It’s a double cosmic conundrum: Lots of stuff that was already invisible has gone missing.

Astronomers have found a distant galaxy where there is no dark matter.

Dark matter is called “dark” because it can’t be seen. It is the mysterious and invisible skeleton of the universe that scientists figure makes up about 27 percent of the cosmos. Scientists only know dark matter exists because they can observe how it pushes and pulls things they can see, like stars.

It’s supposed to be everywhere.

What you see is what you get

But Yale University astronomer Pieter van Dokkum and colleagues spied a vast, old galaxy with relatively few stars where what you see truly is what you get. The galaxy’s stars are speeding around with no apparent influence from dark matter, according to a study published in Wednesday’s journal Nature.

Instead of shaking the very foundations of physics, scientists say this absence of dark matter may help prove the existence of, wait for it, dark matter.

“Not sure what to make of it, but it is definitely intriguing,” wrote Case Western Reserve astronomer Stacy McGaugh, who was not part of the study, in an email. “This is a weird galaxy.”

Van Dokkum studies diffuse galaxies, ones that cover enormous areas but have relatively few stars. To look for them he and colleagues built their own makeshift telescope out of 48 telephoto lenses that he first tested by using a toy flashlight to shine a light on a paper clip. The bug-eyed telescope, called Dragonfly, peers into the sky from New Mexico.

Using Dragonfly, van Dokkum and colleagues found a large, sparse galaxy called NGC1052-DF2 in the northern constellation Cetus, also known as the whale. It’s as big as the Milky Way but with only 1 percent of its stars. Then they used larger telescopes on Hawaii and eventually the Hubble Space Telescope to study the galaxy.

Slow-moving stars

Even though the galaxy is mostly empty, they found clusters of densely grouped stars. With measurements from the telescopes, van Dokkum and colleagues calculated how fast those clusters moved. If there were a normal amount of dark matter those clusters would be speeding around at 67,000 mph (108,000 kilometers per hour). Instead, the clusters were moving at 18,000 mph (28,000 kilometers per hour). That’s about how fast they would move if there were no dark matter at all, van Dokkum said.

The team also calculated the total mass of the galaxy and found the stars account for everything, with little or no room left for dark matter.

“I find this unlikely in all possible contexts,” said McGaugh, who is a proponent of a “modified gravity” theory that excludes the existence of dark matter altogether. “That doesn’t make it wrong, just really weird.”

How could this absence of dark matter help prove that it exists? By potentially disproving modified gravity theories that suggest gravity acts in a way that the cosmos makes sense without dark matter. But those alternative theories require stars in this galaxy to zip at least twice as fast as they were seen moving in this study.

More dark matter, not none

Other outside scientists said the initial look at the calculations appear to be correct, though the results are confounding. A galaxy with so few stars should have more dark matter than others, not none.

“These are very strong scientists and so I take the results very seriously,” said Marc Kamionkowski, a physicist at Johns Hopkins University.

One outsider suggested that perhaps the “galaxy” van Dokkum studied is so diffuse that it may not really be a galaxy. Another suggested that the dark matter might just be outside of the area that van Dokkum measured.

A true surprise

Van Dokkum dismissed both possibilities. 

“It’s sort of non-negotiable. There’s nothing else, just the stars,” he said. The only way this can be explained is if dark matter exists in the universe, just not in that galaxy, he said.

There’s no good explanation for why and how this galaxy has no dark matter, van Dokkum said. He proposed four different possibilities, all unproven. His favorite: That the galaxy formed in the very early universe in a way astronomers have never seen or understood.

“It’s not so often you get a true surprise,” van Dokkum said.
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From: MeNeedIt

Prosecutors have selected the five additional accusers they plan to call to the witness stand at Bill Cosby’s April 2 sexual assault retrial.

The accusers, including model Janice Dickinson, were chosen from a group of eight women whose allegations date as far back as the early 1980s.

Prosecutors listed their selections in a letter to Judge Steven O’Neill that was made public on Wednesday.

