legal observation: The federal government had subpoenaed any material with classification markings (regardless of whether that material was still classified) and an attorney for Trump reportedly claimed that all such documents had been turned over. So when the FBI walked through the gates of Mar-a-Lago, they should have come away empty-handed.
They did not. Instead, they discovered about 100 documents still bearing classification markings, along with scores of empty folders intended for classified material. And at least one of the documents they recovered, The Washington Post reported Tuesday, addressed a foreign nation’s nuclear capabilities.
All of this is confusing to a layperson. So in the interest of clarifying what was sought and what was obtained, we’ve walked through the government’s documentation of the subpoena and the search to detail what the FBI was looking for — and what it found.
The May subpoena
Technically, the government shouldn’t even have needed to subpoena Trump in May. Four months before, it had received a number of boxes of material that should theoretically have included any presidential records owned by the government. But after investigating, the Justice Department issued a subpoena for material with a wide range of classification markings.
The contents of the box shown above are less complicated than they might appear.
First, it demands any documents “bearing classification markings” — again including any material that might have been declassified by Trump or any other government official. This is obviously important as Trump and his allies (dubiously) insist he’d declassified everything: It doesn’t matter for the purposes of the subpoena.
Then there’s that litany of classification codes. In short, they detail three levels of classification — confidential, secret and top secret — and then compartments or categories into which intelligence might fall. To use an admittedly odd analogy, it’s sort of like cars: “Top secret” is the make — Toyota — and “NOFORN” the model, like “Camry.”
So what do all of those codes mean? Here you go.
FRD: Formerly Restricted Data (can include nuclear weapons-related information)
HCS: HUMINT Control System (intelligence from human sources)
HCS-P: HCS Product (disseminated intelligence)
HCS-O: HCS Operations (clandestine operations and methods not intended for dissemination outside of originating agency)
NATO: NATO-classified intelligence
NF: Not Releasable to Foreign Nationals (also NOFORN)
OC: Originator Controlled (source of information controls distribution, also ORCON)
SAP: Special Access Program (intelligence that requires even stricter access controls)
SI: Special Intelligence (intelligence from communications intercepts, formerly COMINT)
SI-G: SI GAMMA (subcompartment of SI)
TK: Talent Keyhole (intelligence from satellite observations)
It’s likely that FRD jumped out at you, given The Post’s recent reporting. The descriptor of “formerly restricted” can be confusing, given that it implies that restrictions no longer apply. But as the Department of Energy explained in a presentation, that’s not accurate. Material identified as FRD can include a range of obviously sensitive information.
To be clear: The Post did not report that the FBI obtained information marked FRD. We did, however, report that, in its search, the FBI “came upon records that are extremely restricted, so much so that even some of the senior-most national security officials in the Biden administration weren’t authorized to review them.”
We can begin where we left off last week, with that photograph of documents on a floor at Mar-a-Lago. This one:
As we explained when we detailed the contents of that picture last week, there’s a lot of information included in that picture that might not be obvious to a casual observer. For our purposes, that includes two elements: the classification markings shown and that “2A” placard.
The government often uses cover sheets to indicate the classification levels of different material. In true government fashion, these are standardized forms, SF-703 to SF-705. Each color indicates a different classification level.
As you can see in the photograph, though, the cover sheets can also include additional information. The document at bottom-center, for example, is labeled “SECRET/SCI.”
But that’s just a photograph of one box — or more accurately, a box within a box. The “2A” refers to documents found within a container the government identified as “Box 2.” In a separate filing, the Justice Department catalogued what it found in all of the other boxes it removed from Mar-a-Lago, including various photographs and newspaper clippings. This list, though, gives us our clearest sense of which documents with classification markings where found where — including dozens of empty folders identified as “confidential.”
The boxes were removed from two locations: Trump’s office at Mar-a-Lago and a storage room at the facility. Below, an index of what was found where. Since the markings on the documents in “2A” are often legible, we’ve included compartment indicators where possible.
It’s important to note that the Justice Department’s interactions with Trump’s team before the search last month focused largely on the storage room. That’s the room that government officials visited in June and the one that they requested have security added to it. Yet, in August, about a quarter of the documents with classification markings — and half of those marked as “top secret” — were found in Trump’s office.
Again, it’s not clear what material those documents included. It’s not clear what the nuclear-related document was or where it was found.
But it does seem clear that the FBI found a multitude of documents marked as classified at Mar-a-Lago last month — documents that should have been returned to the government two months before. | 2022-09-07T16:39:04Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Trump’s classified Mar-a-Lago documents, cataloged - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/trump-classified-documents-fbi-search/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/trump-classified-documents-fbi-search/ |
By Matt O'Brien | AP
Musk’s legal team has argued that the allegations made by Zatko to U.S. officials may help bolster Musk's claims that Twitter misled him and the public about the company’s problem with fake and “spam” accounts. Zatko, a well-known cybersecurity expert known by his hacker handle “ Mudge,” said he was fired in January after raising flags about Twitter's negligence in protecting the security and privacy of its users. | 2022-09-07T16:47:52Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Judge: Musk can use Twitter whistleblower but not delay case - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/judge-musk-can-use-twitter-whistleblower-but-not-delay-case/2022/09/07/4f5a6d3e-2ebf-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/judge-musk-can-use-twitter-whistleblower-but-not-delay-case/2022/09/07/4f5a6d3e-2ebf-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
Trans residents sue Florida over gender-affirming Medicaid ban
Under a new rule rule approved by Florida health officials last month, trans patients can no longer use Medicaid to pay for their gender-affirming care.
(iStock; Carl Juste/Miami Herald/ AP/Washington Post illustration)
When August Dekker celebrated his 28th birthday in June, it was a moment of affirmation and euphoria, he said.
The Hernando County, Fla., resident went to the beach with his family. It was a perfect afternoon, he said: they sipped on mojitos, played in the water, made “a very bad sand castle” and ate mac and cheese at a seaside restaurant. But the highlight of the day was a simple one — it was the first time he could take his shirt off in public and feel comfortable.
Dekker, who is transgender, had undergone chest surgery three months before.
Although Dekker had been taking testosterone injections for years, he said he decided to get top surgery because of the shifting political and social climate — as more states, including Florida, attempt to roll back access to gender-affirming care.
“I was afraid that if I didn’t get the ball rolling, that I would not be able to have surgery covered in the future,” he said. Because Dekker receives disability benefits — they are his only source of income — he was able to pay for the procedure through Medicaid, just as he has done for his hormone therapy.
But according to a new rule approved by Florida health officials last month, Dekker and other trans patients can no longer use Medicaid to pay for their gender-affirming care.
‘Don’t say trans’: Texas school board’s new policies spark an outcry
Dekker and three other trans Floridians are now fighting back against the policy.
On Wednesday morning, LGBTQ and health advocacy groups filed a federal lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Florida challenging the state’s new Medicaid exclusion. The complaint was filed on behalf of Dekker and Brit Rothstein, as well as two minors, Susan Doe (represented by parents John and Jane Doe) and K.F. (represented by mother Jade Ladue). The lawsuit argues that Florida’s policy, which went into effect in last month, violates the plaintiffs’ constitutional rights and federal nondiscrimination statutes, because it categorically denies them treatment on the basis of their gender identity.
Florida’s Agency for Health Care Administration, which is named in the lawsuit, couldn’t be immediately reached for comment.
The state’s Medicaid exclusion comes amid a larger effort, in Florida and elsewhere, to roll back access to gender transition care, particularly for trans youths. Conservative lawmakers argue that these policies are meant to protect children and families from harmful procedures they may later regret.
Gender-affirming care is “critical and lifesaving” for transgender Floridians, said Simone Chriss, director of the Transgender Rights Initiative at the Southern Legal Counsel, one of the groups involved in the lawsuit.
“It’s important that we dispel the myths that allow people to believe that bans like this are protecting anyone,” Chriss said. “They are harming people and denying them access to care that has been deemed medically necessary for them.”
Omar Gonzalez-Pagan of Lambda Legal, an LGBTQ civil rights organization also challenging the rule, added that the procedures banned for trans patients are still covered for cisgender Medicaid patients using them to treat other conditions.
Across the country, advocacy groups are pushing back against such policies. In Alabama and Arkansas, bans on gender-affirming care have been temporarily blocked by federal courts amid legal challenges.
Gender-affirming care can, but does not always, include medical interventions such as hormone replacement therapy, chest surgery or voice therapy. Though conservative lawmakers — including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis — often refer to genital surgeries being performed on minors, these procedures are not recommended for patients younger than 18.
While most states have expanded Medicaid protections for gender-affirming care, Florida is now among nine states that explicitly exclude residents from using Medicaid to pay for it.
The rule came after a June report by the state’s Agency for Health Care Administration that claims services for the treatment of gender dysphoria are “not consistent with widely accepted professional medical standards,” and are “experimental and investigational with the potential for harmful long term affects.”
Medical professionals told The Washington Post last month that the agency’s actions are highly unusual and concerning.
Pennsylvania becomes the 27th state to restrict ‘conversion therapy’
The country’s largest medical organizations, including the American Academy of Pediatrics, recommend gender-affirming care to help treat minors experiencing psychological distress because their biological sex and gender identity do not align, a condition known as gender dysphoria. In April, 300 medical providers in the state wrote an open letter in the Tampa Bay Times criticizing a state memo that advised doctors not to give gender-affirming care to minors.
“Florida was really the first state to come for the throat of the medical evidence behind gender-affirming care, to create this false narrative that there is not sufficient evidence to support the benefits,” said Meredithe McNamara, an assistant professor at Yale’s School of Medicine, who was a part of a team of researchers who recently reviewed the AHCA report.
Brock Juarez, a spokesperson for the AHCA, told The Washington Post in August that the agency conducted “a very thorough process, and our in-depth work and findings really speak for itself.”
As the state’s medical board considers more rules restricting trans Floridians ability to receive gender-affirming care, patients who rely on Medicaid are scrambling to figure out how they can pay for their upcoming treatments and not disrupt the care they have come to depend on.
This includes John and Jane Doe, who joined the lawsuit on behalf of their 12-year-old daughter, “Susan.” The couple, who declined to be named to protect their child’s right to privacy, adopted Susan, as well as their eldest son, out of medical foster care, which makes them eligible for Medicaid coverage until they turn 18.
As a young child, Susan would come home from school and immediately change into “princess dresses,” according to the lawsuit. Eventually, she socially transitioned — changing her name, hair and pronouns to align with her gender identity.
Along the way, the family began working with a team of doctors — including mental health specialists, primary-care physicians and a pediatric endocrinologist — to support Susan’s medical needs. On their recommendation, she recently began taking Lupron, a puberty blocker that needs to be administered every three months.
According to the complaint, her next injection is scheduled for October, but without Medicaid coverage, the family may be forced to pay out of pocket for the medication, which they said costs about $11,000 for a single shot.
They would have to go into debt to afford Susan’s care, even if they are able to move her under her father’s health care plan. Switching insurance plans also means that Susan could be cut off from her long-term health-care providers, including those seeing her for other conditions.
It’s a “cruel” position to be put in, Susan’s father said in an interview.
Dekker, the trans man receiving disability benefits, said that he fears for his safety in a way he had not before.
The political attacks have triggered increased harassment and violence against trans people in Florida, he said. But Dekker also remembers what it felt like to be without hormone therapy. He was depressed and reclusive, showering with the lights off so he would not have to see his body, he said. At times, he was suicidal.
That’s why it was important to him to step forward and challenge his home state, Dekker said: “The thought of going back to that ghost person that I was … I don’t want to become that person again.” | 2022-09-07T16:48:23Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Trans residents sue Florida over gender-affirming Medicare ban - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/07/florida-transgender-medicaid-lawsuit/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/07/florida-transgender-medicaid-lawsuit/ |
FILE - New York Film Festival executive director Eugene Hernandez attends the 47th annual Chaplin Award Gala honoring Cate Blanchett in New York on April 25, 2022. (Evan Agostini/Invision/AP, File)
January’s Sundance Film Festival — its first in-person festival in three years — is being shepherded by Joana Vicente, Sundance Institute chief executive, and Kim Yutani, director of programming, after the departure in June by Tabitha Jackson. Jackson, who succeeded longtime director John Cooper, was the first woman and first person of color to lead America's premier independent film festival. She served as festival director for two years, a pandemic span that saw Sundance mount successive virtual editions. January’s Sundance will feature a smaller on-demand streaming component to launch halfway through the Park City festival. | 2022-09-07T16:48:48Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Sundance Film Festival names Eugene Hernandez director - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/sundance-film-festival-names-eugene-hernandez-director/2022/09/07/0731cd04-2ec9-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/sundance-film-festival-names-eugene-hernandez-director/2022/09/07/0731cd04-2ec9-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
Paolo Espino has been a staple of the Nationals' pitching staff for the past two seasons. (Jonathan Newton/The Washington Post)
ST. LOUIS — Paolo Espino is nearing the wrong kind of history in a stat he shouldn’t, and really doesn’t, care much about. But in all the years of professional baseball, only 10 pitchers have thrown 100 or more innings in a full season and not been credited with a single win. And Espino is now less than a month away from potentially becoming the 11th.
If the year ended Wednesday, Espino would be at zero wins and 101 innings. It doesn’t matter that the Washington Nationals have actually won — you know, like, scored more than the other team — six of his 16 starts. By the letter of the sport’s unjust law, Espino has needed to log five innings and exit with the Nationals ahead, then have his last-place team finish on top. That has not happened for the 35-year-old journeyman, who may lead the entire league in friendly interviews after tough games. The reason is a combination of bad luck, Espino’s short leash as a long reliever-turned-starter and Washington’s ineptitude for most of this season, amounting to a majors-worst 48-88 record.
So here’s the list Espino could join:
(Listed in order of total innings)
1. Terry Felton: Zero wins, 117⅓ innings (1982, Minnesota Twins)
2. Hulon Stamps: Zero wins, 115⅓ innings (1927, Memphis Red Sox)
3. George Weidman: Zero wins, 113⅔ innings (1880, Buffalo Bisons)
4. Diego Seguí: Zero wins, 110⅔ innings (1977, Seattle Mariners)
5. Russ Miller: Zero wins, 108 innings (1928, Philadelphia Phillies)
6. Steve Sparks: Zero wins, 107 innings (2003, Detroit Tigers/Oakland Athletics)
7. Bob Moorhead: Zero wins, 105⅓ innings (1962, New York Mets)
8. Bob Shirley: Zero wins, 105⅓ innings (New York Yankees, 1986)
9. Steve Gerkin: Zero wins, 102 innings (1945, Philadelphia Athletics)
10. Paolo Espino: Zero wins, 101 innings (2022, Washington Nationals)
11. John Malarkey: Zero wins, 100⅔ innings (1895, Washington Senators)
Espino is not there yet. But if he remains in the rotation — a good bet with Cade Cavalli recovering from shoulder inflammation — he could pass Felton and set the record for innings pitched without a win. At the moment, he has the most starts (16) and third-best ERA (4.28) among these pitchers. The best ERA belongs to Weidman, who pitched to a 3.40 as a 19-year-old rookie for Buffalo.
Everyone loves to talk about how Juan Soto debuted at 19. No one — absolutely no one — talks about how little run support Weidman got from the Bisons as a teenager.
“Wins and losses, I don’t think it’s a stat that you really need to follow, cause you can’t really control it sometimes,” Espino said Tuesday, having spent a decade in the minors before debuting in 2017. “People throw nine shutout and they end up losing the game, or later on the team loses. For me, the number one key is to go out there and compete and try to give the team a chance to win.”
The veteran is right: Wins and losses are outdated because of the shoddy way they are calculated. Sure, some pitchers, Max Scherzer among them, see a high win total as a sign of durability and consistency. That is fine and fair. But it is hard to place much value in a number when a starter can go 4⅔ scoreless innings, exit with a lead and then watch a reliever record one out and get the win. Or, as Espino alluded to, when a pitcher can work nine shutout and receive a no decision when his team wins in extras.
In that scenario, the entire baseball world would agree that the starter did more than whoever entered from the bullpen. For Espino, all of his early season relief appearances came with the Nationals leading or trailing by at least three runs. Half of his 16 starts have lasted at least five innings, including his loss to the Cardinals on Tuesday. But he only exited with the Nationals ahead in three of them.
The first time, against the Los Angeles Dodgers on July 25, he worked just four innings and was not qualified for the win. The second time, against the Chicago Cubs on Aug. 9, he pitched five and was in line for the win until the Cubs erased a three-run deficit against relievers Erasmo Ramírez and Kyle Finnegan in the seventh. Finnegan yielded four hits and two earned runs, yet was credited with the win because Washington went back ahead in the next half. And the third time, against the San Diego Padres on Aug. 19, the Nationals won, 6-3, but Espino fell two outs short of the sacred five-inning mark.
Heading into the home stretch of the season, his record is 0-7. If it’s any consolation, Felton, Stamps, Miller and Gerkin each finished with at least 12 losses, a number that feels unreachable for Espino despite how his year has gone. | 2022-09-07T16:49:34Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Nationals pitcher Paolo Espino still without a win this season - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/paolo-espino-wins/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/paolo-espino-wins/ |
The travel deals we've recently grown accustomed to are becoming a thing of the past. (iStock)
Just ask Tracy Hayes, who recently wanted to fly from Little Rock to St. Louis. “The cheapest flight I could find was roughly $375,” she says. “That was the one-way fare.”
Hayes, a notary public from Little Rock, checked the usual suspects — Booking.com, Expedia and a few airline sites — but struck out. Either she paid $375, or she wasn’t going.
She’s not alone. Travelers, accustomed to the generous bargains offered during the early days of the pandemic, are waking up to a cold reality. Travel is expensive. These days, it’s really expensive.
Deals don’t just fall into your lap anymore. You have to go out and look for them. Hayes thought about other ways to get from Little Rock to St. Louis. How about by train? She checked Amtrak’s site, which offered a one-way ticket for just $52. She could relax with plenty of legroom and onboard WiFi. But instead of an hour, it would take her about seven to get there.
“I think with those rates, I will be taking the train a lot more,” she says.
How do you find a travel bargain now? After having your I-can’t-believe-it moment when you see the shocking initial price, you’ll need to apply patience, a little stubbornness and a lot of counterintuitiveness.
He’s not alone. Industry insiders say their customers started to book their trips at the last minute during the early days of the pandemic because of the uncertainty of travel.
They’re still doing that, forcing providers to adjust the way they set their prices. In other words: Don’t stress out if you aren’t finding a bargain months before your trip. Your patience may reward you with a lower price — eventually. But don’t wait too long.
Being a contrarian can lead to deep discounts, too. For example, if you’re looking for a discounted cruise or vacation package, a big-box store probably isn’t the first place that comes to mind. Maybe it should be. Wholesale stores such as Sam’s Club and Costco have earned reputations for offering deep discounts, particularly during the pandemic, according to deal experts.
“The deals posted to their website tend to be anywhere from 10 to 30 percent less,” says Andrea Woroch, a Bakersfield, Calif.-based budget travel expert.
“And when you find a low price,” she adds, “don’t wait. I can’t overstate how important this is.”
So what’s a traveler to do? Experts have told me that at a time like this, they’ve seen too many people rush to book a “deal,” only to discover that it was too restrictive — or too good to be true.
The bottom line: When you find a deal (and you will), don’t rush the process, but don’t dither, either. Find that sweet spot in your timing. Read the terms of your purchase, paying close attention to cancellation information and other restrictions. | 2022-09-07T16:50:30Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Tips for finding travel deals - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/09/07/travel-vacation-deal-bargain-cheap/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/09/07/travel-vacation-deal-bargain-cheap/ |
With enough saving and planning, you could travel from South America to Europe to Asia on $50 a day
Advice by Carla Vianna
Carla and her boyfriend, Guil, at the Uyuni salt flat in Bolivia. (Carla Vianna for The Washington Post)
1Set a trip budget
2Create a savings plan
3Make a bucket list
4Create your itinerary
5Determine how long you’ll be abroad
6Start packing light
7Tell your job
8Make a final checklist
9Book your one-way ticket
The decision to quit your job to travel the world isn’t an easy one: You need money, a plan and the overarching determination to reach a goal that seems larger than life.
I didn’t have any of that when I walked into my first job after college, working for a small local newspaper in Miami. It would take a few months for the idea to develop, and another two years before I saved enough money to make it happen.
My first job was anything but glamorous. I couldn’t afford to live in Miami on my first-year reporter salary, so I settled into a family friend’s home an hour away. During that daily, hour-long commute, I would think about all the trips that got away: Why didn’t I study abroad in college? Why didn’t I do that post-grad trip to Europe?
I felt suffocated by the 10-day vacation policy and the pressure to never take time off. The few vacation days I did have would be spent visiting my mom and dad — each lived in a different state than me — and the rest of my family in Brazil. Dream trips to Italy and Thailand would be nearly impossible.
That trip around the world changed my life. And if you’re curious, this is exactly how you can do it, too.
6 Mexico vacations that check every travel style
My boyfriend and I each spent just over $18,500 in 10 months, which averaged $62 a day. We used this helpful spreadsheet created by fellow world traveler Shannon O’Donnell to keep track of our expenses in each country.
“I feel like so much is about being willing to concede on some things,” Monique Brown says. “If I have to eat peanut butter and jelly in my room for a week so we could pay for a snorkeling tour, I’ll happily do that.”
We actually flew back to the United States during our trip to work the event again — which funded the Southeast Asia part of our journey.
Write down every country, city or landmark you’ve ever wanted to visit. You can also approach this through experiences — road tripping to the Uyuni salt flat in Bolivia and scuba diving in Thailand topped my list. Browse Pinterest and Instagram. Read travel blogs. Flip through magazines. Talk to international friends or those who have lived abroad.
As a general rule of thumb, it’s best to follow one global direction. Research shows that traveling west is easier on the body. You don’t need to follow this rule, but it helps avoid backtracking and extra transportation costs.
Determine how long you’ll be abroad
If you don’t have a set amount of time in mind, try this:
“Slow” travelers spend weeks or even months in a single country. “You get to form a community and participate in events and activities that promote the longevity and well-being of the place,” says Brittany Sneller, a 29-year-old travel blogger who’s been traveling full-time for seven years.
“I love being able to feel more connected to a place and its people rather than breezing through,” she says.
“Fast” travel, on the other hand, is about seeing as much as you can in a set amount of time. When I started my trip, it was only supposed to last six months. And I was traveling fast: I zipped through 20 cities in Europe in the first two months.
There’s no right or wrong option. The experience is yours, and you should choose what best fits your travel style.
Tell your job
When you put in your two weeks’ notice, be transparent about your plans. Your colleagues may not understand or even support you, but it’s better for them to hear it from you directly than to see it on social media.
Go to a travel clinic to receive the necessary vaccines and medications for the countries you’re visiting.
A guide to travel insurance in 2022
Getting a one-way ticket is the start of your new, flexible adventure. When you finally buy it, there’s no turning back. | 2022-09-07T16:50:36Z | www.washingtonpost.com | How to quit your job and travel the world - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/tips/plan-trip-around-world/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/tips/plan-trip-around-world/ |
But months after painting this 1870 masterpiece, the young, rising French artist would be killed on the battlefield
Édouard Manet was in his pomp. Edgar Degas was making his first great pictures of the Opera’s orchestra pit. Pierre-Auguste Renoir and Berthe Morisot were making their first forays into Impressionism. All managed to have their works selected to show at the Paris Salon of 1870.
But the star attraction — the painting that captured everyone’s imagination — was by Henri Regnault, a 26-year-old painter with an athletic build, a long, pointed beard and hair that coiled in tight, glossy waves.
Working in Rome, at the Villa Medici (he had won France’s prestigious Prix de Rome), Regnault had set out to make a simple portrait study from a live model named Maria-Veronica-Concetta Latini. At first, he set the smiling, slightly disheveled-looking Latini, who had jet-black hair, against a red background. He adorned her in jewelry and exotic garments, including a translucent skirt embroidered with gold. As Regnault progressed, he decided to enlarge the canvas not once but twice. Finally, he changed the background from red to a sumptuous gold, creating an overwhelming effect of saturated yellow.
French art was in the dying throes of a vogue for Orientalism. Regnault had used his Prix de Rome scholarship to travel to Spain and North Africa, and he now played up the North African vibes with a leopard-skin rug laid over a tribal carpet. He placed a shallow bronze dish in Latini’s lap and in it a small, sheathed sword, supported lightly in her left hand.
Almost as an afterthought (as Marc Gotlieb explains in his splendid book “The Deaths of Henri Regnault”), Regnault called the picture “Salomé.” And even though at least five other painters exhibited interpretations of the Salomé story at the same Salon, the general astonishment at Regnault’s effort was unmissable: “This fantastic Salomé,” wrote the critic Paul de Saint-Victor, “bewitched all of Paris.”
The critic Théophile Gautier, who had coined the term “art for art’s sake,” described it as “magical” — a “symphony in yellow major.” The painting, he wrote, “sparkles, it glistens, it melts in the light, it dazzles.”
[San Francisco’s Diego Rivera exhibition is the largest in 20 years]
Part of the effect was attributable to its inauthenticity. Latini’s sly, intimate grin has nothing to do with an attempt at biblical veracity. No one was being asked to believe that she had just danced for a king to get her wish — the head of John the Baptist — on a platter. Regnault hadn’t tried to hide that the painting was a studio improvisation. Although the picture was more conventionally modeled than Manet’s work, it nonetheless had the same air of knowing make-believe as Manet’s 1860s renderings of Victorine Meurent in various costumes.
Regnault had a partner, Genevieve Breton, who would soon be his fiancee. But because he was handsome and talented, his painting inspired a lot of excited speculation. Breton wrote in her diary about standing in front of “Salomé” at the Salon and being addressed by a stranger: “And you haven’t heard about what they are saying?” she was asked. “He wants to marry that ugly and vulgar Salomé, a painter’s infatuation. He’s known her since he arrived in Rome and is mad about her.”
The Salon had opened in May. France ill-advisedly declared war on Prussia in mid-July. Holders of the Prix de Rome were excused from military service, but Regnault chose to enlist. In October, during Prussia’s long siege of the French capital, which had reduced Parisians to eating pigeons, rats and pet cats — he proposed to Breton, who gamely said yes.
He received his marching orders on Jan. 17, 1871. The defenders of Paris were making a final attempt to break through the Prussian lines. Not even their commander believed they had any chance.
Sure enough, sometime after the order was given to retreat, Regnault was killed. No one knows whether it was by a Prussian bullet or friendly fire. But diarists all over the city made note of it, and the story of Regnault’s last day rapidly acquired the luster of legend.
Salomé, 1870
Henri Regnault (b. 1843). At the Metropolitan Museum of Art. | 2022-09-07T16:52:01Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Perspective | Henri Regnault's sumptuous Salomé, at the Met, wowed all of Paris - Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/interactive/2022/henri-regnault-salome/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/interactive/2022/henri-regnault-salome/ |
Hurricane Kay’s remnants could bring rare deluge, flooding to California
Up to several inches of rain could fall in areas east of San Diego, although the forecast is still coming into focus
Forecast rainfall in Southern California through the weekend -from the National Weather Service. Much of this rain would fall Friday and Saturday. (WeatherBell)
With much of California baking under a record-breaking September heat wave, it seems hard to believe that the weather could get any more unusual. However, as soon as Thursday, Southern California and other parts of the Southwest may contend with another extreme event.
The remnants of Hurricane Kay — currently about 200 miles southwest of Baja California in Mexico — are forecast to bring substantial rainfall and possible flooding to the region Friday and Saturday. Some areas, particularly in interior Southern California, could see multiple inches of rain.
“[C]onfidence is rapidly increasing for a significant rainfall event across Southern California, Arizona, and eventually central California and Nevada into Saturday,” the National Weather Service wrote in an online discussion Wednesday.
The heat and drought relief offered by such rain would be beneficial in this exceptionally dry region. However, there is a serious risk of flooding as downpours’ runoff affects the parched terrain.
“[I]t’s never a good thing to get too much rain all at once, a trait all too common among slow-moving tropical storms,” the Weather Service wrote. “Thus, the flash flood potential is summarily also rapidly increasing.”
Forecasters, however, stress that there is large uncertainty in exactly how much rain falls and where.
Kay’s potential path
A Category 2 hurricane with 100 mph winds, Kay is churning in the Pacific Ocean southwest of the tip of Baja California. It is expected to move essentially parallel to the Mexican peninsula over the next couple of days.
The National Hurricane Center calls for Kay to strengthen slightly Wednesday before starting to weaken on Thursday as it gets closer to a possible landfall in Mexico. Hurricane warnings have been hoisted for the west-central coast of Baja California, where the storm is supposed to be closest to the coast, while tropical storm warnings have been issued farther south.
Parts of Baja California could see up to 15 inches of rain from Kay, as well as a destructive ocean surge and hurricane-force winds. Flooding rains from Kay have already killed three people in Baja California, according to local reports.
Winds from Kay are expected to impact nearly all of Baja California — even on the Gulf of California side. Kay is a large hurricane with tropical-storm-force winds (39+ mph) extending up to 230 miles from its center.
Potential impacts on Southern California
Kay’s size makes it probable that the storm will, in fact, bring notable impacts to Southern California, Arizona and Nevada even though the current Hurricane Center has the storm starting to bend away from the California coastline and its offshore islands Friday.
By Thursday, clouds from Kay will begin spreading into the Southwest United States, helping bring relief from the heat. “[T]he huge cloud shield of Kay will very effectively end the ongoing heat wave across the area,” the Weather Service wrote.
A few outer bands of Kay could stray into far southern parts of California as early as Thursday, according to the Weather Service forecast office in San Diego.
Moisture from Kay is forecast to spread over the region in earnest on Friday, bringing with it the potential for rainfall from San Diego to Phoenix, with downpours possible as far north as Las Vegas.
The Weather Service has placed a large swath of Southern California in slight- to moderate-risk zone for flash flooding between Friday and Saturday morning. It cautioned the risk could be upgraded to high if model simulations converge on multiple inches of rainfall.
There remains uncertainty as to exactly how much rain will fall and where, but the counterclockwise flow around the storm will steer winds from the east over much of the Southwest. This steering flow means the heaviest rainfall will probably concentrate along the eastern slopes of Southern California’s mountains.
“The most susceptible areas for flash flooding will be in slot canyons, burn scars and urbanized areas,” the Weather Service wrote. “The Peninsular Ranges of Southern California, being the mountains furthest southwest and therefore closest to the ocean and the center of Kay will get the brunt of the associated rainfall.”
Current rainfall projections suggest areas closer to the coast, from San Diego to Los Angeles, should see about 0.5 to 1 inch of rain. The Weather Service wrote that if the storm track shifts closer to the coast, it would “mean more rainfall in the coastal cities, specifically San Diego and nearby suburbs, but could eventually spread north into Los Angeles on Saturday.”
Kay’s winds and rain are likely to also have an effect on California’s wildfire situation, which has worsened in recent days. Between Friday and Labor Day, four people were killed in two separate wildfires in the state.
If Kay tracks closer to the coast, more rainfall is likely in Southern California and Arizona, which will be helpful in denting the region’s drought and lowering the wildfire risk. But if Kay tracks farther offshore, it would decrease drought relief and an acute fire risk would remain.
Kay would not be the first tropical system to impact California, but such occurrences in the state are fairly rare. They typically originate from the remnants of tropical storms and hurricanes rather than direct strikes, as would be the case with Kay.
California’s most notable encounter with a tropical system was probably in 1976 when Tropical Storm Kathleen, previously a hurricane over the ocean, entered south central California from Mexico. Kathleen unleashed a maximum rainfall of nearly 15 inches, a state record.
“Ocotillo, Calif. suffered catastrophic damage, with 70 to 80 percent of the town destroyed,” NASA wrote in a recap of the storm. “Twelve deaths were blamed on the storm in the United States.”
The tropical Atlantic is busy, but there are no U.S. landfall threats
Elsewhere in the tropics, the Atlantic is bubbling with activity after a rare August with no named storms.
Danielle, a Category 1 hurricane, is dancing harmlessly in the Atlantic Ocean, expected to perform a loop-de-loop motion more than 600 miles to the northwest of the Azores islands before tracking toward Spain as a post-tropical cyclone.
Hurricane Earl, currently also a Category 1 storm, is expected to become the season’s first major hurricane, rated Category 3 or higher, late Thursday. The large storm is forecast to brush Bermuda, which is under a tropical storm warning due to the potential for strong winds and rough seas over the next 36 hours.
Two more systems have caught the eye of forecasters at the National Hurricane Center. A tropical wave to the west of the Cabo Verde Islands has a 60 percent chance of developing into a tropical depression over the next 48 hours, while a strong tropical wave moving off the coast of Africa has a 30 percent chance of developing into a tropical system within the next five days. | 2022-09-07T17:22:30Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Hurricane Kay’s remnants could bring rare deluge, flooding to California - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2022/09/07/hurricane-kay-mexico-california-flooding/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2022/09/07/hurricane-kay-mexico-california-flooding/ |
‘The Special Master,’ with apologies to ‘The Alchemist’
The Special Master dwells within these mountains. But first you must prove your worthiness.
With apologies to Paulo Coelho and his novel “The Alchemist.”
The shepherd boy fell asleep in the half-ruined democracy. He always slept soundly among the sheep. A dream came to him. In the dream he reviewed a lot of classified paperwork and made significant pronouncements about it. When he awoke, he went to tell his father of what he had seen. His father nodded and told him, “You must fulfill your own personal news cycle. You must seek out the Special Master.”
The boy sold his sheep and set out on his journey. He traveled over mountains and hills and through tunnels and across trestles, until he came to a prominent peak. He could hear very steadily from deep inside the mountain the sound of reams of papers being shuffled.
He called out in greeting, but there was no answer. The door opened and a wizened arm reached out. It tossed some shredded bits of paper at his feet. Then the door shut again and he heard footsteps receding. The boy spent the morning piecing together the bits of shredded paper.
At midday, as the sun beamed hotly down on the boy, he paused and wiped his brow.
“What has brought you here?” a voice asked. He turned and looked. A man clad in black robes was there, someone who could be an allegory of all kinds of things.
“I am trying to fulfill my place in the news cycle,” the boy said. “I dreamed that I would one day review some important documents.”
“You seek the Special Master,” the man in black said.
“Yes!” the boy cried. “Do you know of him? Can you tell me where he makes his dwelling?”
“The Special Master dwells within that mountain,” the man said. “But before you gain admission, you must prove your worthiness. What are you doing with those papers there?”
“I am piecing them together,” the boy said. “It is my dream.”
The man studied him closely. “Can you talk to your heart?” he asked.
“I — I think so,” the boy said. “I will try.”
“Then you may come work for me and earn your keep here,” the man said, “while you wait to meet the Special Master.”
The boy sprang up in gratitude. “Thank you,” he cried.
In the days that followed, the man in black set the boy many tasks to complete. The boy fetched the man’s slippers. He steamed all his robes. He watched the man sort through documents and declare that they were covered by executive privilege.
One day, the man led him to a toilet that was clogged. “Look into the heart of this toilet,” the man said. “What do you see?”
“I see water,” the boy said.
“Look deeper.”
“I see toilet paper?"
“Look with your heart,” the man said.
“I … see documents,” the boy said. “They do not belong there.”
The man led him to a wall where there was ketchup and shattered bits of ceramic. “What do you see?”
“Rage,” the boy said.
“With your heart?” the man said.
“Economic … economic anxiety,” the boy said.
A long time passed. The sun rose and set many times, which is one way of noting the passage of time. The man led the boy to the top of the peak and set him a final task: “You must declassify a document using only your mind, telling no one about it.”
“That is impossible!” the boy said. “Everyone knows that you can only declassify using procedures.”
“Is it impossible?” the man asked. “Or do you only think it is impossible, o my Special Apprentice?”
The boy gasped and his heart leaped within him. “You! You are the Special Master!”
“Special Master is only a title,” the man said. “There are no requirements. Become acceptable to a district judge and various legal teams and you, too, can become one.”
“You wily old sorcerer!" the boy cried. “You knew all the time that I could have stayed at home and never left the sheep, and been spared all these puzzles and indignities!”
“Ah,” the man said, “but then you would never have learned the language that is within all languages, and the song that the heart sings, and the dreams that the angels dream for each of us in our lifetimes, and how to call to the wind so that the wind may answer."
“Did I learn all those things?” the boy asked, in wonder. “Are these the powers of the Special Master?”
“Well, no,” the man said. “Mostly the Special Master is sort of a judge’s aide, and his job is to kind of familiarize himself with case details to a degree a judge can’t."
“Oh,” the boy said. “That’s a bit of an anticlimax.”
“Only if your heart says it is,” the Special Master said. And he vanished into the mountain, never to be seen again, like a dream or a document that had been improperly stored. | 2022-09-07T17:48:39Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Opinion | How to become Trump's special master: Look with your heart - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/trump-special-master-satire-alchemist/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/trump-special-master-satire-alchemist/ |
Decades old audio tape reveals clues into 1971 cold case killing
Police in Montgomery County, Md., make arrest in decades-old homicide of sheriff’s deputy James Tappen Hall.
For 50 years, the slaying of a Maryland sheriff’s deputy remained a mystery. Last year, two detectives dove into the case of James Tappen Hall with fresh eyes. Inside a box of evidence they found an old reel-to-reel tape.
And after listening to that recording, things began to take a turn.
The long-forgotten audio, police say, was among a string of clues that led them to a 70-year-old living in a high-rise apartment building in Upstate New York.
“He appears to have been living a quiet life,” said Sgt. Chris Homrock, head of the Montgomery County Police Department’s cold case unit.
Officials identified the suspect Wednesday as Larry David Smith of Little Falls. In court papers, police accused him shooting Hall the night of Oct. 23, 1971, in a parking lot of the Manor Country Club in Rockville. At the time, Hall was working a part-time security job, and according to investigators, came upon Smith — just 19 at the time — who had just broken into a nearby home and was trying to get to his getaway car parked in the dark lot.
She died and became the ‘Christmas Tree Lady.’ Now we know her name.
Hall was taken to a hospital and died three days later, leaving behind a wife and two children.
“Daddy was a great man,” Hall’s daughter Carolyn Philo said this week. “When he put on his sheriff’s uniform, he shined.”
In the early 1970s, detectives thought Smith was someone who might have known what happened to Hall, but did not suspect him of being the actual perpetrator, according to court records.
But in the recording — of Smith talking to detectives in 1973 — he knew details about the shooting that police had never released to the public, including how many times Hall was fired upon.
Investigators who revived the investigation last year researched Smith. Several things caught their attention.
He grew up near the country club. He had a criminal history, they now assert, of burglary, assault, shoplifting and escape. And he had changed his name — from Larry David Becker in the 1970s to his current name of Larry David Smith.
“Investigators believe that this was done purposefully to avoid any further investigation into his involvement in this offense,” detectives wrote in court papers.
Last week, Montgomery County Police Detectives Lisa Killen and Katie Leggett drove to Little Falls, N.Y., and interviewed Smith. He “admitted to accidentally shooting Sheriff [Deputy] Hall after Hall confronted him as he was taking property from the burglary on Beverly Road back to an awaiting getaway vehicle,” detectives asserted.
“He was just out there doing his job,” said Leggett, noting that Hall wasn’t even supposed to be working that night. “He was filling in for another guy who couldn’t come in.”
The Lyon sisters case: A painstaking search for justice and answers
Smith remained held in Herkimer County jail on Wednesday, according to online records. He is expected to be moved to Montgomery County to face court proceedings.
It is not clear if Smith has retained an attorney in the case. Members of his family could not immediately be reached through phone numbers linked to them.
Hall had grown up in a large family in Virginia, according to his daughter, Philo, and his granddaughter, Carrie Crutcher.
Many of Hall’s family have worked as police officers or firefighters, Philo and Crutcher said. Hall chose a job as a deputy with the Montgomery County Sheriff’s Office in Maryland. Hall and his wife Anna Louise, had two children, Carolyn and Melvin.
Philo remembers that her dad wasn’t just an attentive father and grandfather, he was one who’d literally show up with gallons of milk during snowstorms.
Oct. 23, 1971, a Saturday, Carolyn, then 28, and her young family went to her parents’ home in Wheaton, Md., for a spaghetti dinner. After arriving, the phone rang. It was a co-worker of her dad’s saying he couldn’t make a part-time, security-guard job that evening at the Manor Country Club. He asked Hall if he could sub for him.
“Oh sure, oh sure,” Hall said, Philo remembers hearing.
Hall went to work. The spaghetti dinner went on. Philo and her husband returned to their home in Damascus, Md. Their children, Carrie and Eddie, stayed behind for a planned sleepover at their grandparents.
Later that night, Philo and her husband received a phone call. Her dad had been shot and was at a hospital. They raced there. The prognoses they heard was grim. When they came back the next morning, it was worse.
“There isn’t anything we can do,” Philo remembers one of the doctors telling them. Days later her father died.
Immediately after Hall died, Philo and her family received lots of calls, visitors and help. But as time went on the attention from others waned.
“The second year was just terrible,” Philo said, remembering always asking herself: “Where is everyone?”
At the Montgomery County Police Department, which was handling the case, progress stalled.
Philo and her family moved to Texas. She’d call into the investigations division of the department every six months of so — checking to see if there had been any progress.
Beyond that, Philo tried to remember her dad in life. Everyone morning, when she passed his photograph in her front hall, she’d kiss her fingers and touch his picture. “Good morning dad,” she’d say with a smile. “I’m still here.”
In time, Philo’s photo greetings to her dad were joined by greetings to her mom, who passed in 2005, and her son, who passed in 2007.
She held onto hope that investigators would learn who killed her father. And she hoped the suspect was still alive, so he could be arrested, and face at least some measure of justice before his own passing.
“I kept thinking, if I’m still alive at 79, maybe he is too,” Philo said.
About a year ago, a sergeant leading the department’s cold case squad, Chris Homrock, told her he had assigned the case to two detectives with instructions for them to take a serious dive back into the investigation. Philo started receiving monthly updates. It was clear the detectives held back certain details even as they seemed to have active pursuits going. Philo’s hopes grew.
Last week, Philo was at her Del Webb adult community in McKinney, Tex., playing a dice game — Bunco — with her friends when she received a call from Homrock.
“Can you talk?” he asked.
Philo went into a hallway. Homrock told her they’d arrested a suspect.
“I can’t believe it,” she told him. “Thank you, thank you.”
Philo started crying, a reaction her friends could see through the glass. They came out to check on her.
“These are happy tears!” she told them.
