Sunday, March 31, 2013

How to build your own R2D2

R2D2 greets the crowd at this year's WonderconANAHEIM, CA - The power of the Force may be elusive outside the fictional Star Wars universe but fans of R2D2 can take home their very own astromech droid if they have the time and money to build it.

Hundreds of potential droid crafters waited in line to hear from a panel belonging to the R2D2 Builders Club, a group of hobbyists who have been assembling their own functional Star Wars robots out of aluminum, plastic and even wood since 1999.

But how much time does it take to build a bleeping and whirling R2 lookalike?

"Thats the magic question," said Victor Franco, who has been building his own droids for over a decade. "It's the one you don't want your spouse to know the answer to."

And the answer varies, depending on just how detailed and capable you want your droid to be, with the final price ranging from as little as $500 up to $10,000.

"The average cost is a little over $5,000," Franco said. "A single small aluminum part can cost $100. It's not for the faint of heart."

Not surprisingly, a large variety of parts and electronics go into replicating one of the droids, with potential parts including plywood, aluminum, resin, styrene, transmitters and receivers speed controller servo motor and circuits.

"There's no one way to make an R2 unit," said William Miyamoto. "The plus side of using plastic is you pretty much can just use an cacti knife and glue."

At the other end of the spectrum, a finished R2 unit made from aluminum can weight more than 200 pounds and forces the creators to decide if they want their droid to be remote controlled or less mobile.

"I did run over a kid once," deadpanned Chris Romines.

But the four R2 builders said it is a project worth both their time and money. And when a droid is complete, it is almost immediately put into service, appearing at conventions and events for children. The droids have even starred in television commercials for companies like Verizon and ESPN and cruised across the red carpet at movie premiers.

When a pair of the hand crafted R2 units took to the stage on Friday at Wondercon, They were greeted with the type of "oohs and ahhs" normally reserved for cute animal videos or small children performing adorable tricks.

"I was poor when I was a kid so I took my toys apart and put them back together," fellow builder Mike Senna said of how he first became inspired to join the R2 club.

The R2-D2 Builders Club had humble beginnings when creator Dave Everett first launched the club as a Yahoo group, posting the blueprints showing how other aspiring builders could follow his lead.

Today, the club has thousands of members around the world and brought dozens of their robots to the most recent, annual Star Wars Celebration event.

" At the StarWars Celebration we even have droid races, including a mouse droid race," said Michael McMaster. "But when I started I was electronics illiterate."

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/sideshow/build-own-r2d2-062419995.html

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Fla. brewers push to legalize 64-ounce beer jugs

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) ? David Wescott has two 32-ounce growlers he brings into Proof Brewing Company to fill up and take home.

Why two? Because Florida is one of only three states where it's illegal to fill one 64-ounce beer container, known as a growler. He can get as many of the 32-ounce containers filled as he wants, and Florida breweries can also fill unlimited 128-ounce growlers for customers to take home. But the size preferred by most beer enthusiasts is banned.

"If you're bringing some beer home for you and the wife, that's two beers," Wescott, whose wife calls him a beer snob, said of the quart-sized growlers. "It makes no sense to me. It's just not logical ? 128s are probably too much, 32 is too small. I'd love to get a 64."

Two lawmakers have filed bills to legalize the half-gallon jugs, but a group of beer distributors is fighting both measures and appears to have helped effectively kill both for the year.

"It's really silly. I have in my office a 32-ounce, a gallon and a 64 to show people. And I ask them, 'Which one do you think is currently illegal?'" said Rep. Katie Edwards, D-Plantation. "They all think the gallon is illegal. They say, 'Oh, you're trying to legalize the big one!' and I say, 'No, it's the one in the middle,' and it's like, 'Why is it not legal?' They don't get it."

And Edwards doesn't even drink beer. She said her only motive in sponsoring her bill is economic development. The half-gallon size growlers are an industry standard and are sold at breweries around the country, helping to expand the small businesses.

Amherst Brewing Company in Massachusetts, which locals call ABC, has gone through three expansions since the pub opened in 1997. Chloe Drew, ABC's bar manager, said that growth has been helped by selling the 64-ounce growlers that fill two refrigerated cases at the front of the restaurant.

"It's really good for small towns because they become a destination and people can bring stuff home from that destination. It's probably only going to bring people back," Drew said, adding that the Florida law is strange because anyone who wants 64 ounces could simply buy two 32-ounce growlers.

The Florida Beer Wholesalers Association, which represents all the state's Anheuser-Busch distributors, is opposing the bill. Its lobbyist, Mitch Rubin, was able to convince Rep. Debbie Mayfield, R-Vero Beach, not to give it a hearing at the House Business and Professional Regulation Subcommittee she chairs. Without a House hearing, the bill is essentially dead.

Rubin said he is trying to protect the three-tier system of alcohol distribution the federal government set up after Prohibition. It basically ensures that alcoholic products are passed through a distributor to get to retailers. Exceptions have been made, however, for purchases where products are produced, such as buying bottles of wine at a winery.

State law does allow take-home sales at breweries, though Rubin argues that language was meant only to allow sales at Busch Gardens in Tampa when Anheuser-Busch brewed beer at what is now a major theme park. He said it was never intended to allow breweries to sell directly to consumers.

"It's definitely operating in the gray," said Rubin, who said he is not fighting the bill to boost distributers' profits. "There's a little to that, but the larger point is about the three-tier system, and that is our larger concern."

At his urging, Sen. Maria Sachs, D-Delray Beach, tried to add a nearly 12-page amendment to Sen. Jack Latvala's two-line bill. The amendment would have allowed 64-ounce growlers to be sold, but it also would have restricted take-home sales to only the smallest of startup breweries. The Senate Regulated Industries Committee refused to consider the amendment before approving the bill, though Rubin has likely succeeded in halting that measure as well.

Latvala noted that it's hard for beverage laws to be changed because of the powerful lobbying of distributors. He pointed out that it took years for Florida to change a law that only allowed beer cans and bottles in sizes of 8, 12, 16 or 32 ounces. The law, until changed in 2001, kept many imported beers out of Florida because bottles were based on the metric system. Also banned at the time were 22-ounce bottles popular with microbreweries.

"It's the same thing still going on. Those that have the sizes and those that have the distributorships are protecting that," said Latvala, R-Palm Harbor.

Brewers say growlers and tasting rooms are an important part of growing business, especially when certain beers aren't readily available in stores. A tasting room at Cigar City Brewing in Tampa, for instance, has helped the business grow from two employees in 2009 to more than 50 now, said owner Joey Redner.

The larger profit margins on beer sold at Florida breweries helps them reinvest the money to produce more beer, which creates more jobs. Unlike beer giants such as Anheuser-Busch and MillerCoors, which have automated systems that allow a few people to brew massive amounts of beer, craft brewing is labor intensive. In order to brew more, small breweries have to hire more people.

