country: United States

Stay updated with comprehensive news on the United States from Worldcrunch. Discover insights on American politics, economic strategies, societal issues, and cultural landmarks with translations from top international sources. Highlights include Washington D.C., New York, Los Angeles, and cultural events.

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Future Society

Who Owns The Sky? Anti-Drone Tech To Keep Airplanes Safe

Battelle drone defender
Battelle drone defender Battelle

PASADENA — The drone intruder was roaming around the Rose Bowl Stadium as 94,000 fans cheered, oblivious to the threat. But scientists testing a new security device at the game knew: they detected its radio signals and seized control of the gatecrasher. This was only a simulation, but if the unmanned drone had been a security risk they could have forced it down — even though the airwaves were choked by thousands of smartphones and Wi-Fi hotspots. “It’s like being at a rock concert and trying to listen to someone at the other end of the stadium,” said Randy Villahermosa, […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Geopolitics Ideas Trump And The World

The Importance Of Obama, For Both Bernie And Hillary

His reach is long
His reach is long Pete Souza/White House

As Republicans mercilessly attack the sitting president, Democratic hopefuls Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton should remember that ambivalence never wins elections.

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Geopolitics Trump And The World

Hillary Clinton’s Unexpected Obstacle: The Women’s Vote

Hillary Clinton in Nashua, New Hampshire, on Feb. 2
Hillary Clinton in Nashua, New Hampshire, on Feb. 2 Ryan Mcbride/ZUMA

CONCORD — On the eve of the New Hampshire primary, Hillary Clinton’s quest to become the country’s first female president has encountered an unexpected problem: She is having trouble persuading women, young and old, to rally behind her cause. The latest sign came Sunday, when a new CNN-WMUR survey here showed Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders beating Clinton among women by eight percentage points — which represents a big shift from the results last week in the Iowa caucuses, where Clinton won women by 11 points. The survey followed unintentionally problematic comments over the weekend by Madeleine Albright and Gloria Steinem, […]

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Economy

Chinese Super-Rich Storm Los Angeles Real Estate Market

Up for grabs
Up for grabs Ringo Chiu/ZUMA

In the past year, the greater Los Angeles area has seen a surge in the number of Chinese buyers interested in the area’s real estate — in particular, those mega-properties valued above the $15 million mark. The trend has been confirmed by both L.A.”s high-end real estate brokerage firm, John Aaroe Group, which has recently […]

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Economy Eyes on the U.S.

American Banking Hegemony, A View From Europe

The New York Stock Exchange on Wall Street
The New York Stock Exchange on Wall Street Richard B. Levine/Levine Roberts/Newscom/ZUMA

More than eight years after the beginning of the financial crisis, U.S. banking groups are dominating the financial world more than ever. This leadership has technical, political and legal grounds. But it also relies on one quintessentially American quali

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Eyes on the U.S. Ideas Trump And The World

Trump Threatens The American Dream — That’s A Global Problem

A Trump supporter in Iowa
A Trump supporter in Iowa Bryce Vickmark/ZUMA

Donald Trump’s brand of xenophobic patriotism belies basic values on which America was founded. Given the U.S.’s cultural sway, his election would weign on other countries facing similar issues.

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Economy Future Society

Why Top Software Developers Choose To Go Freelance

Coder James Knight, a former Google employee, shown on a rooftop in Brooklyn, 2015
Coder James Knight, a former Google employee, shown on a rooftop in Brooklyn, 2015 Chris Goodney

NEW YORK — James Knight recently made an unorthodox career move for a 27-year-old coder: quitting a well-paid job writing software for Google to go freelance. No more catered lunches, gold-plated benefits or million-dollar views from the search giant’s Manhattan office. Knight is willing to sacrifice those perks because, he says, as an independent he’s pulling down about twice as much as he did at Google — and with more freedom. In March, Knight and his wife plan to hopscotch across Europe while writing code for a dating app and a self-portrait app, among others. “I’d rather control my own […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Trump And The World

How The Christian Right Can Believe In Donald Trump

Trump speaking Monday at Liberty University
Trump speaking Monday at Liberty University Tina Fultz/ZUMA

LYNCHBURG — Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr. stood before more than 10,000 of his students and some visitors on Monday morning and laid out the case for why conservative evangelicals like them should support a presidential candidate like Donald Trump – the cursing, self-promoting, thrice-married billionaire who bungles Bible references. It’s not that Trump is the most religious or pious of the candidates, Falwell said, although he described Trump as a “servant leader” who “lives a life of helping others, as Jesus taught.” It’s that Trump is a savvy businessman who “speaks the truth publicly, even if it is […]

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Economy Eyes on the U.S. Trump And The World

How The Minimum Wage Battle Will Shape 2016 U.S. Election

Demonstrating in NYC for a raise in the minimum wage.
Demonstrating in NYC for a raise in the minimum wage. Otto Yamamoto

With the primary season about to kick off, questions about economic inequality — and the fact that even with jobs, many Americans can’t climb out of poverty — are taking center stage.

