A2 EZ SU THE WASHINGTON POST.WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 2 , 2020
auxiliary cable snapped in
August, causing a 1 00-foot gash
on the 1,000-foot-wide dish and
damaging the receiver platform
that hung above it. Then a main
cable broke in early November.
The collapse stunned many
scientists who had relied on what
was until recently the largest
radio telescope in the world.
The telescope was built in the
1960s with money from the
Defense Department amid a push
to develop anti-ballistic missile
defenses. It had endured
hurricanes, tropical humidity and
a recent string of earthquakes.
The telescope has been used to
track asteroids on a p ath to Earth,
conduct research that led to a
Nobel Prize and determine if a
planet is potentially habitable.
— Associated PressPENNSYLVANIAConviction of Penn State
ex-leader is reinstatedA federal appeals court on
Tuesday reinstated former
P enn State president Graham
Spanier’s convi ction for child
endangerment over his handling
of a report that former assistant
football coach Jerry Sandusky
had sexually abused a boy in a
team shower.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for
the 3rd Circuit ruled that a
l ower-court judge had improperly
vacated Spanier’s misdemeanor
jury conviction in the 2001
incident.
A federal magistrate judge in
April 2019 threw out Spanier’s
conviction a d ay before he was to
begin serving a two-month jail
sentence, followed by two months
of house arrest.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Karoline
Mehalchick in Scranton, Pa., had
agreed with Spanier that he had
been improperly charged under a
2007 law for allegations dated
from 2001. Prosecutors had
argued that the 1995 and 2007
versions of the law criminalized
the same conduct.
Sandusky is serving a lengthy
state prison sentence.
— Associated PressPUERTO RICOTelescope, key to many
discoveries, collapsesA huge, already damaged radio
telescope in Puerto Rico that has
played a k ey role in astronomical
discoveries for more than half a
century collapsed T uesday.
The telescope’s 900-ton
receiver platform and the
Gregorian dome — a structure as
tall as a f our-story building that
houses secondary reflectors — fell
onto the northern portion of the
vast reflector dish more than
400 feet below.
The U.S. National Science
Foundation had earlier
announced that the Arecibo
Observatory would be closed. Anwas anchored in a c ove off Santa
Cruz Island on Sept. 2, 2019, when
a fire broke out around 2:35 a.m.
One of the surviving crew
members noticed a glow coming
from the salon area on the boat’s
middle deck, one above where 33
passengers and one crew member
slept.
None of those in the lower
deck, who ranged in age from 17
to more than 60 years old,
survived the fire.
The boat sank quickly and, by
the time Coast Guard rescue
teams arrived from the mainland
about 20 miles away, much of it
rested on the seabed 65 fe et
below. Boylan and four other
crew members survived.
— Scott Wilsonlong admired in Santa Barbara,
Calif., for his care and
seamanship of a boat that many
locals rode to their open-water
scuba certification dives at the
Channel Islands. But a grand jury
in Los An geles found Boylan
responsible for safety lapses over
Labor Day weekend last year and
alleged that he could have
prevented such a severe loss of
life.
The fire killed one crew
member and 33 recreational
divers, all from the Bay Area, who
had chartered the boat for the
weekend.
Boylan, a 67-year-old Santa
Barbara resident, could not be
reached for comment Tuesday.
The Conception, a 75-foot
vessel comprising three decks,the commercial dive boat
Conception with 34 counts of
manslaughter for the deaths in a
predawn fire aboard the vessel,
one of the worst maritime
disasters in recent U.S. history.
The captain, Jerry Boylan, wasCALIFORNIA
Boat captain charged
in fire that killed 34
A federal grand jury on
Tuesday charged the captain of
HAPPENING TODAYFor the latest updates all day, visit washingtonpost.com.10 a.m. | The Supreme Court hears arguments in Edwards v. Vannoy, a
case involving non-unanimous jury verdicts for life sentences. For
developments, visit washingtonpost.com/national.
10 a.m. | Fed Chair Jerome H. Powell testifies before the House Financial
Services Committee. Visit washingtonpost.com/business for details.
12:15 p.m. | The Food and Drug Administration holds a town hall on
testing for the coronavirus. For developments, visit washingtonpost.com/
national.
5 p.m. | House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) hosts the lighting
ceremony of the U.S. Capitol Christmas tree. Visit washingtonpost.com/
entertainment for details.
8 p.m. | The lighting of the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree takes place.
For developments, visit washingtonpost.com/entertainment.
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l A N ov. 27 Metro article about
Donald Brooks, a Carnegie
Institution for Science worker
who died of covid-19, misspelled
the last name of a former
colleague of Brooks. She is Ana
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KrebsChristopher Krebs, cybersecurity
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Post Live eventsDIGESTBiden builds a cast of strong supporting characters
President-elect
Joe Biden has
been precise and
deliberate as he
sketches the
foundational
story of his White
House. He has
cast his narrative
with veterans who
are familiar to this
enormous stage. And instead of
being blind to color, he has made
it fundamental to his ability to
see the world with clarity and
nuance.
