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Students, parents and critics have decried Huntington High and the district for what they say was a violation of religious freedoms. Those frustrations erupted Wednesday when students walked out of the school during their homeroom period, chanting “Separate the church and state” and “My faith, my choice.”
Jedd Flowers, a district spokesman for Cabell County Schools, told The Washington Post that the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and the school followed the rules in making the event voluntary. The issues stemmed from the two teachers who “mistakenly took their entire class to the assembly,” believing the Christian revival was mandatory.
“Those teachers have been corrected and the district does not anticipate a similar issue in the future,” he said in a statement.
The sermon at the public high school of about 1,000 students was led by evangelical preacher Nik Walker of Nik Walker Ministries, who has performed other revivals in the area for weeks. Walker, who did not immediately respond to a request for comment, told the Herald-Dispatch that students with the athletes fellowship reached out to the ministry about speaking at the school.
“I told him I’d be contacting the principal about it, and he said, ‘Lol, the principal is here.’ ” Herman L. Mays Jr. told the outlet. | null | null | null | null | null |
Opinion: Republicans keep attacking a highly qualified Black female Fed nominee
This extensive experience — in academia and in crisis situations — is why President Biden nominated her to be on the Federal Reserve Board. And it’s why many prominent economists, including former Fed chair Ben Bernanke (appointed by Mr. Bush), strongly support her.
Yet Republicans keep attacking her. Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) called her “fundamentally not qualified,” and Fox News host Tucker Carlson went as far as to judge her “economically illiterate” and “unqualified to teach junior college econ 101.”
In the case of Ms. Cook, some Republicans have claimed she knows little about the Fed and macroeconomics. That could not be further from the truth. She is an expert on financial crises, developing countries and the role patents and innovation play in growth.
She made it clear at her confirmation hearing that she would prioritize fighting the current inflation problem. She described seeing the devastating impact of high inflation firsthand in developing nations. Last June, she told The Post she was already concerned about how inflation would impact retirees, among others.
Some Republicans have zeroed in on her research on long-standing racial disparities in the economy, which they characterize as unrelated to the macroeconomy. That criticism reveals their own ignorance. The fact that some Americans are not able to reach their full potential, even today, because of discrimination and other barriers harms the economy. One of those who encouraged Ms. Cook to keep studying this interrelationship was Nobel Prize winner Milton Friedman, the avatar of free-market economics.
Another GOP gripe is that Ms. Cook voiced support this past year for a bill in Congress that would form a commission to study the possibility of reparations to African Americans. Note that she was advocating more research. And Congress, not the Fed, will decide these issues.
We reiterate our support for Ms. Cook. She’s qualified and brings much-needed expertise on hyperinflation and inequality. The Senate should approve her soon. | null | null | null | null | null |
Less than two weeks later Thursday night, they were halfway across the world in an unfamiliar arena in Beijing, celebrating together after each had played a hand in Team USA’s 8-0 win over China to open its Olympics. There was Brisson scoring the first goal on a dish from Knies. There was Beniers showing off his speed and cleaning up his team’s seventh score of the night. There was Farrell scoring three goals and assisting on two others, the star on a night devoid of the sport’s biggest stars, who were back home with their teams in the NHL, forced to watch from afar after the league opted in late December not to send its players to the Winter Games because of coronavirus-related scheduling concerns.
“It definitely helps to play in a real game,” said Farrell, who knows the effort to field a team for Beijing has been frantic. Team USA has had three general managers serve in the role over the past several months. It has replaced its coach and, exactly four weeks before the puck was dropped Thursday, announced a mishmash roster featuring NHL castoffs, European league veterans and 15 college kids. The Americans didn’t have any NHL players at the PyeongChang Games in 2018, either, but at least then the team had 10 months’ notice of the league’s plans to not participate. Four years later, a gold medal pursuit in Beijing hinges on a group of players who have had a matter of days to prepare.
After the NHL withdrew from the Games in December, Team USA turned to Quinn to take over head coaching duties from Pittsburgh Penguins Coach Mike Sullivan. The team also appointed John Vanbiesbrouck as the third general manager to handle the role leading into Beijing. In December, Minnesota Wild General Manager Bill Guerin took over for former Chicago Blackhawks general manager Stan Bowman, who resigned after an investigation determined Bowman failed to take sufficient action after he was informed of a sexual assault allegation in 2010. Guerin stepped down after the NHL’s withdrawal from the Games, and amid that attrition in the front office there was still a roster to build in less than a month.
“One of the things we did as an organization is we identified players that we thought were team players first and foremost,” said Quinn, whose team opted to bring back just one player with Olympic experience: Brian O’Neill, who was part of Team USA’s seventh-place finish in PyeongChang.
The United States opted to lean heavily on NCAA stars, some of whom missed a chance to represent their country at the world junior championships when the tournament was canceled for coronavirus reasons late last year. Most had prepared to watch Team USA compete with NHL players in Beijing while they stayed with their college teams. But once they received the call for Beijing — the United States did not announce its roster until Jan. 13 — they were told to report at the end of January for a training camp in Los Angeles for a few days. They would have to learn how to gel with their teammates on the fly.
There were signs Thursday night that this group is still a work in progress. The U.S. players were shaky offensively and had to adjust to the physicality of China in the first period, leading 1-0 off Brisson’s goal after 20 minutes. But the talent, especially from a core of younger players, was also undeniable: Noah Cates, a forward for NCAA powerhouse Minnesota Duluth, opened the second period with a goal off a slick backhanded feed from Farrell.
After O’Neill added a goal, Farrell converted to push the score to 4-0, then contributed two more goals in the third period. And Beniers, who was the No. 2 pick by the Seattle Kraken in last year’s NHL draft and is one of Team USA’s headliners, had settled in by that point and scored his first Olympic goal with eight minutes left. He said later that the performance underscored the team’s process of building chemistry in such a short span.
“I think everyone saw that in the game … we were playing hard, but things weren’t connecting like they normally would,” Beniers said. “Later in the game, you start seeing passes connect, people making nice plays and linemates starting to feed off each other.”
Team USA’s path in the tournament will get more difficult Saturday when it meets Canada and, of course, there are still tweaks to the roster being made. Jake Sanderson, a budding defenseman from the University of North Dakota, is expected to join the team by Friday after clearing coronavirus protocols. He’ll be the latest young prospect to experience the stark difference between playing in college games and on the international stage in the matter of two weeks.
Knies could relate. He called the transition to competing in Beijing “pretty crazy,” and he was still trying to wrap his head around it after the win Thursday night.
“It was pretty surreal,” he said, “playing in that kind of game, that kind of atmosphere.” | null | null | null | null | null |
The day after the raid, the Biden administration blamed the deaths on Qurayshi, saying he detonated a large explosion that caused his own death, though U.S. officials have since said they are not sure who detonated the device.
“While regrettable, it’s not surprising that he chose to kill himself and others, but thankfully all our service members came back safely,” a senior U.S. military official, referring to Qurayshi, said Thursday in a briefing for reporters. | null | null | null | null | null |
James Harden didn’t want to be teammates in Brooklyn so Kevin Durant didn’t want to be teammates at the upcoming All-Star Game in Cleveland.
James and Durant were appointed all-star captains after leading the Western Conference and Eastern Conference, respectively, in all-star votes. Per the rules of the draft, James received the first vote among the pool of starters as he was the overall leading vote-getter. Durant then received the first pick among the pool of reserves for the draft, which was televised on TNT.
Seeking to captain the winning team for the fifth straight year, James selected Giannis Antetokounmpo with the first overall pick. He then filled out his lineup with Stephen Curry, DeMar DeRozan and Nikola Jokic.
Durant, who will not be playing in Cleveland because of a knee sprain, selected Joel Embiid, Ja Morant, Jayson Tatum, Andrew Wiggins and Trae Young. Tatum was initially selected as a reserve but was promoted to the starting pool because of Durant’s injury.
The drama ramped up when it came time to pick the reserves, once it became clear that Durant was intent on not selecting Harden. Once the dust settled, Durant had selected Devin Booker, Karl-Anthony Towns, Zach LaVine, Dejounte Murray, LaMelo Ball and Rudy Gobert. | null | null | null | null | null |
Durant, who will not play in Cleveland because of a knee sprain, selected Joel Embiid, Ja Morant, Jayson Tatum, Andrew Wiggins and Trae Young. Tatum was initially selected as a reserve but was promoted to the starting pool because of Durant’s injury.
The drama ramped up when it came time to pick the reserves, once it became clear that Durant was intent on not selecting Harden. Once the dust settled, Durant selected Devin Booker, Karl-Anthony Towns, Zach LaVine, Dejounte Murray, LaMelo Ball and Rudy Gobert. | null | null | null | null | null |
The National Women’s Soccer League champions are almost two weeks into training camp at an indoor venue in Northern Virginia before operations move to Bradenton, Fla., this weekend. Veterans are regaining fitness, and prospects are seeking to make their mark before roster cuts begin.
The players had publicly supported Kang in a saga that spilled into public view in August when then-coach Richie Burke was accused of verbally and emotionally abusing players.
“It’s not just a man’s world anymore,” she said. “We’ve got a woman helping us.”
Aside from a statement Tuesday, Kang has not spoken publicly about her plans. The Spirit still doesn’t have a full-time training facility. Since Feb. 1, it has been using the St. James in Springfield. Upon its return from Florida late this month, the Spirit plans to use fields at Episcopal High in Alexandria — the same location it used late last season.
For more than two years, the long-term plan had been to move into D.C. United’s new training center in Leesburg, which opened last fall. But the Spirit is leaving its options open.
Ben Olsen, the former United player and coach whom Baldwin appointed president of club operations in September, is expected to retain his job. Olsen also has been serving as the de facto general manager, working with Ward on roster moves.
Ward is shorthanded for the next two weeks as 11 players report to five national teams for tournaments. Kelley O’Hara, Andi Sullivan and Trinity Rodman were among seven named to the 23-strong U.S. squad for the SheBelieves Cup. … | null | null | null | null | null |
Winter Olympics live updates Shaun White chases a medal; Mikaela Shiffrin looks to bounce back
Shaun White in fourth after second run of men’s snowboard halfpipe final
Ayumu Hirano makes Olympic history with frontside triple cork
American Taylor Gold leads after first run of halfpipe final; Shaun White in fourth place
It’s freezing in Beijing. So why do the Winter Games lack real snow?
For 40-year-old Nick Baumgartner, the end of the ride
Just as in 2018, Chloe Kim needed something to eat
Mikaela Shiffrin says she’s ready to compete in ‘fun’ super-G
Perspective: Who’s to blame for another potential Olympic Russian doping scandal? Start with the IOC.
U.S. men’s bobsledders grin and bare it for calendar shoot to raise funds
Shaun White is in his final night of Olympic competition. (Matthias Schrader/AP)
Shaun White needed a clutch qualifying run to advance to the halfpipe final — but he got there. White, 35, is seeking his fourth snowboard halfpipe gold medal in what is expected to be his final Olympic event. Through two of three runs, White was in fourth place, just out of medal position.
Shaun White improved his score from 72.00 to 85.00, but he remained in fourth place in the men’s snowboard halfpipe final after the second of three runs Friday in Beijing.
Australia’s Scotty James, the 2018 Olympic bronze medalist, was in first with a 92.50 for his second run. Japan’s Ayumu Hirano again landed a triple cork after earlier hitting the first one in Olympic halfpipe history, but unlike in his incomplete first run, he followed it with series of successful tricks to earn a score of 91.75. NBC’s announcing crew was incredulous that Hirano’s run did not easily put him into first.
Switzerland’s Jan Scherrer was in third with a second run score of 87.25.
White’s American teammate, Taylor Gold, who was in first place after the first run, slid out in his second try but still hung onto fifth at 87.25. Japan’s Kaishu Hirano fell on his second run, but not before launching himself an astonishing 23 feet, nine inches into the air on his first trick.
White, 35, the defending Olympic champion in the event, is looking to cap his career with a fourth gold medal.
Japan’s Ayumu Hirano became the first snowboarder to land a frontside triple cork 1440 in Olympic history during his first run in Friday morning’s halfpipe final (Thursday night Eastern). The trick, commonly known simply as the triple cork, is four full rotations and three off-axis flips, and is something snowboarders have experimented with but found too dangerous and difficult to land.
But last fall, Hirano and three of his Japanese teammate began landing triple corks in practice runs, meaning the sport was about to reach a new level. Hirano also landed a triple cork in last December’s Dew Tour. Despite landing the triple cork in Beijing, Hirano fell at the end of his run, only earning him a score of 33.75, well out of the top three spots.
In his quest for a fourth Olympic gold medal in the men’s snowboard halfpipe, Shaun White posted the fourth-best score during the first run of Friday’s final in Beijing. He settled for a 72.00 after a wobbly landing off a 1080 midway through his run, but some highly touted rivals fared worse
Grabbing the top spot after all 12 competitors got their first tries at the halfpipe was fellow American Taylor Gold, with an 81.75 on his first run. In second was 16-year-old Australian Valentino Guseli (75.75), who is making his Olympics debut.
Japan’s Kaishu Hirano flew up over 22 feet on his first trick and earned a 75.50, good for third. Hirano’s older brother, two-time Olympic silver medalist Ayumu Hirano fell during his opening run, as did Australian Scotty James, the 2018 bronze medalist, and Ruka Hirano, the 2020 Youth Olympic gold medalist who is not related to Kaishu and Ayumu.
White, 35, is the defending champion in the event, as well as a winner in 2006 and 2010 (he finished fourth in 2014). Another member of Team USA, Chase Josey (62.50) was in sixth.
By Bob Henson8:45 p.m.
One day in November, Shaun White sat in the snow on the side of a mountain in Austria, deflated. His knee ached; he had spent the day watching younger snowboarders “throw down heavy tricks”; and then, during a practice run, his ankle “just gave out.” He felt old.
Finally, White got up and headed for a gondola to take him to the top of the halfpipe — and went the wrong way. To get to where he wanted to be, he climbed onto an empty chairlift and began the long, slow ride back up the mountain.
He thought about all the signs telling him he could no longer keep up — the injured ankle, the wrong turn, the futile search for the right gondola — and decided this month’s Beijing Olympics would be his last. And there, dangling alone above the trees, the 35-year-old godfather of snowboarding cried.
“It was sort of like I was sad,” White says, recalling the story over the phone two months later. “But then it was like a joyfulness because I was sitting there thinking: ‘Like, wow, what a run. You knew this day would come, like you know it’s inevitable this is going to happen at some point, and to know that today is that day. This decision has been made.’ ”
ZHANGJIAKOU, China — Nick Baumgartner was doing it for all the people back in Iron River, Mich., who supported him all these years in this lunatic pursuit of his. He was doing it for all the guys back in the States who aren’t afraid to break their backs and build things for a living. He was doing it for all the middle-aged dads out there who wake up wondering what hurts today and whether it’ll take two Advil or three. He was doing it most of all for 17-year-old Landon Baumgartner, the kid who could barely remember his dad’s first Olympics and who was home in Iron River, surrounded by his buddies in the middle of the night, watching his old man make history at his fourth.
Two Winter Olympics for Chloe Kim, two gold medals — and two episodes in which the American snowboarding star didn’t get enough to eat.
During a news conference Thursday in Beijing after again topping the field in the women’s halfpipe, Kim told reporters she was “starving” and asked if “anybody has some snacks in their pockets.” At least two people came up to the podium to provide some food, which Kim offered to share with Japan’s Sena Tomita, who won bronze and was seated next to her at the dais.
The scene was reminiscent of the 2018 Olympics in PyeongChang, when Kim tweeted between runs in the halfpipe final, “Wish I finished my breakfast sandwich but my stubborn self decided not to and now I’m getting hangry.” Apart from teaching some oldsters about that term — “hangry” means becoming irritable because of a temporary lack of proper nourishment — the online remark provided more evidence that Team USA had a new face who offered as much refreshing charm as overwhelmingly talent.
Given how thoroughly the 21-year-old Kim dominated her rivals in these Olympics, she seems likely to go for a golden three-peat at the 2026 Winter Games in Italy. Perhaps by then she’ll have remembered to keep a few granola bars handy.
After a pair of stunning miscues quickly forced her out of the first two women’s Alpine skiing events, Mikaela Shiffrin is ready for some “fun” at the Beijing Olympics. The two-time gold medalist thinks that will come in the form of Friday’s super-G race that also represents her first opportunity to get back into competition and begin changing a painful narrative.
“Well I’ve had a lot of support over the last 48 hours and I have to thank everyone for that,” Shiffrin tweeted early Friday morning in Beijing. “Today is Super G, and Super G is fun.
“I can’t express how grateful I am to have the opportunity to refocus on a new race, in the sport that I love so much. Onward.”
In the immediate aftermath Wednesday of Shiffrin’s failure to get past the first few gates of the slalom, her mother had said of the possibility of competing in the super-G, “We’re going to wait and see.”
Team USA told media members in Beijing Thursday that Shiffrin had entered that race, and her comments on Twitter provided both confirmation and a glimpse into the mind-set of a decorated athlete who needed some time to regroup after skiing out of the slalom and Monday’s giant slalom, two events in which she was a favorite to get a medal.
Not only is her mother with her in Beijing, so is her boyfriend, Norwegian skiing star Alexsander Aamodt Kilde. On Thursday, Shiffrin praised Kilde for finding a way to “love, understand, and heal” her, and she also expressed gratitude on Twitter to a fan account that said it was sending “some positive vibes and love” to her.
BEIJING — We ended up here, with yet another Russian doping scandal at yet another Olympics, because Russia was never properly punished for its original sins. The Russians were so set upon success at the 2014 Winter Games, hosted at their own Black Sea resort of Sochi, that they ran a state-sponsored doping system. Olympics missed by Russian athletes since the scheme was exposed: zero.
That’s not on Kamila Valieva, the 15-year-old figure skater who was part of the Russian Olympic Committee team that won a gold medal here — but has yet to receive it. To this point, the specifics of this case — Russian media reports that Valieva tested positive for a banned substance in December — are murky at best. They always are.
“The original idea was to help with the funding,” he said. “Federations can’t take care of everything. We still got to pay out of pocket for some things. We need help with that, and luckily, the calendar has provided a small buffer outside of what people have donated.” | null | null | null | null | null |
What to know from the Capitals’ victory over the sputtering Canadiens
Capitals rookie Joe Snively scored his first two NHL goals Thursday night. (Graham Hughes/Canadian Press/AP)
Joe Snively grew up idolizing the likes of Alex Ovechkin and Nicklas Backstrom. But on Thursday night, the 26-year-old Herndon native was the Washington Capitals’ hero, scoring twice in a 5-2 win over the lowly Montreal Canadiens at Bell Centre.
Snively was filling in on the top line for Ovechkin, who tested positive for the coronavirus last week and could not go to Montreal because of Canada’s travel restrictions.
Snively, who grew up playing youth hockey in the Capitals’ practice facility in Arlington, made his NHL debut earlier this season. He added an assist Thursday, giving him two goals and three assists in six games. He was the eighth Capitals rookie to score his first goal this season, and he is the first player from Virginia to play for Washington, according to the team.
The Capitals’ youth dominated Thursday in a game the struggling squad desperately needed.
Washington jumped to a 2-0 lead. Snively scored his first goal on a juicy rebound just 5:04 in, and fellow rookie Connor McMichael followed with his own tally 20 seconds later.
Carl Hagelin gave the Capitals a 3-0 lead at 3:40 of the second period with a surprising snipe from a sharp angle, ending a 14-game goal drought. The Canadiens had a quick answer, with Rem Pitlick beating goalie Ilya Samsonov just 29 seconds later.
Snively capped his memorable night with his second goal at 5:18. That ended the evening for Montreal goaltender Cayden Primeau, who allowed four goals on 14 shots. Sam Montembeault (eight saves) replaced him.
Cole Caufield cut the Capitals’ lead to 4-2 with a pretty power-play goal past Samsonov at 15:58. The Canadiens made a push to open the third period but could get no closer. Montreal briefly appeared to pull within one on Caufield’s second goal, but the Capitals won an offside challenge.
Tom Wilson had the empty-netter to set the final score with 1:15 left — and Snively had the primary assist. Samsonov appeared to suffer an injury in the final moments, but he remained in the game and finished with 42 saves.
Here is what to know from the Capitals’ win:
Last time out: In return from all-star break, Capitals get burned in the final minute for a 5-4 loss
Snively’s road to the show
Snively signed an entry-level contract with the Capitals in 2019. The 5-foot-9, 176-pound winger was an undrafted college free agent.
Snively had 15 goals and 21 assists in 33 games with Yale in 2018-19 and was a nominee for the Hobey Baker Award, given to college hockey’s top player. He led the Bulldogs in points in all four years he played there.
Before making his NHL debut this season, Snively played parts of four seasons with the Capitals’ American Hockey League team, the Hershey Bears. Snively has 15 goals and 23 assists in 35 games with Hershey this season, leading the team in points and goals.
St. Louis takes over
The last-place Canadiens fired coach Dominique Ducharme on Wednesday and named Hockey Hall of Famer Martin St. Louis their interim coach. Thursday’s game was his NHL coaching debut.
“I think for me right now it’s getting them excited to play hockey again,” the former Tampa Bay Lightning star said Thursday morning. “They’ve gone through some tough times this year — obviously with injuries, covid — but my job coming in is just to inspire them. And I think it’s one of my strong suits.”
Hagelin played with St. Louis with the New York Rangers.
“He was a very passionate guy, a vocal leader,” Hagelin said. “… I saw him as a guy who could get into coaching. I didn’t know it would be this quick.”
Special teams woes
Washington has struggled mightily on special teams. After Thursday’s win, its once-high-powered power play fell to 15.3 percent, ranking 29th in the league, and its penalty kill has a 78 percent success rate to stand 20th.
The penalty kill, which thrived last season, has allowed seven goals in the past four games. The Canadiens finished 1 for 5 on the power play; Washington was 0 for 3.
“It’s not like we’re making a ton of mistakes [on the penalty kill], but the ones that we’re making end up costing us,” Hagelin said Thursday morning. “Obviously we can’t give up the amount of goals that we’re giving up. You go through ebbs and flows when it comes to the PK throughout a year, and the run we’ve been on the last 10, 20 games is unacceptable.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Panthers 78, Eagles 68
Paul VI's Jaquan Womack goes to the basket during Thursday's game at Gonzaga. (Amanda Andrade-Rhoades/For The Washington Post)
Gonzaga had just retaken the lead and the volume inside its D.C. gym was deafening. It was the final minute of the third quarter in a back-and-forth matchup between the No. 3 Eagles and No. 1 Paul VI. The student section was in full throat, rocking a set of purple bleachers as Panthers guard DeShawn Harris-Smith brought the ball back up the floor, hoping to beat the buzzer.
Harris-Smith got caught in a traffic jam of bodies at the top of the key. Without enough time to assess other options, he found a little bit of space and banked in a three-pointer that gave the Panthers a two-point lead and silenced the crowd.
The poise Harris-Smith showed at the end of the third quarter was carried into the fourth, where the Panthers ripped off eight straight points and pushed on for a 78-68 victory. All night, the Panthers had looked unfazed by the Gonzaga fans or the Eagles team they were backing.
“That type of environment just makes basketball better,” Harris-Smith said. “Stuff like that is why we want to play.”
An away game at Gonzaga, one of the most boisterous environments in the D.C. area, is always disorienting, but matters were further complicated by the absence of Glenn Farello, the Panthers’ coach. Farello was out sick Thursday, leaving assistant Lamar Butler as the de facto man at the helm. He was backed by the leadership of players like Harris-Smith and senior star Dug McDaniel, who had experience in plenty of conference battles like this one.
“Guys were kind of nervous that [Farello] wasn’t going to be here but in the end we just wanted to get this win for him,” McDaniel said.
The Eagles (14-5) led by two after a tight first half, and the third quarter featured more of the same. Gonzaga was hot from the outside while Harris-Smith and McDaniel had more success slicing to the rim. After Harris-Smith’s three put the team up by two heading into the fourth, Paul VI (20-3) kept pressing the gas, creating a double-digit lead.
From there, the team was content to trade buckets until the end of the night. Harris-Smith finished with 27 points to lead the Panthers.
“Coach Farello is always saying this team is a 10-0 run waiting to happen,” Harris-Smith said. “That’s all about energy, playing defense, getting stops. And we did that there to start the fourth.”
After losing two of their first three WCAC games, the Panthers have won eight straight. That stretch has included plenty of tests, including an overtime win at No. 7 DeMatha and a three-overtime thriller against No. 20 St. John’s. Early February is a good time for a team to have a rhythm, as the Panthers now have just four games remaining in the regular season. | null | null | null | null | null |
South Carolina’s Bree Hall (23) drives while defended by Kentucky’s Dre’Una Edwards (44) during an NCAA college basketball game in Lexington, Ky., Thursday, Feb. 10, 2022. (AP Photo/James Crisp)
LEXINGTON, Ky. — Aliyah Boston had 14 points and 15 rebounds, including a key free throw and board late that helped top-ranked South Carolina get past Kentucky 59-50 on Thursday night for its 10th consecutive victory. | null | null | null | null | null |
There was something noticeably different Thursday about the pregame video the Wizards play on the big screen before tip-off at Capital One Arena. Familiar faces that were once featured had suddenly disappeared. Others got much more screen time, including someone who had played a total of seven minutes before Thursday.
Of course, they weren’t the ones who did some tinkering before the Wizards’ 113-112 win, a contest between two teams whose rosters after the deadline looked a lot different than in the hours prior.
Gone for the Wizards were starting point guard Spencer Dinwiddie (Mavericks), center Montrezl Harrell (Hornets), forward Davis Bertans (Mavericks) and point guard Aaron Holiday (Suns). That left the Raul Neto as the only full-time point guard. Cassius Winston, on a two-way contract, saw the floor for the third time this season.
The Nets were without James Harden and Paul Millsap, who were sent to Philadelphia as part of the biggest deal of that day with Ben Simmons, Seth Curry and Andre Drummond set to come to Brooklyn.
So the Wizards took the floor with a starting lineup of Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Kyle Kuzma, Thomas Bryant, Corey Kispert and Neto, who was making his first start of the season. They were still without Daniel Gafford, who remains in the health and safety protocol.
The teams essentially played to a stalemate before the Wizards closed the third quarter on a 10-0 run to take an 86-78 lead into the fourth. Rui Hachimura hit a pair of three-pointers during the stretch and Kuzma closed it out with a layup in transition. Kuzma posted 15 points, 13 rebounds and 10 assists, notching the first triple-double of his career.
Sparsely used Anthony Gill scored a career-high 15 points as seven players scored in double figures for the Wizards. Coach Wes Unseld Jr. said before the game that his team needed to make up for the missing bodies as a group and that’s exactly what he got from Neto (season high 21 points), Gill, Bryant (13), Hachimura (12), Caldwell-Pope (13) and Deni Avdija (13).
Kyrie Irving led the Nets with 31 points, five rebounds and six assists while Cam Thomas added 27 points.
Surgery for Beal
Bradley Beal underwent wrist surgery in New York on Thursday and the organization announced it was a success. That in itself was good news, but it was also notable that the franchise cornerstone was still a Wizard after the deadline. Beal can become an unrestricted free agent next season and has yet to sign a four-year, $181.5 million extension that has been on the table since Oct. 1.
Wizards assistant coach Mike Batiste was suspended by the NBA for two games without pay, starting Thursday, for entering the stands to confront a fan. Batiste had to be held back by Harrell at the end of the Wizards’ 121-100 loss to the Heat on Monday. | null | null | null | null | null |
Rodgers won his fourth career MVP award Thursday, putting him one behind Peyton Manning for most ever. It was, once more, a consolation prize for Rodgers, with another Super Bowl about to be played without him. He and the Packers were eliminated in the divisional round of the NFC playoffs, ending a season that began with Rodgers at odds with team management and included him creating a national furor when he vigorously defended his unvaccinated status following a positive test for the coronavirus.
“It’s been an amazing 17 years,” Rodgers said as he thanked the Packers during his on-air acceptance speech. | null | null | null | null | null |
There was something noticeably different Thursday about the pregame video the Washington Wizards play on the big screen before tip-off at Capital One Arena. Familiar faces that were once featured had suddenly disappeared. Others got much more screen time, including someone who had played a total of seven minutes before Thursday.
Of course, they weren’t the ones who did some tinkering before the Wizards’ 113-112 win, a contest between two teams whose rosters after the deadline looked a lot different than a few hours earlier.
Gone for the Wizards (25-29) were starting point guard Spencer Dinwiddie (Mavericks), center Montrezl Harrell (Hornets), forward Davis Bertans (Mavericks) and point guard Aaron Holiday (Suns). That left Raul Neto as the only full-time point guard. Cassius Winston, on a two-way contract, saw the floor for the third time this season.
The Nets (29-26) were without James Harden and Paul Millsap, who were sent to Philadelphia as part of the biggest deal of the day, with Ben Simmons, Seth Curry and Andre Drummond set to come to Brooklyn.
So the Wizards took the floor with a starting lineup of Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, Kyle Kuzma, Thomas Bryant, Corey Kispert and Neto, who was making his first start of the season. They were still without Daniel Gafford, who remains in the health and safety protocols.
“Before we even came out at the start of the game, just in the huddle, I could just sense everybody had a different vibe,” Caldwell-Pope said. “Their energy or whatever it was, their aura, or whatever it was, it was different. I could feel eat. Everybody was antsy. They were just ready. That’s what we needed.”
The teams essentially played to a stalemate before the Wizards closed the third quarter on a 10-0 run to take an 86-78 lead into the fourth. Rui Hachimura hit a pair of three-pointers during the stretch, and Kuzma closed it out with a layup in transition. Kuzma posted 15 points, 13 rebounds and 10 assists, notching the first triple-double of his career.