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Eyes on the U.S. Geopolitics Ideas Society Trump And The World

Donald Trump Is A Big Jerk — And Good For Democracy

Donald Trump Is A Big Jerk — And Good For Democracy
Gage Skidmore

Czech President Milos Zeman, Donald Trump and other over-the-top personalities may not offer any practical solutions to society’s problems, but they do have a function in an increasingly uniform political arena.

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Future Society

The Search For Aliens Is Very Real

Hello? Is there anybody out there?
Hello? Is there anybody out there? Seth Shostak/SETI Institute

NASA scientists believe we may be just 10 or 20 years from discovering life in outer space. While they may not manifest as the kind of fantastical creatures we see in Star Wars movies, experts are convinced they’re out there.

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Eyes on the U.S. Society

Jihad Recruitment In Minnesota, A Case Study After San Bernardino

A group of Somali women wait outside Minneapolis' Federal Courthouse
A group of Somali women wait outside Minneapolis' Federal Courthouse Renee Jones Schneider/Minneapolis Star Tribune/ZUMA

The Somali community has solid roots in and around Minneapolis. But young people have increasingly been lured by jihadists.

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Geopolitics Society

An Egyptian Jail And The Brutal Toll Of A Hunger Strike

Mohamed Soltan during his hunger strike in Egypt
Mohamed Soltan during his hunger strike in Egypt Mohamed Soltan's Facebook page

Mohamed Soltan lost 120 pounds during a hunger strike in Egyptian prison, where he landed for protesting against the military regime. The only American prisoner freed since the coup, he’s home now. But the physical and pychological effects of food

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Economy Ideas

You Can Have A Checking Account, But Can You Do The Math?

Child's play
Child's play Images Money

Which is the greater number: $105 or $100 plus 3%? You might think this a trivial question, but about 60% of adults can’t answer it correctly — and many of them still use financial services. It’s an alarming situation. After all, smokers understand they’re taking a risk, if only because they’ve seen the health warning on cigarette packs; but bank clients, especially in poorer countries, are often clueless about money matters. Standard & Poor’s Global Financial Literacy Survey goes further than any of the previous research in examining the phenomenon throughout the world. It’s based on 150,000 interviews in more […]

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Geopolitics Syria Crisis

Beyond Rhetoric, A Hard Look At Obama’s Anti-ISIS Strategy

President Obama boards Marine One last month
President Obama boards Marine One last month Pete Souza/White House

As President Obama makes a weighty Oval Office address to the nation, a closer analysis of recent U.S. military and diplomatic efforts to defeat the Islamist terrorist enemy.

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Food / Travel Future Society

Digital Detox: How To Get Offline, Ideas From Around The World

Time to turn it off
Time to turn it off Firstfreddy/GFDL

In our increasingly digital world, people often feel the need to disconnect from the Internet for a dose of silence and breath of fresh air. Worldcrunch has reported recent stories from Brazil to California, about the hunt for “digital detox” solutions. With the help of the Internet (!), we’ve tracked down five other examples of […]

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Economy Society

Steeped In Novelty, American-Made Tea From A New York Entrepreneur

Another kind of tea party
Another kind of tea party damianosullivan/Worldcrunch montage

NEW YORK — On a recent Sunday afternoon, David Bromwich paces his friend’s kitchen in Brooklyn barefoot, waiting for some tea to steep. As the alarm on his phone goes off, he’s already pouring. “It has a slight asparagus taste,” he says, slurping the hot green tea from a spoon. “There are so many chemicals in tea,” he explains, sticking a thermometer in another cup of water. “It’s the processing that unlocks all the different compounds.” Bromwich, a 36-year-old product manager at Thomson Reuters, has always loved tea, tasting every one he could as a kid and later mail-ordering the […]

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Society

Celebrating The Black NASA Engineer Who Invented The Super Soaker

Getting soaked
Getting soaked Graham Dean

The story of how Lonnie Johnson, an African-American inventor just inducted into the Toy Hall of Fame, beat the odds to create a water gun with seriously fun firepower.