Biden has turned his live-
streamed introductions of those
he’s invited to work in his
administration into a kind of
tone-poem performance before a
global audience that’s both needy
and resentful, desperately
optimistic and unabashedly
outraged. If there’s anything that
Biden has made clear, it’s that he
alone will not right the country.
It’s a g roup effort. Considering
the perils ahead, it may well be a
heroic one.
But don’t worry. It’s not just
him. It’s them. It’s us. That’s his
message.
And so, instead of standing
alongside one person or even two
and thrusting them into the
spotlight, Biden has had his cast
of aides and Cabinet members
debut en masse. They aren’t all
equal in power or prestige, but
they’re all linked. They stand
together — albeit six feet apart
and masked.
The presentations are rooted
in a particular format. The most
recent round of introductions
came Tuesday afternoon when
Biden and Vice President-elect
Kamala D. Harris arrived — late,
so terribly late — at the Queen
theater in Wilmington, Del., for
the announcement of the
incoming administration’s
economics team.
Biden walked in on a broken
foot. He has hairline fractures in
his “lateral and intermediate
cuneiform bones,” according to
his doctor. He broke his foot
while playing with his dog
M ajor and will be wearing a
walking boot for several weeks.
He pointed to the black
orthopedic boot as he emerged
from his SUV. Then he held up
his afflicted foot as he stood on
the sidewalk and photographers
snapped away. It was an
admission of a misstep, of an
imperfection. Such a small
gesture. Such an enormous
statement.
Once inside, Biden and Harris
sat at separate tables, which were
situated against a blue backdrop,
and the nominees were arrayed
at tables in front of them. Theirattire wasn’t rigidly coordinated,
but it was in a similar tone, as
though they’d all plumbed the
same bureaucrats’ flash sale.
They mostly favored dark suits
and blue ties, with only a rare
exception. Their clothes were
serious and even stodgy, but
mercifully dignified, which is to
say that all the men realized that
a tie should end somewhere in
the vicinity of one’s belt buckle
and not one’s nether regions.
To begin, Biden made a
statement on the skills of each of
his nominees, chuckling at his
own jokes and seeming to relish
the moment of public team spirit.
There have been no surprises, no
drama at these events. Everyone’s
biography had already been
posted on Biden’s transition
website, along with tasteful
headshots; political observers
had already begun to parse the
choices for existential meaning,
and naysayers had already begun
murmuring their criticism.
But for 30 or 40 minutes
onstage, Biden offered up short
stories from the American
Dream.
There are some who might
argue that in making these
announcements, it would be just
fine to let the images speak for
themselves. They tell the story of
diversity in gender and race and
ethnicity. They reflect the
composition of the country.
According to the Biden website,
of those folks considered senior
staff members, 17 are women andseven are men. The economics
team is made up of four women
and two men. The
communications team is all
women. Those who are advising
him on the coronavirus
pandemic are a diverse lot, too.
It wouldn’t seem necessary for
Biden to stand onstage and
verbally draw attention to every
dramatic first or every
incremental progression on the
road to full inclusivity or gender
parity. That simply by choosing
Janet L. Yellen to lead the
Treasury Department and asking
the Nigerian-born and
California-raised Wally Adeyemo
to serve as her deputy, Biden has
said all that’s necessary. But
sometimes people see without
comprehension. Sometimes, they
don’t even see.
Biden acknowledged the South
Asian heritage of Neera Tanden,
his nominee to head the Office of
Management and Budget, and
said, “She believes what I believe
— that a budget should reflect
our values.” As Yellen sat
listening to Biden’s introduction,
with her platinum bob precisely
matching her white jacket and its
popped collar, she looked every
bit the experienced wise woman.
But the impact of her nomination
only truly unfurls when Biden
says that she is “one of the most
important economic thinkers of
our time,” and also the first
woman to head the Treasury
since its first secretary, Alexander
Hamilton, took the oath in 1789.And then Biden adds that he
needs to get Lin-Manuel Miranda
to write a sequel to “Hamilton”
and title it “Yellen.” Biden got a
good chuckle out of that one.
In allowing each nominee to
speak, Biden was symbolically
making room for the voices of
others, for the voices of experts,
in his administration. He is the
lead in this story, but his
supporting characters have heft.
When the national security team
was introduced last month, the
four men and two women stood
onstage together. All of the men
wore blue ties. The president-
elect distinguished himself with
his crisp trifold white pocket
square. Harris opted for a plum-
colored suit instead of one in
navy or black. They made a
cohesive picture.
Each nominee stepped to the
lectern for two or three minutes,
offering their gratitude, as well as
a thumbnail of how they see the
world — whether it be Linda
Thomas-Greenfield, nominated
as ambassador to the United
Nations, speaking of her use of
“gumbo diplomacy,” or Avril
Haines, who would oversee
national intelligence, explicitly
stating that she was being invited
not to serve the presidency, “but
to serve on behalf of the
American people.”
As his opening salvo, Biden is
building a team that looks like
the people it serves, not the man
who leads it.
[email protected]Robin
Givhan
THE CRITIQUEDEMETRIUS FREEMAN/THE WASHINGTON POST
President-elect Joe Biden announces his economic team Tuesday at the Queen theater in Wilmington,
Del. H is choices so far, also including his national security and communications teams, tell a story of
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