O’Neill’s March 15 ruling cleared the way for prosecutors to broaden their case beyond the alleged assault of Andrea Constand in 2004 that led to Cosby’s only criminal charges. They want to show that he had a pattern of misconduct over a five-decade span.

At Cosby’s first trial, which ended in a deadlock, O’Neill allowed only one other accuser to take the stand. But that woman is not one of the five who will testify this time in support of Constand’s case.

In the letter to O’Neill and other filings, prosecutors have listed the women only by witness number. The Associated Press was able to identify them by cross-referencing the details of the allegations described in court filings with statements and other accounts they have made publicly.

The AP does not typically name people who say they are victims of sexual assault, but those named below have consented.

Attorneys for Cosby, who is now 80, have said the women’s memories are tainted at best and tried to get them barred from testifying, but their request was denied.

 ___

The criminal case

Andrea Constand

Ages then: She was 30; he was 66.

Constand told police in 2005 that Cosby drugged and sexually assaulted her a year earlier at his suburban Philadelphia estate. The Temple University basketball team manager said he gave her three unlabeled blue pills to “relax” as she discussed a career change. She said she was semi-conscious when he digitally penetrated her. Cosby, a Temple alumnus, booster and former trustee, is charged with sexually assaulting a person unable to give consent, a felony that could bring 10 years in prison upon conviction. The defense says her story has evolved and there were other times they were sexually intimate. Cosby has pleaded not guilty.

 ___

The five other accusers

Janice Dickinson

Ages then: She was 27; he was 45.

Dickinson met Cosby in 1982 and saw him as a trusted friend and mentor as she tried to broaden her career from modeling to music and television. Dickinson said Cosby arranged for her to fly to see him perform in Lake Tahoe and knocked her out with a pill he gave her after she had complained of stomach pain. She said she woke up in pain and found fluids between her legs. She never reported the encounter to authorities and has said she was afraid that if she did, her career would be damaged and Cosby would retaliate. Cosby lawyer Martin Singer said in 2014 that Dickinson’s allegations were a lie and a “glaring contradiction” to what she wrote in her book and what she had previously told the media.

 ___

Janice Baker-Kinney

Ages then: She was 24; he was 45.

Baker-Kinney, then a Harrah’s casino bartender in Reno, Nevada, went to a pizza party at a nearby home where Cosby was staying in 1982. He insisted that she take two pills, she said, before the backgammon game they were playing went blurry. She said she recalls seeing her blouse unbuttoned and his pants unzipped before she awoke naked with signs she had been sexually assaulted. The defense says her story is “nothing like Ms. Constand’s” because she only met Cosby once, “voluntarily” took quaaludes and apologized for passing out.

 ___

Heidi Thomas

Ages then: She was 24; he was 46.

Thomas’ agent sent the aspiring actress to meet Cosby for career advice at a Harrah’s hotel in Reno in 1984, but the limousine he sent instead took her to a private house where she said he gave her a drink so she could play the intoxicated person in a script he gave her. During intermittent bouts of consciousness, she said, she was naked and Cosby forced her to perform oral sex. The defense says she has given three versions of her story.

 ___

Chelan Lasha

Ages then: She was 17; he was 48.

The model and aspiring actress met and befriended Cosby in 1986. Lasha said he invited her to his Las Vegas hotel room to introduce her to a modeling agency representative and gave her a pill he described as an antihistamine and a double shot of almond liqueur to help fight a cold. At Cosby’s behest, Lasha said, she changed into a robe, wet her hair and posed for a few modeling shots. She said Cosby then directed her to the bed, where he pinched her nipple and humped her leg as she lay immobilized and unable to speak. She says she woke up naked.

 ___

Lise-Lotte Lublin

Ages then: She was 23; he was about 52.

