Airstrike kills ‘high-profile’ targets, wounds another less than two days after Kabul airport attack
WASHINGTON — A U.S. drone killedtwo Islamic State terrorists and injured athird in an airstrike less than two days af-ter an attack at the Kabul airport killed 13American troops, Army Maj. Gen. HankTaylor, the Joint Staff’s deputy directorfor regional operations, said Saturday.
The drone strike in the Nangarharprovince hit “high-profile ISIS targets”that worked as “planners and facilitators”for the terrorist group’s Afghanistanbranch known as ISIS-Khorasan, orISIS-K, Taylor said. A sole suicide bom-ber and an unknown number of gunmenon Thursday attacked a gate at the HamidKarzai International Airport killing the
U.S. troops and wounding 20 other ser-vice members.
The ISIS-K attack killed 11 Marines, asailor, a soldier and a large number of Af-ghan civilians when a terrorist wearingan explosive vest detonated it near theairport’s Abbey Gate “followed by direct[gun]fire from an enemy position,” Tay-lor had said. The gate is one of three en-
trances to the airport where large crowdsof people had been gathered to vie forevacuation flights.
The airstrike was conducted in re-sponse to the airport attack, chief Penta-gon spokesman John Kirby confirmedSaturday.
2 ISIS-K terrorists killed by US droneBY CAITLIN DOORNBOS
Stars and Stripes
AFGHANISTAN
SEE DRONE ON PAGE 5
Evacuated Afghanistan arrive at the international airport in Tirana,Albania, early Saturday. The Albanian government plans to allow theevacuees to stay in Albania for at least a year before they move to theUnited States for final settlement.
FRANC ZHURDA/AP
Families, communities beginpaying tribute to troops killedPage 3
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Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 3
AFGHANISTAN
WASHINGTON — A young
husband with a child on the way, a
corporal who expected to follow in
his parent’s footsteps as a sheriff’s
deputy and a soldier who enjoyed
tending garden with his wife were
among the 13 U.S. service mem-
bers killed Thursday in a horrific
suicide bombing at Afghanistan’s
Kabul airport, which also claimed
the lives of more than 100 Afghans.
As military personnel were go-
ing through the grim task of noti-
fying the troops’ next of kin, some
of their names emerged Friday
before the government formally
announced them.
Eleven Marines, one Navy sail-
or and one Army soldier were
among the dead, while 18 other
U.S. service members were
wounded in Thursday’s bombing,
which was blamed on Afghanis-
tan’s offshoot of Islamic State.
The U.S. said it was the most le-
thal day for American forces in Af-
ghanistan since 2011. The White
House said President Joe Biden
will look for opportunities to honor
the service members who lost
their lives.
None of the names had been of-
ficially released by the Pentagon
on Friday, as military service
branches by policy wait 24 hours
after fallen troops’ next-of-kin
have been notified before making
the announcement. However,
families can choose to identify
their loved ones any time.
David Lee EspinozaLance Cpl. Da-
vid Lee Espino-
za, 20, of Rio
Bravo, Texas,
“embodied the
values of Ameri-
ca: grit, dedica-
tion, service, and
valor,” Rep.
Henry Cuellar,
R-Tex., told the Border Report
new site.
Espinoza was identified as one
of the victims via a Facebook post
from the Laredo police depart-
ment on Friday. He is survived by
his brother, mother and stepfa-
ther.
“When he joined the military af-
ter high school, he did so with the
intention of protecting our nation
and demonstrating his selfless
acts of service,” Cuellar said, ac-
cording to Border Report. “I
mourn him and all the fallen he-
roes in Afghanistan.”
“It was his calling and he died a
hero,” his mother Elizabeth Hol-
guin said in an interview with the
Washington Post, adding that her
heart now has “a David-sized hole
nobody can fill.”
The two last spoke on Wednes-
day, Holguin said. It would be
their final phone call.
The young Marine’s last words
to his mother were, “I love you.”
Taylor HooverStaff Sgt. Tay-
lor Hoover, 31,
hailed from
Utah, where the
governor on Fri-
day ordered
flags at all state
facilities and
public grounds
to be flown at
half-staff through Monday.
The Marine’s family confirmed
he was among those who died in
the suicide attack, KSL-TV in Salt
Lake City reported Friday.
“Staff Sgt. Hoover served val-
iantly as a Marine and died serv-
ing his fellow countrymen as well
as America’s allies in Afghanis-
tan,” Utah Gov. Spencer Cox said
on Twitter. “We honor his tremen-
dous bravery and commitment to
his country, even as we condemn
the senseless violence that result-
ed in his death.”
In a brief phone call with the
Washington Post, Hoover’s father
Darin Hoover called his son a
“true hero” who “did what he
loved doing, serving the United
States.”
Ryan KnaussThe sole sol-
dier who died in
the attack was
Staff Sgt. Ryan
Knauss, 23, of
Knoxville,
Tenn., according
to WBIR-TV,
which con-
firmed his iden-
tity with Knauss’ stepmother.
Knauss, who was assigned to 1st
Special Forces Command, had
just completed psychological op-
erations training and had expect-
ed to move to Washington, D.C.,
she told the station. He enjoyed
working with his hands and help-
ing his wife, Alena, with her gar-
den, she said.
“Our teammate died not only
serving our nation, but helping to
give others a life of freedom and
opportunity,” the command said
on Twitter.
Rylee McCollumLance Cpl. Ry-
lee McCollum,
20, a Marine
from Bondurant,
Wyo., whose
wife is expecting
a baby in three
weeks, was iden-
tified by family
members and lo-
cal media outlets as one of the ser-
vice members killed Thursday.
“He was a Marine before he
knew he was allowed to be a Ma-
rine,” his sister Cheyenne McCol-
lum told The Associated Press on
Friday.
“Rylee wanted to be a history
teacher and a wrestling coach
when he finished serving his coun-
try,” she said. “He’s a tough, kind,
loving kid who made an impact on
everyone he met. His joke and wit
brought so much joy.”
McCollum, who was stationed
in San Diego, was manning an air-
port checkpoint at the time of the
explosion Thursday, according to
the Casper Star Tribune.
According to the Washington
Post, McCollum was expected to
arrive back in California in time
for the birth of his son or daughter.
The couple, according to the pa-
per, had chosen to keep the child’s
gender a surprise.
“I lost my best friend,” McCol-
lum’s wife Jiennah Crayton wrote
on Facebook. “He would’ve been
the best dad. I wish he could see
how much of an impact he made
on this world. I’m so proud to call
him my husband.”
Hunter LopezMarine Corps
Cpl. Hunter Lo-
pez, of Indio,
Calif., was the
son of two River-
side County
Sheriff’s Depart-
ment deputies.
The Riverside
Sheriff’s Associ-
ation issued a statement Friday
announcing his death.
Lopez, 22, was assigned to 2nd
Battalion, 1st Marines, and had
planned on becoming a Riverside
County sheriff’s deputy after re-
turning from his current deploy-
ment, according to the associ-
ation.
“Like his parents who serve our
community, being a Marine to
Hunter wasn’t a job; it was a call-
ing,” the statement said. “He
loved his family, and as we grieve
for Hunter and his fellow Marines
taken from us too soon, there are
simply no words to express how
deeply he will be missed — Sem-
per Fi.”
“This kid knew since he was 11
what he wanted to do,” wrote JC
Lopez, Hunter Lopez’s uncle, on
Facebook. “Every free moment
was spent training and perfecting
his craft. Hunter you did your job.
Rest now.”
Kareem NikouiLance Cpl. Ka-
reem Nikoui, 20,
of Norco, Calif.,
was identified as
one of the vic-
tims by his fa-
ther, Steve Ni-
koui, who spoke
with The Daily
Beast on Friday.
‘“He really loved that [Marine
Corps] family,” Steve Nikoui said
of his son. “He was devoted — he
was going to make a career out of
this, and he wanted to go. No hes-
itation for him to be called to du-
ty.”
Nikoui was stationed at Camp
Pendleton, allowing him easy ac-
cess to visit his family on week-
ends, his father said.
“No mother, no parent should
ever have to hear that their child is
gone,” Nikoui’s mother, Shana
Chappell, wrote on Instagram,
where she shared a recent photo of
her son in Afghanistan. “He was
so amazing in every way.”
D. William-Tyeler PageThe family of
23-year-old Ma-
rine Corps Cpl.
Daegan William-
Tyeler Page,
from Omaha,
Neb. released a
statement to lo-
cal media on Fri-
day confirming
his death, the Omaha World-Her-
ald reported.
“He loved the brotherhood of
the Marines and was proud to
serve as a member of the 2nd Bat-
talion, 1st Marine Regiment at
Marine Corps Base Camp Pendle-
ton, California,” the statement
said.
The Marine was an avid hunter
and outdoorsman, as well as an
animal lover with a soft spot for
dogs, the statement said. In one
Facebook photo, he is shown
sporting a chest tattoo that reads:
“Death Before Dishonor.”
“Daegan always looked forward
to coming home and hanging out
with his family and many buddies
in Nebraska,” the statement said.
“Daegan’s girlfriend Jessica,
his mom, dad, step-mom, step-
dad, 4 siblings, and grandparents
are all mourning the loss of a great
son, grandson, and brother.”
Jared SchmitzLance Cpl.
Jared Schmitz,
20, of Wentzville,
Mo., was identi-
fied as one of the
victims by his fa-
ther, Mark
Schmitz, the AP
reported Friday.
Mark Schmitz
said deploying with the Marine
Corps was something his son “al-
ways wanted to do.”
“His life meant so much more,”
he told St. Louis radio station
KMOX. “I’m so incredibly devas-
tated that I won’t be able to see the
man that he was very quickly
growing into becoming.”
Maxton SoviakMaxton “Max” Soviak, 22, a Na-
vy corpsman from Ohio, was iden-
tified by family member Marilyn
Soviak on Instagram but did not
provide his rank.
In her post,
she described
him as her
“beautiful, intel-
ligent, beat-to-
the-sound of his
own drum, an-
noying, char-
ming baby
brother.”
“He was a f——-g medic there
to help people and now he is gone
and my family will never be the
same,” she wrote on Instagram.
“He was just a kid. We are sending
kids over there to die.”
Maxton Soviak called himself a
“patriot” on the social media plat-
form, where his final post featured
a picture of himself with two Ma-
rines posing in their combat gear.
“It’s kill or be killed,” Maxton
Soviak wrote in his post. “Defi-
nitely trynna be on the kill side.”
Humberto SanchezCpl. Humber-
to Sanchez, 22, of
Logansport,
Ind., was identi-
fied as among
the dead in social
media posts by
members of
Congress and
the school he at-
tended in the town of 17,500.
The young Marine “still had his
entire life ahead of him,” Logan-
sport Mayor Chris Martin said in a
post on his own Facebook page
Friday night.
“Any plans he may have had for
his post-military life were given in
sacrifice due to the heart he exhib-
ited in putting himself into harm’s
way to safeguard the lives of oth-
ers,” he said.
Fatima Magnison, the wife of
another Marine who had mistak-
enly reported among the dead on
some lists, said in a comment that
her husband was best friends with
Sanchez, who she called Bert.
Listing four of the slain Marines —
Sanchez, Page, Soviak and Lopez
—she said they “were too sweet …
to be gone so soon.”
“I can’t believe it,” she wrote.
“My heart is heavy today and ev-
ery day on.”
Nicole GeeSgt. Nicole
Gee, 23, had
been pictured in
photos of the
evacuation hold-
ing an Afghan
baby and escort-
ing girls to a
waiting military
aircraft.
“She had a name. She was doing
God’s work … a warrior,” Capt.
Karen Holliday said in a post on
her personal Facebook page.
“Searching Afghan women and
Families, communities pay tribute to fallenBY CAITLIN DOORNBOS,
WYATT OLSON, KAT BOUZA
Stars and Stripes
Espinoza
Hoover
Knauss
McCollum
Lopez
Kareem
Page
Schmitz
Soviak
Sanchez
Gee
SEE FALLEN ON PAGE 4
PAGE 4 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • Sunday, August 29, 2021
The Marine officer who filmed a
viral video calling out senior mil-
itary and civilian leaders for fail-
ures in Afghanistan was relieved
of command Friday “based on a
lack of trust and confidence,” he
said.
“My chain of command is doing
exactly what I would do … if I
were in their shoes,” Lt. Col. Stu
Scheller wrote in identical Face-
book and LinkedIn posts announc-
ing his dismissal from command
of the Advanced Infantry Training
Battalion at Camp Lejeune, N.C.
Marine leaders can address
their disagreements with the
chain of command through proper
channels, not social media, said
Maj. Jim Stenger, a Marine Corps
spokesman, in an emailed state-
ment confirming that Scheller had
been relieved by Col. David Em-
mel, commanding officer of the
School of Infantry-East.
“This is obviously an emotional
time for a lot of Marines, and we
encourage anyone struggling
right now to seek counseling or
talk to a fellow Marine,” Stenger
said.
Scheller posted the video cri-
tique on social media Thursday,
hours after a blast in Kabul killed
13 U.S. troops. He appears in uni-
form and responds directly to Ma-
rine Corps Commandant Gen. Da-
vid Berger’s letter to troops and
veterans asking whether the near-
ly 20-year-long war in Afghanis-
tan was worth it.
“The reason people are so upset
on social media right now is not
because the Marine on the battle-
field let someone down,” Scheller
says in the video. “People are up-
set because their senior leaders let
them down. And none of them are
raising their hands and accepting
accountability or saying, ‘We
messed this up.’ ”
The video garnered more than
300,000 views and 22,000 shares
on Facebook and LinkedIn, spur-
ring both praise and criticism in
the more than 4,000 comments
within its first 24 hours.
It’s the latest in a spate of calls
from veterans and others de-
manding that senior officials an-
swer for mistakes over the course
of the war, especially in its final
months. Some have blamed the
precipitous U.S. withdrawal for
undermining the Afghan govern-
ment and allowing the Taliban to
seize the country.
Critics have also likened the Af-
ghanistan failure to the Islamic
State’s sweep through Syria and
Iraq in 2014, when President Joe
Biden was vice president and De-
fense Secretary Lloyd Austin led
U.S. Central Command.
Scheller is a veteran of the Iraq
and Afghanistan wars, according
to a biography posted on his com-
mand’s website. It states that he
started his career in 2005 with the
1st Battalion, 8th Marine Re-
giment, which is one of the units
deployed to Kabul’s airport to sup-
port the U.S. airlift.
Eleven Marines, a soldier and a
Navy corpsman were killed in the
attack Thursday that was claimed
by ISIS. About 169 Afghans were
killed, two officials told The Asso-
ciated Press on Friday, though a
final count is expected to take
more time. Scores of others were
wounded, along with at least 18
U.S. troops.
Scheller says he knows one of
the people killed in the blast, but
he declined to name the person
until the family had been notified.
“Not making this video because
it’s potentially an emotional time,”
he says in the video. “Making it be-
cause I have a growing discontent
and contempt for … perceived in-
eptitude at the foreign policy lev-
el.”
Scheller cites remarks Austin
gave earlier this year suggesting
that the Afghan security forces
could withstand a Taliban ad-
vance. He also notes that two Ma-
rine generals are supposed to be
advising the president: Berger, in
his position on the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, and CENTCOM boss Gen.
Frank McKenzie, though he does
not name McKenzie.
“I’m not saying we’ve got to be ...
in Afghanistan forever,” Scheller
says in the video. “But I am saying,
‘Did any of you throw your rank on
the table and say, hey, it’s a bad
idea to evacuate Bagram Airfield,
a strategic air base, before we
evacuate everyone? Did anyone
do that?’”
A Marine of his rank and posi-
tion would be fired immediately
over “the simplest live-fire inci-
dent” or equal opportunity com-
plaint, he says. He then suggests
that the lives lost over the past 20
years could all be for naught if
high-level political and military
leaders don’t take responsibility
for their actions.
“Potentially all those people did
die in vain if we don’t have senior
leaders that own up and raise their
hand and say, ‘We did not do this
well in the end,’ ” he says. “With-
out that, we just keep repeating
the same mistakes.”
Scheller participated in the non-
combatant evacuation of Ameri-
can citizens from Beirut in 2006
and deployed to Ramadi, Iraq, the
following year.
Beginning in 2010, he spent a
year in Afghanistan, where he led
a team in Paktika and Ghazni
provinces that destroyed explo-
sives caches and sought to prevent
attacks with improvised explosive
devices.
“Obviously new generation Ma-
rine Corps,” LinkedIn user Erik
Watson, whose profile lists five
years as a Marine officer, wrote in
response to Scheller. “There are
proper channels [to voice con-
cerns] and if it is not addressed to
your satisfaction, so sorry so sad,
keep it moving. Submit resigna-
tion ASAP.”
But others defended Scheller.
Facebook user Craig Lowell
called his video “probably the
most incredible act of leadership
I’ve ever seen.”
It’s definitely out of the ordinary
but almost certainly violates mil-
itary rules, said Jim Golby, an ad-
junct senior fellow at the Center
for a New American Security and
a 20-year Army veteran.
“I’m not sure the last time I’ve
seen an active-duty battalion com-
mander openly and directly chal-
lenge senior military officers, in-
cluding the Commandant of the
Marine Corps, in this way,” he
said.
Scheller echoes what many are
feeling, but the video could be
used to sow division in the ranks,
Golby said, and in the end, likely
does more harm than good.
Scheller had no plans to resign,
he said in a comment responding
to Watson, though in the video he
says his critique would likely cut
his career short “if I have the cour-
age to post it.”
“I think what you believe can
only be defined by what you’re
willing to risk,” he says in the vid-
eo. “I think it gives me some moral
high ground to demand the same
honesty, integrity, accountability
from my senior leaders.”
“I’ve been fighting for 17 years,”
he continues. “I’m willing to throw
it all away to say to my senior lead-
ers, ‘I demand accountability.’”
In a message on LinkedIn earli-
er in the day, Scheller declined to
speak to Stars and Stripes “until
the dust settles.” After his firing,
he said in his post that he would
not be making further statements
to the press until he leaves the ser-
vice.
America “has many issues,” but
is “the light shining in a fog of
chaos” where he will raise his
three sons, Scheller said in the
post about his firing. He was look-
ing forward to a new beginning af-
ter the Corps, he said.
“While my days of hand to hand
violence may be ending,” he said.
“I see a new light on the horizon.”
Demand for ‘accountability’ leads to firing
STUART SCHELLER/Facebook
In a screenshot from a video posted to Facebook, Lt. Col. StuartScheller, a Marine battalion commander, calls for accountability forsenior military and civilian leaders for failures in Afghanistan, hoursafter a blast in Kabul killed 13 U.S. troops.
BY CHAD GARLAND
Stars and Stripes
“My chain of command is doingexactly what I would do … if I werein their shoes.”