“I thought our ball movement was terrific,” Unseld said. “Obviously, it helps when we make shots, but we did a pretty job of just finding the next action. We didn’t get caught too often stagnating or ball watching. Kept energy in it. … I’ve got to give our guys a lot of credit. By all accounts, it’s a good team win.”
Sparingly used Anthony Gill scored a career-high 15 points as seven players scored in double figures for the Wizards. Coach Wes Unseld Jr. said before the game that his team needed to make up for the missing bodies as a group, and that’s exactly what he got from Neto (season-high 21 points), Gill, Bryant (13), Hachimura (12), Caldwell-Pope (13) and Deni Avdija (13).
“We’ve been through a lot this year,” Kuzma said. A lot of things have transpired. Our main message before the game was, 'Hey, man, we’ve got 30 games left. It just all depends on us how we want to finish this season. We can continue to dwell and point fingers or we can just come together and play free and have a lot of fun out there. … Ball movement was great. Talking defensively. It was just a lot of fun. ”
Kyrie Irving led the Nets with 31 points, five rebounds and six assists, while Cam Thomas added 27 points.
Beal has surgery
Bradley Beal underwent wrist surgery in New York on Thursday, and the organization announced it was a success. That in itself was good news, but it was also notable that the franchise cornerstone was still a Wizard after the deadline. Beal can become an unrestricted free agent next season and has yet to sign the four-year, $181.5 million extension that was offered Oct. 1.
Brooklyn gets relief
Assistant suspended
Wizards assistant coach Mike Batiste was suspended by the NBA for two games without pay for entering the stands to confront a fan. Batiste had to be held back by Harrell at the end of the Wizards’ 121-100 loss to the Heat on Monday. | null | null | null | null | null |
After Russian figure skater’s positive doping test, officials promise exped...
Shaun White acknowledges spectators after his final Olympic halfpipe run. (Maxim Shipenkov/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)
ZHANGJIAKOU, China — On the final run of his charmed Olympic life, Shaun White fell. His board hit the lip of the halfpipe here at Genting Snow Park, and the world’s most famous snowboarder tumbled to the snow, eventually riding out to a standing ovation from a crowd of spectators and other riders.
Then the three-time Olympic gold medalist stood and watched as the sport’s new star, Japan’s Ayumu Hirano, sailed through a final run that included his second frontside triple cork 1440 of the day, giving Hirano a score of 96.00 and the gold.
The two triple corks — four full rotations and three off-axis flips — are the first landed in Olympic history. In December, Hirano also landed the only other triple cork in competition.
It made for a perfect handoff, as the 35-year-old White ceded the future to a 23-year-old rider who is hitting bigger and more daring tricks than White can do. Australia’s Scotty James and Switzerland’s Jan Scherrer finished second and third.
“That was the run of a lifetime,” White said of Hirano. “I’m so proud of him.”
White took fourth. It was the second time he has finished fourth in his five Olympics dating from 2006. He won gold in the other three. And while the placement was probably a disappointment, it also was about the best he could have asked for after struggling the last four years to maintain his previous brilliance.
His best run, an 85.00, left him just two points from a last medal in his final Olympics.
“I would have loved to have to [have made the podium] one last time,” White said. “You can’t always get what you want, but you get what you need. A little Rolling Stones there.”
Earlier in the week, White nearly failed to qualify for Friday’s final, needing a big final run to make the cut. It was good enough to get him the fourth starting place Friday, a showing that seemed to invigorate him.
He breezed through his first run for a 72.00 that put him fourth and in early contention. His second run, even cleaner, got the 85.00, but he was still stuck in fourth, never able to break into the top three.
The lead-up to these Olympics has been different for White. In past Games, he was always the sport’s most dominant star, the one who could drop into any big competition and somehow find a way to win it. For four Olympics, he was the first name everyone mentioned when guessing who would take the gold.
But not this time. Not at 35. Not with knees that ache and ankles that are now perpetually sore. Not with him barely competing the past couple of years. Not with a new generation soaring higher, with more dangerous tricks.
After White’s last medal in PyeongChang, his protege, Toby Miller, and their coach, J.J. Thomas, were ready for White to say he was done with competitive snowboarding. At the time he was 31, nearly ancient in the snowboarding world. He had come back from a disappointing fourth-place finish in Sochi to win a gold that seemed like his redemption. He had nothing left to prove.
Thomas said he and Miller “kept waiting” for White to say he was through. But White never did. At some point a couple years ago, Thomas and Miller realized White was going to make one more Olympic run, even if the whole thing seemed so unlikely.
The climb back has been hard. White hasn’t been the old version of himself. Each time he felt a hint of momentum, something came to knock him back. In the early fall it was injuries. In early December it was freak occurrences, such as a boot binding coming loose in the middle of a run. In late December it was the confirmation, in a positive test, that his hacking cough was actually the coronavirus.
Making the four-man U.S. team became a laborious pursuit. He hoped to build enough points to qualify before the end of 2021, but poor finishes and the coronavirus forced him to wait until the end, to the very last qualifying event, just two weeks before the Games, to finally secure a spot. He finished third that day, standing on his first podium since the last Olympics.
By then, he had decided that Beijing would be his final Games. It was a decision made while riding a chairlift in Austria after a particularly discouraging practice day. He said he wept that day as he rode over the trees back to the pipe’s top. The tears, he explained, were less about sadness and more about the finality of his choice to retire.
He now moves on, expressing afterward his desire to start a family and later mentioning the snowboard fashion company he is starting with his brother.
“The future is so exciting,” he said. “There is so much I want to do in life.” | null | null | null | null | null |
The official said “we immediately went to work planning for every aspect of leaving,” including for an evacuation operation “that eventually helped more than 120,000 individuals fly out of Kabul in a few short weeks."
”Those months of extensive preparation, like the deployment of troops in the region, are reflected in the public record and the CENTCOM interviews," the official said. “We reject any assertion that claims otherwise.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Aaron Rodgers wins fourth MVP, says decision on his future coming soon
Rodgers won his fourth career MVP award Thursday, putting him one behind Peyton Manning for most ever. He said after receiving the award that his decision about whether to continue his NFL career, in Green Bay or elsewhere, will come soon.
“I have not made any decision yet. ... Like I said in the last press conference, I’ll make a decision in due time,” Rodgers said in a video conference with reporters. “And not in a ton of time, give the team plenty of time to do what they’ve got to do. I think that time is coming. ... There will be a decision in the near future. I’m not going to keep a lot of people waiting.”
It was, once more, a consolation prize for Rodgers, with another Super Bowl about to be played without him. He and the Packers were eliminated in the divisional round of the NFC playoffs, ending a season that began with Rodgers at odds with team management and included him creating a national furor when he vigorously defended his unvaccinated status following a positive test for the coronavirus.
“It just comes down to kind of weighing where I’m at mentally and understanding what the commitment is, and then kind of making a commitment and everybody moving forward,” Rodgers said.
He said Thursday night that he had “great conversations” with the Packers before leaving town following the playoff defeat.
“I don’t fear retirement,” Rodgers said. “I don’t fear moving on. I’m very proud of what I’ve been accomplished and proud that I’ve accomplished it in Green Bay over the last 17 years, and excited about the future, whatever that ends up being or looking like. I’m also still highly competitive and still have a bitter taste from the divisional [playoff] game.”
“Should I come back, there’s things that need to get done, probably, to get the team where it needs to go,” Rodgers said Thursday. “But should I feel like [it’s] my time to move on and do something else, I’ll be extremely, eternally grateful for the Green Bay Packers organization, the fan base, all the incredible 17 years’ worth of memories and friendships and special, special moments that I’ve gotten to share with members of the organization, my teammates, people that work there and the fans as well. I’m just super thankful for every single moment.”
Rams left tackle Andrew Whitworth was named the Walter Payton NFL man of the year for accomplishments on and off the field. | null | null | null | null | null |
Man fatally shot in Fairfax
A man was fatally shot Thursday night in a residential area of Fairfax, near Oakton, county police said.
Officers investigated the incident in the 3300 block of Willow Crescent Drive, where they found the victim outside of an apartment complex just after 8:15 p.m., said Sgt. Ian Yost, a police spokesman.
Authorities said the man, whose name was not released by police, was taken to hospital, where he was pronounced dead.
Police said they were searching for a woman seen fleeing the area, who officials described as being between 20 and 30 years old and wearing tan coat and black pants.
No further details were released Thursday night. | null | null | null | null | null |
WASHINGTON — U.S. military officials say there could have been more civilian casualties than initially thought in the raid that killed the top Islamic State leader in Syria last week, but they believe any such deaths were caused by the militant’s suicide bomb and were not at the hands of American forces. | null | null | null | null | null |
Mikaela Shiffrin reacts after competing in the women's super-G final. (Joe KLAMAR / AFP) (Joe Klamar/AFP via Getty Images)
YANQING, China — All anyone wanted to see late Friday morning was a thick spray of snow rising up from Mikaela Shiffrin’s skis beyond the finish line at National Alpine Skiing Centre. When she hit the brakes and took a peek at the scoreboard, there was nothing much good to see up there, but on this day, of all days, it hardly mattered. She was an afterthought in the women’s super-G at the Beijing Olympics, and that has never seemed so encouraging.
A week ago, a ninth-place finish in the super-G for the most accomplished female skier in the world might have been considered a disappointment. And the competitive side of her, which has carried her to three career Olympic medals and 73 World Cup victories in her career, may have been frustrated by Friday’s result.
But after ski-outs in her first runs in the giant slalom and slalom — runs that lasted perhaps 20 seconds combined — what Shiffrin needed Friday was a time next to her name instead of a DNF. And that’s what she got, even if that time, 1 minute 14.30 seconds, was nearly a half-second out of medal contention and more than three-quarters of a second behind gold medalist Lara Gut-Behrami (1:13.51) of Switzerland.
“I skied strong, and it’s a really big relief to be here now at the finish, having skied a run well,” Shiffrin said. “Like, I wasn’t skiing safe or anything. But I did get to the finish. And that’s really nice for my heart — to know it’s not totally abandoning everything I thought I knew about the sport.”
Gut-Behrami, the defending world champion in the super-G, secured her first career Olympic gold and her second medal of these Games, conquering the icy course known as “The Rock.” Mirjam Puchner of Austria (1:13.73) took the silver, and Michelle Gisin of Switzerland (1:13.81) won bronze.
By Friday morning, some had begun to wonder whether Shiffrin’s greatest strength as a skier — her versatility — had begun to feel like an anchor. While some slalom specialists had already come to the end of their Olympics, Shiffrin, who has indicated she hoped to enter all five individual events here, was back for another taste in the third women’s event of the Games.
The super-G brought a shift in courses — to the longer, steeper, faster speed course nicknamed “The Rock” — and a shift in mentality, away from the more technical precision required of the slalom and giant slalom, and toward a more reactive, instinctive approach. Rather than two runs, as in the slalom and GS, the super-G was one hurtling, flying blitz down the mountain.
Anyone who views sporting achievement as a binary outcome — win or lose — must have been confused by Shiffrin’s mission here Friday.
“After the last race, there’s been a lot of emotional fatigue,” she said. “And I feel emotionally wary right now. And there’s definitely a sense of dullness, and you cant have that … But when we got out today, I just felt a little more settled, a little quieter.”
She was in no way the gold medal favorite in super-G, an event she had never before attempted in an Olympics. Of Shiffrin’s 10 podium finishes on the World Cup circuit this season, just two were in super-G, and both were thirds. Her four career wins in the event were far fewer than she has notched in slalom (47) or giant slalom (14) — though she did win the 2019 world championship in super-G in Are, Sweden. Most of the training and competition she had planned in the super-G this winter were wiped out by a back injury in October and November and a bout of covid-19 in December.
Friday’s field was without Italian star Sofia Goggia, the top female downhill/super-G skier in the world and reigning Olympic downhill champion, who had recovered from the knee injury she suffered in January in time to race Friday’s super-G. But she pulled out after a pair of training runs Thursday, and will focus on defending her downhill title Tuesday.
After initially considering sitting out the super-G herself — with her mother/coach, Eileen, telling The Washington Post she was “worried it could be dangerous” for her daughter — Shiffrin decided late Thursday afternoon to ski it. Early Friday morning, some 4½ hours before the start, she tweeted in a tone that sounded hopeful and excited: “Today is Super G and Super G is fun,” she wrote. “I can’t express how grateful I am to have the opportunity to refocus on a new race, in the sport that I love so much. Onward.”
In the starting gate Friday, she took a deep breath before launching herself out and downward. Her race was far from perfect, and she was already off Gut-Behrami’s pace by the second checkpoint. At the most severe turn of the 36 gates on the 6,509-foot-long course, she took it out wider than most of the other medal contenders.
After reaching the finish line, Shiffrin took another deep breath and gathered herself before gliding to the exit. This wasn’t a race to remember. But at that moment, it wasn’t so bad to have one to forget. | null | null | null | null | null |
Lara Gut-Behrami, of Switzerland celebrates during the medal ceremony after winning the gold medal in the women’s super-G at the 2022 Winter Olympics, Friday, Feb. 11, 2022, in the Yanqing district of Beijing. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)
BEIJING — Lara Gut-Behrami finally has her Olympic gold medal, winning the super-G at the Beijing Games on Friday. And it came in the event that has caused the Swiss skier so much disappointment on one of sport’s biggest stages. | null | null | null | null | null |
What to watch on Friday: ‘Everything’s Gonna Be All White’ premieres on Showtime
E60 (ESPN at 8) A new entry in the docuseries chronicles Whitney Houston’s famous rendition of the national anthem at Super Bowl XXV and the ripple effects it had on American culture at the time.
RuPaul’s Drag Race (VH1 at 8) Contestants are tasked with making an outfit from all the junk in Michelle Visage’s online shopping; guest judge actress Taraji P. Henson.
20/20 (ABC at 9) The first televised interview with a woman who allegedly met a man online and had him square off with her unwitting husband.
Pretzel and the Puppies (Apple TV Plus) A new animated series for children about the titular Dachshund and his family — based on the popular “Pretzel” books from the authors of “Curious George.”
Poly (The Roku Channel) A documentary series focused on polyamory.
Everything’s Gonna Be All White (Showtime at 8) A three-part history of race in America as seen through the eyes of people of color. The first episode airs tonight but the entire series can be streamed online — plus a bonus episode.
Inventing Anna (Netflix) A limited series from Shonda Rhimes about the cat-and-mouse game of scammer Anna Delvey (played by “Ozark’s” Julia Garner) and a magazine journalist (“Veep’s” Anna Chlumsky).
Anne+: The Film (Netflix) Based on a Dutch TV series, a young queer woman in Amsterdam manages the expectations to finish a book project and move in with her partner in Montreal.
Bigbug (Netflix) A dark, sci-fi comedy from Jean-Pierre Jeunet (“Amélie”) about androids who take over Earth in 2045.
Love and Leashes (Netflix) A raunchy Korean rom-com starring two K-pop stars turned actors who enter into a unique relationship.
Love Tactics (Netflix) Two people, who claim not to believe in love, make a bet to see who can best make the other swoon in this Turkish romance.
Tall Girl 2 (Netflix) Jodi, the noted tall girl, gets the lead in the high school musical but she becomes riddled with self-doubt.
Old Flames Never Die (Lifetime Movie at 8) An acclaimed novelist returns to her hometown for refuge after her latest book bombs, but a tryst with her old flame leads to its own messy situation.
The premise of ‘Tall Girl’ was widely mocked. The actual movie doesn’t help matters.
First Time Fixer (Discovery Plus) | null | null | null | null | null |
But aid groups say some of the dead — particularly children — may be going uncounted. On the day of the strike, UNICEF stated that at least six children had been killed in Atma on the night of the strike “due to heavy violence” and that “civilian-populated areas were severely damaged.” | null | null | null | null | null |
While North America remained the highest-ranked region in the EIU survey, Canada saw “a notable decline," pushing the country out of the top 10, though it still scored highly, the report said.
Meanwhile, it noted that just about 10 percent of Canadians in a separate poll felt they had “a great deal” of freedom of choice and control, with “a worrying trend of disaffection among Canada’s citizens with traditional democratic institutions and increased levels of support for non-democratic alternatives.”
The United States, which received a “flawed democracy” classification, fell one spot to number 26 “as political and cultural divisions have become more entrenched.” However, the analysis also said Americans had become much more engaged in politics in recent years, and “a series of high-impact events in 2020—including a politicized pandemic and a presidential election that the two main political parties framed in existential terms—boosted political engagement and participation.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Appalachian State and Georgia State meet for conference matchup
BOTTOM LINE: Adrian Delph and the Appalachian State Mountaineers host Corey Allen and the Georgia State Panthers in Sun Belt play.
The Mountaineers are 10-2 on their home court. Appalachian State is the top team in the Sun Belt in team defense, allowing 62.7 points while holding opponents to 42.2% shooting.
The Panthers are 4-5 against Sun Belt opponents. Georgia State ranks eighth in the Sun Belt shooting 32.4% from 3-point range.
The teams play for the second time in conference play this season. The Mountaineers won the last meeting 61-60 on Jan. 21. Delph scored 29 points points to help lead the Mountaineers to the victory.
TOP PERFORMERS: Delph is scoring 17.3 points per game and averaging 5.3 rebounds for the Mountaineers. Donovan Gregory is averaging 13.1 points and 5.9 rebounds over the last 10 games for Appalachian State.
Jalen Thomas is averaging 6.8 points, 6.3 rebounds and 1.6 blocks for the Panthers. Allen is averaging 1.9 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games for Georgia State. | null | null | null | null | null |
Bethune-Cookman faces Alcorn State following Davis' 23-point game
BOTTOM LINE: Bethune-Cookman plays the Alcorn State Braves after Kevin Davis scored 23 points in Bethune-Cookman’s 66-63 loss to the Texas Southern Tigers.
The Braves are 2-2 in home games. Alcorn State allows 72.0 points and has been outscored by 7.0 points per game.
The Wildcats have gone 4-7 against SWAC opponents. Bethune-Cookman gives up 68.3 points to opponents and has been outscored by 6.9 points per game.
The teams play for the second time in conference play this season. The Braves won the last matchup 70-67 on Jan. 25. Justin Thomas scored 16 points points to help lead the Braves to the win.
TOP PERFORMERS: Thomas is averaging 9.7 points, 3.9 assists and 2.1 steals for the Braves. Keondre Montgomery is averaging 13.8 points over the last 10 games for Alcorn State.
Joe French is scoring 15.8 points per game and averaging 3.0 rebounds for the Wildcats. Davis is averaging 1.1 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games for Bethune-Cookman. | null | null | null | null | null |
Bowling Green visits Miami (OH) following Grant's 25-point outing
BOTTOM LINE: Miami (OH) faces the Bowling Green Falcons after Dae Dae Grant scored 25 points in Miami (OH)’s 62-57 win against the Western Michigan Broncos.
The RedHawks are 7-6 in home games. Miami (OH) has a 6-9 record against teams above .500.
The Falcons have gone 5-8 against MAC opponents. Bowling Green ranks third in the MAC scoring 33.2 points per game in the paint led by Cam Young averaging 0.3.
The teams meet for the second time in conference play this season. The Falcons won 87-83 in the last matchup on Jan. 8. Daeqwon Plowden led the Falcons with 27 points, and Grant led the RedHawks with 26 points.
TOP PERFORMERS: Grant is scoring 16.7 points per game and averaging 4.7 rebounds for the RedHawks. Mekhi Lairy is averaging 12.1 points and 2.3 rebounds over the last 10 games for Miami (OH).
Myron Gordon is averaging 10.7 points and 3.2 assists for the Falcons. Plowden is averaging 17.1 points over the last 10 games for Bowling Green. | null | null | null | null | null |
Citadel visits VMI after Stephens' 27-point game
BOTTOM LINE: VMI takes on the Citadel Bulldogs after Jake Stephens scored 27 points in VMI’s 85-79 win over the Mercer Bears.
The Keydets are 9-2 on their home court. VMI averages 79.3 points while outscoring opponents by 7.7 points per game.
The Bulldogs are 4-8 against SoCon opponents. Citadel is 5-11 against opponents over .500.
The teams square off for the 10th time in conference play this season. The Keydets won the last meeting 90-85 on Jan. 15. Stephens scored 20 points points to help lead the Keydets to the victory.
TOP PERFORMERS: Stephens is averaging 19 points, 9.1 rebounds, 3.4 assists and 2.1 blocks for the Keydets. Trey Bonham is averaging 13.1 points over the last 10 games for VMI. | null | null | null | null | null |
BOTTOM LINE: Oregon hosts the California Golden Bears after De’Vion Harmon scored 21 points in Oregon’s 68-60 victory against the Stanford Cardinal.
The Ducks are 10-3 on their home court. Oregon is seventh in the Pac-12 in team defense, allowing 66.7 points while holding opponents to 42.6% shooting.
The Golden Bears have gone 3-11 against Pac-12 opponents. Cal is 3-14 against opponents over .500.
The Ducks and Golden Bears face off Saturday for the first time in conference play this season.
TOP PERFORMERS: Will Richardson is averaging 15.1 points and 3.5 assists for the Ducks. Harmon is averaging 1.0 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games for Oregon.
Jordan Shepherd is averaging 13.8 points for the Golden Bears. Jalen Celestine is averaging 1.0 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games for Cal. | null | null | null | null | null |
Kansas State takes on Iowa State following Pack's 31-point game
The Cyclones have gone 12-3 at home. Iowa State is 1-1 in one-possession games.
The Wildcats are 4-7 in Big 12 play. Kansas State ranks ninth in the Big 12 scoring 27.3 points per game in the paint led by Mark Smith averaging 5.9.
The Cyclones and Wildcats face off Saturday for the first time in Big 12 play this season.
TOP PERFORMERS: Izaiah Brockington is averaging 16.6 points and 7.8 rebounds for the Cyclones. Tyrese Hunter is averaging 8.3 points over the last 10 games for Iowa State.
Pack is averaging 16.9 points for the Wildcats. Smith is averaging 9.2 points and 5.5 rebounds over the past 10 games for Kansas State. | null | null | null | null | null |
McCabe leads Saint Francis (PA) against Mount St. Mary's after 21-point game
BOTTOM LINE: Saint Francis (PA) takes on the Mount St. Mary’s Mountaineers after Brad McCabe scored 21 points in Saint Francis (PA)’s 78-65 win against the Fairleigh Dickinson Knights.
The Red Flash are 4-5 in home games. Saint Francis (PA) ranks second in the NEC with 34.0 points per game in the paint led by A.J. Labriola averaging 0.7.
The Mountaineers are 7-4 against NEC opponents. Mount St. Mary’s leads the NEC shooting 35.4% from downtown. Nana Opoku leads the Mountaineers shooting 42.9% from 3-point range.
The teams square off for the 10th time in conference play this season. The Mountaineers won the last meeting 71-54 on Jan. 29. Jalen Benjamin scored 22 points to help lead the Mountaineers to the victory.
TOP PERFORMERS: Ramiir Dixon-Conover is scoring 12.7 points per game with 4.8 rebounds and 3.5 assists for the Red Flash. Maxwell Land is averaging 12.4 points and 3.8 rebounds while shooting 39.4% over the past 10 games for Saint Francis (PA).
Benjamin is averaging 13.2 points and 4.2 assists for the Mountaineers. Opoku is averaging 9.9 points over the last 10 games for Mount St. Mary’s. | null | null | null | null | null |
BOTTOM LINE: Ohio faces the Eastern Michigan Eagles after Ben Vander Plas scored 24 points in Ohio’s 81-72 win against the Central Michigan Chippewas.
The Eagles are 7-3 on their home court. Eastern Michigan gives up 76.9 points and has been outscored by 5.9 points per game.
The Bobcats are 11-2 against MAC opponents. Ohio ranks third in the MAC giving up 66.7 points while holding opponents to 43.9% shooting.
The teams meet for the second time in conference play this season. The Bobcats won 81-68 in the last matchup on Feb. 3. Mark Sears led the Bobcats with 20 points, and Nathan Scott led the Eagles with 16 points.
TOP PERFORMERS: Noah Farrakhan is averaging 15.8 points for the Eagles. Bryce McBride is averaging 11.9 points over the past 10 games for Eastern Michigan.
Sears is averaging 19.7 points, 5.2 rebounds, 3.9 assists and 1.8 steals for the Bobcats. Jason Carter is averaging 13.3 points and 5.4 rebounds over the last 10 games for Ohio. | null | null | null | null | null |
Pember and the UNC Asheville Bulldogs take on conference foe South Carolina Upstate
BOTTOM LINE: Bryson Mozone and the South Carolina Upstate Spartans host Drew Pember and the UNC Asheville Bulldogs in Big South play.
The Spartans have gone 4-6 at home. South Carolina Upstate is 4-10 against opponents with a winning record.
The Bulldogs are 5-6 against Big South opponents. UNC Asheville has a 2-2 record in games decided by 3 points or fewer.
The teams play for the second time this season in Big South play. The Spartans won the last meeting 76-73 on Jan. 15. Jordan Gainey scored 22 points points to help lead the Spartans to the victory.
TOP PERFORMERS: Mozone is averaging 15.3 points and 5.4 rebounds for the Spartans. Gainey is averaging 2.8 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games for South Carolina Upstate.
Trent Stephney is averaging 7.2 points, 3.4 assists and 1.6 steals for the Bulldogs. Pember is averaging 19.7 points over the last 10 games for UNC Asheville. | null | null | null | null | null |
BOTTOM LINE: Southern Utah visits the Sacramento State Hornets after Tevian Jones scored 23 points in Southern Utah’s 78-67 loss to the Montana Grizzlies.
The Hornets are 3-7 on their home court. Sacramento State has a 5-9 record against opponents above .500.
The Thunderbirds are 9-3 in Big Sky play. Southern Utah is 2-0 in one-possession games.
The teams meet for the second time in conference play this season. The Thunderbirds won 64-51 in the last matchup on Dec. 31. Jones led the Thunderbirds with 19 points, and Bryce Fowler led the Hornets with 12 points.
TOP PERFORMERS: Fowler is averaging 16.9 points, 5.5 rebounds, 4.3 assists and 1.8 steals for the Hornets. William FitzPatrick is averaging 2.6 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games for Sacramento State.
Jones averages 2.1 made 3-pointers per game for the Thunderbirds, scoring 16.0 points while shooting 31.3% from beyond the arc. John Knight III is averaging 13 points, 4.6 assists and two steals over the past 10 games for Southern Utah. | null | null | null | null | null |
Settle leads Howard against Delaware State after 21-point game
BOTTOM LINE: Howard takes on the Delaware State Hornets after William Settle scored 21 points in Howard’s 96-38 win over the Gallaudet Bison.
The Bison have gone 5-3 in home games. Howard is 3-6 against opponents with a winning record.
The Hornets are 0-7 in MEAC play. Delaware State is 2-13 in games decided by 10 or more points.
The teams square off for the second time in conference play this season. The Bison won the last meeting 69-64 on Feb. 8. Kyle Foster scored 21 points points to help lead the Bison to the victory.
TOP PERFORMERS: Foster is scoring 14.9 points per game and averaging 3.7 rebounds for the Bison. Settle is averaging 15.2 points and 4.7 rebounds over the last 10 games for Howard.
Myles Carter is shooting 41.1% and averaging 14.9 points for the Hornets. Dominik Fragala is averaging 9.0 points over the last 10 games for Delaware State. | null | null | null | null | null |
South Carolina State visits Coppin State after Madlock's 20-point performance
BOTTOM LINE: South Carolina State visits the Coppin State Eagles after Antonio Madlock scored 20 points in South Carolina State’s 74-68 victory against the North Carolina Central Eagles.
The Eagles are 2-2 in home games. Coppin State averages 13.3 turnovers per game and is 3-7 when it turns the ball over less than its opponents.
The Bulldogs are 4-3 in MEAC play. South Carolina State is 5-0 in games decided by less than 4 points.
The teams play for the second time this season in MEAC play. The Eagles won the last matchup 74-65 on Jan. 8. Tyree Corbett scored 23 points points to help lead the Eagles to the victory.
TOP PERFORMERS: Jesse Zarzuela is scoring 14.6 points per game and averaging 3.1 rebounds for the Eagles. Corbett is averaging 15.0 points and 11.6 rebounds over the last 10 games for Coppin State.
Madlock is shooting 40.5% and averaging 11.9 points for the Bulldogs. Omar Croskey is averaging 1.6 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games for South Carolina State. | null | null | null | null | null |
South Dakota visits Denver following Kamateros' 20-point game
BOTTOM LINE: South Dakota takes on the Denver Pioneers after Tasos Kamateros scored 20 points in South Dakota’s 91-69 victory over the Omaha Mavericks.
The Pioneers have gone 6-6 at home. Denver is 4-16 against opponents with a winning record.
The Coyotes are 7-6 in conference play. South Dakota is third in the Summit allowing 70.6 points while holding opponents to 45.1% shooting.
The teams play for the second time in conference play this season. The Coyotes won the last meeting 80-71 on Jan. 14. Kruz Perrott-Hunt scored 25 points to help lead the Coyotes to the win.
Mason Archambault averages 1.8 made 3-pointers per game for the Coyotes, scoring 14.3 points while shooting 38.2% from beyond the arc. Perrott-Hunt is shooting 43.8% and averaging 17.3 points over the last 10 games for South Dakota. | null | null | null | null | null |
Texas A&M-CC visits Nicholls State following Jones' 21-point outing
BOTTOM LINE: Nicholls State plays the Texas A&M-CC Islanders after Latrell Jones scored 21 points in Nicholls State’s 69-58 win against the Incarnate Word Cardinals.
The Colonels are 7-1 on their home court. Nicholls State has a 3-5 record against opponents over .500.
The Islanders are 3-4 in Southland play. Texas A&M-CC is third in the Southland scoring 77.8 points per game and is shooting 45.2%.
