Innholdsfortegnelse for 06/29/2018 i Newsweek International

LIKE FIVE OF HIS MODERN PREDECESSORS, President Donald Trump inherited a growing economy when he moved into the White House last year—indeed, a record expansion from the depths of the Great Recession. But mere expansion was not “big league” enough for Trump. He promised to supercharge the economy, and, after Republicans passed a $1.5 trillion stimulus package, the task looked easy. His top economic adviser, Larry Kudlow, predicted “3 to 4 percent economic growth for as far as the eye can see.” The president was no less gushing. “The Economy is raging, at an all time high,” he tweeted, “and is set to get even better.” But here’s the thing: It is not. And may not. Although unemployment is low, inflation remains tame and gross domestic product (GDP) growth could,…

The tug-of-war over Medicaid funding has become a perpetual fight in health care debates. Ever since the Affordable Care Act expanded the program, which provides state and federally funded coverage for low-income Americans, Republican opposers have been trying to shrink it. That opposition is at odds with the majority of the country: 32 states and the District of Columbia have now voted to expand Medicaid (a decision likely motivated, at least in part, by the decrease in state funding that such expansion brings). It is also at odds with a new study in Health Affairs showing the benefits of increasing coverage. Researchers at the Boston University School of Public Health report that the first two years of expanded Medicaid coverage under the ACA improved the quality of care that millions…

FOR MORE THAN SIX DECADES, U.S. presidents had a hard and fast rule when it came to North Korea: Don’t meet with a dictator. The mere image of the leader of the free world standing with an authoritarian figure would bestow prestige and legitimacy on a rogue state—one that has flouted U.N. sanctions, assassinated political rivals and built a small nuclear arsenal. Then, on June 12, Donald Trump burned the playbook. With full swagger, the president swept into steamy Singapore, where he sat down with Kim Jong Un in an unprecedented bid to get him to, as he put it, “de-nuke.” Afterward, Trump dismissed the idea that his presence alone had given the dictator something precious. “If I have to say I’m sitting on a stage with Chairman Kim, and…

CHIMPS AND BONOBOS—OUR CLOSEST RELATIVES, EVOLUTIONARILY SPEAKING—SHARE ABOUT 99 PERCENT OF OUR DNA. GORILLAS clock in at 98 percent. So what genes distinguish humans? In the journal Cell, researchers at the University of California, Santa Cruz, report their discovery of three nearly identical genes, found only in humans, that seem to play a critical role in one of our unique features, the development of a larger brain. About 3 million or 4 million years ago, just when our ancestral brains enlarged, the triplet of genes, called Notch (named after the shape of a fruit fly’s wings), appeared. They help guide the slow maturation of the human brain and the profusion of neurons in the neocortex, two features that proved key to the evolution of higher functions like reasoning and language.…

THE U.S. FOOD AND DRUG Administration might approve a prescription medication made from marijuana this summer, a huge step forward for people with epilepsy, which the drug treats. It would also signal a new—some would say long-delayed—embrace of cannabis-based medications. GW Pharmaceuticals, the company behind the drug, called Epidiolex, started the approval process with the FDA last year. A study it funded, published in The Lancet in January, offered encouraging signs. One hundred and seventy people with Lennox-Gastaut syndrome (a rare, severe and difficult to treat form of epilepsy) were given either a placebo or an anti-seizure medication with cannabidiol, or CBD. The result: The CBD medication cut the number of seizures per month by 41 percent. Adding a placebo reduced it by roughly 14 percent. “It’s exciting that it…

IT’S JUST AFTER 8 ON A CRISP MORNING OUTSIDE Besters, a farming village in South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal province, and Mhle Msimanga is wading through his herd of cattle in a wire pen, calling out directions to his sons and nephews standing outside it. “The cows can’t get out if you’re all crowded at the gate!” the 48-year-old farmer yells, speaking the local isiZulu language. The boys move aside, and a few cattle trot out, meandering onto a dirt road that leads toward the low-slung mountains that spread out behind Msimanga’s property. It wasn’t always his land. In 2005, the post-apartheid South African government bought about 1,112 acres from his former boss—a white farmer—and transferred the title deed to Msimanga and his fellow workers. It was part of a larger transaction…

Guppies are the least intimidating of fish—unless you’re a smaller guppy. In that case, pay attention to the eyes of your larger foe: When they change color, swim away! According to a new study in Current Biology, Trinidadian guppies show their aggression by changing the color of their irises from silver to black. Researchers at the University of Exeter and the University of the West Indies discovered this striking behavior by creating robot guppies programmed to defend patches of food and act territorially toward larger real-life guppy intruders. Within seconds of encountering the combative robots, the eye color of the real guppies turned to black—a response they show only if they can actually dominate their rival. If only humans were so predictable.…

THE NETFLIX SERIES LUKE CAGE DEBUTED in 2016 with some timely symbolism: Its lead, the first African-American Marvel superhero to headline a TV show, wore a hoodie punctured with bullet holes, invoking the fatal wounds of Trayvon Martin. A series marrying one of the most emotionally divisive issues of the day with comic book escapism was a bold statement. But the overall intention of creator Cheo Hodari Coker was not to remind viewers that black men and boys are getting shot by police; it was to offer hope that one day black people wouldn’t have to worry about it. Luke Cage debuted on the page in 1972, an ex-con imprisoned for a crime he didn’t commit. Like his fellow Marvel character Jessica Jones (who has her own Netflix show), Cage…