Lt. Col. Stu Scheller
AFGHANISTAN
children trying to get out of coun-
try.”
The photo of Gee leading girls to
the plane had elicited sexist com-
ments on Instagram days before
her death, Holliday said in the
post.
“A few days after this photo was
released, she gave the ultimate
sacrifice,” she said.
Gee was a maintenance techni-
cian with 24th Marine Expedition-
ary Unit, according to a caption on
a military photo in April.
She was a “model Marine” who
had recently been promoted to
sergeant meritoriously and had
perfect fitness scores, Holliday
said.
Johanny RosarioMarine Corps Sgt. Johanny Ro-
sario, 25, of Lawrence, Mass., was
also among the dead, NBC10 Bos-
ton and other local news stations
reported.
Her Facebook page lists her as
working in supply admin.
Friends and fellow Marines
poured out their grief over Rosa-
rio’s death on social media.
Her friend Nastassia Hyatt, a
former Marine
who said in a
Facebook post that they met while
serving at Marine Corps Air Sta-
tion Futenma in Okinawa, Japan,
called her “my soulmate.”
Hyatt, who runs a YouTube vid-
eo blog, posted a clip of a time she
surprised Rosario with a prom be-
cause she had not been able to at-
tend the spring dance in high
school.
“This was one of the happiest
days of your life and mine,” she
said. “The smile on your face.”
She also recalled Rosario help-
ing her through difficult times.
“You brought me back to life.
Back to life… back to life…” Hyatt
wrote.
“I wish i could bring you back to
life for just one last hug, one last
smile, one last nap, one last meal…
one last anything.”
Dylan R. MerolaMarine Corps Lance Cpl. Dylan
R. Merola, 20, was among the
dead.
Merola, who was from Rancho
Cucamonga, Calif., was assigned
to 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Re-
Fallen: Remembering the victims of the Kabul airport attackFROM PAGE 3
Rosario
Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 5
AFGHANISTAN
KABUL, Afghanistan — Tali-
ban forces sealed off Kabul’s air-
port Saturday to most Afghans
hoping for evacuation and most
NATO nations flew out their
troops after two decades in Af-
ghanistan, winding down a frantic
airlift that Western leaders ac-
knowledged was still leaving
many of their citizens and local al-
lies behind.
The United States, which says
round-the-clock multinational
flights have evacuated 117,000
people since the Taliban claimed
Kabul on Aug. 15, was keeping up
airlifts ahead of President Joe Bi-
den’s Tuesday deadline for with-
drawal.
Britain also was carrying out its
final evacuation flights Saturday,
though Prime Minister Boris
Johnson promised to “shift heav-
en and earth” to get more of those
at risk from the Taliban to Britain
by other means.
Britain’s ambassador to Af-
ghanistan, Laurie Bristow, said in
a video from Kabul airport and
posted on Twitter that it was “time
to close this phase of the operation
now.”
“But we haven’t forgotten the
people who still need to leave,” he
said. “We’ll continue to do every-
thing we can to help them. Nor
have we forgotten the brave, de-
cent people of Afghanistan. They
deserve to live in peace and secu-
rity.”
As the flow of planes leaving
Kabul slowed, others arrived in lo-
cales around the world carrying
Afghans who managed to secure
places on the last evacuation
flights, including in the Washing-
ton area, Philadelphia, Madrid,
Birmingham, England, among
others. Some were relieved and
looking forward to starting their
new lives far from the Taliban, but
others were bitter about having to
flee.
In Spain, evacuee Shabeer Ah-
madi, a 29-year-old journalist tar-
geted by the Taliban, said the
United States had doomed the
work he and others had put into
making Afghanistan a better place
by allowing the insurgent group to
reclaim power.
“They abandoned the new gen-
eration of Afghanistan,” Ahmadi
said.
An evacuation flight to Britain
landed with an extra passenger on
Saturday after the cabin crew de-
livered a baby girl mid-air, Turk-
ish media reported. The parents
named her Havva, or Eve, and she
was at least the fourth baby known
to have been born to Afghan moth-
ers who went into labor on evac-
uation flights.
Meanwhile, families of Afghans
killed in Thursday’s suicide
bombing at the airport by an Is-
lamic State group affiliate contin-
ued burying their dead — at least
169 Afghans and 13 U.S. service
members died in the attack.
Among those killed was Belal Az-
fali, a 36-year-old contractor for a
U.S.-funded project who had gone
to the airport on his own, without
his wife. His remains were so dis-
figured that he could only be iden-
tified when someone picked up
the family’s repeated calls to the
cellphone he had with him, rela-
tives said.
The U.S. on Saturday released
the names of the 13 Marines, Navy
and Army personnel who were
killed in the bombing. They in-
cluded at least one of the Marines
— recently promoted Marine Sgt.
Nicole Gee, 23 — who were seen in
widely circulated photos cuddling
Afghan infants they had tempora-
rily rescued from the crush of the
crowds outside the airport gates
this month.
Taliban spokesman Zabihullah
Mujahid claimed Saturday that
the group’s forces were holding
some positions within the airport
and were ready to peacefully take
control of it as American forces
flew out. But Pentagon spokesman
John Kirby denied the claim.
The Taliban did deploy extra
forces outside of the airport to pre-
vent large crowds from gathering
in the wake of Thursday’s bomb-
ing . New layers of checkpoints
sprang up on roads leading to the
airport, some manned by uni-
formed Taliban fighters with
Humvees and night-vision gog-
gles captured from Afghan securi-
ty forces. Areas where the crowds
had gathered over the past two
weeks in the hopes of fleeing the
country were largely empty.
Officials said U.S. forces were
taking every precaution at the air-
port, as there were concerns that
IS, which is far more radical than
the Taliban, could strike again.
Maj. Gen. Hank Taylor said dur-
ing a Pentagon news conference
Saturday that a retaliatory drone
strike Biden ordered had killed
two “high-profile” IS militants be-
lieved to have been involved in
planning or facilitating attacks,
not one, as initially reported.
An Afghan who worked as a
translator for the U.S. military
said he was with a group of people
with permission to leave who tried
to reach the airport late Friday.
After passing through three
checkpoints they were stopped at
a fourth. An argument ensued,
and the Taliban said they had been
told by the Americans to only let
U.S. passport-holders through.
“I am so hopeless for my fu-
ture,” the man later told The Asso-
ciated Press, speaking on condi-
tion of anonymity because of secu-
rity concerns. “If the evacuation is
over, what will happen to us?”
Kirby, the Pentagon spokes-
man, said Saturday that Afghans
who had worked with American
forces still were being allowed in.
According to a State Depart-
ment spokesperson, 5,400 Ameri-
cans and likely more have been
safely evacuated from Afghanis-
tan since Aug. 14, including nearly
300 Americans in the last day. An-
other 350 were still seeking to
leave the country, and those were
the only ones the department
could confirm were still in Af-
ghanistan.
As Tuesday’s deadline draws
near and with the Taliban con-
trolling nearly all of the country,
hundreds of protesters, including
many civil servants, gathered out-
side a bank while countless more
lined up at cash machines. They
said they hadn’t been paid for
three to six months and were un-
able to withdraw cash. ATM ma-
chines were still operating, but
withdrawals were limited to about
$200 every 24 hours. Later Satur-
day, the central bank ordered
commercial bank branches to
open and allow customers to with-
draw $200 per week, calling it a
temporary measure.
The economic crisis, which pre-
dates the Taliban takeover, could
give Western nations leverage as
they urge Afghanistan’s new rul-
ers to form a moderate, inclusive
government and allow people to
leave after Tuesday.
Afghanistan is heavily depend-
ent on international aid, which
covered around 75% of the toppled
Western-backed government’s
budget. The Taliban have said
they want good relations with the
international community and
have promised a more moderate
form of Islamic rule than when
they last governed the country,
but many Afghans are deeply
skeptical.
Airport mostlyclosed off asairlift dwindles
Associated Press
KHWAJA TAWFIQ SEDIQI/AP
Afghans wait for hours to try to withdraw money, in front of Kabul Bank, in Kabul, Afghanistan, onSaturday.
“We have the ability to con-
duct over-the-horizon counter-
terrorism capabilities — we’ve
talked about that — this certainly
fits in that mold,” he said. “But
it’s not a coincidence that it hap-
pened just a couple of days after
we lost 13 brave service mem-
bers.”
In the hours after the bombing
Thursday, President Joe Biden
pledged vengeance against the
perpetrators of the attack.
“To those who carried out this
attack, as well as anyone who
wishes America harm, know
this: We will not forgive. We will
not forget. We will hunt you
down and make you pay,” he
said. “I will defend our interests
and our people with every mea-
sure at my command.”
The troops killed and injured
were conducting security checks
on Afghan evacuees attempting
to enter the airport when the at-
tack happened. U.S. and coali-
tion forces have been evacuating
tens of thousands of Americans
and Afghans since the Taliban
took control of the country two
weeks ago.
Those evacuations continued
despite the deadly attack, with
the U.S. evacuating about 4,000
people on 27 C-17 and five C-130
transport aircraft on Friday,
Taylor said. Additionally, 34 coa-
lition aircraft carried 2,800 eva-
cuees out of Kabul.
In total, U.S. and coalition
forces as of Saturday had evac-
uated more than 117,000 people,
about 5,400 of whom are Amer-
icans, Taylor said.
Though the U.S. military’s
withdrawal from the airport has
begun, Taylor said the evacua-
tions will carry on until Tuesday.
“We continue to evacuate
American citizens and vulnera-
ble Afghans out of Kabul,” he
said. “In fact, there are approxi-
mately 1,400 individuals at the
Kabul airport who have been
screened and [readied] for
flights (Saturday).”
Taylor also said the U.S. could
conduct more airstrikes as the
threat in the region remains in
the final days of the withdrawal
and evacuation missions there.
U.S. forces began moving out
more equipment Saturday, Kir-
by said.
“Without specifying any fu-
ture plans, I will say that we will
continue to have the ability to de-
fend ourselves and to leverage
over-the-horizon capability to
conduct counterterrorism oper-
ations as needed,” Taylor said.
Drone: US threatens more airstrikes amid continued threatsFROM PAGE 1
Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 7
On his tour through the fallen
city of Kabul last week, Taliban-
aligned militant Khalil Haqqani
rose to address a crowd at the
capital’s largest place of worship,
Pul-i-Khishti Mosque. As he
clutched a U.S.-made M4 rifle, his
security guards, similarly armed,
were draped in the U.S. combat
aesthetics that have come to sym-
bolize the last 20 years of war in
Afghanistan and Iraq.
Sporting high-cut helmets with
night-vision goggle mounts, plate
carriers and U.S. camouflage pat-
terns, the guards looked like car-
icatures of the elite troops who
have hunted insurgents in nightly
raids and firefights.
The bounty of U.S.-provided
weapons and vehicles, long pa-
raded by Taliban insurgents after
capturing or stealing them from
Afghan forces, has grown to
alarming proportions, well be-
yond the ability of U.S. officials to
casually dismiss. And while
throughout the war, militants
prized rifles and other sophisti-
cated personal equipment as indi-
vidual trophies, the sudden and
stunning collapse of the Afghan
military has allowed for armored
vehicles, helicopters and a glut of
heavy weapons to be comman-
deered by militants now running
the country.
“We don’t have a complete pic-
ture, obviously, of where every
article of defense materials has
gone, but certainly, a fair amount
of it has fallen into the hands of
the Taliban,” President Joe Bi-
den’s national security adviser,
Jake Sullivan, told reporters last
week.
Since 2005, the United States
provided at least $18 billion to the
Afghan military for “equipment
and transportation,” according to
a report to Congress last month
from the Special Inspector Gener-
al for Afghanistan Reconstruct-
ion, with billions more spent on
training and maintenance.
Coalition forces running the
massive effort to evacuate U.S. ci-
tizens and allies at the Kabul air-
port will focus on dismantling and
extracting equipment brought in
for the mission, Pentagon spokes-
man John Kirby said Wednesday.
Transporting evacuees remains
the priority, he said, leaving it un-
clear if some of the military hard-
ware there now will be destroyed
in place to save room for people.
As for the U.S.-provided mate-
riel seized by the Taliban else-
where in Afghanistan, it appears
for now that Washington has little
recourse.
Among the concerns is a trove
of biometric data used by coali-
tion forces to identify and docu-
ment interpreters and others who
aided the war effort. It is unclear
if those records were destroyed —
or if they’ve fallen into the hands
of militants who, U.S. officials
fear, could use the data to exact
revenge.
Some of the captured equip-
ment, like helicopters and attack
planes, may be more useful for
propaganda imagery than for ev-
eryday use. The more-advanced
U.S.-supplied aircrafts rely on
costly maintenance regimens and
parts inventories that Taliban
militants are unlikely to maintain,
much less operate.
But rifles, plate carrier vests
and other infantry gear provide
legitimate tactical value to the
group’s foot soldiers while also
underscoring the defeat of U.S.-
backed Afghan forces and the Ta-
liban’s desire to present itself, in-
ternally and externally, as a legiti-
mate governing entity and battle-
field victor.
“They want to convey not just
authority, but intimidating au-
thority,” said Katherine Kuzmin-
ski, a military policy expert at the
Center for a New American Secu-
rity think tank in Washington, not-
ing the similarities between imag-
es of Haqqani and his guard de-
tail, and those of some far-right
groups in the United States who
participated in the U.S. Capitol as-
sault in January.
Both groups, Kuzminski said,
appear to recognize that display-
ing military gear and attire pro-
jects the threat of violence, and a
desire to be seen as competent
and serious.
While many of the Taliban mil-
itants photographed entering Ka-
bul carried AK47s or M16s and
wore traditional clothing seen on
fighters throughout the war, Haq-
qani’s guards, by contrast, ap-
peared as though they explicitly
sought to copy the style of elite
U.S. troops and their Afghan com-
mando counterparts. Haqqani’s
rifle included an infrared laser
used for night targeting, while
others on his security team wore
night-vision goggles and tactical
gloves along with their M4s. One
wore an arching green patch in
the style of Ranger and Special
Forces tabs.
It’s a distorted reflection of
what became a defining image of
wars in Afghanistan and Iraq:
U.S. special operators, said Phil
Klay, a Marine Corps veteran and
author of “Missionaries,” a novel
about the globalization of war vio-
lence.
The mimicking of such an elite
status, both celebrated and derid-
ed as “tacticool,” has spread glob-
ally, starting on battlefields but
stretching now to blockbuster
films, video games and even diap-
er bags.
“The style has been omnipres-
ent in pop culture as the image of
war that we like to admire and be
in awe of,” Klay said. “The stories
are dramatically satisfying. . . . A
hardy American warrior killing a
bad guy.”
In Kabul, the simulacra of tacti-
cool has come full circle. U.S. and
other Western special operators
who pursued Taliban fighters oc-
casionally wore baseball caps
rather than helmets and grew
beards to facilitate a cultural con-
nection with Muslim men, where-
as now at least one bearded body
guard for a man wanted by the
U.S. government wears a cap with
the logo of 5.11 Tactical — a U.S.
company that produces commer-
cial tactical gear.
It’s unclear if the body guard
wore his own hat or if it was stolen
from an abandoned Afghan or
U.S. military position, where mil-
itants often win their weapons
and equipment.
Kristen Gooding, a spokeswo-
man for 5.11 Tactical, said the hat
was not authentic, suggesting
there is demand for such items on
the counterfeit market.
“There is very little we can do,”
she said, “to protect our brand
from these types of occurrences.”
Taliban flaunt US-made weapons and gearBY ALEX HORTON
The Washington Post
WALI SABAWOON / AP
Taliban fighters stand guard outside the airport in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Friday, a day after deadly attacks.
AFGHANISTAN
For months, terrorism analysts
warned that Islamic State-linked
militants in Afghanistan would
try to turn the Biden administra-
tion’s exit into a bloody spectacle.
On Thursday in Kabul, those
predictions were realized.
ISIS-Khorasan, the Islamic
State’s Afghanistan and Pakistan
arm, issued a statement claiming
responsibility for the suicide
bombing attack that killed 13 U.S.
service members and dozens of
Afghans in an attack outside the
airport. The series of blasts
ripped through crowds of civil-
ians who were clamoring for a
chance to flee before the U.S.
withdrawal deadline on Tuesday.
With its signature blend of com-
plexity and cruelty, the attack was
seen by many observers as a re-
minder to both the Americans and
the Taliban that, no matter who
was in the presidential palace, Af-
ghanistan would remain contest-
ed.
Authorities had instantly sus-
pected the Islamic State affiliate,
known as ISIS-K or ISK for short.
The group’s rivalry with the Ta-
liban is a microcosm of the com-
petition between al-Qaida and its
more radical spinoff, the Islamic
State, analysts say. There are gen-
erational and doctrinal splits be-
tween the groups, with the Islam-
ic State brand more popular with
militants in recent years because
it managed to capture territory
and create a short-lived extremist
fiefdom that spanned Iraq and Sy-
ria.
In Afghanistan, with the U.S.-
backed government gone from
power, ISIS-K can now focus on
undermining its other local ene-
my, the Taliban, which analysts
said will be hard-pressed to stave
off attacks as it struggles to se-
cure and govern a war-weary na-
tion.
Amira Jadoon, an assistant pro-
fessor at the U.S. Military Acade-
my, has written extensively about
ISIS-K, arguing that an uncondi-
tional U.S. withdrawal and Tali-
ban takeover would bring about
“the most permissive” environ-
ment for the group to operate.
“And this is what we are seeing
now,” Jadoon said. “ISK’s main
goal right now is to stay politically
relevant, disrupt efforts to stabi-
lize the country, and also under-
mine the Afghan Taliban’s cred-
ibility.”
Even before the Taliban take-
over, U.S. officials were worried
about ISIS-K’s spoiler role in Af-
ghanistan’s transition. An Aug. 17
Defense Department report said,
“ISIS-Khorasan exploited the po-
litical instability and rise in vio-
lence” from April through June
“by attacking minority sectarian
targets and infrastructure to
spread fear and highlight the Af-
ghan government’s inability to
provide adequate security.”
“The blast at the airport today
is showing that unfortunately a
very bloody future is ahead of us,”
said an Arab intelligence official,
who spoke on the condition of
anonymity because they were not
authorized to be interviewed.
The official said the target of
the attack was just as much the
Taliban as it was the Americans:
“It’s a battle over ideologies and
hearts and minds.”
ISIS affiliate behind airport attack sees both US and Taliban as foesBY HANNAH ALLAM
AND SOUAD MEKHENNET
The Washington Post
PAGE 8 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • Sunday, August 29, 2021
TOKYO — A former Navy lieu-
tenant who lost his eyesight after
stepping on an improvised bomb
in Afghanistan won a gold medal
for Team USA in the Paralympic
triathlon Saturday.
