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U.S. Elections, Yemen, Lion Air: Your Thursday Briefing

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Good morning. American voters reaffirm wide divisions, investigators in Indonesia question Boeing’s instruments, India lights up for Diwali. Here’s what you need to know:

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America’s new political landscape.

Democrats — propelled by voter fury toward President Trump — seized control of the House in the midterm elections, ending two years of single-party dominance in the U.S., but cementing the country’s yawning rural/urban-suburban divisions. Republicans held their Senate majority.

Democrats energized more than 300 districts to shift further to the left, flipping 29 from Republican control. See what the blue wave looked like.

With much of the country mulling over the Democratic gains, Mr. Trump made a high-profile ouster: Attorney General Jeff Sessions, who became a frequent and public target of the president after he recused himself from investigations into the Trump campaign’s ties to Russia.

Mr. Trump tapped a loyalist as acting attorney general, Matthew Whitaker, who in the past questioned the scope of the Russia investigation.

What does all of it mean?

Potential gridlock: Democrats in the House will be able to curb the president’s legislative ambitions and have promised to focus energies on investigating his financial and political dealings.

A more representative Congress: Voters elected the first Muslim and Native American women, among a series of historic firsts across the country.

The trade war effect: Some districts hit by retaliatory tariffs switched to Democratic candidates from Republican incumbents.

Russian trolls were at it again: Facebook waited till most of the polls had closed to announce that, on Monday, it had blocked more than 100 accounts linked to the same group of Kremlin-backed operatives that meddled in the 2016 presidential election.

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Credit...Bay Ismoyo/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

More concerns over Boeing instruments.

Investigators looking into the deadly crash of a brand-new Boeing 737 Max 8 jet last week have determined that its angle-of-attack sensors — which gauge the degree of the plane’s ascent or descent — gave faulty readings.

Boeing revealed that in a statement. Some sensors on the Lion Air jet had been worked on a day before the crash, which killed all 189 people aboard.

The Indonesian official leading the investigation said that he and Boeing officials had discussed the possibility that inaccurate readings fed into the Max 8’s computerized system could result in a sudden, automatic descent. Boeing said it had issued a global alert to airlines on how pilots can reclaim manual control.

The Max 8 is the latest model in Boeing’s popular 737 line. Some 200 are in fleets and more than 4,500 have been ordered.

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Credit...Stringer/EPA, via Shutterstock

The Yemen war escalates.

A Saudi-led coalition and Yemeni government forces, above, stepped up the fight against Houthi rebels in Yemen over the past week, exacerbating a humanitarian crisis that the U.N. says could leave as many as 14 million people at risk of starvation.

Warplanes have hit the capital, Sana, and the port city Hudaydah, where ships carrying 10,000 tons of emergency relief grains are waiting to dock.

The surge, which came days after the U.S. called for peace talks, may stem from Saudi Arabia’s desire to score more territorial gains before any talks begin.

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Credit...Athit Perawongmetha/Reuters

• Duterte critic gunned down.

A human rights lawyer who opposed President Rodrigo Duterte’s lethal war on drugs was shot and killed as he was leaving his office.

Benjamin Ramos, who helped low income families targeted by the government’s brutal antidrug campaign, is the 34th lawyer to be killed since Mr. Duterte became president two years ago.

Last year, Mr. Duterte, above, himself a lawyer, told the national police not be daunted by rights lawyers investigating the thousands of deaths associated with the drug crackdown. “If they are obstructing justice,” he said of the lawyers, “you shoot them.”

Mr. Ramos’ colleagues described the shooting as “premeditated, coldblooded murder,” and human rights activists demanded an impartial investigation.

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Credit...Kin Cheung/Associated Press

• Li Ka-shing’s company, CK Group, will likely be blocked from acquiring Australia’s largest gas and pipeline company as the government there increases scrutiny of Chinese investment and influence.

