Here’s what you need to know to start your day.
Credit
Doug Mills/The New York Times
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Good morning.
Here’s what you need to know:
• National security adviser resigns.
Michael T. Flynn quit the post he held for less than a month after it was revealed that he had misled Vice President Mike Pence about a conversation with a Russian diplomat weeks before President Trump’s inauguration.
Mr. Pence is said to have told officials that he believed Mr. Flynn had lied to him in saying that he had not discussed sanctions.
• What led to the decision.
The F.B.I. examined Mr. Flynn’s phone calls after he came under scrutiny, and the Justice Department told the White House last month that Mr. Flynn had not fully explained himself, adding that it feared that he could be vulnerable to blackmail by Moscow.
Here’s a timeline of his tenure, and his resignation letter. Retired Lt. Gen. Joseph K. Kellogg Jr. was named acting national security adviser.
• The newest cabinet member.
The Senate confirmed Steven T. Mnuchin, a former Goldman Sachs banker and Mr. Trump’s top campaign fund-raiser, as Treasury secretary in a 53-to-47 vote.
One of Mr. Mnuchin’s first goals will be to help finalize the administration’s tax plan.
• “HOLY MOLY !!!”
That’s what a member of Mr. Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida wrote on Facebook after he witnessed the president discussing North Korea’s missile test on Saturday with top aides and Prime Minister Shinzo Abe of Japan. Critics said they should have moved to a secure location.
Mr. Trump’s meeting with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada on Monday was more formal. The two leaders discussed ways to maintain their countries’ close political and economic links.
• The air we breathe.
India’s pollution causes about 1.1 million premature deaths each year, rivaling China’s for worst in the world, according to a study out today.
Smog in New Delhi in November. Pollution levels are worsening in India as it tries to industrialize.
Credit
Dominique Faget/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Rapid industrialization, population growth and a lack of government intervention were cited as reasons for India’s environmental crisis.
• Racing to fix a dam.
Evacuation orders for nearly 200,000 people remain in place for areas near the Oroville Dam in California, as more storms are expected this week.
Credit
Josh Edelson/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images
Workers are trying to repair a hole in the dam’s main spillway.
The situation is a drastic reversal for the area, which had been affected by more than five years of drought.
• The Daily, your audio news report.
Today’s show asks: Could the president’s emerging plan for Arab-Israeli peace actually work?
Continue reading the main story
Listen here if you’re on a computer, here if you have an iOS device or here for an Android device.
Business
• Some of the biggest banks in the U.S. are offering customers a chance to ditch their A.T.M. cards and use smartphones to take out cash.
• OPEC members are largely sticking to an agreement to limit production in a bid to bolster oil prices, but how long will they cooperate?
Here’s a quick rundown of the deal, its implementation and its implications.
• Playboy stopped publishing nude photographs last year. Now it’s reversing course.
• U.S. stocks were up on Monday. Here’s a snapshot of global markets.
Smarter Living
• Want to stay focused at work today? Remember to take a break.
• At 100, this man still plays, teaches and conducts. Like the music, he keeps going.
• Recipe of the day: Impress your sweetheart with this easy-to-make chocolate fudge.
Noteworthy
• Inside The Times’s archives.
Throughout Black History Month, we’re featuring previously unpublished photographs from the 1960s.
Photo
Tommy Hunt as he prepared for a performance at the Apollo Theater in September 1967. Credit Don Hogan Charles/The New York Times
Our latest focus on Tommy Hunt, one of soul music’s first stars and a regular at the Apollo Theater in New York alongside Marvin Gaye, Ray Charles, Diana Ross, The Shirelles, The Supremes and many others.
• Controversy after the Grammys.
The big story to emerge after the awards was the freeze-out of Beyoncé in the top categories.
“It was #GrammysSoWhite come to life,” our critic writes, adding that the show’s race problem “is so pernicious that some white winners have chosen contrition over exuberance.”
• Threats to science.
One of our most popular articles today is an op-ed by a professor of biology on attempts to censor government scientists, specifically an episode 10 years ago in Canada.
• Literary debate.
An editor and an author discuss which 20th-century dystopian novel best applies to 2017: “1984” or “Brave New World.”
• The life of a show dog.
Our latest 360 video takes you backstage at the Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show.
• Best of late-night TV.
On Monday, the hosts found a new nemesis: the White House adviser Stephen Miller, who suggested over the weekend that in the future, the president’s authority “will not be questioned.”
Seth Meyers said, “The only way that statement could be more terrifying is if he yelled it in German.”
Back Story
Valentine’s Day isn’t the only holiday celebrating love today in the U.S.
It is also National Donor Day, a government effort encouraging Americans to register to donate organs, eyes and tissue.
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Dr. Christiaan N. Barnard, left, with Dr. Michael DeBakey, center, and Dr. Adrian Kantrowitz before a television appearance in 1967. Credit Associated Press
Fifty years ago in South Africa, Dr. Christiaan N. Barnard performed the first human heart transplant. The patient survived just 18 days, but the use of a donor left brain-dead after an accident was heralded by other doctors.
“It was a monumental advance,” one said, “more societal perhaps than medical, because it applied to all organ transplants.”
Dr. Barnard’s second transplant patient lived for 19 months. The surgery was also notable because the donated heart came from a biracial man, a divisive decision during apartheid.
The kidney is the most frequent organ transplanted. The first operation to transfer a kidney that was considered successful took place in Boston in 1954 and involved a man and his dying twin.
Tiff Fehr, a colleague at The Times, saved a fellow journalist in December. She has this advice to anyone considering the brave act: “Donating a kidney was a kind of faith: in people, health care, hospitals and more. I’m gratified it went well on all fronts.”
For information on how to help, here are donation and transplantation organizations.
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Source: Michael Flynn, OPEC, India: Your Tuesday Briefing – The New York Times