TOP PERFORMERS: Devante Carter is averaging 12.5 points, 3.5 assists and two steals for the Colonels. Spencer is averaging 12.8 points and 6.0 rebounds while shooting 42.9% over the last 10 games for Nicholls State. | null | null | null | null | null |
Virginia hosts Georgia Tech following Devoe's 20-point showing
BOTTOM LINE: Georgia Tech faces the Virginia Cavaliers after Michael Devoe scored 20 points in Georgia Tech’s 79-70 loss to the Miami Hurricanes.
The Cavaliers are 9-4 in home games. Virginia scores 63.5 points and has outscored opponents by 3.6 points per game.
The Yellow Jackets are 3-9 against ACC opponents. Georgia Tech is 1-2 in one-possession games.
TOP PERFORMERS: Jayden Gardner is scoring 14.5 points per game with 6.8 rebounds and 1.5 assists for the Cavaliers. Armaan Franklin is averaging 8.3 points and 2.0 rebounds while shooting 41.4% over the last 10 games for Virginia.
Devoe is averaging 17.9 points and 3.1 assists for the Yellow Jackets. Jordan Usher is averaging 9.9 points over the last 10 games for Georgia Tech. | null | null | null | null | null |
Wade leads Longwood against N.C. A&T after 23-point showing
BOTTOM LINE: Longwood visits the North Carolina A&T Aggies after DeShaun Wade scored 23 points in Longwood’s 85-72 victory against the South Carolina Upstate Spartans.
The Aggies are 6-2 in home games. N.C. A&T has a 4-13 record against teams over .500.
The Lancers are 10-0 against Big South opponents. Longwood leads the Big South scoring 77.8 points per game while shooting 45.8%.
The teams play for the second time this season in Big South play. The Lancers won the last matchup 79-71 on Jan. 27. Leslie Nkereuwem scored 24 points to help lead the Lancers to the win.
TOP PERFORMERS: Marcus Watson is scoring 12.3 points per game and averaging 5.7 rebounds for the Aggies. Demetric Horton is averaging 1.7 made 3-pointers over the last 10 games for N.C. A&T.
Justin Hill is averaging 13.4 points, four assists and 1.6 steals for the Lancers. Wade is averaging 13.3 points over the past 10 games for Longwood. | null | null | null | null | null |
Jordan Reed, 9, leads his fourth grade class on Friday, Feb. 4 to protest their school removing chocolate milk from the lunch menu (KCRA)
His weapons of choice: well-researched arguments, protest signs and the backing of dozens of others who had also been robbed.
Jordan, a 9-year-old fourth grader at Sierra Vista K-8 School in Northern California, took to heart last week’s lesson about opinion writing, unleashing what he’d learned of Vacaville Unified School District’s 2020 decision to remove chocolate milk from the lunch menu. Within roughly 24 hours, Jordan turned the classroom instruction into a protest with his 26 classmates — and one sixth grader — that drew the school district’s nutrition department to Sierra Vista for an impromptu, on-the-spot negotiation with Jordan and his comrades.
Last week, Jordan’s teacher, Emily Doss, reviewed what her 27 students had learned earlier in the year about opinion and argumentative writing. To do so, she gave them a Scholastic News article asking “Should Schools Serve Flavored Milk?” The story featured Esteban Perez, a Missouri fourth grader who last year successfully lobbied his school to reintroduce the strawberry milk it had taken away.
“But I didn’t know that Jordan said, ‘That’s not good enough for me,’” Doss told The Washington Post.
Even though he asked his mother not to post anything on Facebook so he could maintain the element of surprise, she gave her fellow principal at Sierra Vista a heads up that her son was busy mounting a protest that might burst onto the scene the following school day. Word of Jordan’s plan made its way to Elaine Kong, the district’s communications director, who tipped off a local TV station.
Doss, however, didn’t learn about it until the following day when the KCRA news crew was already on its way to the school. After rushing back to her students, she broke the news of Jordan’s imminent protest and rallied his classmates to help him pull it off.
“It felt like the last day of school when kids are so hyped up that they can’t bring it back down,” Doss said.
The end result: The school agreed to serve chocolate milk one day every two weeks.
“I felt good about it because I brought back something that everybody wanted,” Jordan told The Post.
“To remove it completely maybe wasn’t the best decision,” Wilim said, adding, “It was really cool the way that Jordan presented himself to bring in a healthy debate and for us to find a compromise — that chocolate milk should be available as a treat.” He also broke some good news for Jordan: School administrators plan to sweeten the deal they struck with him at Friday’s protest. They’ll offer chocolate milk once a week instead of every other week.
So what was the debate all about? Depends on who you ask.
Or at least that’s what she was trying to say until Jordan interrupted her.
“No, it was about the chocolate milk,” he said
Nevertheless, Jordan and his classmates have been buoyed by their advocacy success. They’ve already started talking about other things they want to fight to improve.
But it’s good that they’re now looking for ways to advocate for themselves and change the world for the better, Doss said. “It started off as not being a big thing, and then it just kind of took off,” Doss said, adding, “It was pretty cool to see … how it went from a review lesson to this huge life lesson for these kids.” | null | null | null | null | null |
As win over Czechs shows, U.S. goalies must be sharp even if they’re not busy
“I can’t control the number of shots I get, and I just have to be ready for everything that comes at me,” United States goalkeeper Alex Cavallini said after Friday's quarterfinal victory. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)
BEIJING — The first shot that U.S. goaltender Alex Cavallini faced in the women’s hockey quarterfinals against the Czech Republic did not come until the game was 25 minutes old, a blast from the right circle that the 30-year-old stopped with her right pad. It was rare action for Cavallini, who had spent more than a third of the game trying to stay warm with her team dominating possession, but it was also unlucky. The puck bounced to the front of the crease, and as a stick was caught under Cavallini, the net was wide open for forward Michaela Pejzlova, who buried the rebound to give the Czechs a stunning lead over the heavily favored Americans.
Cavallini popped up on her skates and watched her opponents mob each other in celebration, as if they couldn’t believe it either. Team USA has played all three of its goaltenders during these Olympics, and each has felt the unique pressure of staying sharp in games in which they don’t face many shots — but perhaps none have felt the stress Cavallini must have felt Friday, knowing she would have to be perfect as her team faced a potentially unprecedented upset.
The Americans found some luck, too: Lee Stecklein scored the go-ahead goal early in the third period after her shot deflected off the stick of a Czech Republic player and into the net, which will be remembered as the decisive moment in an eventual 4-1 victory that sent the United States to the semifinals. But the contest also showcased two goaltenders in wildly different circumstances: The Czechs needed every one of Klara Peslarova’s 55 saves to stay within striking distance, and the Americans needed Cavallini to stay mentally sharp despite long stretches in which she didn’t face any offensive rushes, which can be a tricky proposition in a nerve-racking game, not to mention for a goalie who has not played in every game this tournament. Cavallini made all of five saves Friday, just two in the third period as her team finally broke through with three goals, but she still had to endure tense moments in front of her net.
“I can’t control the number of shots I get, and I just have to be ready for everything that comes at me,” she said. “That’s something I’ve worked on a lot over the years, and it comes with maturity, just trying to not get too stressed out with wanting the pucks to come at me. Just kind of let it happen and make sure I’m staying present and focused.”
“She weathered the storm when it was messy in front of her,” U.S. Coach Joel Johnson said, “and she was sharp when she had to be called upon.”
Johnson has faced persistent questions about his team’s offense over the course of the tournament, and three days after his team produced just two goals on 53 shots in a loss to Canada, the U.S. struggled again to score against the Czechs on an afternoon in which it fired 59 shots at Peslarova and went 1-for-5 on the power play.
There were resilient moments: Hilary Knight tied the score less than a minute after her team went into the 1-0 hole, and after Stecklein’s go-ahead goal seven minutes into the third period, Savannah Harmon provided a two-goal cushion with a power-play goal later in the third, but the Americans still sweated it out. “It never felt safe,” Johnson said.
What has felt safe for Johnson is his trio of goaltenders: Cavallini, Maddie Rooney and Nicole Hensley, all Olympians whom he has vowed to play at different points during the tournament. Each goaltender saw just 12 shots each in their three victories in the preliminary round; Rooney, who was the primary backstop during the team’s gold medal run in PyeongChang in 2018, got the start in Canada’s 4-2 win in the group play finale Tuesday. As each of the tournament’s teams have relied on just one goaltender, Johnson has not tipped his hand on who might play before each game, hoping to use their versatility and rest between games as a weapon.
As Team USA has worked to straighten out its offensive struggles, it has relied on all three for timely stops: The trio has seen just 62 combined shots in five games, which can partly be attributed to the team’s stellar defense in front of the net. But it also underscores the ability for each player to stay focused in lulls when their team is dominating the puck.
“I think we have some of the best in the world. We absolutely trust who is net,” Stecklein said. “[Alex] did a great job coming out playing the puck, staying engaged. I don’t know how they do it, honestly.”
After winning a gold medal in PyeongChang, they each had to work their way back in preparation for Beijing. Following four Olympic appearances and a memorable game-winning save against Canada in the gold medal shootout win in 2018, Rooney returned for her junior year at Minnesota-Duluth and struggled that season as she felt an overwhelming pressure to perform. She worked with a mental skills coach and leaned on other players from the national team who were experiencing similar stresses as they returned to college.
“I just learned different things about the mental side of being a goaltender,” Rooney said in an interview before the Games. “I really had to focus on developing the mental side of my game.”
For Cavallini, Beijing has offered a second chance to compete on the Olympic stage after she didn’t log any ice time in PyeongChang. She took more than five months off after that experience and wondered whether she still loved the game. She did, and it led her to Friday, where she told herself to be ready for anything. Rooney and Hensley were there to support her from the bench, none of them knowing who might be next up in the tournament. There’s three of them and just two potential games remaining.
“We have such a great goalie trio. It’s been awesome to have all three of us play,” Cavallini said. “Definitely taking it game by game … going with the mentality that this could be my last game.” | null | null | null | null | null |
In the men’s halfpipe, now there is better than White’s best. Whoa, there is better. White has spent half his life pushing the sport forward, with his signature Double McTwist 1260 and double cork 1440s and a bunch of cool appetizer tricks creating a show that’s probably best described using curse words. Now everyone sees a future that once seemed like only White could visualize, and the flying standard-bearer is on the ground and looking at younger snowboarders doing things he can’t ask of his body.
To win gold, Hirano had to land the first frontside triple cork 1440s — four complete rotations and three off-axis flips and who knows what else because it happens so fast — in Olympic history. He had to receive a 96.0 score on the final run of the event.
Hirano, who is 12 years younger than White, had won two Olympic halfpipe silver medals as a teenager. Now, as the sole proprietor of the triple cork 1440, he has a trick that no one else has mastered. James, who won bronze four years ago, climbed a spot this time. Swiss snowboarder Jan Scherrer took bronze, with a score slightly higher than White’s 85.0.
None of the medalists is older than 27. Hirano, who is 23, was born nine months after halfpipe debuted at the 1998 Nagano Games. They grew up aspiring to be on White’s level. White leaves appreciating how good they have become. The sport has changed so quickly that his stunning gold medal performance in 2018 wouldn’t have been strong enough to compete for gold or silver Friday. At best, he would have been hoping for bronze.
White fought with his worn body, ignored a throbbing leg and tried to win with savvy. He made it through a conservative first run without incident. He went bigger with his second run, and when he finished, he he pumped a fist, screamed and yanked the snowboard off his feet in celebration. He was pumped as he moved temporarily into second place.
It was as high as he would get. He knew before his final run that he needed to leap over at least one higher score to keep his medal hopes alive. He summoned the past and attempted the double cork 1440 combination that impressed the judges in PyeongChang. But during the second 1440, he crashed, leaving him to take a long and emotional journey down the halfpipe. | null | null | null | null | null |
A U.S.-born Muslim has a question for racists: Go back to where?
This essay was adapted from Wajahat Ali’s new book, “Go Back to Where You Came From: And Other Helpful Recommendations on How to Become American,” which published in January.
Some people cry, some rage and some laugh when they are always asked to be welcoming but are still never welcomed to the American barbecue. Each emotional response is valid in processing and dealing with the daily pain of knowing your own country doesn’t want you.
I try to find some dark humor embedded with the perpetual discomfort and absurdity. Humor, both sublime and silly, sophomoric and sophisticated, unleashed with purpose, can often help communicate very real, hard truths about American society.
My name is Wajahat Ali. I am what diversity and outreach coordinators refer to as a “Muslim man of color.” I am neither White nor Black. Instead, I belong to a growing, miscellaneous tribe known as “people of color.” Recently, I’ve been informed that I’ve been inducted into something called BIPOC. It’s an acronym for Black, Indigenous and People of Color. It also sounds like a malevolent cybernetic entity from a dystopian science fiction novel or an advanced breathing apparatus for people suffering from sleep apnea. I apparently belong to the POC part of BIPOC.
I have also been affiliated with “Other” and “Asian” during high school. I briefly flirted with “Pacific Islander” in college, but who doesn’t experiment in their youth? I was born and raised in the Bay Area of California, in the year of “The Empire Strikes Back,” or 1980. I was also blessed with a trisyllabic name. Today, people at least tell me my name is unique and memorable, even as they insist on pronouncing it incorrectly.
I learned early on that I always had to explain, educate and at times defend my very being. I often became the token Pakistani and Muslim friend for many of my peers who had never met someone who fasted during Ramadan and didn’t eat pork. Once, I ordered a slice of pepperoni pizza and took off all the pepperoni except a small piece embedded in the side of the cheese. It was delicious, but for the rest of the week I felt like a cursed character in a Poe short story, wracked by guilt, convinced Allah would punish me. My friends were curious as to whether I’d go to hell if I ever ate pork. I assured my friends that the earth would not swallow me up whole if they poured bacon bits on my salad during lunch. (They did it anyway. I did not go to hell. Well, I haven’t … yet.)
I was always the odd duck. I went to an all-boys Jesuit Catholic high school in the Bay Area, where I dominated the yearly religious studies classes to the point that Father Allender almost wept when reading out the highest grades in the class: Wajahat Ali, the Muslim, followed by Kalyan, the Hindu. I carpooled with Brian, a Jew; Gaurav, a Hindu; and Allen, a Christian son of Nigerian immigrants. My America was a United Colors of Benetton ad.
In the ’80s and ’90s, my parents used “Amreekans” synonymously with White people. It’s almost as if they knew, without consciously realizing, that they still weren’t part of the tribe.
“Amreekans say, ‘I love you’ all the time. After waking up, going to the bathroom, going to school, on the phone. What is this nonsense?” my mother asked. My parents are not “I love you” people. To this day, I’ve never said it to them or heard them say it to me. My parents weren’t spartan or miserly with their love; I always felt it, but they just have their own way of showing it. My father still slobbers me with big wet kisses on the cheek and my mother smothers me with hugs. They do this in public, alongside giving me unsolicited, critical comments about my wardrobe, fluctuating weight and thinning hair. They always thought “I love you” was superfluous nonsense goras did that cheapened the sentiment. Gora is what we use for White people. (“Ghora” is the word for horse, so be careful.)
Goras also celebrated Thanksgiving and Christmas. We didn’t. Christmas was easy because it was a Christian holiday and my mother told me point-blank at the age of 4 that Santa Claus was not going to give me presents because he didn’t exist and was simply created by goras to sell toys. She then told me I should be grateful for all the toys I already had. That same year, she decided to become the serial killer of all imaginary creatures. I was informed that the tooth fairy and the Easter Bunny also weren’t real, and that they would not be bringing me quarters or chocolate.
My parents appreciated Thanksgiving and the entire tradition and concept of showing gratitude. However, they did not indulge in the customary dinner because they refused to cook this “strange,” “tasteless,” “dry bird” that goras inexplicably loved. By the early 21st century, however, they were hosting their own Thanksgiving parties, deep-frying the dry bird, respecting it with a proper masala base, and also adding achaar and chicken korma on the side.
Eventually, they too became Amreekan. I always knew I was Amreekan and also a Brown-skinned kid with a strange name. I was awkward and creative. But that same dorky, shy kid who couldn’t speak English ended up graduating with an English degree from UC Berkeley and practicing law, and eventually grew up to write “so well” for the New York Times and speak “so well” on CNN. I also married way up.
My wife, Sarah, is way smarter, kinder and better-looking than me. I know this because my parents remind me. “Beta, you know she’s better than you, right? Don’t mess this up,” my father warns me once a week. Remember, I am an only child, so this makes the advice that much more coldblooded. She’s also a doctor, a former athlete and a former cheerleader, and somehow she has still retained her abs despite birthing three children. If you are the person who gains weight simply by looking at food, then you are my brother or sister in this cruel journey called “Life Without Metabolism” and share my frustration at the unfairness of it all.
I still fast during Ramadan, try to watch every Warriors game and do an awesome Yoda impression for my kids. I have learned how to make my mom’s excellent Pakistani and Hyderabadi dishes during quarantine.
I’m about as American as chicken korma, apple pie and chai, but even after 40 years I’m still told to “go back.” Where, exactly? In America, who (and what) are you when you’re both “us” and “them”? When I’m a native but seen as a foreigner? When I’m a citizen but also seen as a perpetual suspect? When I’m your neighbor but also seen as an invader? When I’m a cultural creator but also seen as an eraser of White identity and European civilization?
According to mainstream code, I will never be “ordinary” or “a real American” from the “Rust Belt” (unless you consider California the heartland, which, let’s face it, no one does). My parents are seen by some as potential terrorists because they’re from Pakistan, even though they’ve lived in this country for over 40 years. Can I be a “real” American, when I’m not White no matter how much Fair & Lovely cream I slather on my skin? The answer in 2022 is “Yes, but with conditions.”
But I don’t want conditional love. I want more from America and my fellow Americans. I am not content being the token, the diversity hire, the moderate Muslim, the magical minority or “that one Brown guy” who gets the invite to the prestigious festival or space on the cover of the brochure so the company and university can show the world they are open-minded and tolerant.
With the resurgence of radicalized white power movements, many are now forced to confront the reality called white supremacy that the rest of us have had to deal with our entire lives.
For many, resisting meant protesting. For the rest of us, our resistance is simply walking out of our house and breathing, just holding our head up, smiling, having hope and telling our children that America belongs to them.
For us, surviving is an act of resistance. There are forces that have always attempted, and ultimately failed, to make America static and rigid. But America has proved to be elastic. Our ancestors have always had to push and stretch America to accommodate its many residents and communities. We now have to do our part.
If any of you have been active students of U.S. history, you know that with every two steps we march forward toward progress, we always get pushed one step back. The racially anxious men and women with hoods, tiki torches and business suits will do everything in their power to put America in a violent chokehold and drag it back to 1953. This is the year before the Supreme Court in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka ruled that segregation in public schools was unconstitutional. I’m convinced that 1953 is also the year that many enemies of diversity and progress believe America was allegedly “great.”
You might disagree with me, sometimes passionately, about my opinions, choices and what the appropriate path is for America to move forward toward becoming “great again.” But boring an audience is a grave sin. I believe God said in one of the Holy Books, “Verily, thou shan’t boreth an audience or thy Lord shall smite thee and make ye eat stale naan.”
Bismillah.*
* In Arabic, “Bismillah” means “In the name of God.” People generally use it to invoke a beginning. If you’ve already said it, you’ve become a Muslim. Gotcha. | null | null | null | null | null |
The ground at 9th and G Streets was broken in July 1968, just three months after King’s assassination, to make way for a new central library, and for a time, “central library” was all it was called. But in early 1970, community members launched a letter-writing campaign to demand it be named in King’s honor — a fitting choice, they argued, on such a prominent new building that would be an accessible resource to all.
The campaign encompassed groups from the D.C. Republican Committee to Anacostia Citizens and Merchants, Inc., to regular Washingtonians such as Robert Frazier, who wrote that he was in sixth grade at the Moten School.
Four days later, the library system’s board of trustees voted 5-2 in favor of naming the new central library after King. The White vice president of the board had unsuccessfully proposed naming only the library’s Black studies room after him.
Today, MLK Library reflects this activism, even as it recently underwent a three-and-a half year, $211 million renovation.
Despite the recent auditorium naming controversy, Reyes-Gavilan said, the library’s overarching tribute is clear.
The backlash, Reyes-Gavilan said, showed that the naming process “is flawed.” He said the library system sent the Morrison family a letter about the naming and that it was unclear what their wishes are at this time. | null | null | null | null | null |
Man fatally shot in Southeast Washington
A 28-year-old man was fatally shot Thursday morning in Southeast Washington, according to D.C. police.
The shooting occurred shortly before 11:30 a.m. in the 3900 block of Pennsylvania Avenue SE, near the border with Maryland and in the Fort Davis Park area.
Police identified the victim as Adrian Williams, of no fixed address. They said he was pronounced dead on the scene from a gunshot wound. | null | null | null | null | null |
What to watch with your kids: ‘Moonfall,’ ‘Death on the Nile’ and more
Jennifer Lopez, left, and Owen Wilson in “Marry Me.” (Barry Wetcher/Universal Pictures)
Streaming and in theaters
Rom-com has so-so story, over-the-top product placement
“Marry Me” is a music-infused rom-com starring Jennifer Lopez (who also produced) as Kat Valdez, a pop star who impulsively marries a random guy (Owen Wilson) during a concert. Based on Bobby Crosby’s graphic novel about a young, bubbly Britney Spears type, the story is transformed into a multicultural musical experience. Kat is engaged to Latino superstar Bastian (played by Latin music megastar Maluma), and the two often sing and speak Spanish. Diversity extends to include other characters of color, and there’s LGBTQ+ and disability representation in supporting and background roles. Iffy content includes a few curses (“a--,” “s---”) and a non-detailed reference to the fact that Kat’s previous marriage ended when her husband sold a sex tape. Characters kiss, and after six weeks of marriage, it’s implied that a couple consummates their marriage, but nothing happens on camera. What may take viewers aback is the movie’s enthusiastic embrace of consumerism; the film often feels like an advertising platform. Kat is a material girl living in a material world, and the product placement is blatant. Brands are everywhere: fashion, beer, iPhones, and even a Vitamix blender that practically becomes a character. Producer/distributor NBCUniversal’s shows and networks are featured to the point of obnoxiousness. And with Lopez only being shown in a glamorous/flattering light (other than Kat’s preposterous decision being roundly mocked), it’s clear that viewers are being sold on the star herself. (112 minutes)
At area theaters; also available on Peacock Plus.
Perilous disaster drama has solid effects, silly story.
“Moonfall” is a large-scale
sci-fi disaster thriller from director Roland Emmerich in which the moon is knocked from its orbit and is on a collision course with Earth. Like most other Emmerich films, the movie is filled with intense catastrophic damage, including tsunami super waves, flooding and meteors going off like bombs. Despite constant imminent peril, remarkably few characters die. But guns are depicted positively as self-defense tools, including a teen using a pistol given to him by his father. Underlying the over-the-top spectacle are themes about the depth of a father’s love and the importance of second chances and teamwork. Plus, star Halle Berry’s character Jo is a strong female role model: Jo rises to NASA’s top leadership team while remaining an engaged, hands-on mom (it’s also notable that “Jo” was once “Joe” — the part was originally written for a man). Strong language includes “a--holes” and “s---,” but what will really get your attention is the giant “f---” spray-painted across a space shuttle. While the movie’s plot is pretty wacky (even correlating with some wild conspiracy theories), NASA did cooperate and consult on the film. As a result, teens may actually learn a couple of things (or at least appreciate the value of math, science and physics). (124 minutes)
At area theaters.
Eccentric Poirot whodunit has gun violence, drinking.
“Death on the Nile” is based on Agatha Christie’s same-named mystery novel and is a follow-up to 2017’s “Murder on the Orient Express.” The central figure is a glamorous heiress (Gal Gadot) who marries her best friend’s fiance (Armie Hammer). Racy moments include passionate kissing, references to sex and the honeymooning couple grinding against each other while fully clothed. As the movie’s title suggests, there’s a good deal of murder in the story (involving knives and guns), and while it’s all meant to shock and startle, only one death is accompanied by blood and packed with emotion. Suicidal ideation and behavior are present, and there’s a flashback to wartime battlefield violence and a close-up of a grisly wound (accompanied by a positive message about acceptance). Characters drink throughout, and there are references to smoking. Women are portrayed as intelligent and shrewd, and supporting characters have been updated in a way that reflects a more diverse world than the one Christie wrote about.
(127 minutes)
Violent Neeson action movie squanders early promise.
“Blacklight” is an action thriller about an off-the-books FBI operative (Liam Neeson) who finds out about a secret, deadly operation within the bureau and tries to expose it. It starts promisingly but quickly gets tired and generic. Violence is strong but largely bloodless, with guns and shooting, deaths, explosions, car chases/crashes, minor bloody wounds, fighting, punching, kicking and choking, villains being electrocuted, a neck-snapping sound and some dialogue about violence toward women. Language includes a few uses of “s---,” plus “b----,”
“a--hole,” etc. Characters casually drink beer, wine and whiskey either at home or with others. A character pops some pills and drinks from a flask. Sex isn’t an issue. (105 minutes) | null | null | null | null | null |
The Ottawa trucker convoy is rooted in Canada’s settler colonial history
Canada’s dark history of public health has a long past of hiding behind ‘politeness'
Protesters against vaccine mandates block the roadway at the Ambassador Bridge border crossing in Windsor in Ontario, Canada, on Feb. 9. (Geoff Robins/AFP/Getty Images)
By Taylor Dysart
Taylor Dysart is a PhD candidate in the department of history and sociology of science at the University of Pennsylvania, where her research examines the intertwined worlds of healing, science, indigeneity and settler colonialism in the Amazon.
In recent weeks, a convoy of truck drivers from across Canada began arriving en masse in Ottawa. The “Freedom Convoy” traveled to the Canadian capital to protest new vaccination requirements for essential workers crossing the U.S.-Canada land border. The convoy has amassed significant support; its (now removed) GoFundMe raised more than $10 million (CAD) and it has been celebrated by several center-right and right-wing public figures, including Elon Musk, Joe Rogan and former president Donald Trump. The Freedom Convoy now touts itself as an “Anti ALL MANDATES Movement,” desiring to remove all public health mandates.
While the convoy’s supporters have characterized the protest as a peaceful movement, uninformed by “politics, race, religion, or any personal beliefs,” many supporters have been associated with or expressed racist, Islamophobic and white-supremacist views. When Tucker Carlson of Fox News interviewed Benjamin J. Dichter, cementing his place among the movement’s leaders, Dichter rambled and likened Canada’s western provinces to “a third-world country,” due, presumably, to immigration. In Ottawa, various reports captured maskless protesters brandishing Confederate, Nazi and “Trump 2024” flags. Police have launched dozens of criminal investigations and made at least 20 arrests, including for carrying weapons in a public place and assault.
The convoy has surprised onlookers in the United States and Canada, both because of the explicitly racist and violent perspectives of some of the organizers and because the action seems to violate norms of Canadian “politeness.” But the convoy represents the extension of a strain of Canadian history that has long masked itself behind “peacefulness” or “unity”: settler colonialism. It is not incidental that this latest expression of white supremacy is emerging amid a public health crisis. The history of Canadian settler colonialism and public health demonstrates how both overt white-supremacist claims and seemingly more inert nationalistic claims about “unity” and “freedom” both enable and erase ongoing harm to marginalized communities.
Canada, like the United States, has its origins in a settler colonial project. In the late 16th and 17th centuries, French and British families and soldiers began arriving along the east coast of the northern regions of “Turtle Island,” a name used by the Lenape and Haudenosaunee, with other Indigenous nations, to refer to North America. The settlement of Europeans rested on what historian Patrick Wolfe called a “logic of elimination” where Indigenous peoples were displaced or assimilated through genocidal policies.
In mid-18th century Nova Scotia, for example, Gov. Edward Cornwallis established an extirpation proclamation that commanded “all Officers Civil and Military, and all His Majesty’s Subjects or others to annoy, distress, take, or destroy the Savage” Mi’kmaq.
Through the establishment and amendment of federal policies, the Canadian state weaponized medicine, public health and science in support of settler colonial aims.
Less than a decade after Canadian confederation (1867), the establishment of the Indian Act (1876) bestowed upon the federal government sweeping powers regarding First Nations cultural practices, education, health and systems of governance. For example, Treaty No. 6 of 1876, signed between the Canadian state and the Cree peoples of Alberta and Saskatchewan claimed that if “Indians … being overtaken by any pestilence, or by a general famine, the Queen … will grant to the Indians assistance.”
In 1884, an amendment to the Indian Act required First Nations children under the age of 16 to attend residential schools. Many children were forcibly removed from their homes and received physical and psychological punishment for speaking Indigenous languages or practicing Indigenous customs and rituals. Along with these acts of cultural genocide and accompanying physical violence, the dire hygienic conditions of residential schools resulted in alarming rates of tuberculosis contraction until at least the mid-20th century. The horrendous conditions and treatment of First Nations children at residential schools, the last of which did not close until 1997, were the focus of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (established in 2008) and more recent reports of unmarked mass burial sites.
The Indian Act, along with its various amendments and allied settler colonial policies, led to economic and land dispossession and dire public health conditions of First Nations peoples throughout the 20th century. According to historian Maureen Lux, much of the federal government’s response to these conditions was neglectful and parsimonious.
After World War II, the Canadian state’s approach to First Nations, including the provision of health care, shifted considerably. The federal government intervened more heavily in cases of contagious illnesses, fearing that such diseases might spread from reserves to nearby settler societies. As anthropologist Lisa Stevenson has shown, between 1954 and 1964 as tuberculosis became the “Scourge of the North,” 8,600 Inuit patients were sent, sometimes forcibly, for treatment in southern hospitals. Many would never return.
