Amazon's Kindle Fire vs. Apple's iPad: A choice between price and functionality

If you altered your holiday?wish list after Amazon announced the Kindle Fire, we don't blame you. At $199 per unit, it's easily one of the most enticing devices slated to be on offer before the year ends. Unlike the other Kindle devices announced last week, the Fire is a full-fledged tablet with features that go beyond those of an e-reader. With the tablet market dominated by the Apple iPad, you might be inclined to ask: How does the Kindle Fire compare?

Display size and portability
With an 11.4mm depth, the Amazon Kindle Fire is just a tad thicker than Apple iPad 2's 8.8mm. However, when it comes to tablet size, the screen's dimensions are what really matters. If portability is of utmost importance to you, then the 7" Kindle Fire obviously has an advantage. If you think you need more screen real estate, though, the iPad with its 9.7" display is the better choice. Not to say a 10" tablet isn't portable ? it is. But if you're looking for something that fits in small purses or even large pockets, it's clear you need a smaller tablet.

Both the iPad and Amazon Kindle Fire have multi-touch displays, but the latter is limited to input from two fingers at a time. In comparison, the Apple iPad's true multi-touch capability can recognize input from all 10 fingers simultaneously.

Books, magazines, movies, music, and third-party apps
You can access millions of songs, movies, TV shows, and ebooks on iTunes using the iPad. But Amazon is also known for the content it offers, and you can rent, buy, or preview pretty much any digital product Amazon sells from the Kindle Fire. In fact, content is front and center on the Kindle Fire. On top of the original Android operating system is a user interface that looks nothing like any Android device's software to date.

The Kindle Fire's home screen is designed to look like a bookshelf with a search function for content and direct links to Newsstand (magazines), Books, Music, Video, Docs, Apps, and Web at the menu on the top. And happily, a free one-month trial of?Amazon Prime?comes with a new Kindle tablet. Amazon Prime gives you free two day shipping for?$79 per year, as well as access to Prime Instant Videos, which you can use to instantly stream any of the 10,000 movies and TV shows in its archive.

When it comes to third-party apps, though, the iPad is the landslide winner. Apple has always had an immense archive of third-party apps for its devices. And while the 140,000 apps customized for the iPad is but a fraction of the more than 500,000 overall items on the iTunes App Store, it's still a sizable number compared to what's available on Amazon. The Amazon Appstore first launched as an app for Android devices with 3,800 items on offer. It sells Android apps, but unlike the official Android Market, it's a lot more curated and more comparable to the Apple App Store when it comes quality checking.

Storage capacity and cloud reliance
At 16GB, the iPad's lowest storage capacity is twice that of Kindle Fire's 8GB, restricting Amazon's device to storing approximately 80 apps, 10 movies, 800 songs, or 6,000 ebooks on the device. But if you think you need more storage than that, it's not really an issue ? the Kindle Fire is designed to rely heavily on the cloud. The Amazon Cloud Drive stores your music and video on the web, and Kindle Fire owners get free storage for all Amazon-bought content.

Nevertheless, iPad also has its own cloud storage in the form of iCloud, although it works differently from Amazon's Cloud Drive. Whereas the Amazon Cloud Drive streams music and videos directly to your device on the internet, iCloud stores your files and lets you download them using any of your Apple devices.

Connectivity and Silk browser
Apple offers both wifi with 3G and wifi-only iPad units ? the latter, of course, considerably cheaper than the former. If you need constant connection on the go, it's the iPad that can deliver ? Kindle Fire only has wifi, limiting your mobility unless you have a 3G-enabled device that can act as a mobile hotspot.

But when Amazon's tablet is connected, the proprietary browser called Amazon Silk enables fast loading of websites.?Silk remembers your previous browsing habits and searches. Whenever you go to a particular website, it uses predictive technology to pre-fetch content you usually access for faster navigation. For Silk to be able to do so, it has to log URLs and other details on the Amazon cloud. Understandably, that has prompted some privacy concerns, but Amazon claims that any data it logs remains anonymous.

Mic, camera, and battery life
If you're looking forward to using your tablet to take pictures or do video calls, the Kindle Fire is not for you. Amazon has not included a camera or a microphone in its tablet. The iPad 2, on the other hand, comes replete with a microphone, a 0.3-megapixel, front-facing camera for video calls, and a 0.7-megapixel rear camera for photography and video recording.

Planning to bring your tablet everywhere with you? In terms of battery life, the iPad 2 comes out on top. It can last up to nine hours connected to a 3G network, up to 10 hours on wifi, or up to 10 hours streaming video and music. The Kindle Fire, on the other hand, promises eight hours of continuous reading or seven and a half hours of video playback.

Pricing and availability
Now that you know the important features to consider when choosing between the iPad and the Kindle Fire, all that remains to compare is the impact on your wallet. If you're going for maximum affordability, the Kindle Fire (priced at $199) is poised to make the smallest dent on your budget in terms of a tablet purchase.

The cheapest iPad 2 with 16GB storage and wifi-only connectivity costs $499 ? that's a full $300 more. Granted, the $199 Kindle Fire comes with ads that Amazon calls Special Offers; the ads-free version costs only $40 more. If you're in a very immediate need of a tablet, though, you'll have to settle with Apple; the Amazon Kindle Fire isn't shipping until November 15.

Choosing between the iPad and the Kindle Fire
While Amazon's first tablet is obviously tons cheaper than any iPad, it's also light on features. If you think you need a tablet only for surfing the web, listening to music, watching videos, and reading books or periodicals, then the Kindle Fire can do the job. But if you need anything more than that, then perhaps investing in the more expensive Apple iPad is the better option. Everyone has different needs ? assess yours when choosing between the iPad and the Kindle Fire, and get the one that gives you more bang for your buck.

Source: http://www.tecca.com/columns/kindle-fire-vs-ipad/

carrier classic j edgar hoover j edgar hoover jonathan papelbon jonathan papelbon trisomy 13 veterans

UN report: North Korean harvest improves (AP)

ROME ? U.N. food agencies say that North Korea's main harvest has improved but warn that malnutrition persists.

The report published Friday by two Rome-based agencies, the Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Food Program, says harvests are expected to increase by about 8.5 percent compared to last year's.

The U.N. assessment team says hospital staff report a "significant" increase in malnutrition among young children. Diets lacking in protein or nutrient rich foods are blamed.