Bradley Snyder, 37, of Balti-
more, Md., was working as an ex-
plosive ordnance disposal techni-
cian when he was wounded in Sep-
tember 2011.
The blast cost him the sight in
both eyes, but the following year
he won two swimming gold med-
als at the London Paralympics. He
added another three gold medals
in the pool at the 2016 games in Rio
de Janeiro.
The Tokyo race, at Odaiba Ma-
rine Park near the city’s famous
Rainbow Bridge, was Snyder’s
first Paralympic triathlon but he
took the lead during the initial
swim section and never gave it up.
“My life isn’t all about winning
… it’s about challenges,” he told
Stars and Stripes after crossing
the finish line, waving the Amer-
ican flag and hearing supporters
chant: “USA … USA.”
Visually impaired triathletes
ran, swam and tandem biked with
the aid of sighted teammates.
Snyder’s guide was Greg Billing-
ton, an Olympic triathlete in Rio
who once ran cross country for La-
kenheath High School on a U.S.
Air Force base in England.
After donning his gold medal,
Snyder reflected on recent events
in Afghanistan, where 13 service
members were killed in a suicide
bombing at Kabul airport Thurs-
day following the Taliban’s take-
over of the country.
“It’s a difficult time for us right
now but I think that what I’m try-
ing to do in this sport is try to …
just continue to stick to the mis-
sion and make progress,” he said.
What’s happening in the coun-
try is a tragic and sad situation,
Snyder said.
“I know what all my comrades
were fighting for was liberty and
democracy,” he said. “Afghanis-
tan has taken a step backward, but
it is my hope that Afghans will, one
day, experience a higher level of
liberty and democracy. I remain
optimistic and I hope that my fel-
low service members do, too.”
Snyder was one of several veter-
ans racing in Paralympic triath-
lons in the Japanese capital.
Former Marine captain Eric
McElvenny, of Pittsburgh, lost his
right leg to an improvised explo-
sive device in 2011 while serving
with 2nd Battalion, 4th Marine
Regiment in Helmand Province,
Afghanistan.
The country’s situation was in
his thoughts “almost continually”
ahead of his race, he said, after fin-
ishing in sixth place.
McElvenny filtered those
thoughts from his mind during the
race, which included amputee
athletes, but afterward, he was
thinking about “Marines who are
in harm’s way” and their families,
he said.
PHOTOS BY AKIFUMI ISHIKAWA/Stars and Stripes
Navy veteran Bradley Snyder, left, who lost his sight during an Afghanistan blast in 2011, and GregBillington celebrate, Saturday, after winning gold in the Paralympic triathlon at Odaiba Marine Park, Tokyo.
Navy vet blinded by Afghanistanblast wins triathlon gold medal
BY SETH ROBSON
Stars and Stripes
Snyder, left, and Billington run ina Tokyo Paralympics triathlon atOdaiba Marine Park, onSaturday.
USS Arlington supplies aid to HaitiDaily Press (Virginia)
MILITARY
Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 9
NATION
NEW ORLEANS — Weather
forecasters warned residents
along Louisiana’s coast to rush
preparations Saturday in antici-
pation of an intensifying Hurri-
cane Ida, which is expected to
bring winds as high as 140 mph
when it slams ashore Sunday.
Authorities called a combina-
tion of voluntary and mandatory
evacuations for cities and commu-
nities across the region. In New
Orleans, the mayor ordered a
mandatory evacuation for areas
outside the city’s levee system and
a voluntary evacuation for resi-
dents inside the levee system. But
since the storm quickly escalated
in intensity, Mayor LaToya Can-
trell said it was not possible to or-
der a mandatory evacuation for
the entire city, which would re-
quire using all lanes of some high-
ways to leave the city.
“If you plan to evacuate, do so
now,” said a mid-morning adviso-
ry from the city.
Traffic was heavy on west-
bound routes out of town early Sat-
urday and gas stations were busy.
The storm is expected to make
landfall on the exact date Hurri-
cane Katrina devastated a large
swath of the Gulf Coast 16 years
earlier. But whereas Katrina was
aCategory 3 when it made landfall
southwest of New Orleans, Ida is
expected to reach an extremely
dangerous Category 4 hurricane,
with top winds of 140 mph before
making landfall likely west of New
Orleans late Sunday.
“Today is it,” Jamie Rhome, act-
ing deputy director of the U.S. Na-
tional Hurricane Center in Miami,
said Saturday. “If you’re in coastal
Louisiana and Mississippi, you re-
ally, really have to get going be-
cause today is it in terms of pro-
tecting life and property.”
Ida intensified rapidly Friday
from a tropical storm to a hurri-
cane with top winds of 80 mph as it
crossed western Cuba.
Late Saturday morning, Ida was
centered 435 miles southeast of
Houma, a city on Louisiana’s
coast. It was traveling northwest
at 16 mph, forecasters said. It’s
maximum sustained winds were
85 mph. The wind speed in the late
morning forecast had not picked
up from an earlier advisory from
the National Hurricane Center,
but forecasters still expected it to
reach Category 4 strength before
making landfall on the central
Louisiana coast.
With the storm’s forward speed
slowing down and the intensity
picking up, the storm surge may
overtop some levees that protect
parts of New Orleans on the west
bank of the Mississippi River, said
Heath Jones, emergency manager
of the Army Corps of Engineers’
New Orleans District. However,
he said they are designed to be
overtopped and have protections
in place to prevent more damage.
There does not appear to be any
danger of storm surge coming
over the levees that protect the
city’s east bank, which makes up
most of the city, he said.
Across the region, residents fil-
led sandbags, got gasoline for cars
and generators and stocked up on
food.
La. braces for menacing Hurricane IdaAssociated Press
MATTHEW HINTON/AP
Michael Richard of Creole Cuisine Restaurant Concepts boards up Crescent City Pizza on Bourbon Streetin the French Quarter before landfall of Hurricane Ida in New Orleans, on Saturday.
SAN DIEGO — For 15 years,
Robert F. Kennedy’s assassin was
denied parole by a California pa-
role board that maintained Sirhan
Sirhan did not show adequate re-
morse or understand the enormity
of his crime that rocked the nation
and the world in 1968.
But on Friday, the two-person
panel said he appeared to be a dif-
ferent man, even from his last
hearing in 2016, and granted the
77-year-old prisoner parole. Two
of RFK’s sons, going against sev-
eral of their siblings’ wishes, said
they also supported releasing him
and prosecutors declined to argue
he should be kept behind bars. But
the governor ultimately will de-
cide if he leaves prison.
The board found Sirhan no long-
er poses a threat to society, noting
that he had enrolled in more than
20 programs including anger
management classes, Tai Chi and
Alcoholics Anonymous meetings,
even during the coronavirus pan-
demic.
“We think that you have
grown,” Parole Board Commis-
sioner Robert Barton said.
Douglas Kennedy was a toddler
when his father was gunned down
in 1968. He told a two-person
board panel that he was moved to
tears by Sirhan’s remorse and that
Sirhan should be released if he’s
not a threat to others.
“I’m overwhelmed just by being
able to view Mr. Sirhan face to
face,” he said. “I’ve lived my life
both in fear of him and his name in
one way or another. And I am
grateful today to see him as a hu-
man being worthy of compassion
and love.”
Six of Kennedy’s nine surviving
children, however, said they were
shocked by the vote. They urged
Gov. Gavin Newsom, who is facing
a recall election in California, to
reverse the parole board’s deci-
sion and keep Sirhan behind bars.
“He took our father from our
family and he took him from
America,” the six siblings wrote in
a statement late Friday. “We are
in disbelief that this man would be
recommended for release.
The statement was signed by
Joseph P. Kennedy II, Courtney
Kennedy, Kerry Kennedy, Chris-
topher G. Kennedy, Maxwell T.
Kennedy and Rory Kennedy.
But another sibling, Robert F.
Kennedy Jr., has spoken in favor
of his release in the past and wrote
in favor of paroling Sirhan. He
said in the letter that he met him in
prison and was moved by Sirhan,
“who wept, clinching my hands,
and asked for forgiveness.
Sirhan, whose hair is white,
smiled, thanked the board and
gave a thumbs-up after the deci-
sion to grant parole was an-
nounced. It was a major victory in
his 16th attempt at parole after
he’s served 53 years. But it does
not assure his release.
The ruling will be reviewed
over the next 120 days by the
board’s staff. Then it will be sent to
the governor, who will have 30
days to decide whether to grant it,
reverse it or modify it. If Sirhan is
freed, he must live in a transitional
home for six months, enroll in an
alcohol abuse program and get
therapy.
RFK assassin givenparole after 53 years
Associated Press
Sirhan
WASHINGTON — President
Joe Biden on Friday announced
plans to give all federal civilian
employees an average 2.7% pay
raise, consistent with the in-
creases he had proposed in his
2022 budget.
“I have determined that for
2022, the across-the-board base
pay increase will be 2.2 percent
and locality pay increases will
average 0.5 percent, resulting in
an overall average increase of
2.7 percent for civilian Federal
employees,” Biden wrote in a let-
ter to congressional leaders Fri-
day.
The adjustments would take
effect “on the first day of the first
applicable pay period beginning
on or after January 1, 2022,” Bi-
den wrote.
The raise would apply to some
2.1 million executive branch em-
ployees, although not to the more
than 600,000 employees of the
U.S. Postal Service, whose raises
are set through bargaining. Cost-
of-living increases for federal re-
tirees also are determined sepa-
rately, reflecting the same infla-
tion measure used for Social Se-
curity benefits.
“This alternative pay plan de-
cision will not materially affect
our ability to attract and retain a
well-qualified federal work-
force,” Biden wrote.
The president’s announced
pay increases are not set in stone.
If Congress enacts different
rates of pay increases for 2022,
those numbers would take prece-
dent over Biden’s. If Congress
doesn’t specify any rates, Bi-
den’s numbers take effect auto-
matically. The Democratic-con-
trolled Congress is unlikely to
push for rates lower than Bi-
den’s.
Several federal employee
unions had been calling for a
3.2% increase. One of those, the
National Treasury Employees
Union, on Friday described Bi-
den’s proposed raises as “a vast
improvement over the previous
administration’s attempts to
freeze federal pay.”
“However, federal employee
pay increases have lagged for
years and there is still a very real
gap between federal pay and
comparable positions in the pri-
vate sector,” NTEU President
Tony Reardon said in a state-
ment. “We will continue to urge
Congress to implement an aver-
age 2.2 percent increase across
the board, plus a 1 percent boost
toward locality pay.”
Biden announces 2.7% payraises for federal workers
The Washington Post
PAGE 10 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • Sunday, August 29, 2021
NATION
ATLANTA — Republican ef-
forts questioning the outcome of
the 2020 presidential race have
led to voting system breaches
that election security experts say
pose a heightened risk to future
elections.
Copies of the Dominion Voting
Systems software used to manage
elections — from designing bal-
lots to configuring voting ma-
chines and tallying results —
were distributed at an event this
month in South Dakota organized
by MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell,
an ally of former President Do-
nald Trump who has made un-
substantiated claims about last
year’s election.
“It’s a game changer in that the
environment we have talked
about existing now is a reality,”
said Matt Masterson, a former
top election security official in
the Trump administration. “We
told election officials, essentially,
that you should assume this infor-
mation is already out there. Now
we know it is, and we don’t know
what they are going to do with it.”
The software copies came from
voting equipment in Mesa Coun-
ty, Colo., and Antrim County,
Mich., where Trump allies had
sued, unsuccessfully challenging
the results from last fall.
The Dominion software is used
in some 30 states, including coun-
ties in California, Georgia and
Michigan.
Election security pioneer Har-
ri Hursti was at the South Dakota
event and said he and other re-
searchers in attendance were
provided three separate copies of
election management systems
that run on the Dominion soft-
ware. The data indicated they
were from Antrim and Mesa
counties. While it’s not clear how
the copies came to be released at
the event, they were posted on-
line and made available for pub-
lic download.
The release gives hackers a
“practice environment” to probe
for vulnerabilities they could ex-
ploit and a road map to avoid de-
fenses, Hursti said. All the hack-
ers would need is physical access
to the systems because they are
not supposed to be connected to
the Internet.
“The door is now wide open,”
Hursti said. “The only question
is, how do you sneak in the door?”
A Dominion representative de-
clined comment, citing an inves-
tigation.
U.S. election technology is
dominated by just three vendors
comprising 90% of the market,
meaning election officials cannot
easily swap out their existing
technology. Release of the soft-
ware copies essentially provides
a blueprint for those trying to in-
terfere with how elections are
run. They could sabotage the sys-
tem, alter the ballot design or
even try to change results, said
election technology expert Kevin
Skoglund.
“This disclosure increases
both the likelihood that some-
thing happens and the impact of
what would happen if it does,” he
said.
Voting systembreaches poserisk to elections
BY CHRISTINA A. CASSIDY
Associated Press
SAN FRANCISCO — Al Capone
is infamous for having been a ruth-
less mob boss, but one of his grand-
daughters says his softer side will
shine through when the family auc-
tions the Prohibition-era gangster’s
personal items — including dia-
mond-encrusted jewelry with his
initials, family photographs and his
favorite handgun.
Capone’s three granddaughters
will also auction a letter he wrote to
their father and his only child, Al-
bert “Sonny” Capone, from Alca-
traz, where the mobster served an
11-year sentence following his 1934
tax evasion conviction. In the letter
written in pencil, Al Capone refers
to Sonny as “son of my heart.”
He was called Public Enemy No.
1 after the 1929 “Valentine’s Day
Massacre” of seven members of a
rival bootlegger gang in Chicago by
his associates.
But his granddaughter Diane Ca-
pone describes him differently.
“He was very loving, very devot-
ed to family, very generous, and the
letter that we have is such a poi-
gnant, beautiful letter from a father
to his son. These are things that the
public doesn’t know about,” said
Diane Capone, 77.
Diane Capone and her two sur-
viving sisters will sell 174 items at
the Oct. 8 auction titled “A Century
of Notoriety: The Estate of Al Ca-
pone” hosted by Witherell’s Auc-
tion House in Sacramento.
Among the pieces are gold-
rimmed porcelain fine china, or-
nate furniture, artwork and Dres-
den figurines that once decorated
the Palm Island, Fla., villa where
the Chicago mobster lived after his
release from prison and until his
death in 1947.
Also up for sale is the Colt .45-cal-
iber pistol Capone always carried
with him and used several times to
protect himself, Diane Capone
said.
“That particular .45 was used in
self-defense, and it probably saved
his life on a few occasions and so, he
referred to it as his favorite,” she
said.
Diane Capone said she didn’t
know if the gun was used to commit
any crimes and said her grandfa-
ther, who she called Papa, was nev-
er charged with killing anyone.
“He was accused of doing that,
but he was never found guilty of
shooting anyone,” she said.
The pistol with elaborate etch-
ings and a wooden grip will be the
centerpiece of the auction and is
valued at up to $150,000, said Brian
Witherell, founder of Witherell’s
Auction House.
“When you think about Al Ca-
pone, you don’t think ‘Gosh, I won-
der what his German porcelain fi-
gurine looks like,’ you wonder what
his cigar humidor looks like, what
his Colt .45 looks like,” he said.
RICH PEDRONCELLI/AP
Diane Capone holds a copy of a photograph of her father, Albert “Sonny” Capone as a young boy, and hergrandfather Al Capone, on display at Witherell’s Auction House in Sacramento, Calif., Wednesday.
Al Capone’s favorite handgun,personal items head to auction
Associated Press
SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Frus-
trated by out-of-control increases
in drug overdose deaths, Califor-
nia’s leaders are trying some-
thing radical: They want the state
to be the first to pay people to stay
sober.
The federal government has
been doing it for years with mil-
itary veterans and research
shows it is one of the most effec-
tive ways to get people to stop us-
ing drugs like cocaine and meth-
amphetamine, stimulants for
which there are no pharmaceuti-
cal treatments available.
It works like this: People earn
small incentives or payments for
every negative drug test over a
period of time. Most people who
complete the treatment without
any positive tests can earn a few
hundred dollars. They usually get
the money on a gift card.
It’s called “contingency man-
agement” and Gov. Gavin News-
om has asked the federal govern-
ment for permission to use tax
dollars to pay for it through Med-
icaid, the joint state and federal
health insurance program for the
poor and disabled that covers
nearly 14 million people in Cali-
fornia.
Meanwhile, a similar proposal
is moving through California’s
Democratic-controlled Legisla-
ture. It’s already passed the Sen-
ate with no opposition and is
pending in the Assembly, where
it has a Republican co-author.
“I think there is a lot in this
strategy for everyone to like,”
said state Sen. Scott Wiener, a
Democrat from San Francisco
and author of the bill. “Most im-
portant of all, it works.”
How much it would cost de-
pends on how many people par-
ticipate. A program covering
1,000 people could cost as much
as $286,000, a pittance in Califor-
nia’s total operating budget of
more than $262 billion.
The San Francisco AIDS Foun-
dation, a nonprofit agency, runs a
small, privately-funded contin-
gency management program. It’s
where Tyrone Clifford, who was
addicted to meth, enrolled be-
cause they promised to pay him
for every negative test over 12
weeks.
His first payment was $2. That
increased slightly with each sub-
sequent negative test for a total of
about $330.
“I thought, I can do 12 weeks.
I’ve done that before when my
dealer was in jail,” he said.
“When I’m done I’ll have 330
bucks to get high with.’”
Clifford did make it through
the program without a positive
test. But instead of using the mon-
ey to buy more drugs, he bought a
laptop computer so he could go
back to school. He says he hasn’t
used methamphetamine in 11
years and now works as a coun-
selor at the San Francisco AIDS
Foundation, helping people who
had the same addiction problems
he did.
Clifford, 53, said earning the
money didn’t matter much. Un-
like some who struggle with drug
addiction, Clifford always had a
job and a house and was never
much in danger of losing either.
But he said watching his account
grow with each negative test mo-
tivated him more than any other
treatment program did.
“You watch those dollar values
go up, there is proof right there
that I am doing this,” he said. “By
no means is anyone getting rich
off this program.”
Calif. eyes paying small incentives to drug addicts to stay soberAssociated Press
Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 11
PAGE 12 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • Sunday, August 29, 2021
AMERICAN ROUNDUP
Pasty festival returns to town after pandemic
MI CALUMET — A festiv-
al dedicated to the most
famous food of Michigan’s Upper
Peninsula returned to a small
town after a year off due to the cor-
onavirus.
Sean Nichols won the pasty-eat-
ing contest by eating nearly three
in Calumet. People in pasty cos-
tumes marched during a parade.
And a local curling club rolled ru-
tabagas, The Daily Mining Ga-
zette reported.
Calumet, population roughly
750, is known for its copper
mining history, and pasties were
commonly eaten by miners. They
typically are made with meat and
potatoes stuffed into a crust.