“How could I not be emotional?” Philo later explained in an interview.
Carrie Crutcher, Hall’s granddaughter, said she wonders what the suspect’s life has been like for the past five decades. She said her feelings don’t quite add up to complete sympathy. But her Christian faith, she said, has driven her to at least some level of understanding.
“I can’t imagine his life has been easy,” said Crutcher. | 2022-09-07T18:06:03Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Montgomery County police make arrest in decades old homicide - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/cold-case-killing-solved-montgomery-county/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/cold-case-killing-solved-montgomery-county/ |
ABC’s ‘Claim to Fame’ and the meaninglessness of a celebrity connection
“Claim to Fame” contestant L.C., right, appears in an episode of the reality competition show alongside hosts Kevin and Frankie Jonas. (John Fleenor/ABC)
In ABC’s “Claim to Fame,” celebrity is a double-edged sword. A familial relation to someone famous, be it your aunt Cindy Crawford or your grandfather Chuck Norris, is your golden ticket onto the reality competition show. But the moment you’re selected as one of a dozen anonymous contestants, celebrity becomes a weakness. The easier it is to guess your relative, the sooner you are sent packing.
The goal is to make it 10 weeks in a shared house without anyone sussing out your claim to fame. The premise invites cynicism; granting famous people’s lesser or entirely unknown relatives weekly airtime solely because of those unearned connections could be interpreted as them riding coattails. Add to that the calculated casting of Kevin and Frankie Jonas as hosts, the latter of whom was for years cursed with the nickname “Bonus Jonas,” a reference to his not participating in the Jonas Brothers with his three older siblings. (It should be noted that Kevin, while a host here, is still in the band.)
But with each episode of “Claim to Fame,” which concluded its first season Tuesday night, it becomes clearer that everyone present is keenly aware of the dynamic at play. The show asks its contestants to temporarily erase their relations, to work for the $100,000 prize using their own charm and wit. They reclaim their identities in the public sphere, revealing the futile nature of a fluke celebrity connection.
Casting the show proved difficult — even for Donna Driscoll, who has been in this part of the biz since auditions were sent in on VHS tapes. As the executive vice president of casting and talent at Kinetic Content, a production company whose roster also includes shows such as “Love Is Blind” and “Married at First Sight,” Driscoll led the team that put out a flier advertising their search for the relatives of celebrities. In a recent interview, she described it as depicting “an average Joe on a red carpet.”
Not a single person responded.
“We had to work for every single applicant,” Driscoll said. “When you reach out to people and they are celebrity adjacent, there’s skepticism. They want to make sure it’s a legitimate opportunity. The starting point for us on day one of casting was identifying a list of over 4,000 celebrities we would be interested in trying to research to find their relatives. And from that point, we hit from all directions.”
Driscoll’s team hit up celebrities, their publicists and sometimes the lesser-known relatives themselves. They sent emails and Instagram DMs, eventually generating enough interest to move onto the interview process, during which the team still had to reassure potential contestants nervous about “making sure they were able to represent themselves and their families in a positive way,” Driscoll said.
Hollywood ‘nepo babies’ know what you think of them. They have some thoughts.
In this sense, the show’s first season strays from much of the reality television we have come to know — these contestants were already well-acquainted with the downsides to fame. Their motivations were part of the vetting process, according to Driscoll, who said some contestants wanted to support their families or pursue entrepreneurial dreams. Most didn’t set out with the intention of maximizing their screen-time to launch high-profile careers of their own, as is often the case on shows such as “The Bachelorette,” which preceded “Claim to Fame” in ABC’s Monday night programming block.
That doesn’t mean they wouldn’t be able to. Contestants such as a charismatic woman named L.C. and drawling country boy Logan emerged as fan favorites, partially because of a clever partnership they strike up early in the season. L.C. sails through the later challenges, even without access to phones or the internet. Logan keeps things light, even when he is “as lost as a fart in the wind” (his words).
Both of them make it to the final round by maintaining the mystery of their celebrity connections, aside from a few casually tossed-out clues, such as when (spoiler alert) eventual winner L.C., whose real name is Loreal Chanel, says “Sorry to this man,” a nod to her sister, Keke Palmer. (Runner-up Logan, whose last name is Crosby, is country singer Jason Aldean’s cousin.) Others have it harder. A young woman referred to as Louise, who looks as though someone copy-and-pasted Simone Biles’s face onto her body, only sticks it out because of her ability to win challenges.
Of this season’s 12 contestants, Biles’s sister was the only clear play for a recognizable relative (“We did go back and forth,” Driscoll said of the decision). But even factoring in the indirect involvement of an Olympian, Louise’s prowess in the weekly games lands with more impact. The surprise of the celebrity reveals tends to fade quickly, with more intrigue directed toward the contestants themselves.
“We’re looking for people who are authentic and open books, and who have a great sense of who they are,” Driscoll said. “We’ll see what happens if there is a Season 2 … I have some ideas.” | 2022-09-07T18:19:07Z | www.washingtonpost.com | ABC’s ‘Claim to Fame’ and the meaninglessness of a celebrity connection - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2022/09/07/claim-to-fame-abc-finale/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2022/09/07/claim-to-fame-abc-finale/ |
Toronto’s top award isn’t a juried prize but an audience award as voted on by attendees. Past winners (”Belfast,” “Nomadland,” “JoJo Rabbit”) nearly always go on to be nominated for best-picture at the Oscars, if not win it. This year, several past winners will be returning, including Peter Farrelly, who’ll premiere his Vietnam War tale “The Greatest Beer Run Ever” four years after “Green Book” was a surprise smash at TIFF; Martin McDonagh, back with the friendship-fallout “The Banshees of Inisherin” following 2017's “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri ”; and “La La Land” director Damien Chazelle, who will be in Toronto to talk about (but not screen) his upcoming Hollywood tale “Babylon.”
And, with some 200 features from 63 countries on tap, TIFF is set to once again be a party. For some films, it may also be something of a wake. “Sidney,” Reginald Hudlin’s Apple TV+ Oprah Winfrey-produced documentary about Sidney Poitier, will debut eight months after t he trailblazing actor's death in January at age 94. | 2022-09-07T18:20:22Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Toronto fest roars back to life with Spielberg, 'Knives Out' - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/toronto-fest-roars-back-to-life-with-spielberg-knives-out/2022/09/07/8cda831c-2ed1-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/toronto-fest-roars-back-to-life-with-spielberg-knives-out/2022/09/07/8cda831c-2ed1-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
ST. LOUIS — A murder-for-hire trial involving former stars of the reality TV show “Welcome to Sweetie Pie’s” got underway in St. Louis, where prosecutors allege that James “Tim” Norman arranged his nephew's killing because he needed money from a life insurance policy that he took out on the victim. | 2022-09-07T18:20:28Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Trial begins in killing of Miss Sweetie Pie's grandson - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/trial-begins-in-killing-of-miss-sweetie-pies-grandson/2022/09/07/97e29f58-2ed4-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/trial-begins-in-killing-of-miss-sweetie-pies-grandson/2022/09/07/97e29f58-2ed4-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
The perfect setting for a difficult message
President Biden delivers remarks on Sept. 1 at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. (Matt Slocum/AP)
Regarding Eugene Robinson’s Sept. 3 op-ed, “To sound the alarm on democracy, Biden chose the perfect stage”:
Yes, it was the perfect setting. But for different reasons than those stated by Mr. Robinson and President Biden.
The president delivered a fierce calling-out of and call to act against political subterfuge and violence inspired by the “MAGA failure to stop a peaceful transfer of power.”
But he missed an easy layup by failing to note that just off-screen, 50 yards to his right, was Congress Hall, where George Washington shook John Adams’s hand and peacefully transferred power for the first time in modern history.
Mr. Biden declared, “I believe America is at an inflection point, one of those moments that determine the shape of everything that’s to come after.” What easy rhetorical jujitsu it would have been to use those same words for March 4, 1797. The aspirations of the founders to place power in the people might have been ratified behind those now red-lit windows, but they weren’t actualized until our first head of state voluntarily returned to private citizenship.
We forget at our own peril that history is full of those who, having successfully led a revolution, crown themselves king for life. We mustn’t be so naive as to think that all power seekers will behave as Washington did.
Mr. Biden couldn’t have picked a more apropos example to sway reddish America than that of the father of our country and what he did on that “sacred ground.” A perfect stage.
Randall Freed, Philadelphia
I read with a sense of deja vu the Sept. 3 Style article “Biden warned of democracy collapsing. TV played reruns.” I remember similar conversations in CNN’s Washington Bureau, where I was a writer and producer from 1981 to 1985, about when we should air Ronald Reagan’s speeches. It was then and is now appropriate to broadcast a president’s speeches about policy and national emergencies.
We decided on a case-by-case basis when a speech met those criteria, so I understand why the networks did not broadcast Mr. Biden’s speech. ABC, CBS and NBC saw his warnings about former president Donald Trump and MAGA Republicans as “political” and a clarion call for Trump supporters to seek “equal time” during a political campaign season. (I have not forgotten Fox. Nobody would have expected to see Biden’s speech there.)
Although I understand the networks’ time-honored reasoning, I do wish all news organizations would remember an equally time-honored requirement that news be “unusual.” The raving reactions of Mr. Trump and his minions to every revelation about the former president’s malfeasance do not qualify because they are not unusual. What would be unusual — and thus news — would be Mr. Trump’s acknowledgment of his 2020 defeat or his enablers’ apologies for abetting his “stop the steal” lies while setting up their own steal apparatus for 2022, 2024 and beyond.
Janet Hill Keefer, Pittsboro, N.C. | 2022-09-07T18:20:46Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Opinion | The perfect setting for a difficult message - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/perfect-setting-difficult-message/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/perfect-setting-difficult-message/ |
South Carolina judge halts use of firing squad, electric chair
A South Carolina judge ruled that death by firing squad and the electric chair are cruel and unusual punishment and violate the state Constitution. (Kinard Lisbon/South Carolina Department of Corrections via AP)
A South Carolina judge ruled Tuesday that death by firing squad and the electric chair violated the state’s Constitution, calling them cruel and unusual punishment in an order halting the planned executions of four death row inmates.
The decision invalidates a law the South Carolina legislature passed last year that was designed to restart executions after a decade-long pause that officials blame on a shortage of lethal injection drugs. The law forces death row inmates to choose between firing squad or electric chair, with the electric chair as the default method if they do not select one.
“In 2021, South Carolina turned back the clock and became the only state in the country in which a person may be forced into the electric chair if he refuses to elect how he will die,” Circuit Court Judge Jocelyn Newman wrote. “In doing so, the General Assembly ignored advances in scientific research and evolving standards of humanity and decency.”
State officials are expected to appeal the decision. “We will assess the order and determine the next step,” Chrysti Shain, spokeswoman for the state Department of Corrections, told the State newspaper.
Mississippi, Oklahoma and Utah are the only other states that allow execution by firing squad. Electrocution is allowed in Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Kentucky, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Tennessee.
South Carolina has not executed any death row inmates since 2011 because of what officials describe as an inability to secure the chemicals used in lethal injection.
State lawmakers voted in spring 2021 to authorize death by firing squad and electrocution when lethal injection is not an option.
Soon after, four inmates sued the state, alleging that both methods of execution were unconstitutional. They argued that the legislation approved by lawmakers was “retroactive,” violating their due process rights, and that their right to decide their manner of execution was “rendered meaningless.”
All four plaintiffs had been convicted of at least one murder and sentenced to death between 1997 and 2002.
In an August trial, Judge Newman heard from two expert witnesses for the plaintiffs who testified that execution by firing squad or electrocution could cause a prolonged, painful death. Expert witnesses from the state cast doubt on that assessment, saying death by either method was rapid.
The judge also heard from Colie Rushton, a corrections official who developed the state’s protocol for death by firing squad. According to the judge’s ruling, Rushton testified that he relied on internet research “about historical uses of firing squads and the FBI’s testing of certain ammunition.” He said he also spoke with Utah officials about their use of a firing squad.
Rushton acknowledged in court, however, that he had not consulted with any doctors, firearms experts or ballistics experts, according to the ruling.
The judge found that death by firing squad amounted to torture because it could produce pain and possibly lingering death. She came to a similar conclusion about electrocution, saying it was possible for the inmate to experience pain from electrical burns, heat, oxygen deprivation and muscle spasms.
Both forms of execution were unusual, Newman said, because they accounted for a vanishingly small portion of executions performed over the past century.
Execution by firing squad, she said, is “a reversion to a historic method of execution that has never before been used by our State and is not used in the overwhelming majority of other states.” She added that electrocution is “at a minimum, no longer viewed as a reliable method of administering a painless death, and the underlying assumptions upon which the electric chair is based, dating back to the 1800s, have since been disproven.”
South Carolina’s Constitution contains broader protections against cruel and unusual punishment than the U.S. Constitution, explicitly barring “corporal” punishment that mutilates the human body.
“A method of punishment which mutilates the human body, such as the firing squad, is violative of the South Carolina Constitution,” the judge wrote,” adding that “the South Carolina electric chair causes grave damage to the body.” | 2022-09-07T18:36:37Z | www.washingtonpost.com | South Carolina judge stops use of firing squad, electric chair - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/07/south-carolina-firing-squad-electric-chair/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/07/south-carolina-firing-squad-electric-chair/ |
Liz Truss has one thing in her favor: Her character
British Prime Minister Liz Truss leaves 10 Downing Street on Sept. 7. (Frank Augstein/AP)
Liz Truss takes office in difficult times. The new British prime minister, the fourth Conservative to hold the position in 12 years, will lead a party that is wracked with infighting. Britain also faces many serious challenges, any one of which would test a leader’s skill: war in Ukraine, a looming winter of discontent over energy prices and shortages, threats to the union with Scotland and Northern Ireland.
No one should be surprised if she fails, and many expect she will. But there’s one reason she should instead be tipped to succeed: her character.
Truss is not to the manor born. Like Britain’s first female prime minister, Margaret Thatcher, Truss comes from a middle-class family and was educated at government-funded schools until her merits led her to the University of Oxford. Like Thatcher, she knows her success is earned, not bestowed. She climbed up the legendarily greasy pole of politics on her own determination and wits.
That combination — courage and cunning — happen to be exactly the attributes possessed by the most successful statesman in U.S. history: Abraham Lincoln. The president’s law partner, William Herndon, said of his famous friend, “His ambition was a little engine that knew no rest.” That engine powered Lincoln’s rise from nothing to the top.
Lincoln’s ability to govern other ambitious personalities was also key to his triumph. British soccer pundits call this man-management skills, and historian Doris Kearns Goodwin’s chronicle of Lincoln’s ability to maneuver through factious intra-party politics paints a picture of a master craftsman at work.
Truss’s rise suggests she has similar qualities. She is only 47, and is the third and youngest woman to serve as prime minister. She didn’t get to the top so fast by accident. Working her way up post by post, she slowly built her own network of allies and positioned herself so that others would see her potential. She sought the premiership even though she was not the overwhelming favorite of her colleagues. Indeed, former finance minister Rishi Sunak received more votes from Conservative MPs, but Truss’s standing with party members, cemented with strong commitments to party dogmas on lower taxes and deregulation, saw her through.
Truss is already showing man-management skills by appointing a cabinet almost exclusively from her own backers. A weaker person would have sued for peace with Sunak’s camp, bringing many of them into the fold. But that would have produced only a paper unity that would surely have been tested at the first hint of adversity. Better to weather the coming storm with her own team and create party unity later on her own terms.
Truss will need to show similar resolve and dexterity in the coming months. She has stated she will pursue economic growth through tax cuts, reform, and investments in roads, schools, hospitals and other key infrastructure. The resulting deficits could easily unsettle markets and lead to a run on the pound. Truss, like Thatcher and Ronald Reagan, will have to stick with her core plan during the early days when it might appear to be all pain and no gain.
She will nonetheless need to be flexible in dealing with the inevitable curveballs thrown at her. Strength can easily blend into stubbornness. She should note that Reagan raised taxes in 1982 after cutting them in 1981. He did this because he needed to buy time for his economic program to work and thus bargained away some of his tax cuts for businesses to cement his rate cuts for individuals. Truss will need to be similarly willing to cede some ground to keep the high ground for herself.
Truss’s personal history shows she may grasp this. She once was a Liberal Democrat but switched to the Tories. She opposed Brexit during the 2016 referendum but backed Brexit once her side had lost. She did not join other Tory Remainers in their revolt against Prime Minister Boris Johnson over his proposed Brexit deal, thereby securing herself as the once-promising careers of the Remainers all washed out to sea. She must keep her eyes firmly on her goal rather than on the means she chose to get there.
Niccolò Machiavelli said that a prince must be both a lion and a fox, strong enough to fight enemies and smart enough to avoid snares. He also said that princes should permit few to genuinely see their inner selves. Truss, an enigma to many in a party that is happier to defer to the posh than follow the clever, may be just the princess Britain needs. | 2022-09-07T18:58:24Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Opinion | Liz Truss has one thing in her favor: Her character - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/liz-truss-british-prime-minister-character/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/liz-truss-british-prime-minister-character/ |
Egyptians on holiday walk near the Mediterranean Sea in Marsa Matrouh on Aug. 10, 2022. (Amr Nabil/AP)
The climate in countries such as Egypt, Greece and Saudi Arabia is projected to warm by about 5 degrees Celsius (9 degrees Fahrenheit) by the end of the century, the study said. Such a rapid increase will cause longer heatwaves, more severe drought and frequent sandstorms from the beaches of Lebanon to the deserts of Iran.
The changes will also impact vegetation and freshwater resources, raising the risk of armed conflict, the report said. It was first published in June in the Review of Geophysics but was recently updated to include new global climate projections ahead of the United Nations climate summit in November.
The study’s authors, including researchers from the Cyprus Institute’s Climate and Atmosphere Research Center and the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry in Germany, blamed growing greenhouse emissions for the region’s rising temperatures. The area’s arid landscapes and low water levels also make it more vulnerable to climate change, they said.
“In the E.U, we are seeing a declining trend of emissions, but this is not the case for the Middle East," Zittis said in a phone interview. Most countries in the region, he said, are committed to the Paris Agreement, which aims to limit global warming in this century to 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit (1.5 degrees Celsius).
The report emphasizes the pressing need to “decarbonize” energy and transportation sectors in the Middle East by introducing more widespread use of renewable energy, even as the economies of several countries in the region, such as Qatar and Saudi Arabia, rely heavily on “fossil fuel exploitation.”
Sandstorm wave sweeps Middle East, sending thousands to hospitals
The researchers found that summers in the region have become drier and that extreme precipitation and rainfall have occurred in less frequent but stronger spurts. The heatwaves will restrict outdoor activities and impact key Mediterranean crops such as olives, wheat and barley.
In southern Iraq, where temperatures have increased by 3.2 degrees Fahrenheit (1.8 degrees Celsius) over the past three decades, families have sold their belongings and relocated to urban centers like Basra, the region’s largest city.
Zittis says that the transition will not be easy and that “multi-year droughts” and competition for resources will trigger conflicts. “Where there is social instability, this could be the result of climate change,” he said. | 2022-09-07T19:02:44Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Middle East region heating up twice as fast as rest of globe - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/middle-east-mediterranean-climate-change/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/middle-east-mediterranean-climate-change/ |
The system, which is designed to destroy the SLS rocket if it veers off course and threatens population centers, needs to be recharged every few weeks.
NASA postponed the launch of its massive Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft to the moon after a series of problems during two separate attempts last week. (Jonathan Newton/The Washington Post)
Like all big rockets, NASA’s Space Launch System is outfitted with powerful engines and thousands of gallons of highly combustible propellants capable of lifting a booster the size of a tall building off the Earth and traveling many times the speed of sound out of the atmosphere.
It also carries onboard bomb.
Formally known as the Flight Termination System, it is a detonation system designed to destroy the rocket in case it starts to veer wildly off course and threaten people on the ground. In the dangerous world of rocketry, it’s a vital and ubiquitous safety component, operated by the military. But it’s also creating a bit of a headache for NASA as it struggles to launch the SLS rocket for the first time.
The Space Force requires the batteries on the SLS’ termination system to be recharged every so often to ensure they are in good working order. The problem for NASA is that can only be done in the rocket’s assembly building, meaning they would need to perform the arduous work of rolling the 322-foot-tall rocket off the pad, where it is now, back to the building four miles away — a journey that can take about eight hours each way.
That would further delay a launch that last week was waived off twice because of other technical problems, including a massive leak of the liquid hydrogen the rocket uses for fuel.
NASA already got the Space Force to extend the flight-termination battery requirement from 20 to 25 days so that it could attempt a launch in the latter part of its last launch period, which ended Tuesday.
Now, NASA is in discussions with the Space Force for a waiver that would allow the time frame to be extended yet again. But this time the waiver would have to extend the initial 20-day requirement to over some 40 days, since the earliest NASA could attempt a launch is a two-week period that begins Sept. 19.
The launch would be the first in NASA’s Artemis campaign to eventually return astronauts to the lunar surface. This first mission would send the Orion spacecraft, without any astronauts on board, in orbit around the moon. It would be followed by a crewed flight that would again orbit, but not land on the moon, perhaps in 2024, with a landing to come in 2025 or 2026.
After years of delays and setbacks, NASA officials are eager to get the first mission off the ground. But they’ve struggled with a series of issues. The first attempt was scrubbed because of a bad engine sensor reading. Then, on Saturday, they could not control a large hydrogen leak and said there was also a sudden increase in the pressure of the fuel line that caught officials by surprise.
Now, it’s struggling with the constraints of the termination system, and it is not clear whether the Space Force’s Space Launch Delta 45, which oversees what’s known as the Eastern Range, would grant the extension.
“The first thing is to protect the public and the Eastern Range takes that mandate to protect the public very seriously,” said Wayne Hale, a former NASA space shuttle flight director who now chairs a NASA advisory committee. Rockets, he said in an interview, are “effectively a bomb, it’s a huge bomb” and the wing goes to great lengths to ensure the termination systems are working before they allow launches to occur.
“They are consummate professionals,” said Wayne Monteith, the former commander of the 45th Space Wing. “If something goes wrong, they are they team you want on console.”
NASA said Tuesday evening that engineers would replace the seal that malfunctioned during the hydrogen leak on the launchpad, instead of rolling it back to the assembly building. That would allow it to test the seal by running the liquid hydrogen, which is kept at minus 423 degrees Fahrenheit, through it.
“Performing that work at the pad also allows teams to gather as much data as possible to understand the cause of the issue,” NASA said in a statement.
There is a downside, though — the longer the rocket is outside, the longer it is exposed to the fickle weather that is common along the Florida Coast this time of year.
“We are mindful that we're out there in the elements when we're at the pad,” Mike Sarafin, the Artemis mission manager, told reporters after the scrub on Saturday.
While it does the repair work, NASA said it would “set up an enclosure around the work area to protect the hardware from the weather and other environmental conditions, but enables engineers to test the repair under cryogenic, or supercold, conditions.”
It noted that in order “to meet the current requirement” the Space Force has for the flight termination batteries, it “would need to roll the rocket and spacecraft back” to the assembly building to reset the batteries.
If that is the case, NASA may not be able to attempt another launch until the next opportunity, a roughly two-week period that begins Oct. 4. The SLS’ ability to launch is determined by the position of the Earth and moon, since the Orion spacecraft cannot be in darkness for more than 90 minutes at a time. Its solar arrays need to stay illuminated so that they can provide power to the spacecraft and ensure it maintains the correct temperature. | 2022-09-07T19:07:00Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Timing of Artemis launch may depend on emergency detonation system - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/09/07/artemis-launch-nasa-detonation-system/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2022/09/07/artemis-launch-nasa-detonation-system/ |
‘Barbarian’ turns paint-by-number horror elements into something more
Zach Cregger’s twisty, clever script elevates this story about a double-booked Airbnb
Georgina Campbell in “Barbarian.” (20th Century Studios)
“Barbarian” has a typical horror movie setup. Tess (Georgina Campbell) is in Detroit for a job interview. On a dark and stormy night, she arrives at her Airbnb, but somebody else is already there. Keith (Bill Skarsgard), who rented the house from a different service, tries to be helpful, but he’s awkward and a little creepy. He suggests they both spend the night there. If you were a young woman traveling alone, would you stay in a double-booked rental with someone whose sunken eyes make him look like Steve Buscemi’s unsettling character in “Fargo”?
Cregger, who was born in Arlington, is part of the comedy troupe the Whitest Kids U’Know. But while “Barbarian” is dryly funny, his foray into fright isn’t exactly a horror comedy, and that’s a good thing.
In the end, one wonders who the barbarian really is. Is it Detroit? Is it America? Is it us? Through its parade of screams, “Barbarian” asks an important question: Can we trust anyone to keep an eye out for us — parents, law enforcement — or do we need to learn to fend for ourselves?
R. At area theaters. Contains some strong violence and gore, disturbing images, strong language throughout and nudity. 102 minutes. | 2022-09-07T19:07:07Z | www.washingtonpost.com | 'Barbarian' review: Clever horror movie about a double-booked Airbnb - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/movies/2022/09/07/barbarian-movie-review/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/movies/2022/09/07/barbarian-movie-review/ |
FILE - Brian McGrory addresses staff at The Boston Globe after being named the paper’s next top editor, Dec. 20, 2012, succeeding Martin Baron, who became editor of the Washington Post. McGrory, under whose leadership The Boston Globe won three newsroom Pulitzer Prizes, said Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2022, that he is stepping down after 10 years at the helm to become chair of Boston University’s journalism department. (Essdras M Suarez/The Boston Globe via AP, File) | 2022-09-07T19:50:37Z | www.washingtonpost.com | McGrory, Boston Globe's top editor, says he is stepping down - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/mcgrory-boston-globes-top-editor-says-he-is-stepping-down/2022/09/07/69526ed6-2edc-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/mcgrory-boston-globes-top-editor-says-he-is-stepping-down/2022/09/07/69526ed6-2edc-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
California’s capital has witnessed its highest temperature, wettest day and longest dry spell in the past 12 months, all made more probable by climate change
Analysis by Matthew Cappucci
A temperature sign seen during a heat wave in Sacramento on Tuesday. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg News)
California’s capital experienced its hottest day ever observed Tuesday — hitting an unprecedented 116 degrees and exceeding previous September records by a landslide of seven degrees. This latest peak, amid a historic heat wave torching the state, follows a year of significant extremes in Sacramento: In the past 12 months, before this record hot day, the state capital experienced its wettest day on record last October, an event bookended by a record-long dry stretch that wreaked havoc on agriculture throughout California’s Central Valley.
The most recent heat has fueled dangerous wildfire weather, and there’s continued risk of power shortages. Rolling blackouts have been a constant threat in the Golden State in the past several days, as the state’s grid operator experiences record demand.
It’s all part of a past year that’s been meteorological hell for the Central Valley — and Sacramento has been the scene of a bingo card of climate-fueled weather hazards. The extreme droughts and deluges are two sides of the same coin — all of these records made more probable by a warming planet.
Tuesday’s heat record
The average early-September high in Sacramento is about 90 degrees — hot but manageable in a climate of low humidity. Highs have warmed about 1.4 degrees since the late 1940s, and despite little change in overall yearly rainfall, Septembers are trending drier.
Before this ongoing heat wave, downtown Sacramento had never logged a temperature higher than 109 degrees during the month of September. Then it hit 113 degrees Monday and a staggering 116 degrees Tuesday.
“Obviously we’re starting to see temperatures like this happening in September and October, but it’s more like what we’d see in July or August,” said Emily Heller, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service in Sacramento.
Beating a monthly record by 7 degrees is virtually unheard of — it hasn’t happened there since the 1940s, and back then it was possible only because many records were “younger” and easier to surpass. It’s analogous to running a marathon and winning by 10 minutes or more.
Here's one way to visualize just how extreme this CA heatwave is - Sacramento has a GHCN station with data back to 1877.
It goes without saying that a hotter world will lend itself to more frequent, intense and long-duration heat extremes. Sacramento hasn’t set a monthly cold-temperature record since 1999 but has logged 10 monthly high temperature records since then.
The graph below illustrates the intersection of weather and climate quite well. There will always exist an inherent degree of natural variability in weather, but human-caused climate change is skewing things hotter. The blue curve marks the distribution of high-temperature observations from 1950 to 1980, and the red curve represents 1991 to 2021.
Notice the trend — the red curve is just a bit further to the right, which suddenly translates to considerably more days in the 94 degree-plus range. That’s the crux of climate change — it’s nonlinear. In other words, a subtle warming of a degree or two translates to perhaps exponentially more high-end extremes. Sacramento is seeing that firsthand.
Drought and flooding — two sides of the same coin
A favorite false talking point among some who reject climate science is that opposites such as drought and flood cannot both be caused by the same phenomenon. But in fact, drought and flooding — both of which have had major effects in Sacramento over the past year — are intimately linked by a premise called Clausius-Clapeyron.
Here’s what the premise says: For every degree Fahrenheit the air temperature warms, the atmosphere can hold about 4 percent more water. It’s an exponential relationship. When moisture is available, as in a saturated environment, i.e. a rainstorm, precipitation rates and totals tend to be more extreme. In the absence of moisture, the air can more efficiently evaporate what little remains in the ground, depleting moisture from the landscape and reinforcing drought. That allows the air to warm further, which entrenches the cyclical process even more.
It comes as no surprise that the past year has included Sacramento’s longest drought on record and most severe one-day rain total. Between March 20 and Oct. 17, 2021, not a drop of rain fell on Sacramento — a streak of 212 days. The previous longest dry spell had stretched 194 days and ended in November 1880.
California’s drought is also leading to more extreme fire behavior and larger, more destructive fires.
The state’s 2021 dry streak ended with flooding. Moderate rain fell Oct. 21, 22 and 23, but then 5.44 inches came down on the 24th alone. It was Sacramento’s wettest day on record — especially bizarre considering September averages only 0.93 inches. Another 0.37 inches fell the next day.
Some research suggests that slower west-to-east movement of the jet stream is in part contributing to weather patterns that get “stuck,” making it easier for the same conditions — for example, prolonged rainfall — to linger before the weather changes abruptly.
No single weather event is caused by climate change — but the intensity, frequency, duration and coverage of many extremes are boosted by human influence.
On a typical day, most of us won’t notice things are a degree or two warmer than they were 50 years ago. But suddenly that degree or two manifests in more broken records when outlier events are shifted into unprecedented territory.
There is evidence to indicate the fundamental patterns of our atmosphere are shifting, resulting in myriad hazards that are challenging communities. Sacramento is proof. And as precipitation and temperature extremes become even more pronounced and dramatic, the impact on communities and everyday life may continue to grow more quickly than society can adapt to. | 2022-09-07T19:50:54Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Driest, wettest, hottest: Sacramento’s troubling trifecta of extremes - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2022/09/07/sacramento-record-heat-drought-rain-climate/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2022/09/07/sacramento-record-heat-drought-rain-climate/ |
(Scott Suchman for The Washington Post)
My verdict? As faithful re-creations as they are, I’d put all three of the new Doritos in the category of interesting-but-not-addictive. They remind me that there’s a reason that ketchup and mustard — and tamarind chutney, for that matter — are condiments and not main dishes. They’re the a snack-world version of Jennifer Coolidge — delightful as a character actress, but do I want to watch her for two hours in a lead role? Eh, probably not. | 2022-09-07T19:51:12Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Doritos' ketchup and mustard chips nail the condiments' flavors - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/food/2022/09/07/doritos-ketchup-mustard/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/food/2022/09/07/doritos-ketchup-mustard/ |
Why did trump have these files at Mar-a-Lago files? The Post answers your questions.
The FBI has recovered more than 300 classified documents from Mar-a-Lago this year, according to government court filings, after months of negotiations with advisers to former president Donald Trump, a subpoena and a court-approved search. Some of the seized documents detail top-secret U.S. operations so closely guarded that many senior national security officials are kept in the dark about them. One included details of a foreign government’s military defenses, including its nuclear capabilities.
The documents were found mixed with thousands of unclassified items at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Florida residence and private club, more than a year after he left the White House. They could be used as evidence in the government’s ongoing investigation into possible mishandling of classified information, as well as possible hiding, tampering or destruction of government records. A federal judge has agreed to a request from Trump to appoint an outside expert to examine the documents and determine whether any should be shielded from investigators because of attorney-client or executive privilege.
What questions do you have about the Mar-a-Lago documents and the FBI’s criminal investigation? Post reporters Josh Dawsey, Devlin Barrett and Carol Leonnig will answer your questions at 4 p.m. Eastern.
Takeaways from the redacted affidavit used for the Mar-a-Lago search
Sign up for The 7, a weekday briefing that will catch you up on the most important and interesting stories from The Post in three minutes or less. | 2022-09-07T19:51:18Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Q&A: Post reporters answer your questions about the Mar-a-Lago files - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/09/07/trump-file-questions-answers/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/09/07/trump-file-questions-answers/ |
The problem with GOP extremists isn’t what they thought in college
Blake Masters speaks to voters in June 2022. (Caitlin O’Hara for The Washington Post) (Caitlin O'Hara/for The Washington Post)
In political campaigns, we decide who will make decisions on extraordinarily important matters with far-reaching consequences, and we do this by focusing in large part on an endless stream of triviality, micro-controversy and faux outrage.
So whenever you learn some juicy new piece of information about a candidate, you have to ask: Does this matter? What does it really tell us?
Those are the questions to ask about a newly released trove of emails written by Arizona Republican Senate candidate Blake Masters, which were obtained by the HuffPost and Mother Jones. Masters’s campaign has not commented on their veracity.
They reportedly come from Masters’s time as a college student, when he was writing to fellow residents in a vegan co-op about a number of political controversies. The emails show he expressed skepticism about the official story of 9/11, declared “the United States government is fascist” and railed angrily against a health inspector’s negative report on the co-op’s facilities (to which another resident replied, “I suggest we cut the public yipping and go clean the kitchen”).
That last exchange could be a good summary of Masters’s one-time libertarian philosophy — as convinced of its own righteousness as it is eager to escape the responsibilities of living in a society with other human beings. But the larger point is this: While it may be interesting to see what candidates were like in their youth as a way of understanding their evolution, we can’t let it distract us from the more important question of who they are today.
Masters is only 36 years old, so college wasn’t all that long ago for him. And this isn’t the first time something embarrassing from those days has come to light. Over the summer, a hodgepodge of his online comments about the World Wars, al-Qaeda and immigration became public, causing him momentary embarrassment.
Were you writing a biography of Masters, these might provide some valuable insight into his personal and intellectual journey. But it’s also problematic to believe that when we come upon information that is 1) heretofore unknown or secret, and 2) contradicts in some way what the candidate is saying now, then we’ve gotten closer to discovering who they really are.
That is driven by an assumption that what candidates say on the campaign trail is all artifice and ruse, meant to deceive and manipulate the electorate. Once they win office, that hidden self will supposedly emerge.
The biggest problem with that assumption — and it’s one that guides much of political coverage — is that it can distract you from what’s really important, which is often right in front of your face.
So let’s consider the actual, contemporary Blake Masters. He’s a radical extremist who says “Trump won in 2020”; propagates the racist “great replacement” theory that says Democrats are importing non-White immigrants to “change the demographics of this country”; and supports fetal “personhood,” which would legally make every abortion an act of murder.
Masters’s rhetoric is saturated with fantasies of violence, not only the violence that he alleges liberals are planning to inflict on conservatives, but also the violence conservatives may need to carry out to defend themselves. In one ad, Masters proudly shows off one of his guns, and says: “It wasn’t designed for hunting. This is designed to kill people.”
And who knows, conservatives might have to do just that to defend their freedom. Asked about the problem of gun violence, Masters put the blame on “people in Chicago, St. Louis shooting each other. Very often, you know, Black people, frankly.” Though Masters says he does not like Nazis, Nazis seem to like him.
As a politician, Masters is essentially the creation of controversial billionaire Peter Thiel. As a law student at Stanford, Masters sat in on a class Thiel was teaching, and it changed his life. He became Thiel’s protégé, co-authoring a book of Thiel’s deep thoughts and taking posts atop Thiel’s hedge fund and foundation. Thiel bankrolled his Senate run with millions of dollars.
Like Thiel, Masters has moved away from the libertarianism of his youth and now embraces aggressive government action to serve the interest of favored groups and punish those he sees as enemies. Along with Thiel’s other electoral project, J.D. Vance of Ohio, Masters is at the forefront of a new kind of conservatism that is intensely combative and populist (at least in targeting the particular “elites” it dislikes) and barely conceals its contempt for democracy.
He’s also one example of a common species among Republicans today that can be hard to figure out. While there is no shortage of clowns and halfwits among the party’s candidates and elected officials, there are also a good number like Masters: well educated, clearly intelligent, yet eager to propagate laughable conspiracy theories and encourage the party’s most deranged extremists.
Do figures such as Masters or Sen. Ted Cruz (Tex.) believe the things they say? That’s the kind of question that revelations of years-old emails are supposed to help answer. But it’s the wrong question. That’s impossible to determine definitively, and in the end, it doesn’t really matter.
We don’t have to go searching for the hidden Blake Masters, because the actual Blake Masters is right in front of us. And it’s more than scary enough. | 2022-09-07T19:51:42Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Opinion | The problem with GOP extremists isn't what they thought in college - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/blake-masters-college-emails/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/blake-masters-college-emails/ |
Liz Truss needs to succeed — for Britain and for the world
British Prime Minister Liz Truss speaks during her first weekly Prime Minister's Questions session at the House of Commons in London on Sept. 7. (Jessica Taylor/UK Parliament/AFP via Getty Images)
From the moment she became Britain’s new leader Tuesday, Prime Minister Liz Truss’s days in office seemed numbered. She assumed the job after winning a contest to succeed former prime minister Boris Johnson as head of the U.K.'s Conservative Party, which has held power for 12 years. Just once since World War II has any British party clung to power for more than 13 years — when the Conservatives under prime ministers Margaret Thatcher and John Major governed for 18 years, until 1997. Ms. Truss, with elections coming no later than January 2025, faces bleak prospects of propelling the party again to that mark, or anything close to it, unless she can revive one of the industrialized world’s wobbliest major economies.
She begins with an array of disadvantages, not least her low standing in national polls. Many doubt Ms. Truss’s core values and resolve given her shape-shifting stance on the country’s most polarizing recent issue, its “Brexit” from the European Union, which she opposed before embracing it. Add to that her most pressing tasks: taming soaring inflation, especially in natural gas prices; lifting anemic growth in income and productivity; solving a severe labor shortage; and facing down a wave of strikes hitting postal and train service, ports, schools, health care and garbage collection. All of that is on her plate, along with the Bank of England’s projection that a recession is coming before year’s end.
As Britain’s Financial Times put it, Ms. Truss “will have to be great just to be good.”
Henry Olsen: Liz Truss has one thing in her favor: Her character
She deserved credit as foreign secretary, her most recent job, for showing backbone, along with Mr. Johnson, in opposing Russian President Vladimir Putin’s blood-soaked aggression against Ukraine in the face of Kremlin energy supply blackmail. Her success in office will depend partly on her ability to continue holding firm and rallying Europe to do likewise, even as the pain of Russia’s oil and gas squeeze intensifies this winter and beyond.
Truss has at least one crucial advantage, which is the ease with which she should clear the low bar for dignity, seriousness and truth-telling set by Mr. Johnson, her friend and political ally. His scandals, clownery and impressionistic handling of facts finally wore thin with his own party’s stalwarts, as they did with much of the British public. To the extent that Ms. Truss can reestablish the respectable comportment that Brits and others have long expected from No. 10 Downing Street, she may have an early, if modest, leg up.
Her biggest test will be to reinvigorate the British economy, whose per capita income has grown at less than half the rate of the E.U.'s since Britons voted in 2016 to leave the bloc. Here there is cause for skepticism. She has pledged more government spending along with tax cuts, which may only accelerate the inflationary spiral that Brits refer to as a cost-of-living crisis. And she has floated, then walked back, a proposal to rein in the Bank of England’s independent decision-making on setting interest rates, a bad idea that would further shake faith in Britain’s economy.
Still, give Ms. Truss credit for a preternatural work ethic, a feature she shares with her late idol, Ms. Thatcher. Like the Iron Lady, Ms. Truss has often been underestimated. The United States should help Ms. Truss exceed expectations, for the sake of the special relationship with Britain, the fight in Ukraine and the global economy’s health. | 2022-09-07T19:51:49Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Opinion | Under new Prime Minister Liz Truss, the U.K. needs economic revival - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/new-prime-minister-liz-truss-economy/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/new-prime-minister-liz-truss-economy/ |
Death-penalty opponents protest outside the Oklahoma governor's mansion last month. (AP Photo/Sue Ogrocki)
Oklahoma’s enthusiasm for capital punishment has been a cruel trauma not only for some inmates it has put to death in recent years but also for the state itself. Such is its track record for botched and excruciatingly painful executions using supposedly humane lethal injections — ordeals that have left condemned people writhing and moaning on a gurney, and, in one case, a man saying his body was “on fire” — that the state paused the procedure for nearly seven years, until last year, in an effort to avoid another instance of what many regarded as torture.
Ignoring that barbarous history, officials are now ramping up for what would be a state-sponsored killing spree with few modern antecedents in this country, except in Texas. When James Coddington was put to death last month for a murder he committed in 1997 — despite a clemency recommendation by the state’s Pardon and Parole Board — it marked the first of 25 executions Oklahoma has scheduled over the coming 28 months.
That grim timetable reflects the zeal of Oklahoma Attorney General John O’Connor, who requested the dates, and other state Republicans despite the increasing rarity of capital punishment across the country. Nationwide, the number of executions plummeted to just 11 in 2021, from 85 at the turn of the century. At the same time, death sentences across the United States have plunged by more than 90 percent over the past two decades; just 18 were imposed last year.
In Oklahoma, Republican Gov. Kevin Stitt ignored demands even from some in his own party that he grant clemency to Mr. Coddington on grounds he had changed and felt remorse. He has postponed, but only for several months, the execution of another man, Richard Glossip, whose guilt has been questioned based on new evidence. A law firm that reviewed the case at the request of state lawmakers from both parties concluded that another man was likely solely responsible for the murder of which Mr. Glossip was convicted.
