Even the strongest cultural markers can evolve with continuous rethinking.

Consider Germany and Das Auto. Long before Henry Ford there was Gottlieb Daimler. His work (and that of others, including Karl Benz) fueled a homegrown industry so supercharged with innovation and precision that it became a global industry’s aspirational standard.

Germany is now within days of a ruling on whether to ban diesel cars from its big cities. (Yes, Rudolf Diesel was German, too.) In 2016 the German government passed a nonbinding resolution to make all newly registered cars “zero emission” by 2030. The Bundesrat got a hard nudge from the 2015 US testing scandal involving Volkswagen and particulate emissions.

All of this means sacrifice, workforce disruption, cultural transformation. (It’s hard to imagine the Autobahn as anything other than a showcase of internal combustion in its thoroughbred forms.)

But it’s also possible to discern an underlying sense of pride in leadership, of adjusting to the times. Germany is not alone, even on the automotive front. How universal is that kind of thinking – how transferable – as other nations struggle with how to evolve on other issues?

Said Sen. Marco Rubio (R) of Florida this week at a town hall meeting on an American crisis: “American politics is the only part of our lives where changing your mind based on new information is a bad thing.”

Now to our five stories for your Friday, highlighting protection at schools and outreach that’s familial, local, and extended across old national divides.