Redner said he believes the wholesalers association is opposing the growler bill to protect its profits, as growlers and brewery tasting rooms help craft brewers expand their market presence.

"Ninety-nine percent of their business is a large, foreign-owned company that makes 100 million barrels of beer. That's where their bread and butter is. These craft breweries, that's not what's keeping the lights on for them," Redner said. "If they can shut the tasting rooms down, they can get rid of some the competition."

The Beer Industry of Florida, which counts MillerCoors distributors among its members, supports allowing the 64-ounce growlers because the industry group doesn't see the jugs as a threat to the three-tier system, said BIF president Eric Criss.

The current rules can be frustrating for out-of-state tourists accustomed to the 64-ounce growlers. Luke Kemper, the owner of Swamp Head Brewery in Gainesville, said more and more often people visiting from other states are told their 64-ounce growlers can't be filled. Likewise, if they buy a 32- or 128-ounce growler, they probably can't fill them when they get home.

Chris Lashway of Fredericksburg, Va., recently stopped at Proof Brewing in Tallahassee while on his way to South Florida. He likes visiting microbreweries and said he would have liked to buy a 64-ounce container so there would be more to share with his hosts. Instead, he ordered a quart of red ale.

"It is very bizarre," he said of the rules.

___

Follow Brendan Farrington on Twitter: http://twitter.com/bsfarrington

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fla-brewers-push-legalize-64-ounce-beer-jugs-131042216.html

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Tunable app shows musicians what pitch-perfect means as they play (video)

Tunable for Android and iOS shows musicians what it takes to be pitchperfect video

Musicians who've had some degree of practice will know the lack of sophistication involved in getting an instrument in tune and on time: a light-up tuning box and a swinging metronome may be their only real resources. Affinity Blue knows that mobile apps allow better, and recently unveiled Tunable as a one-stop shop for more exacting performers. The Android and iOS release provides a live graph that shows where the sweet spot is for pitch, and how closely the music has followed along for the past few seconds -- a boon for brass players, vocalists and others who need to sustain a note for more than a moment. There's also a simple tone generator and a customizable metronome that's easily seen from a distance. While it's $1 to try Tunable, that might be a pittance for anyone who'd rather spend time mastering a riff than rehashing the basics.

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Via: Fast Company

Source: Affinity Blue

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Attention Filmmakers: LA Collaboration Challenge Returns - Hit ...

Who wouldn?t want to make a short film in two weeks with strangers? The Los Angeles Collaboration Film Challenge is back for a second year. Former Reason TV intern Mark Wagner is an organizer and passed along an invitation for all interested in participating:

The CFC is a one-of-a-kind nonprofit film festival in Los Angeles. Get paired with other filmmakers and make two movies in two weeks. Are you a writer in search of a cameraman? An editor looking for a director? Worry not wallflowers, we?ll make the connection for you!

Who is this challenge for? It?s for anyone! Industry pros, student filmmakers, amateur enthusiasts?all are welcome. The beauty of this experience is that you?ll be working alongside many other people with a similar passion for filmmaking, and?anyone can win.

On May 4th, we screen the best entries in front of a packed house of industry members? and our esteemed judges, including Kurt Loder, Matthew Lillard, and Slamdance president Peter Baxter? and hand out over $10,000 in cash and prizes.?Check out our site?for more info and official rules. Space is limited, so?enter today!

What makes the CFC a unique experience is that it goes beyond competition. As the name suggests, this challenge is about bringing filmmakers together to transform one person?s vision into a masterpiece through powerful creative partnerships.

The deadline to register as a participant is April 8.

Source: http://reason.com/blog/2013/03/30/attention-filmmakers-la-collaboration-ch

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Jim Carrey Responds to Fox News: "A Media Colostomy Bag" (Little green footballs)

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Tape Your Friends' Wi-Fi Password to their Router for Easy Tech Support

Tape Your Friends' Wi-Fi Passwords to their Routers for Easy Tech Support While I think it's safe to assume that the average Lifehacker reader knows their Wi-Fi password off the top of their head, the same can probably not be said for most of our friends and family members.

When you visit with someone a little less tech-savvy, make a point to find their Wi-Fi password and write it on a piece of masking tape. Just stick the tape to the back or the bottom of their router, and they'll always have it nearby if they need to share if with a house guest or service technician. This will also come in handy if you're trying to remotely diagnose their connection issues over the phone.

Of course, if this is your own router we're talking about, it's much cooler to use a QR code for easy password sharing.

A Quick and Easy Wi-Fi Password Reminder Solution | Apartment Therapy

Source: http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/lifehacker/full/~3/AHhsIe0kOMQ/tape-your-friends-wi+fi-password-to-their-router-for-easy-tech-support

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Kobe passes Wilt for 4th on NBA scoring list

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) ? Kobe Bryant has passed fellow Los Angeles Lakers great Wilt Chamberlain for fourth place on the NBA's career scoring list.

Bryant made a pull-up jumper from the free throw line with 7:54 remaining in the second quarter to eclipse Chamberlain's mark of 31,419 points. He tied Chamberlain 22 seconds earlier with a layup.

Bryant entered the game four points behind Chamberlain.

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar tops the NBA's career scoring list with 38,387 points, Karl Malone is second with 36,928 and Michael Jordan is third with 32,292.

The 34-year-old Bryant is in his 17th season ? all with the Lakers.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/kobe-passes-wilt-4th-nba-scoring-list-030255554--spt.html

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Business, labor close on deal for immigration bill (The Arizona Republic)

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NYC to sift construction debris for remains of 9/11 victims

By NBCNewYork.com

The city has collected about 60 dump truck loads of debris from construction areas around the World Trade Center site over the past two and a half years that will be sifted for fragments of 9/11 victims' remains, officials announced Friday.?

The debris has been collected from the World Financial Center, West Street and a lot near Liberty Street since the last sifting operation in mid-2010.

The material amounts to 590 cubic yards -- 38 from the WTC, 13 from the western edge of the southbound lanes of West Street and 539 from the Liberty Street area, where four pieces of possible human remains have already been found.

The material will be combed for about 10 weeks starting Monday at a mobile sifting unit set up on Staten Island, city officials said.

Any human remains will be analyzed by the medical examiner's office for possible matches to 9/11 victims. Of the 2,750 people killed at the trade center, 1,634 have had remains identified.

More on NBCNewYork.com

"We will continue DNA testing until all recovered remains that can be matched with a victim are identified," Deputy Mayor Cas Holloway wrote Friday in a memo to Mayor Bloomberg.

The city expanded its search for remains of trade center victims in 2006, when several bones were found in a manhole.?

