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| France, Germany make last-ditch peace effort as U.S. weighs arming Ukraine |
| KIEV, Ukraine — The leaders of Germany and France on Thursday announced a surprise diplomatic bid to end the conflict in Ukraine, working to forestall White House deliberations about arming government forces amid fears that the war could quickly spiral out of control. Read full article » |
| Critics pounce after Obama talks Crusades, slavery at prayer breakfast |
| President Obama has never been one to go easy on America.As a new president, he dismissed the idea of American exceptionalism, noting that Greeks think their country is special, too. He labeled the Bush-era interrogation practices, euphemistically called “harsh” for years, as torture. America, he has suggested, has much to answer given its history in Latin America and the Middle East. Read full article » |
| NBC stays silent, but privately stands behind news anchor Brian Williams |
| NBC News went into damage-control mode a day after the public symbol of the network, anchor Brian Williams, faced a torrent of derision and criticism for telling a story about his wartime reporting that has proved to be untrue. Read full article » |
| Sony Pictures co-chair Amy Pascal steps down |
| Amy Pascal’s improbable career in Hollywood began when she responded to a classified ad for someone to answer calls for a TV producer. She got the job and spent the next three decades climbing her way to become one of most powerful executives in the industry. Read full article » |
| Terry McAuliffe put in awkward spot on death penalty |
| State-sponsored executions in Virginia would become shrouded in unprecedented secrecy under legislation that is advancing with bipartisan support, including that of Democratic Gov. Terry McAuliffe.The measure is intended to keep drugs used for lethal injections flowing into Virginia by shielding manufacturers from public scrutiny and political pressure. Read full article » |
| As a curfew is lifted, Baghdad is at long last partying again |
| BAGHDAD — The Iraqi government on Thursday abolished the nighttime curfew imposed on Baghdad by U.S. troops in 2003, heralding another small milestone in the city’s recent — and surprising — revival.Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi announced that the curfew will end at midnight Saturday, as well as a series of other measures aimed at normalizing life in the long-blighted capital, even as much of the rest of the country is consumed by war. Read full article » |
| Virginia may finally join the 21st century on breast-feeding |
| “Are Virginia lawmakers finally ready to stop being boobs?”It’s an important question because Virginia is one of only three states in the nation where public breast-feeding is not protected by law.On Friday, the famously female-unfriendly legislature is poised to take the first step toward changing that. The House of Delegates is going to vote on a long-overdue bill that gives women the right to nurse their infants anywhere. Read full article » |
| Michael Kors handbags are everywhere — and that’s a problem for the brand |
| Michael Kors, the accessible luxury retailer best known for its leather handbags, delivered the kind of earnings report Thursday that many retailers would consider the stuff of dreams: Revenue soared nearly 30 percent and profit rocketed 24 percent in the most recent quarter. Sales at stores open more than a year increased 8.6 percent, and online sales rose 76 percent. Read full article » |
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| POLITICS |
| Democrats invoke perils of terrorism in push for ‘clean’ DHS funding bill |
| Congressional Democrats are invoking the threats of the Islamic State and other terrorist organizations in an effort to pressure Republicans to fund the Department of Homeland Security without the stipulations the GOP has pushed for weeks. Read full article » |
| Everybody hates Donald Trump |
| If there was a master class in how not to conduct yourself as a politician, it would look a lot like Donald Trump.Trump, who fashions himself a potential 2016 presidential candidate and ally to the tea party, has turned himself into little more than a punchline these days. What’s amazing is that he keeps getting invited to gatherings like the Iowa Freedom Summit two weeks ago — an opportunity he used to rag on Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney. Read full article » |
| IRS rehired hundreds of ex-employees with troubled records |
| The Internal Revenue Service rehired four ex-employees in recent years who left the agency amid serious conduct and performance problems, placing each of them the same positions they had before.The employees were among hundreds that the IRS hired for a second time despite past troubles ranging from off-duty misconduct to accessing taxpayer records without authorization. Read full article » |
| Is there a link between the measles outbreak and illegal immigration? |