FAA fines drinking, vapingpassenger without mask
FL KEY WEST — Federal
aviation officials fined a
woman $17,000 for drinking alco-
hol not served by the airline, vap-
ing and refusing to wear a mask on
a flight to Charlotte, N. C.
The Federal Aviation Adminis-
tration said the woman on a Re-
public Airways flight from Key
West, Fla., on Feb. 28 was drinking
alcohol that wasn’t served by the
airline, interfering with crew
members, trying to use a vape pen
and was not complying with the
federal face mask mandate, news
outlets reported. The FAA said the
aircraft returned to the gate at the
Key West airport and she was re-
moved from the plane.
Dump truck plows into 2apartments in fatal crash
CA ANAHEIM — A dump
truck loaded with thou-
sands of pounds of debris veered
off a Southern California freeway
off-ramp and slammed into two
apartment buildings, killing a res-
ident, authorities said.
The truck came down the off-
ramp to State Route 57 in Ana-
heim and struck a car waiting at a
red light, hit two other vehicles as
it careened across a road, crossed
a field and smashed through the
wall of a parking area, California
Highway Patrol Officer Florenti-
no Olivera said.
The truck then smashed
through the back wall of an apart-
ment, where a man in his bed was
pushed into a second apartment
building, the CHP said.
Rory Antoine, 61, died at the
scene. The truck driver was taken
to a hospital with minor to moder-
ate injuries, and a person in one of
the cars was taken to a hospital for
examination, the patrol said.
Man who impersonatedofficer gets probation
KS WICHITA — A Wichi-
ta man who imperson-
ated a police officer several times
last year has been sentenced to a
year of probation.
Daniel J. Corrieri, a bail en-
forcement agent, was initially
charged with 10 misdemeanors
but pleaded guilty earlier this
summer to driving under the in-
fluence and false impersonation,
The Wichita Eagle reported.
A court affidavit said that on
April 9, 2020, Corrieri pulled his
car behind two teenagers working
on a car, activated flashing lights
on his vehicle and told them he
was a Wichita officer. He was
holding a gun and wearing body
armor at the time.
He was arrested after a person
became suspicious and followed
him. Corrieri was jailed after he
failed a field sobriety test, court
records said.
When he was sentenced Aug. 12,
a judged barred Corrieri from
working in bonding or fugitive ap-
prehension.
Officers find 11 poundsof fentanyl during stop
NE LEXINGTON — Law
enforcement officers
recovered 11 pounds of fentanyl
during a traffic stop on Interstate
80, the Nebraska State Patrol said.
A trooper stopped a car on the
interstate about 2 miles west of
Lexington because it had defec-
tive lighting, the patrol said.
The trooper and a Dawson
County Sheriff’s deputy saw mari-
juana in the car and found the fen-
tanyl during a search, according
to the patrol.
The driver, Alexis Murillo Go-
doy, 27, of Long Beach, Calif., was
arrested and held in Dawson
County on possible counts of pos-
session of a controlled substance,
possession with intent to deliver
and other charges.
The patrol said the Drug En-
forcement Administration esti-
mates that 11 pounds of fentanyl
contains about 2.5 million lethal
doses.
Bean field on family farmcollapses 25 feet
MN CLIMAX — Some
consider it a geologi-
cal wonder. A crack in the soil of a
bean field in northwestern Minne-
sota has caused the ground to col-
lapse 25 feet, creating a quarter-
mile long ravine.
Wayne and Erllene Erickson
are the fourth generation on the
family farm near Climax in Polk
County, and say they’ve never
seen anything like it, WDAY-TV
reported.
The fallen land is pushing under
the river bank, sending more dirt
into the Red River.
Geologists with the University
of North Dakota say the dry
weather, a drop in water levels on
the Red River and recent rains
can form a perfect storm for some-
thing like this to occur.
Crevasses are still forming as
the land continues shifting. Soil
experts were expected to visit the
field to study the natural phenom-
enon.
Federal officials takeaction to protect dolphins
HI KAILUA-KONA — Fed-
eral officials have taken a
step toward protecting Hawaii’s
spinner dolphins.
The National Oceanic and At-
mospheric Administration pub-
lished a final environmental im-
pact statement that proposes lim-
iting how close people can get to
spinner dolphins, West Hawaii
Today reported.
The proposal sets a 50 yard bar-
rier around the dolphins for swim-
mers, vessels and aircraft. It
would also prohibit putting people
or vehicles in the path of the mam-
mals. If approved, the measure
would limit interactions within 2
nautical miles of Hawaii’s shores.
Violators could face fines up to
$11,000, a year in prison and forfei-
ture of the vessels involved. There
are exceptions, including when
dolphins approach swimmers or
vessels.
Police arrest man soughtin machete attack
MO HILLSBORO — Po-
lice in eastern Mis-
souri have arrested a man who
was being sought for an attack
with a machete and who had a pre-
vious conviction for firing a cross-
bow and assault rifle at an ac-
quaintance.
Ted Treece, 31, of High Ridge
was arrested, the St. Louis Post-
Dispatch reported, and he was-
charged in at-large warrants with
first-degree assault and armed
criminal action.
Police have said Treece hit a
man with a machete inside a con-
venience store in House Springs.
The victim was not badly injured.
Court records show Treece was
convicted and placed on probation
for firing a crossbow and an AR-15
rifle at an acquaintance he ac-
cused of damaging his car in 2018.
The man suffered a hand injury.
Treece was accused last month
of a probation violation. He also
was charged in May with a domes-
tic assault. The arrest warrant
says Treece is a persistent offend-
er with four felony convictions.
ANDREE KEHN,SUN JOURNAL/AP
Chad Noble, 14, tries a “manual” skateboard trick over a picnic table at the Oxford Hills Skate Park, Wednesday, in South Paris, Maine. Noblehas been skateboarding for more than four years and loves how there is always something new to learn.
Learning new tricks
THE CENSUS
50M The approximate number of bees in the swarm unleashednear Boyne City, Mich. after a truck hauling bee boxes
crashed and overturned, according to police. Police urged local residents tokeep their windows and doors closed until beekeepers could arrive. CharlevoixCounty Sheriff Charles Vondra said it’s estimated that several hundred thou-sand bees never made it back into the boxes. But bee boxes were placed at thecrash site in hopes that some would fly back into those boxes for removal, hesaid. No residents were stung by the bees.
From The Associated Press
Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 13
BOOKS
Near the end of 2020, the pan-
demic had lasted long enough
for author Jodi Picoult to try
something that seemed un-
thinkable for novelists in its early stages
— turn it into fiction.
“At the beginning of the pandemic, I
couldn’t even read, much less write. I
didn’t have the focus,” says Picoult, who
last November began the novel “Wish You
Were Here.” The fall release is set in New
York and the Galapagos during the first
two months of the pandemic, March-May
of last year.
“I couldn’t find myself in my own life;
writing the book was therapeutic,” she
added. “I finished a draft in February,
very quickly. And the whole time it was
going on, I was talking to friends of mine,
telling them, ‘I don’t know if this is going
to work.’ But I had very positive responses
and feel that, unlike almost any other
topic, I have written a book about this one
experience that everyone on the planet
has lived through.”
From wars to plagues to the Sept. 11
attacks, the literary response to historic
tragedies has been a process of absorbing
trauma — often beginning with poetry and
nonfiction and, after months or years,
expanding to narrative fiction. The pan-
demic has now lasted into a second fall
season for publishing, and a growing num-
ber of authors, among them Picoult,
Louise Erdrich, Gary Shteyngart and
Hilma Wolitzer, have worked it into their
latest books.
Shteyngart’s “Our Country Friends”
features eight friends who gather in a
remote house as the virus spreads, a story-
line for which he drew upon Chekhov and
other Russian writers, and upon Boccac-
cio’s 14th century classic “The Decame-
ron.”
Amitava Kumar’s “A Time Outside This
Time” tells of an Indian-American author
working at an artists retreat and trying to
make sense of President Donald Trump,
24-hour media and an equally relentless
virus. Kumar began the book before the
pandemic, but found it fit well — too well
— into an existing wave of misinforma-
tion, “fake news,” reaching from the U.S.
to his native India.
“The Indian Prime Minister was asking
people to bang their plates and pots at a
certain hour; people in his conservative
party were touting the powers of cow dung
and cow urine,” he says. “A minister of
health said that the rays of the sun would
build immunity. So, I was thinking, what
exactly is the work a novel can do in the
time of the novel coronavirus? I’m telling
you all this because I wasn’t at all in doubt
about mentioning the pandemic — I didn’t
think it could be avoided.”
Erdrich’s “The Sentence,” her first
since the Pulitzer Prize-winning “The
Night Watchman,” centers on a Minneapo-
lis bookstore in 2020 and the city’s mul-
tiple crises, from the pandemic to the
murder of George Floyd.
Like Kumar, Erdrich had the original
idea — a haunted bookstore — well before
the virus spread.
“By the end, I realized that although we
might want to forget parts of 2020, we
should not forget,” she wrote in a recent
email. “Obviously, we can’t forget. We
have to use what we learned.”
Wolitzer’s “The Great Escape” is a new
story in her collection “Today a Woman
Went Mad in the Supermarket,” which
includes a foreword by “Olive Kitteridge”
author Elizabeth Strout. “The Great Es-
cape” is the first work of short fiction in
years by Wolitzer, known for such novels
as “The Doctor’s Daughter” and “An
Available Man.” The 91-year-old author
lost her husband to the virus, and drew
upon her grief as she updated characters
from previous stories, the married couple
Howard and Paulette.
“I found it cathartic,” Wolitzer says. “I
wrote it in a week and I couldn’t stop writ-
ing about it. The images about what had
happened to us kept coming up and I felt
like I had to use them.”
More new fiction Fiction this fall will also include works
from Jonathan Franzen, Sally Rooney,
Lauren Groff, Colm Toibin and Strout, and
from four of the past six winners of the
fiction Pulitzer Prize: Erdrich, Richard
Powers, Colson Whitehead and Anthony
Doerr.
“Silverview” is a posthumous release
from John le Carre, who died last year.
Gayl Jones’ “Palmares” is her first novel
in more than 20 years, and Nobel laureate
Wole Soyinka’s “Chronicles from the Land
of the Happiest People on Earth” is the
Nigerian playwright’s first novel in nearly
50 years.
Fiction also is expected from Percival
Everett, Anita Kopacz, Atticus Lish and
Amor Towles, and debut novelists ranging
from Honoree Fanonne Jeffers and Wan-
da M. Morris to the already famous Hill-
ary Clinton, who has teamed with Louise
Penny on the thriller “State of Terror.”
“There’s a very full list of books coming
up. We’ve had a very good year in sales so
far and I see that only strengthening in the
autumn,” says Barnes & Noble CEO
James Daunt.
Poetry Inaugural poet Amanda Gorman has
two books out this fall, the picture story
“Change Sings” and the poetry collection
“Call Us What We Carry.”
Louise Glueck’s “Winter Recipes from
the Collective” is her first poetry book
since winning the Nobel Prize last year,
and new works also are expected from
Pulitzer Prize winners Paul Muldoon,
Frank Bidart and Tracy K. Smith, and
from Kevin Young, Amanda Moore and
Mai Der Vang.
MemoirsMuldoon also assisted on one of the
fall’s most anticipated memoirs: Paul
McCartney’s “The Lyrics: 1956 to the
Present,” a $79 double volume which the
Irish poet helped edit.
Hillary Clinton’s longtime aide and
former Rep. Anthony Weiner’s estranged
wife, Huma Abedin, has written “Both/
And,” and #MeToo pioneer Tarana Burke
tells her story in “Unbound.”
Others with memoirs coming include
Katie Couric, Jamie Foxx, James Ivory,
Steve Van Zandt, Dave Grohl, Robbie
Krieger and two basketball greats,
Dwyane Wade and Carmelo Anthony.
PoliticsSummer bestseller lists included such
Trump-related works as “I Alone Can Fix
It,” and this fall will test the continued
appeal of stories about the former presi-
dent. New works are due from Bob Wood-
ward and Washington Post colleague Rob-
ert Costa (“Peril”), and from ABC News
correspondent Jon Karl (“Betrayal”).
Former national security official Fiona
Hill, a key witness during Trump’s first
impeachment trial, for pressuring Ukraine
leaders to investigate then-candidate Joe
Biden, tells her story in “There Is Nothing
for You Here.” Former New Jersey Gov.
Chris Christie’s “Republican Rescue” is
an attack on his party’s conspiracy theo-
ries, including that the election was stolen
from Trump. Mollie Hemingway’s
“Rigged” contends that “the Democrats,
Big Tech, and the media built a machine
to ensure that a Trump victory was impos-
sible,” according to Regnery Publishing.
One political genre is largely absent:
Books by the opposition to a sitting presi-
dent, a lucrative business during several
previous administrations. Conservative
books have a large audience; right-wing
commentator Mark R. Levin’s “American
Marxism” has sold hundreds of thousands
of copies this summer. But publishers and
booksellers struggled to name any up-
coming works centered on criticism of
President Biden.
“The focus continues to be on Trump,”
says Mark Laframboise, a buyer for the
Politics & Prose bookstore in Washington,
D.C.
Thomas Spence, publisher of the con-
servative Regnery Publishing, said his
company had profited well from books
about President Bill Clinton and President
Barack Obama but was not even seeing
proposals about Biden.
“Conservatives don’t worry about him
personally. They’re worried about the
policies he’s pursuing,” Spence says. “And
that is so different from the Clinton and
Obama years when Regnery sold moun-
tains of books criticizing both of those
presidents.”
History Debate over the meaning of the coun-
try’s founding continues with works by
Pulitzer winners Gordon Wood and Jo-
seph Ellis, along with Woody Holton’s
700-page “Liberty Is Sweet: The Hidden
History of the American Revolution,”
endorsed by Wood and by an author he
has otherwise disagreed with, “1619 Pro-
ject” creator Nikole Hannah-Jones.
A book-length edition of the “1619 Pro-
ject” expands upon the Pulitzer-winning
New York Times report that, by placing
slavery at the center of the American
narrative, has been either celebrated as a
needed corrective to traditional history or
condemned as unpatriotic, to the point of
being banned from some schools.
Hannah-Jones quotes from Holton in
the “1619 Project” book, which includes
essays, poems and fiction, with Jesmyn
Ward, Terry McMillan, Terrance Hayes
and Jason Reynolds among the contrib-
utors. In a note to readers, publisher Chris
Jackson of One World calls the book an
exploration of the “twinned lineage” of
slavery and resistance, a conflict echoed
in the subtitle of Ellis’ work, “The Cause:
The American Revolution and Its Dis-
contents.”
“The 1619 Project was never meant to
be a simple academic or, worse, partisan
political argument,” Jackson writes, “but a
story about what’s really at stake in how
we envision our history and identity as a
nation: our lives and our future. This is a
clarifying and often inspiring epic of
struggle, one whose ending we can all
have a hand in writing.”
Pandemic prose Fall book releases include stories about the COVID-19 virus, former President Donald Trump and the founding of the US
BY HILLEL ITALIE
Associated Press
PAGE 14 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • Sunday, August 29, 2021
MUSIC
If the other guys were roll-
ing, somebody had to be the
stone.
That was the job Charlie
Watts saw for himself — and
then carried off with incom-
parable style for more than
half a century — as the
steadfast drummer of the
Rolling Stones, the world-famous (and
maybe world’s greatest) rock ’n’ roll band
in which he kept deeply reliable time
behind his flamboyant bad-boy band-
mates.
Onstage, Mick Jagger would wag his
bum as he sneered about his wealth and
taste; Keith Richards would roam around
caressing his guitar in a way that felt
vaguely indecent. And then there was
Watts, never less than crisply dressed, a
ramrod presence at his stripped-down kit.
He’d come up as a jazz drummer but
put aside any tendency toward flash when
he joined the Stones in the early 1960s.
“Mick and Keith write the songs; the mu-
sic is theirs,” he said decades later in an
interview. “So the bottom line is, if they
want me just to go wham-wham-wham,
then that’s what I’ll do.
“I think it should be whammity-wham-
mity-bam, but I’ll do wham-wham-wham.”
Yet to suggest that Watts, who died
Tuesday at age 80 — having never missed
a Stones gig, it should be said — played
simply or minus appreciable flair is way
off the mark. Watts provided a groove and
swing that distinguished the Stones from
the get-go; his propulsive beat in their
youthful covers of “Not Fade Away” and
“It’s All Over Now” made the music jump
in a sexy, slightly dangerous way that
transcended the record-nerd scholarship
the songs actually represented.
And when Jagger and Richards began
writing their own songs, Watts figured out
how to turn their meanings into rhythm.
Listen to his work in “(I Can’t Get No)
Satisfaction,” a relentless forward thrust
so evocative of Jagger’s longed-for you-
know-what that the rest of the band quits
playing around the two-minute mark just
so we can revel in it.
The Stones’ catalog is filled with count-
less examples of Watts’ clever scene-
setting: the beat hammering away like a
migraine in “Paint It Black,” the almost
satirically louche funk groove in “Honky
Tonk Women,” the snare that keeps crack-
ing like a gunshot in the death-obsessed
“Gimme Shelter.” He could play fast, as in
“Rocks Off” and “Mixed Emotions” and
“Bitch,” and he could play slow, as in
“Tumbling Dice” and “Beast of Burden”
and “Wild Horses,” the last of which he
barely keeps from sliding into the ditch it
seems destined for.
Whatever he was doing, though, it was
always just enough and never too much —
an economy that suited a drummer who
said he learned to play on an instrument
he made himself out of a banjo. (It prob-
ably also helped, once he could afford to
buy any drum he wanted, that he main-
tained a number of showoff-ier jazz-combo
side projects.)
The essential tastiness of Watts’ playing
— and his eagerness to let others in the
band do the peacocking — allowed the
Stones to adapt their approach to whatev-
er was happening in pop. He knew how to
push the music toward disco, as he did in
the late ’70s with “Miss You,” without
making the band sound desperate, and he
knew how to push it just as believably
toward punk during the same era with
“When the Whip Comes Down.” Jagger
and Richards could go all-out on vocals
and guitar; Watts kept the Stones sounding
like the Stones.
Looking like them, too: Watts, who’d
worked as a graphic artist before joining
the band, helped shape the Stones’ visual
imagery in merchandise and stage sets; he
co-designed album covers and even ap-
peared on the cover of a couple of them —
including the 1970 live album “Get Your
Ya-Ya’s Out!” — despite his avowed disin-
terest in the spotlight. In concert, his
frowning expression and rigid posture
behind the drums called to mind Sam the
Eagle from the Muppets — a welcome
comic counterpoint to all the rock-star
preening going on around him.
His deadpan attitude was another valua-
ble antidote to his bandmates' huckste-
rism. On the one occasion I spoke with
Watts, ahead of a 50th-anniversary tour
the group mounted in 2012, he scoffed
when I told him guitarist Ronnie Wood
had hyped the group’s five-hour rehears-
als and promised that the band was “up to
a point we’ve never been before.”