In justifying the state’s ambitious execution agenda, Mr. Stitt cited a 2016 referendum in which Oklahomans voted nearly 2-1 to preserve the death penalty, an outcome the governor said was driven by “justice and safety.” If safety was one goal, however, keeping capital punishment intact did little to advance it — in the first four years after the vote — the latest for which data is available — the state’s homicide rate crept higher, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
As for justice, Americans hold divergent views on the death penalty. There is little doubt, however, that even many advocates were shocked by a tableau of ghastly recent executions in Oklahoma. They included the 2014 death of Clayton Lockett, who writhed and moaned for 43 minutes when he was subjected to lethal injection; he finally had a heart attack and died. Last October, when executions resumed after a years-long hiatus, a condemned man, John Grant, vomited and experienced full-body convulsions.
This stomach-turning history compelled the state to halt executions once. Even after nearly seven years, its officials should not be so grotesquely eager to embrace an inherently inhumane form of punishment. | 2022-09-07T19:51:55Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Opinion | Oklahoma's grotesque plan: 25 executions in 28 months - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/oklahoma-death-penalty-executions-torture/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/oklahoma-death-penalty-executions-torture/ |
By Louise Melling
Police officers stand in front of a temporary security fence at the U.S. Supreme Court building on June 21. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Under the banner of religion, an employer is asserting a right to deny its workers insurance coverage for drugs that prevent HIV— an argument that just Wednesday found favor in federal court. Religiously affiliated schools posit a right to fire unmarried pregnant women. And taxpayer-funded child placement agencies turn away families seeking to foster or adopt because they are Jewish, Catholic or a same-sex couple.
The scope of these claims has also mushroomed. When we began our monitoring, most claimants sought to restrict women’s access to abortion and contraception and deny wedding services to same-sex couples. Now, in the name of religion, businesses assert a right to refuse to hire LGBTQ people, public school teachers a right to misgender students and others a right to discriminate against people with disabilities and terminally ill patients exploring end of life options.
Consider an example currently making headlines from Texas. On Wednesday, a U.S. district judge accepted the argument of a for-profit businesses that it has a right to deny employees insurance coverage for pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP), pioneering drugs used to prevent the transmission of HIV that can cost as much as $20,000 a year. The employer argued that buying insurance that covers this treatment — as required by federal law — “substantially burdens” its religious freedom because “homosexual behavior” conflicts with its Christian faith. The court accepted the argument, letting the employer’s religious beliefs override the health of its employees. | 2022-09-07T19:52:01Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Opinion | The religious right's drive to assert its right to discriminate - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/supreme-court-religious-right-antidiscrimination-laws/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/supreme-court-religious-right-antidiscrimination-laws/ |
The only D.C. public school with field hockey tries to grow the sport
Jackson Reed has an inexperienced yet zealous roster
By Shane Connuck
The Jackson-Reed field hockey team huddles after its game against Washington-Liberty on Tuesday, Sept. 6, at Jackson-Reed High in Northwest Washington. (TWP)
Henley Kaminskas played soccer growing up, but as a freshman last year at Jackson-Reed High she decided to try field hockey. Somewhat hesitantly. She had to attend a practice really early in the morning, and “none of us wanted to be there,” Kaminskas remembers. “But we all showed up, and we all had a really fun time.”
Now it’s a passion, and it’s one she and some teammates are trying to spread.
Jackson-Reed is the only D.C. public school with a field hockey program, though it operates as a club team because the D.C. State Athletic Association does not sanction the sport.
Because of this, the program is self-funded through fees and fundraisers. Players have to find rides to away games. Kaminskas has noticed some players have a hard time getting equipment, from sticks to shin guards. On Tuesday, the Tigers opened their season with a game on the Tenleytown school’s football field, where they barely had any practice time before the 5-0 loss to Washington-Liberty.
The situation has prompted Kaminskas to become field hockey’s representative at Jackson-Reed, where she is leading efforts to grow the sport in her city. She is going to be working with a local club to fundraise and give out extra equipment to players.
“I think I have the leadership skills to face the problem,” Kaminskas said. “We have a lot of trouble with funding.”
Patricia Nantume founded the program in 2011 before handing it off to assistant Sarah Whitener. After 10 years on the coaching staff, Whitener retired last year and gave head coaching duties back to Nantume.
At the beginning of the season, Nantume’s job has consisted mostly of teaching the fundamentals rather than drawing up plays.
“Teach the game with passion; the players are going see that from you, and they’re going to play with passion,” Nantume said. “Mistakes can be corrected. But if the passion’s there, and the fundamentals are there, everything else falls in place.”
The Tigers struggled to get shots off against Washington-Liberty on Tuesday, and afterward Nantume huddled them together and asked them to think about their individual strengths and weaknesses. The team isn’t yet ready to knock off a perennial power — and more are coming on a tough schedule — but she’s confident in the players’ abilities to improve.
The team isn’t entirely filled with newcomers. Rigby Zentner was introduced to the sport at sleepaway camp in sixth grade and continued playing with the Beyond Sticks club in McLean. It made her a leader from the moment she stepped on the pitch as a freshman.
While many of the senior’s teammates don’t have close to the experience she does, she admires how they always pick each other up and show a willingness to improve.
“We like to call ourselves the most spirited team at the school,” Zentner said. “We’re just super, super close-knit.”
Not being in a state or conference with the sport sanctioned, there’s no postseason for Jackson-Reed. Its annual late-season game against Brookewood, this year on Oct. 28, will be treated as a one-game playoff. | 2022-09-07T19:52:32Z | www.washingtonpost.com | The only D.C. public school with field hockey tries to grow the sport - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/only-dc-public-school-with-field-hockey-tries-grow-sport/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/only-dc-public-school-with-field-hockey-tries-grow-sport/ |
DAMASCUS, Syria — A building collapsed in Syria’s northern city of Aleppo on Wednesday, killing at least nine people, including three children, the Syrian state television reported.
The TV said the illegally built, five-story building in Aleppo’s southern neighborhood of Fardous collapsed in the evening. It said five women, three children and an elderly man were killed. | 2022-09-07T19:53:33Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Report: Building collapses in north Syria, killing 9 people - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/report-building-collapses-in-north-syria-killing-9-people/2022/09/07/d76cee6c-2ee3-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/report-building-collapses-in-north-syria-killing-9-people/2022/09/07/d76cee6c-2ee3-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
Storm clouds loom over Capitol Hill in July. (Tom Brenner for The Washington Post)
Congress has a lot on its to-do list ahead of November’s midterm elections — confirming circuit-court judges, funding the government and possibly enshrining same-sex marriage protections along the way. But at least as important is a piece of business getting less attention: reforming the Electoral Count Reform Act.
The bipartisan bill would mend and modernize the archaic 1887 law that governs the counting and certifying of votes in presidential elections — the same law that President Donald Trump and his allies tried to exploit to overturn the legitimate 2020 presidential election results. Reform would protect the democratic process from future attacks from unprincipled politicians who would manipulate the system to install their favored candidates in the White House, regardless of the voters’ will.
The reform bill was introduced to some fanfare over the summer, after months of negotiations led by Sens. Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.). It’s essential that the measure not lose steam this fall, amid competing priorities and political tumult. The packed Senate schedule that Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and his party must navigate is only one problem. Another is naysaying from the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection, which might soon issue its own recommendations. Certainly, tweaks to the bill — some of them under discussion as part of the Rules Committee’s work-up — would strengthen the proposal. Some of them are easy to make and should be uncontroversial. Others, sensible or not, could imperil the entire enterprise. These should be approached with caution.
Simple changes include lengthening the six-day period provided for judicial review of disputes over electoral vote certification, raising the proportion of lawmakers who must object in order to halt the congressional counting process, and better defining both what it means for an elector’s vote to be “regularly given” and what events would qualify as “extraordinary and catastrophic” enough to justify delaying the postponement of Election Day.
Slightly trickier, but perhaps still achievable, is the matter of clarifying that the “conclusive” slate of electors presented by a state’s governor is still subject to challenge in court and in Congress. Democrats are also worried that the bill leaves state legislatures too much room to write rules before elections take place, allowing themselves or other officials leeway to override a popular vote. That’s a reasonable concern. Congress’s ability to remediate it, however, is constrained by the Constitution, not to mention by political reality.
Meanwhile, Democrats’ desire to include provisions that would shore up the Voting Rights Act and make voting easier is understandable — but these ideas are nonstarters with Republicans, a substantial group of whom must support the bill for it to clear the Senate.
The bill has never been perfect, but it has so far boasted a politically plausible path through Congress — itself an achievement given today’s politics. The Senate proposal, with plenty of support from Republicans, has much more of a chance to pass than any alternative with fewer bipartisan bona fides. Lawmakers should do whatever they can to improve the bill, but they should also recognize what they can’t do. And they should also act quickly, before this remarkable compromise loses what momentum it has left. | 2022-09-07T20:34:06Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Opinion | Congress must reform the Electoral Count Act, now - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/electoral-count-reform-act-congress-priority/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/07/electoral-count-reform-act-congress-priority/ |
Frances Tiafoe defeated Andrey Rublev in the U.S. Open quarterfinals. (Timothy A. Clary/AFP/Getty Images)
NEW YORK — Frances Tiafoe became the first American man to reach a U.S. Open semifinal in 16 years Wednesday when he defeated world No. 11 Andrey Rublev 7-6 (7-3), 7-6 (7-0), 6-4.
The victory followed Tiafoe’s upset over Rafael Nadal on Monday in his first quarterfinal appearance at the U.S. Open. Tiafoe, 24, is the son of immigrants from Sierra Leone who learned to play at College Park’s Junior Tennis Champions Center at the University of Maryland, where tennis was meant to be a means to a college scholarship.
Tiafoe built himself a lucrative professional career instead, peaking at No. 24 in the world last month (though he currently sits no. 26) and amassing $6.1 million in career earnings.
On paper, toppling Rublev was a tall task. But Tiafoe looked as though he felt no pressure in front of a packed Arthur Ashe Stadium playing under a closed roof due to rain.
“I just always find a way somehow on this court, find a way to play some great tennis," Tiafoe said in the post-match interview on the court. “Let’s enjoy this one. We got two more. We got two more.”
Millie Rocking his way to the semis 🔥 @FTiafoe | @usopen | #usopen pic.twitter.com/60uRog4iTZ
Rublev, a 24-year-old Russian, may not have Nadal’s 22 Grand Slam championships, but he can be a ferocious competitor when he gets hot. Armed with a humongous forehand and tireless work ethic, Rublev broke through during the pandemic and has logged wins over Roger Federer (in 2019), Nadal (in 2021) and Novak Djokovic (in 2022).
Andy Roddick, the last American man to make the U.S. Open semifinals in 2006, watched from the stands Monday.
Tiafoe advances to face either Spain’s Carlos Alcaraz or Italy’s Jannik Sinner on Friday. | 2022-09-07T21:00:14Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Frances Tiafoe advances to U.S. Open semifinals - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/frances-tiafoe-us-open/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/frances-tiafoe-us-open/ |
Tony Clark, the head of the MLB players' union, joined AFL-CIO President Liz Shuler during a news conference in D.C. (Jose Luis Magana/AP)
The Major League Baseball Players Association would like to have a collective bargaining agreement for minor leaguers in place by next year’s spring training, union chief Tony Clark said Wednesday.
Clark, speaking during an interview after an event at the National Press Club in which he announced the players’ union would join the AFL-CIO, reiterated that the players are asking MLB to voluntarily recognize a new minor league union. But he said the soon-to-be beefed-up players association — which would be responsible for negotiating separate major- and minor league CBAs — would still hope for a deal to be in place early next year, even if the new union had to gain recognition through the National Labor Relations Board.
Clark, who attended the Tuesday night ceremony at Audi Field in which the men’s and women’s national soccer teams signed historic collective bargaining agreements, said a combination of factors led minor leaguers to this point. Both he and Liz Shuler, the president of the AFL-CIO who took part in a panel discussion with Clark on Wednesday, said awareness of workers’ rights is at a high ebb.
“The labor movement is moving into a new era,” Shuler said. “ … No workplace is off limits.”
“When you look at our industry, the truth is the major league players are organized,” Clark said in the interview. “The major league umpires are organized. The minor league umpires are organized. The minor league players are not.
“And so we have the right players, right time, right climate, and we do our best to listen to our members who have been asking about providing support to minor leaguers over the course of the last number of years, as well as the minor leaguers themselves who have an interest in being organized.”
The task of negotiating a labor agreement for roughly 1,200 major leaguers who are seeking their part of annual MLB revenue of around $10 billion and a separate deal for thousands of minor leaguers could seem disparate. The major league minimum salary is $700,000, and an average major leaguer in 2022 earns $4.41 million, according to the Associated Press.
“There are differences between the major league experience and the minor league experience, but there’s still an opportunity to have a conversation about improvements on the minor league side,” Clark said. “Improving pay does not mean that minor league players are going to be making the major league minimum.
“But a standard across the board, whether you’re in rookie ball or Triple A, the working conditions under which you’re playing — important. A living wage — important. And ensuring due process and protocols being in place — important.”
Clark was a major league first baseman for 15 seasons, playing in 1,559 games from 1995 to 2009. But before he broke in, he played in more than 300 minor league games over five seasons. He said it’s striking that players are asked to do more than ever in preparation during the offseason — when they aren’t paid — while the in-season conditions are largely the same
“Making $800 a month in A ball or playing on a field where the infield was at an incline and the outfield was at a decline, or being in a locker room where the floor was dirt, those things I do remember like they were yesterday,” Clark said. “And you fast forward to now, what we were asked to do then is different than what players are being asked to do now, except that $800 that I was making in A ball isn’t much different now than it was then. Being asked to do more both in season and during the offseason, but sitting here 30 years later and the compensation is largely the same?” | 2022-09-07T21:00:20Z | www.washingtonpost.com | MLBPA chief Tony Clark discusses minor league unionization progress - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/minor-league-union-tony-clark/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/minor-league-union-tony-clark/ |
Va. man shot by police was robbing undercover officer, authorities say
A 19-year-old man shot to death by police last week during an undercover drug operation in Prince William County, Va., was “an active participant” in the attempted robbery of a plainclothes officer that led to the fatal gunfire, a police spokesman said Wednesday.
While the deadly encounter Sept. 1 remains under investigation, authorities released new details of the sequence of events that they say immediately preceded the shooting on a residential street in Woodbridge, where the undercover officer had arranged to buy at least one firearm and “a large quantity” of fentanyl, a synthetic opioid, Prince William police said in a statement.
The incident ended with a volley of gunfire that killed Jaiden M. Carter, of Woodbridge, and wounded a second alleged robber. An attorney for Carter’s family called the shooting “another example of unnecessary police brutality,” based on his interpretation of video of the shooting that was captured by a neighbor’s Ring camera.
Three men showed up to make the deal with the undercover officer around 7 p.m. in the 14700 block of Fox Glove Court, police said. One of them, identified by police as Jalil M. Turner, 18, left the vehicle he had arrived in and got into the undercover officer’s car. After briefly talking with the officer, Turner stepped out of the officer’s car, then returned moments later with Carter, police said.
With Carter in the back seat, Turner — seated in front next to the officer — “produced a handgun, demanding the [drug-purchase] money from the detective and additional property,” according to the statement, issued by 1st Sgt. Jonathan Perok, a county police spokesman. Carter ordered the officer to open the car’s trunk to look for the money, the statement said.
In an interview Wednesday, Perok said of the now-deceased Carter, “He took an active role in all of this.”
Carter and Turner stole the officer’s drug-buy money and other property in the trunk before returning to the vehicle they had arrived in, which was driven by Shane D. Pollard, 30, of Woodbridge, Perok said.
The shooting occurred when backup officers converged on the car as the three men were attempting to flee, according to police, who described the incident as “an exchange of gunfire.” Perok, who declined to comment on the police shooting, said investigators were still trying to determine what precipitated it and whether it was justified.
“Two handguns, one of which was illegally modified to be fully automatic with an extended magazine, were located at the scene,” the statement said. Perok said Turner “had one of them in his possession” but declined to comment on the other gun.
Turner, who police said had no fixed address, is charged with robbery resulting in death and using a firearm to commit a felony. He is being held in jail pending a scheduled court appearance Oct. 17. His attorney, Reginald Henderson, said Wednesday that he did not have enough information to comment on the sequence of events alleged by police.
Pollard, who was wounded in the shooting, is charged with robbery resulting in death. He remains hospitalized and has not yet appeared in court. It is unclear whether he has a lawyer.
The Carter family’s attorney, Joshua M. Wilson, declined to comment on the case beyond his remarks earlier this week about “police brutality.” He said he was “still in the fact-finding phase” of his work on behalf of Carter’s relatives and that family members were not immediately willing to be interviewed.
“They’re still grieving and trying to process what happened,” Wilson said. | 2022-09-07T21:08:56Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Prince William police: Killed 19-year-old was robbing undercover officer - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/prince-william-police-fatal-shooting/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/prince-william-police-fatal-shooting/ |
California sees record heat but avoids blackouts
In several Western states, temperatures soared to well above 100 degrees.
The heat in Sacramento, California, soared to 116 degrees on Tuesday. It was an all-time high for the city. California narrowly avoided blackouts as extreme temperatures pushed electricity demand to a record and stretched the state's power grid near its limits. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg)
A brutal Western heat wave brought California to the verge of ordering rolling blackouts, but the state’s electrical grid managed to handle record-breaking demand.
The state’s 39 million people were warned Tuesday that demand — some of it from people cranking up air conditioning — might outstrip supply as temperatures in many areas soared past 100 degrees. The California Independent System Operator (CAISO), which oversees the electrical grid, issued a Stage 3 emergency power alert — one step below ordering utilities to start rotating outages to ease the strain on the system. The move allowed it to draw on emergency power sources.
Demand swelled in the late afternoon and into the evening. CAISO said the peak electricity demand on Tuesday hit 52,061 megawatts, far above the previous high of 50,270 megawatts set on July 24, 2006.
While there were no rolling blackouts over large areas, two outages were reported in the San Francisco Bay area cities of Palo Alto and Alameda, affecting several-thousand customers for about an hour.
Demand fell as evening approached, businesses closed and then dropped sharply after CAISO sent a message on its mobile phone app asking customers to cut back their use, warning that “power interruptions may occur unless you take action.”
Western states, meanwhile, were still struggling through one of the hottest and longest September heat waves on record. Temperatures began soaring last week, and the National Weather Service warned that dangerous heat could continue through Friday, despite some slight moderation.
Sacramento County officials used the air-conditioned lobbies of some of their public buildings as cooling centers for people with nowhere else to go and offered free transportation for people who could not get there.
Six places in the San Francisco Bay area and central coast set record maximum temperatures, including Santa Rosa with 115 degrees.
In neighboring Nevada, Reno’s 106 on Tuesday was its hottest day ever recorded in September. In Utah’s Salt Lake City, temperatures were about 20 degrees higher than normal, hitting 105 on Tuesday, the hottest September day recorded going back to 1874. | 2022-09-07T21:22:00Z | www.washingtonpost.com | California sees record heat but avoids blackouts - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/kidspost/2022/09/07/california-sees-record-heat-avoids-blackouts/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/kidspost/2022/09/07/california-sees-record-heat-avoids-blackouts/ |
Md. man is accused of threatening a member of Congress from Texas
A 39-year-old Maryland man was charged Tuesday with threatening a member of Congress from Texas, prosecutors said Wednesday.
The U.S. attorney’s office for the District of Maryland said in a statement that Justin Kuchta, of Annapolis, sent emails through an event management website threatening to murder the legislator, whose district office in Texas received them in July.
The alleged messages, filled with obscenities, said, “I’m coming to murder all of you.” The lawmaker “will be the first on the gallows,” one said.
Agents from the U. S. Capitol Police interviewed Kuchta at his workplace, the affidavit says, where he admitted to sending the messages from home on his government-issued computer. The complaint did not name his employer.
The member of Congress was not named in the prosecutor’s statement. Kuchta’s attorney was not immediately available for comment.
Prosecutors said Kuchta faces a maximum sentence of five years for interstate communication containing a threat to injure.
“You have the right to your own opinions, but not the right to threaten a federal official’s life,” U.S. Attorney for the District of Maryland Erek L. Barron said in a statement. “We’ll continue prosecuting these threats to the fullest extent of the law.” | 2022-09-07T21:22:31Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Maryland man accused of threatening member of Congress from Texas - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/maryland-death-threat-congress-texas/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/maryland-death-threat-congress-texas/ |
On blaming Trump, Americans are moving from ‘unethical’ to ‘illegal’
Donald Trump, then president-elect, speaks to members of the media at the Mar-a-Lago Club in Palm Beach, Fla., in December 2016. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Americans appear to be warming to the idea that former president Donald Trump has broken the law and are less willing to dismiss his actions as merely being unethical.
In new polling, Trump’s effort to overturn the 2020 election and his storage of sensitive government documents in his residence at Mar-a-Lago have reached new highs in the percentages of Americans who say Trump broke the law (rather than saying his actions were unethical but not illegal).
In both cases, more Americans say Trump broke the law — 45 percent and 44 percent, respectively — than ever said so during the investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, the scandal involving Trump’s interaction with the Ukrainian president and other instances in which the question was asked, according to a Washington Post review of polling during Trump’s tenure.
After a presidency marked by Trump repeatedly escaping controversy and retaining a fighting chance to win the next election, the data suggest that Trump may find it more difficult to move past these new issues.
At the same time, the political middle remains somewhat mixed in its views on whether Trump’s actions in these various controversies were illegal or merely unethical. And the polls suggest Trump’s devoted base, which regards him as blameless, continues to constitute as many as 3 in 10 Americans.
A new Marist College poll for PBS and NPR released Wednesday showed 44 percent of Americans say Trump’s storage of sensitive government documents at Mar-a-Lago was illegal, while another 17 percent say it was unethical but not illegal.
That follows on a July CNN poll showing that 45 percent said Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election were illegal and 34 percent saying they were unethical.
Never before has a poll that offered people three options — including a middle-ground “unethical” option — shown this many Americans saying Trump’s actions were illegal.
According to The Post’s review, the previous highs came during the Ukraine impeachment, when an Associated Press-NORC poll showed 42 percent said Trump acted illegally, and the Russia investigation, when the number saying Trump broke the law peaked at 40 percent.
Below are many of the polls that have tested this question, along with which controversy they polled and when.
Notably, the percentage of Americans who regarded Trump’s actions as either illegal or unethical also peaked in the July CNN poll, with about 8 in 10 picking one of those options. The previous highs came in the early stages of the Russia investigation in February 2018 and later that year after Trump’s alleged hush-money payments to women who accused him of affairs were driving the news. (The numbers then also approached 8 in 10.)
The most recent poll, on the Mar-a-Lago documents, includes significantly fewer choosing the “unethical” option, but it still adds up to a combined 6 in 10 regarding Trump’s actions as either illegal or unethical. (This latter poll shows more respondents saying Trump did nothing wrong — 29 percent — but also significantly more undecideds.)
Previous controversies also carry some lessons about where public perception might go from here.
This question on Trump’s actions vis-a-vis Russia was polled frequently, and it took some time for the perception that Trump broke the law to set in. Shortly after he was elected in 2016, about 1 in 5 thought he had acted illegally, with that number rising as high as 40 percent late that year. Later polling ebbed and flowed somewhat, depending upon the latest developments and which pollster was asking the question.
The hush money scandal also took some time to build, given the gradual revelations. The peak of 38 percent saying Trump broke the law (and nearly 8 in 10 saying he at least acted unethically) came in December 2018, shortly after federal prosecutors linked Trump more directly to the scheme and former Trump lawyer Michael Cohen was sentenced to prison for his role.
Similarly, the investigation of the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection has been building for some time. But the reaction to the attack on the Capitol also appeared to be instantaneous. We don’t have multiple polls asking this particular question to compare, but asking a binary question soon after the event — did Trump break the law, or didn’t he? — showed that, for the first time in his political career, a majority said he had.
The next month, that number dropped off. But the most recent poll suggests this continues to be a major concern for many Americans, 20 months later.
The question for Trump now is whether his documents controversy more closely resembles the Jan. 6 issue or these other controversies. Obviously, much will depend upon what we learn from here. The unprecedented presidential search was shocking in the moment — albeit in a less pronounced way than the Jan. 6 insurrection — but the investigation is complicated and much remains to be learned.
What’s evident, though, is that compared to almost his entire tenure in office, it’s now becoming less of a leap for people to believe Trump broke than law. And while most Americans still aren’t convinced he did — and Trump retains the loyalty of much of the GOP — these numbers are not exactly conducive to regaining the presidency in 2024. | 2022-09-07T21:23:14Z | www.washingtonpost.com | More call Trump's actions on Jan. 6, Mar-a-Lago search 'illegal' than before - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/polling-trump-illegal-unethical/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/polling-trump-illegal-unethical/ |
A weather-related sign on the Kim Sing Theatre in downtown Los Angeles on Sept. 7. (John Antczak/AP)
One of the most efficient ways to get a resident of San Francisco to roll her eyes is to invoke Mark Twain’s description of the city’s summer: it was the coldest winter he’d ever experienced. Twain never actually said this, which is certainly one reason to find it annoying; couple that with a true San Franciscan’s contempt for any corny, touristy aphorism and you’ve got a winner. I would imagine I’ll get a number of emails from city residents who only got through the first sentence before getting so irritated that they needed to reach out.
But! In every misattributed saying there is a grain of truth. And the grain here is that San Francisco’s summers are, in fact, mild. In the morning, you may need a jacket — something that can take visitors by surprise.
Or, at least, that’s usually what summers are like in the Bay Area. This week, that is very much not what they are like.
“This week was something I’ll call psychedelic heat. Everything slowed down. Reality was questioned.”
This is the assessment of my friend Michael Elliott, who lives in San Jose — a city experiencing an excessive heat warning. I used to live there too, in an apartment that, like his house, had no air conditioning. You just didn’t really need it that often. Even when it got hot, it would cool off at night, daytime heat dissipating into the cloudless sky.
This week, this summer, has been different. The heat seen throughout California has been exceptional.
In 2020, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that the percentage of homes in the Bay Area with air conditioning had risen from 36 percent in 2015 to 47 percent only four years later. The rise was attributed to “changing weather patterns” — which, of course, is broadly a euphemism for climate change. No individual weather event can easily be linked to climate change, but the recent heat seen across the west is consistent with a warming world.
According to 2020 data compiled by the Energy Information Administration (EIA), there are about 18.5 million households in the Pacific region: California, Washington, Oregon, Alaska and Hawaii. Only 12.6 million have any form of air conditioning — the lowest of any census region.
We’d expect Alaska to have fewer air-conditioned homes. But California makes up a disproportionate percentage of the region’s total. In 2019, California was the state with the highest percentage of homes without air conditioning in the continental U.S.
Increasing the number of households with air conditioning does address the problem of keeping people comfortable — and safe — during heat spikes. But it introduces a new problem: electricity consumption. That Chronicle article quoted a climate-change assessment which noted the increased electricity demand that the increase in air conditioner usage had prompted.
This week, California sent out a text message calling on residents to conserve power as the heat drove up usage. It worked. But notice the key line in Gov. Gavin Newsom’s (D) call to action: keep your thermostats set high.
California is exceptional in that its moderate climate has made air conditioning less necessary. (According to the EIA, only about half of households in “marine” climates have air conditioning, compared to 88 percent of homes in “cold” or “very cold” climates.) But in much of the country, the lack of air conditioning is more closely correlated to income.
In 2020, about a quarter of households with an annual income of less than $5,000 had air conditioning. About 16 percent of households with incomes of under $40,000 had no air conditioning (which comes out to about 7 million of 43 million total homes). Only 7 percent of households with incomes at or over $100,000 (about 2.5 million out of 33 million nationally) don’t have air conditioning.
The effects of climate change continue to expand. A new report estimates that, within 30 years, a third of the country may experience at least one day a year with a heat index — that is, how hot it feels — of over 125 degrees.
That probably means more air conditioning. Which means more electricity consumption (and higher electricity bills). It also, for now, often means more release of carbon dioxide or methane into the atmosphere where the molecules can trap escaping planetary heat.
By 2050, San Francisco may see average summer temperatures 3 degrees warmer than it did 20 years ago. Of course, in a warming world, that may still qualify as winterlike frigidity. | 2022-09-07T21:43:53Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Californians may no longer be able to avoid air conditioning - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/californians-may-no-longer-be-able-avoid-air-conditioning/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/californians-may-no-longer-be-able-avoid-air-conditioning/ |
Family members celebrate loved ones, describe horror of stabbings
Brian Burns, left, and brother-in-law Mark Arcand appear at a news conference on Sept. 7 in Saskatoon. Burns's wife, Bonnie, and their son Gregory, shown in the photos, were among the 10 people stabbed to death this past weekend on and near the James Smith Cree Nation reserve. (Robert Bumsted/AP)
Mark Arcand was sleeping early Sunday when the alerts began to sound on his phone. A family member was telling him, urgently, to call.
That’s how he learned his sister and nephew had been killed in the stabbing attack at the James Smith Cree Nation, a First Nations reserve in Saskatchewan.
“Driving to the community that day was the longest two hours of my life, not knowing what to expect,” Arcand said. “In the back of my mind, I thought about my family — what are they thinking? Hope they are holding each other, hugging each other, telling each other they love them.”
Arcand’s half sister, Bonnie “Goodvoice” Burns, 48, and her son Gregory Burns, 28, were among the 10 people stabbed to death early Sunday on the reserve and nearby Weldon, Saskatchewan. Eighteen more people were wounded.
Details of Canada stabbing suspect, victims emerge as manhunt continues
Suspect Damien Sanderson, 31, was found dead Monday on the reserve. Suspect Myles Sanderson, 32, Damien’s brother, remained at large. Their parents on Wednesday pleaded with Myles to surrender to authorities before anyone else gets hurt.
“Myles, my boy, turn yourself in. Please. You can do this,” his mother said in an interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. “Come back. Turn yourself in. Do the right thing.”
“We don’t want to more hurt,” his father said. “Please, my son. I love you. Turn yourself in. Be safe.”
They spoke on the condition that their names and images and the location of the interview not be disclosed, the CBC said, citing safety concerns.
The Saskatchewan Coroners Service and the Saskatchewan Royal Canadian Mounted Police on Wednesday released the names and ages of the 10 victims. They included Bonnie Burns, 48, Carol Burns, 46, Earl Burns, 66, Gregory Burns, 28, Lydia Gloria Burns, 61, Thomas Burns, 23, Christian Head, 54, Lana Head, 49, and Robert Sanderson, 49, all of the James Smith Cree Nation, and Wesley Petterson, 78, of Weldon.
Authorities said they would not identify the relationships among the victims or name the wounded. The wounded included one “young teen”; the rest were men and women.
Arcand and Brian Burns, Bonnie’s partner of 30 years and husband of 15, appeared before reporters Wednesday at a news conference in Saskatoon. Burns showed framed portraits of Bonnie and himself smiling and their son Gregory in a life jacket on the water.
The couple’s three younger sons were at the news conference. They were home during the stabbings; one was stabbed in the neck but survived, Arcand said.
Arcand is chief of the Saskatoon Tribal Council but said he was speaking as a family member. He arrived at the reserve at around 1 p.m., he said, several hours after the stabbings.
“I can’t get it out of my head,” he said. “It reminded me of the movies, But to me, this is not a movie. This is a real-life scenario.”
Gregory was stabbed several times at his home, Arcand said. Bonnie rushed out to help her son, he said, and was stabbed twice. “And she died right beside him.”
Bonnie had called a friend for help. The woman, “an innocent person trying to support her community, trying to help,” Arcand said, was also killed.
Arcand gestured to Brian and Bonnie’s surviving sons.
“These two young boys woke up to screaming, not being able to help,” he said. One hid behind a high chair and witnessed the attacks. A 13-year-old was stabbed in the neck and spent the night in a hospital.
“That young boy is angry,” Arcand said. “He’s traumatized.”
“These children have seen everything that day,” he said. “This act has destroyed our family. How could somebody do this to women and children?”
Arcand said he wanted the world to remember Bonnie for who she was: “Family came first … She was a sober person. You go into her home, it was a beautiful home — it was filled with love and care.” She worked at a local school and was fostering two more children; she volunteered and cooked for community celebrations. “She always puts other people before her,” Arcand said.
“She’s not a victim,” he said. “She’s a hero.”
Gregory, he said, “was a great kid.”
“He worked in the community to build houses. He did whatever he could for his family and tried to help his mom and his dad.”
Bonnie was of the Wahpeton Dakota Nation and married into the James Smith Cree Nation. “This is how it is in our country where we grow up,” Arcand said. “It’s all about relationships. It’s all about family. It’s all about nicknames. It’s all about laughter. It’s all about joy. It’s all about humbleness.”
“We’re just climbing a mountain now as a family, both of our communities,” he said. “And that mountain is the devastation of what happened. … And what it’s going to take to heal from senseless acts as this that happened.” | 2022-09-07T22:18:49Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Canada stabbings: Victims identified, family members describe horror - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/canada-stabbing-victims-identified-saskatchewan/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/canada-stabbing-victims-identified-saskatchewan/ |
This combination of images shown during a press conference at the Royal Canadian Mounted Police "F" Division headquarters in Regina, Saskatchewan, on Sunday, shows Damien Sanderson, left, and Myles Sanderson. (AP)
Sanderson, 32, and his brother Damien, 31, were charged with murder in the stabbing attacks on and near a First Nations reserve in Saskatchewan Sunday that killed 10 people. Damian Sanderson was found dead on the James Smith Cree Nation reserve on Monday.
“Myles Sanderson was located and taken into police custody near Rosthern, [Saskacthewan] at approximately 3:30 p.m. today," the Royal Canadian Mounted Police said in a statement. "There is no longer a risk to public safety relating to this investigation.” | 2022-09-07T22:18:55Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Canada stabbings suspect Myles Sanderson taken into custody, police say - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/canada-stabbings-myles-sanderson-arrested/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/07/canada-stabbings-myles-sanderson-arrested/ |
1 man killed, 3 wounded in Southeast D.C. shooting police say
A D.C. police vehicle at a crime scene. (Peter Hermann/The Washington Post)
Four men were shot, one fatally, Wednesday afternoon on a street in the Washington Highlands neighborhood of Southeast Washington, according to D.C. police.
The shooting occurred about 4:50 p.m. in the 600 block of Chesapeake Street SE. A police spokesman said it appears two people exited a vehicle and opened fire on people on the block.
Police had initially said the victims were conscious, but a department spokesman said one of the men later died. The man’s name and age were not available.
The shooting occurred near a strip of shops and Hendley Elementary School. The school’s website says classes ended at 3:15 p.m. but that after-school care goes until 6 p.m.
Police had few immediate details of the shooting, Police said they are looking for a black sedan with temporary license plates and tinted windows, last seen headed north on Sixth Street SE. | 2022-09-07T22:27:19Z | www.washingtonpost.com | One man killed, three others wounded in Southeast D.C. shooting - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/men-shootings-southeast-washington-dc/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/men-shootings-southeast-washington-dc/ |
The Washington Commanders have rarely started fast in any facet under Coach Ron Rivera. The team hopes that will change on Sunday in the season opener against Jacksonville. (John McDonnell/The Washington Post)
“I'm fired up for who we can be,” Rivera said. “I like what we've seen so far.”
After two losing seasons, Ron Rivera is optimistic Washington can make a Year 3 leap
This year, Detroit sold out its opener against Philadelphia — its first standing-room-only game since 2019 — while Washington has offered regular discounts on tickets that are usually among the most in-demand.
“It obviously makes for a fun story and all that, but for me, it's Week 1,” he said. “It's Week 1. It's another football game.”
“That first drive is going to be real important for us,” Rivera said. “Hopefully, we go eight, nine, 10 plays … so we get a pretty good sense about [the matchups].”
Last year, Washington averaged five plays on its opening drive, third-fewest in the NFL, and most were boom-or-bust. It scored on six — three touchdowns, three field goals — and went three-and-out on eight.
“If we get off on third down, that's a good start,” cornerback Kendall Fuller said of Week 1. “[The key is] just locking in, knowing the situation, knowing what the offenses are trying to do, then being able to anticipate and just going out there playing fast.” | 2022-09-07T22:49:05Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Washington Commanders hope to start strong in Week 1 vs. Jaguars - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/washington-commanders-slow-start-jaguars/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/washington-commanders-slow-start-jaguars/ |
More absence than action in Va. General Assembly’s one-day special session
Virginia House Speaker Todd Gilbert (R-Shenandoah) gavels the special session to order in Richmond on Sept. 7. (Steve Helber/AP)
RICHMOND — Virginia’s General Assembly returned to the State Capitol briefly Wednesday for a special session that was more notable for absences than actions.
Absent was any consensus on a new judge for the State Corporation Commission — the primary reason for the session — so lawmakers didn’t act. Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) was traveling to Maine to campaign for GOP gubernatorial candidate Paul LePage, so Democrats criticized his absence.
And while Democrats sounded the alarm that Republicans might use the session to seek a ban on some abortions — with abortion rights supporters holding a rally on Capitol Square — GOP leaders said they had never intended such an action during Wednesday’s session.
In the end, after about three and a half hours, the Republican-controlled House and the Democratic-controlled Senate couldn’t even agree on how to adjourn. The House adjourned sine die, meaning they consider the special session to be over. The Senate did not, meaning they say the special session continues.
The distinction matters, because if the General Assembly is out of session then several powers fall to the governor — such as making judicial appointments and calling special elections to fill open seats in the legislature. That could allow Youngkin to, among other things, step in and name the new judge to the corporation commission, which oversees the state’s big electric utilities.
But House Speaker Todd Gilbert (R-Shenandoah) said in an interview that he was hoping the governor would not step in. “I would ask him not to,” Gilbert said. “I do think come January we’ll have another opportunity to” reach consensus in the legislature. He said the House gaveled out simply because its work was complete, given that it could not agree with the Senate on the pick.
Adjournment also could allow Youngkin to order a prompt special election if state Sen. Jen A. Kiggans (R-Virginia Beach) wins her bid to unseat U.S. Rep. Elaine Luria (D) in November. Republicans warned that Democrats would aim to keep the seat open until after the General Assembly launches its next regular session in January, which would give Democrats the power to defeat a bill to ban abortions after 15 weeks that Youngkin plans to submit.
Democrats have a 21-19 edge in the upper chamber but will have trouble blocking the bill because one member of their caucus, Sen. Joseph D. Morrissey (D-Richmond), supports some restrictions on abortion, and Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears (R) has the power to break tie votes. If Kiggans’s seat were vacant, Democrats would have a 21-18 majority — enough to thwart the bill even if Morrissey defects.
Senate Majority Leader Richard L. Saslaw (D-Fairfax) denied that the Kiggans scenario was the reason Democrats in his chamber voted to keep the session going. Instead, he said, it was the prospect of Youngkin filling the SCC vacancy. “We didn’t get an agreement on the SCC. We don’t want him to do that,” he said.
Saslaw argued that as long as one chamber has not adjourned, the Assembly is still in session. If the governor tried to make any appointments under the current scenario, he said, “it’d be tested in court, and we would win.”
The situation has happened before, although it was Republicans arguing that one chamber cannot go it alone. In August 2015, amid a bitter standoff over a state Supreme Court appointment between Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) and the Republicans who at the time controlled the General Assembly, the House insisted that a special legislative session remained underway while Senate Democrats — joined by one Republican defector — said it was over.
Lawmakers did agree Wednesday on a handful of lower court judgeships, but otherwise the special session was notable mainly as a chance for speeches on hot topics of the day. Democrats went after Youngkin for his ongoing travels to other states to campaign for Republicans in gubernatorial races, arguing that he is using Virginia as a steppingstone to run for president or vice president in 2024.
They took special exception to his plans Wednesday to travel to Maine and stump for LePage, a former GOP governor who drew national headlines for racially inflammatory comments, most notably in 2016, when he called people of color “the enemy” and said drug traffickers passing through Maine often “impregnate a young White girl.”
“To be going to Maine, to stand with a person like that, today, while we’re here working is shameful,” House Minority Leader Don L. Scott Jr. (D-Portsmouth) said in a floor speech.
Sen. Adam P. Ebbin (R-Alexandria) expressed dismay that Youngkin was lending support to someone “who has a long history of using inflammatory, racist rhetoric.”
Youngkin planned to appear with LePage on Wednesday evening at a fundraiser in Lewiston, Maine.
Republicans didn’t respond to the Democratic attacks on the floor, but afterward several defended Youngkin, who said last week that he was unaware of LePage’s rhetoric but was focused on boosting fellow Republicans running for governor in competitive states.
“I don’t know what former Governor LePage said or when he said it,” said House Majority Leader Terry G. Kilgore (R-Scott). “If he’s apologized we should just move on.”
“I think they’re going to find something to criticize [Youngkin] for no matter what’s happening,” Gilbert said. “That was the criticism of the day.”
Democrats also warned Republicans against attempting to impose further restrictions on abortions. Virginia law allows abortion in the first and second trimesters, until about 26 weeks, and in the third trimester only if the mother’s life or health is at serious risk, as certified by three doctors.
Youngkin to seek 15-week abortion law in Virginia
About 100 people gathered at the bell tower on Capitol Square in the morning to demonstrate for abortion rights, at times chanting, “We will not go back.” Many in the crowd carried signs, including one that read, “Forced pregnancy is a human rights violation,” and another that said, “I bow to no law made by men who never bore a child.”
“If we have to march, if we have to rally, if we have to drag folks out to the polls, we’re going to do it because rights can be taken away and the court has put this fight back in that building,” state Sen. Jennifer L. McClellan (D-Richmond) told the crowd, referring to the State Capitol.
Del. Emily M. Brewer (R-Suffolk), who is 31 weeks pregnant, made a floor speech defending Youngkin’s proposed 15-week ban and accusing Democrats of being afraid to say how they actually feel about limits on abortions. “They want to talk to their base and they want to stir a pot,” she said. “You’re allowing abortion until the moment of birth until you speak up and say different.”
One area where Republicans and Democrats found agreement was in offering farewell wishes to Del. Mark L. Keam, a Fairfax Democrat who resigned his seat Tuesday to join the Biden administration as deputy assistant secretary for travel and tourism in the International Trade Administration.
Gilbert called a special election for Jan. 10 to fill the seat.
Keam, the first Korean American in Virginia’s General Assembly, has served in the House since 2010. The winner of the special election will serve the remainder of Keam’s term, which expires in January 2024.
