Hasta La Gadget!

President Trump went on his first trip overseas, away from his TV and his golf course, and he got souvenirs! 

From creepy glowing orbs that send Mike Pence into a trance to a sword Trump named “Sexcalibur,” see all the cool things the president brought back to the U.S. in this week’s episode of “The President Show.”

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

In a speech in Riyadh ostensibly billed as seeking to unite the Muslim world against terrorism, U.S. President Donald Trump instead further inflamed the Shia-Sunni schism in the region by signaling America’s embrace of the Saudi anti-Iran vision for the Middle East. It was, of course, left unmentioned that the so-called Islamic State, which claimed credit for the truly evil atrocity in Manchester days later, derives part of its fanatic ideology from the fundamentalist Wahhabism strain of Islam that legitimates Saudi Arabia’s monarchy.  

One can only imagine how the images of Trump partaking in a traditional sword dance with Saudi officials played to voters who had just gone to the polls in Iran and overwhelmingly returned the reformist leader Hassan Rouhani to the presidency. Rouhani’s re-election was due in no small part to the nuclear and sanctions relief deal he negotiated with the United States and other major powers. That deal was crucial to former U.S. President Barack Obama’s effort to not only curb the proliferation of nuclear weapons, but to establish a new balance in America’s Mideast policy between Sunni and Shia powers as well. It is a tragic mistake for the Trump administration to reverse that policy at the very moment it was producing results in Iran.

Seyed Hossein Mousavian, who once headed the Foreign Relations Committee of Iran’s National Security Council, underscores this shift in Iran. “The Iranian electorate has spoken in its decision between two stark alternatives: strengthening civil society and engaging with the world, or turning inward with economic populism and combative foreign policy,” he writes. “In decisively voting for Rouhani, Iranians have endorsed diplomacy and moderation. And they have done so in direct contrast to U.S. President Donald Trump, who has called for increasing tensions with Iran and championed isolationist foreign policy.”

Abolhassan Bani-Sadr concurs that Iran’s election was a milestone. The first president of the Islamic Republic of Iran told The WorldPost this week that Rouhani’s landslide win marked a level of democratic culture in his country not seen since before the pro-American shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi: “In this election ― for the first time since the early days of the revolution itself and the rule of our democratic Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh, back before the shah ― the core debates were about human rights, the rights of citizenship and democracy. I am a good barometer to measure this shift, after all, since I was forced out of office in those early revolutionary days by the ayatollahs for promoting these values. This gives us reason to believe that democratic culture is spreading and deepening in Iran.”

Despite Trump’s anti-Iran remarks in Riyadh, Bani-Sadr’s hope and expectation is that this budding advance of democratic culture in Iran will make it more difficult for Washington to demonize Tehran.

Reza Marashi of the National Iranian American Council expects that, given Rouhani’s victory, Iran will continue to try to engage the U.S.-Saudi alignment and damp down rivalry. But it is a two-way street, he says: “Rouhani’s track record demonstrates that sustained engagement can lower tensions and produce peaceful solutions to conflict. By electing him to a second term, Iran has once again extended its hand. It remains to be seen if the world will unclench its fist.”

Turning to other key events, in an article ahead of the G-7 summit in Sicily, Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe highlights the populist backlash against free trade and globalization. “We are approaching the 10-year mark since the start of the global financial crisis,” he writes. “Many countries and regions have made tenacious efforts to ride out the crisis and ensure a growth path. Looking at things globally, however, much remains to be done on issues such as youth unemployment, wage levels and productivity. The key to overcoming these challenges,” he boldly states, “is free trade.” But trade, he goes on to stipulate, must not only be free, but fair. Above all, its benefits must be spread more inclusively both within societies and globally, the Japanese leader says, if the zero-sum alternative of protectionism is to be avoided.

Finally, Singapore’s scholar-statesman George Yeo explains this week why “civilizational states” in Asia, like China and to some extent Japan, are less prone to populism than the West. As he sees it, China’s largely homogenous Han people, not unlike Japan’s even more homogenous population, “bow before the ideal of a common ancestry and destiny” that ties them together more strongly than any factional or individual interests might divide them.

