By Madeline Holcombe, CNN

(CNN) — You have a problem? There is probably a product that claims to solve it –– especially in the longevity space.

Social media, stores and online ads are abuzz with different regimens, items, supplements and strategies promising a longer life and everlasting beauty. It can be easy to get swept up in things that are just snake oil.

“There’s so much misinformation online about everything,” journalist Kara Swisher said. “There’s all these, essentially, wellness grifters that are giving people bad information, and these shortcuts that don’t really work.”

It is fine if the things that don’t work out are harmless, such as a terrible cauliflower bread recipe, she added, but “a lot of this stuff is real medical stuff that is not good for you or it’s costly for you, and I found that really offensive.”

In this week’s episode of “Kara Swisher Wants to Live Forever,” a CNN series airing at 9 p.m. ET Saturday that investigates longevity trends and science, Swisher parses out the grifts from the actual longevity tools.

Some of the things marketed toward people looking for longer, healthier lives are harmful; others are just expensive but not effective, she said. Then there are those that, even if they still need more research, may have something to offer.

Red light therapy

One of the latest crazes in beauty and longevity trends is red light therapy, but its impacts aren’t strictly just hype, said Dr. Zakia Rahman, a clinical professor of dermatology at Stanford University School of Medicine and affiliate faculty at the Stanford Center on Longevity.

Red light and less commonly talked about near-infrared light are specific wavelengths of light, which can send different signals to the body.

The idea is that the red light is converted to energy in the mitochondria, which if you remember from biology class are the powerhouse of the cell. While not known with certainty, researchers believe that exposing the cells to red light wavelengths helps improve cell performance and resilience and reduces inflammation, said Dr. Praveen Arany, associate professor of oral biology at the University at Buffalo School of Dental Medicine in New York.

The scientific evidence is increasingly supporting the assertion that red light therapy can help with skin texture and hair growth, which has caused a boom in at-home devices for cosmetic purposes, Rahman added.

Studies are being done to look at a host of other potential benefits such as treating chronic pain, Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease, Arany said.

Going beyond the surface and treating deeper parts of the body still need more data, however. Protocols such as how to administer the light, exactly which wavelengths to use and for what amount of time still haven’t been established, he said.

There are two ways of administering red light therapy: lasers, which are typically in a doctor’s office, and LED panels, which many people are buying for their homes. The LED option has less potential for damage if used incorrectly, but there is also less quality control in the marketplace, Arany said.

If you want to try red light therapy and feel confident about the machine you are purchasing, Rahman recommends starting by looking for devices that have clearance from the US Food and Drug Administration.

But remember, she said, red light therapy isn’t a magic elixir, and you won’t use a device once and wake up the next day looking 10 years younger with a full head of hair. Devices such as these take consistent use over a period of months to see results, Rahman said.

Sweating in a sauna

Sweating it out in a sauna is another wellness strategy that isn’t purely snake oil, Swisher said.

“If you don’t overdo it, you get plenty of water. It’s great. It’s actually on

Por Aaron Blake, CNN

Este mes, el presidente Donald Trump amenazó con atacar la infraestructura iraní de maneras que bien podrían constituir crímenes de guerra. Luego amenazó con algo mucho más grave, cuando declaró: “Toda una civilización morirá esta noche”.

Estas amenazas conmocionaron al mundo político e incluso a algunos importantes aliados de Trump, quienes repentinamente se distanciaron de él.

Pero para la base republicana no representaron un gran problema, según las encuestas publicadas esta semana. De hecho, en general, fueron bien recibidas.

Y este es solo el ejemplo más reciente de Trump proponiendo ideas bastante extremas que luego son rápidamente adoptadas por gran parte de la base republicana.

Una encuesta de la Universidad de Quinnipiac realizada esta semana mostró que el 66 % de los republicanos dijo apoyar el bombardeo de centrales eléctricas y otra infraestructura civil en Irán si las negociaciones fracasan. (La pregunta de la encuesta no mencionaba que esto probablemente constituiría un crimen de guerra).