Even Del. Nick Freitas (R-Culpeper), one of the most fiery conservatives in the House, paid tribute to Keam’s ability to work across the aisle. “I liked Delegate Mark Keam,” Freitas said to loud cheers. “This is the only time I could’ve said that because he’s not seeking reelection. Because me saying nice things would have been devastating for him in his district.” | 2022-09-07T22:53:45Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Va. General Assembly argues over Youngkin, abortion, judges in special session - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/virginia-general-assembly-youngkin-abortion/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/virginia-general-assembly-youngkin-abortion/ |
This wanted poster provided by the U.S. Marshals Service shows Leonard Francis, also known as “Fat Leonard,” who was on home confinement, and allegedly cut off his GPS ankle monitor and left his home on the morning of Sept. 4, 2022. Multiple agencies were searching for Francis on Tuesday Sept. 6, but they acknowledged he may already be in Mexico with the border only a 40-minute drive from his home. (U.S. Marshals Service via AP) (Uncredited/U.S. Marshals Service)
SAN DIEGO — The big, jovial personality of the Malaysian defense contractor nicknamed “Fat Leonard” got him favors across Asia, where he became rich by wooing US Navy commanders with wild sex parties and luxury gifts. | 2022-09-07T22:54:10Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Explainer: How did big fish in Navy bribery case get away? - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/explainer-how-did-big-fish-in-navy-bribery-case-get-away/2022/09/07/aabfebf0-2efa-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/explainer-how-did-big-fish-in-navy-bribery-case-get-away/2022/09/07/aabfebf0-2efa-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
Bennie Hudson, 65, executive director of the Mississippi Faith-Based Coalition for Community Renewal, walks past bottles of water in her Jackson, Miss., home, on Sept. 1. (Rogelio V. Solis/AP)
The capital city of Jackson, Miss., has been without drinkable tap water since late July. But this isn’t the first time there’s been a water crisis in the majority-Black town.
“I think what's really been lost is that there was a crisis in Jackson long before,” reporter Emmanuel Felton says, “And what had been going on for years was really almost constant boil water notifications.”
Residents say sewage is spilling into backyards and people are getting rashes and lumps from the water. “It’s horrible, it’s horrible, everything is horrible,” resident Tammie Williams says. “And it’s it’s a disaster, really, you know? Disaster.”
Today on Post Reports, Felton explains how the water crisis in Jackson got so dire, and whether there’s any end in sight.
Plus, we bring you to the mountains of Peru, where one farmer is trying to save his city from drowning by suing one of the biggest carbon emitters in the world. The case could set a precedent for holding polluters accountable for harming the planet. Reporter Sarah Kaplan has more. | 2022-09-07T22:54:35Z | www.washingtonpost.com | No clean water in Jackson, Miss. - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/podcasts/post-reports/no-clean-water-in-jackson-miss/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/podcasts/post-reports/no-clean-water-in-jackson-miss/ |
Navy reservist already charged in Jan. 6 riot indicted in Va.
Hatchet M. Speed has been described by federal prosecutors as a heavily armed Nazi sympathizer with a top-level U.S. government security clearance
Hatchet Speed, a U.S. Navy reservist who until recently worked with a U.S. defense and intelligence cyberoperations contractor based in Vienna, Va., told an undercover FBI agent that he stormed the Capitol with members of the far-right Proud Boys extremist group, according to court records. (John Minchillo/AP)
A Navy reservist has been indicted in Virginia on charges of possessing unregistered firearms months after authorities in D.C. charged him with breaching the Capitol with the Proud Boys extremist group during the Jan. 6, 2021, attack.
Hatchet M. Speed has been described by federal prosecutors as a heavily armed Nazi sympathizer with a top-level U.S. government security clearance. Speed until recently worked with a U.S. defense and intelligence cyberoperations contractor based in Vienna, Va., but resigned as he delved deeper into fringe ideologies, authorities said.
An undercover FBI employee sent to befriend Speed said he spoke about using violence to further “anti-government and anti-Semitic ideologies” and remarked that many “enemies” were clustered in the Washington area, according to court documents.
The FBI said Speed in private praised Eric Rudolph, the 1996 Centennial Olympic Park bomber in Atlanta, and also “Unabomber” Ted Kaczynski and Adolf Hitler, whom he called “one of the best people that’s ever been on this Earth.”
Federal prosecutors in D.C. charged Speed in June with misdemeanor offenses, accusing him of breaching the Capitol during the Jan. 6 insurrection with the Proud Boys group. An FBI search of Speed’s residence found 13 firearms, seven silencers, evidence of three more unrecovered suppressors and 25 firearms belonging to housemates, according to court documents.
After the Jan. 6 attack, Speed went into a “panic” and made more than $50,000 in firearms-related purchases, including a dozen pistols, revolvers, shotguns and rifles, prosecutors said.
A grand jury in Virginia indicted Speed on three counts of unlawful possession of a silencer for which he lacked registration, according to documents unsealed Wednesday. If Speed were convicted, each offense would be punishable by up to 10 years in prison.
Speed appeared briefly in Alexandria federal court and was released pending trial with the same conditions imposed by the D.C. federal court, including home detention with GPS monitoring and a ban on possessing weapons.
Assistant U.S. Attorneys Thomas Traxler and Amanda Lowe wrote in a court filing Wednesday that Speed was a risk to the community and noted that the D.C. court allowed only limited exceptions to his home detention, such as medical appointments.
A federal public defender for Speed, Courtney Dixon, declined to comment after the hearing Wednesday. Speed’s arraignment is scheduled for Sept. 22.
Speed is not accused of violence, has no criminal history and retains Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information (TS/SCI) clearance, the government has said.
Speed, a petty officer first class, is assigned to the Naval Warfare Space Field Activity at the National Reconnaissance Office in Chantilly, part of the U.S. intelligence community, according to court filings. He previously worked as a software developer for a cyber analytics firm cleared for classified work for the Pentagon and other federal agencies, the FBI said. | 2022-09-07T23:32:37Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Hatchet Speed, already charged in Jan. 6, indicted on gun charges in Virginia - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/hatchet-speed-jan6-indictment-virginia/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/hatchet-speed-jan6-indictment-virginia/ |
Amid relentless scrutiny, disinformation campaigns, harassment and a state review, Georgia’s most populous county has had trouble hiring a director of elections
Fulton County election workers sort through mail-in ballots at the Atlanta Hawks practice gym in 2020. (Kevin D. Liles for The Washington Post)
ATLANTA — It is in many ways an ideal job for a public servant with a passion for democracy — the chance to facilitate voting in Georgia’s most populous county, the electoral center of one of the most important political battlegrounds in the nation.
What happened when a Georgia elections office was targeted for takeover by those who claim the 2020 election was a fraud
Fulton’s elections have been criticized by state lawmakers for decades as poorly run. An independent monitor assigned to observe county election workers during the 2020 election described the process as badly managed, sloppy and chaotic, although he emphasized that he saw no evidence of fraud. Many local leaders consider the attacks on the county — which is racially diverse with a heavily Democratic voting base — as prejudicial saber-rattling in a Southern state mostly run by Republicans.
“You have to have a thick skin, because you’re going to get attacked,” said Richard Barron, the former elections chief. “You’re going to have to deal with the fact that you’re going to have a hostile secretary of state. You’re going to have a hostile board of commissioners, plus the legislature. So the person that takes that job is going to have to be able to deal with that stress and pressure.”
Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) defended the need for the review and dismissed Fulton’s recruitment troubles, arguing that the county “has had well-documented issues running their elections for at least two decades.”
The convoluted process worries voting rights experts who are concerned about the partisan administration of elections. Liz Avore, vice president of law and policy at the Voting Rights Lab, an advocacy group that studies election law, said that while it’s “totally fine” for a state elections board to conduct a review, it’s alarming that the board members — a majority of whom are now appointed by partisan legislators because of the 2021 election law — have the power “to remove and replace the local election official with a person of their choosing.”
Raphael Warnock’s campaign for the moral high ground
“My life is upside down. … I don’t want anyone knowing my name. I don’t want to go anywhere with my mom because she might yell my name out in the grocery aisle or something,” former Fulton elections worker Shaye Moss testified in June.
“I’ve lost my sense of security, all because a group of people, starting with (Trump) and his ally Rudy Giuliani, decided to scapegoat me and my daughter Shaye to push their own lies about how the presidential election was stolen,” Freeman said before lawmakers.
Election workers describe ‘hateful’ threats after Trump’s false claims
Yet, Republicans continued to focus their attention on Fulton County. Georgia House Speaker David Ralston (R) proposed that the state’s Bureau of Investigation launch a criminal probe into potential fraud and irregularities in Fulton. Burt Jones, a Republican state senator now running for lieutenant governor, called for legislative hearings to address the “rampant mismanagement” of Fulton’s elections. In July 2021, Raffensperger called for Barron and Fulton’s registration chief, Ralph Jones, to be fired.
“We make mistakes just like any other county. There is no perfect election. … When you’re supervising 3,000 people, there’s going to be some type of human error,” Williams said. “We have done nothing fraudulent. So I’m not worried about that at all.”
“Who’s going to move here and move their family and then wait until the state says, ‘Oh, we’re taking you over,’ ” Crawford said. “That’s a hindrance for a job search, for sure.” | 2022-09-07T23:32:47Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Georgia's biggest county can’t find a top elections official - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/fulton-county-atlanta-elections-official/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/fulton-county-atlanta-elections-official/ |
Barack and Michelle Obama, joined by dozens of former staffers, return to the White House for a celebratory moment
Former president Barack Obama kisses former first lady Michelle Obama after they unveil their official portraits in the East Room of the White House on Sept. 7. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
“Thanks for letting us invite a few friends to the White House,” Obama said to the Bidens. “We will try not to tear up the place.”
The ceremony, years delayed because former president Donald Trump declined to host the traditional event for his predecessor, was punctuated by the reveal of the two portraits — a hyper-realistic painting of the former president standing against a white backdrop and a painting of the former first lady, seated on a sofa in the Red Room, in a light blue dress.
New images more traditional than gallery portraits
The jovial event was mostly filled with praise (“There are a few people I’ve ever known with more integrity, decency and moral courage than Barack Obama,” Biden said) and jokes (Obama said he is still waiting for a former staffer to name their child Barack).
“We trusted him, all of you in this room,” Biden said of the man who elevated him to the vice presidency. “We believed in him. We counted on him — and I still do. Mr. President, that’s why the country elected you twice. It’s why you’ll be considered one of the most consequential presidents in our history.”
She continued with veiled criticisms of Trump’s refusal to concede the 2020 election and his repeated false claims that he was the real winner.
“Once our time us up, we move on,” the former first lady said about occupants of the White House, “and all that remains in this hallowed place is our good efforts — and these portraits, portraits that connect our history to the present day, portraits that hang here as history continues to be made.”
What to know about today's unveiling
In his remarks, Barack Obama also reflected on presidential succession and his hope that the portraits convey to future generations that “if we could make it here, maybe they can, too.”
He compared the presidency to a relay race. “You take the baton from someone, you run your leg as hard and as well as you can, and then you hand it off to someone else, knowing that your work will be incomplete,” Obama said. “The portraits hanging in the White House chronicle the runners in that race, each of us tasked with trying to bring the country we love closer to its highest aspirations.”
“Presidents so often get airbrushed, they even take on a mythical status, especially after you’ve gone and people forget all the stuff they didn’t like about you,” he said. “But what you realize when you’re sitting behind that desk — and what I want people to remember about Michelle and me — is that presidents and first ladies are human beings like everyone else.”
“I want to thank Sharon Sprung for capturing everything I love about Michelle — her grace, her intelligence and the fact that she’s fine,” he said.
Michelle Obama blushed, laughing as she stood next to him, and then opened her remarks by thanking her husband for “such spicy remarks.” The former president laughed, threw up his hands and said, “I’m not running again.”
The artists, whose identity was kept secret along with the portraits until Wednesday, joined the Obamas at the White House. By the end of the day, Barack Obama’s portrait was already hanging in the Grand Foyer of the White House, where the portraits of other recent presidents are traditionally displayed, and Michelle Obama’s portrait was hanging on the ground floor of the building, along with other recent first ladies.
The East Room event also featured a who’s who of the Obama years. Valerie Jarrett, the longtime senior adviser to the Obamas, sat in the front row near Michelle Obama’s mother. Behind them was a row of former Cabinet officials: Eric Holder, the former attorney general; Tom Perez, the former labor secretary; Shaun Donovan, who ran the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
“I’m honored to host you and so many friends who have been part of this incredible journey,” Biden said to Obama. “It includes members of your staff, some of whom were foolish enough to come work with me.”
Meanwhile, it remains unlikely Biden will host an event for Trump, who has repeatedly ridiculed him and questioned his legitimacy, while Biden has excoriated Trump and his “MAGA Republicans” as a threat to democracy. Karine Jean-Pierre, the White House press secretary, deferred questions about a ceremony for Trump to the White House Historical Association.
Stewart McLaurin, the president of that association, said there is no “prescribed process” for portrait unveilings.
“It’s really up to the current president in the White House and the former president that is portrayed in the portrait to determine the right moment, but there is no set timeline,” McLaurin said in a statement. | 2022-09-07T23:32:47Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Obamas return to White House for portrait unveiling - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/obama-white-house-portrait/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/07/obama-white-house-portrait/ |
Judge rejects Oath Keepers founder’s ‘bewildering’ bid to delay trial
Rhodes filed a motion Tuesday afternoon in federal court in the District claiming he could not continue with his current legal team because of “a complete, or near-complete breakdown of communication,” and needed at least three months with a new lawyer to file over a dozen motions.
U.S. District Judge Amit P. Mehta called Rhodes’s allegations about the case and his own attorneys “incorrect and frankly bewildering.” In a nearly two-hour hearing, he dismissed most of Rhodes’s proposed demands as irrelevant, legally impermissible or redundant.
“Mr. Rhodes at no point … since he’s been arrested has remained silent,” Mehta said. “Never, not once … have I heard a peep from Mr. Rhodes about his lack of contact with his lawyers or his disenchantment with his lawyers’ performance.”
Rhodes is accused of conspiring to use force against the federal government and stop the lawful transfer of power by attacking the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. While he is not accused of entering the building, prosecutors say he oversaw a group that violently confronted law enforcement and tried to hide evidence of those crimes. Three associates have pleaded guilty to sedition; four will go to trial with him and four more in November.
Delaying would cause “havoc” to a packed court schedule, Mehta said, and “there is no humanly possible way” a new attorney “could be ready in 90 days.” The trial is set to begin Sept. 27; it was previously scheduled for Sept. 26, but last week Mehta ordered a one-day delay for the Rosh Hashanah holiday.
Mehta called it “complete and utter nonsense” to suggest that Rhodes was not competently represented by Bright and Linder, whom he credited with leading efforts to help all the defendants prepare for trial. The two Texas attorneys have represented Rhodes since his January arrest.
Far from being shut out of the process, Mehta said, Rhodes was “getting dispensation that no other defendant, to my knowledge — that no other defendant in any case, not just Jan. 6 cases, but any case in this district, is getting.”
Rhodes is jailed in D.C.; U.S. marshals have brought him to court twice a week to review evidence for six hours at a time. “No other defendant is getting that kind of accommodation,” Mehta said. The judge acknowledged that having attorneys in Texas was a challenge but said Rhodes made the choice not to hire local counsel.
Rhodes’s new attorney, Edward L. Tarpley Jr., wrote that Rhodes’s previous lawyers “do not materially communicate with Rhodes regarding trial preparation, witness discovery, evidence selection, or even basic defense strategy,” even though “Rhodes is a Yale Law School graduate with legal training, experience and education.”
Mehta challenged Rhodes’s legal acumen, saying the self-styled militia leader was making demands a federal judge had no power to grant — including forcing the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack to hand over information and barring use of a recording made by a private citizen because it might violate state law. “You don’t have to be a constitutional scholar to know that” a First Amendment challenge to the indictment would go nowhere, Mehta said.
Bright told the court that he had rejected some of Rhodes’s proposals on similar grounds, including a “red herring” from “the conspiratorial world.” Others, he said, he had heard about for the first time in Tarpley’s motion.
“I have no ill will in any way towards Mr. Rhodes. I’ve given seven months of my life to Mr. Rhodes,” he said. But “I’m real strained right now to not tell the court that this isn’t a broken relationship.”
By the end of the hearing, he and Rhodes had both apologized for accusing each other of lying, and Bright promised to “bend over backwards” to communicate better with his client.
Mehta said the only concern raised by Tarpley that had any merit was that the indictment last week of Kellye SoRelle, former general counsel for the Oath Keepers, “represents a monumental change in how Rhodes expected to defend himself.” In court, Linder said that up until her arrest SoRelle had been willing to testify for Rhodes’s defense.
Prosecutor Jeffrey Nestler said the Justice Department had told all the defendants months ago that SoRelle, who stood on the Capitol grounds with Rhodes on Jan. 6, had “potential criminal exposure.” She is accused of conspiracy to obstruct the congressional vote count and tampering with evidence, among other crimes. She has publicly maintained her innocence. | 2022-09-07T23:54:23Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Oath Keepers trial ... Stewart Rhodes fires lawyers - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/stewart-rhodes-trial-delay/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/stewart-rhodes-trial-delay/ |
The news comes as Prince George’s County prepares for a 30-day crackdown on its curfew for those under 17, a policy that experts have long criticized
D.C. Police Chief Robert J. Contee III with Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) in July. (Bonnie Jo Mount/The Washington Post)
D.C. police quietly resumed enforcing the city’s long-standing juvenile curfew last month in what the chief described as an effort to concentrate on areas where crime has spiked and young people tend to congregate.
Sixteen people have been picked up since Aug. 1 for violating the District’s curfew, police said. The curfew restricts activity for those under 17 during nighttime hours.
Police began enforcing the curfew, which was largely suspended during the pandemic, without fanfare — a direct contrast to the Labor Day news conference in neighboring Prince George’s County. The leadership there, frustrated by a spate of killings and violence in August, announced a 30-day crackdown on its own curfew for youths to begin Friday.
The efforts from law enforcement to keep children and teenagers inside comes as both jurisdictions are struggling to reduce violent crime, with youth arrests in 2022 up about 12 percent in D.C. and 53 percent in Prince George’s compared with the same time last year. Proponents of the curfew hope it will keep young people safe and prevent any violence they may cause. But experts who have long studied the tool say that it risks exacerbating tense dynamics between police and communities and is rarely, if ever, effective in reducing violence.
“It’s a really blunt instrument that criminalizes and impedes on the rights of young people, particularly Black youth,” said Eduardo Ferrer, a Georgetown University law professor and legal and policy director of D.C. Lawyers for Youth. “The risks are high, while the benefits are very low.”
Curfews targeting youths exist in at least 400 towns, cities, counties and states across the country, according to a survey conducted by the National Youth Rights Association. They gained momentum in the 1990s — when politicians touted a tough-on-crime posture in response to rising violence — but the policies fell out of favor more recently when racial justice protests called attention to police killings of Black men stemming from minor offenses. There are no active juvenile curfews in Alexandria or the counties of Montgomery, Fairfax or Arlington, officials in each jurisdiction said. Norfolk and Richmond have curfews for minors, though their ordinances say little about how police are supposed to enforce them.
In D.C. and Prince George’s, the policies allow police officers to stop and question anyone they believe to be under 17 and outside after hours. In D.C., those hours are between midnight and 6 a.m. each night during the summer. For the rest of the year, the hours are midnight to 6 a.m. Friday and Saturday and 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. Sunday through Thursday. In Prince George’s, the restrictions are in place between 10 p.m. and 5 a.m. Sunday through Thursday and from midnight to 5 a.m. Friday and Saturday. Both jurisdictions offer exceptions for minors accompanied by a parents or working, among other circumstances.
In the 1990s, the American Civil Liberties Union filed a flurry of lawsuits challenging curfews nationwide, arguing that they violated the rights of minors and their parents. In 1996, after the ACLU of D.C. sued, a federal judge struck down the District’s curfew — saying the city had not proved that the law would, in practice, benefit public safety. The curfew was reinstated by 1999, but similar concerns about its efficacy remain.
This week, ACLU chapters in D.C. and Maryland renewed their criticism.
“We oppose the County’s decision to put all children under virtual house arrest,” Yanet Amanuel, public policy director of the ACLU of Maryland, said in a statement. “Criminalizing the innocent behavior of children is also fundamentally ineffective.”
Multiple studies have also found that the prime time for violence committed by youths is right after school lets out in the afternoon — a concern the federal judge raised in 1996 — and not the late-night stretches when curfews are in place.
One study that analyzed the District’s juvenile curfew between 2006 and 2012 found that the policy actually led to an increase in gunshots citywide. When the District changed its cutoff time from midnight to 11 p.m., restricting youth activity by an extra hour, there were 0.045 additional gunfire incidents per hour, according to the study.
An analysis conducted by the Urban Institute found that the curfew in Prince George’s County, passed in 1995, had little effect on protecting children from violent crime — though it was associated with a reduction in the victimization of young adults ages 22 to 25.
D.C. Police Chief Robert J. Contee III pushed back on the findings, saying that it is impossible to measure what would have happened without curfews in place. “If you see a 13- or 14-year-old out at 2 o’clock in the morning, something is wrong with that picture,” he added.
Still, the extent of curfew enforcement varies by jurisdiction and possibly by neighborhood. In D.C., the code allows police to detain youths who violate the curfew and release them to a parent or guardian, or to the family services division of the Department of Human Services until 6 a.m. The code also allows authorities to fine their parents up to $500.
But Contee said those penalties are rarely handed out, and officers typically drive youths home or to family services. He also said the officers who concentrate on curfew violations tend to patrol areas such as Gallery Place, where fights and robberies have been frequent and minors often congregate.
“We’re not randomly picking up kids,” he said, adding, “But we will engage when we have to.”
Throughout 2020 and 2021, as the pandemic raged, D.C. police sparingly stopped youths on curfew violations related to crime reduction. The department said it picked up six people last year and 61 people the year before (it detained additional curfew violators but said those were due to unique orders during periods of civil unrest and the pandemic that applied to people of all ages). They stopped 81 juveniles in 2019, the department said, and 63 in 2018.
In Prince George’s, the code states that penalties begin with a warning to parents and escalate after the first offense, allowing police to take youths to police stations until they are placed with parents, guardians or the Department of Social Services. The code similarly allows for police to fine parents for their children’s violation, with penalties ranging from $50 to $250, depending on the number of offenses.
In a statement posted to Twitter on Wednesday evening, Prince George’s County Executive Angela D. Alsobrooks (D) said that “the first measure our officers will take, if required, is to educate youth on the curfew and tell them to go home.”
Alsobrooks also defended her decision to have officers begin enforcing the curfew Friday.
“Our County is 84% Black and brown, which means we are working to protect children of color, including those who have been victims of violent crime at the hands of other children,” she said. “I think we can all agree that none of us want to see negative interactions between police and our youth during this curfew.”
Victoria Clark, the advisory neighborhood commissioner for an area in Northeast Washington that borders Prince George’s, said she is concerned that curfews will create more violent interactions between police and constituents. She urged local governments to instead invest in programming for youths and argued that any policy that restricts outdoor activities for kids deprives them of their childhood freedoms.
“As anyone who has raised children can tell you, telling kids they can’t do something is not likely to be effective,” she said. “It’s not addressing the root issue.”
Salvador Rizzo, Katie Mettler and Jasmine Hilton contributed to this report.
Children’s hospital threatened after Libs of TikTok recording on trans hysterectomies | 2022-09-08T00:03:26Z | www.washingtonpost.com | D.C. started reenforcing its juvenile curfew this summer - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/dc-curfew-enforcement-prince-georges/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/dc-curfew-enforcement-prince-georges/ |
Former Prince William election registrar indicted on corruption charges
The office of Virginia Attorney General Jason Miyares in Richmond. Miyares announced on Sept. 7 that the former Prince William County registrar has been indicted on corruption charges. (Julia Rendleman/The Washington Post)
The former Prince William County registrar of voters has been indicted on corruption charges, Virginia’s attorney general announced Wednesday.
Michele White, who resigned last year, is facing felony counts of corrupt conduct as an election official and making a false statement by an election official, as well as a misdemeanor charge of willful neglect of duty by an elected official. The crimes are alleged to have occurred between August and December 2020, while White was still in office.
White did not immediately respond to a request for comment and no attorney is listed for her in court records.
The office of Attorney General Jason Miyares declined to detail the specific allegations against White, but Eric Olsen, the registrar who succeeded White, said in an interview that he triggered the probe in April.
“I was going through some documents in the office and I saw some matters that needed to be reported to the state,” Olsen said.
Olsen declined to discuss what those “discrepancies” were, citing the ongoing criminal case, but he said they potentially affected a small number of votes in the 2020 election. He said the issues were not serious enough to change the outcome of any contests.
“The Electoral Board and new Director of Elections have built an entirely new leadership team that is dedicated to fair and accurate elections,” Olsen said in a statement. “Many improvements and best practices have been adopted to ensure a safe and transparent voting experience for the voters of Prince William County.”
The registrar oversees voter registration and helps administer elections in Virginia counties. The registrar is appointed by a county electoral board.
White stepped down in early 2021 after holding the position of registrar since 2015, Olsen said.
The Prince William County Times reported in April 2021 that White resigned after an emergency meeting of the Prince William County Electoral Board to discuss her tenure. The discussion occurred during a closed session and board members declined to comment on the reasons for White’s resignation at the time.
A spokesman for the electoral board did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday.
Olsen said in an interview that the office saw high turnover during the latter part of White’s tenure but that it was not related to any alleged criminal conduct.
“There was typical office stuff that was going on, and that was exacerbated by working during the pandemic,” Olsen said.
A grand jury in Manassas indicted White on Monday. No court dates have been set in her case. | 2022-09-08T00:03:32Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Former Prince William election registrar indicted on corruption charges - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/prince-william-election-registrar-indicted/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/07/prince-william-election-registrar-indicted/ |
Raids on ISIS camp in Syria yield hundreds of arrests
A member of the Syrian Kurdish Asayish security forces stands guard during an inspection of tents at the Kurdish-run al-Hol camp, which holds relatives of suspected Islamic State fighters. (Delil Souleiman/AFP/Getty Images)
Syrian forces allied with the United States have rounded up hundreds of suspected Islamic State operatives this year in raids on a refugee camp that has been a hotbed of violence perpetrated by terrorist sympathizers, operations coordinated and facilitated by the U.S. military.
U.S. Central Command announced Wednesday that, over the last two weeks alone, Syrian Defense Forces (SDF) had apprehended “dozens” of suspects at the al-Hol camp in northeast Syria and dissolved a “major ISIS facilitation network.” The operation is ongoing, according to a U.S. defense official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to detail an unfolding situation.
The raid, characterized as a “full clearing operation,” is the largest carried out at the al-Hol camp since May 2021, the official said. It marked the seventh time this year that SDF units, enabled by their American allies, have raided the sprawling desert complex that houses about 55,000 people — many of them deemed ISIS sympathizers who traveled to Syria and Iraq at the height of the group’s power. Each raid has resulted in the detention of between 40 and 120 suspected ISIS operatives.
Col. Joe Buccino, a spokesman for U.S. Central Command, said in a statement that, as part of the ongoing operation, Syrian forces on Monday rescued four women located in tunnels where they had been chained and tortured.
For this and other efforts undertaken at al-Hol, the U.S. military personnel identified the targets based on intelligence gathered from tipsters, the defense official said. U.S. forces spearheaded much of the planning, coordinating the Syrian Defense Forces with the police and security guard units stationed inside the camp.
It’s unclear how many of the detainees rounded up in recent weeks are children, who account for more than half of the camp’s population. The vast majority of residents at al-Hol — Syria’s largest refugee camp — are women and children considered to be members of ISIS or their relatives.
“This operation will make the camp safer for those residents who remain or wish to return to their countries of origin but are unable to do so,” said Buccino, stressing that officials’ goal is for those at al-Hol to be rehabilitated and repatriated to their home countries.
The process of moving individuals out of al-Hol has lagged. Its residents come from more than 50 countries, not all of which have been eager to bring back identified ISIS operatives and sympathizers, or even their children.
Most Western nations have only recently begun to bring back refugees by the dozens, while Iraq has repatriated nearly 2,500, according to a recent U.S. State Department count.
Almost half of the camp’s residents hail from Iraq, and more than a third come from within Syria — both of which still struggle with challenges stemming from terrorism and instability. As such, there are limitations to how swiftly relocations can occur.
“The SDF will continue its efforts to eliminate the ISIS threat,” Buccino said, “but it remains critical that the international community support this effort through repatriation.” | 2022-09-08T00:11:48Z | www.washingtonpost.com | ISIS suspects arrested in raids on al-Hol camp in Syria, U.S. says - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/09/07/isis-al-hol-raid/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/09/07/isis-al-hol-raid/ |
Joe Flacco (19) started one game last year as an injury replacement for Jets starter Zach Wilson (2). (John Minchillo/AP)
It’s not the news that New York Jets fans wanted to hear but to Baltimore Ravens fans and others, it adds some spice to a Week 1 matchup.
Jets Coach Robert Saleh revealed Wednesday that starting quarterback Zach Wilson will be out until at least Week 4 because of knee injuries he suffered in a preseason game. That means Joe Flacco, New York’s backup, will start the season opener against the Ravens, with whom he played for 11 seasons and led to a Super Bowl triumph in 2013.
Flacco said later on Wednesday that the fact he’s yet to face Baltimore, which traded him away in 2019, as an opponent means that it’s “ultimately going to be tough to completely prepare” for what he will experience Sunday at the Jets’ Met Life Stadium.
Wilson, the No. 2 overall pick in last year’s NFL draft, was hurt last month in the Jets’ first preseason game. Running with the ball and attempting to elude a Philadelphia Eagles defender, he fell to the turf without being contacted and was later diagnosed with a bone bruise and torn meniscus in his right knee. He underwent surgery and was reportedly given a two-to-four-week timetable for recovery, providing some hope he might be able to start the season opener but also putting in play something of a grudge match for Flacco.
After Wilson went through a light workout on Monday, Saleh indicated it was “possible” the quarterback could make it back for Week 1. On Wednesday, however, the head coach said the team decided it wasn’t “worth the risk” with Wilson, who missed four games last season with a ligament injury in the same knee.
Declaring the Jets are playing “the long game” with Wilson, Saleh told reporters, “He’s a young man, and we don’t want anything else happening to that knee.”
The coach added that he didn’t want to face further questions about Wilson’s possible return — “I really don’t want to talk about this situation anymore” — and thus was making public the plan to shelve Wilson for at least the first three weeks of the season.
The Jets play at Pittsburgh in Week 4, which will mark the end of an unusual stretch in which they start their season with four straight games against AFC North opponents, including the Cleveland Browns in Week 2 and the defending AFC champion Cincinnati Bengals in Week 3.
Flacco, of course, is very familiar with that division after having been a first-round pick by the Ravens in 2008. He immediately became Baltimore’s starter and held that position until suffering a hip injury in the middle of the 2018 season. Lamar Jackson, who was drafted in the first round earlier that year, performed well enough in a fill-in capacity that the Ravens kept him as their starter even after Flacco returned to health toward the end of the season. Flacco was traded in the following offseason to the Denver Broncos.
Flacco played just eight games for the Broncos in 2019 before a neck injury ended his season, and was released with a failed physical designation after then-rookie quarterback Drew Lock showed promise in his place. He first joined the Jets in 2020 as a backup to Sam Darnold, returned to the team in a trade from Philadelphia after Wilson was injured last season and re-signed with New York in March. In five starts with the Jets spanning the past two years, Flacco has yet to win a game, but his passer rating over that stretch of 88.3 is notably better thanWilson’s 69.7 from last season.
In a podcast interview conducted by the Jets Wednesday, Flacco said he has seen other players face their former teams and “as much as they tried to keep it in check, that’s all good to say and talk about until all of a sudden the lights turn on and it’s game time, and your emotions get the best of you.”
“That’s what’s great about football — it’s a team sport, it’s about the team and you just have to play your role,” he continued. “So I’ll try to make sure I do that as much as possible, but I’ve been through it enough times to see how emotional it can be, so I think I’d be a little bit naive to think there’s going to be zero of that.” | 2022-09-08T00:11:54Z | www.washingtonpost.com | With Jets' Zach Wilson out, Joe Flacco to face Ravens - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/jets-zach-wilson-joe-flacco-ravens/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/07/jets-zach-wilson-joe-flacco-ravens/ |
The decision — citing an employer’s religious freedom — is likely to be appealed
A federal judge ruled Wednesday that requiring coverage of an HIV prevention drug under the Affordable Care Act violates a Texas employer's religious freedom. (John Raby/AP)
A federal judge in Texas ruled Wednesday that the Affordable Care Act cannot require a Christian-owned company to cover HIV drugs for its employees because it violated the owners’ religious freedom.
In his 42-page ruling, U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor said the requirement forcing the company to comply with the mandate or pay a penalty, “imposes a substantial burden on religious freedom” He also declared unconstitutional the government’s system for deciding which preventive care services should be covered at no cost to consumers under the health-care law — a decision that could jeopardize a broad range of services, including screenings for cancer and heart disease, for millions of Americans.
The ruling is the latest in a series of challenges to the health-care law. O’Connor himself ruled the entire law unconstitutional in late 2018 — a decision that did not stand after the Supreme Court upheld the law 7-2 last year, the third time the body had considered a challenge to the Obama administration’s most significant domestic policy.
The challenge this time centered on several issues, including whether requiring certain preventive services violated the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, passed by Congress in 1993, and also the authority of the government’s Preventive Services Task Force to determine what preventive services employers must cover.
Steve Hotze, one of the plaintiffs and owner of the Christian for-profit corporation Braidwood Management Inc., objected to providing coverage for HIV-prevention drugs, called PrEP, saying they “facilitate and encourage homosexual behavior and sexual activity outside of marriage between one man and one woman.”
O’Connor’s ruling met with swift opposition from consumer advocacy groups and many Democrats, who said they expected it to be appealed.
A Biden administration official said the decision was under review. Since the judge did not issue an injunction laying out the scope of his decision, “it’s too soon to know really what this means,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the case.
Consumer organization Protect Our Care said the ruling “threatens the Affordable Care Act preventive services requirement that guarantees free access to over 100 preventive health services, including health screenings, routine vaccinations, well baby and child visits, prenatal care, contraception, and more,” services used by 150 million Americans, according to the group.
“In a legally sane world, this would be quickly overturned, but that’s not the world that we live in” said Ira Lupu, professor emeritus at George Washington University Law School who has specialized in the study of religious freedom.
Lupu said that the new ruling extended the high court’s Hobby Lobby decision.
“It’s not the drug that’s sinful,” he said. “They’re saying many of the people who will want to use this drug will have committed a sin.” | 2022-09-08T00:24:52Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Obamacare can’t require coverage for some HIV drugs, federal judge rules - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/09/07/aca-hiv-drugs-religious-freedom-texas/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/09/07/aca-hiv-drugs-religious-freedom-texas/ |
The vote increases the likelihood that the Food and Drug Administration will clear the first drug for the disease in five years
Sandra Abrevaya helps her husband, Brian Wallach, at their Kenilworth, Ill. home earlier this year. He was diagnosed with ALS in 2017. (Erin Hooley/Chicago Tribune/Getty Images)
The vote was a stunning turnaround from late March when the panel voted 6 to 4 to recommend against FDA approval. At that meeting, the FDA’s Peripheral and Central Nervous System Drugs Advisory Committee concluded the evidence from a single clinical trial — with just 137 patients and some follow-up data — was not sufficient to show the drug, called AMX0035, slowed a degenerative disease that usually kills people within three to five years.
But on Wednesday, after hours of discussion, several advisers said that additional analyses submitted by the drug’s manufacturer, Cambridge-based Amylyx, bolstered the case for approval, even though uncertainties remain. Advisers were also affected by the disease’s severity and the lack of effective treatments. A vow by a top Amylyx official to pull the drug from the market if a larger study, with 600 patients, fails to show effectiveness was also a factor in the vote.
Dunn also noted the manufacturer is conducting a large trial that will be completed late next year or in early 2024; that trial is expected to show definitively whether the drug works. And in a highly unusual move, he asked company officials whether they would voluntarily withdraw the product if it was approved now but the larger trial failed to show effectiveness.
Justin Klee, co-chief executive of the Cambridge-based biotech company, agreed. If the larger trial is not successful, “we will do what is right for patients, which includes withdrawing the product from the market,” he said.
During the public hearing portion of Wednesday’s session, leading ALS doctors pleaded for the drug’s approval, saying even small benefits could provide enormous help in dealing with a fatal neurodegenerative disease. Several patients who have gotten the drug through clinical trials gave emotionally wrenching testimonials asking for approval.
Vance Burghard said he was diagnosed with ALS in 2017 and soon needed help pulling up his pants. Through a clinical trial, he has been on AMX0035 for three years, something he called “life-changing.” He said his condition has stabilized and he has been able to hike in China and Tibet.
Gregory Canter said he participated in the ALS Association’s Ice Bucket Challenge several years ago, although “I didn’t have ALS and I didn’t know anyone who did.” A few years later, he was diagnosed with the illness and subsequently enrolled in the six-month Amylyx trial. He believes he got the placebo, but as a trial participant was offered the drug after the trial was over, as part of what is called an open-label study.
Canter said the drug has stabilized his breathing and helped him in other ways. “I am still alive, living independently and my disease progression has noticeably decreased,” he said.
Brian Wallach, a former Obama White House staffer who was diagnosed five years ago, noted that some panel members said they had voted against the drug in March to protect patients from false hope.
“I don’t need you to protect me from myself,” he said. Such “antiquated paternalism is misplaced,” he said through an aide because his speech is severely affected. “There is only one right answer here. I only hope you have the courage to recommend approval.”
Amylyx applied to the FDA for approval of the drug in November 2021. The company submitted data from a 24-week week trial that showed the drug was safe and slowed a decline in essential functions such as walking, talking and cutting food, by 25 percent.
In a follow-on study, in which all participants were offered the drug, patients who received the treatment from the start of the trial lived a median of more than six months longer than those who did not, the investigators found.
Still, the FDA has signaled for months it had doubts about approving the drug on a single study, especially when the agency said it did not find the data “exceptionally persuasive.” The agency said the company did not adequately account for deaths during the trial and took issue with other aspects of the study. It said the additional analyses included no new information.
Canada recently approved AMX0035 on a conditional basis. That means Amylyx can sell the drug but is required to confirm its benefits based on the results of the larger trial. But the FDA’s approval processes are somewhat different from Canada’s.
Some ALS patients are already taking one or both components of AMX0035. Since sodium phenylbutyrate is approved for another purpose, doctors are allowed to prescribe it off label for ALS. And the nutritional supplement, sometimes called TUDCO, is available on a variety of websites.
Some health policy experts said in the hearing that the drug should not be approved until additional data proves its effectiveness.
Others agreed the FDA has a legal responsibility to determine that drugs are safe and effective — but noted it has flexibility about how to do that. Murky data can complicate the picture.
“Science is messy and even well-designed trials will not always give you a clear-cut answer,” said Holly Fernandez Lynch, a bioethicist at the University of Pennsylvania who is not on the panel. | 2022-09-08T00:24:58Z | www.washingtonpost.com | FDA advisers recommend approval of controversial ALS drug - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/09/07/als-treatment-amx0035-fda-advisers/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2022/09/07/als-treatment-amx0035-fda-advisers/ |
Police serve search warrants in killing of Las Vegas reporter
Las Vegas Review-Journal investigative reporter Jeff German, 69, was found dead outside his home Saturday morning with stab wounds
Elahe Izadi
Jeff German, a Las Vegas investigative reporter, was stabbed to death outside his home on Sept. 3. (K.M. Cannon/Las Vegas Review-Journal/AP)
Authorities served search warrants on Wednesday as they continued to investigate the fatal stabbing of a Las Vegas reporter.
Las Vegas Review-Journal investigative reporter Jeff German, 69, was found dead outside his home Saturday morning with stab wounds after police received a report from a person who said a neighbor had died, the newspaper reported.
The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department told The Washington Post in a statement that it is serving search warrants related to German’s death. No one has been charged in the case.
Police declined to provide any additional information on the warrants, but the Review-Journal said its reporters witnessed authorities search the home of Clark County Public Administrator Robert Telles on Wednesday.
An SUV and a second vehicle were towed from Telles’s property on Wednesday afternoon, the Review-Journal reported.
On Tuesday, authorities released photos and video of a maroon vehicle suspected to be linked to German’s death.
Police tow away a GMC SUV from Public Administrator Robert Telles’ driveway in Las Vegas as part of the investigation into the slaying of @reviewjournal investigative reporter Jeff German https://t.co/vAhxjgdlzU pic.twitter.com/Ur3yq7C7GF
Local reporters outside Telles’s home on Wednesday asked him why police towed away his vehicle and requested comment, but Telles ducked under his garage door, walked through his cluttered garage and lowered his garage door on reporters.
Requests for comment to multiple numbers listed for Telles were not immediately returned.
Telles, 45, had been the focus of German’s reporting this year, which examined the official and claims of intimidation and an inappropriate relationship with a staffer.
In tweets from June, Telles called German a “bully” and took jabs at his reporting.
Telles (D) lost his reelection bid in June’s primary election after German’s findings were published, according to the Review-Journal.
In a Saturday news conference, Capt. Dori Koren of the Las Vegas police said German had an altercation with another person Friday that led to his stabbing.
German had not told the paper’s leadership about any concerns for his safety, the Review-Journal’s executive editor, Glenn Cook, told the paper.
At least 15 journalists have been killed in the United States since 1992, according to a Committee to Protect Journalists database. Those deaths included people who died during dangerous assignments and those who seemed to have been targeted.
In 2007, Oakland Post editor in chief Chauncey Bailey, who had been covering the financial troubles of a local bakery, was walking down the street when a masked shooter gunned him down. A jury convicted the former head of the bakery and an accomplice in the killing.
In 2015, local Virginia ABC television reporter Alison Parker and cameraman Adam Ward were shot and killed during a live broadcast by a disgruntled former employee.
One of the deadliest attacks on an American newspaper took place in 2018, when a gunman stormed the Capital Gazette newsroom in Annapolis, Md., killing five and wounding several others. The gunman had previously lost a defamation lawsuit against the newspaper for its 2011 coverage of a criminal harassment charge against him. Prosecutors argued he was out for “revenge,” and the jury found him criminally responsible for the rampage. A judge last year sentenced him to serve five consecutive life sentences.