Lublin was an aspiring actress when she met Cosby in 1989. She and her mother went for a run with Cosby, and he gave them show tickets before he invited her to the Elvis suite of the Las Vegas Hilton to practice acting improvisation. He prodded her to take two drinks to relax, which she ultimately did. She said she recalls seeing Cosby stroking her hair and walking down a hall before she woke up at home two days later. She said she believes she was sexually assaulted. The defense says Lublin assumes she is a victim based on other media accounts but can only remember Cosby stroking her hair.
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From: MeNeedIt

The search for life’s sweetest but most elusive treasure — happiness — brings nearly 1,200 Yale University undergraduates twice a week into an

enormous hall on the Connecticut school’s campus for its most popular class ever.

“Psychology and the Good Life” is such a hit that one in four undergraduate students at the Ivy League university is enrolled in the spring semester course, said Laurie Santos, the psychology professor who teaches the class. It is the largest class enrollment size in the history of Yale, founded in 1701.

 What is the draw? Santos says it is the hope that science can help students find blissful relief from the misery that has reached at all-time high at colleges.

“Students report being more depressed than they have ever been in history at college, more anxious,” she said.

Social science has generated many new insights into what makes people happy and how they can achieve that, Santos said. “They really want to learn those insights in an empirical, science-driven way,” she said, referring to students enrolled in the course.

The third-oldest university in the United States, Yale boasts many famous alumni, including presidents George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito and actors Paul Newman and Meryl Streep.

Socialization, exercise, sleep

Santos said feelings of happiness are fostered through socialization, exercise, meditation and plenty of sleep. Money and possessions are often seen as goals in the game of life, but the route to happiness heads in a different direction, she said.

“Very happy people spend time with others, they prioritize time with their friends, time with their family, they even take time to talk to the barista,” Santos said.

She points to the psychological phenomenon of “mis-wanting,” which leads people to pursue the wrong goals in life.

“We work really hard to get a great salary or to buy this huge house,” she said. “Those things are not going to make us as happy as we think.”

Homework assignments for the class, also known as Psyc 157, include showing more gratitude, performing acts of kindness and bumping up social connections.

Because of overwhelming demand, the course is now being offered free to the public, through Coursera.org.

On campus, the class is already paying off for Yale senior Rebekah Siliezar, who described her previous mindset.

“What’s most pressing on our minds is grades, it’s the next job, it’s a potential salary after graduation,” said Siliezar, whose family lives in suburban Chicago. Now, she said, “I really try to focus on the present moment and the people around me.”
…

From: MeNeedIt

There are fewer than 2,000 wild pandas in the world. However, as VOA’s David Byrd reports, a new documentary tells how scientists are working to introduce captive-bred panda cubs into the wild.
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From: MeNeedIt

While working for a big consulting firm in Lagos, Nigeria, Afua Osei repeatedly encountered women who wanted to advance professionally but didn’t know how. They needed guidance and mentoring.

So, Osei and her colleague Yasmin Belo-Osagie started She Leads Africa, a digital media company offering advice, information, training and networking opportunities to help “young African women achieve their professional dreams,” according to the website.

Launched in 2014, it now has an online community of over 300,000 in at least 35 countries in Africa and throughout the diaspora.

“I didn’t plan to be an entrepreneur,” Osei said this month at South by Southwest (SXSW), an annual festival of music, film and tech innovation. 

Anyone can be an innovator, Osei said in an interview, after co-hosting a meetup on starting and investing in African businesses. “You don’t have to look a certain way. It’s not just for one type of person. Anybody can play a role, and there is so much work to be done.”

​Opportunities in Africa

The Ghana-born entrepreneur — who grew up in metropolitan Washington, D.C., and once worked for first lady Michelle Obama — has lived in Nigeria for roughly five years. From there, she sees “so many opportunities and potentials in Africa to innovate and help improve people’s lives.”

The continent has some fast-growing economies — including Nigeria, Ghana and Ethiopia — and the world’s fastest-growing population. With more than 1.2 billion people, it’s projected to top 2.2 billion by 2050. At least 26 African countries are likely to double their current populations by then, the United Nations reports. 