Since the discovery of the manhole bones, the city has sifted debris from various construction sites and subterranean areas surrounding the 16-acre trade center site. More than 1,800 pieces of potential human remains have been found.?

The office has made 34 new identifications since 2006, and hundreds of fragments of remains have been matched to people who were already identified.

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/653381/s/2a26bd78/l/0Lusnews0Bnbcnews0N0C0Inews0C20A130C0A30C30A0C175246270Enyc0Eto0Esift0Econstruction0Edebris0Efor0Eremains0Eof0E9110Evictims0Dlite/story01.htm

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Cosmic crash 2022: Space probes will smash into asteroid in nine years

Cosmic crash 2022: American and European scientists are planning to crash a spacecraft into a nearby asteroid in 2022 to analyze the interior of the cosmic rock.

By Miriam Kramer,?Space.com / March 25, 2013

This NASA simulation shows asteroid 2012 DA14 approaching Earth from the south on Feb. 15, 2013, when the 150-foot asteroid passed within 17,000 miles of the Earth. In 2022, scientists hope to crash a space probe into asteroid Didymos in order to understand its composition.

JPL-Caltech / NASA / AP

Enlarge

Scientists in Europe and the United States are moving forward with plans to intentionally smash a spacecraft into a huge nearby asteroid in 2022 to see inside the space rock.

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The ambitious European-led Asteroid Impact and Deflection Assessment mission, or AIDA, is slated to launch in 2019 to send two spacecraft ? one built by scientists in the U.S, and the other by the European Space Agency ? on a three-year voyage to the asteroid Didymos and its companion. Didymos has no chance of impacting the Earth, which makes it a great target for this kind of mission, scientists involved in the mission said in a presentation Tuesday (March 19) here at the 44th annual Lunar and Planetary Science Conference.

Didymos is actually a binary asteroid system consisting of two separate space rocks bound together by gravity. The main asteroid is enormous, measuring 2,625 feet (800 meters) across. It is orbited by a smaller asteroid ?about 490 feet (150 m).

The Didymos asteroid setup is an intriguing target for the AIDA mission because it will give scientists their first close look at a binary space rock system while also yielding new insights into ways to deflect dangerous asteroids that could pose an impact threat to the Earth.?

"Binary systems are quite common," said Andy Rivkin, a scientist at Johns Hopkins' Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Md., working on the U.S. portion of AIDA project. "This will be our first rendezvous with a binary system."

In 2022, the Didymos asteroids will be about 6.8 million miles (11 million km) from the Earth, during a close approach, which is why AIDA scientists have timed their mission for that year.

Rivkin and his colleagues at Johns Hopkins' Applied Physics Laboratory are building DART (short for Double Asteroid Redirection Test), one of the two spacecraft making up the tag team AIDA mission. Like its acronym suggests, the DART probe crash directly into the smaller Didymos asteroid while travelling at 14,000 mph (22,530 km/h), creating a crater during an impact that will hopefully sending the space rock slightly off course, Rivkin said.

The European Space Agency is building the second AIDA spacecraft, which is called the Asteroid Impact Monitor (or AIM). AIM will observe the impact from a safe distance, and the probe's data will be used with other data collected by telescopes on Earth to understand exactly what the impact did to the asteroid.

"AIM is the usual shoebox satellite," ESA researcher Jens Biele, ?who works on the AIM spacecraft, said. "It's nothing very fancy."

AIDA scientists hope their mission will push the smaller Didymos asteroid off course by only a few millimeters. The small space rock orbits the larger, primary Didymos asteroid once every 12 hours.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/science/~3/c5vac-mjVOI/Cosmic-crash-2022-Space-probes-will-smash-into-asteroid-in-nine-years

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Veterans fight changes to disability payments (The Arizona Republic)

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Italy president pledges to stay to deal with crisis

By Giselda Vagnoni

ROME (Reuters) - Italian President Giorgio Napolitano on Saturday ruled out standing down early to make way for new parliamentary elections, after the failure of attempts to form a government this week, saying he would keep trying to find a way out of the deadlock.

Napolitano, whose term ends on May 15, spoke after news reports suggested he might resign to get around constitutional provisions which prevent a president dissolving parliament and calling elections during his final months in office.

"I will continue until the last day of my mandate to do as my sense of national responsibility suggests, without hiding from the country the difficulties that I am still facing," he told reporters at his Quirinale palace.

But he acknowledged that he had limited scope to force the divided parties to find a way out of political situation that he said was "frozen between irreconcilable positions".

With investors still mindful of the turmoil that took the euro zone to the brink of disaster in 2011, the gridlock has revived worries about Italy just as the Cyprus banking crisis reopened concern about the stability of the single currency.

Napolitano said he would ask two small groups of experts to formulate proposals for institutional and social and economic reforms that could be supported by all political parties.

He named 10 senior figures including Enrico Giovannini, the head of statistics agency ISTAT, European Affairs Minister Enzo Moavero Milanesi and Bank of Italy board member Salvatore Rossi as well as one senior figure from each of the main parties apart from the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement.

Napolitano met leaders of the main parties on Friday to try to find a way out of the stalemate created by an election which has left Italy facing a return to the polls after no party won a viable majority in parliament.

However with all of the three main formations in parliament clinging to entrenched positions that have prevented a majority being formed, hopes of a solution that would head off potentially destabilizing early elections have faded.

Pier Luigi Bersani, whose center-left alliance has a majority in the lower house but not the Senate, was rebuffed by the populist 5-Star Movement, which rejects deals with the main parties it blames for Italy's social and economic crisis.

Bersani himself rejected demands by center-right leader Silvio Berlusconi for a cross-party coalition deal that would give the scandal-plagued former prime minister a share in power and the right to decide Napolitano's successor.

Both Berlusconi's group and the 5-Star Movement, led by ex-comic Beppe Grillo have also ruled out a new technocrat government like the one led by outgoing Prime Minister Mario Monti, blocking what appears to be the only other option.

IRRECONCILABLE

Napolitano's pledge to stay on delayed an immediate crisis but left hopes of progress dependent on parties which are divided less by substantive issues of policy than by deep personal mistrust that has worsened as the standoff has worn on.

Bersani said he would be guided by Napolitano but Berlusconi's party secretary Angelino Alfano had a more lukewarm response and stuck to demands for a coalition government in which it would play a part.

"Either we have a political government with a grand coalition or we return to vote immediately," he told Italian daily Corriere della Sera. "If the initiative begun today leads to this outcome, good. Otherwise, the only way is to go straight to the polls with no delay," he said.

Napolitano stressed that Monti retained full authority at the head of a caretaker administration until a new government can be formed but he will be unable to undertake any significant reforms to Italy's stagnant economy, now deep in its longest recession for 20 years.