The report says nearly 3 million people will continue to require food assistance next year. U.N. officials have appealed to wealthy countries to put aside politics to help hungry North Koreans. There have been concerns about whether Pyongyang's authoritarian government diverts food aid.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/un/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111125/ap_on_re_eu/eu_un_nkorea_food

iron bowl elf on the shelf elf on the shelf bo jackson bo jackson hazing ibogaine

Retirement Information Regarding Life Insurance Coverage ...

Perhaps you have reached retirement, have no dependents, and now feel life insurance coverage is unneeded for you. You may be right. But if, later, you?ve gathered debts and want them covered once you die, you might choose to do it with life insurance ? or an alternative. Here?s some retirement information regarding various choices with life insurance coverage.

Retirement information regarding utilizing an existing life insurance coverage
If you have a life insurance policy and feel you may need it to handle outstanding debts at your death (e.g. home loan, credit cards, etc), then maintain it. Another reason to keep life insurance coverage in retirement would be to equalize your estate. Say you?re leaving a resource that is hard to separate, your house, to once son. You can leave the life insurance reward to the other son.

Retirement information on getting a new life insurance policy
Should you worry about qualifying for brand new life insurance coverage to fulfil you?re demand?
Yes, if you would like a policy more than say $50,000 of death benefit. In such a case, your health wll determine eligibility. Wellness is not a concern for a small policy. You?ve seen these late nigh Television advertisements from AARP and Colonial Life on buying a $50,000 policy regardless of health. The will cost you a lot but they will sell a policy to anyone.

Retirement information regarding life insurance policy options
Loaning institutions have discovered it lucrative to provide insurance coverage to deal with debt you have with them. Credit card corporations and banks provide insurance deductibles on your outstanding balances. This?ll probably cost you a few bucks each month. And when you die, this debt-based insurance coverage will pay that particular financial debt entirely. Sometimes they are doing this for automobile loans.

So if this kind of debt-based insurance is a better alternative than spending for a regular lifestyle insurance policy to cover your financial debt, go for it. And if so, and also you nonetheless have additional use for a normal life insurance coverage, be sure to subtract off the financial debt covered by your debt-based insurance from your forecasted death benefit needs for the regular life insurance coverage.

Observe that any policy problems where wellness isn?t an issue for your insurance provider usually charges much more. Your least costs insurance policies always come from insurance providers who need taking a look at your health background and occasionally a health insurance exam.

Retirement information: disclosures about life insurance
The purchase of life insurance entails costs, fees, expenses and possible surrender charges and depends on the health of the candidate. Not every candidates are insurable (excluding for instances exactly where the insurance firm offers a no-health review policy). If a coverage is organized as a modified endowment agreement, withdrawals will be subject to tax as ordinary revenue and withdrawals prior to age 59 ? are subject to a 10% penalty.

Retirement information regarding liquidating an active life coverage
In case you have a policy in retirement and no longer need it as you do not have debts or estate equalization concerns as explained above, then you can either surrender it to the insurance organization or sell it to a third party. Just consult your insurance adviser about both alternatives and also to get you the quotations.

Source: http://www.retirement-income.net/blog/retirement-information/insurance-coverage/

florida marlins ncaa basketball boise state football boise state football jack and jill uss carl vinson holly marie combs

Obama pops into bookstore, backs small businesses (AP)

WASHINGTON ? President Barack Obama has pitched in to help small businesses get into the holiday shopping season.

The president took his daughters, Malia and Sasha, along on a shopping run to a bookstore a few blocks from the White House.

He says he made the visit because it's "small business Saturday" and he wanted to support a small business.

The retail industry is encouraging shoppers to patronize mom-and-pop businesses on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. It's a counterpoint to Black Friday and the sales and special deals offered by department stores and other large retailers.

The Obamas walked out with a selection of books including "The Invention of Hugo Cabret," "Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Cabin Fever" and "Descent into Chaos: The U.S. and the Disaster in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia."

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/obama/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111126/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_obama_shopping

reno news syracuse denver broncos shonn greene oklahoma state plane crash syracuse basketball syracuse university

Fanatec Forza Motorsport CSR Wheel and Elite Pedals review

Fanatec Porsche 911 Turbo Wheel for Xbox 360 review

Fanatec Porsche GT2 wheel and Clubsport pedals review

Forza Motorsport CSR and CSR Elite wheel and pedals hands-on

It's amazing to realize that about two years ago Fanatec's first Xbox 360 racing wheel, the Forza 3 Porsche 911 Turbo Wheel, hit the scene. Although it turned out to be a mixed bag, Fanatec pleasantly surprised us with its Porsche GT2 and Clubsport Pedals in January of this year -- despite a roaring fan and shaky shifter mounts. Now, we're saying hello to a new trio of racing sim-related goods from the company intended for Forza Motorsport 4 on Xbox 360: the $249.95 Forza Motorsport CSR Wheel, $59.95 shifter set, and $149.95 CSR Elite Pedals.

If you'll recall, it was back in March that we checked some of this kit out, and now with Forza 4 here, we hooked this mashup of gear up with our Playseat Evolution for a massive amount of virtual spins. So, did this combination help speed past the checkerboard with a respectable feel? Shift past the break find out in our full review.

Gallery: Fanatec Forza Motorsport CSR Wheel and Elite Pedals review

Continue reading Fanatec Forza Motorsport CSR Wheel and Elite Pedals review

Fanatec Forza Motorsport CSR Wheel and Elite Pedals review originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 24 Nov 2011 14:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Source: http://www.engadget.com/2011/11/24/edit-fanatec-forza-motorsort-csr-wheel-and-elite-pedals-review/

mike wallace mike wallace koch brothers dash diet weather phoenix dippin dots lindsey vonn

Mice with fewer insulin-signaling receptors don't live longer

Thursday, November 24, 2011

Scientists studying longevity thought it might be good to lack a copy of a gene, called IGF1 receptor, that is important in insulin signaling. Previous studies showed invertebrates that lacked the copy lived longer, even if their bodies were less responsive to insulin, the hormone that lowers blood sugar.

A new study from The University of Texas Health Science Center San Antonio challenges this. Knocking out one copy of the gene failed to increase the life span of male mice, and it only modestly increased the life span of female littermates.

Martin Adamo, Ph.D., professor of biochemistry, and Arlan Richardson, Ph.D., professor of cellular and structural biology, lead the laboratories that conducted the study. "Our data show insufficiency of this insulin-signaling gene does not produce a robust increase in life span as previously reported in invertebrates," Dr. Richardson said.