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Terror in Europe

How To Defeat ISIS? Only A Global Coalition – And Ground Troops

Stepping forward
Stepping forward Yin Gang/Xinhua/ZUMA

NEW YORK — French President Francois Hollande pledged a “pitiless” war on ISIS after Friday’s Paris massacre. Russian President Vladimir Putin says his nation is focused on “finding and punishing the perpetrators” who downed a Russian passenger jet over Egypt. U.S. President Barack Obama says the goal is to “degrade and ultimately destroy this barbaric terrorist organization.” How? That’s the question none of these men seems willing to answer. Here’s one idea that, while not optimal militarily, might hedge the political risk: Form a broad alliance, akin to the one that pushed Saddam Hussein’s forces out of Kuwait in 1991, […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Ideas Terror in Europe Trump And The World

The Paris Attack Could Redefine The U.S. Presidential Race

Hillary Clinton stumbled at Saturday's debate
Hillary Clinton stumbled at Saturday's debate Rick Majewski via ZUMA

WASHINGTON — The 2016 presidential campaign has been peculiarly disconnected from the real world of problems, crises and governing. It took the catastrophe in Paris to narrow the gap — and even a monstrous terrorist attack may not shake the trajectory of a contest that operates within a logic of its own. The inevitable distance between politicking and the business of running a government is especially wide this year because of the strange configuration of the Republican field. Donald Trump and Ben Carson in particular have detached themselves from anything resembling normal politics, and sometimes from reality itself. Moreover, the […]

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Society

Parking In New York Has A Grammar Of Its Own

Parking in the rain, just parking in the rain.
Parking in the rain, just parking in the rain. Andrej Mrevlje

Alternate-side parking, illogical signage, unspoken rules, clueless New Jersey visitors. Everything in New York has its own rules and language. Even parking your car.

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Economy Eyes on the U.S.

America’s Latest Political Weapon: Oil

A fracking operation near Carrizo Springs, Texas
A fracking operation near Carrizo Springs, Texas John Davenport/San Antonio Express-News/ZUMA

The U.S. was once vulnerable to the geopolitics of energy reserves. Now American shale gas exploration offers foreign policy muscle in the face of the Saudis, Russians and Iranians.

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Geopolitics Ideas Syria Crisis

Obama Plays Chess, Putin Plays Poker

Putin and Obama at the UN on Sept. 28, 2015
Putin and Obama at the UN on Sept. 28, 2015 Chip Somodevilla/CNP/ZUMA

Where the Russian leader lacks any real strategy, his American counterpart is short on nerve. They’re playing two different games and following very different rules.

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Eyes on the U.S. Ideas

The United States As Global Monarch, A Different Kind Of Empire

The United States As Global Monarch, A Different Kind Of Empire
James Montgomery Flagg/Worldcrunch montage

Since the end of World War I, the United States has been methodically establishing a global state, in the same way European kings built power.

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Eyes on the U.S. Society

From Rebels To Republicans: The American Biker’s U-Turn

Bikers in Waco, Texas, in June
Bikers in Waco, Texas, in June Joseph Tye

WASHINGTON — Tattoos dedicated to Lucifer, traces of alcohol and various drugs, lots of wounds: The recently unveiled autopsy report for the nine victims of a gunfight in Waco, Texas include all the elements needed to preserve the dark legend of American bikers. On Aug. 6, a week before the report went public, Republican Party […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Geopolitics Syria Crisis

The Fiasco Of U.S. “Train And Equip” Against ISIS In Syria

Anti-ISIS fighter training in Aleppo, Syria
Anti-ISIS fighter training in Aleppo, Syria Jacob Simkin/Pacific Press/ZUMA

ISTANBUL — The program to train and equip the “moderate opposition” in Syria, as long planned by the United States alongside Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, ended in utter failure. What led to this global diplomatic fiasco that has left the future of Syria looking so grim? The chain of problems began with the most […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Ideas

Why Donald Trump Is Bound To Lose

His lead in the polls is still pretty wide
His lead in the polls is still pretty wide Richard Ellis/ZUMA

-OpEd- WASHINGTON — I never expected to write these words, but I miss Mitt Romney. On Wednesday, the day the front-runner for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination was in New Hampshire alleging that Syrian refugees fleeing for their lives may actually be clandestine terrorists, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee was in Washington, talking sense. “Donald Trump will not be the nominee,” Romney told a group of business-school students at Georgetown University. And why won’t Trump, who, when he isn’t besmirching Syrian refugees as terrorists, is maligning Mexican immigrants as rapists, get the nod? Because, Romney said, “when all is said […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Future Society

Big Pharma, Low Libido And The Rise Of Disease Mongering

Pills for everything, and then some
Pills for everything, and then some e-Magine Art

The pharmaceutical industry looks to identify new diseases so it can push new drugs on the market, and patients play along. The approval of reduced female libido as a pathology is a case in point.

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Eyes on the U.S. Society

Buenos Aires To Philadelphia, A Family Road Trip To See Our Pope

A "trip of hope"
A "trip of hope" America en familia

This Argentine family decided a 13,000-mile trip in a VW van was the perfect way to see Pope Francis, their former archbishop. There were bumps along the way.