The Indian and Northern Health Services, directed by the Department of National Health and Welfare, increased the number of Indian Hospitals, which were segregated community institutions, in its expansion of the Canadian welfare state.
The expansion of the welfare state thus perpetuated the project of colonialism, allocating goods and services to certain residents while maintaining segregation and racial hierarchy. This expanding state also hinged on ideas about individual freedom. Canadian liberalism characterized citizens as “free,” encouraging them through social programs to cultivate autonomy and individualism. Participation in modern Canada and its notions of “freedom” was encouraged, for both settlers and Indigenous populations. But while liberalism underpinned White Canadian prosperity, participation came with extreme costs to individual and collective health and well-being of Indigenous peoples.
For example, in 1947, anthropologist Diamond Jenness proposed a “blueprint for the enfranchisement and racial assimilation of Canada’s Indigenous populations,” as Stevenson described it, before a parliamentary joint committee. While advocating for the enfranchisement of Indigenous peoples, Jenness described “a solution that will be final and definite,” invoking the language of Nazis. In other words, freedom was promised to First Nations, Inuit and Métis peoples on the condition that they would no longer be First Nations, Inuit and Métis.
By contrast, the Canadian government, both at the federal and provincial levels, has intervened much less assertively into the public and private lives of White settlers. Physicians and public health officials have associated disease, and resulting mandates, with groups broadly viewed as “others,” including Indigenous peoples and immigrants of color. Yet, while impacts from the coronavirus itself have certainly been shaped by race, class and gender, Canadian public health mandates, in theory, make no such distinction.
Canada’s history of freedom then, was founded in the unfreedom of Indigenous people. This dynamic has been unnoticed and misconstrued by organizers, attendees and supporters of the Freedom Convoy. On the GoFundMe, the organizers claimed: “We are a peaceful country that has helped protect nations across the globe from tyrannical governments who oppressed their people, and now it seems it is happening here … We are doing this for our future Generations and to regain our lives back.” They are advancing a settler colonial genealogy that deploys the language of “freedom” and “unity” while engaging in actions that are harmful and violent. | null | null | null | null | null |
The roots of the celebrity chefs pitching Super Bowl recipes may surprise you
How Lena Richard, a Black woman, blazed a trail as a chef, author, entrepreneur and mentor
Chef Lena Richard, center, during her televised cooking show in the studios of WDSU. (Newcomb Archives and Nadine Robbert Vorhoff Collection, Newcomb Institute, Tulane University)
By Ashley Rose Young
Ashley Rose Young is the historian of the American Food History Project at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History; she is currently working on two books: an academic manuscript about New Orleans’ street food culture and a biography of Creole chef Lena Richard.
As football fans prepare to host Super Bowl parties, celebrity chefs like Padma Lakshmi, Ina Garten and Bobby Flay are dishing out their favorite game-day recipes on television, the Internet and social media. In 2022, seeing these chefs on programs like the “Today” show and “Good Morning America” or hosting their own shows on platforms like PBS and the Food Network is routine — a much-beloved part of American culture.
But like almost every aspect of American life, the rise of food television and TV chefs has an origin story that largely has been forgotten. Black Creole chef Lena Richard, one of America’s earliest TV stars, played a key role in this history. She was part of the first cohort of chefs whose cooking shows aired in the post-World War II period on local channels across the country, helping to establish the genre of food television. All the while, she blazed a path for Black chefs and worked to train them and boost their careers.
Richard was born in 1892 and grew up in a working-class family in New Orleans. Like her mother, she worked in domestic service as a young adult. Looking to hone her culinary skills, she attended several cooking schools in New Orleans thanks to the sponsorship of her White employer. This support gained Richard access to these professional programs despite Jim Crow segregation.
Hungry to advance her career, she set off in 1918 for the Fannie Farmer cooking school in Boston, the top program for women at the time. Richard’s degree solidified her status as a trained culinary professional.
To build a culinary empire in Jim Crow New Orleans as a Black woman, Richard had to overcome seemingly insurmountable odds tied to racism and sexism. Across the country, very few Black women were able to attend culinary school — let alone access the capital necessary to launch their own food businesses after graduating.
White writers had long portrayed the cooking talents of Black women as “innate” or “magical,” obscuring the years of training they underwent through informal apprenticeships with other Black women. The color line also deprived Black women of opportunities to publish and speak publicly about that knowledge. Instead, White authors regularly appropriated Black women’s recipes and expertise, and their narratives diminished the central role of Black women in the creation of regional and American food cultures.
Yet, importantly, even this discriminatory food culture recognized that Black women possessed culinary skill. This acknowledgment gave Richard a chance to surmount the barriers imposed by the color line.
Richard’s professional credentials and business acumen, paired with her connections to influential advocates and funders, enabled her to rise further than most Black women and become a leading authority on Creole cuisine; her many successes included the release of “Lena Richard’s Cook Book” in 1939, which made her the first Black author to publish a cookbook on Creole cuisine.
She pulled this off at a pivotal moment in New Orleans food history. In the 1930s and 1940s, Americans saw the city as a major center of fine dining. White elites from across the country flocked to dine at renowned restaurants like Antoine’s and Galatoire’s. For Richard to rise to prominence in the city’s food scene — so often dominated by White figures — at this time made her a nationally important figure.
Over the course of her career, Richard owned and operated numerous eateries and catering businesses, founded a cooking school for Black New Orleanians, self-published a cookbook and then republished it for a national audience through Houghton Mifflin, headed several restaurant kitchens along the Eastern Seaboard, ran an international frozen food business that shipped her small-batch Creole and Southern specialties across North and South America, and opened one of the only Black-owned restaurants in New Orleans.
Richard also looked to create educational and professional opportunities for Black youths. In 1937, she opened her cooking school “to teach men and women the art of food preparation and serving … for any occasion.” She also hoped to position her students to demand higher wages. The skills they learned under her tutelage — including how to navigate and advocate for oneself in a racially biased and sexist food service industry — enabled them to build better lives for themselves. One student, Martha Myles, for example, launched her own catering business in 1947.
On Oct. 20, 1949, Richard made history again when she became the first Black woman to host her own self-titled cooking program, “Lena Richard’s New Orleans Cook Book,” on the city’s first TV station, WDSU, which had launched less than a year earlier. Local newspapers covered the show’s premiere, acknowledging Richard’s decades-long career in the food industry and her reputation, both in and outside of New Orleans, as “one of the nation’s top culinary experts.”
That one of the earliest and most-beloved programs on WDSU was a cooking show is unsurprising given the city’s long-lasting love affair with its local cuisine. Richard’s 30-minute program hit a sweet spot, providing viewers with precise and approachable recipes that reflected their city’s unique Creole culture.
Twice a week, Richard guided TV audiences — many of them middle- and upper-class White women who could afford to purchase a TV — through classic Creole recipes from her 1940 cookbook, “New Orleans Cook Book.” Ruth Zatarain, who at the time was recently married and learning how to cook, took careful notes during Richard’s program. Zatarain recalled that Richard “cooked the kind of food that New Orleanians were used to eating. […] Good basic red beans, meatballs and red gravy, and stews, gumbos, that kind of food.” More than 60 years later, Zatarain described to me Richard’s ability to connect with her audiences: “When she was talking to you, it was like you were talking to her in her kitchen.” Richard’s program ran until her sudden and untimely death in November 1950, around age 58.
Richard remained influential even after her death. Marie Matthews, who worked as her television sous chef, built a 42-year career at WDSU, earning induction into the New Orleans media hall of fame.
Initially after her passing, Richard was well remembered by those who grew up eating her food or who saw her on TV, like Virginia McIlhenny, who told me in an interview, “Everybody knew about her.” But as these fans grew older and many passed away, memories of Richard began to fade — even in the New Orleans region.
Nationally, Richard's story disappeared because a majority of archives and libraries, focused on preserving the history of White Americans, men in particular, did not see historic value in the life, labor, love and activism of Black women, especially those working with food.
But as these errors become evident in the 21st century, Richard’s story is making a comeback. Recently, her personal copies of her cookbooks — passed down to her daughter and then her granddaughter — became part of the collections at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History (where I’m a historian). And her story is told in the museum’s “American Enterprise” exhibition, in a special display focusing on female entrepreneurs.
We’re starting to see Richard as the trailblazer she was. From her business endeavors and role in early food media to her community advocacy, she left an indelible mark — not only on New Orleans, but the country.
When we watch Andrew Zimmern and Tim Love show us their favorite recipes for game-day parties, they are building on the legacy that Richard helped create.
Today, there are still too few Black chefs on TV, but key figures in food have fought their way to the top, including Marcus Samuelsson, Carla Hall and Darnell Ferguson. There are also crucial figures in food media such as Toni Tipton-Martin, the 2021 recipient of the Julia Child Award and the editor in chief of Cook’s Country, who are actively creating space for people of color to share their expertise. As food media continues to embrace inclusion, more opportunities will arise for mentorship and community outreach. Those efforts echo the advocacy work that Richard dedicated so much of herself to and reflect her mission to create a better future for the next generation of Black culinary professionals. | null | null | null | null | null |
From "Lakeside," published by Gnomic Book. (Shane Rocheleau)
This photobook grapples with whether the American Dream is real, or just propaganda
I am a big believer in first impressions. Much like cliches, they can often ring true. Of course, they can also be wildly off-key. But I find that more often than not, the gut reaction one gets from meeting a person or looking at a piece of art for the first time isn’t that far off base.
So today I’m writing mostly offmy first impression of Shane Rocheleau’s book “Lakeside” (Gnomic Book, 2022). A week or so ago, the publisher reached out to me to see if I’d be interested in checking it out. I love to see new work, so of course I said, “Yes!”
Not long after that email I got a package containing Rocheleau’s book. The first thing I noticed is the rather cryptic, yet beautiful, front cover. That was a harbinger of what was to come. The book contains a series of mysterious and, yes, beautiful images.
The first thing I usually do with photo books is page through them to try to take them all in, then I go back over more slowly, several times. I look for introductions and afterwords and endnotes, to see what guidance, if there, they can provide for the work.
“Lakeside” is mostly bereft of words, save for two bits — one at the front of the book and another at the back. They help provide a framework in which to “read” the book, but the images are really the star, as they should be.
And the images speak volumes. There’s an overwhelming sense of loss in the images. They come across not dissimilar to the foreboding eloquence of an A24 movie, like “Hereditary” or “Saint Maud.” And the story I pick up on is one of bereavement and loss.
The photos are sumptuous. There is a lusciousness and close attention to detail and detritus. They drip with what seem to be literary and religious references. As a whole, “Lakeside” seems to be a meditation on broken dreams fueled by misguided thoughts that propelled them in the first place.
As it turns out, those broken dreams were built upon that great fable almost all Americans are taught: If we only work hard enough and put our noses to the grindstone, we can achieve it! Never mind the systems of power and hierarchy that exist, that have always existed, and are a barrier to many really being able to grab the golden ring.
The people in Rocheleau’s book, not accidentally, are all men, surrounded by decay, subsumed by darkness. Sometimes they seem confined, peering from doorways and through windows. It’s like they are in prisons of their own thoughts, caught up in the miasma of broken promises.
Rocheleau’s work is driven by an interest in the intersection of masculinity and racism, power and hierarchy. But more importantly, he’s interested in how these things conspire to keep humanity from its full potential.
Here is a snippet from Rocheleau’s artist statement that I think really helps us navigate and understand the motivations behind “Lakeside”:
Those in power in the United States reinforce and redirect powerlessness, fear and paranoia through nationalist rhetoric and myth, fabricated inadequacy and fear-mongering to ensure both political stasis and the self-serving maintenance of hierarchies.
By design … the proletariat direct less ire toward the American system of money and power but, instead, shore up their “private property” — physical, ideological and existential — against manufactured and immediate threats. Within Lakeside, the safety and agency afforded by these physical and abstract property lines is simulated — even if precisely effective — drawn into and around our lives to divert our anger, fear, and paranoia toward scapegoats — non-white immigrants and black, brown and LGBTQI persons, to name a few.
I grew up knowing and liking and spending time with my neighbors. Now, I look askance at too many of them, and too many return the gesture. It hurts. Physical communities … are disintegrating. Capitalism and its hegemonic minions are isolating each of us. We must fight against propaganda, money, power — not one another. We must contend with and embrace Truth, American flaws and injustices, communal suffering, the humanity of all persons, and each other. There’s a possibility for redemption, true community, and love (please, love) with an honest reckoning.
You can find out more about the book, and buy it, here. And you can see more of Rocheleau’s work on his website, here. | null | null | null | null | null |
Is Putin lining up with ultraconservatives? We’re not so sure.
His hard line on gender and sexuality leaves him room to tack to the middle again
Russian President Vladimir Putin attends a news conference with Kazakhstan's president after talks in Moscow on Feb. 10. (Mikhail Klimentyev/AFP/Getty Images)
By Janet Elise Johnson
Alexandra Novitskaya
Valerie Sperling
Lisa McIntosh Sundstrom
Last month, as Vladimir Putin was gathering troops around Ukraine, Russia’s Ministry of Culture proposed a law “on preservation and reinforcement of traditional moral and spiritual values.” The law, designed to promote “a strong family,” aims also to counter “activities of extremist and terrorist organizations, as well as activities of the U.S. and its allies” that threaten Russia’s traditional values. Some observers interpret the proposal as signaling a shift in which elites surround Putin, and they link this social ultraconservatism with the hard-liners pushing for war against Ukraine.
But a close look at the Russian president’s policies and language about gender and sexuality reveals a more complex picture. Putin’s messaging shows that he is not simply in the sway of ultraconservatives, but that he continues to find ways to balance competing elite interests while maintaining mass support.
Gender and sexuality are central aspects of leaders’ political signaling, especially in Russia
Leaders use norms about gender and sexuality to legitimize their regimes, whether through appeals to liberals who generally support gender equality and LGBT rights or to conservatives who reject such views. Gender has played a particularly important role in political ideologies in Russia; the Soviet Union made women’s emancipation, or at least the appearance of it, into a political project. Since 2013, when Russia passed a “gay propaganda” ban arguing that promotion of LGBT rights was harmful to children, the Kremlin has used statements about sexuality to signal that it’s aligned with conservatives promoting a particular worldview of Russia as distinct from and better than the West.
Putin has been mixing these signals to balance competing interests since he rose to power
We recently analyzed two decades of Putin’s major annual speeches. Our study shows that his rhetoric is a balancing act, with messaging to numerous elite and mass audiences. Mixed messages help Putin manage his constituencies’ conflicting expectations and maintain support. In the early 2000s, Putin included progressive remarks about gender, signaling to liberals. He decried the “rarity of women in high governmental positions” and the fact that women “sometimes get less for their work, unfortunately.” He promoted child-rearing as a joint venture, saying that he would not want people to “get the impression that only women should take care of children; that would be wrong in general.” He also spoke about Russia embracing human rights and emancipating women.
After widespread protests over electoral fraud started in 2011, Putin returned to the presidency and replaced this more progressive language with echoes of old Soviet approaches to gender, which combine conservative and progressive values. Putin most often mentioned the “maternity capital” program that rewarded women who had more than one child. Programs like this, modeled on Soviet policies to encourage reproduction, signaled support for Soviet-trained elites who were socialized to believe that men and women were equal, while being essentially biologically different. As revealed in survey data, this take on gender is also that of the average Russian who leans conservative on women’s responsibilities as mothers but accepts divorce and supports women’s equal right to work even when jobs are scarce.
In fact, we found that from 2011 to 2020, Putin made only two gender-related comments in his major domestic speeches that would resonate with the kinds of conservative ideologues who have been pushing for Russia to invade Ukraine. The first was a dismissal of “the rights of sexual minorities” and conflation of homosexuality with “pedophilia.” The second was mild support for repealing what conservatives had labeled “the slapping law” that had criminalized domestic violence for the first time in post-Soviet history.
There is some evidence that Putin is swinging conservative
In addition to extending Putin’s right to rule, Russia’s 2020 constitutional changes included an amendment defining marriage as exclusively between a man and a woman, a provision that boosted turnout. In October 2021, Putin restated his commitment to traditional values, asserting that Russians “must rely on [their] own spiritual values [and] historical tradition.” He also made, for the first time, explicitly transphobic statements, saying that it was “truly monstrous … when children are taught from an early age that a boy can easily become a girl and vice versa.” And at his major annual news conference in December, Putin declared, “I uphold the traditional approach that a woman is a woman, a man is a man, a mother is a mother, and a father is a father.”
However, these recent moves do not necessarily suggest that Putin has sided with this one set of elites. While doling out occasional signals to highly conservative elites and popular constituencies, two decades of evidence suggests that Putin knows his strength lies in his appeal to the broad middle and his ability to manage elites across the spectrum. However pointedly he may signal to conservatives, he still has to manage many different elites and mobilize the appearance of mass support to retain his power.
Janet Elise Johnson is a professor of political science at Brooklyn College CUNY.
Alexandra Novitskaya is a PhD candidate in women’s, gender and sexuality studies at Stony Brook University.
Valerie Sperling is a professor of political science at Clark University in Worcester, Mass.
Lisa McIntosh Sundstrom is a professor of political science at the University of British Columbia. | null | null | null | null | null |
Look for these overlooked and under-the-radar players to impact Super Bowl
Rams' safety Eric Weddle (Kevin C. Cox/Getty)
Most Super Bowls feature rosters that are star-studded, packed with Pro Bowlers and even future Hall of Famers.
Sunday’s game is certainly not lacking in star power. The Los Angeles Rams have Cooper Kupp, Aaron Donald, Von Miller, Jalen Ramsey, Matthew Stafford and others. And on the opposite sideline the Bengals are able to trot out Joe Burrow, Joe Mixon, Ja’Marr Chase and Trey Hendrickson.
But in Super Bowls there are often overlooked player who can make an impact. Let’s look at a few who could steal the spotlight Sunday.
Eric Weddle, Rams safety: Weddle has every reason to be overlooked. He came out of a two-year retirement to join the Rams at the beginning of the playoffs. Now, he’s one of the most interesting and unexpected story lines in the Super Bowl.
He was initially filling in for injured safeties, but the Rams felt good enough about what they saw from Weddle. Even though Taylor Rapp is now healthy, the third-year safety will be backing up the 37-year old Weddle Sunday.
Weddle has done an exceptional job since returning. He became increasingly important with each passing game. He had four tackles in the divisional round game against the Arizona Cardinals, and then in the NFC championship, he managed nine tackles.
For the Super Bowl, he’s one of the most important players on the Rams defense. Coach Sean McVay decided to give him the green dot in his helmet. That means he is the only one to hear the defensive calls, and it’s his job to line everyone up.
Evan McPherson, Bengals kicker: McPherson was the only place-kicker drafted in 2021. In the playoffs, he’s made 12 of 12 field goals, many of them in key, critical parts of games. During the regular season, he was 28 of 33.
He becomes more valuable if this Super Bowl is a low-scoring game. Naturally, when you go against an offense as good as the Rams and a quarterback as good as Matthew Stafford, you would rather have touchdown drives than field goals. But Super Bowls can be tricky. Look at the Rams in their Super Bowl loss to the New England Patriots three years ago — they basically had no offense.
McPherson gives Bengals Coach Zac Taylor a sense of comfort; if he gets in scoring position, he knows he can get points.
Cam Akers, Rams running back: Akers had 625 yards as a rookie and this was supposed to be his breakout season in his second year. Unfortunately, he tore his Achilles tendon in July and missed all but one game in the regular season.
The Rams have been cautious using him in the playoffs. He had 32, 58 and 30 snaps in his three games. That has limited his production, which is why he has turned in only 55, 48 and 48 yards in the three postseason outings.
The run game is vital to the Rams offense and with an extra bye week to get ready, it will be fascinating to see how McVay uses Akers. He is one of the better young backs in the league, and maybe this will be his breakout game.
D.J. Reader, Bengals defensive tackle: Hendrickson and Sam Hubbard are Cincinnati’s primary pass-rushers, and they are both very good. They combined for 21½ sacks during the regular season. But Reader could be a vital part of this game.
The interior of the Rams offensive line isn’t great. During the playoffs, they had problems with inside pass rushers. Reader may not be a sack guy — he only had two sacks during the regular season — but he could put pressure on Stafford and cause problems. Clearly, he will have single blocking and could be a big sleeper in this game.
Darious Williams, Rams cornerback: Williams lines up on the opposite side of Ramsey, and he played well enough this season that a lot of people league think he’ll get more than $10 million a year in free agency. Though he didn’t get an interception this year, he had 71 tackles.
The expectation is Ramsey will matchup most of the game with Chase. That puts Williams in position to get a lot of action. Some of his coverage stats haven’t been great. He had 55 of 86 completions against him, but he only gave up three touchdowns. This will be a good showcase for him as he prepares to enter free agency.
Tyler Boyd, Bengals wide receiver: Even though he’s considered one of the better slot receivers in the game, Boyd has become a little bit of forgotten man. That’s largely because of Chase and Tee Higgins. But if Burrow is looking for a quick option in the face of the Rams’ unforgiving pass rush, Boyd could be in for a big Super Bowl.
During the regular season, he was targeted 94 times and caught 67 passes for 828 yards. But in three playoff games, he only has 10 catches, as the Bengals have been using more two- and three-tight end sets. If Bengals tight end C.J. Uzomah, Boyd could be for even more looks, especially against the Rams’ cover-three defense. Don’t sleep on him. | null | null | null | null | null |
Katie Uhlaender, of United States, slides during the first run of the women's skeleton. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)
YANQING, China — Having sled at five Olympics and lived in the world for 37 years, Katie Uhlaender has experienced all the complexity and contradiction, the exhilaration of competing in the Games and the frustration with the people who run them. She feels cheated by a system complicit of stealing the medal she believes she earned eight years ago, yet she spoke of the “utmost respect” she has for the tainted rival who beat her.
Two Olympic cycles after those 2014 Games, the cloud of Russian doping still hovers over the Games. The Russian Olympic Committee won the team figure skating event Monday, but the skaters have not received their medals. Following days of intrigue and deflection by the International Olympic Committee, the International Testing Agency announced Friday that star 15-year-old skater Kamila Valieva tested positive a banned substance and promised an expedited hearing to determine her eligibility.
“The way I’d look at that is they let them compete, so if comes back positive they’re disqualified,” Uhlaender said. “That’s their own risk. But also, at this point, man, I don’t know. Even being here in China, they have the ITA here and all these people, how do we really know what’s going on behind the scenes? It’s not independent. None of this is independent. It’s all run by the IOC. It’s really hard to have faith in a system that failed so hard in 2014.”
Another Russian doping scandal at the Olympics resurfaced the nation’s history of malfeasance and, to many, the IOC’s inability or refusal to deter it. Russian athletes have competed under the Russian Olympic Committee in the past two Olympics with Russia officially banned after the state-sponsored doping program it employed at the 2014 Games was revealed.
Perhaps no athlete was affected more directly than Uhlaender. She finished fourth at the 2014 Sochi Olympics, behind Russian Elena Nikitna by four hundredths of a second. After the pervasive doping came to light, the IOC banned Nikitina and 27 other Russian athletes from the Olympics for life, putting Uhlaender in position to be retroactively awarded bronze.
On the day Uhlaender arrived in South Korea for the 2018 PyeongChang Games, the Court of Arbitration for Sport overturned the permanent Olympic bans of all 28 Russian athletes. Uhlaender cried when she received the news, but not because it would cost her her first Olympic medal.
“A lot of athletes feel like we’re believing in a movement that is dying,” Uhlaender said then.
Friday morning at Yanqing National Sliding Centre, Uhlaender hurtled 78.9 miles per hour down a curved tube of ice on a “cookie sheet with rails,” as she called her sled, banging off a wall with nothing for protection but a helmet and an elastic polyurethane suit. That is the simple part of her Olympic experience. Uhlaender still thinks about Sochi, but with more nuance than anger.
“It’s not just, ‘Oh, I lost a medal by four-hundredths.’ It’s, ‘I also got cheated,’” Uhlaender said Friday, near the track’s finish. “I know that word is so harsh, and I hate saying it, because I have the utmost respect for the Russian team and Nikitina. It just shows there’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes that exists at the same time as the Olympics being so amazing and inspirational.
“There are other things at play that can kind of take away from that. As an adult, I know these darker layers exist. But at the same time, my passion for sport is there. So I came back trying to focus on that, and I think I’m succeeding at that.”
Reminders are everywhere — including a living, breathing, sliding one. Nikitina is here competing, reinstated as a member of the Russian Olympic Committee after missing PyeongChang. Nikitina finished Friday in 18th place, out contention for a medal. She tearfully told a Russian reporter she had trouble with her technique.
Uhlaender directs any ire not at Nikitina or any other individual, but at systems. She expressed sympathy for athletes “forced into doing potentially harmful drugs.” She alluded to the incestuous nature of Olympic bodies. As one example, CAS, the organization that hears appeals of drug bans, is littered from top to bottom with close connections to the IOC.
Any solution, Uhlaender believes, must start with athletes having genuine representation. In China, Uhlaender has been drug-tested four times in five days, including two tests that involved drawing blood within 12 hours. A legal representative could ensure she could compete without such disruption. To Uhlaender, the problematic lack of athletes’ power goes beyond doping. She noted that Olympic organizers can promote with the likeness of Olympians, but Olympians are restricted by which sponsors’ equipment they can wear in competition.
“We need an independent athlete commission,” Uhlaender said. “We need rights. We need someone that’s specifically here to protect us for our health and safety. Not just for situations like myself that lost out on a medal, but think about the aspect of: They chose to give Russia back the medals after they stripped them. That doesn’t protect the athlete, because that’s why Russia cheated in the first place. That doesn’t protect the athlete from being forced into doing potentially harmful drugs.
“They did not set the parameters by which the athletes can be treated. Somebody has to set those parameters, beyond borders. Sexual harassment. Doping. There’s a number of things where we need protection. You can’t promote and regulate at the same time. That’s why WADA was created. Now we’re just discovering you can’t regulate, promote and protect at the same time. So we need a third branch that’s specifically here to protect us and advocate for our rights.”
Uhlaender once chose not to race at a major event in Sochi because she felt suspicious about what might become of her sample.
“The ITA was like, ‘We’re here independent; we’re hired by the IOC,’ ” Uhlaender said. “I was like, ‘Is that independent?’ ‘We oversee everything.’ Okay, well, so did the KGB.”
Uhlaender has crafted her durable Olympic career through personal tumult beyond the track.
After her father died in 2009, Uhlaender moved to the Atwood-McDonald community in Kansas, where Ted had built a ranch. The entire community, maybe 1,000 people between both towns, felt like family to Uhlaender. Ted’s best friend’s father, Gilbert, was like a grandfather to her.
“He would roll in and be drinking his peach brandy and asking if we wanted to go shoot gophers at, like, 95,” Uhlaender said. “He was classic, and he was a huge supporter of mine.”
As Uhlaender traveled to the skeleton world championships last year, Gilbert died. She could not attend the funeral, so she paid tribute in the way she could. Uhlaender gave her new sled a name and wrote it across the top in black letters: Gilbert.
“I was like, ‘Okay, Gilbert, we’re going to worlds,’” Uhlaender said. “And I’m really happy he made it here, too.”
Friday morning, she ran next to Gilbert, jumped on and sped down the ice. She hit the wall out of tricky Turn 13 on her first run, the mistake that kept her out of medal position, but corrected the mistake on her second. She believes on a track in which anything could happen, her experience can close the gap, maybe enough for her first Olympic medal in five tries.
It would not be the first Olympic experience she cherishes. Despite all that has happened since Sochi, she holds on to memories. She walked out of the finish area happy and proud, convinced she had done all she could, overjoyed for silver medal-winning teammate Noelle Pikus-Place.
“My awesome experience in Sochi can’t be taken from me,” Uhlaender added. “And I can also know this aspect can exist at the same time. I’m choosing to feed this wolf versus that wolf.”
Uhlaender could take Gilbert to the Olympics, and she could see reminders of how the people running the sport she loves have failed her. She could make sure she didn’t wear clothes with her sponsor’s logo, and she could fly 79 miles per hour down a sheet of ice. She could feel dismay, and she could feel alive.
“If we’re honest, that’s life,” Uhlaender said. “What aspect of life is all one thing or the other? I’m someone, as all these people can tell you, I will always fight. I’m not one to be like, well, that’s wrong, I’ll just turn my head and keep going. I believe people have the ability to be better.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Gold medalist Lara Gut-Behrami had an old score to settle in the Olympic super-G
Switzerland's Lara Gut-Behrami celebrates her gold medal in super-G. (Jean-Christophe Bott/EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock)
YANQING, China — Four years ago on a frigid afternoon at the bottom of a mountain in South Korea, when a relatively unproven skier came out of nowhere to win an Olympic gold medal in the women’s super-G, Lara Gut-Behrami, suddenly bumped from third place, slipped out of the leaders’ hut and went to find someplace warm. The difference between the Olympic bronze medal she thought was hers and the fourth-place finish that actually was: one-hundredth of a second.
The fourth-place finish was her second straight in that race, with a total of .08 separating her runs in 2014 and 2018 from a pair of bronze medals. This much was clear entering these Beijing Winter Games: the Olympic super-G owed her one.
On Friday at “The Rock” course at the National Alpine Skiing Centre, Gut-Behrami, a 30-year-old from Switzerland, cashed in that IOU, skiing to a gold medal in the women’s super-G. A stellar career that had included almost every other prize in Alpine skiing — two Olympic bronzes in other events, two world championships golds, one World Cup overall points title — suddenly had a new pinnacle.
“It’s a really good day,” Gut-Behrami said. Though she also speaks Italian, French, German and Spanish, she answered every question in her post-race news conference in English. “It was intense. I just wanted to ski well, and I thought it’s probably going to be the last Olympic super-G of my life. I just wanted to show I could ski super-G. I was really nervous someone would come and be faster. I just wished it wouldn’t happen again today.