Other highlights in The WorldPost this week:

• Trump Reportedly Called Germans ‘Very Bad,’ Vowed To Stop German Car Sales In The U.S.
• Inside North Korea’s Secret Cyber Warfare Cell
• Climate Change Is Turning Antarctica Green
• Elon Musk Is ‘Cautiously Optimistic’ After Talking To Trump About Paris Climate Pact
• There’s A New Type Of Pollution Invading The Oceans

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Hillary Clinton offered a powerful message of resistance and hope during her commencement address to Wellesley College graduates Friday, taking the opportunity to skewer President Donald Trump.

The former secretary of state and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee returned to her alma mater 48 years after delivering the college’s first student commencement speech, which would help launch her into the national spotlight.

“I couldn’t think of any place I’d rather be this year than right here,” Clinton said during the school’s 139th commencement ceremony. “You may have heard that things didn’t exactly go the way I planned, but you know what? I’m doing OK.”

Clinton encouraged graduates to continue to “break glass ceilings” and defy sexism in politics, a message easily embraced by the small liberal arts college for women some 20 miles west of Boston, Massachusetts. 

“Don’t let anyone tell you your voice doesn’t matter,” Clinton said. “In the years to come, there will be trolls galore ― online and in-person ― eager to tell you that you don’t have anything worthwhile to say or anything meaningful to contribute.”

“They may even call you a nasty woman,” she added. “Doors that once seemed sealed to women are now open. They’re ready for you to walk through or charge through, to advance the struggle for equality, justice and freedom.”

Clinton didn’t shy away from addressing the country’s current heated political climate, comparing Trump to former President Richard Nixon and warning against further polarization.

“By the way, we were furious about the past presidential election, of a man whose presidency would eventually end in disgrace with his impeachment for his obstruction of justice,” Clinton said of the 1960s, referencing Nixon’s Watergate scandal.

“We got through that tumultuous time,” she said. “We turned back a tide of intolerance and embraced inclusion. … The ‘we’ who did those things were more than those in power who wanted to change course, it was millions of ordinary citizens, especially young people, who voted, marched and organized.”

Clinton also decried the administration’s budget proposal, calling it “an attack of unimaginable cruelty on the most vulnerable among us.”

When people in power invent their own facts and attack those who question them, it can mark the beginning of the end of a free society.
Hillary Clinton

She also denounced the administration for its aggressive stance toward the media and willingness to embrace conspiracy theories.

“You are graduating at a time when there is a full-fledged assault on truth and reason,” Clinton said. “Just log on to social media for 10 seconds, it will hit you right in the face.”

“Some are even denying things we see with our own eyes ― like the size of crowds,” she added, taking a jab at Trump’s obsession with his inauguration attendance. “And then defending themselves by talking about ‘alternative facts.’”

“When people in power invent their own facts and attack those who question them, it can mark the beginning of the end of a free society,” she said. “That is not hyperbole, it was what authoritarian regimes throughout history have done. They attempt to control reality.”

Clinton ended her address by imploring the audience to stand up for free speech and human rights by registering to vote, marching in protests, running for office and promoting plurality.

“We’re going to share this future ― better do so with open hearts and outstretched hands than closed minds and clenched fists,” Clinton said. “Make defending truth and a free society a core value of your life every single day.”

Clinton first came to national attention as a student at Wellesley College in 1969, when her peers selected her to deliver the school’s first-ever student commencement speech. In her address, the student body president said that although those of her generation weren’t yet in positions of power, they had “that indispensable element of criticizing and constructive protest.”

Her comments were a direct rebuke of the speech Sen. Edward Brooke (R-Mass.) had delivered right before she took the stage, in which he had argued against the effectiveness of protest. Clinton made The New York Times, The Washington Post and Life magazine. She began to get noticed, speaking around the country.

Clinton only recently emerged from the sidelines after her defeat in the 2016 president election. She mentioned her absence from the public eye, joking that she recovered from the loss by taking long walks in the woods and organizing her closets.

“I won’t lie ― chardonnay helped a little, too,” she said, prompting the crowd to roar with applause.

type=type=RelatedArticlesblockTitle=Related… + articlesList=5908cb4de4b0bb2d0872763d,57688526e4b0fbbc8beb78b2

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

Four days after a deadly terror attack claimed the lives of 22 people and injured scores of others at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester, the pop star has announced she’s hosting a benefit concert to raise money for the victims and their families.

In an open letter shared on social media Friday, the “Dangerous Woman” singer expanded upon her original tweet, in which she wrote she was “broken” and “so so sorry.” 