Tom Jackman contributed to this report. | 2022-09-08T00:25:04Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Las Vegas police issue search warrants for journalist Jeff German's death - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/07/jeff-german-las-vegas-murder/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/07/jeff-german-las-vegas-murder/ |
Arthur Cotton Moore, defining architect of Washington, dies at 87
The sixth-generation Washingtonian led a celebrated renovation of the Library of Congress as well as the development of Georgetown’s Washington Harbour
Arthur Cotton Moore at his home in the Watergate building in Washington in 2007. (Jacqueline Delos Angeles)
Arthur Cotton Moore, a Washington architect who painstakingly renovated landmarks such as the Library of Congress and gave the capital a new waterfront destination with the development of Washington Harbour, preserving the city’s urban landscape even as he pushed it to evolve, died Sept. 4 at his home in Washington. He was 87.
The cause was pulmonary fibrosis, said his wife, Patricia Moore.
A sixth-generation Washingtonian, Mr. Moore established his firm, Arthur Cotton Moore/Associates, in 1965 and over the next half-century became one of the preeminent architects in the capital, overseeing more than $1 billion in office buildings alone. “I wish I had designed as much of my town as he has,” Hugh Newell Jacobsen, another of the city’s leading architects, told The Washington Post in 1981.
Arthur Cotton Moore's Designs on Washington
In the 1980s and 1990s, Mr. Moore served as a consulting architect on an $81.5 million renovation of the Thomas Jefferson Building, the centerpiece of the Library of Congress, which reopened after the work in 1997. Dropped ceilings were removed to reveal long-forgotten paintings. Artwork was scrubbed of years of dust and buildup. Stained glass and mosaics were restored. Structural changes brought the cavernous building — which Mr. Moore said had only two fire extinguishers — at long last up to safety codes.
Lauding the “dazzling restoration,” New York Times architecture critic Herbert Muschamp wrote that visitors to the newly refurbished library found themselves in a “place of radiance.”
Earlier, Mr. Moore helped rescue the Old Post Office on Pennsylvania Avenue NW from demolition. He played a leading role in the renovation of that building as well as the Phillips Collection, the private art museum in Dupont Circle where paintings had once been stored in the bathroom for lack of space, as well as the Cairo, the apartment building on Q Street NW that is the tallest residential structure in Washington.
In those projects, Mr. Moore displayed a reverence for history that endeared him to preservationists and advocates for traditional design.
At the Old Post Office, his “intervention didn’t take away from the character of the original building,” Dhiru A. Thadani, a Washington-based architect and urbanist, said in an interview. At the Jefferson building, Thadani added, “it’s almost like you don’t know he was there.”
“We might all be grateful that Arthur Cotton Moore has humanely preserved the best of Washington,” Michael Curtis, the author of the book “Classical Architecture and Monuments of Washington, D.C.,” wrote in an email.
In his own designs, Mr. Moore was more exuberant, challenging the Washington aesthetic that seemed to hold, he wrote, that “good architecture is just a utilitarian building whose greatest virtues are making money and not leaking.” The city, as he saw it, was full of boxy structures erected to house the city’s lawyers, lobbyists and “green-shaded bureaucrats.” Even the Kennedy Center, he told Washingtonian magazine, was “like a Whitman Sampler, with toothpicklike columns.”
Mr. Moore sought to confer on the city’s architecture a hint of lightness, even whimsy, with his signature curvaceous, futuristic forms. His design for the old Rizik’s fashion boutique on Connecticut Avenue NW, with its undulating lines, exemplified the style he called “Industrial Baroque.”
“People are tired of endless grid-crunching,” he told the Times in 1990. “Baroque deals with modern design’s fear and loathing of the curve — just what I think is missing in modern design.”
Mr. Moore’s most noted design was Washington Harbour, a $200 million complex situated along the banks of the Potomac River in Georgetown. In the 1960s, he had undertaken the restoration of nearby Canal Square, a 19th-century warehouse that he converted into retail and office space, marking the beginning of his decades-long effort to transform the neighborhood.
For many years, the Georgetown waterfront was hardly a destination. It included a concrete plant and a parking lot for impounded cars. During one period in its history, a stench emanated from a building used for animal rendering. “One day they tried to improve the smell by dumping chocolate into the thing,” Mr. Moore told The Post, “and there was a smell of rancid chocolate all over Georgetown.”
Yet he saw the potential for a new Washington landmark — a combination of luxury condominiums, restaurants, office space and stores with a promenade along the water. After years of battles with Georgetown community activists who argued for more park and public space, Washington Harbour opened in 1986.
The project was not universally popular. Writing in the Times, architecture critic Paul Goldberger described it as “an overly busy cacophony of curves and arches and turrets and columns and domes and bay windows.”
“As a work of architecture Washington Harbour feels like a modern building trapped in a postmodern girdle,” he wrote. “Its parts seem to clash intensely, and the complex has neither the integrity of a truly classical structure nor that of a truly modern one. It is ponderous and graceless, a reminder that commercial architecture in Washington is still years behind the times.”
Mr. Moore was undeterred by the criticism.
“I was well aware,” he wrote shortly after Washington Harbour opened, “that while no one has ever been pilloried for producing a boring building in Washington, the buildings most beloved here, such as the Cairo, the Old Post Office, the Smithsonian Castle and the Library of Congress … all received terrible reviews by architectural critics at their openings.”
Decades later, as people continued to gather and dine on the waterfront, he seemed to consider his vision fulfilled, at least in part.
“Before Washington Harbour, people didn’t even realize they were living on a river,” Mr. Moore told Washingtonian in 2005. “The Potomac wasn’t part of the collective consciousness.”
On the Waterfront, Calm After the Storms
Arthur Cotton Moore was born April 12, 1935, and grew up in a Victorian house in the Kalorama neighborhood that was later destroyed to accommodate the Chinese embassy. His father was a Navy captain, and his mother was a homemaker.
After graduating from the private St. Albans School in 1954, Mr. Moore enrolled at Princeton University — in part to avoid the Naval Academy, he said. His freshman year, he signed up for a class in architectural drawing.
“What hooked me was the idea of making your drawings come to life,” he told The Post. “I find great excitement in actually seeing my squiggles on paper built. The only true award in architecture is when hundreds of people make your buildings real.”
He received a bachelor’s degree in 1958 and a master’s degree in 1960, both in architecture.
His marriage to Yolanda Andrea Clapp ended in divorce.
Survivors include his wife of nearly six decades, the former Patricia Stefan of Washington; a son from his first marriage, Gregory W. Moore of Highland Park, N.J.; a sister; a brother; and a grandson.
Mr. Moore and his wife lived for a period in Talbot County, on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, in a stainless steel mansion of Mr. Moore’s design. In recent years, they had resided in a penthouse apartment at the Watergate building along the Potomac.
In addition to his architectural work, Mr. Moore was painter, a furniture maker and a novelist. He was the author of books including “Interruption of the Cocktail Hour: A Washington Yarn of Art, Murder, and the Attempted Assassination of the President,” as well as “The Powers of Preservation: New Life for Urban Historic Places” and “Our Nation’s Capital: Pro Bono Publico Ideas.”
The latter book, published in 2017, detailed his vision for projects that he hoped might one day come to fruition in Washington: a staircase linking the Kennedy Center’s terrace to the Potomac River; a ferry connecting the Kennedy Center, Washington Harbour and Rosslyn, Va.; an expanded National Mall with underground parking; even open-air art and book stands along the imposing sides of the FBI headquarters.
“They’d fold up at night,” he suggested, “like Parisian bookstalls.”
Among his final creative projects, his wife said, was a stainless steel sculpture of a tree, its gleaming branches curved as if bending in the wind. The work will be installed later this month, she said, at his grave in Oak Hill Cemetery in Georgetown. | 2022-09-08T02:57:15Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Arthur Cotton Moore dies; architect designed Washington Harbour - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2022/09/07/arthur-cotton-moore-architect-washington-dead/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/obituaries/2022/09/07/arthur-cotton-moore-architect-washington-dead/ |
Man arrested in Memphis shootings after grisly live stream
Memphis police officers work a crime scene on Poplar Avenue on Sept. 7. (Patrick Lantrip/AP)
A 19-year-old man has been arrested in Memphis after multiple shootings, police said, after a live-streamed video appeared online, showing someone entering an auto-parts store and shooting a man.
The suspect, whom police identified as Ezekiel D. Kelly, is in custody hours after several shootings prompted a citywide alert, Memphis police said Wednesday night on Twitter. Court records show he has been charged with first-degree murder.
Local media reported that Kelly suffered injuries when he crashed a Dodge Challenger before being cornered by police in Whitehaven, a town in the south Memphis area.
A safety alert for the region has been lifted. Earlier, police warned residents to shelter in place and stay indoors as the suspect remained at large. Multiple shootings were reported in the city Wednesday, and there were at least two deaths, police said, but it was not clear whether they were connected to Kelly’s arrest.
In a video live-streamed on Facebook that has since been taken down, a man appeared to walk into an auto-parts store, aim a gun at another man and pull the trigger. In the video viewed by The Post, the man claims to have shot five people. | 2022-09-08T03:53:50Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Ezekiel Kelly charged in Memphis shootings after Facebook video - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/07/memphis-shootings-ezekiel-kelly-video/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/07/memphis-shootings-ezekiel-kelly-video/ |
She is very persistent and thinks she is entitled to my used baby stuff and will throw a tantrum if I don’t cave. How do I handle her? This is a lifelong pattern between us that I really need to break.
— Sibling
Sibling: Then break it! Let her have her tantrum. You are not required by law, love or family to listen to it.
There are a bunch of things you can say, which I’ll write out if you’d like, but the whole answer hinges on your being willing to hold your “no” under the seemingly unbearable pressure of her persistence and entitlement. That’s how you handle her. Decide, stay calm and don’t budge.
Do you want phrasing to make it easier? Or is validation enough that this is the right battle to choose? If it’s the latter, then you’ve got it.
Re: Phrasing: I’m not the original poster, but I could really use help with the phrasing. I’m in a similar situation with my best friend, where she demands unrealistic things of me and I say yes to appease her. (Yes, I’m working on this in therapy, it goes to back to childhood, etc.)
Anonymous: This is good, actually. It forces me out of the baby-clothes topic and toward something universal.
So: “I gave you my answer to this: No. Please kindly accept it.”
Early on, when a hard no like this is a pronounced change to your dynamic, it’s okay to have a conversation about it: “You’re still pressing me to change my mind. I don’t appreciate that. Letting people say no is a matter of respect.” And: “I’m your friend/sibling! I want to make you happy. I just have my limits, as do you. We’re both entitled to have them, and both of us should be able to trust the other to respect them.”
At any point, in this or any conversation, you can say: “I’ve made my point here, and now we’re just doing laps. Let’s drop it, please.”
Remember that it stops being an argument when only one of you chooses to drop it. Your saying, “Let’s drop it,” is really just a courtesy; you can drop it unilaterally — which I suggest you do if the other person refuses. You can hang up, abruptly change the subject or leave.
All of this grows out of the taproot of boundaries: that YOU decide what you think, what you discuss with whom, where you go, whom you see, how you spend your time, what you lend, what you value, where you live, how you guide the trajectory of your life. You. Other people can have opinions, but that doesn’t affect any of the preceding points unless you choose to let it.
Once you know this to be true in your very core and you feel it, then it gets a lot easier to know when and how to tell people to back the erf off.
And easier to withstand the blowback of people who are highly frustrated that they can’t push you around anymore. Resets are hard. (Understatement.) | 2022-09-08T04:28:45Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Carolyn Hax: New mom thinks she's entitled to family's hand-me-downs - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/advice/2022/09/08/carolyn-hax-new-mom-hand-me-downs/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/advice/2022/09/08/carolyn-hax-new-mom-hand-me-downs/ |
A resident walks near a Soviet monument in Berdyansk, Ukraine, which is now occupied by Russian forces. The city's Russian-appointed military commandant was targeted this week in a car bombing. (Pierre Crom/Getty Images)
KYIV, Ukraine — For anyone contemplating a top administrative position in the Russian-occupied territories in Ukraine, Kyiv authorities have a message: Be afraid. Very afraid.
They have been gunned down, blown up, hanged and poisoned — an array of methods that reflects the determination of the Ukrainian hit squads and saboteurs often operating deep inside enemy-controlled territory. The unpredictability of the attacks is meant to terrify anyone who might agree to serve in the puppet governments Russia has been creating with an eye toward staging sham referendums and ultimately annexing the occupied lands.
Artem Bardin, the military commandant in Berdyansk, a port city on the Sea of Azov that Russia seized early in the war, was critically injured when a car exploded near the city administration building, according to Russia’s Tass news agency, which described the incident as a “terrorist act.”
Bardin’s legs were blown off and he suffered extensive blood loss, but he was alive, Vladimir Rogov, a Ukrainian who works as a pro-Russian official, told Tass. “Doctors continue to fight for his life,” Rogov said.
Inside occupied Ukraine: A photogapher's firsthand account
As Ukrainian soldiers press forward in the country’s south and east to try to reclaim occupied territories, Ukrainian authorities say the shadowy behind-the-lines operations are undermining, if not outright thwarting, Moscow’s plans to take political control, and especially to stage the sham referendums the Kremlin hoped to use to justify annexation.
A Ukrainian official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter, said one of Ukraine’s special services was involved in the attempt on Bardin’s life, though he couldn’t specify which agency.
“In my understanding, everything that is done to destroy the leaders of the invaders and traitors is done by our special services,” the official said. “You can say that three organizations are involved in this kind of business: special operations forces, the main intelligence department [of the military] and a special unit of the SBU,” Ukraine’s main internal security service.
The assassination campaign, while cheered by many Ukrainians, nonetheless raises legal and ethical questions about extrajudicial killings and potential war crimes, particularly when the targets are political actors or civilians and not combatants on the battlefield or other military personnel. And those questions cannot simply be waved away by pointing to the illegality of Russia’s invasion.
The Geneva Conventions, referring to “persons taking no active part in the hostilities,” specifically prohibit “violence to life and person, in particular murder of all kinds,” as well as “the passing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced by a regularly constituted court.”
Mykhailo Podolyak, a top adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, told The Washington Post that the attacks in the occupied territories were evidence of a “powerful partisan and active protest movement” that shows “Moscow is absolutely incapable of controlling” the areas and that “no one here was waiting … with flowers in their hands” to greet the Russian forces.
As a result, Podolyak said, “all scenarios concocted in the Kremlin, including fictitious referendums, remain only on paper.” He said that Moscow was finding it difficult to recruit from the local population for the pro-Russian administrations, and that Russian officials were refusing to travel to Ukraine because of the risk they would end up on a target list.
“The risks and consequences are extreme — and they understand this very well,” Podolyak said.
In Berdyansk, the deputy head of the traffic police, Aleksandr Kolesnikov, died after a bomb blast, which local authorities blamed on the “Kyiv regime.”
It is far from clear that all these hits were the work of the Ukrainian special services. However, Konrad Muzyka, director of Rochan Consulting, a Polish-based defense consulting firm, said he had not seen “any evidence, even a shred of evidence, or even a rumor” that the attacks were the result of infighting in the pro-Russian administrations.
“Whoever is organizing the attacks, they try to focus on big fish,” he said.
“I think it’s fair to say that Kyiv is very concerned about these referendums,” Muzyka said. Ukrainian officials “would do their utmost to actually prevent them from happening.”
A Putin ally’s daughter was killed near Russia’s capital: What to know
In May, Andrei Shevchik, the Russian-appointed head of Enerhodar, the city closest to Ukraine’s giant Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, was targeted in a bombing attack. That strike was confirmed by Dmytro Orlov, the legitimate mayor, who was unseated by the invading Russians and is exiled from his city.
On Monday, Kirill Stremousov, a senior official in the Moscow-backed Kherson administration, said that “a pause has been taken” in carrying out the referendum in his region because of the security situation. Other Russia-aligned officials tried to walk back that statement, but it was far from clear that Russian forces would control the territory long enough to stage the fake vote.
At the end of August, Podolyak tweeted a still photo taken from Quentin Tarantino’s film “Inglourious Basterds,” which recounts the exploits of a fictitious U.S. unit killing German soldiers behind enemy lines in World War War II.
“In Kherson, it is said that Russian officers … have been avoiding evening walks recently,” he wrote. “As soon as city falls asleep, the partisans wake up. … We wish all the collaborators a ‘good night.’ ” | 2022-09-08T06:21:56Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Ukrainian hit squads are killing Russian occupiers and collaborators - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/08/ukraine-assassinations-occupied-territory-russia/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/08/ukraine-assassinations-occupied-territory-russia/ |
FILE - In this undated photo provided by the Memphis Police Department, 34-year-old Eliza Fletcher, of Memphis, Tenn., is shown. Police in Tennessee said Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2022, they found Fletcher’s body after she was abducted during a pre-dawn run, confirming fears that she was killed after she was forced into an SUV on Friday morning. Cleotha Abston has been charged with kidnapping and murder in the case. (Courtesy of Memphis Police Department via AP, File) (Uncredited/Memphis Police Department)
MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Leaning into the camera, with both palms on her chin beneath a beaming smile, Eliza Fletcher invites students from St. Mary’s Episcopal School to join her in singing, “This Little Light of Mine.” | 2022-09-08T06:31:15Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Slain jogger recalled as 'bright light' with 'zest for life' - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/slain-jogger-recalled-as-bright-light-with-zest-for-life/2022/09/08/600e6bc4-2f34-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/slain-jogger-recalled-as-bright-light-with-zest-for-life/2022/09/08/600e6bc4-2f34-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
Its benchmark is 0.5% for lending to banks. The Fed’s main benchmark is 2.25% to 2.50% after several large rate hikes, including two of three-quarters of a point. The Bank of England's key benchmark is 1.75%.
Higher interest rates would help support the euro’s exchange rate against the dollar by increasing demand for euro-denominated investment holdings. The euro's recent slide to under $1 — driven by soaring energy costs and dampening economic prospects — raises inflation because it makes imported goods more expensive. | 2022-09-08T08:02:11Z | www.washingtonpost.com | European Central Bank to join US Fed in outsized rate hikes - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/european-central-bank-to-join-us-fed-in-outsized-rate-hikes/2022/09/08/16adb62c-2f40-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/european-central-bank-to-join-us-fed-in-outsized-rate-hikes/2022/09/08/16adb62c-2f40-11ed-bcc6-0874b26ae296_story.html |
Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare, right, locks arms with visiting Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Honiara on May 26, in a photo released by Xinhua News Agency. (AP)
SYDNEY — Solomon Islands lawmakers voted Thursday to delay national elections, a controversial move opposition leaders called a “power grab” that could rekindle violence in a Pacific country whose growing ties to China have drawn international concern.
The vote was a victory for Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare, who argued that the poor Pacific island nation could not afford to hold elections and host the Pacific Games next year. The constitutional amendment delayed the dissolution of the current Parliament from May 2023 until the end of next year, shortly after the conclusion of the games, and pushed the election until early 2024.
Western allies have watched with alarm as Sogavare has tilted sharply toward China at a time when the world’s most powerful authoritarian state is aggressively expanding its geopolitical ambitions in the Pacific. His policies have fueled local resentment that has occasionally boiled over into civil unrest.
Opposition lawmaker Peter Kenilorea Jr. said he feared that postponing the elections would allow Sogavare to consolidate his control over the country or, worse, suspend elections altogether.
“It’s an authoritarian move,” Kenilorea said in an interview before the vote. “This is all about him staying in power for as long as he can.”
Sogavare denied the accusation.
“The opposition is saying we are using the Pacific Games to amend the constitution to hold onto power,” Sogavare told Parliament on Thursday. “This statement by the opposition is simply wrong ... misleading and meant to turn people against this government.”
The prime minister also blasted Australia’s recent offer to help fund the election as an “attempt to directly interfere" in his country’s domestic affairs.
The election deferral threatens to damage Sogavare’s already frayed relationships with Australia and the United States, which have privately expressed concerns over the idea after publicly criticizing the security pact Sogavare struck with China earlier this year.
The United States and its allies fear the security pact could pave the way for the establishment of a Chinese military base in the strategically valuable island chain — roughly 1,000 miles from Australia’s coast — where several thousand American soldiers died during World War II’s Guadalcanal campaign.
The Solomon Islands and China have denied plans for a base. But China’s increasing sway in the archipelago is unmistakable, from the $50 million sports stadium it is building for the Pacific Games to its growing influence over local policing and politics, to a plan for Huawei to build more than 150 telecommunications towers that critics fear could enable Chinese surveillance.
The Solomon Islands switched diplomatic recognition from Taiwan to China in 2019, shortly after Sogavare was elected.
Kenilorea said he feared that delaying the election could spark violence like the deadly riots that wracked the capital, Honiara, last year.
‘Nothing left’: Solomon Islands burn amid new violence as Australian troops arrive
“People will use [the deferral] as an excuse to perhaps do something” violent, he said.
He also worried the government would use any unrest as an excuse to invoke the security pact and call in Chinese police or soldiers.
Kenilorea and other opposition figures said the constitutional amendment had been rushed through Parliament without the usual review process. At Sogavare’s behest, Parliament voted to scrap the normal three-day waiting period and debate the bill immediately after its second reading on Thursday, against the objections of the opposition.
“The prime minister has succeeded in making us the laughingstock of the region as the country that is prepared to tamper with its constitution for a two-week event against the clear wishes of its people," opposition leader Matthew Wale told Parliament, adding that the deferral was a “power grab" and a “hijacking of the people’s right to exercise their vote [every] four years."
Joseph Foukona, an expert on the Pacific at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, said there was no reliable public polling on the issue but that from social media and local consultations, the idea to defer the election appeared unpopular. He said Sogavare would be hoping to get a popularity boost from holding the Pacific Games a few months before the election.
“It’s sort of a legacy thing as well,” Foukona said, adding that Sogavare wanted to be “the main guy in the show when things are happening, he wants to be the big man.”
Even as he criticized Australia, Sogavare said he would accept the nation’s offer to help fund and facilitate an election — in 2024.
“You made the offer so you better be prepared to pay for it,” he said, with a laugh. | 2022-09-08T08:02:54Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Solomon Islands delays elections as it moves closer to China - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/08/solomon-islands-elections-china-parliament/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/08/solomon-islands-elections-china-parliament/ |
A dead rat that former assistant teacher Gabrielle Reid said was at the U.S. House of Representatives Child Care Center on Capitol Hill. (Dear White Staffer)
A day-care center for the children of congressional leaders and staffers on Capitol Hill experienced “rodent sightings” over the summer, and officials who oversee the site said they’ve taken steps to resolve the issue.
Trouble with rats at the U.S. House of Representatives Child Care Center in Southwest Washington were reported earlier by ABC7 television and an Instagram account called Dear White Staffers, which is known for detailing concerns of staffers on Capitol Hill.
The U.S. House’s Office of the Chief Administrative Officer, which manages the day care, said in a statement to ABC7 that “there have been no reports, sightings, or evidence of rodents since mid-August.” But even one rat was too much for some staffers there. They said they had concerns about management’s response and alleged unwillingness to remove teachers and children from areas where rats had been spotted.
Gabrielle Reid, a former administrative specialist and assistant teacher at the day-care center, said she had picked up rat droppings there and expressed concern to administrators about the health hazards. She worked at the center from April 2021 until August, and left in part, she said, because of concerns about health conditions linked to the rat problem over several weeks this summer.
“There have been sightings of more than 15 rats in a two-month period, and they told the teachers to stay in the classroom with feces and dead rats,” she said.
Officials at the day-care center have sent letters to parents and staffers acknowledging the problem and said steps have been taken to try to get rid of the rodents.
The Office of the Chief Administrative Office did not respond to requests for comment. A spokesman for the Committee on House Administration refused to answer any questions about the situation and referred calls to the chief administrative officer. And the director of the child-care center did not respond to calls and emails requesting comment.
Spotted: A snowy owl at D.C.’s Union Station, where it’s eating pigeons and rats
Rat experts said that it is often tough to know how many rats are in a building but that usually there’s never just one. Seeing them out during the day, when they’re known as nocturnal scavengers, is usually a sign of an infestation.
The day-care center opened a new facility in 2019 and serves children of U.S. House employees. It was intended to help meet the demand for child care, which can involve being on years-long waiting lists. The Senate has its own day-care facility.
The Hill staffer who runs the Instagram account Dear White Staffers said he was tipped off to the rat trouble in mid-August by staffers at the center who sent him photos of a dead rat in a classroom, rodent droppings and traps in the center.
Rats, rats and more rats: D.C. ranks as one of the most rat-infested cities in the country
The chief administrative office issued a statement to ABC7 saying it had been “working closely with the Architect of the Capitol and the Office of the Attending Physician’s environmental health staff since early July to investigate and address reports of rodent sightings and activity with the assistance of a contracted pest management company.”
The statement went on to say that there had been no reports, sightings or evidence of rodents at the center since mid-August and that “all necessary actions have been and will continue to be taken to address any health and safety concerns.”
According to letters from day-care director Paige Beatty to families in mid-July and mid-August, there had been “a recent increase in rodent activity” in a part of the center, including a rodent seen in an adult bathroom, another caught in a trap overnight and one seen in a classroom bathroom while children were on the playground. Officials at the day-care center said several steps also had been taken to deal with the rats, including “frequent and rigorous inspections,” increased trash removal to ensure that food doesn’t remain in containers overnight and better sanitation efforts.
They said they also hired a pest management company and put in “rodent-proof sealing to plumbing” and replaced missing ceiling tiles — openings, experts said, where rodents can easily get inside a building. | 2022-09-08T09:16:19Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Earlier rat problem reported at day care center on Capitol Hill - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/08/rats-at-capitol-hill-daycare-center/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/dc-md-va/2022/09/08/rats-at-capitol-hill-daycare-center/ |
After the expanded playoff arrives, Florida's win over Utah wouldn't close any doors. (Phelan M. Ebenhack/AP)
In college football, change usually comes at the expense of charm. Not this time. For once, the gluttons of the game will gobble up money while creating the kind of accessible, national postseason tournament the sport has lacked.
No decisions are ever ideal in this decentralized mess of unchecked regional power and paternalistic attitudes intended to maintain profits, even as the amateur sports model decays. But on occasion, the leaders come up for air and make something better. That’s what happened with the announcement last week that the College Football Playoff will expand from four to 12 teams by 2026 at the latest.
It remains to be seen whether this resolution leads to conference stability and dissuades the SEC and Big Ten from poaching more programs. It should slow the movement, though. There’s still the matter of how all the playoff revenue will be split now that the postseason television inventory jumps from three games to 11. But what matters most to loyal followers of the sport is that there are more pathways to the big show. It means more teams will have hope — and more people will be glued to the drama.
In sports, parity is more layered than we usually acknowledge. There is both parity of results and parity of opportunity. College football doesn’t have a parity problem simply because 12 of the past 16 champions have come from the SEC. Dominant teams, conferences and divisions emerge and create temporary imbalance in every league, including the parity-driven NFL. The difference is that other sports are structured better to ensure these dynasties and powerful coalitions have their excellence challenged.
It’s likely that, no matter the setup, Nick Saban would have led Alabama to six national titles. However, the Crimson Tide has owned an era in which just eight programs have won a championship since 2006. Alabama’s greatness is clear because it’s the only one to capture more than two. But in the current structure — which, at least, has been better than the Bowl Championship Series or the long bygone days in which the consensus top teams didn’t even meet at the end — most of the nation is still so blocked from opportunity that you’re left to make some level of assumption when declaring a team the national champion.
That title demands a national competition. The four-team playoff has been a perfunctory nod to the need. It has been an elite invitational, not a true tournament, and it was always meant to be expanded. It made no sense to describe college football’s top division as consisting of five power conferences, yet tout a playoff that didn’t account for that. For the past eight years, it has been a decent substitute, an improvement from the way things were. But the SEC earned nearly one-third of the bids, and four conferences (the SEC, ACC, Big Ten and Big 12) combined for 28 of the 32 invitations.
The Pac-12, dubbed one of the Power Five, has had two teams make it. Notre Dame, the tradition-rich independent, has made one appearance. Cincinnati, representing the American Athletic Conference, crashed the party last season.
Has it been indicative of the very best teams? Sure, that’s safe to assume. But a tournament that is supposed to represent the entire country should be broad enough to do so.
The new 12-team format will give automatic bids to the top six conference champions. So, if the strength of the Power Five remains the same, it ensures one champion from these other five conferences will get in: the AAC, Conference USA, the Mid-American, the Mountain West and the Sun Belt. Then there will be six at-large teams, which figure to be dominated by the SEC and Big Ten after their new additions turn them into super conferences.
There are plenty of issues. In particular, it’s both laughable and typical that schools spent decades trying to cast their postseason expansion rigidity as concern about the health and class load of their players, only to create a season that now could last as long as 17 games for programs that go all the way. What won’t be a problem is the popular and breathless worry that a longer postseason would diminish the value of the regular season.
The importance of every game remains because the four first-round byes will be precious. You will see plenty of two-loss teams make the field, and three-loss participants could be possible at times. But if you’re thinking the rare 9-3 qualifier invalidates the regular season, you really ought to avoid the beer pong table. It’s more important to consider how a little more margin for error enriches the whole journey, possibly encourages teams to be more ambitious with their nonconference scheduling and reduces our reliance on reputation and preseason poll momentum to determine the best teams by December.
John Feinstein: College Football Playoff expansion is both good and all about the money
Last weekend, Utah went to Gainesville, Fla., to open the season against Florida. The Utes were coming off a 10-4 Rose Bowl season and ranked No. 7, their highest preseason ranking in program history. They lost, 29-26, at the Swamp. For losing a close opener at one of the toughest venues in college football, they faced questions about their playoff aspirations. Oregon, another well-regarded Pac-12 team entering the year, took a 49-3 pounding against Georgia in Atlanta. As the 2022 curtains were raised, the SEC owned the Pac-12 in two critical games of perception. And now, it doesn’t feel like the next three months really matter for West Coast football.
In the near future, there will be a better opportunity to evolve gradually, learn hard lessons during the regular season and still have a chance to play for the ultimate prize. And urgency won’t suffer much. There are 131 teams in the Football Bowl Subdivision. Twelve will make the tournament. Accessibility won’t alter the difficulty of getting in. There will always be an emotionless bouncer at the door.
Accessibility will alter the difficulty of winning it all. It will take another victory — two if the team doesn’t get a bye — to hoist the trophy. That’s more room for upsets and surprises. That’s more opportunity to verify greatness in a sport that produces too many unbeaten champions to fully appreciate how special it is to go undefeated.
College football actually did something that makes itself more exciting and less exclusionary. The sport is headed toward better, for now. I would tell you to bask in it, but it’s best to stay alert. | 2022-09-08T09:33:24Z | www.washingtonpost.com | College football made itself better with an expanded 12-team playoffs - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/cfp-playoff-expansion/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/cfp-playoff-expansion/ |
Bannon to surrender to N.Y. prosecutors Thursday morning
Just weeks after being convicted of contempt of Congress, the longtime Trump ally faces a state indictment in New York
People familiar with Thursday’s expected indictment of Stephen K. Bannon, seen as he departs federal court in July, say it is related to allegations of fraud that were the focus of his pardon by President Donald Trump. In that federal case, Bannon was accused of pocketing $1 million from a Trump-aligned cash collection drive. (Alex Brandon/AP)
NEW YORK — Stephen K. Bannon is expected to surrender to prosecutors Thursday morning to face a state-level criminal indictment, less than two months after being convicted of contempt of Congress and close to two years after former president Donald Trump pardoned him in a federal case involving defrauded contributors to a $25 million fundraising effort.
Details of the state court indictment have not yet been made public, but people familiar with the matter say it is related to fraud allegations that were the subject of Bannon’s pardon. In that case, he was accused in U.S. District Court in Manhattan of personally pocketing $1 million from “We Build the Wall,” a Trump-aligned cash collection drive that Bannon helped to orchestrate starting in December 2018.
Presidential pardons can only apply to federal cases, making it possible for local prosecutors to bring cases covering the same ground that involve potential violations of applicable state statutes.
Facing trial, Bannon vows to go 'medieval,' but judge says meh.
Bannon’s case will be handled in New York Supreme Court by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and New York Attorney General Letitia James. Spokespeople in both offices have declined to comment on what is still a sealed matter.
But the indictment and the expected surrender were confirmed by multiple people familiar with the arraignment who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss details related to a sealed case.
In a statement Tuesday night, Bannon — a right-wing activist, podcaster and political strategist — referred to the expected case as “phony” and called the move by state prosecutors “nothing more than a partisan political weaponization of the criminal justice system.”
In August 2020, Bannon was yanked off a yacht by federal law enforcement to face his indictment in the original “We Build the Wall” case. Bannon pleaded not guilty to wire fraud conspiracy and conspiracy to commit money laundering in the fundraising case and was released on a $5 million bond.
He and three other men, who were not pardoned by Trump, were accused of defrauding contributors after promising that all funds collected would support the wall’s construction. Two of the men, including disabled veteran Brian Kolfage, have pleaded guilty. A trial for another alleged participant, Timothy Shea, ended in a mistrial by hung jury in June.
Completing a physical barrier across the entire southern U.S. border was a hallmark promise of Trump’s 2016 campaign that never fully materialized. Bannon was a key adviser to Trump during the campaign and for several months at the White House.
Because Bannon, 68, was granted clemency before a conviction, there is not expected to be a viable issue of double jeopardy in his new case.
Manafort’s federal prosecution stemmed from special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s probe into 2016 election meddling. Manafort was pardoned by Trump at the end of 2020. Bannon’s pardon was among dozens of acts of clemency that came in the last hours of Trump’s presidency in January 2021.
Bannon’s ties to Trump landed him in legal trouble again when the Justice Department brought a case against him for contempt of Congress after he refused to comply with a subpoena for records and testimony from the House select committee investigating the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. | 2022-09-08T09:33:42Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Bannon to surrender to N.Y. prosecutors Thursday morning - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/09/08/bannon-surrender-ny-prosecutors-border-wall-fund-fraud/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2022/09/08/bannon-surrender-ny-prosecutors-border-wall-fund-fraud/ |
The sun sets over apartment blocks at dusk on the outskirts of Frankfurt, Germany, on Thursday, Sept. 1. (Ben Kilb/Bloomberg)
BRUSSELS — Faced with an “astronomic” rise in energy prices, European Union ministers will meet on Friday to discuss emergency measures to get their nations through the cold months ahead without additional social and economic upheavals.
The European Commission has asked countries to consider five immediate moves including a plan to redistribute some energy producers’ windfall revenue to businesses and households, a price cap on Russian pipeline gas and mandatory targets for reducing electricity use during peak hours, among other possible steps.
The potential plan underscores the widespread sense of alarm across Europe as the fallout from the war continues to weigh on European economies. It comes just days after energy giant Gazprom suspended the flow of gas through a key pipeline — a move initially blamed on technical issues until the Kremlin stepped in to say it was in fact about Western sanctions.
“We are facing an extraordinary situation, because Russia is an unreliable supplier and is manipulating our energy markets,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Wednesday, outlining the commission’s plan. “Our unity and our solidarity will ensure that we will prevail.”
But for all the talk of solidarity, the E.U. remains divided on the details, with some countries expressing skepticism about windfall taxes and others worried about the idea of a gas price cap. Some would like to tweak the bloc’s power market, while others want an overhaul, including the total decoupling of gas and energy prices. “The devil is in the details,” said a senior E.U. diplomat, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss behind-the-scenes talks.
In the more than six months since Russia launched its full-scale invasion, the E.U. has been trying to weaken Russia’s energy leverage — with mixed results.
Russian pipeline gas now makes up 9 percent of E.U. gas imports, von der Leyen said Wednesday, not the 40 percent it was at the beginning of the war. The E.U. last week reached its goal to get gas stores to 80 percent well before the weather turns in November. As Europe’s reliance on Russian fossil fuels is waning, E.U. officials say, Putin is losing his grip.
For now, energy markets remain in crisis and E.U. countries are spending billions to subsidize electricity bills. Germany on Sunday announced plans for a nearly $65 billion relief package, with Chancellor Olaf Scholz vowing to clamp down on energy providers who are making “excessive profits.” Income from windfall taxes on such producers will be used to reduce consumer prices for gas, oil and coal.
The commission, the E.U.'s executive body, would like to see similar moves at the E.U. level, according to a paper they unveiled ahead of the summit. Von der Leyen on Wednesday outlined plans for what she called a cap on revenue of companies producing electricity at relatively low costs but selling it for high prices allowed under European market rules.
Wholesale electricity price have been soaring because they are currently tied to the cost of natural gas, which has been driven up exponentially by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The current system inflates the cost of several other types of energy, such as solar power or electricity generated from waste-to-gas plants.
The plan addresses these issues by also including a provision that sets mandatory reduction targets for energy use during peak times. But implementing such reductions is a heavy lift, which would require countries to pay subsidies to compensate for the losses incurred as companies are forced to cut back their production. The plan is vague on exactly how those reductions would be enforced, leaving it to individual countries to “identify the best means to decrease total consumption.”
Another provision in the plan would attempt to cap the price of natural gas flowing to Europe from Russia. That would allow countries to keep buying Russian gas as long as the price does not exceed a certain threshold. The idea would be to set the price ceiling above production costs but below current prices, encouraging Russia to keep gas flowing, but limiting profits.
“We must cut Russia’s revenue which Putin uses to finance this atrocious war in Ukraine,” von der Leyen said Wednesday.
But some countries and analysts are skeptical about how effective this would be, considering Russia already has the upper hand on gas supplies and has been using it as an economic weapon against Europe. Russia could use the measure to justify further disruptions or to cut off the flow of gas to Europe.
Putin, for his part, has made it abundantly clear that any new measures will not go unanswered. In a speech Wednesday, he inveighed against the Group of Seven most industrialized nations’ price cap on Russian oil and warned of additional cutoffs to come.
“We will not supply gas, oil, coal, heating oil,” he said, “We will not supply anything.”
Halper reported from Washington. Kate Brady in Berlin contributed to this report. | 2022-09-08T09:34:06Z | www.washingtonpost.com | European Union considers measures to control soaring energy prices - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/08/europe-energy-prices-gas-war/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/09/08/europe-energy-prices-gas-war/ |
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wa.) at her home in Seattle. (Jovelle Tamayo for The Washington Post)
By Ruby Cramer
— SEATTLE
Everyone could hear the men on the street. The car, a black Dodge Challenger with gold rims, sped down the block, just past the congresswoman’s house. Two voices shot through the dark. “HEY, PRAMILA,” the first man shouted. “F--- YOUUUUU.” Then came the second: “F--- you, c---!”
Inside, Jayapal picked up her phone and dialed 911. But when she saw the car leave, she hung up before it could connect. Maybe she should contact the Capitol Police, the D.C. agency that protects members of Congress. She wasn’t sure. Maybe she had been doxed. There had been instances of obscene yelling at the house that summer, this she knew. She had reported those to Capitol Police. But she didn’t know then what dozens of pages of police reports and court filings would later reveal — that one of her visitors that night had been there before, in the same Dodge Challenger. She didn’t know that he had driven by her house between three and seven times since late June, or that the other male voice that night belonged to his adult son, as he would later tell investigators. She didn’t know that from the house across the street, her neighbor had seen the Dodge earlier that same evening, or that down the block, another neighbor had seen it, too, just a week before. She didn’t know that the man in the Dodge had emailed her congressional office back in January, to express his distaste for her political party, and for her, the 56-year-old three-term Democrat from Seattle, the chair of the House Progressive Caucus and a high-profile antagonist to Donald Trump.
Talking about that night now, five weeks later, in the house where Jayapal and Williamson have lived for almost six years, those 47 minutes take on new life. They have shown Jayapal just how many gaps exist in congressional security. The system is like a “black box,” she said, and she is lobbying House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) to fix it. They have changed the way she goes about her work as a public official, physically and psychologically — the routes she drives, the tracking device she keeps on her phone, the alarm it sounds when she unwittingly comes within 1,000 feet of the man with the Dodge. It already happened once, on her way to an appointment on a Sunday in August. They have changed the way she thinks about her home, too. The house looks different now — she and Williamson see all the ways it needs to be “hardened.” So did the neighborhood. The block “had been such a safe space,” Jayapal said. Now it was “tainted.”
A woman’s voice came on the line. “Hi, this is Seattle 911. We got a hang-up call from you. Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, thanks for calling back. This is Congresswoman Jayapal,” she said, according to a recording of the call. There was a tremor in her voice. “I am okay.”
The house was quiet again. On her phone, Jayapal opened the encrypted app Signal and scrolled to a chat named “Gallery Group.” Last year, on Jan. 6, she had been one of several dozen members of Congress trapped on the balcony of the House gallery, the last to evacuate the chamber as rioters stormed the Capitol. While their colleagues on the main floor below were able to leave, rioters pounded on the balcony doors. There was no sense of how or when they would get out. Afterward, Jayapal organized a text chain for the Democrats in the group. They did therapy sessions together, at least three of them. The Signal chain has become a space to vent. “It’s, ‘I’m dealing with this today. I need some support,’” Jayapal said, “which is really unusual in Congress. We all operate like individual fiefdoms.” Republicans had been on the balcony that day, too, but she didn’t invite them to the Signal group. “I don’t know that it would have felt like it was a safe space,” she said. “Honestly, we never tried.”
At 11:03 p.m., Jayapal tapped out a text: “For the second time in a week, I’ve had people outside my house screaming f---ing c--- commie b----, we’re coming back every night, go kill yourself pramila. Reporting it to cap police of course as we did the last two times with nothing done.”
That night, the thoughts of Jan. 6 returned “immediately,” she later recalled, tears in her eyes. The same noises that have stayed with her came back again — the yelling, the pounding on the doors outside in the hallway, the anger. “I could just feel myself, like, ‘OK, I’m back. I’m back there.’”
By the time the Dodge Challenger came, Jayapal had read about other incidents of political violence across America. There was the man in New Hampshire, sentenced to 33 months in prison after threatening to hang members of Congress who didn’t support Trump. There was the man in Alaska, sentenced to 32 months after sending threatening voice mails to his Republican U.S. senators. Two weeks after the incident at Jayapal’s home, a man in New York charged the stage at a campaign event, lunging for Republican Rep. Lee Zeldin. On Capitol Hill, two of Jayapal’s male colleagues, Reps. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.) and Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.), publicly released audio from voice mails they’d received. “Gonna get your wife, gonna get your kids,” a man told Kinzinger. “Cut his wife’s head off, cut his kids’ heads off,” another told Swalwell.
Jayapal got voice mails, too, and these felt different. She’d talked often with other women of color in the House about the threats they’d received, and the racism and sexism laced through the audio files. But she didn’t feel like she could, or should, release them. There was a tension there: “I don’t really want people to know it affects me,” she said. “And at the same time, so much of my work as an activist, and as a member of Congress, is to share vulnerability.”