Africa also holds challenges for entrepreneurs, from finding funding to untangling bureaucratic red tape, Osei acknowledged. “Dealing with polices and governments can be hard. Also, distributions: How can I get a product that I made in Lagos out here to Austin?”

But, Osei insisted, “Every single challenge and opportunity also presents a space for an innovator and entrepreneur to solve that problem.”

Accelerator gives edge

She Leads Africa deals with problem-solving. In its first year, the company started the SLA Accelerator, a three-month development program to assist female-led startups in Nigeria. It gives entrepreneurs business training and opportunities to meet potential investors.

Entrepreneur Cherae Robinson won a spot in the accelerator program’s first year — and $10,000 in seed money to start a specialty travel company. Now called Tastemakers Africa, it has a mobile app to help users “find and buy hip experiences on the continent.”  

The mentorship “provided a wealth of knowledge I did not have,” said Robinson, a 33-year-old New York native living in Johannesburg, South Africa. “I was a few months into developing the model. She Leads Africa helped us not only refine the model, but it continues to be a source I can tap into. They continue to support the entrepreneurs in their network.”

She Leads Africa recently began working with a New York-based Ghanaian-German designer and fashion blogger who goes by the single name Kukua. She started africaboutik, an online store of modern African designs.

“At Africa-themed events in NYC [New York City], I see a lot of so-called ‘Made in Africa’ items that are 100 percent made in Beijing,” Kukua wrote in an Instagram post. With SLA’s help, she’s identifying new textiles and designers in Africa to change the fashion narrative.

​Navigating rules, regulations

At several SXSW Africa-focused events, Osei was asked how entrepreneurs could navigate complicated government regulations and licensing requirements. She suggested finding key government personnel who understand technology and want to help new businesses.  

“It is important for technology leaders to take the lead and be innovative in the way we communicate to government, because they [government staff] are learning as much as we are,” Osei told VOA.

Osei and Belo-Osagie are learning through She Leads Africa, and their efforts have drawn recognition. Forbes magazine named them among “the 20 Youngest Power Women in Africa” in 2014. 

They don’t plan to slow down, Osei said, noting their goal is at least 1 million subscribers for their website. As the site says, it’s for “the ladies who want to build million-dollar companies, lead corporate organizations and crush it as leaders.”
…

From: MeNeedIt

In Ernest Cline’s novel “Ready Player One,” the main character drives a DeLorean because of “Back to the Future,” and uses a grail diary because of “Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.” The films of Steven Spielberg loom large in the story littered with pop culture references. That the legendary filmmaker then ended up being the one to take Cline’s futuristic-nostalgic vision to the big screen is a small Spielbergian miracle.

“I hadn’t read anything that had triggered my own imagination so vividly where I couldn’t really shut it off,” said Spielberg, who, with “Ready Player One,” out Thursday, returns to the wide-eyed grand-scale blockbuster filmmaking that he made his name with.

The sci-fi spectacle with a reported $175 million production budget presents a near-future vision of a dystopian society that has all but abandoned the real world for an escapist virtual reality existence. In 2045, most people, including the teenage hero Wade (Tye Sheridan), spend their lives as avatars (Wade’s is a cooler version of himself named “Parzival”) in the virtual world of the OASIS – a VR game created by an eccentric genius, James Halliday (Mark Rylance), who has promised his wealth to whomever wins and finds the “Easter egg.”

It’s because of Halliday, who, like its author, came of age in the 1980s, that the OASIS is chalk full of 80s nostalgia from Atari to Buckaroo Banzai. It’s also why Cline assumed that “Ready Player One” would be impossible to adapt. How would anyone be able to secure all the rights? 

That it ended up being Spielberg doing the asking helped a little, but producer Kristie Macosko Krieger is the one he credits for getting everything from Chucky to the Iron Giant in the film. She spent three years working with Warner Bros. to obtain all the necessary clearances from various studios. Some they didn’t use, like the main “Star Wars” icons (although you may spot an X-Wing or R2-D2 in a few frames), and some Spielberg just nixed himself, like the mothership from “Close Encounters of the Third Kind.” He didn’t want too many of his old movies in his new movie.