Gut-Behrami’s winning time of 1:13.51 was nearly a quarter-second better than silver medalist Mirjam Puchner of Austria (1:13.78), with Swiss teammate Michelle Gisin (1:13.81) taking bronze. “It’s not bad to have the hundredths on my side this time,” Gut-Behrami said.
Ester Ledecka of the Czech Republic -- the same snowboard/Alpine dual-threat whose gold medal run in PyeongChang in 2018 had bumped Gut-Behrami from the podium -- finished fifth. Having already won gold in the snowboard parallel giant slalom in Beijing, she was thus denied a second historic double — although she said she expects to try again in the Alpine combined and downhill.
U.S. skier Mikaela Shiffrin, meantime, finished a distant ninth (1:14.30), but completed a race for the first time at these Olympics, after having failed to post a time in both the giant slalom and slalom earlier this week.
Friday’s field was without Italian star Sophia Goggia, the top female downhill/super-G skier in the world and reigning Olympic downhill champion, who had recovered from the knee injury she suffered in January in time to race Friday’s super-G. But she pulled out after a pair of training runs Thursday, and will now focus on defending her downhill title Tuesday.
Gut-Behrami’s gold was massive news back in Switzerland. Not only did it give the skiing-mad nation an elusive first-ever gold in the super-G — the only race the country had never won in an Olympics — but it also gave Switzerland’s ultimate sports power-couple a new triumph. In July 2018, Lara Gut married soccer star Valon Behrami, a four-time member of Switzerland’s FIFA World Cup team, in what the Swiss newspapers called the “wedding of the year.” She took on the hyphenated surname at competitions beginning in 2019.
They had met just after she had suffered a major knee injury in 2017 — a ruptured ACL and torn meniscus — and needed a sense of perspective in her life. Behrami provided exactly that.
“I had no idea what was best for me, what I really needed, if I was doing it for me or because I was told to, or because everyone expected me to act like that,” she said. “ … Now I’m realizing I ski because I like to ski, but it’s not my entire life.”
Gut-Behrami, the seventh skier out of the starting gate, skied a near-flawless race on a course some World Cup veterans described as the easiest they had skied all season, but she still had to wait through another 37 competitors to see if someone came along and Ledecka’d her out of the top spot.
When it became clear that Gut-Behrami’s time would hold up, she threw her arms around her father and coach, Pauli Gut, for a tearful embrace. A one-time phenom who, at age 17 in 2008, became the youngest skier to win a super-G on the World Cup circuit, she has had some of the greatest successes of her career in the past 24 months -- from her 2021 world championships at Cortina d’Ampezzo in super-G and giant slalom to her six World Cup victories that season, and now to an Olympic gold.
“For sure a lot of things come with experience,” she said. “At 16, I skied fast, but I had no clue what was going on. I was a kid. And so many things, I had no idea how to deal with them. I was growing up with the cameras on me … I didn’t give up dreaming, but I wasn’t expecting it. I stopped working for it, stopped hoping for medals. I just started skiing and realizing I have already achieved a lot. Maybe that was the key.”
On the podium for the medal ceremony Friday, the diminutive Gut-Behrami, standing 5-foot-3, was towered over by the skiers flanking her, the 5-9 Gisin and the 5-11 Puchner. When they converged for the traditional side-by-side-by-side photos, the silver and bronze medalists hunched down to get in the frame.
The waiting was over. The gold medal was around her neck, and there was no one left to come along and take it. | null | null | null | null | null |
LOS ANGELES — A four-time MVP, three Super Bowl players and the beginning of a brother act. The Associated Press 2021 NFL awards had a bit of everything, starting with Green Bay quarterback Aaron Rodgers becoming the fifth player to repeat as Most Valuable Player.
EDMONTON, Alberta — The Edmonton Oilers fired coach Dave Tippett with the star-studded team scrambling to secure a playoff spot.
VANCOUVER, British Columbia — The Vancouver Canucks hired Hall of Famer Cammi Granato as an assistant general manager.
DALLAS — Second-seeded Reilly Opelka advanced to the quarterfinals of the inaugural Dallas Open with a straight-sets win over Cedrik-Marcel Stebe.
ARCADIA, Calif. — Knicks Go won Horse of the Year and older dirt male horse honors at the Eclipse Awards. His trainer, Brad Cox, won for the second straight year as best trainer in a ceremony at Santa Anita. | null | null | null | null | null |
Friday briefing: Border blockades; Trump records; updated milestones for kids; Russian doping controversy; and more
What’s happening? The fastest pace of inflation in 40 years, with January’s prices rising at an annual rate of 7.5%.
What’s being done? Not much yet, though there have been some arrests. The U.S. has urged Canada to use federal powers.
What’s next: A hearing on whether Valieva can continue to compete, as well as what happens to the gold medal she helped Russia win.
In other news: Shaun White came fourth in snowboarding, plus more live updates. | null | null | null | null | null |
An Afghan doctor checks Afghan refugees recently returned from Pakistan during registration at a U.N. refugee agency center on the outskirts of Kabul, June 20, 2013. (Rahmat Gul/AP)
ISLAMABAD, Pakistan — Two journalists working for the United Nations, as well as Afghan nationals, were detained in Kabul, the United Nations said Friday in a tweet.
The tweet from the U.N. refugee agency said that “we are doing our utmost to resolve the situation.” The statement did not specify how many people were detained or who detained them, although the Taliban is the ruling authority in the Afghan capital. The refugee agency, the Office of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, also did not specify the nationalities of the detained journalists, but the Taliban intelligence member said they are foreigners.
Afghan journalists and civil society activists have come under increasing pressure in recent weeks as they push back against restrictions under Taliban rule. A number of women protesters have been abducted; despite international pressure, their whereabouts remain unknown.
Taliban officials have denied any involvement in the abductions of the women protesters and have pledged to respect media freedom. But the group’s fighters routinely use brutal force to break up protests, and Taliban leaders have called on journalists to “be committed to the national interest and Islamic principles.”
The international community has repeatedly said the Taliban must demonstrate greater respect for human rights, most recently at meetings in Oslo. Taliban leadership is pressing for more humanitarian aid to alleviate a spiraling humanitarian crisis and international recognition. | null | null | null | null | null |
What You Can Learn Taking a Bus to the Super Bowl
The Super Bowl is coming to the Los Angeles area Sunday for the first time in 29 years. I won’t be attending, but having just arrived in Southern California for an extended stay, I did feel compelled to mark the event somehow. So on Tuesday morning I walked about a mile to the 17th Street light-rail station in Santa Monica and got on an eastbound train on the E Line. At the La Brea Avenue station I got off and boarded a southbound 212 bus that, after a scenic drive through Baldwin Hills and Windsor Hills (There’s an oil well! There’s the ocean! There’s downtown! There’s … a parked alien spacecraft?), dropped me off at the corner of Prairie and Kelso in Inglewood.
According to Google Maps it’s an 11-minute walk from that corner to the new SoFi Stadium, which will be hosting the Super Bowl and also turns out to have been the alien spacecraft I thought I saw (it has a pretty crazy-looking roof). I could not verify the walk time because the stadium and its parking lots were locked up behind a chain-link fence, but it seemed about right, as did the prediction that the entire journey would take me an hour and 24 minutes.
By car it would have been less than 40 minutes, but a Lyft or Uber would have cost more than $20 rather than the $1.75 I paid for the train and bus. And ride-hailing will presumably take longer and cost a lot more on Super Sunday. Driving your own car certainly will, with the Los Angeles Times reporting that, because stages and event spaces have taken over much of the parking territory around the stadium, nearby spaces are going for as much as $4,850.
Then again, I doubt things will go as smoothly with the 212 bus on Sunday as they did for me, both because of traffic and because you just can’t fit all that many people on a bus. The Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority, aka Metro, is steering game-goers toward riding the higher-capacity light-rail C (Green) Line to a stop two miles from SoFi and then taking free shuttle buses from there. But when Carla Javier of LAist tried that for the National Football Conference championship game at SoFi, she found people who had been waiting an hour for a shuttle. (She opted for the 42-minute walk instead.) Getting places in Los Angeles is hard, at least when lots of other people want to get there too.
Chances are you’re not really looking for advice on getting to the Super Bowl. You may be interested, though, in the state of public transportation in metropolitan Los Angeles and the rest of the U.S. two years into the Covid-19 pandemic. I am, which is why I didn’t end my Tuesday transit journey at SoFi Stadium. After ambling alongside the stadium fence for a while I turned left at Kareem Court just east of the Forum, the legendary arena north of SoFi where my fellow opinion columnist Kareem Abdul-Jabbar’s Los Angeles Lakers used to play, then walked a block to Manchester Boulevard to await the 115 bus that would take me on the next stage of my journey. It was a pretty long wait (about 15 minutes), so I had time for a selfie.
By the time I returned to my Santa Monica lodgings at 2:43 p.m., six hours and two minutes after departing, I had also experienced a bus-window view of the downtown Los Angeles Convention Center, which is hosting the Super Bowl Experience “interactive theme park” this weekend (it wasn’t open Tuesday so I didn’t see any point in stopping), a goat taco at Grand Central Market, coffee in Koreatown, bus rapid transit in the middle of a freeway, underground heavy rail, a Metro Rapid express bus and about 20 minutes of wandering confusedly around Westwood in search of a bus that could get me to Santa Monica. The total cost, meal and beverages not included, was $5.25, although as will be explained it probably should have been a little higher. Fun day, huh?
Los Angeles is, famously, a city that revolves around the private automobile. But it has one of the biggest transit systems in the country, one that in 2020 seems to have passed the Chicago Transit Authority for the most riders of any U.S. transit agency outside of New York (which I left off this chart because New York City Transit’s ridership is so much higher than the others that one can barely differentiate the also rans from one another):
I say “seems” because transit agencies usually track ridership from farebox data, and the buses that constitute the bulk of the Los Angeles system didn’t charge any fares from early in the pandemic until a couple of weeks ago, meaning its numbers are rougher-than-usual estimates.
Still, it makes sense that Metro would have outperformed its peers. Before the pandemic, the more train-centric systems in and around New York, Chicago, Boston, Washington and Philadelphia carried lots of white-collar commuters. Since Covid-19 hit, those people have been going to the office a lot less frequently, if at all, and choosing their own cars over public transportation if they do commute. Trains, which in 2019 surpassed buses in ridership nationwide for the first time in a very long while, are back in second place.
In Los Angeles, where white-collar workers tend to avoid public transportation, trains never came close to matching buses before the pandemic and their ridership was down 40% as of November, before the omicron wave, while bus ridership was off just 22%.
The buses of Los Angeles serve people who can’t work from home, and often can’t afford to drive, and have thus been less likely to stop riding during the pandemic. The fact that the buses were free for almost two years surely played a role as well, and it will be interesting to see what happens to ridership now that fares have been restored. But on my voyage Tuesday the buses were still markedly fuller than the trains.
Fullest of all was the 115, which links a lot of poorer neighborhoods in South Los Angeles. It was also the most, well, normal. A major issue with public transportation in Los Angeles and elsewhere since the start of the pandemic has been that with fewer people using it, the ratio of troubled passengers to normies has risen alarmingly. Sometimes this has had awful consequences, as it did last month when financial consultant Michelle Go was pushed in front of a subway train in Manhattan, and when nurse Sandra Shells was fatally struck while waiting for a bus in downtown Los Angeles.
I didn’t witness any dangerous behavior, but there were ranters, loud singers and, on the subway, passengers who had clearly settled in for the long haul. There was nothing like that on the 115, just people going about their day, with large numbers getting on and off at almost every stop and some pointedly thanking the driver as they left. One woman got on without a mask, but immediately grabbed one from the dispenser near the front of the bus and put it on.
It and all the other buses I rode were also, as best I could tell, payment-optional. I was paying with the Tap LA smartphone app, and the couple of times when I got a “bad configuration” error message from the bus ticket reader I was immediately waved on by the driver. When the driver of the 212 bus lowered the front entrance of the bus to help somebody with a walker to get on, he told everybody else at the stop to go in the back door, thus avoiding payment. And so on. Keeping on schedule is much more of a priority for Los Angeles bus drivers than collecting fares.
There have been calls for Metro to go permanently fare-free, which is a topic for another day. In the meantime it seems to be muddling through Covid-19 at least as well as any other major U.S. transit system. Still, like those other systems, it faces a reckoning soon. There’s the already-discussed collapse of train ridership among affluent commuters but also, as is apparent from the above charts, a decline in bus ridership that started well before the pandemic. The simplest explanation is that an improving economy was making it possible for more Americans to buy cars, which in Los Angeles and elsewhere can almost always get you where you’re going faster than a bus can.
• Congress May Rescue the Post Office From Itself: Timothy O’Brien
• Business Travel’s Pulse Is Growing Stronger: Brooke Sutherland
• Just Say No to Amtrak’s Expensive Expansion Plans: Editorial | null | null | null | null | null |
Cincinnati Bengals fans show their support and enjoy the show during the team's Super Bowl pep rally at Paul Brown Stadium on Feb. 7. in Cincinnati. (Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post)
This sports-crazy, blue-collar town on the banks of the Ohio River didn’t have much to celebrate until recently, when the Bengals’ young quarterback Joe Burrow — the NFL’s number one draft pick in 2020 — led the team in a thrilling come-from-behind overtime victory over the Kansas City Chiefs, earning a trip to Sunday’s Super Bowl.
The town and state have rallied behind the team in a big way, celebrating the Bengals’ “surreal” journey to Los Angeles with outbursts of joy, spontaneous hugs with strangers and chants of “Who Dey?” — the team’s rallying cry. Paul Brown Stadium, one of the city’s iconic landmarks, is blazing orange, as are other buildings across the skyline. Schools will be closed the day after the game. And do they dare even dream of a victory parade?
It still seems hard to believe. Last year, the Bengals won four games, the year before, two. They hadn’t won a playoff game since 1991. This is the team’s third trip to the Super Bowl, but the first in 33 years. Their first two appearances — in 1981 and 1988 — ended in losses to the San Francisco 49ers.
“We are incredibly proud of the Bengals and everything they have accomplished this season,” DeWine said in a statement announcing the honor. “The whole state will be rooting for Cincinnati on Sunday, and this is a fun way to show support for the orange and black.”
The Bengals presented the city with the game ball from their first playoff victory in 31 years on Jan. 15, against the Las Vegas Raiders, and the mayor has been toting it around since.
The contrast between the teams couldn’t be more striking. The itinerant Rams play before celebrities like Jay-Z and Kendrick Lamar while their moneyed fans sip at the champagne bar in the brand-new SoFi stadium. Bengals fans, who have been cheering for their hometown team since 1968, guzzle beer and eat Cincinnati chili while singing along to Guns N’ Roses “Welcome to the Jungle,” their de facto anthem.
Jim Moehring, 54, owner of the Holy Grail sports bar downtown, said this January was the first in a decade that he hadn’t had to lay off any of his kitchen staff, with business up 200 percent during the Bengals’ playoff sweep. He once feared he might have to close down, he said, even though the bar is just yards from home plate of the city’s other cathedral of sport, the Cincinnati Reds’ stadium.
He endeared himself to his home state during his speech the night he won the Heisman trophy in 2019, after winning the national championship as the quarterback at Louisiana State University.
People say they like Burrow because he’s humble and tough, with just the right amount of swagger. He managed to overcome a serious knee injury in a late-season game against the Washington Football Team in 2020 to take his team to a 10-7 record this year, surviving a playoff game against the Tennessee Titans where he was sacked nine times. Asked by reporters Monday which of his many nicknames he prefers — “Joe Brrr” is one, also “Joe Cool” — he said simply, “Just call me Joe.”
At a Monday night pep rally at Paul Brown Stadium before the team left for Los Angeles, fans draped themselves in fuzzy tiger-stripe blankets, braved a wind chill of 25 degrees and chanted “Who dey? Who dey? Who dey think gonna beat dem Bengals?” (Answer: “Nobody!”) The noise level in the stadium rose to a dull roar when the team entered through a cloud of fake smoke. Burrow got the loudest cheer, along with the chant for “MVP, MVP,” which is what he could be named by the league if he manages to bring the Vince Lombardi Trophy home next week. | null | null | null | null | null |
In the 1950s, their lonely battles on rights and the environment heralded changes to come
Some leaders of the women's movement pass a torch that was carried by foot from New York to Houston, Tex., for the November 1977 National Women's Convention. Among the marchers, front, from left to right: tennis star Billie Jean King, in blue shirt and tan pants; former U.S. Congresswoman Bella Abzug, wearing her trademark hat; and feminist writer Betty Friedan, right, in red coat. (Greg Smith/ASSOCIATED PRESS)
By Lizabeth Cohen
Lizabeth Cohen is the Howard Mumford Jones Professor of American Studies at Harvard University. She is the author, most recently, of “Saving America’s Cities: Ed Logue and the Struggle to Renew Urban America in the Suburban Age,” which won the 2020 Bancroft Prize in American History.
Forget the stereotype of the patriarchal-family-dominated, suburban-rooted, church-going 1950s of television sitcoms. In its place, James R. Gaines proposes a decade that launched the social activism of the 1960s and 1970s around gay rights, second-wave feminism, civil rights and the environment. This is not an uncommon claim among historians, who often search for origin stories in a deeper past. Gaines, a journalist who rose to be managing editor of Time magazine and has written three serious books of history, adds a twist, however.
In “The Fifties: An Underground History,” he argues that the later successes of these movements can be directly attributed to courageous individuals who often suffered isolation, ostracism, even familial banishment for battling to improve their own, and many others’, lives. That they fought sometimes lonely struggles confirms that the 1950s indeed valued conformity and complacency. Gaines does not deny that reality and in fact documents much ugliness from the era: gay bashing, authoritarian policing, patriarchal oppression, white supremacy and profiteering from environmental contamination. But he also offers a response — and potentially an inspiration — to those today who see around them only systemic and hard-to-budge racism, sexism, economic inequality and climate catastrophe. Instead, he insists, individuals committed to change can make a difference.
In making his case for individual heroism, Gaines provides engrossing character studies of people both well-known and more obscure. Some of the most famous figures are gay rights activist Harry Hay, who founded the Mattachine Society; Black lawyer Pauli Murray, who developed brilliant legal arguments that led to Supreme Court victories for greater gender and racial equality; Betty Friedan, the pioneering feminist who authored “The Feminine Mystique” and helped establish the National Organization for Women (NOW); Medgar Evers, the NAACP’s Mississippi field secretary who worked tirelessly to overturn segregation and was assassinated for it; and biologist Rachel Carson, whose hugely influential book “Silent Spring” is credited with launching the modern environmental movement with its no-holds-barred condemnation of the pesticide-producing chemical industry. All of these lives are well documented in biographies, memoirs and scholarly publications, from which Gaines skillfully draws his evidence. In a few cases, he has also consulted personal papers.
More fascinating to me, however, are the many lesser-known individuals who populate Gaines’s book as agents of change. We meet Frank Kameny, who battled for gay rights from the 1950s until President Barack Obama extended employees’ benefits to same-sex partners in 2010; historian Gerda Lerner, who pioneered the field of women’s history, with particular attention to the untold story of Black women’s lives; decorated Army Sgt. Isaac Woodard, who was blinded by a South Carolina police chief on his way home from World War II; and MIT mathematician turned skeptic of technology Norbert Wiener.
These are only some of the characters who fulfill Gaines’s claim that individual activists mattered. But it is striking how so many of their successes depended on the cadre of like-minded colleagues who fought alongside them. Gaines is correct that the mass movements that emerged in the next decade did not burst forth full-blown. But he misses the importance of this intervening level of activists, without whom the leaders would have failed. It took a village — not a city, but also not one individual soul — to launch a movement with the capacity to take down an entrenched status quo.
Gaines’s focus is on what his subjects did in the 1950s as they launched their movements. Although we learn some about their prior experiences, Gaines did not search for any common patterns in their personal histories. A couple of parallels struck me, however. World War II played an outsize role in inspiring these individuals and sustaining their movements. A vast majority of the activists were veterans, an experience that particularly motivated Black Americans. Lerner was a Holocaust survivor. Wiener designed missile guidance systems, whose legacy grew to frighten him. The self-appointed security force for the March on Washington in 1963 was composed of Black veterans who applied the structure and strategies they learned in the military to keep a demonstration of 250,000 peaceful.
Another, perhaps more unexpected, source of inspiration was participation in the Communist Party or similar radical movements. Hay brought communist-like cells to the Mattachine Society. Lerner’s work to create the communist Congress of American Women launched her feminist institution-building. Friedan applied the polemical skills she had developed writing for left-wing unions in the 1940s to her success selling “the problem that has no name,” her description in “The Feminine Mystique” of female unhappiness in the years after World War II. Wiener was never a member of the Communist Party, but he made no secret of his dislike of capitalism and sympathy with workers whose livelihoods he feared would be lost to automation.
That people’s prior participation in radical politics fed their willingness, and ability, to act against injustice turned out to be indicative of a larger reality in the lives of these activists. Despite our tendency to tie leaders to one particular movement, it turns out that a great deal of cross-fertilization was underway — among individuals as well as movements. Gaines conveys that when he introduces Fannie Lou Hamer in his feminism chapter rather than the one on civil rights. Or when we learn that consciousness-raising and the message that “the personal is political” appeared in Hay’s gay rights struggle, long before the women’s movement to which it is usually attributed. Murray battled both gender and racial discrimination and played a pivotal role in both movements, articulating “intersectionality” years before Kimberlé Crenshaw would label it and give it theoretical depth.
Less surprising but poignant nonetheless is the recurrence in all these movements of a struggle between moderates and radicals. The battle took a different form in each movement. In the early gay rights movement, those hoping for broad cultural change found themselves up against opponents seeking only the decriminalization of homosexuality. The reformist founders of NOW like Friedan alienated Murray with their narrow appeal, to the point that she withdrew her name as a board candidate. Everywhere in the South, the more-establishment NAACP faced challenges, whether from the more direct-action-oriented activists of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee or the militant gun club led by Robert F. Williams. The chapter on ecology, which focuses not on an emerging social movement but rather on two individuals — scientists Carson and Wiener — shows that the struggle between moderation and radical transformation took place within each person over time. Whereas early in their careers Carson and Wiener believed unequivocally in the value of scientific progress, by the end of their lives they “converged on the heretical, even subversive idea that the assertion of mastery over the natural world was based on an arrogant fantasy that carried the potential for disaster.”
Beyond the significance of individual action, this underground history of the 1950s has another message for today. It serves as a reminder of the hard work and personal sacrifice that went into fighting for the constitutional rights of gay people, Blacks and women as well as for environmental protections. As we face ongoing threats in all those arenas, it is clear that despite the somewhat triumphalist trajectory of Gaines’s narrative, pointing as it does to the legislative and regulatory victories to follow, these battles have not been permanently won. Dedicated leaders, flanked by equally committed cadres, are still required.
Lizabeth Cohen is the Howard Mumford Jones professor of American studies at Harvard University. She is the author, most recently, of “Saving America’s Cities: Ed Logue and the Struggle to Renew Urban America in the Suburban Age.”
The Fifties
An Underground History
Forget the stereotype of the patriarchal-family-dominated, suburban-rooted, churchgoing 1950s of | null | null | null | null | null |
So when Heather Havrilesky declared, in the New York Times, “Do I hate my husband? Oh for sure, yes, definitely,” people took up her words with relish. The Atlantic’s David Frum likened the essay, excerpted from Havrilesky’s new book, “Foreverland: On the Divine Tedium of Marriage,” to “filing your divorce papers in front of millions of people.” In a now-deleted tweet, the feminist writer Andi Ziesler suggested, with magnificent passive-aggression, “It might be a net good if we stopped conflating ‘successful marriage’ and ‘marriage that lasts forever.’” | null | null | null | null | null |
Demonstrators gather in Hong Kong in 2019. Two new books, one by an American writer with long experience in the former British colony, the other by a local Chinese woman, see Hong Kong through different perspectives. (Justin Chin/Bloomberg)
By Keith Richburg
Keith Richburg is director of the University of Hong Kong’s Journalism and Media Studies Center. He covered the Hong Kong handover as a correspondent for The Washington Post.
China’s communist authorities in Beijing and their handpicked leaders in Hong Kong have been busy lately trying to rewrite the recent tumultuous history of this former British colony turned Chinese “special administrative region.”
In the government’s revisionist narrative of the 2019 protests, espoused repeatedly in official pronouncements and the state-run media, no mention is made of the unpopular extradition bill that triggered the unrest or the heavy-handed police response that fueled citizens’ anger. Instead, the near-daily demonstrations were “violent riots” by pro-independence separatists and were orchestrated by anti-China “foreign forces” intent on undermining communist rule. China’s leadership insists that the new national security law has restored peace and stability and that China’s drastic overhaul of the city’s electoral system has improved its democratic development.
Fortunately, a plethora of new books published or in the pipeline is offering a corrective, with journalists and authors providing a contemporaneous record of the sweeping changes that have convulsed Hong Kong since the Occupy Central protests, also called the Umbrella Revolution, in 2014. But most observers writing about Hong Kong use 1997 as their starting point, the time when the city ended a century and a half as a British colony and began an uncertain future under Chinese sovereignty.
Two recent books cover roughly that same period, from the handover through the Umbrella Revolution and up to the 2019 protests and the imposition of the security law. But the authors come from widely different backgrounds, experiences and sensibilities.
“Today Hong Kong, Tomorrow the World: What China’s Crackdown Reveals About Its Plans to End Freedom Everywhere,” by Mark L. Clifford, is the more polemical of the two. Clifford, an American former journalist, spent almost three decades in Hong Kong, first for the now-defunct Far Eastern Economic Review magazine and later as editor in chief of two of the city’s surviving English-language newspapers, the Standard and the South China Morning Post. His is a journalistic book in the traditional sense, offering readers a rapid-fire recounting of the key events from the Occupy movement to the arrests of prominent politicians and journalists in 2020 and 2021. He also takes time to delve into the history of the handover negotiations between Britain and China, as well as the Tiananmen Square crackdown of 1989, which plunged Hong Kong into crisis and prompted a wave of emigration.
Karen Cheung’s “The Impossible City: A Hong Kong Memoir” is a more personal work, detailing her search for identity, struggles with depression and political awakening, which came about around the time of the most recent protests. The unrest serves primarily as a backdrop to her biography as a young Chinese woman who came of age in the post-colonial years when Hong Kong was under China’s sovereignty; initially little changed, and there was general optimism that the territory would be allowed to maintain its separate, autonomous system unimpeded for 50 years, as China had pledged in the handover.
While Clifford is angry and unsparing in his criticisms of China’s communist leaders and Hong Kong’s local officials, Cheung offers more of a sad lament for a city that she has called home since the age of 1 but that she only recently grew to love.
Clifford lived in Hong Kong long enough to gain status as a permanent resident with voting rights. But he still at times writes about the city as an expatriate outside observer looking in. He sprinkles his chapters with a few characters — his barber, a financial professional, an art gallery owner and his Cantonese teacher, whose goal was to compile the first dictionary of Cantonese. But these characters are rarely fully developed beyond a few pages, and most quickly disappear.
He also devotes surprisingly scant attention to the protests that erupted in early June 2019 and continued into early 2020. “The 2019 summer of democracy descended into an increasingly bitter and violent autumn of discontent,” he notes in a chapter called “The Endgame.” He talks about how “police violence . . . sparked violence on the protesters’ side.” But he hurries through or skips over major events in the timeline.
Clifford, now back in the United States, is a former board member for Next Digital, the parent company of the popular pro-democracy newspaper Apple Daily, which was forced to close in 2021 when its top editors were arrested and the paper’s assets frozen. Its publisher, Jimmy Lai, was arrested in 2020. Clifford does not hide his admiration for Lai, who messaged the author “I’m being arrested” just as Clifford was on the way to meet him for breakfast. “The arrest of Jimmy Lai Chee-ying in February 2020 marked the intensification of a more sinister approach by Hong Kong authorities,” Clifford writes.
Lai, who is Catholic, wrote to Clifford from prison, apologizing to the author for causing him trouble because of their association and saying, “May the Lord’s peace and grace be with you and your family.”
“This is the man China wants to destroy because of what he believes,” Clifford writes angrily. “Why is China afraid of Jimmy Lai? Why is China afraid of the Hong Kong people? Why is China afraid of freedom?” He later answers his own question, saying, “Hong Kong is a key battleground in China’s campaign to extinguish free thought,” which, he argues, has global consequences.
“China wants to decide what can be said, what slogans can be shouted, even what songs can be sung. China wants to decide whom presidents and prime ministers and parliamentarians can meet,” Clifford writes. He argues for the West to totally decouple its “economic, cultural, and personal links” to China — without explaining how such a separation could feasibly occur given the world’s interlinked economies. And in a bit of hyperbole, he adds, “Anything less may amount to an American death wish.”
Cheung spends little time on political analysis or colonial history. She even offers what sounds like an apology, writing, “I did not want to write a book ‘about Hong Kong’” and adding, “Maybe this isn’t the book you expected to read.” But through her graceful writing, especially about her early years, we learn about Hong Kong’s many different worlds and social strata, and her struggles to find her place.
She went to an expensive international primary school run by Singaporeans — not because her father could afford it but out of his “wounded pride,” suggesting she was not accepted to the elite public schools because she was born in mainland China. In the primary school, she barely understood English, and her native language, Cantonese, was forbidden on campus, with Mandarin being the medium of instruction. When her friends from the Singaporean school went off to even pricier international high schools, she ended up back in the public school system, where she was “smack in the middle between the kids on social welfare and the ones who get sent off to English boarding schools.”