El apoyo fue casi exclusivamente de parte de los republicanos. Los demócratas rechazaron la idea con un 95 % frente a un 3 %, y los independientes también la rechazaron abrumadoramente, con un 77 % frente a un 18 %. Las cifras fueron prácticamente las mismas en general con respecto a la amenaza de Trump en redes sociales de acabar con la civilización iraní: el 62 % de los republicanos la consideró “aceptable”, mientras que la gran mayoría la rechazó.

(Cabe destacar que la pregunta de la encuesta se refería a la amenaza en sí, no a su cumplimiento).

Una encuesta de CBS News-YouGov realizada el fin de semana arrojó resultados similares.

Tras mostrar la publicación completa en redes sociales, el doble de republicanos dijeron que les gustaba (casi la mitad) que los que dijeron que les disgustaba (aproximadamente 2 de cada 10). Otro 31 % se mostró neutral.

Si esto les resulta familiar, hay una razón. Durante una década, Trump ha lanzado ideas que parecían diseñadas para poner a prueba la lealtad de sus seguidores, para ver hasta dónde llegarían para apoyarlo.

Y sus seguidores han demostrado repetidamente que están dispuestos a llegar muy lejos, incluso con ideas ampliamente rechazadas por los independientes.

En 2023, Trump dijo que quería ser dictador, pero solo por un día, y luego afirmó que era una broma. Sin embargo, los republicanos respaldaron la idea; una encuesta de la Universidad de Massachusetts Amherst mostró que el 74 % de ellos la consideraba algo positivo.

Cuando Trump declaró casi al mismo tiempo que alentaría a Rusia a hacer “lo que les diera la gana” con los aliados de la OTAN que no pagaran lo suficiente, la encuesta de Quinnipiac mostró que los republicanos estaban divididos casi por igual. Mientras que el 38 % estaba a favor, el 39 % se oponía. El resto no se pronunció.

Trump ha insinuado o bromeado con frecuencia sobre la posibilidad de presentarse a un tercer mandato, a pesar de que eso sería inconstitucional. Una encuesta de Reuters-Ipsos realizada hace un año mostró que más republicanos se oponían que los apoyaban, pero el 44 % aún respaldaba que Trump siguiera adelante con esta idea manifiestamente ilegal.

Desde que Trump asumió la presidencia e impulsó una política exterior más expansiva y a menudo militarista, ha propuesto varias ideas que bien podrían calificarse de poco convencionales, pero los republicanos no tardaron en adoptarlas.

Cuando Trump planteó brevemente la posibilidad de que Estados Unidos se hiciera cargo de Gaza el año pasado, la encuesta de Quinnipiac reveló que el 49 % de los republicanos respaldaba la idea. Y el 41 % la apoyaba incluso cuando una encuesta de Reuters-Ipsos señalaba que implicaría el reasentamiento de palestinos en otros lugares, lo que se conoce como limpieza étnica.

Otra encuesta de Reuters-Ipsos d

By Harmeet Kaur, CNN

(CNN) — Why are TikToks about dining out so boring? Dillon Davis and Nichols Neff were debating the question from their couch in their shared Manhattan apartment late last year, as they watched one video after another of influencers visiting the same handful of upscale restaurants.

Neither one had any experience making social media content. But between the two of them, they had an idea.

“I feel like it’d be cooler to do something more about the hole-in-the-wall restaurants and restaurants that maybe don’t get as much publicity on TikTok,” Neff remembered telling Davis.

Davis, in turn, said he’d been wanting for a while to try food from every country in the world. What if it could be done without leaving New York City?

The duo found a virtual online wheel that could pick a country at random and turned on a camera to record their first spin. It landed on Armenia. A cursory Google Maps search turned up only one Armenian eatery: Little Armenia Cafe in Greenpoint, Brooklyn (in reality, the city has at least one other, called Sevan, in Bayside, Queens).

When Davis and Neff walked in, they told Little Armenia Cafe’s chef and owner Ararat El-Rawi that they wanted the most authentic Armenian experience he could offer them. They recorded themselves working their way through seven dishes including tabbouli salad and spinach pie — and more than that many glasses of Armenian wine — as El-Rawi eventually pulled up a seat to share a bottle.

In the resulting video, the two captured themselves getting emotional about their newfound friend and the mingling of cultures. “This is why we play,” a delightfully inebriated Davis said. “This is why we play,” Neff echoed.