“There comes a point when I would have just had to defer to someone else who likes my movies and not make a movie about my movies,” Spielberg said. 

It meant co-screenwriter Zak Penn would have to lose a few of his Spielberg-inspired jokes and ideas that he’d written into the script before Spielberg signed on to direct, but he didn’t mind. 

“It would have taken you out of the narrative. He’s too iconic a director,” Penn said. “You’d be sitting there thinking, ‘Oh, this is from a Spielberg film.”’

But everything was on the table, from the song Cline walked down the aisle to (the Hall & Oats song “You Make My Dreams,” which plays during the credits) to a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it nod to “Last Action Hero,” Penn’s first movie which he had wanted Spielberg to direct. Penn, for his part, had said “no” to a proposed reference and was surprised when he saw one in the final cut. Cline had gone behind his back to persuade the folks at ILM to do it.

Most of the references amount to set-dressing, packing every frame in the OASIS with eggs that would take even the most eagle-eyed viewer multiple viewings to catch.

“My philosophy from the very beginning was, the story is out the front windshield and the pop culture references are out the side mirror,” Spielberg said. “And it’s your choice what you would like to look at.”

The production used cutting-edge technology to simulate the OASIS for the cast and crew with VR headsets that would give everyone a 360-degree view of what the virtual world looked like. And the film itself is a mash-up of past and present technologies, including motion capture, computer animation and even film stock, which Spielberg used to shoot the live-action sequences. 

“It was just a small little touch because I’m trying to keep, you know film, meaning the chemical, the chemistry of film, relevant and I’m just trying, until they close the last lab and stop making raw stock, to shoot everything I can on film,” Spielberg said. “It also gave the real world a more gritty flavor because when you shoot digitally, it’s much more like acrylic. And film is more like oil. You get that blend between that world of oil and the texture that an oil painting has with the film and you get the very smooth, almost antiseptic clarity of what the digital world looks like.”

Lena Waithe, who plays the tech-savvy Aech, said, “I love that he did that. The movie really represents where cinema is going and where it all began, which is really beautiful.”

Cline’s novel has already proved prophetic in the digital space. He says companies like Oculus and Google have copies on hand and, he’s been told, give them to people who come through the offices. And he thinks the movie, which will play globally, will have a more significant impact.

“The best thing that could ever happen to a science fiction writer is to write something that helps inspire the people who make it into a reality,” Cline said. “This movie could be a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

The OASIS, essentially, is not that distant of a reality. It’s also something of a cautionary tale about the perils of VR, or as, Spielberg said how, “too much of a good thing is too much.”

Whether or not audiences will flock to theaters to soak up the nostalgia and the visionary tech is a big question. Waithe said the film is a feel-good escape, and Sheridan stresses that it’s a, “great metaphor for the world that we live in in 2018 and the balancing act from your digital profile to your real world self.” Early tracking pegs the film, which has received strong reviews, for a $45 million opening. Spielberg might not have lost his touch, but mass audiences might also be too distracted to notice.

As for Cline, he still can’t believe his luck. 

“I tell people I’m just prepared for it to all be downhill from here. What could ever top this? I’m so lucky, I got to work with one of my heroes on a story that he helped inspire,” Cline said. “I’m just ready for the slow fade after this.”
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From: MeNeedIt

Oscar-winning filmmaker Alex Gibney is to put golfer Tiger Woods under the microscope in an upcoming documentary series based on a new biography of the 14-time winner of the sport’s major tournaments, Gibney’s Jigsaw Productions said Tuesday.

Gibney will use Tiger Woods, written by journalists Jeff Benedict and Armen Keteyian, as a foundation for the series. The book was released Tuesday.

Jigsaw did not say when production of the series would begin, and it has yet to be picked up by a distributor.