Dr. Adamo said: "This demonstrates that reducing insulin signaling through the IGF1 pathway in mammals does not play the same role in aging that is observed in invertebrates."

A receptor is a molecule on a cell's membrane that receives chemical signals. Knocking down the genetic instructions that make IGF1 receptors results in reduced insulin signaling.

###

The study is described Nov. 23 in the journalPLoS ONE.

University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio: http://www.uthscsa.edu/hscnews

Thanks to University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

This press release has been viewed 87 time(s).

Source: http://www.labspaces.net/115462/Mice_with_fewer_insulin_signaling_receptors_don_t_live_longer

listeria listeria kendall hunter 50 50 50 50 gene simmons family jewels dream house

They call it 'guppy love': Biologists solve an evolution mystery

Thursday, November 24, 2011

Guppies in the wild have evolved over at least half-a-million years ? long enough for the males' coloration to have changed dramatically. Yet a characteristic orange patch on male guppies has remained remarkably stable, though it could have become redder or more yellow. Why has it stayed the same hue of orange over such a long period of time?

Because that's the color female guppies prefer.

"Sometimes populations have to evolve just to stay the same," said Greg Grether, a UCLA professor of ecology and evolutionary biology and co-author of a study published Nov. 23 in the online edition of the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, a major journal for research in evolutionary biology.

"In this case, the males have evolved back over and over again to the color that females prefer," said Grether, who noted that there are many examples in which there is less variation among populations of a species than life scientists would expect.

The new study, funded by the National Science Foundation, "provides a neat solution to a mystery that has puzzled me for years," he said.

The orange patches on male guppies are made up of two pigments: carotenoids (which they ingest in their diets and are yellow) and drosopterins (which are red and which their bodies produce). Carotenoids are the same pigments that provide color to vegetables and fruits. Plants produce carotenoids, but animals generally cannot; guppies obtain most of their carotenoids from algae.

UCLA's Kerry Deere, the lead author of the study, conducted experiments in which she presented female guppies (Poecilia reticulata) with a choice of males with low, medium and high levels of drosopterin to see which males they preferred. In her experiments, the females were given a wider range of pigment choices than they would find in the wild. Deere, who was a graduate student of ecology and evolutionary biology in Grether's laboratory at the time and is currently a UCLA postdoctoral scholar in human genetics, conducted more than 100 mate-choice trials.

The females strongly preferred the intermediate males, those whose patches, or spots, were the right hue of orange ? not too red and not too yellow.

"The females preferred the males with an intermediate drosopterin level by a highly significant margin," Deere said.

"Males that are closer to this preferred hue probably have more offspring," Grether said.

If guppies were dependent only on carotenoids for their orange coloration, one would expect to find large changes in the color of their orange patches because the availability of algae varies by location. Guppies are native to Trinidad and Venezuela; the ones in this study were from Trinidad.

(Unlike the colorful guppies sold in pet stores, female guppies in the wild do not have bright coloration like the orange patches. Males are not as ornate, or as large, as the pet-store variety either.)

"A pattern I discovered 10 years ago, which was mysterious at first, is that in locations where more carotenoids are available in their diet, guppies produce more of the drosopterins," Grether said. "There is a very strong pattern of the ratio of these two kinds of pigments staying about the same.

"To human eyes at least, as the proportion of carotenoids in the spots goes up, the spots look yellower, and as the proportion of drosopterins goes up, the spots look redder. By maintaining a very similar ratio of the two pigments across sites, the fish maintain a similar hue of orange from site to site. What is maintaining the similar pigment ratio across sites and across populations? The reason for the lack of variation is that genetic changes counteract environmental changes. The males have evolved differences in drosopterin production that keep the hue relatively constant across environments. As a result of Kerry's experiment, we now have good evidence that female mate choice is responsible for this pattern."

While there are many cases in nature in which genetic variation in a trait masks environmental variation, there are very few examples where the cause is known.

"I originally assumed if there was variation among populations in drosopterin production, it would be the populations where carotenoid availability was lowest that were producing more of these synthetic pigments to compensate for the lack of carotenoids in their diet. But we found the opposite pattern," Grether said. "They're not using drosopterins as a carotenoid substitute; they're matching carotenoid levels with drosopterins. Why they are doing that was a mystery. The answer appears to be that it enables them to maintain the hue that female guppies prefer."

###

University of California - Los Angeles: http://www.newsroom.ucla.edu

Thanks to University of California - Los Angeles for this article.

This press release was posted to serve as a topic for discussion. Please comment below. We try our best to only post press releases that are associated with peer reviewed scientific literature. Critical discussions of the research are appreciated. If you need help finding a link to the original article, please contact us on twitter or via e-mail.

This press release has been viewed 128 time(s).

Source: http://www.labspaces.net/115457/They_call_it__guppy_love___Biologists_solve_an_evolution_mystery

west virginia football west virginia football wvu football meteor shower tonight district 9 district 9 pandaria

India opens door to foreign supermarket chains (Reuters)

NEW DELHI (Reuters) ? India threw open its $450 billion retail market to global supermarket giants on Thursday, approving its biggest reform in years that may boost sorely needed investment in Asia's third-largest economy.

The world's largest retail group, Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT.N), and its rivals see India's retail sector as one of the last frontier markets, where a burgeoning middle-class still shops at local, family-owned merchants.

Allowing foreign retailers to take stakes of up to 51 percent in supermarkets would attract much needed capital from abroad and ultimately help unclog supply bottlenecks that have kept inflation stubbornly close to a double-digit clip.

Wal-Mart hailed the decision, but said it would take a close look at the fine print to see what the decision entails for its ability to do business in India.

"We believe this is an important first step," said Scott Price, president and chief executive of Walmart Asia in a statement.

Raj Jain, who heads Wal-Mart India, told CNBC TV18 the decision will "redefine the way consumers shop in India, but more importantly, the way supply chains in India run."

Under fire for a slow pace of reform, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's embattled government appears to be slowly shaking off a string of corruption scandals to focus on policy changes long desired by investors.

"This is a very bold move and the economic reforms process is back on track." Rajan Mittal, vice chairman of India's Bharti Enterprises, which is Wal-Mart's partner in that market, told reporters.

Millions of small retail traders vigorously oppose competing with foreign giants, potentially providing a lightning rod for criticism of the ruling Congress party ahead of crucial state elections next year.