• Cambridge Analytica, the consulting firm, broke British law by improperly harvesting Facebook data to aid President Trump’s 2016 campaign and the Brexit campaign, Britain’s top data protection watchdog found.

•The maker of the Grand Theft Auto video game, Rockstar Games, has filed at least five lawsuits around the world to crack down on what it calls “cheat” plug-ins. One led to the recent raid of a Melbourne home.

• U.S. stocks were up. Markets in India are closed. Here’s a snapshot of global markets.

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Credit...Pool photo by Andrew Harnik

• A meeting between Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, above, and a top North Korean diplomat has been called off, stalling Washington’s efforts to get the country to denuclearize. [The New York Times]

• Over 200 mass graves holding as many as 12,000 bodies were discovered in parts of Iraq that had been controlled by the Islamic State, underscoring what the U.N. called a “legacy of terror.” [The New York Times]

• Canada is already running low on marijuana, three weeks after the country legalized it for recreational use. [The New York Times]

• The Italian government has offered to help Asia Bibi, the Christian woman who was acquitted of blasphemy charges, leave Pakistan, where she remains in detention. [NPR]

• The northern Indian city of Ayodhya lit up 300,000 clay oil lamps for the Hindu festival of Diwali, breaking a Guinness World Record. [The New York Times]

Tips for a more fulfilling life.

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Credit...Christopher Testani for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Barrett Washburne. Prop Stylist: Courtney de Wet.

• Recipe of the day: Sweet potato fans will love this mash with bourbon and brown sugar.

• Essential gear for solo travel.

• Parents should not spank their children.

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Credit...Image by William Yu. Background source photograph: Everett Collection. Face source photographs, clockwise from top: Michael Germana/Everett Collection; Araya Diaz/Getty Images for IFC; Mike Pont/WireImage/Getty Images; Chris Delmas/AFP/Getty Images; Rodin Eckenroth/Getty Images.

• Despite “Crazy Rich Asians,” Hollywood has made little progress in bringing Asian-American actors into the fold without the hint of tokenism, writes our T Magazine features director. Above, “The Breakfast Club” reimagined.

• Our 52 Places traveler journeyed around New Zealand and immersed herself in Maori culture, at the same time Prince Harry and the Duchess of Sussex toured the country. But the royal charm of the trip almost slipped away after rain and an ash cloud complicated what should have been an easy flight to Fiji.

• Tiny love stories: In 100 words or less, our readers share stories of a highway kiss, comforting snores and a rare connection.

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Credit...Erik Tanner for The New York Times

“It’ll be up in lights on Broadway: Kong, the Eighth Wonder of the World!” an adventurer exclaims in the 1933 film “King Kong.”

Eighty-five years later, a $35 million musical version with the big ape officially opens in New York tonight.

Before the movie was released, the excitement was palpable, even if newspapers didn’t exactly know what would be happening. “The film will show prehistoric monsters fighting one another and making weird sounds,” The Times wrote in 1933.

It was easy to see why the movie would be popular. The stop-motion special effects were groundbreaking, although film scholars saw thinly veiled racist overtones.

Nevertheless, the Times reviewer was enthralled: “Imagine a 50-foot beast with a girl in one paw climbing up the outside of the Empire State Building.”

The movie, starring Fay Wray as the beauty who charms the beast, was among the first to be shown at Radio City Music Hall in New York City, shortly after the 6,200-seat theater was converted to show films.

A box office hit, the movie was rereleased periodically and has featured in numerous remakes.

In the original, Kong was an 18-inch puppet. In the new Broadway production, the ape is 20 feet tall and weighs 2,000 pounds. Not bad for the Eighth Wonder of the World.

Kathleen Massara wrote today’s Back Story.

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A correction was made on 
Nov. 7, 2018

Tuesday’s briefing incorrectly spelled the name of a 17th-century church in the Andes that architects are studying for clues about resilience to earthquakes. It is the Church of Santiago Apóstol, not Apóstal.

How we handle corrections

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