| “I don’t think there is any health care professional who has examined the fact, who can honestly say that Americans have not died because of the diseases brought into America by illegal aliens who are not properly healthcare screened as lawful immigrants are. It might be the enterovirus that has a heavy presence in Central and South America that has caused deaths of American children over the past 6 to 9 months. It might be this measles outbreak. There are any number of things.” Read full article » |
| OPINIONS |
| A juvenile GOP |
| Bang. Bang. Crash. That was the sound of the Republican majority in Congress shooting itself in both feet, then tripping over them.At a moment of heightened concern that terrorists in the Middle East might stage or inspire attacks on U.S. soil, the GOP-controlled House and Senate are unable to agree on a bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security. If the party’s aim is to show Americans it is ready to govern, we are witnessing an epic fail. Read full article » |
| The story of the U.S. measles outbreak, as the rest of the world might see it |
| If the foreign press covered the U.S. measles outbreak the way the American press covered the Ebola crisis . . . ■ Paranoia and fear have spread throughout this human-resource-rich but politically dysfunctional nation, allowing a disease once nearly eradicated to return and ravage large swaths of the U.S. population. Read full article » |
| Does the barbarism have a logic? |
| Why did they do it? What did the Islamic State think it could possibly gain by burning alive a captured Jordanian pilot?I wouldn’t underestimate the absence of logic, the sheer depraved thrill of a triumphant cult reveling in its barbarism. But I wouldn’t overestimate it either. You don’t overrun much of Syria and Iraq without having deployed keen tactical and strategic reasoning. Read full article » |
| AS THE Obama administration pushes to complete a nuclear accord with Iran, numerous members of Congress, former secretaries of state and officials of allied governments are expressing concern about the contours of the emerging deal. Though we have long supported negotiations with Iran as well as the interim agreement the United States and its allies struck with Tehran, we share several of those concerns and believe they deserve more debate now — before negotiators present the world with a fait accompli. Read full article » |
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| LOCAL |
| In Metro probe, blame is directed at the District’s fire department |
| Unions for D.C. firefighters and paramedics broke ranks with Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) on Thursday, blaming the District’s fire department for poor training and pervasive radio failures as probes continue into last month’s fatal smoke incident aboard Metro. Read full article » |
| At-risk funding in the District: A school-by-school breakdown |
| The D.C. Council approved more than $40 million last year to meet the needs of students who are considered at-risk in D.C. Public Schools.Some 40 percent of the city’s public school students are considered “at risk,” according to a new category being used in the District. That includes students who are in foster care or homeless, who are receiving welfare benefits or food stamps, or who are performing at least a year behind in high school. The extra funding — $2,079 per eligible student — is supposed to help schools mitigate the effects of poverty that can interfere with a student’s ability to learn. Read full article » |
| The gamblers in the District are out there, ready to risk their money. But Washington hasn’t been making it easy for them. Trying to find a scratch lottery ticket inside the city’s borders is harder than finding a Metro station where all the escalators work. Read full article » |
| D.C. area forecast: Another cold day before of a taste of spring this weekend |
| Cool breezes may not make it feel warmer today. Best to dress in layers. Read full article » |
| SPORTS |
| Wizards blow 11-point lead, fall to Hornets for fifth straight loss |
| CHARLOTTE — The Washington Wizards’ list of maladies, already long, continued expanding Thursday night at Time Warner Cable Arena. A few minutes before they even stepped on the court against the Charlotte Hornets, backup center Kevin Seraphin surprisingly notified Coach Randy Wittman that he couldn’t play because of a sprained right ankle, the same injury John Wall has played through for more than a week. Near the end of the first quarter, Bradley Beal walked off to the locker room with a big toe injury and did not return. Read full article » |
| Dustin Johnson quietly returns to PGA after six months away for ‘personal challenges’ |
| The big story from Thursday’s first round at the Farmers Insurance Open was the withdrawal of Tiger Woods, who gave up after 11 holes because of back pain. Actually, that wasn’t just a big story, it was a massive tale that blotted out the sun, let alone any other details from the tournament. Read full article » |