They posted it on November 20, 2025, under the name of the Taste Buds. The combination of the concept, their friendship and their infectious enthusiasm turned out to be immediately irresistible, catapulting them to niche TikTok stardom. The two, both 27, have since moved to separate apartments. But they’ve kept sampling the world’s cuisines and posting a new video each week: mantu at the Afghan restaurant Ariana, tavë kosi at the Albanian restaurant Çka Ka Qëllu, hilib ari at the Somali restaurant Safari, oxtail at the Antiguan restaurant Wadadli.

A community of more than 400,000 viewers has made them appointment viewing on TikTok, awaiting each installment like a new episode of a TV series. “Every Thursday I do a double at my job and when I go on break you guys are always the first video on my feed,” one user commented recently. “Thanks for spending Thursdays with me boys.”

“Everyone quiet my show is on,” wrote another.

‘Who are we to know what an 8/10 Indonesian dish is?’

Taste Buds episodes are unpolished by the standards of food-influencer TikTok, where creators promote gimmicky dishes at impossible-to-book restaurants, often in exchange for free meals or outright payment.

The opening frames always feature Davis and Neff as crudely drawn stick figures like something out of Microsoft Paint. The editing is sometimes choppy, and there are no ring lights in sight. The creators’ names aren’t even specified anywhere on their page — most of their followers know them as Tall Guy and Hat Guy.

“The rough-around-the-edges part about it is what people like a little bit too,” Davis said. “It’s not perfectly put together. It’s not super high production quality. It’s just two friends going to dinner and posting about their experience and talking to people.”

The ribbing and banter between them can make them look like lifelong friends, but Davis and Neff only became pals through a mutual friend when they moved to New York about a year ago.

Davis grew up in a small

By Julian Torres, CNN

New York (CNN) — Mary Akkerman has visited more than 30 college campuses with her children, one now at Stanford and another still in high school. She especially wanted them to get degrees that lead to good jobs – but figuring that out, said the Sioux Falls, South Dakota, parent, was a major challenge, thanks in part to the rapid advance of AI and its effects on the job market.

“I constantly grapple with the idea of ‘what is value,’” Akkerman said.

Nationally, the deadline for most students to commit to a college is around May 1, College Decision Day. But this year, parents and students are trying to figure out what counts as a “good return” for an education in a shifting labor market. Majors once thought of as golden tickets, like computer science, might not carry the same value as AI reshapes the tech industry. But what majors might instead benefit remains an unanswered question.

“There is even more confusion now than there ever was,” said Brianna Angelucci, a parent and a college advisor with the Access to College Experts network, a subscription-based group that provides college preparation services.

‘AI is just taking over’

Average tuition and fees grew by 3.4% for the 2025 to 2026 school year for public four-year-out-of-state institutions, totaling $31,880 per year, while private nonprofit colleges increased by 4% to reach $45,000 per year, before adjusting for inflation, according to the College Board.

At the same time, rapid advances in artificial intelligence are reshaping expectations for entry-level jobs and for recent graduates to land their first jobs. That makes it harder for families to predict how reliably a degree could translate into stable employment.

“Back in the day, we could go to college and major in what we loved… It was easy for me to find work, but these days, it’s not,” said Kate Hilgenberg, a 50-something New Yorker with one child in college and a high school junior starting applications in the fall.

Questions about which degree makes the most sense helped shape her thoughts on her kids’ future careers.

“I’m very glad my kids are going into STEM fields, because I feel like those are less able to be taken over by AI,” Hilgenberg said. “I wouldn’t let my kid go to school to be an illustrator at this point, because AI is just taking over.”

As a result, in part, of her concerns, Hilgenberg said she set firm limits on what she is willing to contribute to her children’s college expenses, leaving them to decide whether taking on debt is worth it.

Average student loan debt at graduation has increased 41% since 2007, after adjusting for inflation, according to the Education Data Initiative. College students face an average loan debt of $39,457 at graduation.

“You have to be smart about how much student loan debt you’re taking out, especially as repayment plans have become less favorable to borrowers,” said Daniel A. Collier, a professor of adult and higher education at the University of Memphis.