“I don’t know what he’s talking about,”
Watts said in his clipped English accent.
“We have a lot of songs. You start off play-
ing a hundred, then get it down to 25.”
As usual, he was forgoing the whammi-
ty-whammity-bam.
AMY HARRIS/AP
Rolling Stones drummer Charlie Watts performs at TD Garden in Boston on June 14, 2013. Watts, who had anchored the band’s sound since 1964, died Tuesday at age 80.
Singular Stone
The steadfast genius of Charlie Watts was always just enough and never too muchBY MIKAEL WOOD
Los Angeles Times
APPRECIATION
Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 15
Lorde’s musings on the burden of famedon’t sound like hits. That’ll suit her fine.
Lorde’s songwriting stands up to digitalfact-checking.
When the 24-year-old pop singerfrom New Zealand sings on her newalbum of having “an arm in a cast at
the museum gala,” it takes only a few clicks to finda photo (dozens, actually) of her plaster-accentedlook at the Met Gala in 2016. Ditto her memory ofthe time “in Hollywood when Carole called myname” — Carole King, that is, who presentedLorde with a Grammy Award for song of the yearat Staples Center in 2014.
As a child of the internet, Lorde knows that herlife over the past decade — since her smash “Roy-als” made her a teenage superstar despite (or per-haps because of) the song’s suspicions about celeb-rity — has been documented in obsessive detail;she also understands that fans crave the feeling ofbeing let behind the curtain of what they alreadyknow.
That doesn’t mean she likes it.
“If you’re looking for a savior
/ Well, that’s not me,” Lorde
declares just minutes into “So-
lar Power,” her third LP. “You
need someone to take your pain
for you? / Well, that’s not me.”
Even before these pronounce-
ments, the first thing she tells us
in the album’s opening track,
“The Path,” is that she was
“born in the year of OxyContin”
— certainly one way to describe
1996 (when the notoriously
addictive painkiller was in-
troduced) that leaves little
doubt as to her thoughts on the
dangers of fame-as-religion.
Elsewhere on this curiously
low-key album, Lorde deplores
getting on airplanes all the time
and admits to “having night-
mares from the camera flash”;
on “Dominoes,” she sounds
utterly exhausted by having
dated an unnamed guy who
went on to do “yoga with Uma
Thurman’s mother.” (Your
Googling awaits.)
Doesn’t anyone want to be a
pop star anymore? “Solar Pow-
er” is just the latest in a series
of high-profile releases about
seeking an escape from online
ubiquity, after Lana Del Rey’s
“Chemtrails Over the Country
Club” and Billie Eilish’s “Hap-
pier Than Ever”; even 2021’s
breakout debut, “Sour” by Oli-
via Rodrigo, starts with a song
in which Rodrigo threatens to
quit the job she just got and
start a new life, far from the
soul-crushing experience that is
being a young woman reading
about herself on social media.
Lorde makes similar prom-
ises on “Solar Power,” which
she recorded primarily with
producer Jack Antonoff, pop’s
premiere facilitator of VIP
ambivalence: “Goodbye to all
the bottles, all the models / Bye
to the kids in the lines for the
new Supreme,” she sings on
“California,” while “Stoned at
the Nail Salon” counsels listen-
ers to “spend all the evenings
you can with the people who
raised you.”
In “The Path,” Lorde brags
that she “won’t take the call if
it’s the label or the radio”; in the
title track she exults in having
thrown her “cellular device in
the water” so that nobody at all
can reach her.
What distinguishes “Solar
Power” from those other re-
cords is that Lorde truly sounds
like she’s OK with not having
hits. These are weird, spare,
twisty-turny psych-folk tunes,
many of them without the pro-
pulsive beats that used to drive
Lorde’s music; most of the time,
she’s simply layering her flut-
tering, slightly raspy vocals
over Antonoff’s noodly electric
guitar in a way that recalls
Nico’s 1967 cult classic “Chelsea
Girl,” of all things.
Although the results are uni-
formly gorgeous, not-hits are
indeed what Lorde has so far
reaped: Ahead of the album’s
release, none of its advance
singles were on Billboard’s Hot
100 or the Spotify U.S. Top 50 —
a startling turnabout for an
artist who spent nine weeks at
No. 1 with “Royals.”
Lorde doesn’t use all of “Solar
Power” to chew over her disin-
terest in fame. “Fallen Fruit”
addresses climate change, crit-
icizing the singer’s parents’
generation for not working to
solve a problem that may now
be too late to fix. And “The Man
with the Axe” tenderly recounts
a relationship with someone
who “felled me clean as a pine.”
(There’s a vivid metaphor to
show for all the wandering in
nature Lorde says she did dur-
ing COVID quarantine.)
In the twinkling “Mood
Ring,” she satirizes the modern
wellness industry with the
sharp sense of humor that keeps
the rest of “Solar Power” from
feeling like a privileged per-
son’s lament. Lorde closes with
“Oceanic Feeling,” in which she
turns her focus from the dis-
appointments of getting what
she thought she wanted to the
comforting thrill of the yet-to-
be-known.
“In the future, if I have a
daughter / Will she have my
waist or my widow’s peak?” she
sings over a gently trippy gos-
pel-soul groove, “My dreamer’s
disposition or my wicked
streak?”
That nobody can pull up any
pictures of the hypothetical
child clearly delights her.
BY MIKAEL WOOD
Los Angeles Times
LORDE/YouTube
Lorde released her third album, “Solar Power,” on Aug. 20. The New Zealander joins other pop stars singing about escaping from online ubiquity.
MUSIC
Lorde
Solar Power (EMI/Republic)
REVIEW
PAGE 16 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • Sunday, August 29, 2021
CROSSWORD AND COMICS
NEW YORK TIMES CROSSWORD
THINK TWICE BY AIMEE LUCIDO AND ELLA DERSHOWITZ / EDITED BY WILL SHORTZ
59 Symbol on the Connecticut state quarter
60 Stop along the highway
61 Quite
64 Finished brushing one’s teeth, say
66 Racial-justice movement since 2013, in brief
67 ‘‘Really, though?’’
68 Word in many font names
69 Betray . . . or a hint to four answers in this puzzle
73 ____ the Cat (fictional feline of children’s books)
74 Thin incision
75 Some $200 Monopoly properties, in brief
76 Set of 50 on the Argo, in myth
77 Coaxed (out of)
79 Insurance giant bailed out in 2008
80 Word before cap or pop
81 Awesomest bud
82 Spirit in Arabian myth
83 Arizona county or its seat
85 Pushing up daisies
90 Neighbor of Mozambique
92 Nonwriting credentials for Conan Doyle and Chekhov, informally
93 Seller’s need
95 Artificial habitat
97 Abolitionist Lucretia
98 The avant-garde ‘‘artists’’ Congo and Pierre Brassau
100 Hedy of the 2017 documentary ‘‘Bombshell’’
103 Kind of chip
105 Question of perplexion
108 ‘‘The Raven’’ writer’s inits.
109 Like
110 Big believer in the freedom of assembly?
112 Press ____
113 What the beleaguered are behind
115 Classic folk story that teaches a lesson of sharing
118 Be up for some biking?
120 Fast runners
121 Advanced math degree?
122 Ninny
123 Sternutation
124 Real cutup
125 Landscaper’s supply
126 In the past
127 ‘‘As You Like It’’ forest
DOWN
1 Novelist Margaret
2 Absorb the beauty of, as a scene
3 Lacked the gumption to
4 Gladly, old-style
5 Jazzy James and Jones
6 First law-enforcement org. in the U.S. to hire a female officer (1910)
7 Nail-polish brand
8 List of performers
9 Star man?
10 Half of a ’55 union merger
11 ‘‘That’s enough arguing out of you!’’
12 Lip-puckering
13 Things that may be rubbed after din-din
14 Playwright Will who was a 2005 Pulitzer finalist
15 Crew implement
16 One getting special instruction
18 Ink holders in pens and squid
22 ‘‘Just like ____!’’
24 Like morning people vis-à-vis night owls, around dawn
26 Response to ‘‘How bad was it?’’
29 Extends, in a way
35 Lead-in to call
37 Cause for an onslaught of yearly txts
39 ‘‘If the pessimists are right . . .’’
41 Stroke
42 East: Ger.
44 Wednesday, but not Friday
46 Accelerator particles
47 Overwhelm
48 Some tax breaks
50 Boos and cheers
51 Light
53 Latin list ender
54 Some Hershey candies
56 Bought in
61 Time-consuming assignment to grade
62 Xanax alternative
63 Monthly publication of the National Puzzlers’ League, with ‘‘The’’
64 More convinced
65 ‘‘The Magic School Bus’’ was its first fully animated series
66 Sound at the end of December, appropriately?
67 Beach with a girl who ‘‘swings so cool’’
70 Part of many a corsage
71 Bite site
72 Job to do
78 High-quality cannabis, in slang
80 ‘‘Success!’’
81 Decorate
82 ‘‘I. Can’t. Even.’’
84 Spain’s Duchess of ____
86 Classic novel with the line ‘‘You must be the best judge of your own happiness’’
87 Environmental opening
88 When repeated, a reproof
89 Overturned
91 Most chiffonlike
94 Figure out
96 Not thinking
97 The Supremes’ record label
99 Bad temper
100 Makeup target
101 Where a ‘‘Married at First Sight’’ contestant meets his or her mate
102 Language in which
‘‘kia ora’’ is a
greeting
104 Up on
106 Confused responses
107 Fight site
111 Long runs?
113 ‘‘A man’s character is
his ____’’: Heraclitus
114 ‘‘Suds’’
116 Prefix with classical
117 Prof’s degree
119 Post on Insta
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
221202918171
62524232
1303928272
736353433323
38 39 40 41 42 43 44
15059484746454
6555453525
06958575
76665646362616
372717079686
8777675747
28180897
98887868584838
4939291909
9989796959
801701601501401301201101001
411311211111011901
911811711611511
321221121021
721621521421
Aimee Lucido, of Berkeley, Calif., is a full-time crossword constructor and an author of children’s books. Ella Dershowitz, of New York City, is an actor. A mutual friend introduced them, and Ella says, ‘‘We bonded immediately through being artsy puzzle people.’’ When Ella moved to San Francisco they became close. Now that she’s back in New York, the two stay in touch by making puzzles together. — W.S.
ACROSS
1 Confound
6 Sarcastic internet laughter
10 Most Times Square signage
13 Performance check
17 Dark hair and a warm smile, for two
19 Samoan capital
20 To’s opposite
21 Full-length
23 Something that bugs criminals?
25 Blabberer
27 Duplicitous
28 Musicianship
30 ____ dress
31 Pasture
32 Signed off on
33 Ukr. or Lith., formerly
34 Places for development
36 Corn kernel, e.g.
38 Actress Merrill
40 Genre for BTS or Blackpink
43 Added to the staff?
45 Alerts
48 ____ of lies
49 Aquafina : PepsiCo :: ____ : Coca-Cola
52 #$%& and @%¢!
55 Practice whose name means, literally, ‘‘union’’
57 Words before ‘‘before’’
58 ‘‘Deck the Halls’’ contraction
GUNSTON STREET
“Gunston Street” is drawn by Basil Zaviski. Email him at [email protected], and online at gunstonstreet.com.
RESULTS FOR ABOVE PUZZLE
ADDLELOLZADSTEST
TRAITSAPIAFROUNCUT
WIRETAPPINGLOUDMOUTH
ONEFACEDEARPROMLEA
OKDSSRUTERINIBLET
DINAKPOPNOTATED
NOTIFIESWEBDASANI
TWOLETTERWORDSYOGA
ONORTISOAKINN
EVERSOSPATBLMISIT
SANSDOUBLECROSSPETE
SLITRRSOARSTEASED
AIGICEBFFJINN
YUMATHREEFEETUNDER
MALAWIMDSCUSTOMER
BIODOMEMOTTAPES
LAMARRNACHOWHAEAP
ALAIKEAKITFOURBALL
STONESOUPPOPAWHEELIE
HARESNTHTWITSNEEZE
RIOTSODONCEARDEN
Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 17
GADGETS & TECHNOLOGY
Persephone is a tour guide in Greece, but
perhaps not the type people are used to.
Billed as the world’s first robot tour
guide inside a cave, Persephone has been
welcoming visitors since mid-July to the Alistrati
Cave in northern Greece, 84 miles northeast of the
city of Thessaloniki.
The multilingual robot covers the first 500 feet
of the part of the cave that is open to the public. In
the remaining 2,400 feet, a human guide takes
over.
The robot was named Persephone because,
according to one version of the ancient Greek
myth, it was in a nearby plain that Pluto — the
god of the underworld who was also known as
Hades — abducted Persephone, with the consent
of her father Zeus, to take her as his wife.
The robot can give its part of the tour in 33
languages and interact at a basic level with vis-
itors in three languages. It can also answer 33
questions, but only in Greek.
Nikos Kartalis, the scientific director for the
Alistrati site, had the idea of creating the robot
when he saw one on TV guiding visitors at an art
gallery. Seventeen years later, “we got our funds
and the robot guide became a reality,” Kartalis
told The Associated Press.
The robot was built by the National Technology
and Research Foundation and cost 118,000 euros
($139,000).
“We already have a 70% increase in visitors
compared to last year since we started using” the
robot, says Kartalis. “People are enthusiastic,
especially the children, and people who had visited
in the past are coming back to see the robot guide.
“It is something unprecedented for them, to
have the ability to interact with their robot by
asking it questions and the robot answering them,”
he said. “Many foreign visitors couldn’t believe
Greece had the capacity to build a robot and use it
as a guide in the cave.”
Persephone, with a white body, black head and
two luminous eyes, moves on wheels, guiding vis-
itors to the first three of eight stops along the
walkway. She can do two more stops, but her low
speed slows down the tour, which is conducted in
three languages simultaneously. Persephone’s
creators are considering ways to speed her up.
The robot begins by saying: “My name is Perse-
phone. I am the daughter of the goddess Demeter
and the wife of Pluto, the god of the underworld. I
welcome you to my under Earth kingdom, the
Alistrati Cave.”
Many visitors are intrigued by the robot guide.
“It was surprising for me. I’ve never experi-
enced such a thing. Actually, honestly, I prefer a
live guide, but it’s interesting doing it this way.
And I like the pace of the robot. It goes slower, so
I can look around,” said Patrick Markes, a Czech
visitor.
Markes listened to the first three stops from the
robot in his native language and the rest in En-
glish from a human tour guide.
“I should thank Persephone, our robot; she said
very fine things,” said Christos Tenis, a Greek
visitor. “I’m impressed by the cave. Of course, we
had a flawless (human) guide. She explained many
things. I’m very impressed.”
Persephone is not the only technology used
inside the cave. There’s a cellphone app in which a
visitor, scanning a QR code, can see the Alistrati
Beroni. That’s a microorganism that is only found
in this cave, in the huge mounds of bat droppings
left behind when the cave was opened and the bats
migrated elsewhere.
Evdokia Karafera is one of the tour guides who
partners with the robot.
“It is helpful, because it speaks many languages.
There’s just a little delay in the touring,” she said.
“Most find it fascinating, especially the children,
and find it interesting that it speaks many languag-
es.”
Karafera insisted, however, that human tour
guides cannot be completely replaced.
“Robots, at some point in the future, will take
over many jobs. But I believe they cannot replace
humans everywhere,” she said. “(Visitors say) ‘the
robot is interesting, original, but can’t substitute
for the human contact with the guide and the con-
versation we can have on the way back.’”
GIANNIS PAPANIKOS/AP
Persephone guides visitors inside Alistrati cave, about 84 miles northeast of Thessaloniki, Greece.Persephone, billed as the world’s first robot used as a tour guide inside a cave, has been welcomingvisitors to the Alistrati cave since midJuly.
Underworld guidePersephone, a robot, leads visitors through a Greek cave
BY COSTAS KANTOURIS
Associated Press
After just a few hours using the
pocket-sized Noopl, it’s easy to
see the tremendous results. The
app’s dashboard is well designed
creating a user-friendly experi-
ence to control the audio beam’s
direction and volume.
Online: noopl.com; $199
The new Mophie Powerstation
Go Rugged portable battery does
it all. And when I say all, this
battery has portable power for
charging cellphones or jump-
starting a car, boat or truck. It
even has an air compressor for
filling tires, which makes this one
of the most versatile portable
power devices available.
Inside is a 55,500mWh
(megawatt-hours) internal
battery, which holds its
charge so it’s ready for
use.
Two USB-A ports are
built into the battery un-
der a flap, which can be
used for charging just
about any USB device.
They can be used individ-
ually or simultaneously
and have an 2.4A output.
The air compressor is
what got my curiosity, and
with bicycle tires needing
air, it worked perfectly. A
display on the side of the
battery allows the re-
quired PSI to be dialed in
to prevent overinflating. It
also easily filled inflatable
pool floats.
The sturdy powerstation can
jump-start a full-sized truck in
seconds. If a jump is needed, the
mini jumper cables plug into a
port, which is covered by a front
side flap.
On the side of the Mophie
Powerstation Go Rugged battery
is a built-in LED floodlight,
which also has an emergency
alert red flashing light.
Online: zagg.com; $159.95
GADGETS
iPhone accessory enhanceshearing in noisy situations
BY GREGG ELLMAN
Tribune News Service
MOPHIE/TNS
The new Mophie PowerstationGo Rugged portable battery
While doing some advance
reading about the Noopl, a hear-
ing enhancement accessory for
iPhone, I thought about finding a
friend with hearing loss to put
this through a proper test. I have
good hearing, but after using the
Noopl, I realized I didn’t need a
hearing test to see (or hear) what
I’ve been missing.
The goal of the Noopl is for you
to never miss a conversation and
to provide clarity in noisy envi-
ronments, such as crowded res-
taurants, airports, malls, stores
or even your own home. It uses
Al-based noise
reduction tech-
nologies to im-
prove the audio in
your current
noisy environ-
ment. Noopl’s
creators came up
with the concept
after they had
challenges hear-
ing each other in a
noisy restaurant.
It’s built with
an iPhone Light-
ning port, attach-
es in a second, and
is Apple-certified. It
measures about
2-by-1.2-by-0.27
inches, and stores
in the included
carrying case.
The instruc-
tions and website video are very
helpful to get you set up with a
two-way communication link to
AirPods Pro and other compat-
ible headphones, including Pow-
erBeats Pro and other Made for
iPhone (MFi) hearing devices.
The setup emphasizes starting
with the AirPods Pro in the case,
not in your ears. After download-
ing the Noopl Listen app, there
are a few short audio clips to
show how well the Noopl works
in manual or automatic mode. In
automatic and with AirPods Pro,
it tracks your head’s movement.