When Cheung’s old primary-school friends later called her “local,” it wasn’t as a compliment. And while other high school students set their sights on prestigious universities in the United States or Britain, she knew nothing about applying for scholarships and stayed home. “To the world I am in then,” she writes, “the University of Hong Kong is the holy grail.” She excelled in English and was drawn to writing and journalism, even though her teachers called it a “waste” because she didn’t choose to study law.
Her lyrical book is part diary and part love letter to her hometown, although she concedes that she didn’t actually come to love it until she moved away from her family’s apartment to attend the University of Hong Kong. She inhabited an entirely different world than the one known to expats, starting out cloistered in a working-class area called To Kwa Wan on the Kowloon side of the harbor, where, she recalls, “I don’t recall ever running into a single white person.”
Cheung’s Hong Kong was far removed from the power brokers and business types who frequented the Mandarin Oriental hotel coffee shop and the prestigious Hong Kong Club. She hung out in the small bookstores that doubled as coffee shops, the restaurants atop the wet markets, the warehouses where indie bands played, the record shops and the waterfront parks. She had 22 different roommates in six different apartments from the time she left home for university until she met her partner.
Clifford had a close-up look at the 1997 handover events, from the rain-drenched ceremony on the harbor front to the Chinese border, where he watched thousands of People’s Liberation Army troops pour over.
Cheung in 1997 watched the handover unfolding on television as an unknowing 4-year-old kindergartner enjoying steamed fish. When planes took off from the nearby airport, rattling her home as they whisked away Hongkongers anxious to flee Chinese rule, Cheung professes that she was “oblivious to it all.” Later, she says, “Post-handover, my life is exactly the same.” She was still eating her pork and egg congee and enjoying Japanese anime cartoons.
She writes about joining the protests in 2019 but never feeling entirely a part. She went to work most weekdays and on weekends donned her yellow hard hat and protective gear, not really knowing many of her fellow protesters. “It feels as if those two worlds do not converge,” she writes.
She has considered leaving, like many of her friends. But “for now,” she writes, “I’d like to stay as long as is possible, knowing one day it won’t be possible anymore.”
While coming from different vantage points, both books end on a similarly bleak note. Clifford concludes, “Hong Kong as a free city is no more.” Cheung writes, “This book is about the many ways a city can disappear, but also the many ways we, its people, survive.”
Keith Richburg is the director of the University of Hong Kong’s Journalism and Media Studies Center. He covered the Hong Kong handover as a correspondent for The Washington Post.
Today Hong Kong, Tomorrow the World
What China’s Crackdown Reveals About Its Plans to End Freedom Everywhere
The Impossible City
A Hong Kong Memoir | null | null | null | null | null |
It’s a pas de deux that plays out for over 25 laps.
So much uniformity. Or at least there was before Nils van der Poel showed up at these Beijing Olympics, where the Swedish skater has continued his stellar 2021 form, resetting records and seizing a small golden bounty at speeds that untrained eyes, that human eyes, have never seen.
“Eight laps to go, I felt like, ‘Okay, I got the gold within control. Now I just need to not f*** it up,’” he said. “With four laps to go it was like, ‘Okay, now I can also go for the world record now,’ and then I kind of wanted to go for it.”
The 25-year-old entered Beijing hoping to win a gold medal. He said he wanted to have fun and endure pain; and he accomplished all three Sunday when he scorched the ice to snatch the gold medal from Roest, his longtime Dutch competitor, in the 5,000-meter event.
“It’s really amazing how far he’s been able to raise the level,” said Ted-Jan Bloemen, the Dutch-born Canadian whose Olympic title van der Poel seized. “He just gets in such a nice rhythm and just keeps going and going, and from there he can accelerate a little bit at the end. I think it’s beautiful.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Suzanne Schulting of the Netherlands, reacts after winning the final of the women’s 1000-meters during the short track speedskating competition at the 2022 Winter Olympics, Friday, Feb. 11, 2022, in Beijing. (AP Photo/Natacha Pisarenko)
BEIJING — Suzanne Schulting of the Netherlands successfully defended her title in 1,000-meter short track speedskating Friday night. | null | null | null | null | null |
The ground at 9th and G streets was broken in July 1968, just three months after King’s assassination, to make way for a new central library, and for a time, “central library” was all it was called. But in early 1970, community members launched a letter-writing campaign to demand it be named in King’s honor — a fitting choice, they said, on such a prominent new building that would be an accessible resource to all.
The campaign encompassed groups from the D.C. Republican Committee to Anacostia Citizens and Merchants Inc., to regular Washingtonians such as Robert Frazier, who wrote that he was in sixth grade at the Moten School.
Four days later, the library system’s board of trustees voted 5 to 2 in favor of naming the new central library after King. The White vice president of the board had unsuccessfully proposed naming only the library’s Black studies room after him.
Today, MLK Library reflects this activism, even as it recently underwent a three-and-a half-year, $211 million renovation.
Despite the recent auditorium-naming controversy, Reyes-Gavilan said, the library’s overarching tribute is clear.
The backlash, Reyes-Gavilan said, showed that the naming process “is flawed.” He said that the library system sent the Morrison family a letter about the naming and that it was unclear what their wishes are at this time. | null | null | null | null | null |
Winter is a fine time for a hike on Theodore Roosevelt Island. (Carolyn Van Houten/The Washington Post)
When temperatures go down, your instinct might be to cozy up. Instead, take off your slippers and put on your hiking boots. These cold-weather months are the perfect time to enjoy some of the region’s best trails, where you will be treated to stunning natural beauty and captivating wildlife — minus the crowds and clamor of summertime. These six spots span skill and stamina levels, so you can find a trail that’s the right challenge for you. After finishing your trek, slip back into your slippers. You earned it.
Theodore Roosevelt Island
This woodsy isle nestled in the Potomac River brims with beauty all year long, offering restorative calm just minutes away from the bustle of the city. Take the 1½-mile Swamp Trail to get the fullest view of the island: A boardwalk traverses a cattail marsh and swampy woodlands, while a gravel pathway wends through the forest. If you want to explore further, the Woods Trail goes to the memorial plaza, which is dominated by an imposing stone statue of Roosevelt and is ringed with quotes from the 26th president on nature, youth and manhood. To get yourself in the mood for your visit, pick up a copy of Melanie Choukas-Bradley’s excellent “Finding Solace at Theodore Roosevelt Island,” a loving homage to the natural wonders of this lush little island.
Open daily from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. Parking lot off George Washington Memorial Parkway, Arlington, Va. nps.gov/this/index.htm. Free.
Mason Neck State Park
Whether your kid is tiny, teen or in between, this 1,856-acre park in Fairfax County has a hike for them. Those with little ones can opt for the easy 1⅓-mile Bayview Trail that runs alongside the beach on Belmont Bay. For a longer trek, stitch that trail together with the Eagle Spur and Dogue trails, which adds nearly 5 miles, taking you through a large swath of the park. No matter where you go, keep an eye out for bald eagles.
Open daily from 8 a.m. until dusk. 7301 High Point Rd., Lorton, Va. dcr.virginia.gov/state-parks/mason-neck. $10 per vehicle.
Occoquan Bay
Perched at the convergence of the Potomac River and the Occoquan River, this onetime military research facility is now a tranquil wildlife refuge. A verdant blend of wetlands, woodlands and grasslands spread across 642 acres, the park is the home to a host of bird life — including bald eagles and blue herons, osprey and great horned owls — as well as beavers, otters, deer and red foxes. For the best chance to spot an array of furry and winged creatures, take the 2-mile main loop trail. This flat gravel pathway starting at the parking lot is easygoing for hikers of all ages and abilities. Pause for a moment at the gazebo on the river’s shoreline, where swivel-mounted binoculars help you spot waterfowl.
Open daily from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. through March 31; open from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m. April 1-September 30. 13950 Dawson Beach Rd., Woodbridge, Va. fws.gov/refuge/occoquan_bay/. Free.
An impressive 37 miles of trails wind their way through this well-forested 15,000-acre park, the largest green space in the D.C. metropolitan region. Starting near the Pine Grove picnic area by the visitor center, the 6.2-mile North Valley Trail is a good hike for families whose kids can endure a few hours of walking (if you need to bail early, there are plenty of shortcuts back). The path is generally level — though there are a few steep spots — following Quantico Creek and ending at a picture-worthy waterfall. Along the way, you’ll pass the ruins of a pyrite mining operation.
Open daily from sunrise to sunset. 18170 Park Entrance Rd., Triangle, Va. nps.gov/prwi/index.htm. $20 per vehicle.
Seneca Creek State Park
Stretching along Seneca Creek to the Potomac River, this 6,300-acre park in Montgomery County boasts 50 miles of trails. The relatively easy 3.7-mile Lake Shore Trail, accessible near the parking lot, loops around Clopper Lake. Keep an eye out for herons, ducks and turtles as you cross over several streams. This placid, picturesque hike is perfect if you’re looking to decompress with your family and soothe anxieties.
Open daily from 10 a.m. until sunset through February 28. Open daily 8 a.m. until sunset March 1-Oct. 31. 11950 Clopper Rd., Gaithersburg, Md. dnr.maryland.gov. Free on weekdays; $3 for Maryland residents and $5 for out-of-state residents on weekends and holidays.
Falling Branch area of Rocks State Park
If you are going to go chasing waterfalls, this one is worth the pursuit. Kilgore Falls is Maryland’s second largest, tumbling down over 17 feet. In the winter, it sometimes freezes, creating a towering ice sculpture that looks like it was transported from Beyond the Wall in Westeros. It’s easy to access via the Falling Branch Trail, which is only a mile round trip. At one point, the trail goes over steppingstones in a stream, so wear waterproof boots. Additionally, expect portions of the trail to be slippery because of ice and snow. Note: Parking is limited, so the lot can fill up quickly on weekends and holidays (the park is requiring advance reservations from May 1 to Labor Day).
Open daily sunrise to sunset. 1026 Falling Branch Rd., Pylesville, Md. dnr.maryland.gov. Free.
More ideas for getting outdoors
5 spots for hiking that are perfect for the whole family
How to make the most of the National Arboretum, from the redwood grove to the secret pavilion | null | null | null | null | null |
Jordan Reed, 9, leads his fourth-grade class on Feb. 4 to protest their California school's removal of chocolate milk from the lunch menu. (KCRA)
His chosen tools: well-researched arguments, protest signs and the backing of dozens of others who had also been robbed.
Jordan, a 9-year-old fourth-grader at Sierra Vista K-8 School in Northern California, took to heart last week’s lesson about opinion writing, unleashing what he had learned of Vacaville Unified School District’s 2020 decision to remove chocolate milk from the lunch menu. Within roughly 24 hours, Jordan turned the classroom instruction into a protest with his 26 classmates — and one sixth-grader — that drew the school district’s nutrition department to Sierra Vista for an impromptu, on-the-spot negotiation with Jordan and his comrades.
Last week, Jordan’s teacher, Emily Doss, reviewed what her 27 students had learned earlier in the year about opinion and argumentative writing. To do so, she gave them a Scholastic News article titled “Should Schools Serve Flavored Milk?” The story featured Esteban Perez, a Missouri fourth-grader who last year successfully lobbied his school to reintroduce the strawberry milk it had taken away.
“But I didn’t know that Jordan said, ‘That’s not good enough for me,’ ” Doss told The Post.
Even though he asked his mother not to post anything on Facebook so he could maintain the element of surprise, she gave her fellow principal at Sierra Vista a heads-up that her son was busy mounting a protest that might burst onto the scene the following school day. Word of Jordan’s plan made its way to Elaine Kong, the district’s communications director, who tipped off a local TV station.
Doss, however, didn’t learn about it until the following day when the KCRA news crew was already on its way to the school. After rushing back to her students, she told them of Jordan’s imminent protest and rallied his classmates to help him pull it off.
“It felt like the last day of school, when kids are so hyped up that they can’t bring it back down,” Doss said.
The result: The school agreed to serve chocolate milk one day every two weeks.
“I felt good about it, because I brought back something that everybody wanted,” Jordan told The Post.
“To remove it completely maybe wasn’t the best decision,” Wilim said, adding: “It was really cool the way that Jordan presented himself to bring in a healthy debate and for us to find a compromise — that chocolate milk should be available as a treat.” He also broke some good news for Jordan: School administrators plan to sweeten the deal they struck with him at Friday’s protest. They’ll offer chocolate milk once a week instead of every other week.
So what was the debate all about? Depends on whom you ask.
At least that’s what she was trying to say until Jordan interrupted her.
“No, it was about the chocolate milk,” he said.
Nevertheless, Jordan and his classmates have been buoyed by their advocacy success. They’ve started talking about other things they want to fight to improve.
But it’s good that they’re looking for ways to advocate for themselves and change the world for the better, Doss said. “It started off as not being a big thing, and then it just kind of took off,” she said, adding: “It was pretty cool to see … how it went from a review lesson to this huge life lesson for these kids.” | null | null | null | null | null |
A protester with a New Zealand flag stands in front of Parliament buildings on the fourth day of demonstrations against covid-19 restrictions, inspired by a similar demonstration in Canada, in Wellington on February 11, 2022. (Marty Melville/AFP/Getty Images)
Individuals gathered outside parliament for a fourth day, inspired by the massive trucker protests paralyzing the Canadian capital. As with the self-described “Freedom Convoy” in Canada, protesters in New Zealand are unhappy about coronavirus related restrictions, with demonstrations growing to encompass a series of broader grievances against Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s government. A handful of similar protests have also sprung up across the globe including in France and Australia.
“Police have identified a range of different causes and motivations among the protestors, making it difficult to open clear and meaningful lines of communication,” said Wellington District Commander, Superintendent Corrie Parnell, in a statement.
“It is important to note that Police on Parliament grounds continue to take a measured approach,” Parnell said. While police there had been seen carrying batons, “that was not in line with current approach and staff have now removed this equipment,” he added.
“So passive aggressive. Love it,” tweeted one person in New Zealand, while another wrote: “Overseas countries have water cannons, New Zealand has sprinklers.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Opinion: After a school shooting in Montgomery County, students turned to social media. They should have called 911.
Police block the entrance to Magruder High School in Derwood after a SWAT team responded to shooting incident on Jan. 21. (Bill O'Leary/The Washington Post)
Marcus Jones is the Montgomery County chief of police.
When a 17-year-old student allegedly shot a 15-year-old student at Magruder High School on Jan. 21, there were several disturbing aspects to the incident. First, of course, that the shooting took place at all, and within the confines of a Montgomery County public school, at that. Second, the weapon used was a “ghost gun,” otherwise known as a privately manufactured firearm, made from a mail-order kit and totally untraceable.
The element of the crime that has the longest-lasting impact and might be the most serious danger to all of us is that there were witnesses to the crime who did nothing to help the victim or try to make sure the person who committed the crime would be caught.
This wasn’t a case in which the students took a vow of silence to protect themselves from retribution or simply didn’t want to get involved. Just the opposite. They told the whole world, but not the appropriate part of the world. Rather than notify the school staff or get in touch with 911 by calling or texting, students instead posted about it on Twitter and Snapchat. Their followers knew what had happened at the school, and whoever received the shared or retweeted tweets knew, and perhaps they even sent it further along. None of that helped someone who was in need. In the long run, after the student who was shot recovers and after ghost guns are banned (I hope), that’s the real tragedy here.
Social media can cause some of our best citizens to lose focus during a critical moment. I’m not here to attack Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and the rest. Plenty of others are doing that quite well. There’s a lot to be said for a technology that allows people to keep in touch and to share their life experiences and interests in sports, music and much more. Yes, social media can bring people together, and, as we have seen in a wider political and societal context, social media can help drive people apart, into their own worlds of like interests of politics or hate.
Online social media, however, cannot take the place of social responsibility IRL (in real life).
The lure of RTs (retweets) and shares shouldn’t obscure the basic principle of helping someone who needs help, such as someone who has been shot or beaten. Even if someone sees a crime and doesn’t call the police, he or she should at least have a thought for the victim and act accordingly.
The Magruder incident isn’t an isolated occurrence. In another case, 11 people witnessed an assault in Silver Spring, and not one called the police or even stuck around to tell what they had seen. If someone has been shot, stabbed or beaten and is fighting for life, the least anyone could do is punch three digits on a phone. Emergency calls are anonymous, so the person calling isn’t in any danger.
It could be that we need better tools that make it easier for people to report crimes. We can look into video tip lines. Through text, an app or a website, someone could forward, anonymously, video of an incident. We could do this in real time or with a recorded video.
Even though we wouldn’t know who is sending it, video could help investigators looking into a crime determine crucial facts. And, of course, if done in real time, it could save someone’s life. As we strive to improve our 911 system by implementing Next Generation 911, we hope to accomplish those opportunities.
Would anyone use a video tip line? Perhaps, perhaps not, but we need to give people every option we can to do the right thing. We know some people don’t like the police and don’t want to help the police. We know we have a lot of work to do. We work every day to establish better relations with the people in our community.
What we’re talking about here, however, is a much more basic issue of responsibility, personal and to society. This is a discussion that I hope teachers will have with their students and that adults should have as well.
How is it that people can watch a shooting or beating or stabbing and not do anything for the person being attacked? Even if you don’t know first aid, even if you don’t want to call the police, at least tell someone who can help. Even better, students or others can prevent tragedy if they warn school security or law enforcement if they know someone has a weapon.
This isn’t about betraying friends or snitching. It’s about a responsibility to your neighborhood, your community or simply the health and safety of another person. | null | null | null | null | null |
Opinion: A more connected Maryland would improve inclusivity and equity
The Twinbrook Metro station is one of 17 designated transit-oriented development locations in Maryland. (Dan Morse/The Washington Post)
By Jazz Lewis
Malcolm L. Augustine
Pamela G. Beidle
Jazz Lewis, a Democrat, represents Prince George’s County in the Maryland House of Delegates; Jared Solomon, a Democrat, represents Montgomery County in the Maryland House of Delegates. Malcolm L. Augustine, a Democrat, represents Prince George’s County in the Maryland Senate. Pamela G. Beidle, a Democrat, represents Anne Arundel County in the Maryland Senate.
With a few smart investments today, we can make a more accessible, inclusive and sustainable Maryland over the next decade. Maryland is often described as America in Miniature. From our two major metro areas, to the Chesapeake Bay and oceanside communities of the Eastern Shore, and the mountain towns in the west, more than 6 million people call our state home. However, like in most of the rest of the country, it is much too hard to move around this state without a car, and too few of our jobs and homes are located near transit stations. Those two facts are holding back our economy, exacerbating inequities and polluting our environment.
In this General Assembly session, we are introducing two pieces of legislation that will make it easier for all Marylanders to experience the great opportunities this state has to offer. First is the Maryland Regional Rail Transformation Act, which would require the Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) to create investment programs to advance major upgrades and expansions to the MARC commuter rail system, including additional capacity on the Brunswick, Penn and Camden lines, station improvements and rail connections to Virginia and Delaware.
Today, MARC connects Baltimore and D.C. to many of Maryland’s suburban communities, but service is too slow, infrequent and disconnected from the wider region. In fact, throughout much of the day, service is unavailable altogether. Investing in Maryland’s passenger rail service and infrastructure would create jobs and new markets, unlock opportunities for residents, increase access to affordable housing and create a more sustainable transportation system.
The proposed investment plans in our bill would also help the state compete for $66 billion in federal funds for passenger rail made available through the historic bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. Right now, we are not prepared to compete for that federal money. This bill would put us on the right track. These operational investments are critical, but to get the biggest return on our investment, we must ensure that the right policies are in place to maximize the areas in and around our transit stations.
The companion bill is the Equitable and Inclusive Transit-Oriented Development Enhancement Act. In 2008, the Maryland General Assembly enabled an official transit-oriented development (TOD) state-designation process that allows development projects within a half-mile of designated TOD stations to be eligible to receive state support in advancing transit-oriented development around the station. As of this month, there are 17 state-designated TOD sites throughout Maryland. However, the 2008 statute did not provide any meaningful benefits or incentives to encourage more TOD.
Developing around a transit station is often more expensive because of higher land costs, legacy developments, environmental hazards and the greater need for supportive infrastructure, including sidewalk networks, station parking and bus facilities. Though more expensive, building residences and businesses near transit stations allows more residents to access opportunities, especially low-income residents without cars who must rely on transit.
This bill would create a $10 million competitive grant and revolving loan fund to provide financial assistance to local jurisdictions for design, planning, construction or gap funding and financing for public or private development within a state-designated TOD station area. The bill would also expand the tax credits that businesses receive for creating eligible jobs in Opportunity Zones to state-designated TOD sites and require the secretary of transportation to report annually on MDOT’s efforts to increase TOD throughout the state.
Combined, these bills will make sure the state is investing in an expanded and improved regional rail system and encouraging more development around the state’s rail and transit stations. Think about what 30-minute train service from D.C. to Baltimore would mean for you and the state’s economy. Residents in Northern Virginia or Delaware could take hourly MARC service to spend a weekend or even a day trip, hiking or antiquing in Western Maryland. More houses would be built and jobs located near our transit stations, protecting and preserving our waterways, forests and farms and making it easier for transit-dependent Marylanders to find and get to work.
This is not a far-off dream but something we could see in the next decade. We know the policy changes and decisions we need to make. By passing these bills, we can make the investments needed to leverage federal dollars, and we can set in motion a bright future for our state. | null | null | null | null | null |
President Biden pledged more than $70 billion to HBCUs and other minority-serving institutions in recognition of the work they do with limited resources, but Congress has scaled back the proposal. His Build Back Better plan sought $3 billion for the schools to upgrade research infrastructure and $6 billion for those schools to improve academic support services and award need-based financial aid to students. Although the legislation cleared the House in November, it stalled in the Senate without the backing of Sens. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.). | null | null | null | null | null |
Here’s a look at enrollment trends since the pandemic among selected historically Black universities
The Student Center at North Carolina A&T State University in Greensboro. (Ted Richardson for The Washington Post)
GREENSBORO, N.C. — Year after year, the Aggies keep growing.
Federal, state and institutional data analyzed by The Washington Post shows that several prominent historically Black universities held steady or grew during the public health crisis. Here is a snapshot of preliminary total enrollment, counting graduate and undergraduate students, for fall 2021 compared to fall 2019 for selected historically Black universities.
The latest growth, of 6 percent since 2019, is all the more notable because it occurred during the coronavirus pandemic as many colleges and universities around the country were struggling to recruit and retain students.
Federal, state and institutional data analyzed by The Washington Post show that several prominent historically Black universities held steady or grew during the public health crisis. Here is a snapshot of preliminary total enrollment, counting graduate and undergraduate students, for fall 2021 compared with fall 2019 for selected historically Black universities.
Fall 2021 head count
Change since 2019
North Carolina A&T State U.
Up 6 percent
Howard U. (D.C.)
Up 28 percent
Prairie View A&M U. (Texas)
Florida A&M U.
Down 7 percent
Morgan State U. (Md.)
Tennessee State U.
Almost unchanged
North Carolina Central U.
Texas Southern U.
Down 17 percent
Southern U. and A&M College (La.)
Jackson State U. (Miss.)
Fayetteville State U. (N.C.)
Albany State U. (Ga.)
Bowie State U. (Md.)
Alabama A&M U.
Norfolk State U. (Va.)
Winston-Salem State U. (N.C.)
Clark Atlanta U. (Ga.)
Some enrollment figures may change as institutions finalize what they will send to the federal government’s education data center. Fall 2021 data was not yet available for many schools, so this chart may be updated.
The unprecedented social, educational and economic upheaval since March 2020 has wreaked havoc on enrollment at many schools. Florida A&M University attributes its enrollment dip to the pandemic, admission testing rules in Florida and state funding formulas that focus on retention and graduation rates. University officials foresee a rebound in their head count. They say applications were up this year 30 percent. “We’re hoping and we’re pushing to try to increase enrollment this year,” William Hudson, Florida A&M’s vice president for student affairs, told The Post. He said the university will also focus on recruiting transfer and graduate students “as we continue to support our stellar academic programs.”
Here in Greensboro, enrollment is a point of pride for the school formally known as North Carolina Agricultural and Technical State University. But not the only one.
It was founded in the 1890s along with a cluster of other public universities to serve Black students who were shut out of state flagship schools and many other places of higher education in the segregated South. Among its alumni are the Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, civil rights leader; Michael Regan, administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency in the Biden administration; and Ronald E. McNair, one of the astronauts who died in the 1986 space shuttle Challenger disaster.
The university has powerful connections to the 20th-century civil rights movement.
On Feb. 1, 1960, four North Carolina A&T freshmen walked to a downtown F.W. Woolworth’s store and sought to be served at a Whites-only lunch counter. Their sit-in led to further demonstrations, striking a formidable blow against Jim Crow. A monument to the “A&T Four” — Ezell Blair Jr., Franklin McCain, Joseph McNeil and David Richmond — stands on campus, and four student residence halls are named for them.
Retropolis: Images of lunch counter sit-ins helped launch a movement
This month, North Carolina A&T was abuzz over a report in Forbes magazine on chronic underfunding of the school and other public HBCUs since the late 1980s in comparison to the resources state governments provide predominantly White land-grant universities. North Carolina A&T, Forbes found, had a massive funding gap relative to North Carolina State University.
North Carolina A&T Chancellor Harold L. Martin Sr. told The Post he is pushing state officials and the business community for more resources, “unapologetically demanding the best for our university.”
‘Transformational’: MacKenzie Scott’s gifts to HBCUs, other colleges surpass $800 million
The university has drawn notice for its work with disadvantaged students. More than 60 percent of entering freshmen have enough financial need to qualify for federal Pell grants. Engineering and business fields are among the most popular majors. About 80 percent of full-time freshmen stay for a second year, federal data shows, and 52 percent graduate within six years. Martin said the university has made significant progress on those benchmarks and wants to improve further.
Many factors affect graduation rates, but as a general rule, universities that serve high numbers of Pell grant recipients tend to have much lower graduation rates than those that don’t. Faculty members here say they are mindful that they are role models and mentors for many students who might be among the first in their families to go to college.
Arwin D. Smallwood, chair of the history and political science department, grew up in a rural area of eastern North Carolina and was himself a first-generation college student — “a poor country boy,” as he put it, and blind in his right eye. He graduated from another historically Black school, North Carolina Central University, and earned his doctorate from Ohio State University. He taught at the University of Memphis and Bradley University in Illinois before joining the North Carolina A&T faculty in 2013.
“So I understand the importance of an HBCU and the purpose and impact that it can have on students,” Smallwood said. “That’s one of my reasons for being here is that for me, it’s the opportunity to come back home to the state of North Carolina. It was an opportunity to have an immediate impact on the African American community. This is something I believe in.”
Most of the university’s students, by design, are from North Carolina. But applications from elsewhere have surged in recent years. Of 27,000 first-year applicants for the next fall term, 72 percent are from out of state. State higher education officials have eased in-state enrollment rules to encourage growth at North Carolina A&T and four other HBCUs in the state — North Carolina Central, Winston-Salem State, Fayetteville State and Elizabeth City State.
Martin told The Post he expects enrollment at North Carolina A&T to surpass 14,000 soon. The university, he said, could set a new target of 15,000 as it seeks to deepen its graduate education and expand research capacity. “We are on a very competitive trajectory,” he said.
Jelani M. Favors, a history professor, graduated from North Carolina A&T in 1997. He said it was an emotional homecoming for him last year to return to its classrooms as a professor determined to help new generations find their purpose. Favors wrote a 2019 book, “Shelter in a Time of Storm,” on the history and role of HBCUs in America.
“It’s important for us to remember our roots as a seedbed of activism,” he said, “as a space which is continuing to be unapologetically Black and at the same time welcoming of any other culture and other races. As HBCUs always have.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Shaun White’s Olympic Career
Three-time Olympic gold medalist and five-time Winter Olympian Shaun White announced he is retiring after the 2022 Beijing Games.
The Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics were his final Games.
Sandra Behne/Bongarts/Getty Images
White was 19 years old when he competed in his first Olympics in 2006.
At the 2006 Turin Games, White was the first person to land back-to-back 1080s.
He needed all three runs to claim his first gold.
At the 2010 Vancouver Games, White secured the win on his first run.
sampics/Corbis via Getty Images
On his second run, White pulled off a Double McTwist 1260, which he named “The Tomahawk.”
It was the best run of the night.
At the Sochi Games in 2014, White was entered into the new slopestyle event and the halfpipe.
Citing poor conditions, White withdrew from the slopestyle event.
White performed poorly in all three of his runs on the halfpipe.
AAron Ontiveroz/Denver Post via Getty Images
White missed the podium, finishing fourth in Sochi.
Despite a serious training accident four months earlier, White won his third gold at the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics.
White was not expected to medal at the Games.
With that win, White became the first snowboarder to win three Olympic gold medals.
White earned his spot on the 2022 U.S. team late, with a third-place finish at an event in January.
At 35, White is the oldest male halfpipe rider to compete in the Olympics.
On his final run during qualifying, White advanced to the finals.
White was in second place going into his final run.
White clipped a landing halfway through his final run.
White finished his Olympic career with a fourth-place finish at the Beijing Games. | null | null | null | null | null |
HARRISBURG, Pa. — Mehmet Oz, the celebrity cardiologist who recently ended his daytime TV “Dr. Oz Show” to run for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, will be honored Friday with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame — just as he is being attacked 2,000 miles away in a rival’s TV ad saying he’s too “Hollywood.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Russia's Kamila Valieva at a training session in Beijing. (Anne-Christine Poujoulat/AFP via Getty Images)
Here’s a timeline of important milestones:
Host country Russia closes the Sochi Olympics having won a surprising 33 medals, more than doubling the nation’s medal count from the 2010 Vancouver Games and topping all countries at a Winter Games that was of particular interest to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
In a documentary aired on German television, former Russian Anti-Doping Agency official Vitaly Stepanov and his, wife Yulia, a former middle-distance runner, allege that Russia sponsored systematic doping for its athletes. Another former Russian athlete says that “99 percent” of the country’s Olympians had used performance-enhancing drugs. The Stepanovs, fearing for their safety, take exile in the United States.