Parliament must soon begin preparations to vote for a new president either to oversee the first steps of a new government or early elections and the battle to choose the next head of state is unlikely to ease the political tensions.

The head of state, elected by a joint sitting of parliament and representatives from the regions, has a broadly defined but at times vital role in overseeing affairs of state, as Napolitano himself has shown repeatedly ever since the last Berlusconi government fell in 2011.

With bond markets closed for the Easter break, investors have been left on the sidelines but a poorly received auction of mid- and long-term debt last week underlined the danger if the crisis drags on.

(Additional reporting by Naomi O'Leary in Rome and Ethan Bilby in Brussels; Writing by James Mackenzie; editing by Barry Moody and Rosalind Russell)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/italy-president-could-resign-allow-election-source-083108238--business.html

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Monroe, Eisenhower letters to be auctioned

NEW YORK (AP) ? Marilyn Monroe's letter of despair to mentor Lee Strasberg and Dwight D. Eisenhower's heartfelt missives to his wife during World War II are among hundreds of historical documents being offered in an online auction.

Monroe's handwritten, undated letter to the famed acting teacher is expected to fetch $30,000 to $50,000 in the May 30 sale.

"My will is weak but I can't stand anything. I sound crazy but I think I'm going crazy," Monroe wrote on Hotel Bel-Air letterhead stationery. "It's just that I get before a camera and my concentration and everything I'm trying to learn leaves me. Then I feel like I'm not existing in the human race at all."

The 58 Eisenhower letters, handwritten between 1942 and 1945, range from news of the war to the Allied commander's devotion to his wife, Mamie. They are believed to be among the largest group of Eisenhower letters to survive intact and could bring up to $120,000, said Joseph Maddalena, whose Profiles in History is auctioning the items.

They are among 250 letters and documents being sold by an anonymous American collector. Selected items will be exhibited April 8-16 at Douglas Elliman's Madison Avenue art gallery.

Also included is a typed, undated draft letter from John Lennon to Linda and Paul McCartney that reflects the deep animosity between the two Beatles around the time of the foursome's formal 1971 breakup. The two-page letter is unsigned and contains corrections. A photographic logo on the stationery shows Lennon and his wife Yoko Ono within a circle with their lips almost touching.

"Do you really think most of today's art came about because of the Beatles? I don't believe you're that insane ? Paul ? do you believe that? When you stop believing it you might wake up!" Lennon writes. It's expected to fetch $40,000 to $60,000.

Other highlights include two large photo albums that Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini exchanged prior to World War II.

"When Mussolini and Hitler visited each other before the war, they would each have their photographers document their trips," Maddalena said. "They really documented the regalia, the flags, the uniforms, tanks and all the pomp and circumstance, and them speaking and reviewing the troops."

The leather-bound albums, containing hundreds of images, have a pre-sale estimate of up to $50,000.

The sale is the second of several planned online auctions of the anonymous collector's artifacts. The entire collection contains 3,000 items.

____

Online: http://www.profilesinhistory.com

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/monroe-eisenhower-letters-auctioned-062939252.html

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Saturday, March 30, 2013

Singer Michelle Shocked sits in at canceled show

SANTA CRUZ, Calif. (AP) ? Her show had been cancelled, but that didn't stop alternative folk and rock singer Michelle Shocked from showing up at a Santa Cruz nightclub where she staged a sit-in with tape across her mouth that read "Silenced By Fear."

Moe's Alley was one of several nightclubs that cancelled Shocked's gigs after she made what were considered anti-gay comments during a rambling outburst at a show earlier this month.

On Thursday evening, Moe's Alley owner Bill Welch had replaced her with two local bands that support gay rights, Beaver Fever and Frootie Flavors.

"We will not be bashing Michelle Shocked," he said. "Rather, we will celebrate music, diversity and send some healing Santa Cruz energy her way."

Sitting on the ground outside the venue and strumming her guitar, Shocked was largely ignored and refused to speak. She pointed to a sign inviting people to pick up a Sharpie marker and write on the white disposable safety suit she was wearing.

Earlier this week in an email to The Associated Press and other media, Shocked apologized and said her comments during the San Francisco show were misinterpreted.

"Of course the fault for that is completely my own, and I cannot and do not blame anyone for defending the gay community," she wrote.

On Thursday night, she posted signs that read "Does speech scare you that much?" and on her back she had scrawled "Gimme Wit, Not Spit."

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/singer-michelle-shocked-sits-canceled-show-033230066.html

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What role do small dams play in pollution control?

Mar. 28, 2013 ? Sometimes, little things can add up to a lot. In short, that's the message of a research study on small dams, streams and pollution by Steve Powers, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Notre Dame's Environmental Change Initiative (ECI).

"Small dams, reservoirs and ponds trap water pollution, which provides an important benefit to water resources," Powers said. "This is especially relevant in agricultural lands of the Midwest U.S., where there are lots of small, but aging dams."

Although small individually, the sum total of the small reservoirs and ponds have a global surface area comparable to that of all large reservoirs added together.

Powers and his fellow researchers showed in detail how a small aging dam, which was more than 100 years old and located in agricultural Wisconsin, trapped water pollutants associated with fertilizer and manure runoff. They also showed an increase in downstream transport of nutrient pollution after the dam was removed, which occurred because of concerns about the dam's safety.

"Many small dams are threatened by long-term structural decline and are also filling with sediment," Powers said. "If we don't better incorporate how small dams affect the movement of water and wastes through the environment, their benefit to downstream water quality could be lost. Meanwhile, legacy sediment and pollution currently trapped behind dams could release as dams lose their water storage capacity, fall apart, or are removed deliberately."

Powers notes that there is a crucial need to gain a better understanding of what small dams mean for our water quality before they crumble and disappear.

"I am continuing to work on the subject at a broader regional scale by looking at hundreds of stream and river monitoring stations throughout the Midwestern U.S. to detect signals of dams," he said. "One current goal is to try and figure out which regions are most vulnerable to water quality changes caused by accumulation of sediment and phosphorus behind dams."

The research paper appeared in the Journal of Geophysical Research-Biogeosciences.

Powers is conducting his research as part of the Notre Dame Environmental Change Initiative's Land Use Project. The Environmental Change Initiative conducts policy-oriented research designed to help policy-makers manage environmental changes.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by University of Notre Dame.

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Journal Reference:

  1. S. M. Powers, J. P. Julian, M. W. Doyle, E. H. Stanley. Retention and transport of nutrients in a mature agricultural impoundment. Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences, 2013; DOI: 10.1029/2012JG002148

Note: If no author is given, the source is cited instead.

Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/most_popular/~3/YxvhKhIHuEg/130329090620.htm

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Obama pitches public works spending to create jobs

MIAMI (AP) ? Trying to show that the economy remains a top priority, President Barack Obama promoted a plan Friday to create construction and other jobs by attracting private money to help rebuild roads, bridges and other public works projects.