In manual and with other head-
phones, you choose which direc-
tion the audio needs to be cap-
tured.
The Noopl app gives examples
in crowded restaurants and air-
ports, which both displayed the
advantages well. I took the Noopl
out for a day that included gro-
cery shopping, a veterinarian, a
post office and a few other stops,
which were busy with lots of
background noise.
To amplify the sound, three
microphones together create a
steerable beamformer that im-
proves the signal-to-noise ratio
(SNR) in acoustically challenging
environments.
NOOPL/TNS
Noopl has an iPhoneLightning port.
PAGE 18 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • Sunday, August 29, 2021
Ernie GatesThe Stars and Stripes ombudsman protects the free flowof news and information, reporting any attempts by the
military or other authorities to undermine the newspaper’sindependence. The ombudsman also responds to concerns
and questions from readers, and monitors coverage forfairness, accuracy, timeliness and balance. The ombudsmanwelcomes comments from readers, and can be contacted by
Stars and Stripes (USPS 0417900) is published week-days (except Dec. 25 and Jan. 1) for 50 cents Mondaythrough Thursday and for $1 on Friday by Pacific Stars andStripes, Unit 45002, APO AP 96301-5002. Periodicalspostage paid at San Francisco, CA, Postmaster: Sendaddress changes to Pacific Stars and Stripes, Unit 45002,APO AP 96301-5002. This newspaper is authorized by theDepartment of Defense for members of the military servicesoverseas. However, the contents of Stars and Stripes areunofficial, and are not to be considered as the official viewsof, or endorsed by, the U.S. government. As a DOD newspa-per, Stars and Stripes may be distributed through officialchannels and use appropriated funds for distribution toremote locations where overseas DOD personnel are located.
The appearance of advertising in this publication doesnot constitute endorsement by the Department of Defense orStars and Stripes of the products or services advertised.Products or services advertised shall be made available forpurchase, use or patronage without regard to race, color,religion, sex, national origin, age, marital status, physicalhandicap, political affiliation or any other nonmerit factor ofthe purchaser, user or patron.
The world sees a wobbly, impulsive USBY GEORGE F. WILL
Washington Post Writers Group
The policy battle for voting rights is
reaching a fever pitch. Republi-
cans are arguing vociferously
that greater safeguards are need-
ed to prevent widespread voter fraud, with
a wave of state legislative efforts that limit
mail-in balloting, restrict early voting win-
dows and reduce locations for easy ballot
drop-off. We witnessed Texas Democratic
lawmakers become fugitives from justice
as they fled their state in protest over pro-
posed restrictive legislation. Congressional
Democrats are fighting for expanded voter
access through the For the People Act,
which would create national safeguards
against barriers making it harder for many
citizens to vote.
The discussion is now framed as a zero-
sum game, one that pits security versus ac-
cess. For me, there’s only one factor that
matters: The strength of our democracy de-
pends upon the ability of our citizens to
have their voices heard. But the devil re-
mains in the details. Simplistically pitting
security versus access is not only inaccu-
rate, it may result in more people having
their right to vote restricted.
A case in point is the wording of the For
the People Act. In their battle to protect and
expand voting rights by increasing polling
places and vote-by-mail, Democrats have
inserted language that could end up mak-
ing access for millions of people more diffi-
cult.
Tucked into hundreds of pages of the bill
is the following language: “Nothing in this
section may be construed to allow the
marking or casting of ballots over the in-
ternet.” This attempt to enhance security
by creating a national mandate for paper-
only voting is an anti-technology provision
that could stop progress many states have
made to deploy an evidence-based ap-
proach to utilize proven technology and im-
prove access for people who need it. In re-
sponse to COVID-19 last year, many states
passed laws to utilize secure remote voting
options to protect the rights of disabled citi-
zens and overseas military members. This
one line could create significant barriers
for persons who need assistive technology
to cast their ballot, and makes it more diffi-
cult for overseas military to have their
votes counted when sending paper ballots
from overseas.
Military personnel, overseas citizens and
people living with disabilities vote in far
lower numbers than the population at
large. History has shown time and again
that those who don’t exercise their voice at
the polls have their needs ignored by elect-
ed officials. Banning technology in the
name of security is myopic, halting proven
methods we already use in the voting proc-
ess. Disabled voters, for example, use
Americans with Disabilities Act-mandated
assistive technology when they vote in per-
son at polling places. Overseas military
currently use fax machines and email,
which are less secure and lack privacy. The
proposed language could either limit them
to mail-in ballots that often don’t reach the
clerk’s office in time to be counted, or pos-
sibly restrict the utilization of current
email or faxed-in balloting.
Last month, we saw a great example of a
bipartisan effort to improve access for ac-
tive members of the military. It is no sur-
prise that the co-sponsor of the bill is Dem-
ocratic Sen. Tammy Duckworth, a combat
veteran. With Republican Sen. John Cor-
nyn, she introduced the Reducing Barriers
for Military Voters Act, which would estab-
lish a secure electronic voting system for
active-duty service members stationed in
hazardous duty zones or rotational deploy-
ments.
While the Democrats have taken on a
generational battle over protecting voting
rights, they may be committing legislative
malpractice by actually impeding voters’
ability to cast a ballot through existing and
proven technology that is highly secure,
ADA compliant and offers privacy that is
not afforded within a “paper only” frame-
work.
Good legislation should mandate out-
comes (e.g., a safe, accessible and auditable
election) rather than specific methods. Re-
stricting remote marking and delivery of
ballots utilizing state-of-the-art technology
could mean that, in the future, millions of
people who cannot safely walk into a poll-
ing station will be denied their most impor-
tant right our constitution provides.
Don’t make it harder for overseas military to voteBY SHANNON O’BRIEN
The Fulcrum
Shannon O’Brien, a former treasurer of Massachusetts, is theprincipal of the O’Brien Advisory Group and an advisor to Voatz,which makes a mobile voting app.
Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 19
SCOREBOARD/SPORTS BRIEFS
PRO FOOTBALL
NFL Preseason
Friday’s games
Indianapolis 27, Detroit 17Carolina 34, Pittsburgh 9Philadelphia 31, N.Y. Jets 31Kansas City 28, Minnesota 25
Saturday’s games
Arizona at New Orleans, canc.Green Bay at BuffaloBaltimore at WashingtonChicago at TennesseeTampa Bay at HoustonL.A. Rams at DenverL.A. Chargers at Seattle
Sunday’s games
Jacksonville at DallasLas Vegas at San FranciscoMiami at CincinnatiNew England at N.Y. GiantsCleveland at Atlanta
COLLEGE FOOTBALL
Schedule
Saturday’s games
SOUTH
Alcorn St. (0-0) vs. NC Central (0-0) at At-lanta
MIDWEST
Nebraska (0-0) at Illinois (0-0)E. Illinois (0-0) at Indiana St. (0-0)
FAR WEST
Uconn (0-0) at Fresno St. (0-0)Hawaii (0-0) at UCLA (0-0)
Sunday’s games
FAR WEST
UTEP (0-0) at New Mexico St. (0-0)S. Utah (0-0) at San Jose St. (0-0)
YOUTH BASEBALL
Little League World SeriesAt Williamsport, Pa.
Saturday’s games
Tom Seaver Championship
Game 27: Ohio vs. South Dakota, Noon
Hank Aaron Championship
Game 28: Michigan vs. Hawaii
Sunday’s games
Third Place
Game 29: Game 27 loser vs. Game 28 los-er
Championship
Game 30: Game 27 winner vs. Game 28winner
PRO BASKETBALL
WNBA
EASTERN CONFERENCE
W L Pct GB
x-Connecticut 19 6 .760 —
Chicago 13 12 .520 6
New York 11 16 .407 9
Washington 9 15 .375 9½
Atlanta 6 19 .240 13
Indiana 5 18 .217 13
WESTERN CONFERENCE
W L Pct GB
x-Las Vegas 18 7 .720 —
x-Seattle 18 9 .667 1
Minnesota 15 9 .625 2½
Phoenix 15 10 .600 3
Dallas 11 14 .440 7
Los Angeles 10 15 .400 8
Friday’s games
Phoenix 80, New York 64Chicago 73, Seattle 69
Saturday’s games
Las Vegas at IndianaDallas at WashingtonLos Angeles at Connecticut
Sunday’s game
Chicago at Seattle
PRO SOCCER
MLS
Eastern Conference
W L T Pts GF GA
New England 15 3 4 49 44 26
Orlando City 9 4 8 35 30 24
Philadelphia 8 5 8 32 27 20
Nashville 7 2 11 32 32 20
NYCFC 9 6 4 31 34 19
CF Montréal 8 7 7 31 30 27
D.C. United 8 10 3 27 32 31
Columbus 7 9 6 27 25 29
Atlanta 6 6 9 27 25 26
Inter Miami CF 6 9 5 23 21 31
New York 6 9 4 22 23 24
Chicago 5 11 5 20 23 33
Cincinnati 3 9 8 17 21 37
Toronto FC 3 13 6 15 26 47
Western Conference
W L T Pts GF GA
Seattle 12 3 6 42 35 17
Sporting KC 11 4 6 39 36 21
Colorado 11 4 4 37 29 19
LA Galaxy 11 8 2 35 32 32
Minnesota 7 6 7 28 22 23
Real Salt Lake 7 7 6 27 30 23
San Jose 6 7 8 26 24 29
Portland 7 10 3 24 27 39
LAFC 6 9 5 23 25 28
Vancouver 5 7 8 23 23 30
FC Dallas 5 9 7 22 25 30
Austin FC 5 11 4 19 17 24
Houston 3 8 10 19 23 32
Note: Three points for victory, one pointfor tie.
Friday’s games
Columbus 3, Cincinnati 2 CF Montréal 3, Toronto FC 1 Miami 0, Orlando City 0, tie
Saturday’s games
Nashville at Atlanta Chicago at New York LA Galaxy at Los Angeles FC New England at New York City FC Philadelphia at D.C. United Colorado at Sporting Kansas City Minnesota at Houston
Sunday’s games
FC Dallas at Austin FC Real Salt Lake at Vancouver Portland at Seattle
NWSL
W L T Pts GF GA
Portland 10 3 2 32 23 9
North Carolina 8 4 3 27 22 9
Washington 6 5 4 22 19 18
Reign FC 7 7 1 22 20 17
Gotham FC 5 4 6 21 17 14
Orlando 5 5 6 21 19 19
Chicago 6 7 3 21 16 22
Houston 5 6 3 18 17 20
Louisville 4 7 4 16 13 22
Kansas City 2 10 4 10 9 25
Note: Three points for victory, one pointfor tie.
Saturday’s game
Kansas City at Chicago
Sunday’s games
North Carolina at Washington Orlando at Gotham FC Louisville at Houston Portland at Reign FC
Friday’s TransactionsBASEBALL
Major League BaseballAmerican League
BALTIMORE ORIOLES — Released INFMaikel Franco after clearing waivers.
BOSTON RED SOX — Placed 2Bs EnriqueHernandez, Christian Arroyo and INF/OFKike Hernandez on the COVID-19 list. SentLF Danny Santana to Portland (Double-ANortheast) on a rehab assignment. Re-called INF Jonathan Arauz from Worcester(Triple-A East). Selected the contract ofINF/OF Yairo Munoz from Worcester andagreed to terms on a major league con-tract.
CHICAGO WHITE SOX — Reinstated CYasmani Grandal from the 10-day IL. Op-tioned C Zack Collins to Charlotte (Tri-ple-A East).
CLEVELAND INDIANS — Sent RHP AaronCivale to Lake County (High-A Central) ona rehab assignment.
DETROIT TIGERS — Recalled RHP JasonFoley from Toledo (Triple-A East). Rein-stated C Eric Haase from the 10-day IL.Designated RHP Erasmo Ramirez for as-signment. Optioned C Grayson Greiner toToledo.
HOUSTON ASTROS — Agreed to termswith INF Marwin Gonzalez on a minorleague contract.
KANSAS CITY ROYALS — Recalled CF Ed-ward Olivares from Omaha (Triple-A East).Placed RHP Brad Keller on the 10-day IL.Reinstated RHP Josh Staumont from the10-day IL.
LOS ANGELES ANGELS — Selected thecontract of RHP Cooper Criswell from SaltLake (Triple-A West) and agreed to termson a major league contract. Recalled RHPPacky Naughton from Salt Lake. OptionedINF Kean Wong and RHP James Hoyt to SaltLake.
MINNESOTA TWINS — Reinstated RHPJorge Alcala and OF Byron Buxton from the10-day IL. Selected the contract of RHP IanGibaut from St. Paul (Triple-A East) andagreed to terms on a major league con-tract. Optioned RHPs Edgar Garcia andKyle Barraclough to St. Paul. TransferredRHP Luke Farrell from the 10-day IL to the60-day IL. Placed C Mitch Garver on the 10-day IL, retroactive to Aug. 25.
OAKLAND ATHLETICS — Placed OF SethBrown on the 10-day IL. Recalled RHP Daul-ton Jeffries from Las Vegas (Triple-AWest).
SEATTLE MARINERS — Agreed to termswith RHP Chris Jefferson on a minorleague contract. Added LHP Sean Doolittleto active roster. Optioned RHP Wyatt Millsto Tacoma (Triple-A West).
TAMPA BAY RAYS — Reinstated RHPPete Fairbanks from the 10-day IL.
TEXAS RANGERS — Sent RHP Kohei Arih-ara to Round Rock (Triple-A West) on a re-hab assignment. Placed RHP Spencer Ho-ward on the 10-day IL. Selected the con-tract of RHP Glen Otto from Round Rockand agreed to terms on a major leaguecontract.
TORONTO BLUE JAYS — Claimed OF Jar-rod Dyson off waivers from Kansas City.Placed LHP Brad Hand on the bereave-ment list. Recalled RHP Connor Overtonfrom Buffalo (Triple-A East).
National LeagueARIZONA DIAMONDBACKS — Claimed
INF Asdrubal Cabrera off waivers fromCincinnati. Selected the contract of OFJake McCarthy from Reno (Triple-A West)and agreed to terms on a major leaguecontract.
ATLANTA BRAVES — Designated RFAbraham Almonte for assignment. Rein-stated LF Eddie Rosario from the 10-day IL.
CINCINNATI REDS — Claimed 3B Asdru-bal Cabrera off waivers from Arizona.
LOS ANGELES DODGERS — Recalled RHPAndre Jackson from Oklahoma City (Tri-ple-A West). Optioned LHP Darien Nunezto Oklahoma City. Sent RHP Neftali Felizoutright to Oklahoma City.
MIAMI MARLINS — Sent RHP BryanMitchell outright to Jacksonville (Triple-AEast).
NEW YORK METS — Reinstated C TomasNido from the 10-day IL. Optioned CChance Sisco to Syracuse (Triple-A East).
PHILADELPHIA PHILLIES — Recalled RHPEnyel De Los Santos from Lehigh Valley(Triple-A East). Placed RHP Zach Eflin, 2BLuke Williams and C Andrew Knapp on the10-day IL. Selected the contract of C RafaelMarchan from Lehigh Valley and agreed toterms on a major league contract.
SAN FRANCISCO GIANTS — ReinstatedRHP Kevin Gausman from the 10-day IL.Optioned C Chadwick Tromp to Sacra-mento.
BASKETBALLNational Basketball Association
DALLAS MAVERICKS — Waived G NateHinton.
PHILADELPHIA 76ERS — Waived F Antho-ny Tolliver.
FOOTBALLNational Football League
BUFFALO BILLS —Activated WRs ColeBeasley, Gabriel Davis and DTs VernonButler, Star Lotulelei from the reserve/CO-VID-19 list. Placed DT Treyvon Hester on IR.Released WR Rico Gafford and DT JoeyIvie.
CAROLINA PANTHERS — Waived S BrianCole. Acquired K Ryan Santoso from theNew York Giants in exchange for a condi-tional seventh-round pick.
DALLAS COWBOYS — Activated S MalikHooker from the COVID-19 list.
GREEN BAY PACKERS — Released WR De-vin Funchess from IR with an injury settle-ment. Waived QB Jake Dolegala. Signed DBRojesterman Farris.
NEW ENGLAND PATRIOTS — Claimed TEKahale Warring from Houston.
NEW ORLEANS SAINTS — Signed DE Da-mion Square. Waived LB Sutton Smith.
NEW YORK GIANTS — Signed DB JordynPeters.
SAN FRANCISCO 49ERS — Waived S KaiNacua. Re-signed OL Corbin Kaufasi.Placed R/PR Richie James Jr. on the IR.
TAMPA BAY BUCCANEERS — Placed GsEarl Watford and Nick Leaverett on the re-serve/COVID-19 list. Waived S RavenGreene from IR with an injury settlement.
TENNESSEE TITANS — Activated DL An-thony Rush from the reserve/COVID-19list.
HOCKEYNational Hockey League
MINNESOTA WILD — Signed D JordieBenn to a one-year contract.
MONTREAL CANADIENS — Signed F RyanPoehling to a two-year contract exten-sion.
SOCCERMajor League Soccer
MINNESOTA UNITED — Signed F FanendoAdi to a one-year contract with an oneyear option.
VANCOUVER WHITECAPS FC — Firedhead coach Marc Dos Santos and assist-ant coach Phil Dos Santos. Loaned F SimonColyn to Jong PSV through June 2022, withan option to buy. Named Vanni Sartini act-ing head coach.
National Women’s Soccer leagueWASHINGTON SPIRIT — Re-signed F Ash-
ley Sanchez to a long-term contract exten-sion through 2024 with a club option for2025.
DEALS
TENNIS
Winston-Salem OpenFriday
At Wake Forest UniversityWinston-Salem, N.C.
Purse: $717,955Surface: Hardcourt outdoor
Men’s SinglesSemifinals
Ilya Ivashka, Belarus, def. Emil Ruusuvu-ori, Finland, 6-2, 6-1.
Mikael Ymer, Sweden, def. Carlos Alca-raz (15), Spain, 7-5, 6-3.
Men’s DoublesChampionship
Matwe Middelkoop, Netherlands, andMarcelo Arevalo-Gonzalez, El Salvador,def. Ivan Dodig, Croatia, and Austin Kraj-icek, United States, 6-7 (5), 7-5, 10-6.