“My heart, prayers and deepest condolences are with the victims of the Manchester Attack and their loves ones,” Grande wrote. “There is nothing I or anyone can do to take away the pain you are feeling or to make this better. However, I extend my hand and heart and everything I possibly can give to you and yours, should you want or need my help in any way.”

“The only thing we can do now is choose how we let this affect us and how we live our lives from here on out. I have been thinking of my fans, and of you all, non stop over the past week,” she continued. “The way you have handled all of this has been more inspiring and made me more proud of you than you’ll ever know. The compassion, kindness, love, strength and openness that you’ve shown one another this past week is the exact opposite of the heinous intention it must take to pull of something as evil as what happened Monday.”

Grande revealed she plans to return to the “incredibly brave city” of Manchester for a benefit concert, suggesting that she’ll be joined by other musicians, who have yet to be announced. Details about the concert are limited, but Grande promised to keep her fans updated once everything is confirmed. 

In the wake of the attack, the singer canceled all dates on her Dangerous Woman tour until June 5, while the fate of the rest of the tour remains in limbo. 

“From the day we started putting the Dangerous Woman Tour together, I said that this show, more than anything else, was intended to be a safe space for my fans,” the 23-year-old added. “A place for them to escape, to celebrate, to heal, to feel safe and be themselves. To meet their friends they’ve made online to express themselves. This will not change that.”

For Grande’s full letter, read below. 

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

New research investigating how we adhere to certain unspoken codes of conduct and appearance may give us insight into extremist behavior. And with this weeks’s deadly terrorist bombings in Manchester, England that targeted an Ariana Grande concert, many people are debating what motivates individuals to take extreme steps like suicide bombing.  

Answering the question of how humans evolved to cooperate with groups and internalize social norms even when doing so can be detrimental to their safety and wellbeing was the goal of a study published on Monday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 

Researchers from the National Institute for Mathematical and Biological Synthesis and University of California, Davis say that in today’s society suicide bombings and other self-sacrificial acts could be viewed as an example of “oversocialized” individuals. Individuals like this are willing to make extreme sacrifices that place the interests of a specific group and its values above all else. For those extreme individuals, acting in the interest of that group trumps individual interests. 

“You can think of people willing to go to the extreme to defend or promulgate what they believe is right,” Sergey Gavrilets, lead author of a the study and a professor of ecology, evolutionary biology and mathematics at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville told HuffPost.

The study authors used computer simulated models to analyze genetic factors that might influence whether or not individuals followed social norms. After running many simulations, built on previous public good games research, researchers found a high degree of variation among people’s ability to internalize norms.

Through the model, a relatively small percentage of people emerged as “oversocialized,” following the social norms of their self-identified group at any cost. 

Beyond terrorists and martyrs, oversocialized individuals could also be individuals who organize group cooperation, such as tribal leaders in small-scale societies.

“Depending on the situations they can be viewed as heroes, saints, or the worst villains.”

A different study Gavrilets worked on, published in the journal Nature in March, found that negative or harmful shared group experiences can bond people together and could groom them for extreme self-sacrifice. An example of this could be soldiers preparing for war.

You can think of people willing to go to the extreme to defend or promulgate what they believe is right.
Sergey Gavrilets, lead study author

On the other end of the spectrum are what’s known as “undersocialized” individuals, who are “totally immune to social norms and only care about their own material benefits,” Gavrilets explained. “Some psychopaths can be an example.”

Of course, most people are neither over- nor under-socialized, and instead follow social norms of their society to an intermediate degree.

The study also examined “free riders,” or individuals who don’t participate in collective group actions, even though those actions might benefit the individual. (A teammate who doesn’t give his full effort in a game of tug war would be an example of a free rider.)  

Interestingly, the researchers found that peer punishment, such as shaming, shunning or spreading rumors about free riders, was the most effective mechanism for getting them to cooperate with the group. Less punitive measures of encouraging group norms, such as promoting participation in group effort, were less effective at getting individuals to comply. 

As for if the new findings could be applied to counter-terrorism efforts, Gavrilets noted that their model would need to be rigorously tested before it could be practically applied to policy. 

“What we’ve done is a step in that direction,” he said.

This reporting is brought to you by HuffPost’s health and science platform, The Scope. Like us on Facebook and Twitter and tell us your story: scopestories@huffingtonpost.com. 

— This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.