“Hey, guess what, a--hole,” the driver, Forsell, said.
“I’m your new f---in’ neighbor,” he said.
“Call the f---ing police if you want,” Forsell said.
“Yes. I’m, I’m — I’m telling them, babe,” Jayapal said, according to a recording of the call. “They were yelling ‘c---,’ ‘b----,’ ‘go kill yourself.’”
“Oh, God. Okay, okay,” said the operator. “I’m gonna stay on the phone with you, one second.”
“No, no, no, it’s okay,” said the operator.
“Okay, hold on. All right, hold on.”
“It’s actually helping me just to be able to text you all,” she added.
She didn’t go to sleep for a long time. After 2 a.m., she sent a final message to the Gallery Group. “Update: we should definitely have a discussion about security,” Jayapal wrote.
For more than an hour, Forsell sat in the back of a police car, his conversation captured on video. He said he’d made a point of driving by Jayapal’s house regularly, just to roll down his window and call out “the hypocrisy” of the Democratic Party. “I pulled up in front of the house. I got out. I pulled out my tent. The guy opened the door, and I said, ‘Hey, a--hole, I’m your new neighbor.’ That was it,” he said. In the video, Forsell appeared calm, making small talk with the officers on the scene. There were bursts of frustration as dispatch radio chatter came through from the front seat. There were “real” crimes being committed elsewhere, he said. “I have broken no law.” He said he struggled with “mental issues,” and argued he was exercising his First Amendment rights when he came to Jayapal’s block.
Inside the police car, Forsell said he had respect for the police on the scene, but none for the political process. “You should have that b---- in handcuffs, ’cause she’s a f---in’ traitor to this country,” he told authorities. “I just don’t see what law I’ve broken, and I’m very well-versed in the law.”
Police documents describe Forsell as a longshoreman and lifelong resident of West Seattle. In his original email to Jayapal, dated Jan. 5, he said he had watched his hometown morph from a “relatively beautiful and safe city into the filthy and violent s---pit that it is now.” Sitting cuffed in the back of the car, he said he’d pitched his tent on Jayapal’s block just as scores of homeless people did across downtown Seattle. He said he carried his pistol for protection and would not use it unless his life was at risk. “The socialists come into power? I want a gun,” he said. He told the officers he wanted to buy an AR-15, in case Democrats banned them.
The case is now in its preliminary stages. At a hearing scheduled for Oct. 4, the two parties will have the chance to move toward a plea or a trial. Until then, as part of the conditions of his release, Forsell is prohibited from possessing a firearm and required to wear a GPS tracking device. He isn’t allowed to go within 1,000 feet of Jayapal, her house or her office — a restriction that the congresswoman, too, has to monitor with the police-provided tracking app on her phone. She was told she is one of the first people in Seattle to use it, and the notification system has been buggy. The app has just two buttons: a red circle labeled “Panic,” and a gray one labeled “Dispatch.”
In August, Jayapal asked Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.), the chair of the House Democratic Caucus, to convene a call. Pelosi was on. So was Chief J. Thomas Manger from the Capitol Police and the House sergeant-at-arms, Maj. Gen. William J. Walker. More than 100 members of Congress joined. On Aug. 15, Jayapal laid out her recommendations in a letter to Pelosi: basic requirements for home security; clear security protocols for members and their spouses, including “Run, Hide, Fight” training, developed by the Department of Homeland Security; centralized points of contact for the many agencies involved.
Later that day, the congresswoman was driving from her house to an event in Seattle, celebrating the introduction of a trans bill of rights. Berkson, her district director, was behind the wheel. In the passenger seat, Jayapal pulled out her phone and played some of the voice mails she’d received.
“ … Your f---in’ day is coming. God damn, as soon as the president’s installed, like on Nov. 4 or 5, we’re f---in’ coming after all you motherf---ers. You’re gonna be scrubbing f---in’ floors for the rest of your life, you f---in’ wh---.”
“You stupid f---in’ b----. Get ready for turmoil. You’re gettin’ it. You’re gonna get exactly what you deserve, b----. Have a nice day, b----.”
Then another man.
“ … I’m gonna send you some knee pads, you f---in’ b----. You worthless f---in’ c---.”
“ … We’re coming. And we're really pissed off.”
“ … You are an evil b---- and you need to die and I hate you and I will never vote for you again.”
Jayapal stopped the recordings. Berkson, in the front seat, was one of the staffers who screened the messages. She decides what to forward to Capitol Police, and what to bring to Jayapal’s attention. As she drove, she started to cry. “Sorry,” Berkson said. “I honestly don’t think about it that much.”
At home later that night, Jayapal listened again to the threatening voice mails that Kinzinger and Swalwell released this summer. She thought about how violence begins with the ability to dehumanize the subject of that violence. And she spent that evening replaying the voice mails that had been left for her. There was one calling her an animal. “The unleashing of it everywhere creates this space for other people to be unleashed as well,” she said.
She thought about why she had never shared the voice mails before.
“Is it like, ‘Oh you’re supposed to take it?’” | 2022-09-08T10:16:56Z | www.washingtonpost.com | When a man with a pistol shows up outside a congresswoman’s house - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/08/congress-pramila-jayapal-threats-stalking/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/09/08/congress-pramila-jayapal-threats-stalking/ |
One D.C. school navigates the maze of federal covid education funding to target students on the verge of failure
Xavier Byrd, a sophomore at Dunbar High School in Northwest Washington, helps set up chairs for his first period class on June 16. After falling behind on his studies during the pandemic, he found a passion for robotics and engineering after returning to in-person classes last year. (Maansi Srivastava/The Washington Post)
In September 2021, Milton Laurence called every sophomore at Dunbar High School into his small office, one-by-one, and asked them to read a passage about a monument dedicated to Hiroshima. With a half-million dollars in federal pandemic relief aid, the assistant principal of the Northwest Washington school hoped to find promising students who fell behind — and then figure out how to spend that money in a way that would catch them up.
In stepped Xavier Byrd, a quiet 15-year-old with an unremarkable record: average GPA, no behavior issues while at the school, attendance of less than 70 percent. He’d spent his freshman year online, camera off, sleeping through most of his classes, failing to turn in most of his assignments.
“There’s not much motivation in virtual learning,” Xavier recalled. “My handwriting got worse, I forgot how to do algebra."
This was his first semester of in-person high school. He had never physically met anyone at Dunbar before.
No one at Dunbar knew that the teenager dreamed of being an aerospace engineer or that he spent his pandemic days tinkering with old machines at home and building contraptions in his backyard. And they certainly didn’t know that he was beginning to question whether he even had the work ethic to pull off his dream.
Laurence asked Xavier to read passages, observed what happened when he stumbled on a word he didn’t know, and then had the teen quickly write about the piece and talk about it. The assistant principal determined that Xavier had extraordinary critical-thinking abilities but struggled with some writing fundamentals.
In a typical year, students like Xavier wouldn’t receive a lot of extra attention outside of class. He wasn’t failing, he wasn’t asking for help, and he didn’t have any outbursts in class. Dunbar, a school where 70 percent of the students come from families that receive public assistance and more than 20 percent receive special education services, already had systems in place aimed at preventing the students with the highest needs from dropping out.
But now Laurence had money to help more students, and he decided that kids like Xavier — seemingly average students who slipped during the pandemic and wanted to improve — would benefit.
“Here is a student that is capable, but lacks confidence and assertiveness, but is able to do the work,” Laurence said. “There are students that have ability but are flying under the radar because they aren’t getting the supports that the highest need students get."
So it was decided: Xavier would stay after school twice a week and show up on Saturday mornings. The school would pay for an online tutoring program that would help him hone his writing skills for 45 minutes three times a week, and a teacher would be paid overtime to staff an after school and weekend robotics club he would participate in.
Xavier was one of 50 sophomores enrolled in an experiment, one of many across D.C., to see whether Dunbar could rebuild the school community that was lost during the pandemic while also getting students caught up on academics.
Freshman and sophomore years are critical, and Xavier had lost his first year of high school to the pandemic. These were the years when school staff could convince middling students who never thought much about life after high school that they could go to college and have careers. Or, these were the years that students who were already lagging could fall even further behind, succumbing to the pressures of adolescence, derailing opportunities for a career or a college path.
For them, this year could determine the shape of their entire lives. Administrators called them the “bubble students.”
In 10th grade, they can either burst or soar.
The spending challenges
The rules governing how educators can spend their portions of the $200 billion in education federal relief money are vague and broad. School districts need to spend at least 20 percent of their money to help students catch up on academics, but the rest can go toward infrastructure projects, extra school nurses or masks for students to wear in classrooms. They have until the 2024-2025 academic year to spend it.
And school districts took big liberties. They revamped sports fields, purchased cleaning supplies, hired extra staff and enrolled their teachers in professional development programs. School districts with crumbling infrastructure were finally able to patch up some of their buildings.
But there’s been little oversight across the country, and it’s unclear whether this unprecedented windfall actually helped students learn.
The nation’s capital, a city with about 90,000 students, most of whom are from low-income families, received more than $600 million over three rounds of congressional funding disbursements. That was mostly split between the District’s large charter sector and the traditional public school system. It was a potential boon to an already well-funded school district that spent about $2 billion from the city budget on public education last year.
D.C. Public Schools Chancellor Lewis D. Ferebee received more than $300 million for the 50,000 students in the traditional public school system. It was on him to figure out how to spend it. He had data showing just how hard the pandemic had been on the students. Literacy scores for the city’s youngest students showed a widening gap between White students and Black and Hispanic children. Older students were disengaged from school, teachers reported.
Ferebee set aside $70 million in the first year for coronavirus mitigation expenses such as masks, extra air filtration machines and new HVAC units. An additional $2.5 million went to expand summer school. Dunbar funded a two-week program to get sophomores acclimated to high school before the first semester started. Xavier’s academic record wouldn’t qualify him for free summer school in a typical year, but he attended that program at Dunbar, his first time in a school building since middle school.
Ferebee also sent $26 million to the principals of the school system’s 116 campuses, giving them latitude on how to spend the money for the 2021-2022 academic year. Schools received money based on how many students they had from low-income families. Dunbar received more than $518,000 in federal funding, a 5 percent bump to the school’s annual budget — enough to fund the summer program, couple extra full-time positions or bring in extra tutoring programs.
Ferebee’s multipronged approach began with investing millions to develop teachers so they were better prepared to instruct students who had fallen behind. Then Ferebee hoped to provide individual or small group tutoring to five to 10 percent of all students in the 2021-2022 academic year, with the hope of reaching more the following year. He would depend on principals to identify the students to benefit from these measures and get whatever else they needed. In the end, Ferebee said, 8 percent of students received this “high dosage” tutoring.
“Our strategy was to be flexible and to give principals a tremendous amount of autonomy,” Ferebee said. “We wanted to meet students where they were, whether they needed extra counseling or support in literacy, or whatever the needs are.”
But the District’s spending plan highlighted just how complicated and difficult it was for many of the nation’s school districts to spend the money. U.S. Education Secretary Miguel Cardona urged them to hire more tutors and mental health support. But with nationwide staffing shortages, there are not enough high-quality tutors or mental health workers to fill classrooms. Same with specialized interventionists or any other school staff.
Ferebee, for example, announced at a news conference last October a plan to hire a permanent substitute teacher and full-time coronavirus logistic coordinator for every school. But by the end of the academic year, just around a third of those positions were filled, according city officials.
The school system expanded existing contracts with reading tutoring organizations and after-school programs. But many workers and volunteers with these programs got stuck for months in the city’s backlogged background check process, derailing expansion plans.
Marguerite Roza, director of the Edunomics Lab at Georgetown University, which has tracked how school districts have spent their federal aid, said enrollment at school districts across the country fluctuated, and officials used the money to plug budget holes so they did not have to lay off teachers. Last academic year, D.C. spent more than $21 million of its federal funds to plug those holes. Roza argued that using the money to keep existing staff isn’t necessarily a bad use of funds — it ultimately means more teachers in classrooms — but it doesn’t provide extra resources to help students catch up.
To students and staff, Dunbar didn’t seem flush with new staff and programming this academic year, according to interviews with staff.
Some of that was by design, Principal Nadine Smith said. Instead of contracting tutoring programs and academic specialists, she asked her staff to stay after school and paid them overtime — $40 per hour for employees in the Washington Teachers’ Union. Schools across the country have long relied on principals like Smith to be creative and stretch their resources, often making it feel like they had more than they actually did. Some of Dunbar’s money paid for staff and programs that had been in place before the pandemic.
Smith said her strategy was effective, but it had drawbacks. Xavier’s math teacher, for example, recently had a baby and couldn’t spend much time on campus outside of school hours. But his robotics coach, Anthony Allard, was with Xavier on Saturday mornings and after school, getting Xavier socializing with other students and more excited about coming to school.
Allard had pulled after-school and weekend hours long before the pandemic, so for many staff and students, the work didn’t feel like anything extra. It’s just that this year, Smith said, Allard was getting paid like he should have in past years. The school anticipates receiving these extra funds for the next three school years.
“We really focused on Dunbar teachers doing small-group tutoring across the building. It wasn’t just academic ... it was really anything that would bring the kids back in and bond them back to Dunbar," Smith said.
And she determined that, under supervision and coupled with in-person instruction during standard class time, virtual tutoring could be effective for high-schoolers. So she used some of the pandemic aid to buy subscriptions to math, reading and writing tutoring programs for struggling students.
That’s what Xavier did. And while he still struggled with writing, the virtual writing program helped with grammar conventions and how to structure essays. His English teacher gave him more critical-thinking and creative assignments during class time. He finished the school year reading passages from Elie Wiesel’s “Night,” drawing parallels between the lessons in the book and his own life in short writing assignments.
By the middle of the year, attendance was up at Dunbar, though still lower than pre-pandemic levels. Xavier was in class nearly everyday. He was excited about an upcoming robotics competition. He had a close relationship with his coach.
Still, the extra money couldn’t outrun the pandemic-induced challenges playing out in schools in D.C. and across the country. Teachers reported more behavior disruptions in classrooms. More students were receiving mental health services, but without additional mental health counselors to provide them.
And there simply weren’t enough people to teach students.
Xavier’s first-period engineering class should have been one of his favorites. But in January, the teacher, a longtime educator nearing retirement, quit during the omicron variant surge, and the school couldn’t find a replacement. At least once a week, Allard and another engineering teacher stepped in t0 teach, but they had full course loads themselves. The rest of the time, a substitute teacher supervised them and gave the students busy work.
So Xavier spent much of first period those last months of school passing time until the bell rang.
“I’m just waiting until the class is over,” Xavier said of his engineering class. “Sleeping.”
Immense challenges require a novel plan
The process to match Dunbar students with the right resources wasn’t easy. The most vulnerable students largely received academic interventions during the school day, on the theory that they’d be less likely to turn up for after-school programming. But Laurence believed the “bubble students” might be able to give a little more.
So after assessing all the sophomores with the Hiroshima reading passage, Laurence called their families to see if they would get their children to school on Saturday mornings. Xavier’s parents agreed, and he made it almost every week.
Laurence said he believes his plan worked. Students in the sophomore class didn’t have a single physical fight on campus all semester — a success for any large high school in any year. The majority of the 50 students that he identified as mid-tier met their academic goals, and he said they will receive the same specialized services next academic year.
Xavier admits his reentry into school was hard. He hadn’t sat in a classroom in years. He had attended a language immersion charter school for elementary and middle school, but he kept running into trouble, testing boundaries and talking back to teachers, his father said. The school threatened to expel him, so Xavier’s parents decided to home-school him for the end of much of his eighth grade. Then the pandemic struck, and he started as a Dunbar freshman online. When schools reopened, Xavier, like teens across the country, wasn’t used to sitting in a classroom anymore.
Xavier would show up late at the beginning of the school year as he tried to develop a routine, taking a bus and Metro train to school each morning. A coronavirus exposure and then a covid diagnosis in the fall kept him home for two weeks. And staying awake during the academic day proved hard.
“He already went to Dunbar not motivated,” his father, John Byrd, said of his freshman year. “And then he wasn’t even there, he was just on his keyboard.”
Xavier entered Dunbar without knowing anyone. He talked to friends during the pandemic but didn’t meet anyone new. And coming from a small charter school, the bustle of a large high school was completely new. So he kept his head down when he started sophomore year in person: Stay quiet and out of trouble.
“I missed like two years of in person talking to people, so, I think, mentally and probably I’m still like a freshman, or like an eighth grader, compared to where I could be,” Xavier said. “I probably don’t act as mature as I could, I’m not sure.”
Still, Xavier’s teachers say he has made strides. His attendance and grades are up. He blew opportunities and deadlines in virtual learning, but this summer, he made the deadline to get a summer internship at an engineering firm. Laurence said Xavier completed his online writing program and met the school’s academic goals for his sophomore year. Attendance: Above 90 percent. GPA: A minus.
On an assessment that all D.C. sophomores take at the beginning and end of the academic year, Xavier scored below city averages in the fall. By the end of the academic year, he tested well above the average D.C. sophomore. And while the city experienced its lowest performance on PARCC — a federal standardized exam — in the last five years, Xavier passed.
Xavier’s verdict: “School’s probably better this year than last. It’s just easier to focus.”
Laurence credits robotics with helping Xavier succeed at Dunbar — a club Xavier didn’t even know existed his freshman year. He made a close friend, Rafael, and together the two teens are known around school for their ability to speedily complete Rubik’s cubes.
His father said that connecting with Black male teachers in person has been invaluable, and Xavier has found a mentor in Allard, his coach. After school, Xavier and Rafael rush to robotics club so they could finish building an electric vehicle.
“Xavier has definitely become more confident,” Allard. “He’s a little sarcastic. He is now pointing out what is incorrect [in projects], he’s now taking charge. Leaps and bounds.”
On one of the last weeks of school, Xavier and Rafael are in robotics club, trying to figure out how to connect the vehicle’s base to its engine. They go to the tool closet, grab a drill, and try drilling it together. That doesn’t work, so Xavier suggest just connecting the two pieces with rope. It works.
The teens joke about how Rafael test drove the car through the Dunbar hallways and crashed it. “We need to still fix it,” Xavier says. They talk about the robotics competitions to come their junior year. And they spend some of the afternoon looking out the window at a track meet happening on the school’s field, making teenage quips about the event until Allard told them it was time to go home.
Now that Xavier is a junior, Allard will have a new assignment for him: He’ll be responsible for recruiting new blood for the robotics team — telling his classmates about the club. Talking to them. His teachers think he’s ready to be a leader at Dunbar. A confident teen, destined to be an engineer. | 2022-09-08T10:43:04Z | www.washingtonpost.com | How federal covid aid trickled down to Xavier’s classroom - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/09/08/covid-money-education-help/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2022/09/08/covid-money-education-help/ |
A thief swiped David Hove’s table and cooler from his front yard when he went inside to use the bathroom.
David Hove, 10, at his scone stand in Toronto. He was overwhelmed with support after his stand was stolen on Aug. 27. (Courtesy of David Hove)
The only thing left behind was a handwritten sign that read “homemade lemon cranberry scones.”
David, 10, had set up a baked goods table on Aug. 27 outside his home. That day, he was selling lemon-cranberry scones — his sister’s specialty. The sibling pair had been running a small baked-goods business called The Hove Delights for about a month.
So far, their stand had been a success. They sold sweet treats — such as cinnamon rolls, doughnuts, oatmeal cookies and scones — for between $2 and $3.50, depending on the size of the desert. Kimberly used her mother’s recipe for lemon-cranberry scones, which quickly emerged as the top-selling product.
“I felt pretty happy,” David said about his business. He took great pride in independently running the stand, adding that, “I love communicating with other people.”
“I felt sad. I was thinking it was my fault for leaving it unguarded,” said David, adding that he’s glad he took the cash box and leftover scones inside with him.
“It was frustrating, because we had that table for a long period of time, and it held sentimental value,” Kimberly said, explaining that her parents received it as a gift from a cousin.
Although their profits remained safe, everything else was gone, even a reusable water bottle and paper towel that had been on the table. The theft was captured on a security camera outside the Hove family’s home. The footage shows a man stopping in a white SUV and loading his truck with the siblings’ stand. There also appears to be a child in the back seat of the vehicle.
The siblings’ father, also named David Hove, said he was stunned that someone would steal a child’s baked-goods stand. “I was so upset. It was like being kicked in the gut,” he said. “How can somebody do this to kids?”
“David was so heartbroken and devastated, and Kimberly as well,” Hove continued, adding that David felt responsible for the ordeal. “They were both so down.”
“I just thought the police are dealing with a lot of other issues, and I don’t want to stretch them thin,” explained Hove, who was surprised by the theft because the family lives in a neighborhood with minimal crime.
Still, he didn’t want to ignore the incident. He decided to share the video with local news in the hope that maybe the thief would return the items and perhaps apologize to his children, who, he said, developed a “mistrust in humanity” as a result of what happened.
“I feel very lucky to be in a community that other people care about every person,” the younger David said.
“People went out of their way to help us by reaching out and supporting us,” echoed his sister.
“I’m not lying when I say this to you: They’re incredible,” said Ricci, 48.
Beyond their love of the scones, the couple also admired David’s ambition and wanted to support his entrepreneurial efforts.
“I thought it was admirable that he’s trying to reach his goals,” Ricci said. “This kid’s got it.”
When he heard that David’s stand was stolen, he and his wife ventured to a hardware store and bought a table and cooler, which they dropped off at the Hoves’ home.
“It felt really great,” said Kimberly, who began baking more scones.
“The kids were grateful to be back in business so quick,” her father said. “I’m so proud of them.”
Tim Byrne — who lives 55 miles north of Toronto in Barrie — had also seen the story and wanted to contribute. Knowing David was working toward a new Xbox, he decided to deliver one.
“I was an entrepreneurial kid my whole life,” said Byrne, 54, who spent his childhood mowing lawns and doing other odd jobs for money. He feared the theft might deter David from staying in business, so he decided to step in.
“I hope I inspired him to keep carrying on,” Byrne said.
“We clearly stated how we didn’t want a GoFundMe,” Kimberly said, adding that she is close to being able to buy a new phone for herself. “We wanted to work for the money.”
In the past week, Hove Delights has received about 70 order requests — including from fans in the United States — and the siblings are crafting a plan to expand their business to offer shipping options.
“People from all over the world wanted to help by buying scones,” said Kimberly, who started 10th grade on Wednesday. “We’re still trying to navigate. We need to make a plan.”
“In this world, there are way more good people than bad,” Hove said. “That’s the underlying story here.” | 2022-09-08T10:51:46Z | www.washingtonpost.com | David Hove's scone stand was stolen. People put him back in business. - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2022/09/08/bakery-stand-stolen-toronto-hove/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2022/09/08/bakery-stand-stolen-toronto-hove/ |
By Vijai Nathan
Kevin, left, is 31 and a senior planner at Metrorail. His dream date would be “a train ride across the country in a private rail car, staffed with top chefs.” Will is 35 and a marketing director. His dream date would be with “a tenured professor” who can “forage for a meal in the wilderness.” (Daniele Seiss)
Kevin, 31, signed up for Date Lab because “it’s two people who clearly want to go on a date — I love that.” He is not the most “prolific dater” and struggles to meet people online. “There’s a lot of empty back-and-forth talk,” said the Pentagon City resident who works as a senior planner at Metrorail. “It’s so hard to get anybody to commit to an actual date anymore.”
Kevin has had a few “situationships” but wants to have a relationship. A “balance of communication” between two people is very important to his romantic endeavors. If he feels that he’s texting too much, he’s “learned to slow my roll and wait for people to reach out.” And a beard is a must. “Beards just draw me in,” he said.
We set him up with marketing director Will, 35, who has lived in D.C. for about a year. Will signed up for Date Lab to get back in the dating pool. “I was with my last partner for seven years and moved to D.C. for a fresh start,” he explained.
Like Kevin, Will also finds dating apps frustrating. “People text on these things for months. If you don’t want to meet in-person within two weeks, I don’t want to keep this going.” Will had three serious relationships before marrying his last partner. One thing he’s learned since his divorce is to be “upfront about what I’m looking for and what I want in a person.”
Both Kevin and Will admitted to dealing with a bout of nerves before meeting. “I don’t have the easiest time meeting people, never been on a blind date and I felt intimidated,” Kevin said. “I was deep breathing on the bus en route to dinner.”
Despite having his mom “psyche” him up, Will said he “was pacing back-and-forth” in his apartment before he walked over to the restaurant, Le Diplomate on 14th Street NW. Will said that Kevin seemed shy at first, but “I made a few jokes to loosen up. I felt like I took the lead on breaking the ice to make it less awkward, and he broke out of his shell.”
Kevin liked Will’s look. “We both put some thought in dressing to impress,” he said. “He seemed nice and nerdy — that’s a plus.” However, he would have preferred if Will were more hirsute. Kevin described his date’s facial hair as “some scruff,” not the full beard that he is usually attracted to.
Kevin did appreciate that Will took the conversational reins. “When I get nervous I get really quiet and I was worried it would get awkward,” he said. “But Will admitted he was nervous too, but has the opposite response — he talked a lot.” Apparently, Will was so chatty that Kevin had to stop him so they could look at the menu.
When Will ordered a rosé, Kevin was thrilled to follow suit. They sipped their wine and nibbled on charcuterie while getting to know each other. Will was “fascinated” by Kevin’s passion for trains and public transit. “I was very impressed that he knew all the train names,” Will noted.
Will admits that he has not mastered the Metro — “in fact I call it the subway!” Kevin was surprised that Will had used the Metro only twice, given that he’s lived here for a year. I asked him if he was offended that Will called the Metro “the subway” and he responded, “A little bit, yes,” with a laugh.
Over dinner, steak au poivre for Kevin and steak frites for Will, they discovered that they both had joined gay sports leagues in D.C. to meet people. They also both love dogs; Will shared a photo of his pooch, and Kevin reciprocated with a photo of his parents’ dog.
Kevin relayed that “Will was focused on conversation and getting to know me” during the evening. For Will, he learned more about Kevin than Kevin learned about him. “I didn’t feel that he asked a lot of questions of me,” he said.
They ate crème brûlée and wrapped up the date at 8:30 p.m. Will walked Kevin to the Metro and Will asked to exchange numbers. Then they hugged goodbye and went their separate ways.
“He texted me five minutes after the date,” Kevin said. “It was nice to meet someone who is in a totally different social circle. We have completely separate friend groups — that doesn’t happen that often in Gay D.C.”
Will agreed. “We never would have crossed paths,” he said, “and I really appreciated that we had plenty of differences. He’s a really nice guy, very genuine.”
“I’m not sure if he’s going to ask me out again,” Kevin said. “He definitely initiated asking for my number, but since it felt like a business dinner I’m not sure.” Will told me, “This is a very interesting starting point! I’d be keen on going out again in a more relaxed environment where the date isn’t being written about.”
Kevin: 3 [out of 5].
Will: 3.
They texted back-and-forth but have made no plans to see each other again.
Vijai Nathan is a writer and comedian in Washington. | 2022-09-08T10:51:52Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Date Lab: One is a Metro enthusiast. The other called it the ‘subway.’ - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2022/09/08/date-lab-one-is-metro-enthusiast-other-called-it-subway/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/magazine/2022/09/08/date-lab-one-is-metro-enthusiast-other-called-it-subway/ |
Is Israel’s interminable election cycle about to end? Watch the details.
By Gershom Gorenberg
Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid at a cabinet meeting in Jerusalem on Sept. 4. (Abir Sultan/Pool/AP)
Our movie’s antihero, an Israeli citizen, wakes at 6 a.m. to the buzz of an alarm clock and groggily slaps it off. By force of habit, he — or she, perhaps, in this remake — grabs a cellphone and checks the news. Headlines refer to elections and polls, to Yair Lapid and Benjamin Netanyahu. One is prime minister, the other the challenger. Which is which? Our antihero tries to remember. Is this the third or the fifth recent election in which they’ve faced off?
She, or he, scrolls down. More headlines: a warning to Iran from the prime minister (which one is he again?); more testimony in Netanyahu’s corruption trial; a Palestinian killed by Israeli troops; Israelis wounded in a Palestinian attack. The latest polls say that Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud and its religious satellite parties will receive 58 seats out of 120 in parliament, or maybe 60 — still short of the majority needed to form a government. The “just not Bibi” bloc, referring to Netanyahu, is also falling short because a few seats will go to an Arab-backed ticket unlikely to join any governing coalition.
This is the same news that our antihero saw the last time the clock buzzed. The news is never new. Welcome to Israel’s version of “Groundhog Day,” a real-life political drama on a seemingly endless loop.
The Israeli election on Nov. 1 will in fact be the country’s fifth in 3½ years, an unprecedented stretch of indecision and instability. The last election, in 2021, pushed Netanyahu out of power. But the fragile coalition that replaced his government collapsed in June of this year. Naftali Bennett, leader of a small right-wing party who became the unlikely prime minister for a year and a few days, is leaving politics. Lapid, a centrist, heads a caretaker government. If incumbency has given him an edge, it is hard to detect.
If polls were precise predictions, the certain results of this election would be more deadlock and another round by next spring. The large, looming issues are unlikely to make a difference. Yet small changes — less likely to show up in post-election stories in the foreign media — might tip the balance at last.
Netanyahu’s endless trial, for instance, doesn’t move the needle. His supporters either aren’t paying attention or accept his claims that the charges are a plot against him. His opponents correctly argue that the former prime minister’s conspiracy-mongering undermines the rule of law. But those who recognize the danger have already voted against him four times.
The Likud keeps voters’ phones buzzing with text messages blaming Lapid for high prices. The opposing camp knows that Netanyahu’s 12-year hold on power actually shaped the economy. The issues, in short, haven’t changed since this endless election campaign began in 2019.
The old dividing line in Israel ran between those who supported permanent rule of the West Bank and those who hoped, intensely or vaguely, to end it. The new divide, between Netanyahu’s loyalists and their opponents, is mostly congruent with the old one — but not entirely. A portion of the old right has come to see Netanyahu as a danger to democracy within Israel. Here, there is potential for some movement. Bennett’s party has crumbled. Two of its Knesset members have moved to the center-right National Unity ticket, opposed to Netanyahu. If — if — they persuade some of their erstwhile voters to follow them, the electoral scales might shift.
Turnout, of course, is crucial. Which side’s voters are more likely to have lost interest? If predictions of low turnout among the Arab minority come true, Netanyahu will profit. Most Arab votes go to two small parties. One broke precedent by joining the current governing coalition. The other, known as the Joint List, is unlikely to join any coalition — and certainly not Netanyahu’s.
Indeed, a difference of a few votes for a small party could shift the entire outcome. In Israel’s proportional election system, a party needs 3.25 percent of the national vote to get into parliament. If it reaches that number, it will get four seats. If it falls short, it gets none. A threatened ideological split in the Joint List could create two competing tickets — one or both of which may fail to pass the threshold. Again, Netanyahu would benefit.
On the other end of the spectrum, a split is looming in United Torah Judaism, an ultra-Orthodox party tightly aligned with Netanyahu. Recent polling shows that one of the factions is unlikely to get into parliament if it runs separately. In that case, Netanyahu’s chance of returning to power will shrink.
The deadline for parties to submit their lists of candidates — and to decide on alliances or splits — is Sept. 15. Keep an eye on backroom decisions until then to understand the results in November: Netanyahu’s return, or the end of his long damaging grip on Israeli politics — or Israel waking up to the next election campaign, still trapped in Groundhog Day. | 2022-09-08T11:04:56Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Opinion | Israel's seemingly endless election cycle may be about to end - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/08/israel-repetitive-elections-november/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/08/israel-repetitive-elections-november/ |
Medical exemptions in abortion bans won’t protect women’s health
History shows that it will be judges, lawyers and juries — not doctors and patients — who decide whether an abortion is medically necessary
Perspective by Evan Hart
Evan Hart is an assistant professor of history specializing in women's history and the history of medicine. She's currently working on a history of abortion in Missouri.
Abortion rights supporters fill Indiana Statehouse corridors outside legislative chambers on Aug. 5 as lawmakers vote to concur on a near-total abortion ban in Indianapolis. (Arleigh Rodgers/AP)
After the Supreme Court’s decision in June in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization overturned Roe v. Wade (1973) and abolished the constitutional right to an abortion, a number of states’ trigger bans snapped into place. As of Aug. 25, 13 states effectively ban or severely limit access to abortion. Every one of these laws, however, contains a clause allowing physicians to perform abortions in cases of medical emergency. Politicians claim these provisions will prevent women’s deaths.
But many physicians and abortion rights activists counter that the clauses are unclear and insufficient to protect those who are pregnant, as well as medical practitioners. And history shows they’re probably right.
The problem lies in how to define a medical emergency — and who gets to define it. Before Roe v. Wade, most states allowed for abortion in cases of medical emergency or necessity. Court records indicate, however, that many physicians, nurses and midwives were tried and convicted for performing abortions after the legal system rejected their claims about medical necessity. Prosecutors, judges and juries decided what was medically necessary — not doctors and patients — leaving doctors at the whim of the legal system for exercising their best medical judgment.
In 1921, for example, Belvie Duncan, a married 23-year-old mother of two, sought an abortion from physician Herbert E. Johnson in Jefferson City, Mo. According to Duncan and her husband, she had suffered for months after a bout of typhoid fever, leaving her very thin and bedridden. She could barely care for her two children. Her husband agreed that she would not be able to give birth safely, so the couple visited Johnson, who agreed she was not well and performed the procedure. Unfortunately, the abortion led to an infection and bleeding, which necessitated treatment, leading to Johnson’s arrest for felony abortion.
The charges typified how, in this period, when abortions led to infection or death, officials often arrested physicians — even though the exception in states’ abortion bans theoretically protected them when they believed abortions were medically necessary. Generally, when abortions were performed safely, prosecutors either didn’t know about the procedures or chose to look the other way since there was no harm to the patient. But when a complication arose, it was a different story.
Johnson insisted that Duncan was “very anemic and very weak,” thereby necessitating an abortion. At trial, the state called three other doctors to testify who claimed otherwise. J.E. Jose — who previously cared for Duncan but hadn’t seen her in more than a year — tended to Duncan after her operation and testified that “she was in very good health” and that an abortion was not necessary for her health. He told jurors that “a young lady in a family way … is more nervous as a rule … some women are nervous every time they become pregnant,” thus her testimony about her health could not be trusted. Although Jose admitted that “there is no specific rule you can set down” to judge when an abortion was necessary to save a woman’s life, he insisted that Duncan’s fears about her health were signs of a “delusion.” To support Jose’s testimony, two additional doctors testified to Duncan’s health — despite never having examined her. They did so on the basis of Jose’s reputation as a physician, and his report that she felt better after her treatment for the infection. In addition, because Duncan previously delivered two children without incident, the three physicians insisted she could not be suffering from any life-threatening emergency during her third pregnancy.
Despite testimony from Duncan and her husband about her poor health for months before the abortion and Johnson’s insistence that she was not well, a jury convicted the doctor of felony abortion and the state’s Supreme Court upheld his conviction.
Ultimately, the Missouri Supreme Court decided that Duncan could not be trusted to decide whether her well-being was at risk from the pregnancy. They agreed with the prosecutor that her ailments were “imaginary,” and that her poor health was only a “delusion.” In addition, they noted that Johnson might have reason to lie about Duncan’s health to spare himself from a significant fine, whereas Jose would not.
This case revealed how physicians could easily differ on the line between an emergency and an emergent medical situation, leaving a doctor performing an abortion in legal jeopardy. Courts, despite a lack of medical expertise, got to determine where the line stood. These cases exposed how courts would not simply trust the judgment of the doctor who, after examining a patient, decided that her condition necessitated an abortion. And as Jose admitted in Johnson’s trial, there weren’t always clear guidelines for courts to follow.
Today, states are trying to define more clearly what constitutes a medical emergency under their trigger bans. The Missouri Department of Health and Social Services, for instance, claims that such an emergency is “a condition which, based on reasonable medical judgment, so complicates the medical condition of a pregnant woman as to necessitate the immediate abortion of her pregnancy to avert the death of the pregnant woman or for which a delay will create a serious risk of substantial and irreversible physical impairment of a major bodily function of the pregnant woman.” The state insists that if a doctor’s medical judgment is reasonable, they have no need to fear.
But while politicians believe this definition is clear, physicians argue that making such medical judgments is more complex than many politicians understand. Lisa Harris, a physician, wondered “how imminent must death be” to fulfill the criteria under the Missouri definition. Could the potential or likelihood of serious complications in the future suffice?
History tells us that this lack of clarity means that judges and juries will decide what constitutes a medical emergency, not doctors. And that, in turn, may make doctors hesitant to act, leaving patients at risk. This is why the American Medical Association and the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists argued before the Supreme Court that abortion bans force “clinicians to make an impossible choice between upholding their ethical obligations and following the law.” As long as doctors have to worry about potential legal repercussions, they will be stuck in this conundrum with potentially catastrophic consequences for some women. | 2022-09-08T11:05:21Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Medical exemptions in abortion bans won’t protect women’s health - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/made-by-history/2022/09/08/medical-exemptions-abortion-bans-wont-protect-womens-health/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/made-by-history/2022/09/08/medical-exemptions-abortion-bans-wont-protect-womens-health/ |
Do voters care whether a candidate is really from the state they aim to represent?
Perspective by Christopher J. Galdieri
Christopher J. Galdieri is professor of politics at Saint Anselm College and author of "Stranger in a Strange State: The Politics of Carpetbagging from Robert Kennedy to Scott Brown."
Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, the Democratic candidate for Senate, greets supporters at a campaign stop May 10 in Greensburg, Pa. (Keith Srakocic/AP)
When Robert Kennedy ran for the U.S. Senate in New York in 1964, he and his opponent, Sen. Kenneth Keating (R-N.Y.), debated about which candidate would better lead the nation in policy areas such as housing, labor and civil rights. Kennedy’s status as a newcomer to the state was the subject of criticism from his opponent, but not of ridicule. Initially, Kennedy talked up (and exaggerated) his family’s ties to the state and his brief residence there when he was a child. When that proved unpersuasive, he argued that his recent experience as attorney general in his brother’s presidential administration would give him a head start in addressing the issues of the day. And he emphasized to New York’s Democratic electorate that he would be one more vote for President Lyndon B. Johnson’s agenda in the Senate, while Keating spent the campaign ducking the question of whether he would vote for conservative outsider and 1964 Republican presidential nominee Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-Ariz.).
To the extent that Rudman's campaign engaged with Peabody at all, it capitalized on Peabody’s outsider status. One campaign ad featured a Peabody look-alike, who gave a rambling monologue in which he confused New Hampshire for both Maine and Vermont. The Rudman campaign also handed out buttons urging voters to “Scrub Taxachussets Chub,” linking his out-of-state origins to Granite Staters' legendary aversion to taxes. In response, Peabody tried to argue that he was more in touch with New Hampshire voters' opinions than Rudman, but this response never connected with the state's voters and Rudman easily won reelection.
Four years later, Illinois Republicans recruited Alan Keyes, the frequent Republican presidential primary candidate, from Maryland to run against Barack Obama for their state’s U.S. Senate seat. Obama had such a comfortable lead that he did not make much of Keyes’s carpetbagger status, but Keyes still made a spectacle of himself with his ignorance of the state. One newspaper editorial compared Keyes’s answering the Illinois GOP’s call to Mighty Mouse flying to someone’s rescue, while the Chicago Tribune suggested that Keyes learn how to pronounce Cairo, Ill., properly. | 2022-09-08T11:05:27Z | www.washingtonpost.com | In the Pa. Senate race, will it matter that Dr. Oz is a carpetbagger? - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/made-by-history/2022/09/08/pa-senate-race-will-it-matter-that-dr-oz-is-carpetbagger/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/made-by-history/2022/09/08/pa-senate-race-will-it-matter-that-dr-oz-is-carpetbagger/ |
Fifty years ago, there was a mad dash to stage the composer’s ‘Mass’ at the Kennedy Center. Now, the ambitious wartime work returns, renewing its call for unity.
In September of 1971, the nation was cracking in half.
The front pages of The Washington Post were aflame with violence and conflict: the ongoing catastrophe of the Vietnam War, political upheaval in Latin America and, here at home, racial unrest as busing foes boycotted schools. The bad news was unrelenting.
That is until the edition of Thursday, Sept. 9, when The Post’s lead story took a markedly different tone: “Bernstein’s Mass,” read the headline, “A Reaffirmation of Faith.”
This good news topping A1 was the previous evening’s official premiere of “Mass,” composer Leonard Bernstein’s genre-hopping magnum opus. “Mass” was Bernstein’s response to a request from Jacqueline Onassis for a piece to honor her first husband and inaugurate the soon-to-open John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts, a $66.5 million colossus overlooking the Potomac River and declaring the arts as central to American life — if not to D.C. pedestrians.
At 50, Kennedy Center can no longer be a cultural island
(Onassis herself wouldn’t see the show until its second opening at the Kennedy Center in the spring of 1972 — four years to the day Robert F. Kennedy was shot by an assassin. Her reception of “Mass” remained something of a mystery, not least of all to Bernstein, with whom she shared the presidential box. “She never said one word,” Bernstein told the New York Times. “I think she was speechless. She still hasn’t said anything.”)
Half a century and one pandemic year later on this Sept. 15, the Kennedy Center will belatedly celebrate its 50th anniversary with a new production of “Mass” that stars baritone Will Liverman in the spotlight role of the Celebrant. This rejuvenated “Mass” is helmed by director Alison Moritz and choreographer Hope Boykin, with conductor James Gaffigan leading the National Symphony Orchestra, the Heritage Signature Chorale and the Children’s Chorus of Washington.
Billed as “A Theatre Piece for Singers, Players and Dancers,” Bernstein’s “Mass” arrived as an assertive smear of genres, composed — largely in a six-month blur before its premiere — to encapsulate the vast range of artistic and performance programming to be housed at the Kennedy Center. Like the artistic center it was created to anoint, “Mass” was under construction right up until the final moments.
The original production assembled more than 200 performers on the Opera House stage, christening the lavish red theater with a “melange of music, dance and drama,” as The Post’s theater and cinema critic Richard L. Coe described it in 1971, as well a controversial blend of ancient texts and contemporary speech.
“It’s bigger than a major Broadway musical,” director Gordon Davidson told the New York Times that year of the “unprecedented” challenge of staging “Mass.” “And there’s less rehearsal time for it.”