Cleveland Championships
FridayAt Flats West Bank
ClevelandPurse: $235,238
Surface: Hardcourt outdoorWomen’s Singles
SemifinalsIrina-Camelia Begu, Romania, def. Mag-
da Linette (6), Poland, 7-6 (5), 6-2.Anett Kontaveit (2), Estonia, def. Sara
Second Round (Suspended by darkness)Bryson DeChambeau 6860—128 16 Patrick Cantlay 6663—129 15 Sungjae Im 6765—132 12 Sergio Garcia 6567—132 12 Hudson Swafford 6766—133 11 Rory McIlroy 6470—134 10 Sebastián Muñoz 6768—135 9 Lucas Glover 6867—135 9 Erik van Rooyen 6768—135 9 Aaron Wise 6966—135 9 Paul Casey 6868—136 8 Hideki Matsuyama 6769—136 8 Alex Noren 7166—137 7 Kevin Na 7265—137 7 Charl Schwartzel 7166—137 7 Harold Varner III 6770—137 7 Dustin Johnson 6770—137 7 Brian Harman 6969—138 6 K.H. Lee 6969—138 6 Jhonattan Vegas 6970—139 5 Maverick McNealy 6970—139 5 Matt Jones 6970—139 5 Harris English 6970—139 5 Justin Thomas 6871—139 5 Shane Lowry 7168—139 5 Webb Simpson 6772—139 5 Daniel Berger 6871—139 5 Scottie Scheffler 7366—139 5 Emiliano Grillo 6773—140 4 Cam Davis 7367—140 4 Mackenzie Hughes 6971—140 4 Talor Gooch 6971—140 4
The Ally ChallengePGA Tour Champions
FridayAt Warwick Hills Golf & Country Club
Grand Blanc, Mich.Yardage: 6,740; Par: 72
Purse: $2 MillionFirst Round (Suspended due to darkness)Marco Dawson 3331—64 8 Bernhard Langer 3430—64 8 Jim Furyk 3134—65 7 Joe Durant 3134—65 7 K.J. Choi 3332—65 7 Darren Clarke 3432—66 6 Woody Austin 3432—66 6 Doug Barron 3432—66 6 Davis Love III 3532—67 5 Retief Goosen 3433—67 5 Steve Flesch 3235—67 5 Mike Weir 3434—68 4 Jerry Kelly 3335—68 4 Michael Allen 3335—68 4 Ernie Els 3336—69 3Harrison Frazar 3534—69 3 Wes Short, Jr. 3534—69 3 Jeff Maggert 3336—69 3 Vijay Singh 3534—69 3 David Toms 3534—69 3 Scott Parel 3534—69 3 Kevin Sutherland 3336—69 3 Gene Sauers 3633—69 3 Paul Broadhurst 3534—69 3 Tom Byrum 3534—69 3 Larry Mize 3436—70 2 Rod Pampling 3634—70 2 Stephen Ames 3535—70 2 Colin Montgomerie 3436—70 2 Rocco Mediate 3535—70 2 Ken Duke 3634—70 2 Tom Pernice Jr. 3932—71 � 1Kenny Perry 3635—71 1
GOLF
Associated Press
Jags trade QB Minshewto Eagles for 2022 pick
The Jacksonville Jaguars trad-
ed backup quarterback Gardner
Minshew to Philadelphia on Sat-
urday for a conditional draft pick
in 2022. The Jaguars received a
sixth-round pick that would be-
come a fifth-rounder if Minshew
plays 50% of snaps in three games.
Minshew joins a QB room that
already has starter Jalen Hurts
and veteran backup Joe Flacco.
The Eagles cut third-string quar-
terback Nick Mullens to make
room for Minshew.
In other NFL news:
■ The New Orleans Saints can-
celed their third and final presea-
son game because of Hurricane
Ida. The Saints were initially set to
the play the Arizona Cardinals on
Saturday at 7 p.m. The game was
rescheduled for noon, but the
Saints, the NFL and Louisiana
Gov. John Bel Edwards decided to
call the game off entirely.
DeChambeau takes
1-shot lead at BMWOWINGS MILLS, Md. — The
opportunity was there, and the
putts didn’t fall. This wasn’t Bry-
son DeChambeau trying to break
60, but Jon Rahm trying to take the
lead Saturday morning at the
BMW Championship.
Rahm completed the storm-de-
layed second round at Caves Val-
ley by narrowly missing birdie
chances from 15 feet and 10 feet,
and then he three-putted from
long range on the 18th hole for a 66
that left him two shots behind.
DeChambeau had a shot at tying
the PGA Tour record at best until
missing putts from 15 feet and 6
feet over his final two holes Fri-
day.
Louisville suspends coach
Mack for 6 gamesLOUISVILLE, Ky. — The Uni-
versity of Louisville said Friday
that it is suspending head basket-
ball coach Chris Mack for six
games for failing to follow proce-
dures in handling an extortion at-
tempt by one of his assistants.
Mack’s former assistant, Dino
Gaudio, pleaded guilty in June to a
federal charge of attempted extor-
tion.
Ronaldo makes splashy
return to Man UnitedCristiano Ronaldo is heading
back to Manchester United, the
team that turned him into a global
superstar.
In a fast-moving deal that
stunned the world of soccer, Ro-
naldo secured a return to Old
Trafford on Friday — a day after
telling Juventus he no longer
wanted to play for the Italian club.
BRIEFLY
PAGE 20 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • Sunday, August 29, 2021
OLYMPICS/NBA
NBC’s Olympics coverage has long been built on a
foundation of human-interest stories and showcasing
athletes’ road to the Games. The same philosophies
will apply to the coverage of Paralympics, which will
air on the network for the first time.
Sunday will mark the first time that Paralympics
coverage will air on the main NBC network and is
part of 1,200 hours of programming airing across
NBC, NBCSN, Olympic Channel and digital proper-
ties. The Paralympics began in Tokyo on Aug. 24 and
continues through Sept. 5.
NBC will have three weekend docu-follow series
episodes which will show the stories and perform-
ances of athletes competing in Tokyo. Sunday’s epi-
sode will feature U.S. team flagbearers Melissa
Stockwell (triathlon) and Chuck Aoki (wheelchair
rugby), along with swimmer Jessica Long.
NBC’s Mark Levy, the SVP of Original Production
and Creative, said the one-year delay of the Games
due to coronavirus allowed them to be able to dive
deeper into athletes’ back stories.
“We really want our viewers to feel connected to
the Paralympians. We want to give them a chance to
care and cheer for them,” Levy said. “It’s our oppor-
tunity through the primetime shows to reach a lot of
people and share these back stories.”
Long — who entered Tokyo with 23 career medals,
including 13 gold — has had part of her story shown
on Toyota ads that premiered earlier this year during
the Super Bowl. Sunday, though, will allow viewers to
see her visit to Russia for the first time in 2013 and
meeting her birth mother for the first time.
Long was born with fibular hemimelia, a genetic
abnormality which caused her lower legs to not de-
velop properly. She was given up for adoption and
was adopted at 13 months old. Her lower legs were
amputated five months later.
Future episodes will show Long in competition, as
well as how her Toyota ad has inspired people.
Stockwell is the first female American soldier to
lose a limb in active combat when a roadside bomb
exploded while she was leading a convoy in Iraq. She
was also the first Iraq War veteran who qualified for
the Paralympics in 2008. She finished fifth in the the
triathlon Saturday.
Aoki and the wheelchair rugby team are looking to
win gold after a tough loss to Australia in Rio in 2016.
The shows will also show swimmer Abbas Karimi,
who is part of the six-member Paralympic Refugee
Team
“To be able to showcase all these athletes with dis-
abilities and the opportunity to create a dialogue,
we’re hoping that people’s perceptions might
change,” Levy said. “That’s really compelling for us
and a real important reason why we’re sharing these
stories.”
JOEL MARKLUND/AP
United States Paralympic team athletes Melissa Stockwell and Charles Aoki lead the team during the athletes parade at the opening ceremonies for the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games in Tokyo, Japan, Tuesday.
Paralympic coverage airson NBC for the first time
BY JOE REEDY
Associated Press
JOE TOTH/AP
The United States’ Melissa Stockwell approachesthe finish line in the women’s triathlon PTS2 atOdaiba Marine Park during the Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games on Saturday in Tokyo.
All NBA team personnel who
will be near players and referees
must be fully vaccinated against
the coronavirus this season, the
league told its clubs in a memo on
Friday.
It essentially covers anyone
who will travel with teams, be
around the bench areas, have ac-
cess to home, visiting and referee
locker rooms and those working at
the scorer’s table. The league also
said in the memo, a copy of which
was obtained by The Associated
Press, that the policy may be up-
dated when federal agencies re-
lease “expected guidance related
to booster shots.”
Team personnel will need to be
fully vaccinated by Oct. 1; game-
day personnel by the time of a
team’s first home preseason
game, which means early Octo-
ber.
Among the groups of personnel
required to have vaccinations:
coaches, medical and perform-
ance staff, equipment staff, front
office members, team and arena
security, media relations, social
media producers, facility oper-
ations workers and more.
The NBA said exemptions will
be made in the cases of unionized
workers who cannot be forced to
be vaccinated, and for those with
religious or documented medical
reasons.
Those not fully vaccinated, the
NBA said, “will be prohibited
from having in-person interaction
with, or being within 15 feet of, any
player or referee.” They would al-
so not be permitted to travel with
teams and would have to wear
face masks at all times inside team
facilities.
Cavs land Markkanen in
three-way tradeLauri Markkanen was in search
of a new team. The Cleveland Cav-
aliers needed to add another out-
side shooter.
They found each other.
The Cavaliers have agreed to
acquire Markkanen, a restricted
free agent forward from Chicago,
in a three-way trade that will send
forward Larry Nance Jr. from Cle-
veland to Portland, a person famil-
iar with the deal told The Associ-
ated Press on Friday.
Markkanen is coming to the
Cavs in a sign-and-trade agree-
ment, said the person who spoke
on condition of anonymity be-
cause the deal needs NBA approv-
al before it can be completed. It
could be a few more days before
the trade becomes official.
The 24-year-old Markkanen
will receive a four-year, $67.4 mil-
lion contract, the person said.
ESPN first reported the three-
way swap.
The Bulls are getting swingman
Derrick Jones Jr. from the Trail
Blazers along with a lottery-pro-
tected 2022 first-round pick.
The 7-foot Markkanen aver-
aged 13.6 points and 5.3 rebounds
in 51 games for the Bulls last sea-
son, his fourth with the club. A
40% shooter on three-pointers last
season, he had been unable to
work out staying with Chicago,
and Cleveland jumped at the
chance to get him.
Markkanen will join a young
Cleveland nucleus that includes
guards Darius Garland and Collin
Sexton, forward Evan Mobley, the
No. 3 pick in this year’s draft, for-
ward Isaac Okoro and center Jar-
rett Allen.
The price for Markkanen was
high. The Cavs had to part with
Nance, who grew up in the area
and whose father, Larry Sr., was
an All-Star forward and whose jer-
sey was retired by Cleveland.
Nance joined the Cavs in the
2017-18 season, coming over in a
trade from the Lakers. A skilled
all-around player, the 28-year-old
Nance will be a nice complemen-
tary piece for the Blazers. He’ll al-
so get a chance to play with fellow
northeast Ohioan and friend CJ
McCollum.
Video shows LA officer
put knee on Hayes’ neckA Los Angeles police officer
briefly pressed a knee to the neck
of NBA player Jaxson Hayes as
the New Orleans Pelicans center
gasped “I can’t breathe” seconds
before another officer used a Tas-
er on him during a struggle, ac-
cording to body camera video re-
leased Friday.
The officers went to Hayes’
home in the Woodland Hills
neighborhood on July 28 around 3
a.m. after his girlfriend’s cousin
called 911. The cousin said Hayes’
girlfriend was sending her text
messages saying he had become
loud and violent and she was
scared.
Hayes, who was not armed, be-
came argumentative after officers
said he couldn’t go back into his
home. He ignored requests from
his girlfriend and his cousin to
stop talking and struggling with
the police as they tried to subdue
him. The 21-year-old ultimately
was booked into jail on accusa-
tions of resisting arrest after he
was evaluated at a hospital for mi-
nor injuries.
League memo: Thosearound players, refsmust be vaccinated
Associated Press
NBA BRIEFS
Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 21
MLB
American League
East Division
W L Pct GB
Tampa Bay 80 48 .625 _
New York 76 52 .594 4
Boston 74 56 .569 7
Toronto 66 61 .520 13½
Baltimore 40 87 .315 39½
Central Division
W L Pct GB
Chicago 75 55 .577 _
Cleveland 63 63 .500 10
Detroit 62 67 .481 12½
Kansas City 58 70 .453 16
Minnesota 56 72 .438 18
West Division
W L Pct GB
Houston 76 52 .594 _
Oakland 70 59 .543 6½
Seattle 69 60 .535 7½
Los Angeles 63 67 .485 14
Texas 44 84 .344 32
National LeagueEast Division
W L Pct GB
Atlanta 69 58 .543 _
Philadelphia 64 64 .500 5½
New York 61 67 .477 8½
Washington 55 72 .433 14
Miami 53 76 .411 17
Central Division
W L Pct GB
Milwaukee 78 51 .605 _
Cincinnati 71 59 .546 7½
St. Louis 65 62 .512 12
Chicago 56 74 .431 22½
Pittsburgh 47 82 .364 31
West Division
W L Pct GB
San Francisco 83 45 .648 _
Los Angeles 81 48 .628 2½
San Diego 69 61 .531 15
Colorado 59 69 .461 24
Arizona 44 86 .338 40
Friday’s games
Tampa Bay 6, Baltimore 3Detroit 2, Toronto 1Boston 4, Cleveland 3Houston 5, Texas 4Minnesota 2, Milwaukee 0Chicago White Sox 17, Chicago Cubs 13San Diego 5, L.A. Angels 0N.Y. Yankees 8, Oakland 2Kansas City 8, Seattle 7, 12 inningsCincinnati 6, Miami 0Washington 2, N.Y. Mets 1Atlanta 6, San Francisco 5St. Louis 4, Pittsburgh 3Philadelphia 7, Arizona 6, 11 inningsColorado 4, L.A. Dodgers 2
Saturday’s games
Boston at ClevelandN.Y. Yankees at OaklandKansas City at SeattleToronto at DetroitHouston at TexasTampa Bay at BaltimoreChicago Cubs at Chicago White SoxMilwaukee at MinnesotaSan Diego at L.A. AngelsArizona at PhiladelphiaCincinnati at MiamiSt. Louis at PittsburghWashington at N.Y. MetsSan Francisco at AtlantaColorado at L.A. Dodgers
Sunday’s games
Tampa Bay (Archer 0-1) at Baltimore(Watkins 2-6)
Boston (Houck 0-3) at Cleveland (Mor-gan 2-6)
Toronto (Berríos 8-7) at Detroit (Boyd 3-6)Chicago Cubs (Hendricks 14-5) at Chica-
go White Sox (Cease 10-6)Milwaukee (TBD) at Minnesota (Jax 3-2)Houston (Greinke 11-4) at Texas (Hearn 3-4)Kansas City (Singer 3-9) at Seattle (Gon-
zales 5-5)N.Y. Yankees (Montgomery 5-5) at Oak-
land (Blackburn 0-1)Arizona (Bumgarner 7-8) at Philadelphia
(Suárez 5-4)St. Louis (Kim 6-6) at Pittsburgh (Crowe 3-7)Cincinnati (Mahle 10-4) at Miami (Luzar-
do 4-7)Washington (Fedde 6-8) at N.Y. Mets
(Megill 1-3)San Francisco (TBD) at Atlanta (Ander-
son 5-5)Colorado (Senzatela 2-9) at L.A. Dodgers
(Urías 14-3)Monday’s games
Minnesota at DetroitBaltimore at TorontoBoston at Tampa BayColorado at TexasN.Y. Yankees at L.A. AngelsHouston at SeattleSt. Louis at CincinnatiPhiladelphia at WashingtonSan Diego at ArizonaMilwaukee at San FranciscoAtlanta at L.A. Dodgers
Scoreboard
ATLANTA — Jorge Soler hit a go-ahead,
three-run homer in the seventh inning, Joc Pe-
derson made a leaping catch at the wall for the
final out and the Atlanta Braves rallied to beat
San Francisco 6-5 on Friday night to end the Gi-
ants’ five-game winning streak in a matchup of
NL division leaders.
Wilmer Flores led off the ninth with a homer
against Braves closer Will Smith to trim Atlan-
ta’s lead to one.
Buster Posey hit a two-run homer in his re-
turn to San Francisco’s lineup. Adam Duvall al-
so homered for the Braves.
A.J. Minter (2-4) pitched a scoreless seventh
for the win. Losing pitcher Tony Watson (5-4) al-
lowed three hits, a walk and three earned runs.
Yankees 8, Athletics 2: Giancarlo Stanton
homered for a fourth straight game, Aaron
Judge hit a three-run shot and New York ex-
tended its best winning streak in nearly 60 years
to 13 in a win over host Oakland.
Stanton’s 25th homer was crushed an esti-
mated 472 feet above a suite level and into the
second deck of left-center.
Rockies 4, Dodgers 2: C.J. Cron hit a tie-
breaking home run leading off the sixth inning,
and Colorado won at Los Angeles.
The Rockies improved to 16-47 on the road in
a game in which all the runs came on homers.
Nationals 2, Mets 1: Paolo Espino struck out
a career-high seven while also singling and
scoring a run for the first time in the majors,
leading visiting Washington past New York,
which lost for the 19th time in 25 games this
month.
Only two players got beyond first base against
Espino and four relievers. Francisco Lindor tri-
pled with two outs in the first and was stranded
when Javier Báez, who homered in the fourth,
struck out.
Astros 5, Rangers 4: Michael Brantley hit a
tying, two-run single as the sixth consecutive
Houston batter to reach starting the seventh in-
ning, and the AL West-leading Astros rallied to
win at last-place Texas.
Phil Maton (3-0) got the win despite allowing
two runs in his only inning of work. Ryan Press-
ly worked the ninth for his 20th save in 22 chanc-
es.
Padres 5, Angels 0: Joe Musgrove pitched a
three-hitter for his first complete game since his
April no-hitter, and visiting San Diego snapped
its four-game skid.
Musgrove (9-8) finished his second career
complete game and shutout.
Cardinals 4, Pirates 3: Tommy Edman hit a
two-run homer and drove in three runs, Paul
Goldschmidt had three hits and St. Louis won at
Pittsburgh.
Red Sox 4, Indians 3: Jonathan Araúz hit a
three-run homer in the eighth inning after being
recalled from Triple-A Buffalo before the game
due to Boston’s COVID-19 cases, sending the
Red Sox to a win at Cleveland.
Twins 2, Brewers 0: Josh Donaldson’s two-
run home run in the first inning for host Minne-
sota stood up for starter Andrew Albers in a win
over Milwaukee.
Tigers 2, Blue Jays 1: Victor Reyes hit a
pinch-hit tiebreaking inside-the-park home run
in the eighth inning and Detroit held on to beat
visiting Toronto.
Rays 6, Orioles 3: Shane McClanahan won
his fifth consecutive start, Mike Zunino hit a
three-run homer and Tampa Bay won at Balti-
more for its sixth straight win.