An independent commission from the World Anti-Doping Agency accuses Russia of running a state-sponsored doping program, describing a system that included shadow laboratories, destroyed urine samples and surveillance of lab workers by Russian intelligence agents. Days later, track and field’s international governing body bans Russia’s team from international athletic competitions, a sanction that still stands today.
The International Olympic Committee begins retesting old samples from Russian athletes from as far back as the 2008 Beijing Olympics following testimony published in the New York Times from the former director of an anti-doping lab in Moscow. Grigory Rodchenkov said he switched out dirty samples for clean ones, and that at least 15 medalists from the Sochi Games were part of the state-run doping program.
Russia remains banned from track and field (known as “athletics” internationally). But the country competes in most other sports in the Rio de Janeiro Games after the IOC decides to allow individual sporting federations to make their own decision regarding sanctions. Russia wins 19 gold medals and finishes fourth in the overall medal count.
In a historic act of punishment, the IOC bans Russia from the 2018 Winter Olympics in PyeongChang but allows 168 Russian athletes to compete as “Olympic Athletes from Russia.” The Russian flag and anthem are absent, and some of the country’s most accomplished winter athletes do not compete.
The World Anti-Doping Agency executive committee, filled with IOC members responsible for staging the Olympics, reinstates the Russian Anti-Doping Agency against strong opposition from dozens of athletes on the condition that Russia give officials access to data from the Moscow lab where samples were doctored. Russia misses its initial deadline to do so by three weeks. Eight months later, WADA says the lab data Russia provided may have been tampered with and considers another four-year Olympic ban.
WADA bars Russia from competing in the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo and the 2022 Beijing Games. The country is also banned from major international competitions through 2023, including the FIFA World Cup, Youth Olympic Games and Paralympics. As with the 2018 Games, Russians who have not been implicated in the country’s state-sponsored doping are allowed to compete as unaffiliated athletes.
The Court of Arbitration for Sport, a Swiss-based tribunal, reduces the ban from four years to two. The new timeline will still keep Russia out of the next two Olympics and the World Cup.
More than 300 Russian athletes compete at the Tokyo Olympics under the Russian Olympic Committee flag, with the opening of Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 played upon gold medals. The ROC contingent finishes with 20 gold medals and 71 overall medals, third behind the United States and China.
Kamila Valieva, a 15-year-old Russian phenom favored to win the Olympic women’s figure skating gold medal, performs her short program at the Russian national championships on Dec. 25. The Russian Anti-Doping Agency collects a sample from Valieva to be tested for doping. The next day, Valieva competes again and became the national champion.
Russian athletes arrive in Beijing, again to compete for the Russian Olympic Committee. In the second competition of her first Winter Games, Valieva becomes the first woman to land a quadruple jump at the Olympics and leads the ROC team to a gold medal. The medal ceremony is delayed because of what the IOC initially calls an emerging legal case. On Feb. 8, according to the International Testing Agency, a Swedish lab reports to authorities that Valieva’s sample from Dec. 25 contained the prohibited substance trimetazidine. On. Feb. 11, the ITA promises an expedited hearing to determine her eligibility. | null | null | null | null | null |
Late Monday night in Beijing, NBC sportscaster Mike Tirico boarded a chartered jet for one of the most remarkable travel stretches in sports broadcasting history. He’d been in China for two weeks, waking at about 4 a.m. local time to host the network’s primetime coverage of the Winter Olympic, and now he was headed toward the NBC studios in Stamford, Conn.
After a layover in Japan, and spending Tuesday adjusting to the 13-hour time difference, Tirico returned to hosting primetime Olympics coverage on Wednesday and Thursday. Then on Friday, he flew to Los Angeles to begin hosting the network’s Super Bowl programming as well — and on Sunday, which NBC branded “Super Gold Sunday,” he’ll do something unprecedented.
Even if he’s jet lagged and even if this month’s broadcast pursuits share little in common — other than a massive world-wide audience — Tirico can’t let the audience know the great lengths he must go to this month to simply get on air and look fresh, polished and prepared.
Despite the logistical challenges of the Games, NBC executives thought it was key for him to be in China for at least the opening ceremony. Tirico said he fully understood the geopolitical magnitude of the moment when he stood in Beijing National Stadium about 25 yards from Chinese president Xi Jinping and Russian president Vladimir Putin.
On air, Tirico noted “everything and everyone attached to these Games is facing questions.” He criticized China’s human rights record and noted the US government’s “declaration that the Chinese Communist Party is guilty of committing genocide on the Uyghur Muslim population in Western Xinjiang region.” He and Solomon, NBC’s Olympics executive, noted they were proud they framed the Games for a global audience without diminishing the athletes. But Tirico knows critics wanted politics left out.
On Thursday afternoon, Tirico rehearsed the Lombardi Trophy on Microsoft Teams and went to a production meeting for the primetime Olympics broadcast, his last in Stamford before flying to Los Angeles. | null | null | null | null | null |
A protester with a New Zealand flag stands in front of a Parliament building in Wellington on the fourth day of demonstrations against coronavirus-related restrictions. Protesters have been inspired by similar demonstrations in Canada. (Marty Melville/AFP/Getty Images)
Individuals gathered outside Parliament for a fourth day, inspired by the massive trucker protests paralyzing the Canadian capital. As with the self-described “Freedom Convoy” in Canada, protesters in New Zealand are unhappy about coronavirus-related restrictions, with demonstrations growing to encompass a series of broader grievances against Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s government. A handful of similar protests have also sprung up across the globe, including in France and Australia.
“Police have identified a range of different causes and motivations among the protestors, making it difficult to open clear and meaningful lines of communication,” said Superintendent Corrie Parnell, Wellington district commander, in a statement.
“It is important to note that Police on Parliament grounds continue to take a measured approach,” Parnell said. While police there had been seen carrying batons, “that was not in line with [the] current approach and staff have now removed this equipment,” he added.
“So passive aggressive. Love it,” tweeted one person in New Zealand, while another wrote, “Overseas countries have water cannons, New Zealand has sprinklers.” | null | null | null | null | null |
FedEx driver Demonterrio Gibson, speaks during a news conference. He says was fired upon and chased by a father and son while delivering packages on his route in Brookhaven, Miss. (Rogelio V. Solis/Associated Press)
FedEx driver D’Monterrio Gibson said he was delivering packages on his route in Brookhaven, Miss., on Jan. 24 when two White men he had not interacted with started chasing him in a pickup truck for about seven minutes and fired at least five shots at the van he was driving.
Moore said that his client did nothing wrong before the Cases chased and shot at him, but “was simply Black while working.” The attorney said the incident echoed the case of Arbery, the 25-year-old Black man who was murdered in Georgia in 2020 after three White men pursued him in pickup trucks while Arbery was jogging.
“It was clearly a copycat crime,” Moore said, adding that he has urged the Justice Department and FBI to look into the case. “These people tried to be copycats and that’s why we need full justice, not Mississippi justice. This man went to work and they attacked him like he was a wild animal.”
Gibson, of Utica, Miss., said he had only been to the neighborhood in Brookhaven, about an hour outside Jackson, Miss., once or twice for his work at FedEx. The population in Brookhaven is 60 percent Black, according to the latest census data.
At around 7 p.m. on Jan. 24, Gibson was delivering packages when he saw a white pickup truck approaching him and honking its horn. Court records show that Gregory Chase was driving the truck. When the vehicle cut him off as he was trying to leave, Gibson told the Mississippi Free Press that he attempted to swerve around the pickup truck in an attempt to get out of the neighborhood. But as he drove past a couple of houses, Gibson said there was another man in the road — and he had a gun pointed at him. That man was Brandon Case, according to court records.
After he eventually got away from the men, Gibson told reporters that he called police to report what happened to him. As he was explaining the incident, a dispatcher interrupted him and asked if he had been on Junior Trail, the street where the driver was delivering packages.
“I said, ‘Yes,’” Gibson said at the news conference. “He was like, ‘Well, I just got a call of a suspicious person at this address.’” Gibson recalled to the Free Press how he responded, “Sir, I’m not a suspicious person, I work for FedEx. I was just doing my job.”
The Cases eventually turned themselves in on Feb. 1, but were released from the Lincoln County Jail on bonds the next day — Gregory Case for $75,000 and Brandon Case for $150,000.
“The safety of our team members is our top priority, and we remain focused on his well-being,” a company spokesperson said. “We will continue to support Mr. Gibson as we cooperate with investigating authorities.”
When asked about what he would ask to the Cases, the FedEx driver said he just wanted to know what was going through their heads last month. The Mississippi native said he had “never really experienced racism, not to this extent.” Now, he’s just thankful to be alive.
“I’m looking at things really differently,” he said. “You can just die doing your job.” | null | null | null | null | null |
In the men’s halfpipe, now there is better than White’s best. Whoa, there is better. White has spent half his life pushing the sport forward, with his signature Double McTwist 1260 and double-cork 1440s and a bunch of cool appetizer tricks creating a show that’s probably best described using curse words. Now everyone sees a future that once seemed like only White could visualize, and the flying standard-bearer is on the ground and looking at younger snowboarders doing things he can’t ask of his body.
To win gold, Hirano had to land the first frontside triple-cork 1440s — four complete rotations and three off-axis flips and who knows what else because it happens so fast — in Olympic history. He had to receive a 96.0 score on the final run of the event.
Hirano, who is 12 years younger than White, had won two Olympic halfpipe silver medals as a teenager. Now, as the sole proprietor of the triple-cork 1440, he has a trick that no one else has mastered. James, who won bronze four years ago, climbed a spot this time. Swiss snowboarder Jan Scherrer took bronze, with a score slightly higher than White’s 85.0.
None of the medalists is older than 27. Hirano, 23, was born nine months after halfpipe debuted at the 1998 Nagano Games. They grew up aspiring to be on White’s level. White leaves appreciating how good they have become. The sport has changed so quickly that his stunning gold medal performance in 2018 wouldn’t have been strong enough to compete for gold or silver Friday. At best, he would have been hoping for bronze.
White fought with his worn body, ignored a throbbing leg and tried to win with savvy. He made it through a conservative first run without incident. He went bigger with his second run, and when he finished, he pumped a fist, screamed and yanked the snowboard off his feet in celebration. He was pumped as he moved temporarily into second place.
It was as high as he would get. He knew before his final run that he needed to leap over at least one higher score to keep his medal hopes alive. He summoned the past and attempted the double-cork 1440 combination that impressed the judges in PyeongChang. But during the second 1440, he crashed, leaving him to take a long and emotional journey down the halfpipe. | null | null | null | null | null |
Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton speak during the second presidential debate on Oct. 9, 2016, at Washington University in St. Louis. (Patrick Semansky/AP)
Doing so now is warranted because of the discovery that former president Donald Trump moved a significant number of documents — some of them marked classified — to his home in Florida after he left office. That report has drawn understandable comparisons to the coverage of Clinton, coverage that, in fact, likely did contribute to her loss. But those comparisons are also often overly neat, which is to say overly simple. Given the importance of understanding both situations, clarification seems useful.
If your instinct is to roll your eyes and dismiss this idea out of hand, I’d offer that you might be among those for whom this exercise is most illuminating. So I ask for the benefit of the doubt that, often, Clinton herself was not granted.
It’s useful to begin by remembering the nature of American politics when it was first reported in March 2015 that Clinton had relied on that email server.
At the time, Clinton, while not yet officially a candidate, was the presumptive nominee for the Democratic presidential nomination the following year. Clinton led Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) by more than 50 points in RealClearPolitics’s average of primary polling at that point, double the lead Donald Trump enjoyed in the most recent poll of the 2024 Republican nomination. As the election neared, her allies increasingly described her as the most qualified candidate ever to seek the presidency; her government experience, in other words, was a key selling point — particularly when contrasted with Trump, her eventual opponent.
She was also running as a Clinton, as the second member of a former president’s family to seek the Oval Office in less than two decades, and as a member of a family that had a rocky relationship with the news media.
Clinton was often not extended the presumption of inadvertency when questions arose in part due to her husband’s record and in part, certainly, out of overwrought animosity from the public and her critics. The result was that journalists looking to hold power to account often approached her with skepticism about her intent. In this case, that seemed warranted, given what was later learned about how the server was set up. It was natural to suspect that the situation was again one in which a Clinton was trying to hide something from the public.
Two things made the situation worse for Clinton than it needed to be. One was that Clinton’s team at first treated the story dismissively, in a way that often antagonized reporters whose job it is to challenge those in power. The other was the way in which the material turned over from Clinton to the State Department was handled. Nothing has emerged in the years since the story first broke to suggest that anything significant from Clinton’s private server that related to her work was not submitted to archivists. But the release of that material to the public in chunks meant that week after week there were new stories again bringing the issue to light. At times, those stories were not ones that merited elevating, but reporters, scrambling to be the first to find any document of significance, occasionally highlighted ones that had little.
By August 2015, we learned that the FBI was investigating the server, including whether it involved transmission of classified material. Ultimately, it was determined that some messages had been. Remember, this was August 2015. This was before the Russia investigation and before we knew about the FBI’s consideration of possible links between Trump’s campaign and foreign actors.
The Clinton situation was relatively novel: a probe from Barack Obama’s Justice Department into a former Cabinet-member’s communications, a top-level official who was almost certainly going to be a top contender for the presidency. Today’s “But her emails!” dismissal often fails to recognize the uniqueness of the situation then.
This does not necessarily mean that each and every story about the email server is defensible, though the number of those stories may be overstated in the public imagination. A search of the New York Times website finds that there were 19 front page stories that mentioned Clinton and the server in 2015. (I’m picking on them here mostly because they include indicators of where stories ran in their online articles.) That included obviously newsy stories, as when Clinton testified for most of a day before the committee investigating the terrorist attacks in Benghazi in 2012. (It was this Republican-led investigation that elevated the server’s existence in the first place.)
But in 2016, stories about Clinton’s emails often blended into another set of emails that were in the news: the emails stolen by Russian hackers from the Democratic National Committee and her senior adviser John Podesta. A lot of the coverage of “emails” related to Clinton in October 2016 — particularly outside the Times — focused on the material stolen from Podesta and released by WikiLeaks. That stolen material was published in clumps at the end of July and then over the course of October.
Of course, the original server story also earned coverage in 2016. Trump talked about Clinton’s server a lot during the campaign, keeping it prominent in the national conversation. In early July of that year, FBI director James B. Comey announced that the government would not be recommending criminal charges be filed, infuriating Trump and his allies. (A group that now, the Times has reported, has been awfully quiet about Trump’s behavior.) In response to the new reporting, Trump this week himself contrasted his behavior with Clinton’s.
Then, of course, there was the discovery of emails from Clinton’s server on a device taken from the home of her aide Huma Abedin — whose husband Anthony Weiner was under investigation for sending explicit material to a minor. That led to an announcement only days before the election that the government was examining the newly discovered material. Comey would later admit that his announcement was likely driven in part by the assumption that Clinton would win: How would it look had she won and become his boss and it was discovered that he hadn’t made the material public?
On Nov. 6, 2016, two days before the election, it was reported that nothing new was learned. But the damage was done. The initial announcement probably contributed significantly to Clinton’s eventual loss.
This has been a lengthy exegesis, I admit, but it reiterates a few important points. First, that Clinton’s position in 2016 combined with the novelty of the question at issue were factors that don’t map cleanly onto the current scenario with Trump. Second, that the idea there was voluminous attention paid to Clinton-related emails in the last weeks of the campaign is inflated by the emails released by WikiLeaks, emails which were not ones from her server. And, third, that while the coverage of the server was probably broader than it needed to be in retrospect, it was often driven by news-related events. The media covered that late-October announcement about the investigation being reconsidered, often while emphasizing uncertainty about what it meant. Should it not have?
Consider, too, that the initial story told us something new about Clinton: that this candidate running a campaign predicated on her experience had worked around governmental rules and constraints. Learning this about Trump is … not new. This is also earlier in the presidential election cycle and, for Trump, represents not an apparent apex of his alleged misbehavior but something much lower on that pyramid.
What’s most important to remember when comparing the Trump and Clinton situations, though, is that we are comparing 20 months of reporting on Clinton with a week of reporting on Trump. We don’t know what the months between now and 2024 will bring. We can’t. The National Archives has asked the Justice Department to begin an investigation, so we’re not yet at the equivalent November 2016, merely August 2015. We will see what happens.
For many people, the comparison being drawn in the moment derives less from a thorough comparison of now and then than from the idea that a Clinton presidency was submarined by outside forces empowered by the media. “But her emails!” is a phrasing that is centered on assigning blame to the media for Clinton’s loss. Members of the media, myself included, might certainly be expected to disagree with that assessment. Hopefully, though, the context above does at least support the case for some hesitance in maligning the media’s approach: Perhaps the Clinton coverage wasn’t quite as unacceptable as you remembered — and perhaps it’s useful to see what happens next with the coverage of Trump. | null | null | null | null | null |
Kamila Valieva, 15, tested positive for the drug Trimetazidine. (Anne-Christine Poujoulat/AFP via Getty Images)
Trimetazidine, also known as TMZ, is a heart medication designed mostly for older people who suffer from angina, a condition that causes severe chest pain because of inadequate blood flow to the heart. The drug has never been approved for use in the United States, and several medical experts said it probably has more risk than benefit.
Some elite athletes have used it in a search for a competitive edge, though its ability to enhance performance is unclear.
The drug is supposed to make the heart more efficient by relying less on fatty acids and more on glucose, which requires less oxygen. In theory, it could aid endurance athletes who have to generate high cardiac output, such as cyclists, rowers and long-distance runners, but would be unlikely to have a direct impact on a figure skater’s performance, where there is less demand on the heart, said Aaron Baggish, director of the Cardiovascular Performance Program at Massachusetts General Hospital.
There is virtually no reason a healthy teenager would be given a legitimate prescription for TMZ, Baggish said. In situations in which an athlete may need to take a drug on the banned substance list, he or she would need to receive a therapeutic use exemption for the drug and a physician would have to make the case there are no suitable alternatives, Baggish added, noting that in the case of TMZ, there are many superior drugs that treat the same condition.
The drug could, in theory, give an athlete such as Valieva an edge by allowing her to train for longer periods of time in a sport in which medals are won by razor-thin margins, said Robby Sikka, a sports medicine physician and anesthesiologist who works with NFL and NBA teams. It also could have a psychological benefit, Sikka said, if someone in Valieva’s orbit told her it could help her performance or enable her to train even harder, and it may be able to help athletes recover faster.
“If it made her more confident to do a jump that she did, the drug’s effect is not inconsequential to her performance,” Sikka said. | null | null | null | null | null |
Opening Ceremonies of XIII Winter Olympics on Feb. 13, 1980, in Lake Placid, N.Y. (Anonymous/AP)
Watching this year’s Beijing Winter Olympics, you’ll get occasional glimpses of the snowless landscape surrounding the venues, with machine-made snow churned out to blanket the slopes and trails for the athletes. The first Olympics to ever use this frozen weather-surrogate dates back to the Lake Placid Games of 1980, made necessary by their fabled snow-drought in an otherwise snowy locale.
Since then, snow-making has been used as needed to improve conditions for other Games, including in 2014 and 2018. And of course has been requisite for this year’s dry and cold winter climate of Beijing.
Flash back 42 years. The Adirondacks, often boasting knee-deep powder, were instead leafless mountains devoid of any snow and as brown as a post-peak autumn day. Any decent chill in the air was mostly lacking during the month leading up to the 1980 Games.
Aerial shots shown on the local TV newscasts leading up to the Feb. 13-24 run of the 1980 Olympics starkly revealed the weather problem, and the forecasts offered little promise that a well-timed snowstorm would bring a storybook metamorphosis to the Opening Ceremonies. Day after January day, seeing those pictures on the news affirmed our realization that the weather is rarely perfectly played, even for this grandest of sports stages.
Of course, natural snow would be expected in the heart of the northern Adirondacks, where average seasonal totals range from around 100 inches at Lake Placid to 150 inches-plus on nearby Whiteface Mountain. But the drought that occurred from December through mid-February over the region was relentless. The period was described as “the worst snow drought to hit the eastern United States since 1887” in the final report from the Organizing Committee for the Olympic Winter Games in Lake Placid.
There was essentially no snow on the ground except over mountain peaks during January, and what little did fall (a couple inches at most) was quickly prone to melt with temperatures frequently ranging above average until the final few days of the month. The warmest period occurred during the second week of January, with readings soaring into the high 40s and mid-50s.
The weather, a primary concern for every Olympics, thus presented the meteorologists assembled for the Games with a unique challenge. The team, as described in a National Weather Service Heritage piece, included meteorologists from the National Weather Service plus one from the state of New York and a student intern. Not only did they have to monitor the meteorology that could impact the athletes and their well-being during the games (frostbite, wind, etc.), they also had to provide support for the broader weather issues that developed in the weeks prior.
As for that lack of snow, the fallback to our mechanisms of technology did ultimately deliver. According to a website on Whiteface Mountain, “the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation approved the design and installation of a $5 million snow-making system at Whiteface in 1979.” Ahead of the Games, organizers had “promised the first ‘weatherproof’ Olympics,” The Washington Post reported on Jan. 15, 1980.
Tony Goodwin, who was the venue manager for the Lake Placid Olympic Organizing Committee, shared pictures of snow-making crews spreading snow on cross-country trails in the Facebook group “History and Legends of the Adirondacks.”
But even after the snow was made, it was unclear if it would survive, given the mild weather pattern. Thankfully, temperatures did turn plenty cold enough just in time for the Games, maintaining the manufactured base of snow that had been expertly layered and groomed.
There was even a fresh coating of natural snow that fell a few days into the event, but, of course, there just had to be one more glitch. On Feb. 20, the thaw returned, with temperatures rising once again to levels seen in January — back to near 50 degrees! It didn’t linger long, so there was little hindrance to the surviving snow and ice for the remaining four days of the Games.
So now, 42 years later, as we enjoy the 2022 Olympics, remember the groundbreaking initiative at Lake Placid in 1980, when machines rescued us from the scarcity of falling snow. The paradigm, established by necessity then, is accepted practice now. But it will never replace the warmth delivered, even on the most frigid of winter days, by sweeping views of snow-covered mountains while we watch every four years from afar. | null | null | null | null | null |
Ward 3 council member Mary Cheh abruptly ends reelection bid
D.C. Council member Mary M. Cheh (D-Ward 3). (Marvin Joseph/The Washington Post)
D.C. Council member Mary M. Cheh (D-Ward 3) is ending her campaign for a fifth consecutive term and will no longer seek reelection, she said Friday.
Cheh, 71, has long been a stalwart politician in Ward 3, which contains some of the city’s wealthiest neighborhoods. She filed paperwork to run in the June primary election, but said in a statement that she had reevaluated her life during the pandemic and wanted to change course. Journalist Tom Sherwood first tweeted news of her decision.
“I have to come to realize that I want to recover my personal life and dedicate more time to my granddaughter, who has been the light of my life since she was born on my re-election day three years ago,” Cheh told her constituents. “ … It is time for someone else to pick up the mantle, and I am excited for the possibilities and future of Ward 3.”
Her departure is the latest shift on a council that in recent years has become younger and more left-leaning. She has held the Ward 3 council seat since 2007, making her the second-longest member to serve on the legislative body behind its chairman, Phil Mendelson (D), who is seeking another term this year. Council member Kenyan R. McDuffie (D-Ward 5), the third longest-serving council member, announced last year that he would not seek another term on the council and is running for D.C. attorney general instead.
Cheh, a former special assistant U.S. attorney in the District and a tenured constitutional law professor at George Washington University, has long been known as one of the council’s more pragmatic members and frequently invoked her knowledge of legal affairs. Teaching classes in constitutional law for first-year law students while also working as a council member, Cheh is the only current member who holds a second job while working as a legislator.
She chairs the council’s committee on transportation and has been vocal about shortcomings at the Department of Public Works, an agency that has faced criticism for its handling of city services like street cleaning and snow plowing.
As transportation committee chair, she has championed bills such as new regulations on taxis and electric scooters and has also focused on the environment. She has been a prolific drafter of legislation on other topics, such as hunger (Cheh’s efforts led to low-income children in the District still getting school meals on snow days) and education, recently proposing a law to weaken mayoral control of the school system.
Cheh was first to propose the law passed in 2020 that allows youth in the District to obtain certain vaccines without parental permission, and the act that legalized assisted suicide for terminally ill patients in D.C. in 2017.
Cheh also oversaw a council investigation into alleged contract steering and preferential treatment afforded by the administration of Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) to Fort Myer Construction.
She drew criticism for her comments last month following a shooting at the Days Inn on Connecticut Avenue, in which she lamented a “state of lawlessness in the community” and criticized a proposal that would limit prosecutions of juveniles in adult court.
She ran uncontested in the 2018 primary election and cruised to victory in the general election, earning 75 percent of the vote against independent Peter Dimtchev. Three candidates had filed to run for the Ward 3 seat in this year’s primaries: Democrats Monika Nemeth and Deirdre Brown, who are a current and a former advisory neighborhood commissioner, respectively, and Republican David Krucoff.
Cheh reported having more than $84,000 in her campaign account at the end of January.
The timing of Cheh’s announcement will likely encourage more candidates to jump into the race; petitions became available late last month, and council candidates have until March 23 to collect 250 signatures to appear on the ballot. | null | null | null | null | null |
After the Zoom concluded, Jawando said he was prepared to suppress the experience and move on. But then he noticed how strongly others reacted. He received apologies by members of the group that hosted the forum, Progressive Legacy, and saw the indignation of his chief of staff, who posted a clip to the video on her Facebook. He’s grown increasingly disturbed by what happened since Tuesday, and decided to talk openly about it in the hopes it would help make clear that such behavior can’t be accepted.
“The big takeaway for me was that this is not okay,” Jawando said in an interview. “It is not ok to accept it and to bury it — that is part of the problem, too. … We have got to call it out and make it untenable.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Lenox Cooper, lawyer
Lenox Cooper, 93, a Washington-area lawyer who specialized in antitrust and product liability cases, died Dec. 18 at a hospital in Bethesda, Md. The cause was a stroke, said his wife, Vicki Allin.
Mr. Cooper, a Bethesda resident, was born in Wilmington, N.C. In a 35-year legal career, he practiced with several firms and was senior attorney with Commonwealth Oil and Refining Co. He retired in 1993 as senior attorney with the Bethesda-based firm Bastian, Clague & Clancy.
Helen Higgins, artist
Helen Higgins, 91, a Washington artist who specialized in nature and religious themes and miniature ceramics, died Dec. 22 at a health-care facility in Davidson, N.C. The cause was neurological brain degeneration, said a daughter, Clare Morton.
Mrs. Higgins was born Helen Schrider in Washington, and she lived in the District before moving in 2019 to live with her children in Birmingham, Ala., and Davidson. Her work had been shown at Catholic University, Strathmore Hall in North Bethesda, Md., and elsewhere.
Hector Cruz, tailor
Hector Cruz, 82, a tailor who operated shops in Rockville, Md., Potomac, Md., and at the Pentagon, where he catered to military personnel, died Jan. 3 at a hospice center in Rockville. The cause was Lewy body dementia, said a daughter, Giselle Colavita.
Mr. Cruz, a Rockville resident, was born in Palmira, Argentina. He opened his first shop, Hector’s Tailoring, in Rockville in 1977 and also had a tailoring contract with the Montgomery County Police Department. He retired in 2012.
Dhanobroto 'Broto' Roy, musician
Dhanobroto “Broto” Roy, 64, a musician who played an Indian hand drum known as a tabla with a Bengali musical ensemble known as Ganga and with other groups, died Dec. 29 at his home in Falls Church, Va. The cause was coronary artery disease, said a sister, Krishna Roy.
Mr. Roy was born in what is now Kolkata, India, and came to the Washington area in 1976. He played with Ganga, which was founded by his parents, and with other groups, at locations including the Smithsonian Institution and the Library of Congress, and at venues around the world. | null | null | null | null | null |
But this is also the NFL, a multibillion-dollar corporation that does not take well to being sued by its employees. Thus, the league’s initial reaction to Flores’s suit was to thunder that it was “without merit.” But then, over the weekend, Goodell also sent out a memo to teams saying the underwhelming effort to promote diversity among head coaches was “unacceptable.” Which was it? | null | null | null | null | null |
Following her second stumble, Shiffrin’s response was a memorable image of solitary suffering. For 20 minutes she sat beside the track, head down, waiting for nonexistent solace. Anyone untouched was working extra-hard to be a cynic.
These are important considerations for a country where, in 2020, about 30 percent of Americans aged 18 to 25 years old reported a diagnosis of mental illness, according to the National Institute of Mental Health — and where suicide is the second-leading cause of death among those 10 to 34 years old, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Shiffrin’s example of instinctive public honesty is valuable. Her openness might help rescue people from feeling isolated in their own despair.
Public honesty about mental challenges helps defeat stigma. When I have talked in public about depression, I have often found people who are seeking permission for their own suffering. It is a form of liberation to acknowledge their own humanity. Stigma can leave potentially deadly mental challenges inadequately explored. Openness allows us to learn from failure, in the company of other fallible people. | null | null | null | null | null |
For one Bengals fan, this unexpected run to the Super Bowl brought his family together again
John Lynch placed a Joe Burrow jersey and an AFC North champions hat at his parents’ gravesite in College Corner, Ohio. (John Lynch) (Courtesy of John Lynch)
“It was the best trip,” John Lynch said. “And as much as it would have been cool to be in Tennessee, there was no better way I would rather have spent that divisional round.”
Lynch’s first Bengals memory was going to games at the since-demolished Riverfront Stadium with his father, James.