While the long-run impact of AI remains unclear, Collier emphasized that parents should keep the lasting benefits of a degree in mind, like on average higher life-time earnings and employment endurance during recessionary periods. Students with four-year degrees earn about 60% more than high school graduates and are less likely to be unemployed according to the College Board.

But that return can vary widely by major, the College Board said – and how AI plays into that mix will depend on how higher education meets the demands of the workforce.

An uncertain return

Por Andy Rose, CNN

En una ciudad que ha sido objeto de una aplicación agresiva de las leyes de inmigración, era una historia conmovedora.

Sundas Naqvi, ciudadana estadounidense de ascendencia pakistaní, declaró que regresaba a Estados Unidos tras un viaje de trabajo al extranjero cuando ella y cinco compañeros fueron detenidos por el Servicio de Inmigración y Control de Aduanas en el Aeropuerto Internacional O’Hare de Chicago.

Su historia llamó la atención de un amigo de la familia, el comisionado del condado de Cook, Kevin Morrison.

“Parece que están intentando encubrir algo. Buscan eludir toda responsabilidad. Y creo que esto es aterrador y preocupante para todos nosotros”, declaró Morrison en una conferencia de prensa el 8 de marzo.

Morrison mostró lo que parecían ser capturas de pantalla de mapas de ubicación con marca de tiempo del teléfono de Naqvi, que la mostraban en el Centro de Detención de Broadview en Chicago y más tarde en el centro de detención del condado de Dodge en Wisconsin, donde Naqvi afirmó que la llevaron antes de dejarla en la calle sin transporte después de una terrible experiencia de 43 horas.

La historia relatada por los amigos y familiares de Naqvi, que alegaba que había recorrido más de 240 kilómetros bajo custodia federal, prácticamente incomunicado, ya era bastante asombrosa.

Pero aún quedaban muchos giros inesperados por venir a lo largo de un mes de nuevas revelaciones.

El Departamento de Seguridad Nacional negó rápidamente que Naqvi hubiera sido detenida en el aeropuerto. El sheriff del condado de Dodge, Dale Schmidt, fue más allá y afirmó que no solo parte de la historia de Naqvi es falsa, sino toda ella.

“Sundas Naqvi no fue detenida por ICE en ningún momento. No fue trasladada al centro de detención de Broadview. No fue trasladada a través de las fronteras estatales al condado de Dodge por las fuerzas del orden… No estuvo bajo la custodia de la Oficina del Sheriff del Condado de Dodge”, aseguró Schmidt en su propia conferencia de prensa el 10 de abril.

Según Schmidt, las preguntas sobre la historia de Naqvi comenzaron cuando el entonces novio de la joven, sospechando después de que sus afirmaciones sobre la detención por parte de ICE se volvieran virales, llamó a las autoridades.

Esa comunicación dio lugar a una cascada de mensajes de texto privados y videos de vigilancia obtenidos por la oficina del sheriff que mostraban una cronología muy diferente.

Naqvi, de 28 años y conocida también como Sunny y Summer, según los registros públicos, no está acusada de ningún delito, pero el sheriff afirma que ella lo difamó al alegar que su oficina la mantuvo tras las rejas, y ahora la está demandando a ella y al político que dio a conocer su historia en un caso de difamación por US$ un millón.

“Se trata de una acusación grave, y cuando no es cierta, causa un daño real”, declaró Schmidt.

El Departamento de Seguridad Nacional confirma que Naqvi fue apartada para un control secundario el 5 de marzo tras regresar de un viaje a Turquía, “en base a controles policiales”. Sin embargo, a partir de ese momento, la historia difiere drásticamente del relato de Naqvi.

“Las grabaciones de vigilancia del aeropuerto O’Hare muestran CLARAMENTE que entró en la zona de inspección secundaria a las 10:46 a.m. y salió hacia el área pública a las 11:42 a.m.”, escribió el DHS en una publicación de X seis días después. “Sus afirmaciones de haber pasado 43 horas bajo custodia del DHS son FALSAS”.

Inicialmente, Morrison acusó al DHS de falsificar la publicación.

“En lugar de publicar una foto claramente manipulada, pido al DHS que publique todos los vídeos relevantes del aer