start -a to existing containerUpdate: turns out this is because /etc/hosts is a bind mount (which I created another zet about).
I was shocked to learn that local modifications to /etc/hosts were lost after exiting and later podman start -a ws to reconnect. I had added them so that ssh would do tab completion (which can also be accomplished in other ways). I discovered (after a friend told me) that /etc/hosts is actually a tmpfs type that is reset upon ever start (restart) of the container. In other words, changes are not persisted.
tmpfs on /dev type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,noexec,size=65536k,mode=755,uid=1000,gid=1000)
tmpfs on /etc/hosts type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,relatime,size=1302836k,nr_inodes=325709,mode=700,uid=1000,gid=1000)
tmpfs on /run/.containerenv type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,relatime,size=1302836k,nr_inodes=325709,mode=700,uid=1000,gid=1000)
tmpfs on /run/secrets type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,relatime,size=1302836k,nr_inodes=325709,mode=700,uid=1000,gid=1000)
shm on /dev/shm type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,size=64000k,uid=1000,gid=1000)
tmpfs on /etc/hostname type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,relatime,size=1302836k,nr_inodes=325709,mode=700,uid=1000,gid=1000)
tmpfs on /etc/resolv.conf type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,relatime,size=1302836k,nr_inodes=325709,mode=700,uid=1000,gid=1000)
cgroup on /sys/fs/cgroup type tmpfs (rw,nosuid,nodev,noexec,relatime,size=1024k,uid=1000,gid=1000)
tmpfs on /proc/acpi type tmpfs (ro,relatime,size=0k,uid=1000,gid=1000)
tmpfs on /sys/firmware type tmpfs (ro,relatime,size=0k,uid=1000,gid=1000)
tmpfs on /sys/dev/block type tmpfs (ro,relatime,size=0k,uid=1000,gid=1000)