Woods, 42, the greatest golfer of his generation who closely guards his personal life and highly crafted image, is in the midst of his latest comeback from injury.

Woods did not speak with the biography’s authors but did allow his chiropractor to speak on the record.

The book, which is published by CBS Corp.’s Simon & Schuster, sits in the top 40 on Amazon’s best-seller list and has so far received favorable reviews.

It examines Woods’ life as a closely managed introverted child prodigy to a global marketing phenomenon, and his midcareer fall from grace as a string of affairs and injuries took a toll on his image and performance.

Gibney’s projects include the scripted Hulu miniseries The Looming Tower and the 2015 HBO Scientology documentary Going Clear. He won an Oscar in 2008 for his Afghan war documentary Taxi to the Dark Side.
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From: MeNeedIt

There is no sign that the United States is distancing itself from the World Trade Organization, and negotiations are underway to avert a global trade war, WTO Director-General Roberto Azevedo said in a BBC interview broadcast Wednesday.

U.S. President Donald Trump has launched a series of tariff-raising moves, upsetting allies and rivals alike.

Trump is also vetoing the appointment of WTO judges, causing a backlog in disputes and threatening to paralyze what is effectively the supreme court of trade. Some trade experts have begun asking whether Trump wants to kill the WTO, whose 164 members force each other to play by the rules.

“I have absolutely no indication that the United Sates is walking away from the WTO. Zero indication,” Azevedo said in an interview on the BBC Hardtalk program, according to excerpts released early by the BBC.

Last month, Trump called the WTO a “catastrophe” and complained the United States had only a minority of its judges.

Correction

The next day, Azevedo gently set him straight, noting that the United States had an unusually good deal, since it had always had one of the seven judges.

Asked whether the WTO should be thinking about a Plan B without the United States, Azevedo told the BBC that he had not heard anything to suggest that such a situation was in the cards.

“Every contact that I have in the U.S. administration assures me that they are engaging,” he said.

The question of whether U.S. tariffs were legal could be settled only by a WTO dispute panel, but the damage from such unilateral actions would be felt much more quickly as other countries retaliated, leading to a global trade war, he said.

“I don’t think we are there yet, but we are seeing the first movements towards it, yes,” he said.

Nobody believed it was a minor problem, including those in the U.S. administration, and people were beginning to understand how serious the situation was and what impact it could have on the global economy, Azevedo said.

“There are still negotiations ongoing. … We want to avoid the war, so everything that we can do to avoid being in that situation, we must be doing at this point,” he said.
…

From: MeNeedIt

A nearly decade-long makeover of King Tut’s tomb aimed at preserving one of Egypt’s most important archaeological sites and also one of its most popular tourist attractions is close to complete, the Getty Conservation Institute of Los Angeles said Tuesday.

The project has added a filtration system to keep out dust, humidity and carbon dioxide and a barrier to keep visitors from continuing to damage the tomb’s elaborate wall paintings. Other amenities include walkways and a viewing platform. 

New lights are also scheduled to be installed in the fall in the tomb of Tutankhamun, the legendary boy king who ruled Egypt more than 3,000 years ago. His mummified body remains on display in an oxygen-free case.

The project was launched in 2009 by the Los Angeles institute, known worldwide for its conservation work, in collaboration with Egypt’s Ministry of Antiquities.

“This project greatly expanded our understanding of one of the best known and significant sites from antiquity, and the methodology used can serve as a model for similar sites,” Tim Whalen, the John E. and Louise Bryson director of the institute, said in a statement. 

Tutankhamun, just a child when he assumed the throne, was about 19 when he died. 

His tomb, discovered in 1922 by British archaeologist Howard Carter, was hidden for millennia by flood debris that preserved it intact and protected it from tomb raiders. 

Over the years humidity and dust carried in by visitors have caused damage, as have some visitors who scratched the wall paintings.