Obama fleshed out the details during a visit to a Miami port that's undergoing $2 billion in upgrades paid for with government and private dollars. The quick trip was designed to show that the economy and unemployment are top priorities for a president who also is waging high-profile campaigns on immigration reform and gun control.

Obama said the unemployment rate among construction workers was the highest of any industry, despite being cut nearly in half over the past three years.

"There are few more important things we can do to create jobs right now and strengthen our economy over the long haul than rebuilding the infrastructure that powers our businesses and economy," Obama said. "As president, my top priority is to make sure we are doing everything we can to reignite the true engine of our economic growth ? and that is a rising, thriving middle class."

Among the proposals Obama called for, which require approval from Congress, are:

?$4 billion in new spending on two infrastructure programs that award loans and grants.

?Higher caps on "private activity bonds" to encourage more private spending on highways and other infrastructure projects. State and local governments use the bonds to attract investment.

?Giving foreign pension funds tax-exempt status when selling U.S. infrastructure, property or real estate assets. U.S. pension funds are generally tax exempt in those circumstances. The administration says some international pension funds cite the tax burden as a reason for not investing in American infrastructure.

?A renewed call for a $10 billion national "infrastructure bank."

Arriving at the expansive port in Miami, Obama stood inside a double-barreled, concrete-laced hole in the ground, touring a tunnel project that will connect the port to area highways. The project has received loans and grants under the programs Obama touted and is expected to open next summer.

The president made private-sector infrastructure investment a key part of the economic agenda he rolled out in his State of the Union address last month. In the speech, he also called for a "Fix-It-First" program that would spend $40 billion in taxpayer funds on urgent repairs.

Congressional approval is not a sure bet, considering that House Republicans have shown little appetite for Obama's spending proposals. In fact, the infrastructure bank is an idea Obama called for many times in the past, but it gained little traction during his first term.

Obama's focus on generating more private-sector investment underscores the tough road new spending faces on Capitol Hill, where Republican lawmakers often threaten to block new spending unless it's paid for by cutting taxes or other spending. "These are projects that are helpful to the economy and shouldn't break down on partisan lines," said White House spokesman Josh Earnest.

But Florida Republicans, including Gov. Rick Scott, faulted Obama for being "late to the party." Before Obama arrived in Florida, Scott argued that state taxpayers have had to pick up too much of the tab for this and other port projects because the president was slow to support them.

Alan Krueger, chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, told reporters traveling with Obama that the initiatives discussed Friday will cost $21 billion, not including the $40 billion for "Fix-It-First." Krueger said any increased spending associated with the proposals would not add to the deficit.

Krueger said details of how the programs would be paid for would be included in the budget Obama is scheduled to release on April 10.

___

AP White House Correspondent Julie Pace in Washington contributed to this report.

___

Follow Josh Lederman on Twitter: http://twitter.com/joshledermanAP

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-pitches-public-works-spending-create-jobs-185930569--finance.html

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Crisis hotlines turning to text to reach teens

NEW YORK (AP) ? They stream in a couple of dozen times a week, cries for help in bursts of text to DoSomething.org, a nonprofit more used to texting out details to teens on good causes and campaigns than receiving them from young people in crisis.

"I feel like committing suicide," one text read. "What's the suicide hotline number?" Another asked: "How do you tell a friend they need to go to rehab?"

DoSomething isn't a hotline, but its CEO, Nancy Lublin, decided to, well, do something. She's leading an effort to establish a 24/7 national text number across trigger issues for teens in the hope that it will become their 911, perhaps reaching those who wouldn't otherwise seek help using more established methods of telephone talking or computer-based chat.

"Most of the texts we get like this are about things like being bullied," Lublin said. "A lot of things are about relationships, so we'll get texts from kids about breakups, or 'I like a boy, what should I do?' But the worst one we ever got said, 'He won't stop raping me. It's my dad. He told me not to tell anyone. Are you there?'"

Lublin hopes the Crisis Text Line, due to launch in August, will serve as a New York-based umbrella, shuttling texts for help to partner organizations around the country, such as The Trevor Project for gay, lesbian, bisexual and questioning youth or other groups already providing hotlines on dating and sexual abuse to bullying, depression and eating disorders.

As more teens have gone mobile, using their phones as an extension of themselves, hotline providers have tried to keep up. Fewer seem to operate today than in decades past. A smattering reach out through mobile text, including Teen Line in Los Angeles, though that service and others offer limited schedules or are "siloed," as Lublin put it, specializing in narrow areas of concern when multiple problems might be driving a teen to the brink.

Some text providers operate in specific towns, counties or regions and-or rely on trained teen volunteers to handle the load across modes of communication. Several agreed that text enhances call-in and chat options for a generation of young people who prefer to communicate by typing on their phones, especially when they don't want parents, teachers, friends or boyfriends to listen in.

"We've had people who are walking and they just needed to get out of their house because they had an argument with their parent, so they're texting us as they're calming down," said Jennifer James, who supervises chat and text outreach for Common Ground, which also serves adults from its base in southeastern Michigan.

Katie Locke, 26, in Philadelphia was one of those teens in 2006, when she found herself in a suicidal panic after a fight with an old friend.

At 18, she said she grabbed her phone, left her college dorm room and headed out in the cold to sit on a bench to talk with a worker on a crisis phone line she knew from one of her favorite blogs. The number was the only one she had handy and it didn't offer text, which she would have preferred.

"People don't always have the (mobile phone) minutes or aren't in a position where they can speak aloud if they're in danger from somebody around them," Locke said. "I know for me there were other times when I probably should have called a crisis hotline and didn't because of the anxiety about calling. That was such an enormous barrier, to have to dial a phone number."

Brian Pinero, director of the National Dating Abuse Helpline run by a nonprofit called Love is Respect, knows that lesson well.

The organization launched phone and computer-based chat in 2007, and chat quickly grew to the more heavily used method of contact. The Austin, Texas-based group launched text in 2011 and it's now about 20 percent of the operation, Pinero said.

"Many times the phone is actually the most powerful computer in the home, but also for people who are of lower socio-economic status, they may not have the ability to engage in chat. Text messaging is something that is even offered on pay-as-you-go phones."

According to research from the Pew Internet & American Life Project, one in four teens is a "cell-mostly" Internet user. Texting among teens increased from about 50 texts a day in 2009 to about 60, with the number running into hundreds for some.

"Phone calls are not the way young people express themselves," said Danah Boyd, a senior researcher at Microsoft Research and an assistant professor of media, culture and communication at New York University.

"And one of the big problems that's emerged is hotlines are splintered across a ton of different phone numbers. Young people don't know them," said Boyd, who sits on the board of Crisis Text Line.