The last time the Bengals had playoff success before this season, Lynch, 43, was a kid — he was just 9 when the Bengals lost Super Bowl XXIII to the San Francisco 49ers in 1989, and he was 11 when the Bengals beat the Houston Oilers in 1991, their previous postseason victory before last month.
Shortly after the Bengals’ playoff victory in 1991, James Lynch died. But John’s memories of watching games with family were ones that he cherished as the Bengals suffered through one disappointing season after another in the decades since.
Lynch said he believed the Bengals were going to be serious contenders before — from the Jeff Blake days in the ’90s to the Carson Palmer era in the 2000s to the stretch of success with Andy Dalton and A.J. Green in the 2010s. But misfortune, injuries, mistakes and playoff heartbreak plagued the Bengals until this year.
“It took a long time for that ball to come full circle and start bouncing our way,” Lynch said. “But it's given us new life as far as the love for the Bengals and what it means to us.”
Lynch was at his daughter’s volleyball tournament during the AFC championship game, so he recorded the game on his DVR and turned his phone off until he was able to get home and watch without spoilers.
The Bengals fell behind the Kansas City Chiefs 21-3 and trailed 21-10 at halftime, and Lynch admitted that in years past he might have had reason to lose hope. But this year felt different, and it was: The Bengals erased the deficit and eventually won, 27-24, in overtime to advance to Super Bowl LVI.
All of the years of disappointment have made this year “nothing short of miraculous” for Lynch, who joked that he told his wife he had no idea how much fun it was to talk about the Bengals this late into the NFL season.
Lynch had planned to return to his parents’ gravesite with family for the Super Bowl, but his schedule won’t allow for the trip this time. Still, Lynch remains grateful for the opportunity to spend time with family for the divisional around, especially after Lynch’s mother, Ann, died during the pandemic.
“It was very important for us to take advantage of that time and just be together and see one another,” Lynch said. “I don’t get back home that often just with life in general. And the pandemic makes things even more difficult to go and do things.”
Lynch has also been extremely thankful for this year’s Super Bowl run bringing his extended Bengals family together. He raved about the number of people who have sent him positive messages since he posted the photo of his parents’ gravesite online.
Amber Conley, of Liberty, Ind., helped the Lynch family pay homage to their parents, designing a custom shirt with a Super Bowl logo. Conley FaceTimed Lynch as she placed the shirt on his parents’ headstone in the midst of a snowstorm this week before the big game.
And although Lynch won’t be with his family in person Sunday, he and his siblings plan to watch the game together on FaceTime. Lynch will be at home with his wife and two kids, who have become Bengals fans themselves, creating what he hopes is a new memory similar to the ones he made with his dad.
“I think they’re smiling and just proud of the individuals that we’ve been,” Lynch said about his parents. “I think my dad especially [is] proud in the way that I’ve instilled the love for the Bengals in my two kids. … I think they’re pretty happy with the whole situation this year.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Late Monday night in Beijing, NBC sportscaster Mike Tirico boarded a chartered jet for one of the most remarkable travel stretches in sports broadcasting history. He’d been in China for two weeks, waking at about 4 a.m. local time to host the network’s prime-time coverage of the Winter Olympic, and now he was headed toward the NBC studios in Stamford, Conn.
After a layover in Japan, and spending Tuesday adjusting to the 13-hour time difference, Tirico returned to hosting prime-time Olympics coverage on Wednesday and Thursday. Then on Friday, he flew to Los Angeles to begin hosting the network’s Super Bowl programming as well — and on Sunday, which NBC branded “Super Gold Sunday,” he’ll do something unprecedented.
Even if he’s jet lagged and even if this month’s broadcast pursuits share little in common — other than a massive worldwide audience — Tirico can’t let the audience know the great lengths he must go to this month to simply get on air and look fresh, polished and prepared.
Despite the logistical challenges of the Games, NBC executives thought it was key for Tirico to be in China for at least the Opening Ceremonies. Tirico said he fully understood the geopolitical magnitude of the moment when he stood in Beijing National Stadium about 25 yards from Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin.
On air, Tirico noted “everything and everyone attached to these Games is facing questions.” He criticized China’s human rights record and noted the U.S. government’s “declaration that the Chinese Communist Party is guilty of committing genocide on the Uyghur Muslim population in western Xinjiang region.” He and Solomon, NBC’s Olympics executive, noted they were proud they framed the Games for a global audience without diminishing the athletes. But Tirico knows critics wanted politics left out.
On Thursday afternoon, Tirico rehearsed the Lombardi Trophy on Microsoft Teams and went to a production meeting for the prime-time Olympics broadcast, his last in Stamford before flying to Los Angeles. | null | null | null | null | null |
Without those parts, said Spleeters, who summarized his findings in a report funded by the European Union and Germany, Russia would have found it “much more difficult to produce and operate the drones, for sure.”
Some of the drone components that CAR identified traveled to Russia via obscure middlemen and small trading companies whose businesses could be tough to track.
The United States and the European Union already restrict their exports of defense-related electronics to Russia and have toughened those rules in recent years. Yet Russian networks have found ways around those obstacles. In 2015, several Russian agents were convicted of, or pleaded guilty to, federal charges of using a Texas-based company they set up to illegally export high-tech chips to Russian military and intelligence agencies.
Under the broader blockade that U.S. officials are considering, the United States could compel many countries worldwide to cut their chip exports to Russia by telling them they aren’t allowed to use U.S. technology to make components for Russian buyers. Most chip factories worldwide, including those in China and Taiwan, use U.S. manufacturing tools or software in their production process, analysts said.
ANO PO KSI, which is an acronym for Professional Association of Designers of Data Processing Systems, was added to a sanctions list by the United States in 2016 for allegedly aiding Russian military intelligence.
On its website, ANO PO KSI describes itself as a nonprofit that makes high-tech products, including document scanners and cameras, for the Russian government and business customers. The organization didn’t respond to a request for comment. | null | null | null | null | null |
Heat records fall in California; Super Bowl LVI could be among the warmest played
The abnormally hot, dry weather and strong winds have fueled brush fires.
Firefighters battle the Sycamore Fire, which destroyed several homes in Whittier, Calif., on Feb. 10, 2022. (David Swanson/Reuters)
It may be February, but that’s not stopping record temperatures, low humidity and strong winds from allowing fires to break out in California. Highs are running 20 to 25 degrees above normal, with readings that would be unusual for July. San Francisco International Airport experienced its hottest February day on record Thursday.
Simply stated, it does not feel like or look like winter. The hot weather and recent aridity are also intensifying California’s inveterate drought.
Meteorologists at the National Weather Service offices in Los Angeles and San Diego have issued what is probably the first heat advisory on record for the winter months. They’re cautioning that “the hot weather may cause heat illness” and are urging people to “drink plenty of fluids [and] stay out of the sun.”
The heat, which has already brought temperatures in the range of the upper 80s to near 90 degrees, is setting the stage for what could be one of the warmest Super Bowls on record. The game is to be played in Inglewood at SoFi stadium, where, lacking air-conditioning, temperatures could be nearly as toasty indoors as out. But low humidity will take an edge off the heat, which will quickly ease toward halftime.
Temperature records
Numerous daily maximum temperature records broken across the Bay Area and Central Coast today! Both San Francisco International Airport @ 78° and Salinas Municipal Airport @ 87° also exceeded their all-time February record high temperatures. #CAheat #BayAreaHeat #BayArea pic.twitter.com/rVWQcPxszS
While the highest temperatures have been recorded in Orange County around the Los Angeles area and across the Inland Empire and deserts, the Bay Area has seen its fair share of record high temperatures. San Francisco International Airport snagged its highest February temperature on record at 78 degrees, beating out a 77-degree reading on Feb. 26, 1986. It was not only the warmest February day but the highest temperature during any of the December through February winter months.
February temperatures at the airport have risen 3.9 degrees on average since 1948, because of climate change and urbanization.
While the airport set a record high Thursday, the high of 76 in downtown San Francisco fell a little short. Its highest February temperature of 81 degrees occurred on Feb. 26, 1986.
On Thursday, Santa Rosa, Redwood City, Oakland, San Jose and Gilroy broke daily records for Feb. 10, with highs in the upper 70s. Salinas hopped up to 87 degrees — a whopping 11 degrees higher than its previous Feb. 10 record of 76 degrees set in 2002 and matching its highest mark for the whole month.
Farther south, Los Angeles International Airport narrowly missed a record on Wednesday when the temperature soared to 85 degrees; 88, set in 2016, was the number to beat. Average highs for mid-February are in the middle 60s. Thursday hit 82 degrees, coming in third behind a record high of 85, also set in 2016.
While Los Angeles just missed records, several surrounding locations tied or broke Feb. 10 record highs on Thursday. That list included Santa Maria Airport, Oxnard, Paso Robles Airport and Burbank Airport.
We have a few new high temperature records for SW CA today, from SLO County down to LA County. More warm weather on the way through Sunday. #CAwx pic.twitter.com/nXchaVMr5P
Temperatures are forecast to remain in the 80s to near 90 over much of the region through the weekend.
Fortunately, the dry air in place means nighttime lows can drop into the 50s, allowing for some respite from the harsh daytime highs. The heat will subside Monday, with 70s still likely but 80s expected to vanish. Sixties will return Tuesday and Wednesday.
A number of blazes have broken out across Southern California, including the Emerald Fire in Laguna Beach, which was 20 percent contained Friday morning. So far it has torched 145.2 acres and forced evacuations. The Pacific Coast Highway was briefly closed as smoke poured across it.
The Orange County Fire Authority tweeted that “crews are working through the night to increase containment and structural defense.”
A second, smaller blaze, the Sycamore Fire, sparked up Thursday in the 4800 block of Cinco View Drive in Los Angeles County. Two homes were destroyed before the fire’s expansion was halted early Friday.
More than eight inches of rain fell in Los Angeles in December, accounting for nearly 70 percent of the year’s total, but hot, dry weather has returned and is parching the state. Two-thirds of California is under a severe drought, according to the U.S. Drought Monitor, and the elevated temperatures are helping evaporate what little moisture remains in plants and further desiccate the landscape.
Add Thursday’s Santa Ana wind event, with offshore gusts as high as 64 mph in the San Fernando Valley and 52 mph in the San Gabriel Valley, and it is no surprise that brush fires spread quickly. The fire risk is lower into the weekend, thanks to lighter winds.
Rising temperatures and frequent drought have expanded Southern California’s fire season to year-round. Los Angeles winters have warmed about 2.5 degrees since 1948; all of the state’s eight largest wildfires on record have occurred in the past five years.
Conditions on Super Bowl Sunday in Inglewood will be rather warm; the local National Weather Service office is especially concerned about out-of-town visitors who may not be accustomed to the warmth in the dead of winter.
SoFi stadium is a domed structure; although panels on the elevated roof can be opened to encourage air flow and allow hot air inside to rise and escape, the effect will reportedly cool the inside of the structure by four degrees at most. In addition, low humidity will take an edge off the warmth.
The high temperature could approach the record set at Super Bowl VII, also in Los Angeles, on Jan. 14, 1973, during which temperatures made it to 84 degrees by kickoff.
Here’s a look at what to expect during the game; kickoff is at 3:30 p.m. Pacific time; fortunately, temperatures will fall significantly toward sunset at 5:35 p.m.
2 p.m.: 83 degrees | null | null | null | null | null |
Opening Ceremonies of the XIII Winter Olympics on Feb. 13, 1980, in Lake Placid, N.Y. (Anonymous/AP)
Watching this year’s Beijing Winter Olympics, you’ll get occasional glimpses of the snowless landscape surrounding the venues, with machine-made snow churned out to blanket the slopes and trails for the athletes. The first Olympics ever to use this weather surrogate were the Lake Placid Games of 1980, amid a fabled snow drought in an otherwise snowy locale.
Since then, snowmaking has been used as needed to improve conditions for other Games, including in 2014 and 2018. And, of course, it has been requisite for this year’s dry, cold winter in Beijing.
Flash back 42 years. The Adirondacks, which often boast knee-deep powder, were instead devoid of any snow and as brown as a post-peak autumn day. Any decent chill in the air was mostly lacking in the month leading up to the 1980 Games.
Aerial shots on local TV newscasts before the Feb. 13-24 Olympics starkly revealed the problem, and the forecasts offered little promise that a well-timed snowstorm would bring a storybook metamorphosis for the Opening Ceremonies. Day after January day, those pictures on the news made clear that the weather is rarely perfectly timed, even for this grandest of sports stages.
Of course, natural snow would be expected in the heart of the northern Adirondacks, where average seasonal totals range from about 100 inches at Lake Placid to 150 inches-plus on nearby Whiteface Mountain. But the drought from December through mid-February was relentless. The period was described, in the final report from the Lake Placid Olympic Organizing Committee, as “the worst snow drought to hit the eastern United States since 1887.”
There was essentially no snow on the ground except on mountain peaks during January, and what little did fall (a couple of inches at most) was prone to melt quickly with temperatures frequently ranging above average until the final few days of the month. The warmest period occurred during the second week of January, with readings soaring into the high 40s and mid-50s.
The weather, a primary concern for every Olympics, thus presented the meteorologists assembled for the Games with a unique challenge. The team, as described in a National Weather Service Heritage piece, included meteorologists from the National Weather Service plus one from the state of New York and a student intern. Not only did they have to monitor the meteorology that could impact the athletes and their well-being during the Games (frostbite, wind, etc.) but they also had to provide support for the broader weather issues that developed in the weeks prior.
As for that lack of snow, our mechanisms of technology did ultimately deliver. According to a website about Whiteface Mountain, “the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation approved the design and installation of a $5 million snow-making system at Whiteface in 1979.” Ahead of the Games, organizers had “promised the first ‘weatherproof’ Olympics,” The Washington Post reported on Jan. 15, 1980.
Tony Goodwin, who was the venue manager for the Lake Placid Olympic Organizing Committee, shared pictures of crews spreading snow on cross-country trails in the Facebook group “History and Legends of the Adirondacks.”
But even after the snow was made, it was unclear whether it would survive, given the mild weather pattern. Thankfully, conditions turned plenty cold enough just in time for the Games, maintaining the manufactured base of snow that had been expertly layered and groomed.
There was even a fresh coating of natural snow a few days into the event, but, of course, there had to be one more glitch. On Feb. 20, the thaw returned, with temperatures rising once again to levels seen in January — back to near 50 degrees! The warm-up didn’t linger long, so there was little danger to the surviving snow and ice for the remaining four days of the Games.
So now, 42 years later, as we enjoy the 2022 Olympics, remember the groundbreaking initiative at Lake Placid, where machines rescued us from the scarcity of falling snow. The practice, established by necessity then, is routine now. But it will never replace the warmth delivered, even on the most frigid of days, by sweeping views of snow-covered mountains as we watch the Winter Games from afar. | null | null | null | null | null |
A man killed in a shooting Wednesday night in Southeast Washington apparently was struck by a bullet fired accidentally by a neighbor, according to D.C. police.
The victim was identified as Harold James, 66. Police said he was shot in one leg and died at a hospital.
Police said the shooting occurred shortly after 9 p.m. inside an apartment in the 2300 block of Good Hope Road SE.
Dustin Sternbeck, a police spokesman, said James was lying on a bed when a bullet fired in the apartment below struck him.
Sternbeck said a man told police he had been cleaning his gun when it fired. The spokesman said the man had a valid permit for the firearm. The man was not identified.
Police have not filed the charges in the case but said the investigation continues. A police report says the incident is being investigated as involuntary manslaughter.
It was not immediately clear whether James lived at the apartment on Good Hope Road or had been visiting. | null | null | null | null | null |
The Washington region will see the weather flip from 60 degrees to snow in less than 24 hours this weekend. But this latest blast of wintry weather, while jarring, shouldn’t be too problematic for those attempting to get around and about on Super Bowl Sunday.
While some areas, especially south of the District, could see a quick inch or two of snow early in the day, other areas may not see much more than melting snowflakes.
We see the chance of an inch in the District at around 40 percent.
This event rates as a Category 1 “nuisance event” on our 1 to 5 winter storm impact scale. Its effects on the region will be mitigated by several factors:
Most of the snow is predicted to fall before dawn on Sunday when there is little traffic and most schools are closed (outside of religious/Sunday schools). | null | null | null | null | null |
FILE - The Federal Correctional Institution is shown in Dublin, Calif., July 20, 2006. A former employee at a federal women’s prison in California pleaded guilty to charges he sexually abused at least two inmates, the first conviction in a wave of arrests at a lockup known to prisoners and workers as “the rape club.” Ross Klinger, 36, is one of four employees, including the warden and chaplain, who’ve been arrested in in the past seven months for sexually abusing inmates at the federal correctional institution in Dublin, California. Several other Dublin workers remain under investigation.(AP Photo/Ben Margot, File)
By Michael R. Sisak and Michael Balsamo | AP | null | null | null | null | null |
Whitney Houston’s Super Bowl performance is legend. Here are 5 more of her musical moments to remember.
Whitney Houston performs at the 2009 American Music Awards in Los Angeles. (Matt Sayles/AP)
No one, absolutely no one, could give you chills like Whitney Houston. Her transcendent voice — the one that effectively voided all other versions of “The Star Spangled Banner” — had the capacity to lift, cradle and soothe. And it’s been a decade since that gift and the woman who welded it were taken.
Feb. 11 marks the 10th anniversary of Houston’s death, and this Sunday’s Super Bowl LVI marks 31 years since Houston graced the field to deliver arguably the most unforgettable rendition of the national anthem — her death and one of the brightest moments of her life inextricably linked on the calendar.
Review | 10 years after Whitney Houston’s death, what have we learned about her — and ourselves?
“Through her trials and triumphs, she gave us emotional, joyous, heartbreaking music that still serves as a soundtrack to so many special moments,” Ebony magazine wrote this week in a tribute to Houston that marked her Super Bowl XXV feat, which will also be highlighted in a new ESPN documentary.
“Whitney’s Anthem,” which explores the cultural and political impact of Houston’s 1991 performance, premieres Friday night on ESPN. The half-hour feature is a behind-the-scenes look at one of the singer’s greatest achievements.
‘The Merv Griffin Show’
If one could point to exactly when a star was born, then this would be it. Houston, along with her mentor and musical Svengali Clive Davis, appeared on TV host Merv Griffin’s eponymous talk show in 1983. It was 21-year-old Houston’s first live TV performance; she performed “Home” from the Broadway musical “The Wiz.” Davis’s introduction set the tone immediately: “You either got it or you don’t got it and she’s got it.”
HBO’s ‘Welcome Home Heroes with Whitney Houston’
America was roughly half a year into the Gulf War when Houston sang the “Star Spangled Banner” at the country’s biggest sporting event. Her live version was turned into a single, with sales going to charities involved in the war effort. To extend the goodwill, Houston had planned to perform for the troops overseas, but the war ended a month after her performance. Instead, she held a concert for returning troops on Easter Sunday in 1991.
‘The Concert for a New South Africa’
In 1994, Houston was the first major artist to visit a post-Apartheid South Africa. The singer would perform three concerts in total in honor of the country’s new president, Nelson Mandela.
In one of the greatest moments on the history of the Grammy stage, Houston delivered a once-in-a-lifetime performance of her smash hit “I Will Always Love You.” The crowd at Radio City Music Hall went wild when Houston delivered the very first note, “Ifffff …” She took home three awards that night for album of the year, record of the year and best female pop performance.
It was 2010 and Houston was one of five recipients of the BET Honors, an award show that celebrated the accomplishments of major talents in the Black community. Houston began her emotional speech by singing just a few lines of the gospel hymn “I Love the Lord.” Then the singer, whose struggle with substance abuse had been well-documented, delivered this powerful line: “It is a wonderful marvelous feeling to be looked at and not judged. Judged not for your flaws but for your triumphs.” | null | null | null | null | null |
Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan (R) at a news conference last month. Some Democratic lawmakers have introduced a bill to restrain his use of messages that self-destruct in 24 hours. (Michael Robinson Chavez/The Washington Post)
By Steve Thompson
Transparency advocates say it is important that government communications and other records be accessible through freedom of information laws and handled with care, so that archivists, researchers and historians can document the operation of government for future generations.
The main provision of the new bill, called the Transparency in Public Records Act, would bring the governor’s office in line with state agencies required to set policies for how long different types of records must be kept. That would not necessarily stop the governor’s office from using Wickr. Most states, including Maryland, have yet to reckon with mobile apps that can destroy government communications before any determination of whether they should be public can be made.
A Washington Post report in December detailed use by the governor and state employees of a Wickr network called “Larry Hogan” and chat rooms with names such as “Inner Sanctum,” “Executive Team,” “COVID-19” and “Front Office.”
Del. Vaughn M. Stewart III (D-Montgomery), who is lead sponsor of the House version of the bill, said his reaction to reading about Hogan’s Wickr use was “horror.” But rather than trying to ban a particular type of communications platform, he decided it made more sense to promote records retention inside the governor’s office in a broader way.
“I think if we polled the House of Delegates, we may get 141 different opinions for what folks think of new technologies and what should be in or out,” Stewart said. “But I hope what everybody can agree with is that the governor’s office should be required to work with the state archivist and the Department of General Services to come up with some plan to determine what to retain and what not to retain.”
Hogan, who is considering running for president, has declined to be interviewed by The Post about his Wickr use, but he defended it at a January news conference. “It doesn’t take the place of official government communications, but we certainly have the ability to communicate in an informal way in person, on the phone and through messaging chats,” he said. “I think it’s a pretty common practice and there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it.”
According to guidance on the Maryland State Archives’ website, how long a record should be kept depends more on its content than whether it’s on paper, contained in an email or, say, sent via a Wickr message. “Transitory correspondence,” regardless of format, need not be kept once its usefulness has passed, the guidance says.
Among recent self-destructing messages obtained by The Post through a request under the Maryland Public Information Act was one sent by Hogan’s scheduler. It gave the whereabouts of a binder for the next day, conveying the location through a code name used by Hogan’s security team. The guidance suggests such a message could appropriately be deleted once the binder was located.
But the content of some of Hogan’s Wickr messages suggests that under the guidance they should be kept longer than 24 hours. “Stop talking about 1,000 f---ing tests!!!!” he admonished staffers in a 2020 Wickr message, obtained by The Post from a former state employee, as the governor tried to keep the uselessness of coronavirus tests he had arranged from South Korea a secret.
Messages of that sort might qualify as “administrative correspondence” sent in the course of carrying out agency functions — which the guidance says should be kept for some number of years before destruction. But because it was sent by the governor, it could also qualify as “executive correspondence,” which the guidance says should be turned over to the Archives for permanent retention.
Under current Maryland law, each unit of state government must have a records-retention schedule. The governor’s office asserts it is not subject to this law because it is not a “unit of the state government” but rather its head. The new bill proposes to explicitly define “unit of the state government,” as far as record-retention-schedule law is concerned, as including the governor’s office.
The governor’s office’s assertion predates Hogan’s administration. In 2010, former governor Martin O’Malley (D)’s administration took that stance while defending against a public-records claim in a Frederick County Circuit Court case that was ultimately dismissed. The attorney general’s office argued that the legislative history of the record-retention-schedule law — passed in its first form in 1984 — “reveals no indication that the General Assembly intended to disrupt the traditional arrangement between the State Archivist and the Governor.”
That traditional arrangement, which lawmakers backing the bill now hope to disrupt, dates back to the 1940s. It has left governors deciding which records to save, with no formal policy, and state archivists trying to cajole them into saving more.
In a 1960 article in the American Archivist, former Maryland state archivist Morris L. Radoff described his successful attempt in 1946 to get former governor Herbert R. O’Conor (D) to start handing over records before the end of his second term — avoiding a scramble on his last day in office.
“We thought, too, that if we sat with him while he sorted his papers it might be possible to persuade Mr. O’Conor not to take away with him the files that he considered personal,” Radoff wrote. “Some ‘carrying off’ of records by a chief executive is always to be expected, but if possible the limits of what is personal should be set at something less than the scandalous depletion of files, which we have all encountered …”
Archivists everywhere still grapple with that issue. Last month, the National Archives and Records Administration retrieved 15 boxes of documents and other items from former president Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence that the agency said should have been turned over to the agency when he left the White House.
Edward Papenfuse, who served as Maryland’s state archivist from 1975 to 2013, created guidelines for the governor’s office that included a “guiding rule” that was more of a plea: “when in doubt, save.” Another “general rule” was that “all email relating in any way to the operation of government should be saved and transferred to archival storage.”
Elaine Bachmann, who Hogan appointed as state archivist in June, has said a records-retention schedule from the governor’s office is “something we’d like to have.” In response to a public-records request from The Post, Bachmann said she had no communications from the governor’s office arguing it was not required to have one. “There was no written communication between the Governor’s office and the Archives asserting what was already an accepted and expected practice,” she wrote.
Stewart said he doubts lawmakers ever intended to exempt the governor’s office from preservation requirements.
“Clearly the public has more interest in a record retention policy for the governor than it does for say, the Department of Transportation,” Stewart said. “It doesn’t stand to reason that the legislature would have crafted a record-retention policy and exempted the one instrumentality of the state that the public has the most interest in knowing about.”
Hogan’s administration has said he will turn over to the State Archives all emails, which are handled on a Google platform, at the end of his term, presumably late this year. The governor’s spokesman, Mike Ricci, told The Post last year that because the governor’s Wickr use is managed by his political apparatus, Hogan has given his staffers no formal guidance on when to use Wickr rather than email.
Gov. Larry Hogan rules out Senate bid, rebuffing overtures from GOP power brokers
“It gives them a wide-open, free path to not have to retain anything that they’re saying behind the scenes, on a piece of software that’s intentionally meant to mask their communications,” said Sen. Clarence K. Lam (D-Howard), who sponsored the Senate version of the bill.
Lam said that while Republican lawmakers may cast the bill as partisan, he does not see it that way. “We need to put an end to this and stop this whether it’s a Democratic or a Republican administration next,” he said.
Legislative committee hearings on the bill are scheduled for Tuesday. | null | null | null | null | null |
After the Zoom meeting concluded, Jawando said he was prepared to suppress the experience and move on. But then he noticed how strongly others reacted. He received apologies by members of the group that hosted the forum, Progressive Legacy, and saw the indignation of his chief of staff, who posted a clip to the video on her Facebook. He’s grown increasingly disturbed by what happened since Tuesday, and decided to talk openly about it in the hopes it would help make clear that such behavior can’t be accepted.
“The big takeaway for me was that this is not okay,” Jawando said in an interview. “It is not okay to accept it and to bury it — that is part of the problem, too. … We have got to call it out and make it untenable.” | null | null | null | null | null |
The Washington region will see the weather flip from 60 degrees to snow in less than 24 hours this weekend. But this latest blast of wintry weather, while jarring, shouldn’t be too problematic for those attempting to get around on Super Bowl Sunday.
Although some areas, especially south of the District, could see a quick inch or two of snow early in the day, other areas may not see much more than melting snowflakes.
We see the chance of an inch in the District at about 40 percent.
Most of the snow is predicted to fall before dawn on Sunday, when there is little traffic and most schools are closed (outside of religious/Sunday schools). | null | null | null | null | null |
The Wizards also acquired a 2022 second-round pick as Sheppard approached the deadline looking for three things — draft capital, trade exceptions and talent.
“There’s only going to be so many opportunities to get talent,” Sheppard said. “And to get talent, you have to give up talent. And understand that three of the players that went out yesterday weren’t with us last season. They were new players and they were part of our go forward.
Beal, who had surgery Thursday to repair a torn ligament in his wrist, wants to win. Plain and simple. The team has fallen to 25-29 since a 10-3 start. Porzingis has dealt with a variety of injuries, though Sheppard said there’s a plan to manage that, and his upside as an elite offensive talent that also provides upper-echelon rim protection, Sheppard believes, was worth the gamble.
“At the end of the day, I had to do my job,” Sheppard said. “Those guys do their jobs and we all meet collectively. I have enough history with Bradley and with [Coach Wes Unseld Jr.] that they trust us to do what’s best for the Wizards.
The Wizards certainly didn’t sit still with the pieces acquired from the Russell Westbrook trade made in July. Dinwiddie was part of the Porzingis deal. Montrezl Harrell was sent to the Charlotte Hornets for Ish Smith, Vernon Carey Jr., a conditional second-round draft pick in 2023 or 2004 and a trade exception. The team had lost nine of 11 games before Thursday night’s victory over the Nets, in which both teams where shorthanded after executing significant trades.
Sheppard acknowledged the Wizards’ struggles since it was 15-11 when a covid outbreak hit the team, but also added that the group did not handle the early success well. He specifically pointed to the defensive drop-off in a season when that’s supposed to be a main tenet of the group’s identity. Kentavious Caldwell-Pope, who was also part of the Westbrook deal, had his own thoughts.
“I would say we all weren’t on the same page,” Caldwell-Pope said. “Everybody had their own agendas of how they wanted to attack this year. A lot of guys were fighting for minutes. A lot of guys were complaining about minutes, not getting the ball, not touching it. A lot of things were going into the reason why [the team struggled].
“We started 10-3, which was great. No one had no agendas. They just wanted to come in and win. Everybody was new and was getting to know each other. So, we wanted to come in and win. But once everybody started getting comfortable, I feel like a lot of agendas and I would say egos took over.”
The roster management is far from over for the Wizards, the GM said. Point guard is an offseason priority, Sheppard said. The talent level still isn’t enough even after adding Porzingis, who was averaging 19.2 points and 7.7 rebounds in 34 games playing Luka Doncic and the Mavericks.
“The two of those guys playing in a two-man game, it’s going to be a nightmare,” Unseld said. “Both guys can shoot with range, both guys can play off the bounce. Both guys can handle in certain situations. So, it’s a very unique pairing. I’m not going to compare it to two guys I used to work with, but it’s pretty close.” | null | null | null | null | null |
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