Food Minister K.V. Thomas said the government will allow

foreign direct investment of up to 51 percent in multi-brand retail - as supermarkets are known in India. It will also raise the cap on foreign investment in single-brand retailing to 100 percent from 51 percent, he added.

The new rules may commit supermarkets to strict local sourcing requirements and minimum investment levels aimed at protecting jobs, according to local media.

A heavyweight member of Singh's coalition government warned on Thursday it unequivocally opposed opening the sector.

The move is politically risky.

Fears of potential job losses could heighten popular anger at the Congress party ahead of key state polls next year that will set the stage for the 2014 general election.

But slowing growth and investment in India, with the rupee currency around historical lows and government finances worsening, may have spurred the government into action.

"Manmohan Singh, after all the scams and the impression of government paralysis, has realized it's time to take some bold steps. This is a very bold step that will please the middle class," said political analyst Amulya Ganguli.

POLITICAL OPPOSITION

India previously allowed 51 percent foreign investment in single-brand retailers and 100 percent for wholesale operations, a policy Wal-Mart and rival Carrefour, among others, had long lobbied to free up further.

"For international retailers, it will open up a $1.6 trillion market growing at 8-9 percent so it's a big business opportunity for all of them," said Thomas Varghese, CEO of Aditya Birla Retail, an Indian supermarket chain.

For Wal-Mart, it's a very big opportunity to reach further abroad, said Moody's senior retail analyst Charles O'Shea.

"There are 1.2 billion people and if you're Wal-Mart, it's a place you need to be," O'Shea said.

Indian retailers have operated supermarket chains in India for years, but their expansion has been hampered by a lack of funding and expertise as well as poor infrastructure, which makes the cold storage of food transported around the country practically impossible.

Political opponents of the proposal, with an eye to the ballot box, argue an influx of foreign players - which could include France's Carrefour (CARR.PA) and Britain's Tesco Plc (TSCO.L) - will throw millions of small traders out of work in a sector that is the largest source of employment in India after agriculture.

India's biggest listed company, Reliance Industries (RELI.NS), was forced to backtrack on plans in 2007 to open Western-style supermarkets in the state of Uttar Pradesh after huge protests from small traders and political parties.

The main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) opposes opening up the retail sector, arguing that letting in "foreign players with deep pockets" would bring job losses in both the manufacturing and service sectors.

"Fragmented markets give larger options to the consumers. Consolidated markets make the consumer captive," the BJP's leaders of the upper and lower houses of parliament said in a statement before the decision. "International retail does not create additional markets, it merely displaces (the) existing market."

(Additional reporting by Nigam Prusty and Krittivas Mukherjee, and Phil Wahba in New York; Editing by John Chalmers and Jan Paschal)

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20111124/bs_nm/us_india_retail

lsu football schedule lsu football schedule terrapin terrapin manny pacquiao vs marquez manny pacquiao vs marquez dish network

Gun issue represents tough politics for Obama (AP)

WASHINGTON ? They are fuzzy about some issues but the Republican presidential candidates leave little doubt about where they stand on gun rights.

Rick Perry and Rick Santorum go pheasant hunting and give interviews before heading out. Newt Gingrich and Herman Cain speak to the National Rifle Association convention. Michele Bachmann tells People magazine she wants to teach her daughters how to shoot because women need to be able to protect themselves. Mitt Romney, after backing some gun control measures in Massachusetts, now presents himself as a strong Second Amendment supporter.

President Barack Obama, on the other hand, is virtually silent on the issue.

He has hardly addressed it since a couple months after the January assassination attempt on Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson, Ariz., when he promised to develop new steps on gun safety in response. He still has failed to do so, even as Tucson survivors came to Capitol Hill last week to push for action to close loopholes in the background check system.

Democrats have learned the hard way that embracing gun control can be terrible politics, and the 2012 presidential election is shaping up to underscore just how delicate the issue can be. With the election likely to be decided largely by states where hunting is a popular pastime, like Missouri, Ohio or Pennsylvania, candidates of both parties want to win over gun owners, not alienate them.

For Republicans, that means emphasizing their pro-gun credentials. But for Obama and the Democrats, the approach is trickier.

Obama's history in support of strict gun control measures prior to becoming president makes it difficult for him to claim he's a Second Amendment champion, even though he signed a bill allowing people to take loaded guns into national parks. At the same time, he's apparently decided that his record backing gun safety is nothing to boast of, either, perhaps because of the power of the gun lobby and their opposition to anything smacking of gun control.

The result is that while Republicans are more than happy to talk up their support for gun rights, Obama may barely be heard from on the issue at all.

"Gun control is a fight that the administration is not willing to pick. They're not likely to win it," said Harry Wilson, author of a book on gun politics and director of the Institute for Policy and Opinion Research at Roanoke College in Virginia. "They certainly would not win it in Congress, and it's not likely to be a winner at the polls. ... It comes down to one pretty simple word: Politics."

Administration officials say they are working to develop the gun safety measures promised after the Giffords shooting, and they say have taken steps to improve the background check system. White House spokesman Matt Lehrich says the White House goal is to "protect the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens while keeping guns out of the hands of those who shouldn't have them under existing law."

But when it comes to guns and politics, Democrats haven't forgotten what happened in 1994. That year, President Bill Clinton was pushing for passage of a landmark crime bill featuring a ban on assault weapons, and then-House Speaker Thomas Foley, D-Wash., twisted Democrats' arms to get it through the House. Come November, Democrats suffered widespread election losses and lost control of the House and the Senate. Foley was among those defeated, and Clinton and others credited the NRA's campaigning with a big role in the outcome. And when the assault weapons ban came up for congressional reauthorization in 2004, it failed.

Given that history, the NRA expects to see Obama treading carefully on guns through 2012.

"It's bad politics to be on the wrong side of the Second Amendment at election time," said Wayne LaPierre, NRA executive vice president. "They're trying to fog the issue through the 2012 election and deceive gun owners into thinking he's something he's not, which is pro-Second Amendment."

For gun control advocates, it adds up to frustration with Obama and the Democrats. The group Mayors Against Illegal Guns argues that polling shows voters support certain gun safety measures like stronger background checks ? although a recent Gallup poll also finds more support for enforcing current laws than for passing new ones.

"Good policy here is good politics," said John Feinblatt, an adviser to New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who is a co-chair of the mayors' group. "Unfortunately, for too long the administration has bought the conventional wisdom" that gun control is bad politics.