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Society The Next Pope

Pope Francis, A Shrewd Political Leader Comes To Washington

Pope Francis makes you think.
Pope Francis makes you think. Evandro Inetti/ZUMA

Depending on his audience, the pontiff’s messages vary. On a historic visit to the U.S., President Obama and the whole world will be listening carefully.

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Future Geopolitics

How 2015 Mass Surveillance Compares To Orwell’s 1984 Big Brother

Watching you and your phone
Watching you and your phone Thomas Leutard

NSA-style monitoring of our ever-more digital lives is beyond even George Orwell’s disturbing vision. It’s also less effective in tracking the true enemies of the state.

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Eyes on the U.S. Society

A Late Summer Stroll, From Country Home To City‘s Homeless

New York, New York
New York, New York Vetaturfumare

NEW YORK — I am one of those privileged people who live in New York and have the chance to escape from the city on occasion. No matter how many loops a person bikes around Central Park, riding across the George Washington Bridge, and biking along the Hudson River, it’s not until you get out […]

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Future Society

Ocean Micronations, The Libertarian Floating Utopia

Vincent Callebaut's
Vincent Callebaut's Seasteading Facebook page

The U.S.-based Seasteading Institute is pursuing the notion of “startup governments” and the opportunity for like-minded people to live in shared offshore communities. Could man-made island colonies be our future?

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Future Geopolitics

The Pitfalls And Pioneers Of Transhumanism

A microchip ready to be implanted
A microchip ready to be implanted Dangerous Things

Remember Gattaca? The superb film describes the contrasting fates of two brothers, one of whom was genetically optimized at birth. A few years later, in another movie, The Island, a community of prisoners discovers one day they are nothing but clones of super-privileged people and that their sole purpose is to provide fresh organs as […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Society

Spanglish, The Muy Popular U.S. Street Lingo

Latino neighborhood in Jackson Heights, Queens, NYC
Latino neighborhood in Jackson Heights, Queens, NYC Marc Tarlock

BOGOTA — Spanglish: Is it a dialect? Ghetto talk? Whatever else it may be, Spanglish is now the brazen, no-nonsense fruit of two languages and cultures coexisting in the United States. It may sound a little crazy at times. For example, walking in a Latino area of New York one day, I saw a notice […]

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Eyes on the U.S. Geopolitics

Poisons In Paradise: Hawaiians Take On Agrochemical Giants

Hawaiians protesting GMOs.
Hawaiians protesting GMOs. GMO Free Hawaii

WAIMEA — Everyday, Klayton Kubo, 49, does the same pilgrimage across his village of Waimea, on Kauai, an island in the Hawaiian archipelago. He takes the road along the river, parks his pickup on the roadside and climbs up the hill overlooking the agrochemicals factory. He stands there and observes. On the other side of […]

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blog Society

How An Unsuspecting American Became An “Accidental” Korean Soldier

How An Unsuspecting American Became An "Accidental" Korean Soldier
Lui Siu Wai/Xinhua/ZUMA

SEOUL — Young Chun is hardly the only U.S. citizen working as an English language teacher in South Korea. But he may the only one who landed the job after being forcibly recruited by the South Korean armed forces — and then shipped off to Afghanistan. Chun, 36, was born in the United States and grew up in Seattle, Washington. As one of the only Asian-Americans in his school, he remembers being bullied and discriminated against. “When I was in the States, I thought if I go to Korea, I’ll fit in,” he recalls. “But once I got to Korea, […]

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blog Economy

Miami Real Estate Market Is Hot Hot Hot. Is It Boom Or Bubble?

Construction in Miami's Brickell business district.
Construction in Miami's Brickell business district. Phillip Pessar

MIAMI — Luis Flores has been on a roll of late, handling real estate deal after real estate deal and helping close, in the past 18 months, on no less than $1 billion worth of property. As the lawyer’s hot streak suggests, property investment has made a serious comeback in Miami, which is attracting capital […]

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Geopolitics Ideas

Why The Whole World Looks Like Africa, And How To Fix It

Anti-government protests last year in Thailand
Anti-government protests last year in Thailand Jack Kurtz/ZUMA

Too many nations and peoples with too many grievances. A wealth divide that grows deeper. A new (new) world order is needed, with the U.S. and China firmly in charge.

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Eyes on the U.S. Society

Jazz And The Resurrection Of Post-Katrina New Orleans

Jazz band in New Orleans
Jazz band in New Orleans Mark Morgan Trinidad

NEW ORLEANS — There are still gaping holes left by houses that disappeared forever. There are also the brownish lines, sad reminders of just how high the water level reached on Aug. 29, 2005. And yet 10 years after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina, the song rising from New Orleans is not a melancholy one. […]

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