Bigger than Broadway, too, was Bernstein’s vision for (and anxiety over) “Mass,” which seemed to distill the most potent parts of his best-known works — tonal and thematic shades of “Candide” and “West Side Story” drift through — into a provocative concentrate of American music and theater.
Davidson was joined by conductor (and Bernstein protege) Maurice Peress and choreographer Alvin Ailey, who was himself leading a company of dance legends-in-waiting, including Judith Jamison (a 1999 Kennedy Center honoree), Dudley Williams and Lee Harper.
At first glance, it might be easy to mistake “Mass” for other hippie-adjacent blurs of music, theater and spirituality from the period — “Hair,” “Jesus Christ Superstar” and the like. Stephen Schwartz, whom Bernstein enlisted six months before the premiere to help freshen the liturgical libretto (which mixes Latin, Hebrew and English) with contemporary lines, had only months earlier staged the off-Broadway premiere of his own breakthrough blend of the sacred and the secular, “Godspell.” (“The speed of the work on the project was simultaneously exhilarating and terrifying,” Schwartz writes in the program notes to the new production of “Mass.”)
They all starred in ‘Godspell.’ Then they became comedy legends.
But, groovy vibes aside, “Mass” endures as a rich and complex work in Bernstein’s oeuvre, and a vessel for some of his most personal revelations. In the more charitable of two reviews of “Mass” run by the New York Times, the critic Howard Klein drew this distinction: “ ‘Hair’ and ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ are manifestations of antiwar feelings and the new quest for transcendental faith. Bernstein’s ‘Mass’ is a cry for peace and brotherhood among men and as such is a humanistic document.”
The music here and there may veer into dated tropes, the lyrics may at times skew too clever by half, but at 50, “Mass” still somehow feels both intimate and transgressive — the sound of an artist trying to bridge a spiritual divide. And at 53 (his birthday was a couple of weeks before opening night) Bernstein fully believed that music — maybe even his — could repair the cracks in the world around him.
The true power of “Mass” comes from the clash of contradictions at its core: Bernstein’s location of the universal through an investigation of individual faith. Or the way the composer’s pluralistic yearning to be everything at once results in a work that is quintessentially, well … Lenny.
Speaking to those who took part in the premiere — the oral history below draws from conversations with nearly a dozen musicians, singers, dancers, critics and others who brought its spirit and spectacle to the Opera House stage — it becomes clear that “Mass” was far more than a show. It was a spiritual experience.
“It’s not a Mass of death, not a Requiem, there is no ‘Dies Irae,’ ” Bernstein told The Post in July 1971. It would still be weeks before he would finish composing it, but the end was in sight. “It is a celebration of life.”
“What happens if I don’t write anything?”
— Bernstein to Kennedy Center artistic director Julius Rude, as reported in The Post, July 27, 1971
Humanity, to Bernstein, was a work in progress. So, too, was “Mass” and the venue that would present it. Rehearsals got underway in the summer of 1971, though the work itself was far from finished.
Ted Chapin, son of associate producer and Metropolitan Opera general manager Schuyler Chapin, and assistant director of subsequent productions of “Mass”: My father, who was associate producer on “Mass,” knew it was way late and that Bernstein was having a very hard time composing it. And Dad also knew there was a date that the Kennedy Center was going to open, and it needed to have this piece performed in whatever form it was going to be in. That summer was tricky because Lenny was still trying to finish the “Mass” while all sorts of other things were grabbing at him.
Alan Titus, baritone, creator of the role of the Celebrant: I went down to Steinway Hall down on 57th Street [in New York], and maestro Bernstein was there with Maurice Peress and a few others. I walked in wearing my jeans-suit and holding my guitar, and I sat on the rim of the little stage in the audition room. I think that was the moment that I got the part, because that’s how the “Mass” starts.
Ronald Bardach, member of the Berkshire Boys Choir: [A fellow choir member] recalls seeing Stephen [Schwartz] walking around on his own backstage, mouthing lyrics and trying to come up with more as we got toward that 11th hour. As boys, we had kind of free rein, so we wandered all over the place, into the bowels of the Kennedy Center, places I’m sure nobody would go.
Judith Jamison, Alvin Ailey dancer and 1999 Kennedy Center honoree: We didn’t realize how not open it was. So, the big bust of JFK hadn’t been put in place, some of the carpet wasn’t down, the flags weren’t up. I mean, it was unfinished. I had a good time having the freedom of walking anywhere in the building.
Alan Titus: [Bernstein] was still writing the piece during rehearsals, which were mid-July. And the opening was September! When I look back now, I shudder because it was hardly any rehearsal time.
Michael Hume, choir member and Celebrant beginning in 1972: Lenny was feverishly finishing music even as the premiere was approaching. I remember hearing that Alvin Ailey would be waiting for the next piece of music that would involve dance so that they could rush to put it together.
Ronald Bardach: There was so much pressure to get things done, you could see the strain on Bernstein’s face when he didn’t have a cigarette in his mouth, which was almost always the case. But he still really embraced everybody in the cast. You just felt his warmth when he walked in. But make no mistake, he was a creative ball of energy — you could see it right up until the last few hours.
The Celebrant
The central role of “Mass” — the Celebrant — was created by young baritone Alan Titus. The role is seen by many as a pair of open brackets, a proxy for individual faith in a world fractured by violence and divided by fear.
Alan Titus: At the very first rehearsal, we all sat in a room together and Lenny said, “There are no leading singers in this production.” And I thought to myself, “What? Well what do you call the Celebrant?”
Ted Chapin: Who is the Celebrant? Is he an archetype? Does he stand for something larger? There are a lot of unanswered questions in the piece.
Frank Getlein, the New York Times, Sept. 12, 1971: Interpretations began at once and divided easily into four main groups: The protagonist, or Celebrant, is: John F. Kennedy, Jesus Christ, [antiwar activist] Daniel Berrigan or all three.
Paul Hume, The Washington Post, Sept. 9, 1971: One person dominates the entire work: Alan Titus is the young man who with unerring feeling for nuance of meaning, blessed with an expressive lyric baritone, and able to wear blue jeans and faded shirt or rich Ecclesiastical robes with equal ease, carried the role of The Celebrant.
Controversies: Church and state
With its direct lift of liturgical structures culminating in a scathing 18-minute mad scene representing the Celebrant’s crisis of faith — “Mass” proved to be a thorn in the side of the Catholic Church, which made its displeasure known in the press (and occasionally, the theater).
Alan Titus: The throwing down of the monstrance and the chalice [in the work’s climactic 16th section, “Fraction: Things Get Broken”], that was a big thing. When we came under fire from the Archbishop of Cincinnati, I thought, “Look, they’re not consecrated, I’m not a priest, it’s just a theatrical effect!”
The Rev. Paul F. Leibold, Archbishop of Cincinnati, in the May 19, 1972, New York Times: The main issue of our concern is, is this production a blatant sacrilege against all we hold sacred (whether it is done in Latin or English)? Does any artist have a right to use elements of our central act of worship as a vehicle to present his theme and, further, may they be vandalized in the expression of his theme?
Tim Smith, former music critic for the Baltimore Sun, who attended the first performance: I went to a Catholic high school and was getting a little too sassy, questioning too many things. I thought this was terrific stuff. It wasn’t really attacking faith at all, it was just making people challenge their beliefs. So I was in heaven.
“Mass” also irked government officials. The libretto, assembled by Bernstein through consultation with various priests and Catholic scholars — including the incarcerated Jesuit priest and antiwar activist Daniel “Father Dan” Berrigan — raised hackles across the Nixon administration, which was convinced that the Latin texts included coded messages intended to humiliate the president. The FBI had been keeping tabs on Bernstein, his leftist politics and his alleged ties to Communist organizations since his graduation from Harvard in 1939. Internal memos reveal a flurry of “Mass” hysteria.
Robert Mardian, then head of the U.S. Justice Department’s internal security division, in a memo to the White House, summer 1971: The fact that two such controversial figures as Bernstein and Father Berrigan are collaborating on the dedication program would appear to offer sufficient reason for inquiries as to just what mischief they are up to.
G. Gordon Liddy memo to Egil “Bud” Krogh, White House Special Investigations Unit, a.k.a. the Watergate “Plumbers,” Aug. 6, 1971: To avoid embarrassing the President or the Administration, neither the President nor any high Administration official will be present for the opening of the Center. In view of the foregoing, we can consider the matter as handled.
FBI memo, Sept. 8, 1971: “It was also noted that the performers were dressed in diverse garments such as hot pants and sweat shirts.”
“Half of the people are stoned, and the other half are waiting for the next election / Half of the people are drowned, and the other half are swimming in the wrong direction”
— Lines contributed to the "Mass" libretto by Paul Simon as a “Christmas present" to Bernstein.
The boldness of Bernstein’s direct recruiting of the liturgical form of the Catholic Mass, equal parts homage and infiltration, is outdone only by his oft-chaotic collision of musical vernaculars: classical (including a sprinkle of 12-tone serialism), jazz, blues, gospel, folk and his let’s-just-say particular idea of “rock,” which he wove into a wild tapestry of many colors.
Meanwhile, echoes of Bernstein’s scores for “Candide,” “Fancy Free” and “West Side Story” filtered through “Mass” with an intensified austerity. His familiar fervor and bombast seemed tempered and tinted as if passed through stained glass. That is, until a climactic mad scene — the “Fraction: Things Get Broken” — shattered everything.
Jamie Bernstein, Leonard’s daughter and author of “Famous Father Girl: A Memoir of Growing Up Bernstein”: It’s almost a manifesto about tonality. He wrote his Norton Lectures [which he delivered at Harvard in 1973] around the same time, and he was really starting to concentrate and cohere his thoughts about defending tonality. In the mid-20th century, if you wanted to be considered a so-called serious composer, you absolutely, positively had to write 12-tone music; tunes and chords and keys and all that stuff were out. You had to write in this very cerebral, rigorous, intellectual manner. My dad totally understood 12-tone music — he even used a little in “Mass” — but he was not going to do it to the exclusion of everything else. It was going to be one color on his compositional palette. He knew that by making that decision, he was consciously removing himself from the pantheon of serious composers.
Lee Harper, Alvin Ailey dancer, who went on to choreograph several productions of “Mass”: Dancers love [Bernstein’s] music, its rhythms — it just makes you want to dance. He put everything he could into this piece. They criticized it for being cheap and common, and I just thought, “No way! It’s something I can hum.” But it was joyous and melodic and beautiful. There’s a lot of contemporary music I like, but not all of it is beautiful.
Michael Hume: Only Lenny could have written this. This music emerged from Lenny at that time and reveals a tremendous display of his compositional skill, a score that from moment to moment can change drastically in terms of the sound of the music, the effect of the music, how it was written, why it was written. It all serves a dramatic purpose.
Ted Chapin: After the opening performance, we left the [Opera House] boxes to take the stairs down to the stage, and Bernstein stopped and turned to his associate Harry Crowd to complain about something that was wrong in the performance. And Harry was like, “Lenny, Lenny! It’s the curtain call! We’ve got to get down there!” But that’s how he was — dramatic. So he went down onstage, burst into tears, kissed everybody and had a wonderful time.
Ronald Bardach: At the cast party, [actor] Gregory Peck came up to us and said “Gosh, that was fantastic,” and we were all asking, “Mr. Peck, can I get your autograph?” He looks down at us and goes, “Well, no, boys, I should be asking you for your autograph.”
Predictably, though devastatingly to Bernstein, “Mass” divided critics. Harold C. Schonberg, the New York Times critic and Bernstein’s nemesis in print, pulled no punches, lashing out at “Mass” in several swipes:
New York Times, Sept. 9, 1971: “When Bernstein struggles with the infinite, he has generally been thrown for a loss, as in his “Jeremiah” or “Kaddish” symphonies. And so it is in the Mass. … It is a pseudo-serious attempt at re-thinking the Mass that basically is, I think, cheap and vulgar. It is a show-biz Mass, the work of a musician who desperately wants to be with it.”
New York Times, Sept. 19, 1971: “The Bernstein was a combination of superficiality and pretentiousness, and the greatest mélange of styles since the ladies’ magazine recipe for steak fried in peanut butter and Marshmallow sauce.”
Washington Post critic Paul Hume, meanwhile, was far more moved:
“The entire Mass is a shattering experience that signally honors its creator, the Center and the memory of the man for whom the Center is named.”
“While ‘Mass’ is theater and dance, it is above all music. Certainly from the ‘Agnus dei’ to the end, it is the greatest music Bernstein has ever written.”
Jamie Bernstein: He was devastated. He had really exposed himself in this piece in so many ways. I think it’s a self-portrait more than any other work of his. It has more of him in it than anything else he ever wrote. And because of that, because he rendered himself so vulnerable, it hurt doubly to have the work be so criticized. I don’t know what he thought “Mass” would do, but I think he was half hoping that, you know, the scales would fall from everyone’s eyes and they would realize we all have to get along, war is terrible, and let’s change our ways. I really think that there was a part of my dad that felt like if he could just write that good enough piece, he could change the world. That was the impulse that drove him forward as an artist.
Aftermath and legacy
“Mass” wasn’t Bernstein’s final large work. In 1977 his “Songfest: A Cycle of American Poems for Six Singers and Orchestra” would premiere at the Kennedy Center with the composer conducting the National Symphony Orchestra. And Bernstein would continue writing and conducting until his death in 1990, at the age 72. But “Mass” may be the height from which he attained his clearest view and made his loudest statement.
Ted Chapin: Stephen Sondheim once said that Lenny had “a bad case of important-itis,” and that may have gotten in his way. I think in “Mass,” Lenny tried to tap into every aspect of what he had done before and try to make it as good and as humanistic as possible, to be as universal as he could.”
Judith Jamison: There was this general feeling of everybody getting along, because you had to get along to get this thing up — there were so many people. God, it was amazing.
Michael Hume: [Bernstein] couldn’t solve the problems of the world with a performance of “Mass,” and he knew that. But what he could do was question. “Mass,” in its own small way, deals with the need to look for answers in a troubled world.
Alan Titus: I would say that it’s the apotheosis of American musical theater.
Tim Smith: I don’t think there will ever be a time, unfortunately, when “Mass” won’t be relevant. This piece is so important, so tied to the age-old struggles we all have. Do we belong? Should we have faith in this institution or that institution? It’s really something.”
Jamie Bernstein: I only wish my dad had lived long enough to see “Mass” being invited to be performed in the Vatican by Pope John Paul II [in 2000]. He would have felt so vindicated!
Lee Harper: This world needs the “Mass” now more than ever. We are nothing if we are not connected, and we are nothing if we are not forgiving and understanding each other.”
Leonard Bernstein’s “Mass” will be performed Sept. 15, 17 and 18 at the Kennedy Center. kennedy-center.org.
Editing by Janice Page and Amy Hitt. Photo research by Moira Haney and Sophia Solano. Copy editing by Susan Doyle. Design by Alla Dreyvitser.
Top image: Washington Post illustration/Fletcher Drake/Leonard Bernstein Office | 2022-09-08T11:05:33Z | www.washingtonpost.com | 'Mass,' Leonard Bernstein's spiritual epic, returns to Kennedy Center - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/music/2022/09/08/resurrecting-bernsteins-epic-kennedy-center-opener/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/music/2022/09/08/resurrecting-bernsteins-epic-kennedy-center-opener/ |
Mike Bass runs toward the end zone in Washington's loss to the Miami Dolphins in Super Bowl VII on Jan. 14, 1973. (AP Photo)
The most famous play of Washington cornerback Mike Bass’s career, the football folly that will be featured in videos long after the NFL starts using the Roman numeral C to count Super Bowls, came in defeat. With two minutes remaining in Super Bowl VII on Jan. 14, 1973 and Washington trailing the Miami Dolphins 14-0, Bass corralled Miami kicker Garo Yepremian’s ill-advised and poorly executed pass attempt after a blocked field goal and returned it 49 yards for a touchdown. The score — Washington’s first in a Super Bowl — and ensuing extra point provided the final margin in the undefeated Dolphins’ 14-7 win.
Bass, who will be inducted into the Commanders’ Ring of Fame during Sunday’s season opener at FedEx Field, contributed much more to Washington’s success in the 1970s than one of the most bizarre plays in Super Bowl history. He started 98 consecutive regular season games from 1969 through 1975, registering 30 interceptions, three of which he returned for touchdowns, and six fumble recoveries. Bass teamed with Brig Owens, Ken Houston and Pat Fischer to form one of the best defensive backfields in franchise history and was named to Washington’s “70 Greatest” team in 2002. He’s the first addition to the Ring of Fame since London Fletcher and Chris Samuels in 2019.
For Commanders' defense to progress, rush and coverage must work together
“I was very fortunate to practice day in and day out with some of the best receivers,” Bass, who called the honor the “crowning moment” of his career, said in a recent phone interview. “Charley Taylor. Jerry Smith. Roy Jefferson. Frank Grant. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the contributions of my teammates. We helped each other out quite a bit.”
The biggest assist during Bass’s eight-year career came from Green Bay Packers coach Vince Lombardi, who selected him in the 12th round of the 1967 NFL draft out of Michigan. The defending Super Bowl champion Packers boasted a talented and experienced secondary, including Willie Wood, Bob Jeter and Herb Adderley. Before Bass was released as part of the team’s final cuts ahead of the 1967 season, Lombardi brought the young cornerback into his office and told him he was good enough to play in the league.
Bass signed with the Detroit Lions and was active for two games as a rookie. He spent the 1968 season on the Lions’ taxi squad before being released. After Washington hired Lombardi in 1969, the legendary coach invited Bass, who was a free agent, to training camp.
“I knew if anyone would give me a fair chance, it would be Coach Lombardi,” said Bass, who had written to several teams in the spring of 1969 requesting a tryout.
Bass seized his opportunity with Washington and justified the belief and confidence that Lombardi showed in him. He impressed during camp and the preseason, intercepting two passes in a loss to Cleveland, and earned the starting job at right cornerback.
“He had that tenacity to drive you beyond what you thought you could do,” Bass said of Lombardi, who coached only one season in Washington before being diagnosed with advanced colon cancer and dying the following September. “Outside of my dad, he is probably the best man that I have ever met.”
In 1971, under first-year head coach George Allen, Bass helped Washington to its first playoff berth in 26 years. He tallied eight interceptions that season, tied for third-most in the league behind Bill Bradley and Houston. Bass thrived under Allen. A tenacious tackler who wasn’t afraid to take on running backs and receivers much bigger than his 6-foot, 190-pound frame, Bass intercepted at least three passes in all seven of his seasons in Washington. The team qualified for the playoffs every year from 1971 through 1974, and made its first Super Bowl appearance after going 11-3 in 1972.
Bass suffered a severe neck injury in Week 8 of the 1975 season when he was kneed in the head as he made a tackle on New York Giants running back Joe Dawkins. Bass was taken off the field on a stretcher, but returned the following week and played the final six games of the regular season. He suffered recurring headaches during the offseason and announced his retirement at age 31 at training camp in 1976.
Looking back, Bass, 77, said he is most proud of the fact that he didn’t allow many catches, much less touchdowns. His favorite play was an interception return for a score in a season-opening win against the Giants in 1974.
Bass’s name will forever be linked with Yepremian, who said his “mind went blank” when he picked up the football after his field goal was blocked in Super Bowl VII. After the ball slipped out of Yepremian’s hand on his inexplicable pass, he attempted to bat it out of bounds, but instead knocked it directly to Bass.
Bass and Yepremian became friends when they were teammates on the Lions in 1967 and kept in touch as they both found success elsewhere.
“I have to always smile a bit because of that play,” Bass said recently. “And at the same time I smile a bit because Coach Lombardi saw in me something that the Lions didn’t see in me, and the Lions have been relegated to 40 or 45 years of losing. That remains in thought in the back of my mind. The Lions were not as smart as Coach Lombardi.” | 2022-09-08T11:06:10Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Mike Bass to be inducted into Washington Ring of Fame - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/mike-bass-commanders-ring-fame/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/mike-bass-commanders-ring-fame/ |
The NFL season opens Thursday at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, Calif., where last season ended with Super Bowl LVI. (Tyler Kaufman/AP)
The NFL season begins where it left off, with the Los Angeles Rams playing at SoFi Stadium.
The Super Bowl champion Rams host the Buffalo Bills, a popular pick to play in Super Bowl LVII, in Thursday night’s prime-time matchup of quarterbacks Matthew Stafford and Josh Allen. Fifteen more games follow in Week 1, including prime-time TV matchups that feature the Tampa Bay Buccaneers at the Dallas Cowboys on Sunday night and the Denver Broncos at the Seattle Seahawks on Monday.
After 272 games, we’ll have a clearer idea where things stand for all 32 teams. For now, here’s something to know about each Week 1 matchup.
Buffalo Bills at Los Angeles Rams, 8:20 p.m., NBC: Allen and Stafford combined for 77 touchdown passes last year, raising the possibility that the season will open with a shootout. The Bills have not forgotten how their season ended, with a 42-36 overtime loss to the Kansas City Chiefs in the divisional round of the playoffs, and while Buffalo may be a popular Super Bowl pick, the Rams are 5-0 in season openers under Coach Sean McVay.
New Orleans Saints at Atlanta Falcons, 1 p.m.: The Falcons have lost their past four home games against the Saints, who now have Dennis Allen as head coach after Sean Payton stepped down. Marcus Mariota replaces Matt Ryan as Falcons quarterback with Jameis Winston back for the Saints, who have the second-best record (58-23, .716) in the NFL over the past five seasons.
Cleveland Browns at Carolina Panthers, 1 p.m.: The Browns have not won a Week 1 road game since 1994, when their head coach was Bill Belichick. Their chances of reversing that may not improve with quarterback Baker Mayfield, now starting for Carolina, facing his former team in one of the most hyped matchups of Week 1. With Deshaun Watson serving an 11-game suspension, Jacoby Brissett will be Cleveland’s starter under center.
San Francisco 49ers at Chicago Bears, 1 p.m.: The 49ers are Trey Lance’s team, but Jimmy Garoppolo is back — at least for now — with a cap-friendly contract. He is even studying the playbook and practicing with the team again as Lance’s backup, but, as Hall of Fame 49ers quarterback Steve Young admitted recently, “This is hairy stuff.” The Bears have a new Matt at coach (that would be Eberflus, replacing Nagy) and Justin Fields at quarterback.
Pittsburgh Steelers at Cincinnati Bengals, 1 p.m.: The post-Ben Roethlisberger era begins with Mitch Trubisky getting the first shot to be his replacement. The eternal question for the Bengals is whether they can protect Joe Burrow, who led them to a Super Bowl appearance last season despite being sacked 70 times in the regular season and postseason (including seven in the Super Bowl). That’s the third-highest total in NFL history (David Carr was sacked 76 times in 2002 and Randall Cunningham 72 in 1986). Good move to sign three free agent offensive linemen in the offseason.
Philadelphia Eagles at Detroit Lions, 1 p.m.: Aidan Hutchinson, the No. 2 pick in this year’s draft, makes his debut against a team with standout left tackle Jordan Mailata and may spend much of the day chasing quarterback Jalen Hurts.
Indianapolis Colts at Houston Texans, 1 p.m.: Carson Wentz has been dispatched, replaced in Indianapolis by Matt Ryan. The key to the Colts’ offense, though, is running back Jonathan Taylor. Who knows what the key is for the Texans, now with Lovie Smith as head coach and Davis Mills at quarterback?
New England Patriots at Miami Dolphins, 1 p.m.: The Patriots look beatable and the Dolphins may have been unable to land Tom Brady despite their best efforts, but they do have Tua Tagovailoa, who is 3-0 against Bill Belichick’s team.
Baltimore Ravens at New York Jets, 1 p.m.: The Ravens will face Joe Flacco, the quarterback they once made the highest-paid player in the league, because Zach Wilson (knee) has not been medically cleared to start. Although the Ravens still have not locked down Lamar Jackson, the 2019 NFL MVP, with a contract extension, Coach John Harbaugh reports that he is “locked in.”
Jacksonville Jaguars at Washington Commanders, 1 p.m.: The Jaguars have to be better with Doug Pederson as coach than they were with Urban Meyer, right? And Colts castoff Carson Wentz has to be an improvement at quarterback for a Washington team making its regular season debut as the Commanders, right?
New York Giants at Tennessee Titans, 4:25 p.m.: The Titans were the AFC’s top seed last season, only to be stung by the Bengals in the divisional round of the playoffs. Star running back Derrick Henry will play in a regular season game for the first time since Week 8 of 2021. As for the Giants, well, the city can always turn its lonely eyes to the Jets.
Kansas City Chiefs at Arizona Cardinals, 4:25 p.m.: The Cardinals were right up there when it came to offseason drama. But Kyler Murray is back, presumably content with a contract extension that pays the quarterback $46.1 million per year. This is the first meeting between Murray and Patrick Mahomes.
Las Vegas Raiders at Los Angeles Chargers, 4:25 p.m.: The Raiders, picked by many to finish last in the loaded AFC West, finished 10-7 last season, lost to Cincinnati in the first round of the playoffs and then added Davante Adams — quarterback Derek Carr’s former Fresno State teammate who has led the NFL in catches, receiving yards and receiving touchdowns since 2018 — and pass rusher Chandler Jones to new coach Josh McDaniels’s team.
Green Bay Packers at Minnesota Vikings, 4:25 p.m.: The Packers traded Adams, which means Aaron Rodgers’s chances for a third straight MVP rest in the hands of Allen Lazard, Randall Cobb and rookies Christian Watson and Romeo Doubs. No pressure.
Tampa Bay Buccaneers at Dallas Cowboys, 8:20 p.m., NBC: Tampa Bay’s quarterback has been dealing with some … stuff, which evidently happens to 45-year-olds. Brady may have a 6-0 record against Dallas (with five of those games coming with the Patriots), but the Bucs have a tough season-opening stretch with the next three games at New Orleans, home against Green Bay and home against Kansas City. In a season-opening 31-29 win over the Cowboys last year, Brady passed for 379 yards and four touchdowns.
Denver Broncos at Seattle Seahawks, 8:15 p.m., ESPN, ABC, ESPN2, ESPN Deportes: For the first time since Peyton Manning retired, the Broncos have a marquee quarterback. Russell Wilson has the second-most passing touchdowns through his first 10 seasons in NFL history, ranking second only to Manning (327 to 317). As Wilson faces his former team, Manning and his brother Eli will be back with their “Manningcast” simulcast. | 2022-09-08T11:06:16Z | www.washingtonpost.com | NFL Week 1 schedule and five-minute guide - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/nfl-week-1-preview/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/nfl-week-1-preview/ |
Veteran edge rusher Von Miller surprised many by signing with the Buffalo Bills this past offseason. (Jeffrey T. Barnes/AP)
Miller — the effervescent edge rusher with two Super Bowl rings, a chicken farm and some of the finest between-drill dance breaks the NFL has ever seen — has been glue in every locker room of his career, the popular kid who gets along with everyone. And he has always been an open book. In a league where stars so often keep their methods secret, Miller routinely shares his. He has impacted football in ways few can, largely because of his ability on the field, but also because of the lessons he has learned and taught over the years.
Over the past six months, as he has left the warmth of Los Angeles for the brutal winters of Buffalo in search of another Super Bowl victory, those close to Miller say he has changed in a way they never saw coming. He is looking ahead — not to retirement but to his fit with a team he believes can win for years to come.
In choosing the Bills, Miller picked a path where he could fill a void on the defensive line — a move that might be enough to bring Buffalo its first Super Bowl victory.
He’s ready to spread his influence further — to pay it forward.
‘I’d go to Madagascar to win’
When the Denver Broncos revamped their defense in 2014 and spent more than $100 million on DeMarcus Ware, Aqib Talib and T.J. Ward, Miller’s life changed immediately. The former Texas A&M standout became the star of a defensive powerhouse. More significant: He gained a mentor in a player he long admired.
The Broncos signed Ware to bolster their pass rush — but also to guide Miller, a young star whose mistakes were starting to cost him. The previous season, he had been suspended six games for violating the NFL’s drug policy.
Von Miller Sr. described Ware as a confidant for his son, almost like a sage uncle or big brother. Miller said Ware was his idol.
“DeMarcus, he came at a vital point in my life,” Miller said ahead of Super Bowl LVI in February. “I thought I knew what it took to be a superstar in this league. I thought I knew what it took to be successful in this league. Well, I was wrong. … We talked about life, football, of course, business, what to do with your money, how to handle the media, how to handle all of these things. I’m really just a product of DeMarcus. I come from the DeMarcus Ware tree.”
Ware and Miller won the Super Bowl together after the 2015 season, but by 2016, the fun had fizzled. Peyton Manning retired, triggering a quarterback carousel that spun for five years, and the frustrations of losing, often in the same way, set in.
After a loss to the Chiefs in December 2019, Miller struggled to hide his disappointment. With watery eyes, he told reporters the losing in Denver “just defeats my soul” and he was “ready to hit the gear” and “ready to go again.” He wanted another taste of that Super Bowl feeling — but it wouldn’t come in Denver.
With Von Miller trade, Rams take their all-in approach to another level
Although the trade to the Rams in November blindsided him — “I cried real tears,” he said — it wasn’t long before he realized its benefits.
“Winning championships is addictive,” he said. “At this point in my career, I’ve played all these years and done everything you can possibly do. It’s about winning. I’d go to Madagascar to win.”
‘I never saw myself leaving'
To Bills General Manager Brandon Beane, seven hours might as well have been seven days. Despite talks at the NFL combine, where teams regularly gauge which players are interested in them (and vice versa), Buffalo didn’t know just how intrigued Miller was until shortly before he signed.
Miller’s agent, Joby Branion, said close to 10 teams called in free agency, but the decision came down to the Rams and the Bills. On the morning of March 16, upon hearing Miller was genuinely interested, Beane made an offer. Seven hours later, after some tweaks and multiple phone calls, they reached an agreement. Miller, in a video from the Bahamas, shocked the NFL by announcing he was going to the Bills.
“My eyes have always been on Buffalo since I almost got drafted here,” Miller said in August. “They had the number three pick, and Denver had number two. That whole draft process, I was always going to Buffalo, Buffalo, Buffalo and [Marcell] Dareus [was going to] the Denver Broncos.”
In retrospect, it seemed Miller’s decision had been brewing for years. In reality, the choice was painful.
The Bills’ interest in Miller ran deep — long after the 2011 draft. They tried to trade for him three times, including in November, and they won this time largely because of their offer: a six-year, $120 million deal that included $45 million guaranteed at signing and more than $51 million in total guarantees. The Rams were willing to give Miller three years and roughly $18 million annually, a higher average value than the Bills. But L.A. didn’t guarantee anything beyond the second season.
NFL star Von Miller details ‘frightening’ coronavirus experience, thoughts on 2020 season
By choosing Buffalo, Miller chose an extra $15 million guaranteed by his mid-30s — and more if he plays out the full deal. Yet the decision tormented him. Miller is conflict-averse and at times loyal to a fault, multiple people close to him said, and he leaves the big decisions to others. He left Texas A&M because Denver drafted him, he stayed in part because he was franchise-tagged, and he went to L.A. because he was traded.
“I told him early in the process, ‘You know, Von, if it were up to you, you’d still be playing in College Station,’ ” Branion recalled. “ ‘The only reason you left is because your eligibility expired.’ ”
“I never saw myself leaving [the Rams],” Miller said. “How do you leave Aaron Donald, a great environment and all those great places that L.A. has for Buffalo?”
But Miller answered his own question: “I was talking to my dad in the process, and he was just like, ‘Are you content?’ I told him I still feel like I got a lot of football left.”
Miller was thinking about the long term — where he can have the greatest impact, where he can win and where he wanted to be. The Bills were built for years to come, Miller’s friends and advisers reminded him, with young talent, an elite quarterback, a good core and a healthy salary cap.
Their missing piece was Miller.
So he chose them.
‘Success leaves clues’
Miller believes some things manifest into reality. Like, for instance, someone calling him old.
“Physically, emotionally and mentally, I don’t feel 33 years old,” he said. “I’ve been around teammates that just fall into that mind-set of like, ‘I’m old.’ I hate saying that. … If I don’t move like it, if I don’t look like it, don’t push that on me.”
Giving a pass rusher who’s approaching his mid-30s a six-year deal might seem risky. But Miller is not just any rusher. With deceptive power, a quick get-off and a bend few can replicate, he can still do things physically that others can’t. Beane points to February’s Super Bowl as proof that Miller can still wreck a game; he had two sacks in the Rams’ victory over the Bengals. But the GM said the Bills were just as intrigued by Miller’s leadership.
“He was a big part of them winning,” Beane said. “It was Von the player — we still think he can do it — and then the intangibles, the leadership. We get these young ends and we’re hoping that he can teach these guys some things and unlock some of their talent.”
Miller’s arrival has required some adjustment, though. He will be primarily a stand-up end in Frazier’s 4-3 defense after years of playing as a linebacker. It’s plausible his playing time will be trimmed too, to keep him fresh and make him more impactful on situational downs.
But no matter what he does with the Bills this season and beyond, it’s almost certain his ways off the field will leave even more of a mark. Behind the scenes, Miller’s studies are expansive. He researches opponents as well as players he has idolized or worked with in the past — such as Ware, Champ Bailey, Bruce Smith and even Tom Brady.
“Success leaves clues,” Miller said.
Miller passes those clues along. For the past six years, he has gathered some of the game’s top pass rushers for a sharing-of-ideas each offseason at the Von Miller Pass Rush Summit. This year, in an NFL Films documentary about the Rams’ win, Donald explained how Miller talked to him for 30 minutes about being more vocal. And this summer in Buffalo, it has been common to see Miller talking to a younger lineman about a move, the angle he’ll take on a rush or even just life — as Ware did with him.
“I talk to them like I’m talking to my younger self,” Miller said. “It could be finances, it could be football, it could be family — anything. I don’t tell these guys stuff I was doing. I tell them stuff that I wish I would’ve done.”
In Denver, Miller moved on from his suspension to become a leader on the Broncos. He built “Club 58” (he wore No. 58 in Denver) in the basement of his home as a hangout for friends and teammates and established a foundation to provide low-income children with eye care and corrective eyewear.
In 2021, police in Parker, Colo., investigated Miller based on his interactions with his former girlfriend, but the district attorney declined to file charges, citing a lack of information and evidence.
Miller has a 1-year-old son, Valor, whom Von Miller Sr. believes has been instrumental in his son’s growth. Soon, Miller will become a father of two, and he has business ambitions beyond football: He hopes to one day run a chicken enterprise, starting with a processing plant that will become operational in December.
And Thursday, facing his former team in the NFL’s season-opening game, he’ll begin the next chapter of his career on the field. It will be built on lessons of the past.
“I’m just paying it forward,” Miller said. | 2022-09-08T11:06:22Z | www.washingtonpost.com | With Buffalo Bills, Von Miller is paying forward the lessons of a long career - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/von-miller-nfl-bills-rams/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/von-miller-nfl-bills-rams/ |
Thursday briefing: Canada stabbing suspect’s death; Memphis shooting rampage; Obama portraits; Thursday Night Football; and more
The second suspect in Canada’s mass stabbings died after being caught.
What we know: The 32-year-old man “went into medical distress” shortly after he was captured in Saskatchewan yesterday after a four-day manhunt, police said.
The other suspect, his brother, was found dead Monday. Police are still investigating what happened.
This was one of Canada’s deadliest mass killings: Ten people died and 18 more were injured in Sunday’s attacks, which started at the James Smith Cree Nation.
A gunman went on a deadly shooting rampage across Memphis yesterday.
What happened? Four people were killed and at least three others were injured, officials said. The shootings, one of which was live-streamed on Facebook, forced people to shelter in place for hours.
A 19-year-old suspect was arrested. We don’t have information yet on the victims or why this happened. The suspect was released from prison earlier this year.
The U.S. is sending Ukraine $2.6 billion more in aid.
What to know: That includes $675 million in weapons, with more rounds for rocket launchers that Ukraine has used to precisely target Russian forces.
On the ground: Ukraine said it recaptured territory in the northeastern region of Kharkiv.
Voluntary power cuts helped California avoid blackouts this week.
What to know: Millions of people lowered their power use during a historic heat wave after alerts on their phones warned them the grid was at risk.
It’s part of a larger problem: America’s power grid is under enormous stress because of extreme weather and some fossil fuel power plants shutting down early.
What else to know: Remnants of Hurricane Kay could bring rain and flooding to Southern California and the Southwest tomorrow.
An experimental ALS drug came a step closer to approval yesterday.
What to know: FDA advisers recommended the treatment, despite concerns that it may not work, although it is considered safe.
Why this matters: ALS is a degenerative disease that usually kills people within three to five years. There are few treatment options, and this one has strong support.
What’s next? The FDA, which usually follows its advisers’ recommendation, is expected to decide whether to approve it by Sept. 29.
Official portraits of the Obamas were unveiled at the White House yesterday.
This was long overdue: President Donald Trump broke nearly four decades of tradition by not holding an unveiling ceremony for the portraits while he was in office.
Why it matters: The portraits will join a collection dating back to Gilbert Stuart’s iconic painting of George Washington.
The NFL season officially kicks off tonight.
The details: The Buffalo Bills play the Rams (the defending Super Bowl champs) in Los Angeles. Kickoff is at 8:20 p.m. Eastern time on NBC.
What then? There are 14 games Sunday, followed by Monday Night Football, to wrap up the start of what’s expected to be an unpredictable season. (Full schedule here.)
And now … should you get the new iPhone 14? This quiz can help you decide. Plus, what to watch tonight: “Pinocchio,” with Tom Hanks, which dropped on Disney Plus today. | 2022-09-08T11:06:46Z | www.washingtonpost.com | The 7 things you need to know for Thursday, Sept. 8 - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/the-seven/2022/09/08/what-to-know-for-september-8/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/the-seven/2022/09/08/what-to-know-for-september-8/ |
How one D.C. theater is advocating for abortion rights
“My Body No Choice” — eight monologues by female playwrights — starts at Arena Stage next month as the midterm elections approach
Abortion rights activists, including actor Busy Philipps, march past the U.S. Supreme Court building in June to protest its Roe v. Wade ruling. (Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters)
One of the advantages of running a theater is that when you have the irresistible urge to say something rapidly, you have the resources at your command to achieve it. That’s what transpired this summer with Molly Smith, Arena Stage’s artistic director, after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the settled abortions rights case law of Roe v. Wade.
In short order, Smith was calling and emailing writers who she knew would have their own urgent and poignant responses to the attack on a basic legal right for American women. The result was the extraordinarily swift whipping-up of a production that will run at Arena next month, presenting the voices of eight female playwrights of various generations and colors, speaking their minds about decisions over their bodies.
The dramatists behind “My Body No Choice” include such established talents as Sarah Ruhl, Dael Orlandersmith, Lisa Loomer, Lee Cataluna and V, formerly Eve Ensler, author of “The Vagina Monologues.” (The others are Fatima Dyfan, Mary Hall Surface and a writer identified only as “Anonymous.”) Performed by a cast still being assembled, the evening of 10-minute monologues begins Oct. 20 in Arena’s Cradle and runs through Nov. 6, the Sunday before Election Day. Smith, who is leaving her Arena post next summer, will make “My Body No Choice” her final directorial venture as company leader.
“As soon as the decision came down from the Supreme Court, and Roe v. Wade was overturned, I immediately felt like a second-class citizen,” Smith said. “Here we are back again to where I was 50 years ago and where women were 50 years ago. And then it became what am I going to do? What can I do?”
In her quarter century at the helm of Arena, Smith has championed Washington theater as an exponent of debate on national issues and history: Her Power Plays project, launched in 2016, is in the midst of offering 25 original works over 10 years on political and historical topics. The fight for abortion rights in particular has figured in her programming, with, for example, Loomer’s “Roe” in 2017, a play about the central figures in the original Roe v. Wade decision. The issue has been portrayed in popular plays elsewhere, such as Heidi Schreck’s widely hailed “What the Constitution Means to Me,” which ran on Broadway in 2019, appeared at the Kennedy Center and toured the country.
A key to building powerful theater around a highly flammable topic is a humanizing dimension. As Smith’s playwrights began submitting their monologues, she found that they were expanding the boundaries of her original concept in highly personal ways. “The project keeps flowering as we go along,” she said. “And it has remained this fierce dynamic, as far as women wanting to be part of this, because of what they feel about how their own choices are being ripped away.
“So one of the stories is about a woman’s choice to be a particular size and weight. That is, not the size and weight the society says she can be. Another one touches on the right to be able to die the way that you want to die. Two-thirds of the writers have also somehow written about their own mothers. And I think that that makes sense. Because our bodies are from our mothers.”
Cataluna, a playwright and journalist who lives on the Hawaiian island of Maui, first worked with Smith on a still-evolving film project involving Indigenous and Native artists. It was her late mother, Dorothy, who inspired her as-yet-untitled contribution to “My Body No Choice.” And how Cataluna chose to write about her reveals the breadth of the production’s subjects: Her mother died in 2016 at 81, after deciding to stop chemotherapy.
“I realized that it was the only significant choice she ever had over her body,” Cataluna said. “I started thinking about how few choices she had about anything. Career choices — being a nurse, teacher or secretary, that was it. Other things: She was expected to be nice, she really couldn’t speak her mind.”
She stopped chemo after one dose, Cataluna recounted. “Which makes it sound like a really tragic story. But the piece is kind of funny, because Mom was kind of funny. I know she would love the idea that there’s a piece about her.”
The actors for the eight monodramas are being recruited mostly from the Washington area. Smith is casting an even wider net for another element of “My Body No Choice”: Videos of up to two minutes are being sought from “women, trans and nonbinary individuals” across the country for their accounts. Eighteen of the submissions will be featured on the company’s social media platforms. More information is available at arenastage.org/mbnc.
The hope, too, is that other theaters will initiate their own productions of “My Body No Choice.”
“It’s a call to action,” Smith said, “for people all over the country.” | 2022-09-08T11:06:53Z | www.washingtonpost.com | How Arena Stage is advocating for abortion rights - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/theater-dance/2022/09/08/arena-stage-abortion-monologues/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/theater-dance/2022/09/08/arena-stage-abortion-monologues/ |
The art and legacies of Burt Bacharach, Eva Perón, Maya Lin and musician/activist Hazel Scott spark works around the region
Shamel Pitts, Tushrik Fredericks and Marcella Lewis in “Black Hole: Trilogy and Triathlon.” (Adeboye Brothers)
Consider it a human-centered season, where the lives of real people take center stage. It’s an intriguing coincidence — I can’t remember another dance season with so many works in circulation that have been inspired by historical figures, complicated icons, and artists living and dead. It feels like a promising trend, one that offers a way to think differently about familiar names and learn about those who have all but vanished. In chronological order, here are some of the works I’m most eager to see.