Comparisons of text hotline volume and efficiency are hard to come by. Researcher Deb Levine, executive director and founder of the nonprofit ISIS, for Internet Sexuality Information Services, said it's clear the number of hotlines of all kinds has declined significantly since a heyday in the Just Say No 1980s.

But chat and text help have been on the rise for more than two years, she said. Most are small-scale operations serving specific communities, said Levine, who lives in the San Francisco Bay area.

"Hotlines are always going to serve a purpose for some teens. Some of them are going to pick up the phone and call, some of them are going to text. I do believe that there's only so much you can do in 160 characters," she said. "There is a power to voice."

The Planned Parenthood Federation of America is in its second year of running one of the largest text and chat outreach operations for people ages 15 to 24, targeting African-American and Latino youth through promotional campaigns on MTV, websites and mobile providers, social media, wallet cards, video and Seventeen magazine.

Through February, nearly 185,000 conversations ? 22,447 via text ? were recorded, according to Planned Parenthood. About a third of conversations on health-related topics ? including birth control, abortion and pregnancy tests ? were with users both under 25 and African-American or Latino.

And nearly all chat and text users ages 15 to 24 agreed or strongly agreed that they were satisfied with their conversations, indicating significantly decreased levels of worry afterward.

"What we've seen from our online chat and text-messaging program is that they appreciate a real answer, in real time, from a real person," said Leslie Kantor, Planned Parenthood's vice president of education.

Evie Priestman, 14, an eighth-grader in Arlington, Va., has called hotlines as recently as a month ago, when she reached out for information on fending off suicidal thoughts, but she hasn't tried text.

"I think teens would definitely use a hotline if they could text to it. I know I would," she said. "Most teens keep their feelings to themselves."

Debbie Gant-Reed sees the need every day. She's the crisis lines coordinator at a 24-hour help line in Reno, Nev., called the Crisis Call Center. The center has been providing 24-hour text help for two and a half years, fielding about 500 text conversations a month.

"We're now taking texts from all over the country," she said. "You can chat all you want but you're going to get older people. Young people don't chat. They text."

___

Follow Leanne Italie on Twitter at http://twitter.com/litalie

___

Online:

http://www.crisistextline.org/ (text service scheduled to launch in August)

Planned Parenthood Federal of America text line video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qYj4TF4c42Y (text PPGO to 774636)

National Dating Abuse Helpline: http://www.loveisrespect.org/about-national-dating-abuse-helpline

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: http://www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org/ (phone and chat service only)

Crisis Call Center: http://www.crisiscallcenter.org/crisisservices.html (text ANSWER to 839863)

Teenlineonline.org: Teen Line in Los Angeles (text TEEN to 839863)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/crisis-hotlines-turning-text-reach-teens-160806045.html

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The Chilling Effects of the DMCA

Stacked CDs Stacked CDs

Photo by Fuse/Thinkstock

It was hard to believe, but the student insisted it was true. He had discovered that compact discs from a major record company, Sony BMG, were installing dangerous software on people?s computers, without notice. The graduate student, Alex Halderman (now a professor at the University of Michigan), was a wizard in the lab. As experienced computer security researchers, Alex and I knew what we should do: First, go back to the lab and triple-check everything. Second, warn the public.

But by this point, in 2005, the real second step was to call a lawyer. Security research was increasingly becoming a legal minefield, and we wanted to make sure we wouldn?t run afoul of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. We weren?t afraid that our research results were wrong. What scared us was having to admit in public that we had done the research at all.

Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of people were inserting tainted music CDs into their computers and receiving spyware. In fact, the CDs went beyond installing unauthorized software on the user?s computer. They also installed a ?rootkit??they modified the Windows operating system to create an invisible area that couldn?t be detected by ordinary measures, and in many cases couldn?t be discovered even by virus checkers. The unwanted CD software installed itself in the invisible area, but the rootkit also provided a safe harbor for any other virus that wanted to exploit it. Needless to say, this was a big security problem for users. Our professional code told us that we had to warn them immediately. But our experience with the law told us to wait.

The law that we feared, the DMCA, was passed in 1998 but has been back in the news lately because it prohibits unlocking cellphones and interferes with access by people with disabilities. But its impact on research has been just as dramatic. Security researchers have long studied consumer technologies, to understand how they work, how they can fail, and how users can protect themselves from malfunctions and security flaws. This research benefits the public by making complex technologies more transparent. At the same time, it teaches the technology community how to design better, safer products in the future. These benefits depend on researchers being free to dissect products and talk about what they find.

We were worried about the part of the DMCA called 17 U.S.C. ? 1201(a)(1), which says that ?No person shall circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under [copyright law].? We had to disable the rootkit to detect what it was hiding, and we had to partially disable the software to figure out what it was doing. An angry record company might call either of those steps an act of circumvention, landing us in court. Instead of talking to the public, we talked to our lawyer.

This wasn?t the first time the DMCA had interfered with my security research. Back in 2001, my colleagues and I had had to withdraw a peer-reviewed paper about CD copy protection, because the Recording Industry Association of America and others were threatening legal action, claiming that our paper was a ?circumvention technology? in violation of another section of the DMCA. Later we sued for the right to publish these results?and we did publish, four months later. We had won, but we had also learned firsthand about the uncertainty and chaos that legal threats can cause. I was impressed that some of my colleagues had been willing to risk their jobs for our work, but none of us wanted to relive the experience.

Alex had dealt with his own previous DMCA threat, although this one was more comical than frightening. After he revealed that a CD copy protection product from a company called SunnComm could be defeated by holding down the computer?s Shift key while inserting the disc, the company had threatened him with DMCA action. Given the colorful history of the company?it had started corporate life as a booking agency for Elvis impersonators?and the company?s subsequent backtracking from the threat, we weren?t too worried about being sued. Nevertheless, it showed that the DMCA had become a go-to strategy for companies facing embarrassing revelations about their products.

What was Congress thinking when it passed this part of the DMCA? The act was meant to update copyright law for the 21st century, to shore up the shaky technologies that tried to stop people from copying music and movies. But the resulting law was too broad, ensnaring legitimate research activities.

The research community saw this problem coming and repeatedly asked Congress to amend the bill that would become the DMCA, to create an effective safe harbor for research. There was a letter to Congress from 50 security researchers (including me), another from the heads of major scientific societies, and a third from the leading professional society for computer scientists. But with so much at stake in the act for so many major interests, our voice wasn?t heard. As they say in Washington, we didn?t have a seat at the table.

Congress did give us a research exemption, but it was so narrowly defined as to be all but useless. (So perhaps we did have a seat?at the kids? table.) I?ll spare you the details, but basically, there is a 116-word section of the Act titled ?Permissible Acts of Encryption Research,? and it appears to have been written without consulting any researchers. There may be someone, somewhere, who has benefited from this exemption, but it fails to protect almost all of the relevant research. It didn?t protect Alex and me, because we were investigating spyware that didn?t rely on the mathematical operations involved in encryption.

