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What We’re Reading This Week, December 14-18

Here is a selection of articles the Federal Relations team is reading this week.

Long View – The National Institutes of Health (NIH) released the NIH-Wide Strategic Plan, Fiscal Years 2016-2020: Turning Discovery Into Health.   The plan focuses on four essential, interdependent objectives that will help guide NIH’s priorities over the next five years as it pursues its mission of seeking fundamental knowledge about the nature and behavior of living systems and applying that knowledge to enhance health, lengthen life, and reduce illness and disability.  Read the plan here. 

Final Act – 2016 is a Presidential election year and Obama’s last year in office. What’s on the agenda? Read the memo at Politico. 

Second Red Alert – Bejing has issued a second Red Alert for air quality. The first was issued last week, and lasted the bulk of the week. The second alert is expected to last longer than the previous alert. Read more at The New York Times.

Debate 5.0 – The latest Republican presidential debate had Donald Trump holding strong, Jeb Bush making a slight comeback, and Ted Cruz solidifying his role as the #2 horse in the race. Read more at the New York Times or CNN has the whole debate in 90 seconds.

Treasonous – During the Republican presidential debate this week, Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) might have said more than he should have. He may have revealed classified information about the CIA meta data program. If he did do so, that’s treason and Congress is looking into it. Read more at MSNBC. 

Hike It Up – For the first time in a decade, the Federal Reserve raised interest rates from 0%-.25% to .25%-.5%. Read more the New York Times. 

Saintly – Mother Teresa will be canonized after a second miracle has been confirmed. She cured  a man in Santos, Brazil, with a serious viral brain infection. Mother Teresa was beatified in 2003, but full Sainthood requires two miracles. Her canonization is expected in September. Read more at NBC News. 

Save Tatooine – In honor of the latest Star Wars film, recent documentary, Set Wars: The Surprising Second Life Of Star Wars, is trying to save Mos Epsa, which was the set to Tatooine. To create the documentary, the filmmakers utilized Verse, which is a platform that allows directors to create a self-guided journey through the documentary with access to various subplots, locations, and narratives. Learn more at Forbes.