“Humidity promotes microbiological growth and may also physically stress the wall paintings, while carbon dioxide creates an uncomfortable atmosphere for visitors themselves,” said Neville Agnew, the institute’s senior principal project specialist. 

He added: “But perhaps even more harmful has been the physical damage to the wall paintings. Careful examination showed an accumulation of scratches and abrasion in areas close to where visitors and film crews have access within the tomb’s tight space.”

Conservationists also studied mysterious brown spots on some of the paintings that have baffled experts for years. They concluded they were caused by microorganisms that have since died and are causing no further damage. 

They decided to leave the spots there because they have penetrated into the paint layers and removing them would cause more damage. 
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From: MeNeedIt

Vietnamese singer and activist Do Nguyen Mai Khoi, an outspoken campaigner for free speech, was briefly detained at an airport in the capital Hanoi on Tuesday after flying home from Europe, her husband told Reuters.

Often dubbed a Vietnamese version of “Pussy Riot” or Lady Gaga because of her activism and provocative style, Mai Khoi was among dozens of dissidents on the watch-list of Communist-ruled Vietnam for her strong words against the system.

“When Mai Khoi landed at Noi Bai airport, at 9:15 am this morning, she texted me to say: ‘Love, I just landed’,” Mai Khoi’s Australian husband, Benjamin Swanton, posted on her Facebook page, which has some 46,000 followers.

“At 9:39 am, she texted another message: ‘Detained’.” Swanton wrote.

Mai Khoi updated her Facebook page later in the day to say that she has been released after eight hours.

“Thank you everyone for your care. I’m now on a public bus back to Hanoi,” Khoi said alongside a photo of herself she posted to the page.

Calls to authorities at Noi Bai International airport and Mai Khoi’s mobile phone went unanswered. Her husband confirmed she had been released.

“We have been evicted from our house three times now,” Swanton said.

At least 129 people are currently detained in Vietnam for criticizing or protesting against the government, according to a February report by Human Rights Watch.

A crackdown on dissent last year caused scores of activists to flee the country, according to Amnesty International.

Mai Khoi, who last year protested beside U.S. President Donald Trump’s motorcade during his visit to Vietnam by holding up a poster which said “[Expletive] on you Trump”, had not yet been subjected to a travel ban by the Vietnamese authorities.

The 34-year-old has courted controversy under a government which, despite overseeing sweeping economic reforms and growing openness to social change, does not tolerate criticism.

In 2016, she was one of a handful of activists who tried and failed to obtain a seat in the Communist party-dominated National Assembly. She met former U.S. president Barack Obama during his visit in Vietnam in 2015.

The title of her new album “Bat Dong”, which she had been in Europe to promote, translates to “Disagreement”. Her song “Please, sir” pleads with the leader of the Communist Party to allow ordinary Vietnamese people to sing, publish, share and travel freely.
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From: MeNeedIt

A growing American economy and passage of a Republican tax overhaul appear to be helping President Donald Trump lift his approval ratings from historic lows, according to a new poll by The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research.

Trump remains unpopular with the majority of Americans, 58 percent. But 42 percent say they now approve of the job he’s doing as president, up seven points from a month ago. That’s a welcome change in trajectory for a White House that has been battered by chaos, controversies and internal upheaval.

The poll suggests that at least some of the president’s improving standing is tied to the economy, which has steadily grown and added jobs, continuing a trajectory that began under President Barack Obama. Nearly half of Americans surveyed — 47 percent — say they approve of how Trump is handling the economy, his highest rating on any issue. When it comes to tax policy, 46 percent of Americans back Trump’s moves.

For Republicans, that offers a glimmer of hope as they stare down a difficult midterm election landscape and a surge of Democratic enthusiasm. With few other legislative victories from Trump’s first 14 months in office, GOP lawmakers have largely pinned their hopes for keeping control of Congress on middle-class voters feeling the impact of the tax law.