Source: http://feeds.slate.com/click.phdo?i=a8f3c9e152953a18b0b979c238b8987e

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Jennifer Lawrence afraid of ghosts, not burglars

Fabulous

By Ree Hines, TODAY contributor

Never one to hold back what's on her mind, 22-year-old leading lady Jennifer Lawrence delivered some of her off-the-cuff commentary on a variety of topics -- from feeling like a dog, to the value of a buck, to admitting her biggest fears -- in an interview with U.K. magazine Fabulous.

Maybe her unrehearsed off-screen nature comes from the fact that she just doesn?t know quite what to say without a script.

?I have no control over what comes out of my mouth,? she told the magazine. ?I would probably turn into a mute if I read what I said!?

So she doesn't read or watch or hold back.

?I?m afraid I?m going to go my whole life being scared like a chihuahua,? she said. ?Making movies is where I belong. I shouldn?t be heard just talking. So, when I?m doing movies, I?m really happy. That?s where I?m comfortable, that?s my home. When you put me on a red carpet or on a stage, I turn into chihuahua Jennifer.?

But no matter how much success she has, she doesn't plan to turn into big-spender Jennifer. The "Silver Linings Playbook" star said she was raised to "have respect for money, even though you have a lot of it."

"That?s why mini-bars are difficult, because it?s like yes, I can afford a $6 Snickers bar, but there?s just something wrong with that!" she insisted. "I still drive my same car I?ve been driving for a long time and I haven?t bought a house yet."

As for the house she lives in now, Lawrence shared this shocker: she's not too concerned about uninvited guests -- as long as they're alive.

"I actually get comforted when I feel like there might be a burglar in my house, like, 'There?s a real person that might be breaking into my house, it?s not a ghost, that?s a relief,'" she said.

Related content:

Source: http://todayentertainment.today.com/_news/2013/03/28/17503501-jennifer-lawrence-im-more-scared-of-ghosts-than-burglars?lite

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NPR ends its news show 'Talk of the Nation'

"East Coast liberal elites" have lost another outlet for their opinions now that?National Public Radio is putting an end to one of its signature shows.?After 21 years on the air, the afternoon call-in show "Talk of that Nation" is being sent out to pasture, taking away the best opportunity the public radio listeners had for interacting with the show and getting their views on the airwaves.

RELATED: Maureen Corrigan: What I Read

The plan, according to Brian Stelter of The New York Times, is to replace "Talk" with the straight news program "Here and Now," which will expand to two hours and fill up the weekday afternoon schedule. "Here and Now" is produced by Boston University's WBUR.

RELATED: Katie Couric's CBS Salary Exceeds Two NPR Show Budgets Combined

It sounds more like a retirement?than a cancellation, since NPR says they offered other jobs to host Neal Conan and every staffer on "Talk." (Conan has decided to leave the network he's been working at since 1977, in order to "step away from the rigors of daily journalism.") Also, the topical once-a-week version of "Talk," which is known as "Science Friday," will continue to air in its regular slot.

RELATED: It's OK, Rush: Don't Fear the Twitter

NPR said the decision was made in part because member stations had requested another news magazine-style show to match "Morning Edition" and "All Things Considered," and that there is already a glut of call-in shows on talk radio. The final episode will air at the end of July.

RELATED: NPR's New CEO Wants to Fix Its Liberal Problem

Image via?cliff1066??on Flickr

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nprs-talk-nation-signing-off-143309856.html

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Busted! Adults text-and-drive more than teens

Teens' hands may be fused to their phones, but on the road, it's adults who say they text more. Anew survey of driving and texting habits, commissioned by AT&T and conducted by ResearchNow, asked 1,011 adults if they texted or emailed while at the wheel.

Almost every adult surveyed ? 98 percent of them ? knew texting or emailing while driving was unsafe (though we wonder what that last two percent are thinking). But half of the group (49 percent) said they did it anyway.

Also, 60 percent of the adults said they didn't text and drive three years ago.

In a similar survey from April last year, 43 percent of a 1,200 teens between 15 and 19 said they texted while driving with their licenses or learning permits.

As a member of the National Safety Council pointed out to USA Today, this trend is concerning because there's just plain more adults than teens on the roads: 10 million teen learners, compared 180 million full-grown humans in cars and presumably with phones. The NSC estimates that 100,000 road crashes involve texters at the wheel.

Of course, there is the chance that teens were shyer about sharing their true texting habits. Even so, adults don't seem to be setting the best example.

Nidhi Subbaraman writes about technology and science. Follow her on Twitter and Google+.

Source: http://feeds.nbcnews.com/c/35002/f/653377/s/2a23aa30/l/0L0Snbcnews0N0Ctechnology0Ctechnolog0Cbusted0Eadults0Etext0Edrive0Emore0Eteens0E1C9139940A/story01.htm

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Obama implores Congress to enact gun reforms

President Barack Obama addresses gun violence on March 28. (Yuri Gripas/Reuters)President Barack Obama spoke at the White House with rows of grieving mothers behind him and publicly implored Congress to pass gun-reform legislation 100 days after the Sandy Hook Elementary School mass shootings in Newtown, Conn.

"We've cried enough. We've known enough heartbreak. ... It's something that if we are serious, we will do," Obama said, Vice President Joe Biden at his side. "Now is the time to turn that heartbreak into something real."

As the mothers of children killed by gun violence wiped away tears, the president went on to urge the passage of background checks for gun buyers, and for loopholes to be closed for buyers who turn around and sell guns to criminals. He said 90 percent of Americans support background checks, as well as 80 percent of gun owners and 80 percent of Republicans.

Obama also suggested that too much time has passed since the shootings at Newtown. "Shame on us if we've forgotten. I haven't forgotten those kids. Shame on us if we've forgotten," the president said.

Later on Thursday, at the White Press briefing, Principal Deputy Press Secretary Josh Earnest addressed questions regarding timing and whether the president himself has acted swiftly enough on gun reform: "The president, I think, has been very forward-leaning in terms of the way he's engaged in this process."

Earnest also noted the 23 executive actions released by the White House in January and the more than 20 events and conversations with lawmakers, community leaders, survivors and gun-related groups the White House has undertaken in the days since Newtown.

But what many consider to be the most contentious proposed gun-reform legislation, an assault weapons ban, was absent from the president's remarks on Thursday.

Senate Democrats working on gun-reform legislation recently announced that they would drop an assault weapons ban from an overall package of reform measures and put it to a separate vote as an amendment. That action is designed to boost the chances a reform package will pass, as it's expected that the ban is too unpalatable for some members, especially Democrats in gun rights states and the multitude of Republican opponents.