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Dance Theatre of Harlem: ‘Sounds of Hazel’
Dance Theatre of Harlem’s world-premiere ballet pays tribute to Hazel Scott, the Trinidad-born and Juilliard-trained civil rights activist who died in 1981. She’d led a trailblazing career as a jazz and classical pianist, singer, movie star and TV host, but the height of her fame coincided with McCarthyism — and she was blacklisted. Over time, her name faded from history. A team of Black female artists created “Sounds of Hazel,” including choreographer Tiffany Rea-Fisher and composer Erica Lewis Blunt. Both DTH and Washington Performing Arts, a co-commissioner, kick off their seasons with this work. Oct. 7-8 at Sidney Harman Hall, 610 F St. NW. washingtonperformingarts.org.
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Washington Ballet: ‘NEXTsteps’
In June, the Washington Ballet ended its spring season with an installment of “NEXTsteps,” as its new-works program is called. The fall season offers a fresh array of new dances. This time, the choreographers include former San Francisco Ballet soloist Dana Genshaft, who created “Shadow Lands” for the Washington Ballet in 2019; former New York City Ballet dancer Silas Farley; and Washington Ballet member Andile Ndlovu. Oct. 12-16 at Sidney Harman Hall, 610 F St. NW. washingtonballet.org.
Dana Tai Soon Burgess Dance: ‘Surroundings: A Tribute to Maya Lin’
The work of contemporary sculptor and designer Maya Lin blends organically with the outside world (think of the quiet, gradual rise and fall of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial). But what do we know about the inner world that produces such art? Dana Tai Soon Burgess Dance explores Lin’s interior landscape, her focus on history and human rights, and how memory and contemplation contribute to her art. The performances are free and feature live piano, cello and vocal accompaniment. “Surroundings” coincides with the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery’s exhibition “One Life: Maya Lin,” Sept. 30-April 16. Oct. 16, 23 and 30 in the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery’s Kogod Courtyard, Eighth and F streets NW. dtsbdc.org.
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Cloud Gate Dance Theatre: ‘13 Tongues’
Cloud Gate Dance Theatre of Taiwan takes the intriguing name of its new work from a 1960s street artist in Taipei. Cloud Gate’s director-choreographer, Cheng Tsung-lung, drew inspiration from his mother’s stories about the storyteller known as 13 Tongues, who had a remarkable ability to embody all sorts of characters found in a historic district of Taipei known as Bangka. These stories entwine with the director’s childhood memories and Taipei’s contemporary culture to form what the company describes as a dreamlike world where ancient and modern coexist. Musical accompaniment includes Taiwanese folk songs, Taoist chants and electronica. Oct. 20-22 at the Kennedy Center, 2700 F St. NW. kennedy-center.org.
Mark Morris Dance Group: ‘The Look of Love’
Do you vibe to “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” or “What’s New, Pussycat?” There’s a distinct charm and poignancy to Burt Bacharach’s songs, and they’ve struck a chord with choreographer Mark Morris. I can’t wait to see the result. After all, Morris’s Beatles-inspired “Pepperland” was magical and profound and full of surprises. “The Look of Love,” Morris’s homage to Bacharach, features new musical arrangements by Ethan Iverson (who also teamed up on “Pepperland,” and has collaborated on many other Morris works). Accompaniment features piano, trumpet, bass and percussion, with Broadway’s Marcy Harriell on lead vocals. “I’ve found an ideal collaborator in Mark Morris,” writes singer-songwriter Bacharach on the Mark Morris Dance Group’s website. You be the judge, as MMDG tours “The Look of Love” this fall. Oct. 26-29 at the Kennedy Center, 2700 F St. NW. kennedy-center.org.
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Nrityagram Dance Ensemble and Chitrasena Dance Company: ‘Ahuti’
The renowned Nrityagram Dance Ensemble, from India, collaborates with Sri Lanka’s Chitrasena Dance Company in “Ahuti,” a cross-cultural work that fuses the companies’ styles. The Nrityagram dancers live on a residential dance commune about an hour’s drive from Bangalore, where they study and perform Odissi, a fluid and intricate temple dance more than 2,000 years old. Chitrasena, based in Colombo, Sri Lanka, specializes in Kandyan dance, once performed only by men. The members of both companies are resident artists at George Mason University, where “Ahuti” will be accompanied by flute, violin, harmonium, manjira and drums. Nov. 5 at the George Mason University Center for the Arts Concert Hall, 4373 Mason Pond Dr., Fairfax. cfa.calendar.gmu.edu.
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Les Ballets de Monte Carlo: ‘Cendrillon’
Is this a fairy tale from Mars? Jean-Christophe Maillot’s ballet “Cendrillon” (the French name for Cinderella) has a strikingly futuristic look, with spare, elegantly simple costuming instead of elaborate gowns and wigs — and glitter-dusted feet instead of glass slippers. Maillot, who created his version in 1999, also provides a fresh perspective on the story, focusing on how the loss of Cinderella’s mother shapes the lives of both father and daughter. The traditional Prokofiev score accompanies performances by Les Ballets de Monte Carlo, which Maillot directs. Nov. 17-20 at the Kennedy Center, 2700 F St. NW. kennedy-center.org.
Shamel Pitts: ‘Black Hole: Trilogy and Triathlon’
Choreographer Shamel Pitts spent seven years with Israel’s Batsheva Dance Company and its former director, Ohad Naharin, immersing himself in Gaga, the movement style that Naharin developed. As founder and director of Tribe, a multidisciplinary arts collective, Pitts has created a trilogy of works built on Gaga, which is essentially a way of developing one’s unique way of moving. “Black Hole” is the third installment of the trilogy. Pitts describes it as a performance-art odyssey that includes movement, lighting, video projections, cinematography and original sound to evoke the mystery of a black hole and to tell a story of three Black artists. Dec. 2 at Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, 8270 Alumni Dr., College Park. theclarice.umd.edu.
Ballet Hispanico: ‘Doña Perón’
The musical “Evita” isn’t the last word on artistic fascination with Eva “Evita” Perón. In her ballet “Doña Perón,” choreographer Annabelle Lopez Ochoa offers a dance portrait of the Argentine first lady, who died at 33 in 1952, leaving behind conflicting legacies. Was she a savior of the working class or the ruthless power behind Juan Perón’s throne? Lopez Ochoa is no stranger to interpreting the lives of historic Latina women in dance, having made two works about Mexican painter Frida Kahlo: “Frida,” for the Dutch National Ballet, and “Broken Wings” for the English National Ballet. She created “Doña Perón” for Ballet Hispanico, with music by Peter Salem. Nov. 30-Dec. 3 at the Kennedy Center, 2700 F St. NW. kennedy-center.org. | 2022-09-08T11:06:59Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Highlights include Mark Morris, Dance Theatre of Harlem and Cloud Gate - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/theater-dance/2022/09/08/fall-preview-dance/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/theater-dance/2022/09/08/fall-preview-dance/ |
This fall, theaters whet our appetites with an impressive buffet
New Stoppard, old Loesser, stories from the political right and left, and Shakespeare with new looks stock the stage
Victoria Clark and Justin Cooley in “Kimberly Akimbo.” (Ahron R. Foster)
Seems like old times, compiling a broad list of options for a pretty much fully stocked autumn in the theater world. Thanks in large part to the federal aid that held the industry together through the worst part of the pandemic, American theater has managed to survive. This season, though, may represent the more formidable test of the strength of its institutions, large and small, and be a truer measure of how much of its audience it can count on returning.
To that end — and not even considering the much-anticipated arrival of Lea Michele in New York, as the Fanny Brice who might rescue the sagging Broadway revival of “Funny Girl” — herein find some of the potentially rewarding options:
Why don’t we start off with Frank Loesser’s humdinger of a classic, the one with the Gotham gamblers rockin’ the boat, and an unmarried poyson developing a cold? The Kennedy Center’s popular and consistently polished Broadway Center Stage series is back with a potential bang. The cast is to die for: Jessie Mueller as Adelaide, the chorus girl with the accent you could cut with a deli knife; James Monroe Iglehart as Nathan, her gun-shy paramour; Phillipa Soo as the finger-wagging soul-saver Sarah; and Steven Pasquale (Soo’s real-life husband) as suaver-than-suave Sky. They’ll all roll the dice with director Marc Bruni. Oct. 7-16 at the Kennedy Center, 2700 F St. NW. kennedy-center.org.
Kennedy Center ups the musical ante with a starry 'Guys and Dolls'
‘Kimberly Akimbo’
As for thoroughly modern material, the unmissable moment this fall is the Broadway debut of this delightful musical, with music by Jeanine Tesori (“Fun Home”) and book and lyrics by David Lindsay-Abaire, based on his play of the same title. This witty and charming musical, directed by Jessica Stone, is the story of Kimberly, a New Jersey teenager in the grips of an age-accelerating disease and played to beguiling effect by Victoria Clark (“The Light in the Piazza”). A smashing ensemble (including Justin Cooley, Bonnie Milligan, Steven Boyer and Alli Mauzey) further lifts the show, unveiled last year at off-Broadway’s Atlantic Theater Company, to first-rate buoyancy. Performances start Oct. 12 at Booth Theatre, 222 W. 45 St., New York. telecharge.com.
‘Ohio State Murders’
It is mind-boggling that playwright Adrienne Kennedy is only now making her Broadway debut at age 91. But let’s be grateful it is indeed happening, with both a spare, chilling drama and an actress, Audra McDonald, capable of raising goose bumps. Kennedy’s 1992 memory play about a kidnapping and murder was most recently revived in a haunting online production by Round House Theatre in Bethesda and Princeton’s McCarter Theatre Center. This time, Kenny Leon will stage the piece, aptly enough, in a theater freshly renamed for another Black theater luminary. Performances start Nov. 11 at the James Earl Jones Theatre, 138 W. 48th St., New York. telecharge.com.
‘Much Ado About Nothing’
Simon Godwin, artistic director of Shakespeare Theatre Company, is staging Shakespeare’s “Much Ado” at London’s National Theatre, set on the swanky, modern-day Italian Riviera. He’s also staging it at his Washington company, with an entirely different setting: a D.C. television newsroom, in which the passive-aggressive love match of Beatrice and Benedick is co-anchoring a telecast. How rare is there a Shakespeare comedy done two distinct ways by one director in the same season? Washingtonians will get half the (hopefully hilarious) answer. Nov. 10-Dec. 11 at Sidney Harman Hall, 610 F St. NW. shakespearetheatre.org.
‘My Body, No Choice’
Molly Smith is in her valedictory season as artistic director of Arena Stage, a post she has held for nearly a quarter-century. But she’s not leaving until, in characteristic fashion, she puts a theatrical stamp on a vital issue of the day. Arena has commissioned an original series of monologues by eight playwrights in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe vs. Wade; nine writers, including V (formerly Eve Ensler) and Sarah Ruhl, will speak to a convulsive moment in the ongoing struggle over abortion rights and the ability of women to control their own bodies. Smith directs. Oct. 20-Nov. 6 at Arena Stage, 1011 Sixth St. SW. arenastage.org.
‘Leopoldstadt’
A sprawling play arrives by the contemporary maestro of literate drama, Tom Stoppard, and perhaps is the most personal work in the 85-year-old playwright’s esteemed career. Rooted in Stoppard’s discovery of his Jewish heritage, the play spans more than a half-century in the history of a fictional Viennese Jewish family. It was first produced in London in 2020 and comes to Broadway with its original director, Patrick Marber, and a cast of (take a deep breath) more than two dozen actors — unheard of for a nonmusical play these days. But this is a true occasion by any head count: the Stoppard play that may be the last he writes. Performances start Sept. 14 at Longacre Theatre, 220 W. 48th St., New York. telecharge.com.
The American Revolution as you’ve never seen it befo — no wait! That’s “Hamilton’s” claim to fame! So here come directors Diane Paulus and Jeffrey L. Page of the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Mass., with their own transformative take on who tells the story of the country’s founding. This time, it’s via a Tony-winning musical by Sherman Edwards and Peter Stone, first produced on Broadway in 1969. The writing and adopting of the Declaration of Independence is the subject, but now the cast of 22 is made up entirely of female, nonbinary and transgender actors. That these performers sing about a document that didn’t take their rights into account makes the evening all the more poignant. Sept. 16-Jan. 8 at American Airlines Theatre, 227 W. 42nd St., New York. roundabouttheatre.org.
‘Heroes of the Fourth Turning’
The only son in a deeply conservative family, playwright Will Arbery has done what few in his profession have been able to: paint a textured portrait of the life of the mind on the political right. Set during a weekend in Wyoming, where four graduates of a small Catholic college have returned for a celebration with their mentor, the play is one of incendiary ideas about religion and the country’s future. It unfolds in a lively if unsettling roundel of debates. Sivan Battat directs a cast for Studio Theatre that includes Laura C. Harris, Gregory Connors, Sophia Lillis, Louis Reyes McWilliams and Naomi Jacobson. Sept. 21-Oct. 23 at Studio Theatre, 1501 14th St. NW. studiotheatre.org.
‘The Tempest’
The wave of another magic wand passes over Prospero’s enchanted isle, courtesy of a real magician — the redoubtable Teller, of Penn and Teller renown. Teaming up once again with co-director Aaron Posner, with whom he conjured an illusion-packed “Macbeth” at Folger Theatre more than a decade ago, Teller brings this 2014 adaptation of Shakespeare’s valentine to the writer’s art to Round House Theatre. Their version, a co-production with Folger, incorporates other ethereal forms of magic, via the dances of Pilobolus and the music of Tom Waits. Nov. 23-Jan. 1 at Round House Theatre, 4545 East-West Hwy., Bethesda. roundhousetheatre.org.
‘My Brief but Calamitous Affair With the Minister of Culture & Censorship or Death of the Dialogic in the American Theater’
Ari Roth, former artistic director of Theater J and his own Mosaic Theater Company, rides the wind back onto Washington stages with a new organization, Voices Festival Productions. Inspired by a series he began at Theater J — Voices from a Changing Middle East Festival — this new group will be situated at an event space, the Corner at Whitman-Walker, on 14th Street NW in Washington. First up is this play, based on events surrounding Roth’s premature exit from Mosaic, or what the Voices website describes as “the artistic director’s departure from the theater he launched with high purpose and blind spots.” Veteran director John Vreeke stages this world premiere. Sept. 29-Oct. 23, the Corner at Whitman-Walker, 1701 14th St. NW. voicesfestivalproductions.com. | 2022-09-08T11:07:05Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Fall theater highlights include Stoppard, Loesser and Shakespeare - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/theater-dance/2022/09/08/fall-preview-theater/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/theater-dance/2022/09/08/fall-preview-theater/ |
The rise in legal sports betting has spawned an overwhelming menu of betting options, and for casual bettors, having so many choices can be both dizzying and treacherous. Here’s one narrow possibility that often makes sense on NFL Sundays.
Playing NFL parlays — bets that link multiple wagers together, for bigger potential payouts but a smaller chance of winning — is rarely a successful long-term strategy. But playing NFL teasers — wagers similar in design but with a twist — can be lucrative in the right scenarios.
In a teaser, bettors can move the point spread a fixed amount of points in their favor, generally 6, 6½ or 7 points. Let’s use the 6-point variation as an example; a team favored by 7 would only need to win by more than 1 point to cover the spread — bettors are “given” an additional six points — while an underdog getting 4 points would instead get 10. The number of legs — or wagers — in the teaser bet determines the odds of the parlay, and all of the wagers involved must win in order for the teaser bet to cash.
Two-team teasers typically pay -120 odds — bettors need to stake $120 to win $100 — and three-team teasers usually pay +160 — bet $100 to win $160. Not all oddsmakers adhere to that payout structure, so be sure to shop around to get the best price and odds, a simple piece of advice that applies to all bets.
Teaser legs
6½ points
However, you don’t want to blindly play any and all teasers. Instead, you should focus on a strategy that has proven profitable over time, called the Wong teaser.
Named after Stanford Wong, the author of the book “Sharp Sports Betting,” the strategy involves using the 6-point teaser to move past the key football numbers of 3 and 7. How? By focusing on underdogs getting between 1½ and 2½ points, point spread that can be teased up to 7½ and 8½; and on favorites giving between 7½ and 8½ points, which can be teased down to 1½ to 2½.
Since 2015, such line movements have resulted in bets covering an astounding 77 percent of the time in NFL regular season games, enough to provide value no matter how many legs you use in a teaser parlay.
Here’s the math behind that last point, and why many sharp bettors use Wong teasers as a part of their overall strategy. A generic two-team 6-point teaser pays -120, which implies a 55 percent probability the bet will cash. Since there are two events in this case, using the Wong teaser, each bet is implied by those odds to have a 74 percent chance of converting (.74 times .74 = .55).
Remember, Wong’s strategy involves events that have been covering 77 percent of the time since 2015, giving you an edge over the odds on each bet. In fact, if you played all available Wong teasers each week from 2015 to 2021, you would be up 34.4 units.
(For several reasons, the strategy does not apply to college football betting.)
The 77 percent cover rate is the aggregate of all the opportunities described by Wong, but you should perhaps be wary of teasing a favorite at -8 on the point spread. These covered just 64 percent of the time since 2015, significantly lagging the other point spreads in this group.
The biggest challenge, though is finding at least two games on the weekly slate with which you can build a Wong teaser. As you can imagine, sportsbooks are well aware of how lucrative Wong teasers have been in recent years and now act defensively, limiting the number of such opportunities available to bettors each week.
Last year, 14 of the 17 weeks during the NFL regular season had opportunities to implement a Wong teaser; however, that’s based on the consensus closing lines. Not all books will offer two games at ideal spreads at the same time. And unlike with straight bets, you generally want to wait until the last possible moment to place your teaser bets because that’s when the lines are most efficient. Don’t stress too much about not teasing an early afternoon game with a later one. Just make sure at least one of the legs is kicking off sooner rather than later.
Whatever you do, to make this strategy work, do not force it. If the opportunity isn’t there, wait for a time when it is rather than experimenting. This strategy is specifically tuned to 6-point teasers with very specific characteristics to overcome the house’s take and provide a small edge. Any deviation, even by as little as a half point, could eliminate your edge completely. | 2022-09-08T11:44:02Z | www.washingtonpost.com | How to create winning NFL teasers - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/nfl-teaser-strategy/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/nfl-teaser-strategy/ |
‘It disgusts me,’ state Sen. Katrina Shealy says of a bill that would eliminate exceptions for rape and incest victims
South Carolina state Sen. Katrina Shealy (R) speaks about a bill banning abortion on the Senate floor on Sept. 7 in Columbia, S.C. (Jeffrey Collins/AP)
South Carolina state Sen. Katrina Shealy (R) proposed antiabortion legislation in four of the five legislative sessions that have taken place since she was first elected a decade ago. But on Wednesday, she lashed out at her Republican colleagues for trying to pass an abortion bill that would eliminate exceptions for rape and incest victims.
“Yes, I’m pro-life,” Shealy said. “I’m also pro-life for the mother, the life she has with her children who are already born. I care about the children who are forced into adulthood that was made up by a legislature full of men so they can take a victory lap and feel good about it.”
“It disgusts me,” she added.
South Carolina senators are considering a near-total ban on abortion starting at fertilization. It would be an even more severe restriction than the one they passed last year that went into effect in late June, which prohibits abortion at about six weeks when doctors can detect a fetal heartbeat. The state Supreme Court voted last month to temporarily block the ban.
South Carolina House passes abortion ban with rape and incest exception
Shealy is one of three Republican women in the Senate. All of them said that, without exceptions for rape and incest, they won’t support their colleagues’ bill.
The Senate adjourned Wednesday night without a vote but is scheduled to reconvene Thursday morning. If the bill clears the Senate, it will go back to the House, which last week approved a version that included exceptions for rape and incest until the 12th week of pregnancy.
Shealy is not the only South Carolina Republican typically supportive of antiabortion measures to express doubts about the strict abortion proposals. On Aug. 16, state Rep. Neal Collins said he regretted voting last year to ban abortion after a fetal heartbeat is detected.
About two weeks after the six-week ban took effect, Collins said, a doctor called to tell him about a 19-year-old woman who’d recently arrived at the emergency room 15 weeks pregnant. Her water broke, the fetus was nonviable and the standard of care called for an abortion.
But, since there was a heartbeat, the hospital’s lawyers told the doctors they couldn’t approve one. They discharged the woman instead, leaving her with a greater than 50 percent chance of losing her uterus and a 10 percent chance of developing a life-threatening infection.
“That weighs on me,” Collins said. “I voted for that bill. These are affecting people.”
South Carolina Supreme Court temporarily blocks 6-week abortion ban
Shealy also voted to ban abortions after six weeks. In fact, she co-sponsored the bill, telling her colleagues during a floor debate last year that the legislation “protects the life of the unborn with a heartbeat.”
On Wednesday — about a year-and-a-half later — she found herself denouncing the new antiabortion legislation and scolding her male colleagues for trying to pass it. In doing so, she told them that women are smart enough to run households and businesses, to take care of children and aging parents.
“The only thing that we are not smart enough to do is take care of our own bodies. We need men in government, not medical professionals, to do that,” she said sarcastically, adding, “The South Carolina legislature — we know best.”
State Sen. Penry Gustafson echoed Shealy from the floor a few minutes later. The Republican said she was against abortion and wished that no one had sex before marriage and that pregnancies were always wanted. But, Gustafson added, she lives in “Realville,” where she acknowledges that’s not reality. She also challenged fellow Republicans to consider mothers’ rights.
Gustafson maligned the bill as “wishful-thinking legislation.”
“This bill does not recognize or even acknowledge another right besides the right of the baby,” Gustafson said. “So, do we women have no autonomy over our own bodies? Are we simply baby machines?”
Then she asked other senators to weigh possible health emergencies. What if a woman is carrying a dead fetus? What if someone has an ectopic pregnancy that could threaten their life? What if an 11-year-old girl gets raped and impregnated?
“Well, that’s just too bad, according to this bill,” Gustafson said.
Sandy Senn, the third Republican woman in the Senate and the only one who voted against the six-week ban passed last year, mocked her male colleagues for calling a special session to address the ban and presuming that “women and families need your guidance because y’all know better than them.”
“You cannot legislate morality, you cannot tell people who to sleep with, you cannot tell people who to marry and you cannot tell women what to do with their own bodies, try as you might.”
Senn warned them that passing the ban could come with consequences in November’s election. “This issue is huge,” she said, adding, “You don’t think that women will vote single-issue on something like this?”
“Because they will.” | 2022-09-08T12:10:24Z | www.washingtonpost.com | S.C. Republicans lash out at colleagues over strict abortion bill - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/08/south-carolina-republican-abortion-rape/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2022/09/08/south-carolina-republican-abortion-rape/ |
Here are key questions to ask yourself to find out if it’s happening in your workplace
The supposedly new trends of “quiet quitting” and “quiet firing” have been around for decades under other names. But just because they’re nothing new doesn’t mean they can’t present real problems.
If you’re an employer, how do you tell the difference between engaged workers setting reasonable boundaries and slackers who are willfully underperforming?
Work Advice: After ‘quiet quitting,’ here comes ‘quiet firing’
If you’re a harried employee who suspects your manager is quiet-firing you, is there any way to break the silence and save your job?
In both cases, the solution starts with examining your own assumptions about what it means to be productive and do good work. It also means finding objective, quantifiable ways to measure work output and quality that are clear to both employers and employees.
Employers looking at empty offices on Fridays or noticing a distinct lack of after-hours chatter on the intranet may be thinking, “It’s quiet. Too quiet.” They may be concerned that their employees are taking advantage of remote work and flexible scheduling to do less than an honest day’s work for a full day’s pay.
But a lack of performative round-the-clock noise doesn’t mean work isn’t getting done. Firming up boundaries between work time and personal time may look like slacking off — or it may mean workers are ensuring they are bringing their full, undiluted focus to work tasks, and then doing the same for their leisure time. Working differently doesn’t mean working less.
‘Quiet quitting’ isn’t really about quitting. Here are the signs.
Employers with concerns about quiet quitting should ask themselves: Is the work we pay for getting done? Do we have relevant, quantifiable measures in place to judge the quality of that work? Finally, if the output is good by those measures, does it matter where, when and how it’s being done?
Obviously, missed deadlines, dissatisfied clients, and unfilled demand are objective output problems that need addressing. And if it turns out that office presence and after-hours engagement are essential to maintaining high-quality output, employers should be able to explain why.
Problems with work output may be due to causes outside employees’ control — which is why, when noting performance issues, it’s important to ask employees for their perspective. Their responses should make clear whether it really is a matter of disengaged workers phoning it in, or something larger and more systemic.
Work Advice: I’m done with pings and notifications. If you want me, email.
What if you’re an employee and suspect you’re being “quiet-fired” — nudged out by a manager who can’t fire you but is making your job increasingly unpleasant and unrewarding? Again, start with a careful look inward. Consider whether it’s possible you’re underperforming and delivering less or lower-quality output than you’re being paid for.
Check your mental and emotional state, and get a second opinion from an outside observer who knows you well. Burnout, anxiety and depression have insidious ways of settling in ways that are visible to everyone but their host.
If you think you’re performing as well as ever, but your manager still seems dissatisfied, make clear that you want to succeed. Ask for quantifiable measures of what constitutes good work, so you and your manager can see when you’re hitting those objective marks.
This may not be enough to win over a manager who really wants you out, but if months or years of managerial “gaslighting” have left you wrestling with self-doubt, it can be empowering to see that your performance is not the problem, and the outcome of this silent standoff is out of your hands.
Take, for example, the reader whose employer was ordering everyone back to the office — but had relocated the local office to a hard-to-reach location. The reader said it seemed strange that the employer seemed willing to risk losing workers, including those newly hired during the coronavirus pandemic, by forcing them into a difficult commute.
But then the reader remembered that the employer had recently opened a new facility in another state with lower labor costs, and had been shifting more work, resources and opportunities there. After connecting those dots, the reader said, it all became clear: “Moving our local office to a cheaper, less-accessible location was just another step toward showing us the door. Mystery solved.”
While being ousted for any reason is discouraging, the reader found knowing the reason oddly motivating. “Your reporting suggests I’m part of a trend. Knowing that is power,” the reader wrote. “I’m interviewing and am hopeful that with the labor market as it is, even with my age, I’ll be able to land something soon.”
Knowing the business motive behind the quiet firing could also give this reader some financial leverage: A company eager to shed staff might be willing to speed the process with a severance package. But to my mind, it’s equally rewarding to be freed from a pointless struggle to stay where you’re not valued. | 2022-09-08T12:19:03Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Quiet quitting, quiet firing, and how to tell if it is happening to you - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/09/08/quiet-quitting-quiet-firing-what-to-do/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/09/08/quiet-quitting-quiet-firing-what-to-do/ |
All spreads were taken Wednesday from the consensus odds at VegasInsider.com unless noted. All times Eastern on Saturday.
No. 1 Alabama (-20.5) at Texas, noon, Fox
Heralded Ohio State transfer Quinn Ewers, making his first career start, threw an interception on his second pass against ULM but otherwise did a good job keeping Texas ahead of schedule: He completed 9 of 11 passes for 171 yards and a touchdown on first down. But after a 23-yard pass on its first play from scrimmage last weekend against Alabama, here’s what Utah State was able to muster on its next nine first downs (which more or less covers the competitive portion of the game): rush for minus-two yards, one-yard rush, incomplete pass, rush for minus-four yards, rush for no gain, pass for minus-two yards, seven-yard rush, rush for no gain, rush for minus-one yard. In total, the Aggies lost one yard on those nine first-down plays. I can’t see Texas moving the ball with such early-down ease as it did against its overmatched opening opponent, and I think Alabama will cover here.
No. 19 Wisconsin (-17.5) vs. Washington State, 3:30 p.m., Fox
No. 20 Kentucky (+5) at No. 12 Florida, 7 p.m., ESPN
That’s enough for me to take the underdog here, but there are other reasons. The Gators’ win over Utah last weekend had much to do with the play of quarterback Anthony Richardson, who rushed for 106 yards and three touchdowns, but it also had a lot to do with the Utes’ struggles in the red zone: In four of their trips past the Gators 20, they either settled for field goals, turned it over on downs or threw an interception from the Florida 6 (in the final seconds of a three-point game, no less).
Kentucky, which is thin at running back with presumed starter Chris Rodriguez suspended and backup Ramon Jefferson limited to two rushes last weekend because of injury, scored on 5 of 6 red-zone trips in its 37-13 win over Miami (Ohio) on Saturday. And while the Gators were able to limit Utah to only a handful of explosive plays, the Utes still had a 56.3 percent success rate on offense (the percentage of plays in which it gained 50 percent of the needed yards on first down, 70 percent of the needed yards on second down and 100 percent of the needed yards on third and fourth down), which was better than the Gators’ offense. Richardson threw for only 168 yards on 24 attempts, and Kentucky similarly limited Miami quarterback Brett Gabbert (20 for 28, only 166 yards, with 24 of them coming on one play). | 2022-09-08T12:19:09Z | www.washingtonpost.com | College football picks: Take Alabama over Texas - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/best-bets-college-football-this-week/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/best-bets-college-football-this-week/ |
Shortly before 3 a.m., Carlos Alcaraz celebrated his semifinal win in the second-longest match in U.S. Open history. (Julian Finney/Getty Images)
At 2:50 a.m., Alcaraz, Spain’s 19-year-old prodigy, advanced to a semifinal against Frances Tiafoe with a 6-3, 6-7 (9-7), 6-7 (7-0), 7-5, 6-3 victory. In doing so, he fought off a fourth-set match point in beating Italy’s 21-year-old Sinner.
“I always say you have to believe in yourself all the time, and that hope is the last thing you lose,” the third-seeded Alcaraz said during his on-court interview early Thursday morning. “I just believed in myself and believed in my game. ”
The two went back and forth for 5 hours 15 minutes, finishing 24 minutes later than the previous mark shared by three matches. In terms of court time, the match was the second longest ever at the U.S. Open, exceeded only by the 1992 men’s singles semifinal in which Stefan Edberg beat Michael Chang in 5:26.
Alcaraz also used the words “unbelievable” and “amazing.” On the other side, there was only disappointment for Sinner.
“This one will hurt for quite a while,” the 11th-seeded player said. “But tomorrow I will wake up — or today I will wake up — trying to somehow [think of] only the positives.”
Alcaraz has been a night owl in New York, beating Croatia’s Marin Cilic on Monday night in five sets in a match that lasted just under four hours, ending at 2:23 a.m. Luckily, he has youth on his side as the youngest man to advance to a U.S. Open semifinal since Pete Sampras won the title at 19 in 1990. He admitted that, early Thursday morning against Sinner, “probably at the end of the match, I was [at] my end” after having played roughly nine hours in his two most recent matches.
Tiafoe’s three-set semifinal victory over Andrey Rublev ended around 4:45 p.m. Wednesday, and he had to be pleased that Alcaraz had to toil for 382 points. | 2022-09-08T12:19:15Z | www.washingtonpost.com | Carlos Alcaraz, Jannik Sinner play deep into the night at U.S. Open - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/carlos-alcaraz-us-open/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2022/09/08/carlos-alcaraz-us-open/ |
50 years later, the chaotic end of a U.S.-USSR basketball game still stings
Dejected members of the U.S. basketball team after a 51-50 loss to the U.S.S.R. in the gold medal game at the Summer Games in Munich in 1972. From left, Jim Brewer, Bob Jones, Dwight Jones and Mike Banton. (Bettmann Archive)
The most recent Olympic controversy — the positive doping test of a teenage Russian figure skating star — hovered over the Beijing Winter Games, a swirl of unpleasantness that included accusations of cheating, questions about the objectivity of Olympic officials and medals left unrewarded, all in a climate of global tension between world powers.
It also carried a certain echo from the past. A half-century ago this week, the Soviet Union stunned the United States in a controversy-marred men’s basketball game to claim the Olympic gold medal. But the end of that Cold War faceoff arrived with questions about fair play and potential bias in the officiating, and the United States team — tormented by the final contentious seconds — refused to accept their silver medals. Fifty years later, the International Olympic Committee still has those medals — and the Americans still have their pain.
“Those medals are going to be in Lausanne Switzerland for a thousand years from now,” Tom McMillen, an American forward on that team, said in a recent interview.
It all resulted from a game that was not expected to deliver drama or dispute. The United States had won 63 consecutive Olympic men’s basketball games, claiming every gold medal dating to 1936, when the sport was first contested as a medal event. Although the young U.S. amateurs were facing a team of older, more experienced Soviet players, the Americans were heavily favored going into the gold medal game, which took place 50 years ago Friday.
Even before tip-off, those Summer Olympics were mired in questions of whether the Games should continue. Days earlier, Palestinian militants had killed 11 Israeli athletes and coaches at the Munich Olympic Village. In an editorial, the New York Times asked, “Are medals and commercial contracts more important than human lives?”
But the president of the International Olympic Committee, Avery Brundage declared, “The Games must go on.” It was a familiar position for Brundage. As head of the American Olympic Committee four decades earlier, he had forcefully and successfully pushed for the United States to participate in the last Olympics in Germany — the infamous 1936 “Nazi Olympics” in Berlin.
The ‘Nazi Olympics,’ and the boycott movement that failed
Now, 36 years later, the Games had returned to Germany — technically, West Germany, another Cold War product. And rather than providing any healing, this game would instead open new wounds.
A late start and a chaotic ending
The gold medal game began at 11:45 p.m. local time to accommodate a prime-time broadcast in the United States. The U.S.S.R. was well-prepared, and dominated early.
Neil Amdur, who covered the game for the New York Times, wrote in a 2012 retrospective piece that the Soviets had “done their homework. They won eight of nine games on a 1971 United States tour with their Olympic lineup.”
“The Americans were a talented, college-dominated squad with little experience in international play,” he added. “The Soviets had a total of 739 international games among the starting five entering the 1972 Games, compared with only seven games for the Americans.”
Meanwhile, the U.S. coach, Hank Iba, “had lost touch with an evolving up-tempo game, espousing a disciplined defense,” Amdur observed.
“It was very difficult for me, because that’s not the way I ever grew up playing basketball,” recalled McMillen, who played 11 seasons in the NBA and later served as a congressman from Maryland. The Americans “were really athletic — and it seemed to me that it was subsuming their athleticism.”
With 10 minutes left, the Soviets had a 10-point lead, and “at that point in time, (guard) Kevin Joyce and a few of the guys just went out on their own and started running, and really took the game back,” McMillen said.
With time running out and the Soviets ahead by one, Doug Collins stole the ball for the Americans and drove to the basket, where he was fouled hard by a Soviet defender. Collins went to the free throw line with three seconds left, and sank both shots, giving the Americans a 50-49 lead.
An international Amateur Basketball Federation (FIBA) rule at the time didn’t allow for a timeout to be called after a second free throw, so the Soviets had to rush the ball across the court, and as a Soviet player dribbled the ball at half-court, it looked like the Americans would win the game. But the Soviet coaches complained that a timeout they had called between Collins’s free throws hadn’t been granted, and as they disrupted the scorer’s table, a referee stopped the action with one second left.
At that point, Renato William Jones — the British head and co-founder of FIBA — ordered the clock reset to three seconds.
“Bedlam has taken over here at the basketball hall,” broadcaster Frank Gifford said on the ABC telecast.
So the Soviets inbounded the ball again from under their own basket, but failed to score as time expired. “It’s all over!” Gifford yelled as the American players rushed the court in celebration. “Wow, what a finish, the United States winning their eighth consecutive gold medal!” A final score of USA 50, U.S.S.R. 49 flashed across the screen.
Then a more subdued Gifford: “Now, we’re being told the scoreboard is not correct.”
It turned out that when the play began, the clock read 50 seconds, not three seconds. So the Soviets were given yet another chance.
As Soviet player Ivan Edeshko prepared to inbound the ball, the 6-foot, 11-inch McMillen guarded him along the baseline, but a language barrier wound up giving Edeshko a clear passing lane.
“There was a referee pointing at my legs, and he was Romanian, he didn’t speak English,” McMillen recalled. “Under international rules, as long as the [inbounding] player can back up, you don’t have to get off the line. It’s his responsibility to back up if he wants more room. But the referee’s pointing at my feet — I’m behind the line, I’m not breaking a rule, why is he pointing at my feet? I thought he was telling me to get off the line, and the last thing I want is to get called for a technical foul at that point. And that’s why I backed off. It was a language issue.”
Standing on the other side of the court was Soviet forward Aleksander Belov, to whom Edeshko made a perfect Hail Mary-style pass. With two players guarding him, Belov jumped, came down as the Americans lost position, then made an uncontested game-winning layup.
“Chaos ensued,” the Times reported in its game story. “Iba again rushed to the scorer’s table, [James] Forbes wept unabashedly, and photographers, newsmen and irate fans flooded onto the floor.”
The Americans protested but the jury was stacked against them in another Cold War timepiece: The vote was 3-2 with judges from Communist bloc nations Hungary, Poland and Cuba voting against the American appeal; those from Italy and Puerto Rico dissented.
“In one of the most bizarre events yet of the 20th Olympiad,” wrote The Washington Post’s William Gildea, “the United States apparently lost its first Olympic basketball game today after 63 victories even though the game appeared to have ended with the Americans ahead.” The game ended “with two premature U.S. victory outbursts, then a Soviet celebration.”
Questions about objectivity
The American players refused to accept their silver medals.
“It was the Cold War,” Edeshko, the Soviet player who made the game-winning pass, later said. “Americans, out of their own natural pride and love of country, didn’t want to lose and admit loss. They didn’t want to lose in anything, especially basketball.”
Soviet guard Sergei Belov, who led all scorers with 20 points, said in the HBO documentary “:03 From Gold” that the Americans “lacked courage,” and “couldn’t admit they were silver medalists.”
“The Americans have to learn how to lose, even when they think they are right,” said Jones, the FIBA chief.
But the Americans might have had reasons to doubt Jones’s objectivity.
“Jones was very antagonistic to the United States continuing to win,” McMillen said. “Jones and his compatriots were really trying to stop American hegemony in basketball. They were tired of America winning all the time.”
About two months before the gold medal game, a top Soviet sports official, Nikolai Beshkarev, paid a visit to Jones at his office in a Munich suburb, according to a 2012 Bloomberg story.
“The Soviets, like most federation members, bestowed gifts on Jones, who reigned over every aspect of international basketball, such as deciding who would referee, who was eligible to play, and even the rules of the game itself,” Bloomberg reported.
The story continued: “Jones, who’d rooted for the Soviets at an earlier Olympic championship game, remained a booster. Jones lauded the 1972 team’s ‘strong athletic mastery’ and its new coach’s ‘professional skills, intuition, and strategy,’ according to Beshkarev’s never before cited report to his bosses in Moscow, which Bloomberg News unearthed in a Russian government archive.”
Citing unpublished correspondence of Brundage, the longtime IOC president, Bloomberg reported that Jones feuded with some U.S. coaches and executives, who considered him a Communist sympathizer and a tyrant. Jones, who was the first international person inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame, died in 1981.
Amateurism ends, but controversy remains
The United States regained the gold medal at the 1976 Olympics in Montreal with a victory over Yugoslavia.
The Americans and Soviets would not compete in the same Summer Olympics for another decade, following the U.S. boycott of the 1980 Olympics in Moscow and the Soviet boycott of the 1984 Olympics in LA. In 1988, the Soviets beat the U.S. again, this time in a semifinal, 82-76. As The Post reported, “there was no resetting of the clock twice in the final three seconds, as happened 16 years ago. The Soviets won this semifinal game straight up.”
McMillen, by then a congressman, circulated a resolution that would allow American professionals to compete in the Olympics. And in 1989, FIBA dropped its restrictions on professionals competing in international competitions, including the Olympics. That allowed the U.S. to field its “Dream Team” — featuring Michael Jordan, Magic Johnson and Larry Bird — which cruised to the gold medal at the 1992 Olympics in Barcelona.
McMillen said that the ’72 game helped pave the way for professionals.
“It was the start of the end of that concept of amateurism, and it took the 1988 game to finish it off,” he said. “Certainly our game played a role in that.”
The American players, though, have refused to accept the silver medals, which remain in Lausanne, Switzerland, home of the IOC. McMillen has long sought a compromise that would give the U.S. team some recognition. In 2012, at the team’s 40-year reunion, he floated the idea of a dual gold, but his teammates rejected it.
“I said if we don’t do something, we’re all just going to go into oblivion,” he recalled. “The compromise I proposed was that we ask the Russians to go along with awarding us the dual gold medal, but we don’t accept them. And we end up monetizing them — we sell them and we create a charity for Russian children or something. In other words, we get the honor of the award, but we don’t get to keep the medals, we end up doing something good for mankind..”
This year, McMillen sent a letter to the IOC requesting that the silver medals be sent to the team’s “proxy,” a U.S. law firm, with the intention of then transferring them to a museum such as the Smithsonian National Museum of American History, the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame or the U.S. Olympic & Paralympic Museum.
“The Team will not seek personal financial gain from this arrangement,” McMillen wrote. “Instead, the Team is seeking to accomplish a positive and constructive alternative to leaving the Medals permanently in a vault in Switzerland.”
But the IOC quickly rejected the idea.
“Everyone at the International Olympic Committee (IOC) appreciates your efforts to turn into something positive the impression that has been left by your declining of the award almost fifty years ago,” wrote the IOC’s legal affairs director, Mariam Mahdavi, in a letter to McMillen. However, she said, having an attorney accept the medals on behalf of the team “would by no means respect the spirit of an award of Olympic medals,” adding that there are no legal grounds to grant the request.
Now, at the 50th anniversary, McMillen again sees a shadow of that Cold War showdown.
“It’s particularly poignant this year because of the Ukrainian war and the fact that this whole Cold War that we’re witnessing right now between Russia and the United States is very similar to what we went through in 1972,” McMillen said. “Every few decades, things often do repeat. Because our game was emblematic completely of the Cold War. Here we are, once again in a Cold War with Russia.” | 2022-09-08T12:19:21Z | www.washingtonpost.com | The end of the U.S.-USSR basketball game at the Munich Olympics still stings - The Washington Post | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/olympics/2022/09/08/us-ussr-basketball-1972-munich-olympics/ | https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/olympics/2022/09/08/us-ussr-basketball-1972-munich-olympics/ |
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