But the NRA outspends gun-control groups by wide margins, and analysts say that when it comes time to vote, the gun issue is more likely to motivate gun rights activists than gun control supporters.

Since becoming president, Obama has been extremely cautious on the issue. In his 2004 Senate race, for example, Obama said it was a "scandal" that then-President George W. Bush didn't force renewal of the assault weapons ban. But Obama himself has done nothing to promote that issue since becoming president.

Obama's commitment to act on gun safety may also be complicated by an unrelated controversy over a Justice Department program aimed at stanching gun trafficking into Mexico. The government lost track of numerous weapons in connection with the program.

Obama has vowed to figure out what went wrong with the operation and make sure it's corrected, but with Republicans seizing on the issue to attack the White House, the politics around taking action on guns hasn't gotten any easier.

So for now, supporters who hoped to see Obama adopt a stronger stance on guns and act in the wake of the Giffords shooting look like they're going to be disappointed. "We haven't given up hope," said Dennis Henigan, acting president of the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, "but our impatience is growing with each passing day."

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/us/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111124/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_obama_guns

mls cup amas 2011 black friday elliot elliot ny giants la galaxy

New House speaker strengthens Australian gov't (AP)

CANBERRA, Australia ? Australia's Parliament elected an opposition lawmaker as its new House of Representatives speaker Thursday, an unprecedented move that actually strengthens Prime Minister Julia Gillard's tenuous grip on power.

The election of Peter Slipper quickly followed the surprise resignation of speaker Harry Jenkins, a member of Gillard's Labor Party, on Parliament's last sitting day of the year and the fourth anniversary of Labor's first election to power. The speaker can only vote to break a tie.

The change effectively gives the center-left government, which nearly lost power in last year's elections, an additional vote in the chamber on most legislation.

Slipper defied his own opposition Liberal Party by accepting the speaker's job, and says he will quit the party to become independent. Gillard denied that the change was planned in advance by her party.

Gillard commands 76 seats in the 150-seat chamber with the support of three independent lawmakers plus a legislator from the minor Greens party.

But with Jenkins in the speaker's chair, she had only been able to rely on the support of 75 lawmakers on most votes. Speakers can rarely use their votes and have done so on only 23 occasions in almost a century.

The conservative opposition had been able to muster up to 74 votes, but now can only hope for 73. Slipper has been a divisive figure in the Liberal Party, which had already been considering dumping him in elections due in 2013.

Slipper told Parliament he had been "encouraged" to accept the speaker's job by the actions of his opponents within his own party.

Opposition leader Tony Abbott had warned that any Liberal who accepted the nomination would be expected to resign from the party, and Slipper said he would do just that.

"I do intend to be an independent speaker," Slipper said.

Slipper was elected speaker uncontested. Opposition lawmaker Chris Pyne had nominated nine government lawmakers as alternatives, but each declined the nomination.

"It would be the first time in this country's history that the government did not support one of their own to be speaker of this Parliament," Pyne said as he opposed Slipper's nomination.

Slipper later ordered four opposition lawmakers to leave the chamber for an hour for misbehavior during a rowdy debate. No government lawmaker was ejected.

Abbott told reporters before the speaker vote that Jenkins resigned "so that the government can shore up its numbers on the Parliament."

"This is clearly a government in crisis," he said.

Gillard denied opposition claims that she had orchestrated the power shift. She told Parliament that Jenkins had given her only 90 minutes' notice of his resignation. She said she had had no private discussions with Slipper.

Jenkins had been speaker since Labor won control of the government in 2007. But when Labor formed a minority government with the support of independent lawmakers following elections last year, he agreed to bring more independence to the role by dropping out of Labor policy development.

"In this era of minority government, I have progressively become frustrated at this stricture," Jenkins said.

"My desire is to be able to participate in policy and parliamentary debate, and this would be incompatible with continuing in the role of speaker," he added.

By quitting, Jenkins cuts his salary by 106,000 Australian dollars ($103,000) a year to the base lawmaker's pay of AU$141,000 ($137,000).

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/oceania/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111124/ap_on_re_as/as_australia_speaker_resigns

sign language alphabet texas tech texas tech giuliana rancic giuliana rancic notre dame football wisconsin badgers football

eBay Buys Recommendation Service Hunch To Improve Buying, Selling [Updated]

Hunch, a service that provides a "taste graph" of personalized recommendations based on users' interests, has just been bought by auction site eBay, the companies have confirmed. The amount hasn't officially been disclosed, but Michael Arrington (who had the scoop this morning) hears that it's around $80 million. [Update: We caught up with Dixon and eBay chief technology officer Mark Carges by phone just now, and got some more details on the deal and what it means for both companies. Our notes below.] Founded in late 2007 and launched in 2009, the New York company will be used by eBay to help improve buying and selling recommendations for its users.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/9lRdoVwjHMI/

listeria symptoms listeria symptoms lsat bluegrass festival texas a m cochlear implant navy football

Britney Spears Fan Perez Hilton Roots For 'I Wanna Go'

Blogger can't believe 'Criminal' is pulling ahead of one of his faves in MTV News' Britney Spears Tournament: 30 Videos for 30 Years.
By Vaughn Trudeau Schoonmaker

Britney Spears in her music video for "I Wanna Go"
Photo: Jive

The first round of the Britney Spears Tournament: 30 Videos for 30 Years is well under way, and we asked celebrity blogger and Britney mega-fan Perez Hilton to weigh in on some of the closest competitions in the tournament:

"Sometimes" vs. "My Prerogative"
While "Sometimes" — as one of Britney's oldest videos — holds a special place in the hearts of her fans, Perez thinks "My Prerogative" has the advantage in this matchup. "In terms of video-making, spectacle, big grandiosity, 'My Prerogative' feels like a much larger to-do," Perez said. "If I was to pick a winner between these two, I would go with 'My Prerogative.' "

"Lucky" vs. "Boys"
"I am not a fan of the 'Boys' music video," Perez admitted of the clip, featuring Pharrell Williams and Mike Myers as Austin Powers. "To me, the competition between that and 'Lucky' is easy. 'Lucky' all the way.

"It's such a classic Britney video," Perez said about the clip, featuring Britney's movie-star alter-ego (in the pre-"Crossroads" world). "She looks so beautiful in it! It's from the golden era of Britney — those first few years where she was pretty much untouchable."