The White House has been casting a positive spin on that decision, suggesting that offering the ban as an amendment still forces lawmakers to choose sides on the issue, even if it doesn't win passage.

"I can't stand here and guarantee that it?s going to pass," Earnest said at Wednesday's press briefing, "but it is a question that 100 senators are going to ask themselves when they wake up in the morning and look themselves in the mirror about whether or not they are going to?about which side they're going to be on when it comes to voting on a ban on military-style assault weapons." He added that the president will continue to advocate for the ban.

Democrats in Congress concede separating the ban from the overall package is the best way forward.

"We want to come out with the best, the boldest common denominator that we can get," House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said at a news conference on Wednesday when asked about the decision to separate an assault weapons ban.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has stated plans to introduce a gun-reform bill next month.

In addition to the president's talk, activities related to gun reform are taking place across the country on Thursday, a day gun-reform advocates have marked the "National Day to Demand Action" to end gun violence.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg?s anti-gun group, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, released two television ads on Thursday featuring family members of those killed in Newtown.

Court documents released on Thursday revealed, among other things, that police investigating the Sandy Hook massacre seized samurai swords, as well as a massive amount of ammunition and books on guns and mental health from the home of gunman Adam Lanza.

?

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/ticket/obama-urges-congress-pass-universal-background-checks-close-162559887--politics.html

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Blink-182 'Going Hard In The Paint' To Win Musical March Madness

The second round of MMM is winding down, but Blink-182 are just getting started.
By James Montgomery


Blink-182's Mark Hoppus
Photo: Chiaki Nozu/ WireImage

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1704503/blink-182-musical-march-madness.jhtml

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What if: Women's coaches weigh in on 1-on-1 games

Baylor coach Kim Mulkey laughed at the idea. Then, after giving it a little thought, declared herself the winner of a mythical NCAA women's tournament in which coaches played 1-on-1 to determine the winner of each round.

Like her Lady Bears, who are four games away from winning a second straight national championship, Mulkey feels she'd be a heavy favorite to win a coach versus coach tourney as well.

She might have a tougher time than Baylor, as there would be some really stiff competition from LSU's Nikki Caldwell and South Carolina's Dawn Staley, who had stellar playing careers. For once, Geno Auriemma (UConn) and Tara VanDerveer (Stanford) might not be the favorites to make the Final Four.

In fact, it might be tough for them to even make it out of the first round.

"Bring me the biggest, slowest, tallest, whichever one you want, I'd make them have to guard me outside the paint," Mulkey said. "And then defending the biggest, tallest, strongest, I'd take charges on them all day. I wouldn't let them back me down there."

The Associated Press threw out the scenario of a 1-on-1 hoops tournament to coaches from around the country ? essentially forcing them to rate each other as players.

Many paused for a minute from their game preparations to entertain the notion. Always analytical, they tried to come up with reasons to pick their favorites. Mulkey, Staley and Caldwell were the overwhelming top choices, while Auriemma and VanDerveer didn't get much support.

"I'm going to be competitive and I'm going to do whatever I can. I was that type of player and probably still am if I was out there," Caldwell said. "Just coming from a program, where I went to Tennessee, if you're coming to the dance, let's dance. So if there's a 1-on-1 tournament, let's go."

Gender didn't even factor in coming up with favorites.

"You don't even need to mention the male coaches. None of them had any careers," Mulkey said laughing. "Name me one male coach that was any good in college basketball. Can you think of any?"

Maybe Mulkey is lucky that Gonzaga coach Kelly Graves wasn't on her side of the bracket. The 6-foot-5 Graves played college basketball at New Mexico.

"I'd figure out a way to compete," she said. "I'd be the one getting on their last nerve."

Auriemma, who played in high school and junior college, might have to employ the same strategy.

"I would really like to know what kind of player Coach A was," said former UConn star and current broadcaster Rebecca Lobo. "On occasion, he would grab the ball and demonstrate what he wanted the guards to do and he looked a bit silly when dribbling. My guess is that he wouldn't stay on the court too long. ... His mouth would get him T'd and tossed pretty quickly."

Unlike Auriemma, Mulkey had quite the playing career at Louisiana Tech, helping guide the team to the first NCAA championship in 1982.

Mulkey's own players differ on how their fiery coach would do. Brittney Griner agrees with her coach thinking she'd win the title. Point guard Odyssey Sims had a different view.

"I don't think coach Mulkey is going to make it very far," Sims said laughing. "She doesn't play any defense, so I'm going to say ? I'll give her one or two, then she's going home. If you can do all the scoring and you're playing no defense, then it defeats the purpose."

Prairie View A&M coach Toyelle Wilson liked her chances against Mulkey in the opening round. Her team lost by 42 to Baylor to start the NCAAs. It was easy for her to come up with a strategy against Mulkey, since she wouldn't have to worry about facing Griner.

"I'd be digging on her and pressuring her and hopefully forcing her to take some fadeaway shots, kind of like how Brittney (Griner) makes people take those type of shots," Wilson said.

Wilson doesn't believe Mulkey's claim that she can't "shoot a lick."

"I think that's some sort of trickery that she's putting up and making me stay off her so she can take some set shots," said Wilson who played at Manhattan College. "I would start out pressuring her, just like she teaches her players."

Staley was a star at Virginia before going on to the ABL and WNBA. She also helped the U.S. win three Olympic gold medals, including one in 1996 under VanDerveer.

VanDerveer admitted that the format wouldn't be the best for her. But always the competitor, she'd be ready if it ever did happen.

"I'm not a 1-on-1 player," she said. "Even with the piano, I like duets."

Cal Poly coach Faith Mimnaugh was a great player for Loyola of Chicago in the early '80s. She still is in the NCAA top 10 in assists for a single season.

Mimnaugh picked Caldwell to advance from her region and if Caldwell were to meet Mulkey, who beat Mimnaugh out for the point guard spot on the 1984 Olympic team, she'd pick the LSU coach.

"Kim Mulkey was a great player, but if she had to go against Nikki, Nikki would throw all of her stuff," Mimnaugh said, waving her arm like she was ready to block a shot.

Seeding the bracket would be a new challenge for the selection committee.

"We'd need footage of people playing to accurately seed," selection committee member Kathy Meehan said laughing. "It would certainly spice up the brackets. I'd like to see that.

"Some of our student-athletes would love to see it. They'll see how much the coach's demeanor as a player carries over to the way they coach."

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AP Sports Writers Schuyler Dixon and Stephen Hawkins in Waco, Texas, Brett Martel in Baton Rouge, La. and Janie McCauley in Stanford, Calif. contributed to this report.

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/womens-coaches-weigh-1-1-games-083700650--spt.html

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