Reds 6, Marlins 0: Wade Miley pitched six-
hit ball over seven innings, Tyler Naquin home-
red and extended his major league-leading hit-
ting streak, and visiting Cincinnati blanked
Miami.
Phillies 7, Diamondbacks 6 (11): Jean Seg-
ura singled with one out in the 11th inning to give
Philadelphia a victory at Arizona.
Royals 8, Mariners 7 (12): Edward Olivares
hit a two-run home run in the 12th inning, Salva-
dor Perez hit a grand slam in a second straight
game and Kansas City won at Seattle.
Braves nip Giants in meeting of division leaders
JOHN BAZEMORE/AP
The Braves’ Jorge Soler hits a threerunhome run during the seventh inning to put histeam ahead for good in a 65 win over theSan Francisco Giants, Friday, in Atlanta.
Associated Press
ROUNDUP
CHICAGO — Yasmani Grandal
has some work to do when it comes
to having enough energy for his
catching duties after being side-
lined by a knee injury.
His swing looks pretty good.
Grandal homered twice and
drove in eight runs in his return
from the injured list, and the Chi-
cago White Sox beat the sloppy
Chicago Cubs 17-13 on Friday
night.
The eight RBIs for Grandal
matched the franchise record and
career best for the switch-hitter.
He also doubled and singled.
“I felt pretty tired halfway
through the game after running
around, blocking, moving behind
the plate, but it just comes with the
job,” he said. “Thank God that I’m
back and I have a month of games
to be able to get my stamina up and
be able to feel good by the time the
playoffs come.”
The AL Central leaders are hap-
py he’s back, too.
“Evidently he’s been doing a lot
of work,” manager Tony La Russa
said, “because his swing was on
time. I mean huge, huge produc-
tion, it was really impressive.”
José Abreu added three hits and
two RBIs as the White Sox im-
proved to an AL-best 43-23 at home
this year. Luis Robert also had
three hits and scored three times,
and Yoán Moncada extended his
hitting streak to 13 games. The
White Soximproved to 4-0 against
the crosstown Cubs, winning the
season series for the first time
since 2014.
The fourth-place Cubs scored
six times in the first against Dallas
Keuchel, but they couldn’t hold on
against the White Sox. Patrick Wis-
dom homered twice and drove in
four runs and Michael Hermosillo
hit a solo shot to go along with two
impressive catches in center field.
Grandal drives in 8 runs in returnWhite Sox catcher powersvictory over sloppy Cubs
BY JAY COHEN
Associated Press
NAM Y. HUH/AP
Chicago White Sox catcher Yasmani Grandal hits a tworun double during the fifth inning. He also homeredtwice and singled in a 1713 defeat of the visiting Chicago Cubs on Friday.
PAGE 22 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • Sunday, August 29, 2021
Power Five teams bring in an
average of $18.6 million annually
from football ticket sales in a typ-
ical year, according to research by
Patrick Rishe, director of the
Business of Sports Program at
Washington University in St.
Louis. Top teams that play in the
biggest stadiums generate more
than twice that.
Rishe said he expects the surge
in COVID-19 cases tied to the
more easily transmissible delta
variant to prevent a full return to
normal. He noted most college
football season ticket holders are
over 50, a group more susceptible
to becoming seriously ill.
“I don’t expect revenues will re-
turn to pre-pandemic levels even
in the best of circumstances this
year,” Rishe said.
Coaches and players are happy
to have fans back, especially in
leagues where games were played
in empty stadiums a year ago. Col-
orado coach Karl Dorrell said the
home team’s defense feeds off the
crowd’s energy.
“So we’re excited about every-
thing being back to normal from
that standpoint, having the stands
back and having Folsom Field
back and rocking,” he said. “I
think our players will be inspired
on both sides of the ball from that,
but it definitely helps the defense,
there’s no question.”
Hawaii will not allow fans when
it hosts Portland State next week
because of a Honolulu ordinance
barring large outdoor gatherings.
No other school has announced an
attendance limit, though specific
attendance rules differ across the
country.
San Jose State is asking fans to
show proof of vaccination when
they come to its game against
Southern Utah on Saturday night.
Unvaccinated fans, or those who
can’t prove they’ve been vaccinat-
ed, will be let in but are required to
wear masks at all times.
LSU, Oregon, Oregon State and
Tulane have announced proof-of-
vaccination requirements starting
with their home openers next
month. LSU will allow unvacci-
nated fans the option of showing
proof of a negative COVID-19 test
in the previous 72 hours.
The Oregon schools and Tulane
mandate fans wear face coverings
at all times, even though they play
outdoors. Many schools have told
fans they must wear masks while
indoors at their stadiums.
Daniel Rascher, director of aca-
demic programs for the Sport
Management Program at the Uni-
versity of San Francisco, said peo-
ple might be turned off by the
screening process when coupled
with delays caused by fans new to
digital ticketing fumbling with
smartphones to display barcodes.
“They don’t want to wait in line,
or some of the fans aren’t vacci-
nated and don’t want to go out and
get a COVID test and bring it with
them,” Rascher said. “You have to
show your card or QR code and I
don’t know if the schools are
equipped to quickly scan that.
You’re probably going to see the
dip in demand because people
don’t want to deal with it.”
Of 10 fans interviewed, six said
they have no hesitancy about re-
turning to stadiums, even amid a
spike in virus cases across the na-
tion. Three said the risk of con-
tracting COVID-19 is in the back
of their minds, and one said he is
taking a wait-and-see approach
before deciding whether to go to
games. All said they are vaccinat-
ed.
Eric Boggs of Edmond, Okla.,
said he plans to attend games at
Nebraska, Oklahoma and Oklaho-
ma State this year. Boggs said
even though he’s vaccinated, see-
ing pictures of more than 90,000
people at the Aug. 14 Garth Brooks
concert at Memorial Stadium in
Lincoln, Neb., gave him pause.
“I’ll still go,” Boggs said. “I just
don’t know yet if I will wear a
mask. I’ll probably have one in the
pocket. It makes you re-think it a
little bit when you start seeing the
pictures and the numbers and
stuff like that.”
Nebraska requires fans to wear
masks while indoors at the stadi-
um and “strongly recommends”
wearing one while outside.
Roll: Despite safety concerns, coaches and players happy to have fans backFROM PAGE 24
US OPEN PREVIEW/COLLEGE FOOTBALL
NEW YORK — Novak Djokovic
is well aware that his two-track
pursuit of men’s tennis history at
the U.S. Open — the first calen-
dar-year Grand Slam in more than
a half-century and a record 21st
major title — means all eyes will
be on him when he is on the court.
“I’m hugely inspired and moti-
vated by that, no doubt. But at the
same time, I know how to balance
things out mentally, with lots of
expectations, obviously, around.
My participation here — without
Rafa (Nadal) and Roger (Federer)
participating,” Djokovic said Fri-
day, mentioning the two sidelined
rivals with whom he shares the
current men’s standard of 20 ma-
jors.
“I feel it,” he continued. “I know
there’s a lot of people who are go-
ing to be watching my matches
and expecting me to do well and
fight for a Slam.”
Naomi Osaka knows, too, that
her return to Grand Slam action
for the first time since pulling out
of the French Open for a mental
health break means she will be the
center of attention when she has a
racket in her hand as the defend-
ing women’s champion at Flush-
ing Meadows — and when she has
microphones in front of her.
“I mean, it will definitely feel a
bit different. I don’t really know
how to describe it, but I kind of had
to get over the feeling of people’s
gazes feeling a bit different to me.
At the same time, I started to tell
myself that it is what it is. Like, I
did what I did, so I can’t really
change people’s perception on
me,” Osaka said. “It might make
me feel a little bit nervous. But
first rounds always make me feel a
little nervous. Maybe I can just at-
tribute it to that. I guess I’ll find
out when I’m in that situation.”
The year’s last Grand Slam
tournament begins Monday —
with full crowds allowed a year af-
ter all fans were banned because
of the coronavirus outbreak —
and, even if this weren’t the first
one since 1997 that’ll be missing
Federer, Nadal and both Williams
sisters, there is little doubt where
the focus would be.
From other players. From the
media. From the fans.
Djokovic, a 34-year-old from
Serbia who is seeded No. 1, and
Osaka, a 23-year-old from Japan
who is seeded No. 3.
“I really wish for me to maybe,
one day, be at that level of consis-
tency and be able to dominate
Grand Slams at such a level,” said
No. 3 seed Stefanos Tsitsipas, who
blew a two-set lead against Djo-
kovic in the French Open final. “It
is something that comes with
time.”
Djokovic began his accumula-
tion of major trophies on the hard
courts of the Australian Open in
2008; his title there this February
was his ninth. He added his sec-
ond trophy on the red clay of Ro-
land Garros in June, followed by
his sixth on the grass of Wimble-
don in July. A fourth on the hard
courts of the U.S. Open in the Sept.
12 final would not only let him
break a tie for career Slams with
Federer and Nadal but also go 4-
for-4 this year, something only two
other men have managed to do.
Don Budge was the first in 1938,
and Rod Laver followed by putting
together true Grand Slams in 1962
and 1969. Here’s what an achieve-
ment that is: In the 52 years since,
no man even had won the first
three major titles in a single sea-
son until Djokovic now.
“He’s just amazing,” said No. 2
seed Daniil Medvedev, who lost to
Djokovic in the final at Melbourne
Park. “I have no other word.”
Osaka has started accumulating
major titles, especially on hard
courts — two at the Australian
Open (including this year) and
two at the U.S. Open (including
last year).
Shortly before the French Open
began in May, she vowed not to
speak to media, saying the process
raised doubts in her mind. Then,
when she skipped the news con-
ference after her first-round win
in Paris, she was fined $15,000 and
threatened with suspension — so
Osaka withdrew from the tourna-
ment altogether, explaining that
she dealt with anxiety and depres-
sion, and sat out Wimbledon, too.
“I didn’t know,” she said Friday
during a 13-minute news confer-
ence that included jokes and
smiles, “how big of a deal it would
become.”
Djokovic, Osaka demand bulk of attention
AP photos
Above: Novak Djokovic is topmen’s seed for the U.S. Open,the year’s last Grand Slam tennistournament. Left: Naomi Osakareturns to Grand Slam action forthe first time since pulling out ofthe French Open in June for amental health break. Play beginsin New York on Monday.
BY HOWARD FENDRICH
Associated Press 20Career major victories for Novak Djo-kovic, tied with rivals Roger Federerand Rafael Nadal for most all-time.Djokovic has an opportunity to win hisrecord 21st major title — and com-plete the first calender-year GrandSlam in 52 years — at the U.S. Open.
SOURCE: Associated Press
Sunday, August 29, 2021 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • PAGE 23
NFL
KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Patrick Mahomes and Ty-
reek Hill have talked openly about the Kansas City
Chiefs chasing a perfect season.
Well, the two were nearly perfect Friday night.
Mahomes was 8-for-9 for 117 yards and two touch-
downs in his only two chances with the ball, including
a 35-yard TD strike to the fleet-footed Hill, and the
Chiefs beat the Minnesota Vikings 28-25 to finish 3-0
in the preseason.
Now come 17 regular-season games and, Kansas
City hopes, three more in the postseason.
“We didn’t change the script,” Mahomes said, “but
we went through that pregame mock week. You had a
couple preseason games they had played, and we
went through that routine I’ve built. And having that
and going against the defense playing a scout-team
defense, we came out a little faster and crisper and
were able to move the ball.”
Mahomes only was miss a throw-away with no-
body open. Mahomes finished his night with a short
touchdown pass to tight end Blake Bell.
Panthers 34, Steelers 9: Sam Darnold completed
19 of 25 passes for 162 yards and two touchdowns, and
host Carolina defeated the Steelers on Friday night in
the preseason finale for both teams.
Colts 27, Lions 17: Rookie Sam Ehlinger was
knocked out of the preseason finale in Detroit with a
knee injury, delivering another hit on the Indianapo-
lis Colts’ depth chart at quarterback.
Eagles 31, Jets 31: At East Rutherford, N.J., New
York’s James Morgan threw a 49-yard Hail Mary to
Kenny Yeboah as time expired and Josh Adams ran
in the 2-point conversion to produce the tie.
ED ZURGA/AP
Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes was 8for9 for 117 yards and two touchdowns as the Chiefs finishedthe preseason 30 with a 2825 win over the Minnesota Vikings, Friday in Kansas City, Mo.
Mahomes sharp as Chiefsroll to victory over Vikings
Associated Press
PRESEASON ROUNDUP
NEW ORLEANS — The Saints
have selected Jameis Winston to
succeed Drew Brees as starting
quarterback for their regular sea-
son opener against Green Bay on
Sept. 12, said a person familiar with
the decision.
The person spoke on condition of
anonymity Friday because the club
has not announced the result of its
preseason competition for the start-
ing QB job between Winston and
Taysom Hill.
The decision, first reported by
ESPN, means Winston is set to start
his first regular season game since
the end of the 2019 season with
Tampa Bay.
The Buccaneers chose not to
bring back Winston, who they
drafted first overall in 2015, when
they had an opportunity to sign for-
mer Patriots quarterback Tom
Brady in the spring of 2020.
While the Bucs went on to win the
Super Bowl with Brady, Winston
spent last season on a one-year con-
tract with New Orleans, hoping to
resurrect his career by learning un-
der coach Sean Payton, who de-
signs the Saints’ perennially prolif-
ic offense, and Brees, the NFL’s all-
time leading passer, who an-
nounced his retirement in March.
This year, Winston returned to
New Orleans on another one-year
contract worth a base of $5 million
plus incentives worth an additional
$7 million and an opportunity to
compete for an open starting job.
“What I look at is improvement,
I’ve got to improve on everything,
every single day,” Winston said
earlier this month. “Like, you can
never get too good at execution,
making it habitual, making my eyes
faster, processing information fas-
ter. And that’s something I’m chal-
lenging myself every single day, in
terms of study and visualization
and working out.”
Now the 27-year-old Winston is
on track to pursue the incentive pay
in his contract and perhaps estab-
lish himself as more of a long-term
fixture with the Saints if he can
show signs of fulfilling more of the
promise he was believed to possess
when he won the Heisman Trophy
and national title with Florida State
in the 2013 season.
AP source: Saints name Winston starting QB for opener
MAX BECHERER/AP
New Orleans Saints quarterback Jameis Winston will reportedly bethe team’s starter in their opener against Green Bay on Sept. 12.
BY BRETT MARTEL
Associated Press
HENDERSON, Nev. — With the
Las Vegas Raiders headed to San
Francisco for their final preseason
game Sunday, coach Jon Gruden
said this year’s lot of draft picks
isn’t the only group with some-
thing to prove.
“Well, it’s all of our young play-
ers, last year’s class and this year’s
class kind of combined,” Gruden
said. “We’ve had a chance to de-
velop players, and that’s all the
coaches can do. We can draft, and
we can trade, and we can sign
guys. At the end of the day, coach-
es are here to develop players and
I’m really excited about the job
our staff has done. I’ve seen some
of these young guys really get bet-
ter.”
With injuries taking their toll on
several of last year’s rookies, a to-
tal of 47 games were missed.
Five rookies saw playing time
last season, Tanner Muse missed
the entire season with a toe injury
and Lynn Bowden Jr. was traded.
Henry Ruggs (13), Bryan Ed-
wards (12), Damon Arnette (9),
Amik Robertson (8) and John
Simpson (7) combined for 49 ap-
pearances.
Several from this year’s class
will see significant time, with
tackle Alex Leatherwood joining a
retooled offensive line, safeties
Tre’von Moehrig and Tyree Gil-
lespie rotating time with Arnette
in an athletic secondary, lineback-
er Malcolm Koonce expected to
help put a bandage on a banged-up
corps along with safety Divine
Deablo, who can slot in during
nickel packages.
Fifth-round choice Nate Hobbs
has been the biggest surprise of
this year’s rookie class and may
have already earned one of the
starting corner slots. Gruden said
seventh-round pick Jimmy Mor-
rissey is like having an extension
of the coaching staff on the field
and has put himself in a good posi-
tion to make the final 53-man ros-
ter.
And while Sunday is the final
dress rehearsal for several of
those rookies and second-year
players before the Sept. 13 regu-
lar-season opener on “Monday
Night Football” against the Balti-
more Ravens, there are those who
know they’re challenging older
players for roster spots.
“I think there’s great competi-
tion at the wide receiver position,”
offensive coordinator Greg Olson
said. “That’ll probably be the most
difficult decision, will be making
the cuts at the wide receiver posi-
tion. And the offensive line, there
will be a good player that might
not make the roster. But those two
positions really are very compet-
itive, and they’ll be probably the
most difficult decisions.”
DAVID BECKER/AP
Rookie safety Tre’von Moehrig isone of several young Las VegasRaiders expected to see playingtime early this season.
Raiders rookiesnot only ones withsomething to prove
BY W.G. RAMIREZ
Associated Press
PAGE 24 • S T A R S A N D S T R I P E S • Sunday, August 29, 2021
SPORTSSaints name starter
Source: Winston wins New Orleans’QB competition ›› NFL, Page 23
NBC airing Paralympic coverage for 1st time Sunday ›› Olympics, Page 20
College football fans will head back into stadi-
ums this weekend, some of them for the first
time in two years. Along with binoculars, sun-
screen and other essentials, some will pack
face masks and proof of vaccination.
With the availability of COVID-19 vaccines, the pomp
and pageantry of fall Saturdays are expected to re-
turn in all their glory nearly everywhere across
the country.
As far as Nebraska fan Capp Anson of
Omaha is concerned, it beats the al-
ternative. Last season, the Big
Ten and Pac-12 allowed no
fans and ACC, Big 12 and
SEC teams limited stadium at-
tendance to a fraction of their
vast capacities.
“It’s nice to be able to sit and
watch it on a big screen TV at home
and have the bathroom by you or go grab a cold beer if
you need to, but to me there’s nothing like the experi-
ences at the stadium,” he said. “It brings out a good time
for sure.”
Anson’s Cornhuskers were among the handful of
teams kicking off their seasons Saturday, with a visit to
Illinois in a Big Ten clash. UCLA was hosting Hawaii in
the only other game involving a Power Five conference.
Schools are eager to let the good times roll again after
the massive financial hits they took in 2020.
Top: Kansas State fans cheer on the field after a game against Oklahoma in Manhattan, Kan., onOct. 26, 2019. Left: Security reminds fans to mask up before the start of the GeorgiaTennessee
game in Athens, Ga., on Oct. 10, 2020. Fans will head back into stadiums this weekend, and alongwith binoculars, sunscreen and other essentials, some will pack face masks and proof of vaccination.
AP photos
Let the good times roll?Fans heading back to stadiums, many with vax cards and masks
BY ERIC OLSEN
Associated Press
SEE ROLL ON PAGE 22
“To me there’s nothing like theexperiences at the stadium. Itbrings out a good time for sure.”