"I Wanna Go" vs. "Criminal"
Perez echoed other Britney experts' surprise that Britney's latest video, "Criminal," is significantly pulling ahead of "I Wanna Go."

"I think that 'I Wanna Go' is one of Britney's all-time best videos," Perez said. "She looked amazing in it, it's fun, it feels different for her, and she had never done a video quite like that before."

As for "Criminal," Perez shook his head. "I like the 'Criminal' video; I don't love it. I was also distracted and slightly unhappy with the casting of her boyfriend [Jason Trawick] in it."

What's your favorite Britney video? Make sure to vote at Britney30.MTV.com or the MTV Newsroom blog, and share your picks in the comments below!

Head over to Britney30.MTV.com and vote for your favorite music video in MTV News' Britney Spears Tournament: 30 Videos for 30 Years.

Related Videos

• Britney Spears: 30 Videos For 30 Years

Related Photos

• Britney Spears' 'I Wanna Go' Video: Pop References

Related Artists

• Britney Spears

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1674860/britney-spears-tournament-perez-hilton-i-wanna-go.jhtml

risky business weather nj weather nj nyc weather nyc weather philadelphia weather chris carpenter

Hugh Grant: Non-Murdoch tabloid hacked me in 2007

British actor Hugh Grant arrives to give evidence at the the Leveson inquiry in London, Monday, Nov. 21, 2011. The Leveson inquiry is Britain's media ethics probe that was set up in the wake of the scandal over phone hacking at Rupert Murdoch's News of the World, which was shut in July after it became clear that the tabloid had systematically broken the law. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

British actor Hugh Grant arrives to give evidence at the the Leveson inquiry in London, Monday, Nov. 21, 2011. The Leveson inquiry is Britain's media ethics probe that was set up in the wake of the scandal over phone hacking at Rupert Murdoch's News of the World, which was shut in July after it became clear that the tabloid had systematically broken the law. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

Former FIA president Max Mosley arrives at the Leveson inquiry London, Monday, Nov. 21, 2011. The Leveson inquiry is Britain's media ethics probe that was set up in the wake of the scandal over phone hacking at Rupert Murdoch's News of the World, which was shut in July after it became clear that the tabloid had systematically broken the law. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

British actor Hugh Grant arrives to give evidence at the the Leveson inquiry in London, Monday, Nov. 21, 2011. The Leveson inquiry is Britain's media ethics probe that was set up in the wake of the scandal over phone hacking at Rupert Murdoch's News of the World, which was shut in July after it became clear that the tabloid had systematically broken the law. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

British actor Hugh Grant arrives to give evidence at the the Leveson inquiry in London, Monday, Nov. 21, 2011. The Leveson inquiry is Britain's media ethics probe that was set up in the wake of the scandal over phone hacking at Rupert Murdoch's News of the World, which was shut in July after it became clear that the tabloid had systematically broken the law. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

British actor Hugh Grant arrives to give evidence at the the Leveson inquiry in London, Monday, Nov. 21, 2011. The Leveson inquiry is Britain's media ethics probe that was set up in the wake of the scandal over phone hacking at Rupert Murdoch's News of the World, which was shut in July after it became clear that the tabloid had systematically broken the law. (AP Photo/Alastair Grant)

LONDON (AP) ? Actor Hugh Grant has told a London courtroom about the dark side of celebrity life, describing mysterious break-ins, leaked medical details and hacked voice mails ? and laying blame on the entire tabloid press, not just the now-shuttered News of the World.

Grant's testimony Monday to a judge-led media ethics inquiry capped a tough day for Britain's beleaguered press. Earlier, the parents of a murdered schoolgirl whose phone was targeted by the tabloid described how the hacking had given them false hope that their daughter was still alive.

Grant said he believes his phone was hacked by Britain's Mail on Sunday tabloid ? the first time he has implicated a newspaper not owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch in the wrongdoing.

The actor said a 2007 story about his romantic life in the paper, owned by Murdoch rival Associated Newspapers Ltd., could only have been obtained through eavesdropping on his voice mails.

He said he could not think of any other way the newspaper could have obtained the story alleging that his romance with Jemima Khan was on the rocks because of his conversations with a "plummy voiced" woman the paper identified as a film studio executive.

Grant said there was no such woman, but he did receive voice messages from the assistant of a movie producer friend.

"She would leave charming, joking messages ... and she had a voice that can only be described as plummy," he said.

Grant sued the newspaper for libel and won.

Challenged about whether he had hard evidence, Grant acknowledged he was speculating.

"But ... I'd love to hear what the Daily Mail or the Sunday Mail's explanation of what that source was if it wasn't phone hacking," he said.

The Mail on Sunday said in a statement said that it "utterly refutes" Grant's suggestion it had hacked his phone and described his comments as "smears."

Over two and a half hours of testimony, Grant ? by turns charming and censorious ? described years of tabloid pursuit that began after his breakthrough hit, "Four Weddings and a Funeral," in 1994. Incidents included a mysterious break-in at his apartment during which nothing was stolen. Descriptions of the apartment later appeared in a tabloid newspaper.

He also said an article published earlier this year in The Sun and Daily Express about his visit to a hospital emergency room was "a gross intrusion of my privacy."

"I think no one would expect their medical records to be made public or to be appropriated by newspapers for commercial profit," he said. "That is fundamental to our British sense of decency."

And he said paparazzi had hounded Tinglan Hong, the mother of Grant's baby daughter, despite the actor's efforts to keep his paternity secret. He said he did not attend the baby's birth in late September, but the next day, "I couldn't resist a quick visit."

"There seems to have been a leak from the hospital," Grant said. "They even knew the fake name she had checked into the hospital under."

Grant had initially refused to confirm the baby was his, but earlier this month released a statement acknowledging it. He told the inquiry that the statement ? intended in part to rebuff claims he had "jilted" Hong, with whom he remains friendly ? had been composed during a phone call with his publicist while he was on a film set in Germany.

"It was not ideal circumstances," Grant said. "I was dressed as a cannibal at the time."

Prime Minister David Cameron set up the inquiry into media ethics in response to an evolving scandal over phone hacking in Britain. Murdoch shut down the discredited News of the World tabloid in July after evidence emerged that it had routinely eavesdropped on the voice mails of public figures, celebrities and even crime victims in its search for scoops.

The inquiry, led by Judge Brian Leveson, plans to issue a report next year and could recommend major changes to the way the media in Britain are regulated.