‘Fortunes will rise and fall’

“Our fortunes will rise and fall with the economy and specifically with the middle-class tax cut this fall,” said Corry Bliss, executive director of the Congressional Leadership Fund, a super PAC aligned with House Speaker Paul Ryan. Bliss urged Republican candidates to view the law as “an offensive, not defensive weapon.”

One of the GOP’s challenges, however, will be keeping the economy and tax overhaul in the spotlight through the fall given the crush of other matters roiling the White House and competing for Americans’ attention. At the White House Monday, the daily press briefing was dominated by questions about the president’s alleged affair with adult film star Stormy Daniels, a relationship he denies. Each week has seemed to bring a new departure among the president’s closest advisers. And many days, Trump is more inclined to use his Twitter megaphone to try to discredit the investigation into possible campaign contacts with Russia than promote the tax overhaul. 

Republican operatives acknowledge that even if they can break through the clutter, they still have a ways to go when it comes to explaining the $1.5 trillion tax plan to Americans. Democrats have aggressively cast the measure, which permanently slashes the tax rate for corporations and reduces taxes for the wealthiest Americans, as a boon for the rich that offers comparatively little for the middle class.

The Democratic message does appear to be breaking through with voters. Among those Americans who are familiar with the new law, 77 percent believe it helps large corporations and 73 percent say it benefits the wealthy, while 53 percent say it helps small businesses. Americans are evenly divided on whether the measure helps the middle class.

Republicans argue Democrats risk overreaching by downplaying the impact that even a small windfall from the tax bill can have for a family and individual. According to the AP-NORC poll, nearly half of those who receive a paycheck — 46 percent — say they’ve seen an increase in their take-home pay as a result of the tax law.

Heather Dilios, a 46-year-old social worker from Topsham, Maine, is among them. Dilios, a Republican, estimates she’s now taking home between $100 to $200 more per paycheck as a result of the new tax law, more than she expected when Trump signed the legislation.

Dilios said it’s more than the dollar amount that’s driving her support for the law.

“It’s more about being able to keep what is rightfully mine rather than giving it to the government,” she said.

Overall, taxes and the economy are the brightest spots for Trump, who gets lower numbers from voters on a range of other issues, including his handling of North Korea (42 percent), trade (41 percent), gun control (39 percent) and the budget deficit (35 percent).

Trump has benefited from an increasingly healthy economy that has boosted consumer and business sentiment. The 4.1 percent unemployment rate is the lowest since 2000 without the same kinds of excesses that fueled that era’s tech bubble.

Continuation of momentum

While Trump attributes the gains to his tax cuts and deregulation efforts, many economists say conditions so far are largely a continuation of the momentum from the gradual expansion that began during the Obama administration.

Trump’s most recent policy moves have also rattled financial markets and raised questions about the prospect of an economic slowdown. He slapped hefty tariffs on steel and aluminum imports, though his administration has issued waivers to several countries. And last week, he moved to slap $60 billion in tariffs on Chinese goods, prompting Beijing to promise swift retaliation.

The full scope and impact of Trump’s proposed tariffs won’t be known for some time, but the initial reaction from Americans is decidedly mixed. The AP-NORC poll finds that 38 percent support the steel and aluminum tariffs and 29 percent are opposed.

The poll also finds that just 32 percent of Americans think the tariffs will lead to an increase in jobs, compared with 36 percent who think it will lead to a decrease. Forty percent think it will lead to an increase in consumer prices, while 39 percent think it will lead to a decrease.

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The AP-NORC poll of 1,122 adults was conducted March 14-19 using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for all respondents is plus or minus 4.2 percentage points.

Respondents were first selected randomly using address-based sampling methods, and later interviewed online or by phone.
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From: MeNeedIt

Extremely rare Chinese musical instruments and works of art dating from 9,000 years ago are on display for the first time in the U.S. The archaeological treasures, mostly found in tombs in central China, give viewers a glimpse of the musical life of the ancient societies. VOA’s June Soh takes us to the exhibit at the Musical Instrument Museum in Phoenix, Arizona.
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From: MeNeedIt