Editor's note
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As President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un prepare to meet in Singapore, scholar Lynn T. White III suggests that Trump not begin the summit by demanding that Kim give up his nuclear weapons. “Total, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization is likely ‘a bridge too far’” right now, writes White. Instead, he suggests another promising road to peace on the peninsula.
While the president tries to make history in Singapore, traditional U.S. allies are fuming over his actions after attending the G-7 over the weekend. Besides attacking his Canadian host in a tweetstorm, he backed out of a joint statement promoting rules-based trade and inclusive growth. Rochester Institute of Technology economist Amitrajeet Batabyal writes
this is another example of how Trump is subverting the global trading system that the U.S. helped erect after World War II – and why that’s not a good idea.
In the aftermath of a disaster, many people turn to religious faith. Boston University religion scholar Wesley Wildman explains how computer simulations of human religious behavior help him understand how different people cope with disaster and tragedy.
Lastly, could you take a moment to help us out? We’d like to know what we’re doing well and how we could improve. Please take a few moments to give us your feedback (and note that we are focusing this year particularly on our science coverage, at the request of one of our funders).
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Naomi Schalit
Senior Editor, Politics + Society
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Top stories
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North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, left, and South Korean President Moon Jae-in at the border village of Panmunjom in the Demilitarized Zone, April 27, 2018.
AP/Korea Summit press pool
Lynn T. White III, Princeton University
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un's risky unreliability will diminish as his country builds ties with South Korea. So Korean unification may be a better focus for Tuesday's summit than denuclearization.
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Trump against the world?
Jesco Denzel/German Federal Government via AP
Amitrajeet A. Batabyal, Rochester Institute of Technology
International trade policy requires three traits to be successful and lead to mutual prosperity. Trump's is missing all three, as he showed at the G-7 summit.
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Christchurch Cathedral in New Zealand partially collapsed after a 2011 earthquake.
AP Photo/Mark Baker
Wesley Wildman, Boston University
Can artificial intelligence accurately simulate people's religious tendencies in the face of disaster and tragedy?
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Politics + Society
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Dyana Mason, University of Oregon
Simply based on how they are housed, forcibly separating immigrant kids from their families is bound to make a bad situation worse.
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Rorie Solberg, Oregon State University; Eric N. Waltenburg, Purdue University
Appointing judges to lifetime terms can be among a president’s longest lasting legacies. The overwhelming majority of Trump’s nominees are conservative, white and male.
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Renée Lafferty-Salhany, Brock University
Donald Trump was under the mistaken impression that Canadians once burned down the White House. But he's not the only one who has a fuzzy sense of the history of the War of 1812.
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Health + Medicine
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Jonathan Rottenberg, University of South Florida
As fans of Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain try to make sense of their tragic deaths, a question arises for many. How can people who seem to have everything end up ending their lives?
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Joseph Franklin, Florida State University
The suicides this week of Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain shocked and saddened many. And the news was disturbing. Why is it so hard to know who might commit suicide?
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Environment + Energy
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Ploy Pattanun Achakulwisut, George Washington University; Loretta Mickley, Harvard University; Susan Anenberg, George Washington University
New research projects that climate change could greatly increase airborne dust levels in the southwestern US, causing higher hospital admissions and premature deaths from heart and lung ailments.
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Gabriel Diaz Montemayor, University of Texas at Austin
Mexico City desperately needs a new airport. It also needs more green space. One landscape architect thinks the Mexican capital's new Norman Foster-designed international airport can be both.
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Trending on site
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Susanna Lim, University of Oregon
K-pop has been hugely popular in Asia, but has never able to catch on in the U.S. – until BTS topped the Billboard 200.
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Amitrajeet A. Batabyal, Rochester Institute of Technology
A global trade war seems well underway as China and the US exchange targeted tariff attacks. An economist explains what they are, how they work and why they matter.
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Today’s chart
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William Hauk
University of South Carolina
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