Grant, who has become an outspoken campaigner against press intrusion, called for a media code of ethics and tougher regulation.

"There has been a section of our press that has been allowed to become toxic over the past 20 or 30 years," he said, urging Britain to find the courage to stand up to tabloid "bullies."

Grant is one of a string of high-profile witnesses, including actress Sienna Miller and author J.K. Rowling, who will testify about how they were followed, photographed, entrapped and harassed by journalists from Britain's tabloids, which collectively sell millions of copies a day.

The first witnesses Monday were the parents of murdered teenager Milly Dowler, whose mobile phone voice mails were hacked after she disappeared in 2002.

Her mother told the inquiry that she believed her missing 13 year old was still alive once she reached the girl's previously full voice mailbox.

Sally Dowler said when she could finally leave a message on Milly's voice mail weeks after the girl disappeared, she shouted: "She's picked up the voice mails! ... She's alive!"

In fact, messages had been deleted by someone working for the News of the World while the Dowlers and police were still searching for Milly, who was later found dead.

The Dowlers said they had been utterly shocked when police told them, much later, that Milly's phone had been hacked.

Bob Dowler said he recognized immediately that the information was "dynamite." News that tabloid journalists had targeted not just celebrities but a murdered girl shocked many Britons and triggered a police investigation and media recriminations that are still unfolding.

The Dowlers took the stand together and spoke in quiet, composed voices during their 30 minutes of nationally televised testimony.

They described their shock and anger when a private walk to retrace their missing daughter's last steps was secretly photographed by the tabloid.

"It just felt like such an intrusion into a really, really private grief moment," Sally Dowler said. The couple said they later realized that their own phone, as well as their daughter's, had been hacked.

More than a dozen News of the World journalists and editors have been arrested and several senior Murdoch executives have resigned over the still-evolving scandal. Two top London police officers also lost their jobs, along with Cameron's media adviser.

Later this week the inquiry will hear from "Harry Potter" author Rowling, comedian Steve Coogan, actress Miller and former Formula One boss Max Mosley ? whose taste for sadomasochism was revealed in a widely publicized News of the World sting.

It's a courtroom lineup that Britain's celebrity-obsessed tabloids would love, if only they weren't the ones in the dock.

____

Online:

The Leveson Inquiry: http://www.levesoninquiry.org.uk/

Jill Lawless can be reached at: http://twitter.com/JillLawless.

Associated Press writer Raphael G. Satter contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/4e67281c3f754d0696fbfdee0f3f1469/Article_2011-11-21-Britain-Phone%20Hacking/id-90a90d75cdad405da21b0068dbbb8603

frank lucas house of wax lego man lego man cheryl hines john lackey

Federal Circuit Divided on Federal Jurisdiction over Legal ...

Stephen Byrne v. Wood, Herron & Evans (Fed. Cir. 2011)

Byrne's malpractice claim alleges that his former patent attorneys at WHE failed to secure broad enough patent protection for his weed trimming device. See RE 34,815. In 2004, Byrne sued Black & Decker but lost on summary judgment. In that case, the district court ruled that B&D's device could not infringe because of it did not include a "generally planar outboard flail stabilizing surface" as required by Byrne's patent claims.

In the subsequent?legal malpractice claim, WHE filed a summary judgment?motion arguing that the prosecution history showed clearly that the "generally planar" limitation was necessary in order to distinguish Byrne's invention from the cited prior art.? WHE also argued that Mr. Byrne's claim should fail because he had so fully participated in the prosecution, including the addition of that limitation into the claim. In the responsive motion, Byrne filed an affidavit discussing the scope of the cited prior art and arguing that the limitation was not necessary for patentability.? Acting sua sponte, the district court rejected Byrne's testimony ? holding that he was not qualified to offer expert testimony as one of ordinary skill in the art.? Without any rebuttal evidence, the court then granted WHE's motion for summary judgment of no malpractice.

Jurisdiction over Patent Prosecution Malpractice. In several recent cases, the Federal Circuit has expanded the scope of federal court and Federal Circuit jurisdiction over patent malpractice cases.?Writing for a 2?1 majority, Judge O'Malley agreed that stare decisis compels federal jurisdiction in this case, but argued that the jurisdictional law should be revisited for cases like this where the cause of action is based upon state-law (malpractice) and the patent issue is only a question of a hypothetical patent claim.

Indeed, it is only the ?special and small category? or ?slim category? of cases in which a state law cause of action will trigger federal jurisdiction. . . .

[I]t is difficult to see teh federal interest in determining the validity of a hypothetical patent claim that is ancillary to a state law malpractice action. The outcome of such determinations invariably will rest on case-specific inquiries comparing prior art against patent claims that have not and will never issue. As such, these determinations, which involve only application and not interpretation of patent law, have little or no bearing on other cases. On the other hand, finding federal jurisdiction over malpractice cases involving questions of hypothetical patent claims opens the federal courthouse to an entire class of actions, thereby usurping state authority over this traditionally state law tort issue. . . .

Applying these federalism considerations, several courts either have outright disagreed with our analysis or have found a meaningful distinction when only hypothetical patent rights are at stake. . . . In many cases, the procedural posture prevents us from reviewing these decisions, thus allowing courts simply to ignore our law. We address the issues in this appeal, however, because our existing case law compels us to do so.

This is the type of issue that the Supreme Court tends to hear, and a high quality petition for certiorari would have a good chance of gaining the high court's attention.? Aiding this theory are the growing number of state and federal court decisions that have criticized the Federal Circuit jurisdictional holdings and?the general rarity non-patent-related cases of finding federal?question ?arising under??jurisdiction where no federal cause of action is alleged.?

On the merits, the Federal Circuit ruled that the lower court abused its discretion by refusing to let the inventor testify regarding the scope and content of the prior art and its relation to the invention. The particular problem with the lower court's finding was that it made no finding of the qualifications of one of ordinary skill in the art and whether Byrne possessed that level of skill.??In several prior cases, the Federal Circuit has held that inventors typically possess at least ordinary skill in the relevant art and therefore ?it is especially inappropriate for the district court to strike Byrne?s affidavit without going through the exercise of identifying the requisite level of skill.?? On remand, the district court?will likely hear Byrne's testimony and consequently?reject WHE's summary judgment motion.