| NHL7 p.m. Anaheim at Washington » Comcast SportsNet, WJFK (106.7 FM), WFED (1500AM)8 p.m. Chicago at Winnipeg » NHL NetworkNBA7 p.m. Los Angeles Clippers at Toronto » ESPN Read full article » |
| Chris Paul on female ref who gave him technical foul: ‘This might not be for her’ |
| Thursday provided one of the season’s low points for the Clippers. They got thrashed by the Cavaliers in a nationally televised game, and they received five technical fouls, two of which were on forward Matt Barnes, earning him an ejection. Read full article » |
| FEDERAL GOVERNMENT |
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| House and Senate reintroduce popular FOIA legislation |
| Congress came one floor vote away last year from passing bipartisan, open-government legislation from the Senate, but lawmakers ran out of time as they rushed to reach agreement on spending legislation. Read full article » |
| Five things Republicans could agree to in Obama’s budget |
| Neither the White House nor GOP lawmakers have publicly acknowledged much common ground in President Obama’s 2016 budget, but a number of the proposals match Republican legislation or align with the party’s priorities. Read full article » |
| NATIONAL |
| I’m addicted to Facebook. And I’m okay with that. |
| This article originally appeared on Role Reboot.We are obsessed with Facebook, and obsessed with why we’re so obsessed with it. “There is something undeniably totalitarian about the combination of mass media, Web, and social media,” that great social networking grouch Jonathan Franzen once (or 20 times) intoned ominously. Read full article » |
| Islamic poets wrote their own crude irreverent satire, centuries before Charlie Hebdo |
| In the weeks since the Charlie Hebdo attacks, friends keep asking me why Muslims are so easily offended. They aren’t referring to the people who commit violence in the name of Islam, but rather figures like Tariq Ramadan, an Egyptian-born academic who condemns violence, but also the publication of inciting images. What it is about Islam, they wonder, that leaves people unable to take a joke? Read full article » |
| Scott Walker thinks my university has fat to trim. Yet my department is barely scraping by. |
| You might think that one of the nation’s leading academic communication programs would be a good place to make a long-distance phone call.Yet there I was on a cold January morning, the interview I needed to get less than 15 minutes away, panic mounting as each attempt to dial out on my department-issued speakerphone produced an electronic wail rather than a ring tone. I’m writing my dissertation on how Web sites owned by sports teams and leagues challenge our society’s most deeply held values about journalism. I collect my data by talking to the people who work for these sites. I need a working phone. My cell was acting as my voice recorder, so I couldn’t use it to make calls — not that the reception in my office is good enough to be trusted. Read full article » |
| WORLD |
| Islamic State guide for female jihadis says women can marry from age nine |
| LONDON -- Girls can marry from the age of nine and most “pure girls” will be married by 16 or 17, according to a lengthy treatise published by female supporters of the Islamic State.Offering new insight into life of women in the Islamic State, a document called “Women of the Islamic State: Manifesto and Case Study” tries to clarify the role of women in the Islamic State. Read full article » |
| What do some Afro-Brazilian religions actually believe? |
| RIO DE JANEIRO — In its contemporary form, Brazil’s Candomblé religion looks about as removed from Western Christianity as could be imagined. It must have seemed positively diabolical, then, to the brutal Portuguese overlords whose slaves imported it from Africa, and whom they believed had been converted. Those slaves may have cleverly “synchronized” their own deities with Catholic saints to be able to continue worshiping, but they did not synchronize their beliefs. Read full article » |
| A federal judge on Thursday declined to approve an agreement in which a subsidiary of Dutch aerospace company Fokker Technologies Holding had agreed to pay a $21 million penalty for selling parts to Iran and other countries in violation of U.S. trade sanctions. Read full article » |
| Rules for Benghazi panel fuel Democrats’ suspicion of political motive |
| A congressional investigation of the 2012 attacks on U.S. facilities in Benghazi, Libya, is operating outside rules that require other House committees to disclose publicly how much money they spend and the issues they intend to pursue, according to Democrats on the panel. Read full article » |
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| BUSINESS |
| RadioShack files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy |
| After years of struggling to adapt to the digital era, RadioShack on Thursday filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy.Under the agreement, hedge fund Standard General will purchase up to 2,400 of RadioShack’s stores. Of the stores purchased by Standard General, wireless carrier Sprint will establish a “store within a store” model in up to 1,750 of them. The company plans to close the rest of the stores that it owns, which currently number 4,000. Read full article » |
| You can’t keep a bad idea down. That’s my reaction to a terrible proposal in President Obama’s budget — limiting how much money can be set aside on your behalf in 401(k)s, pensions and other tax-favored retirement accounts. Read full article » |
| Valentine’s Day on the cheap: Saying I love you doesn’t have to cost anything |
| My husband and I have what I think is a romantic routine for celebrating Valentine’s Day.On Valentine’s Day morning, I’ll turn to him and say, “Honey, do you love me?”To which he replies, “Sure, I love you.” Read full article » |
| TECHNOLOGY |
| Twitter’s battle against abuse has high stakes for the company |
| "We suck at dealing with abuse and trolls," Twitter chief executive Dick Costolo admitted in a memo heard 'round the social network. In his note to the staff, leaked to The Verge late Wednesday, Costolo took personal responsibility for the company's shortcomings -- a problem that he said is costing Twitter "core user after core user." Read full article » |
| Why cable stocks surged after the FCC’s net neutrality proposal |
| It's the mystery of the morning.When Tom Wheeler, head of the Federal Communications Commission, announced his proposal Wednesday to regulate Internet providers, such as phone companies, shares of cable companies unexpectedly surged. Here's what happened to the stock prices of Comcast, Time Warner Cable, Charter and Cablevision minutes after the news dropped. Read full article » |
| Why hackers are targeting the medical sector |
| A hack at Anthem, the second-largest health insurer in the country, exposed personal information about millions of employees and customers. But the attack is just the latest evidence that cybercriminals are increasingly targeting the medical sector where they can collect health information that can be sold for a premium on the black market. Read full article » |
| Yes, that 3D-printed mansion is safe to live in |
| Back in April, a team of Chinese construction workers used a 3D printer to construct houses. By day’s end, there were 10 standing. They were compact and fairly bare bones — nothing much to look at besides the “wow!” factor of there being as many as — count them — 10. But this time around, those same builders have taken the wraps off an achievement that’s roundly more impressive. Read full article » |
| LIFESTYLE |
| Eddie Redmayne is ridiculous in ‘Jupiter Ascending.’ Can he still win an Oscar? |
| On Friday, Oscar ballots get mailed out, and Academy voters will have a chance to dictate movie history. They’ll decide whether rising star Eddie Redmayne takes home a trophy for his phenomenal performance as Stephen Hawking in “The Theory of Everything” and determine if overdue veteran Julianne Moore indeed has a lock on best actress for her wrenching portrayal of a woman with early-onset Alzheimers in “Still Alice.” Read full article » |
| If you miss your Aunt Hattie’s reprimands, here’s a voice you can borrow |
| It’s always Black History Month in my house.I used to keep a photograph of an old North Carolina slave woman in my study.Some people paste pictures of themselves on their refrigerator doors as a reminder not to overeat, I once wrote, but I kept a picture of Sarah Gudger to remind me to get to work early, to feed my kids and take the cat to the vet, to stop complaining about how hard it all is. Read full article » |
| Civilities: When it comes to transgender etiquette, choose to be kind |
| Is Bruce Jenner transitioning? That’s the question bouncing around social and tabloid media alike about the Olympic gold medalist and Kardashian ex. Because Jenner has remained silent on the matter, the correct answer is that we don’t know and, for that matter, it’s none of our business. In much the same way, I’ve long advised nosy parkers not to ask a woman, “Are you pregnant?” if she appears to have gained a few pounds. Nor to query a co-worker, “Are you having chemo?” if he’s suddenly lost his hair. Yes, it’s natural to be curious about whether someone is expecting, ill or transitioning, but my advice is ironclad: Check your curiosity and hold your tongue. And when in doubt, choose to be kind. Read full article » |
| Carolyn Hax: Kids weren’t invited to the wedding? Then don’t bring them. |
| Dear Carolyn:My son and his fiancee live in California and will be married there next summer. My entire family has met the fiancee and feel she is warm and friendly. We live in the Midwest and plan to attend the wedding. Read full article » |
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