Source: http://www.patentlyo.com/patent/2011/11/stephen-byrne-v-wood-herron-evans-fed-cir-2011-byrnes-malpractice-claim-alleges-that-his-former-patent-attorneys-at-w.html

berkman new beavis and butthead game 7 anya ayoung chee big east j.r. martinez peru earthquake

Jessica Simpson to Be New Weight Watchers Spokeswoman?

Jessica Simpson loves her curves, and we love her for it. But with all her body-positive talk, is it possible that she's made a deal to be a Weight Watchers spokeswoman? Us Weekly reports that mother-to-be Simpson, 31, plans to use the diet system to get her weight down after the baby is born next spring, and is currently in talks for a $4 million dollar deal to follow Jennifer Hudson as the next face of Weight Watchers.

Source: http://www.ivillage.com/jessica-simpson-be-weight-watchers-spokeswoman/1-a-404609?dst=iv%3AiVillage%3Ajessica-simpson-be-weight-watchers-spokeswoman-404609

bérénice marlohe google offers tim gunn tim gunn death clock death clock cerebral palsy

Stamped Is Now Ready For Your Approval

One of the great pastimes of the Web is rating places and things, but now with mobile phones you can rate them anywhere, and not just things but experiences. Enter Stamped, a New York City startup founded by ex-Googlers that wants to be your go-to app for rating restaurants, books, movies, and music. The iPhone app just launched on iTunes. Stamped simplifies ratings. Gone are the five stars. You either stamp something with your approval or you don't. But don't stamp too liberally because you only get 100 stamps to start out with (you can earn more by being active on the service). You can follow what your friends are stamping to get a steady stream of recommendations and share your stamps more broadly on Twitter. Open up the map view to see stamps near you. Put some to your to-do list or add your own stamp. If you don't want to waste a stamp, you can show your approval with a weaker "like."

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/8dV7KftVHwk/

philip rivers chanukah chanukah 11 11 11 meaning miracle berry billy crystal veterans day thank you

Ex-military leaders bash candidates before debate

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Three former top military officials slammed the Republican presidential field ahead of Tuesday night's GOP debate on foreign policy. The Democratic-leaning former officials said the entire Republican field has been all over the map but focused on GOP front-runner Mitt Romney.

"My concern would be that he might not be credibly decisive," Richard Danzig, who served as Navy secretary under President Bill Clinton, said of Romney on Monday. "There's too much of a track record here of moving between positions."

Danzig said President Barack Obama has shown the required decisiveness throughout his presidency.

Danzig, retired Gen. Wesley Clark and retired Maj. Gen. Paul Eaton critiqued the Republican field at a news conference organized by the Democratic National Committee.

Without naming Romney, Clark swiped at the former Massachusetts governor for comments downplaying the importance of capturing or killing Osama Bin Laden.

"One candidate said of Osama bin Laden, 'It's not worth moving heaven and earth and spending billions of dollars just trying to catch one person,'" Clark said, referring to Romney. "But like all of us, he cheered his demise."

Andrea Saul, a Romney spokeswoman, responded by assailing Obama's foreign policy but did not directly respond to the officials' criticism of Romney.

"President Obama's feckless foreign policy has emboldened our adversaries, weakened our allies, and threatens to break faith with our military," she said.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2011-11-21-Generals-GOP%20Candidates%201st%20Ld-Writethru/id-af0b50d9b260408f846aae2a878b5b08

packers bears boeing 787 cutler jay cutler duke basketball natalie wood

Launch of huge Mars rover delayed by 1 day

NASA has pushed back the launch of a $2.5 billion Mars rover by one day, to Saturday (Nov. 26), in order to replace a suspect battery on the rover's rocket.

"The launch is rescheduled for Saturday, Nov. 26 from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla.," NASA officials wrote in an update. "The one hour and 43 minute launch window opens at 10:02 a.m. EST."

The launch will blast off atop an unmanned Atlas 5 rocket to send the rover, called the Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity, toward the Red Planet. The one-day launch delay will allow engineers to replace a suspect battery in the rocket's flight termination system ? an emergency safety system used to destroy the Atlas 5 rocket should it veer off course after liftoff.

NASA has until Dec. 18 to launch the new rover toward Mars and still make the current flight window to the Red Planet. The car-size Curiosity rover carries 10 instruments and is designed to seek out any evidence that Mars was once habitable or could support microbial life in the past.

The rover also has a laser to shoot rocks in order to study the gasses released from them and beam the observations home to Earth.

The Curiosity rover is NASA's largest Mars rover mission yet and is expected to last at least two years exploring the Martian surface. Curiosity is about 9 feet (3 meters) long and wide, and has a camera mast that stands about 7 feet (2.1 m) tall. The rover is also equipped with a sophisticated robotic arm that has a reach of up to 7 feet. Each of the rovers wheels are 20 inches (0.5 m) wide.

The rover carries a nuclear power source to feed its onboard systems instead of the solar arrays used by its wheeled predecessors on Mars: the rovers Spirit, Opportunity and the smaller Sojourner. It is also designed to land on Mars using a rocket-powered sky crane, which will lower the rover to the Martian surface.

If all goes well, Curiosity is expected to land inside Mars' huge Gale Crater sometime on Aug. 6, 2012.

Follow SPACE.com for the latest in space science and exploration news on Twitter @Spacedotcomand onFacebook.

? 2011 Space.com. All rights reserved. More from Space.com.

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45376260/ns/technology_and_science-space/

new gmail new gmail oakland general strike oakland general strike houshmandzadeh houshmandzadeh bieber baby

Sri Lankan president receives report on war abuses (AP)

COLOMBO, Sri Lanka ? A Sri Lankan commission that investigated alleged abuses during the country's civil war has delivered its final report to President Mahinda Rajapaksa.

The report by the Lessons Learnt and Reconciliation Commission was not immediately released to the public. However, the president has said he will present it to Parliament, which will make it a public document.

The government appointed the commission last year under intense international pressure to probe possible war crimes in the final stages of the war.

Human rights groups say the commission does not meet international standards and some of its members have conflicts of interest.

An earlier U.N. panel found credible allegations of serious abuses on both sides of the war, which ended in May 2009.

Source: http://us.rd.yahoo.com/dailynews/rss/asia/*http%3A//news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20111120/ap_on_re_as/as_sri_lanka_war_report

oregon usc powerball winning numbers powerball winning numbers black friday 2011 deals uc davis pepper spray uc davis pepper spray usc oregon

Occupy protests spread to US college campuses

As the Occupy Wall Street protests have grown to cities across the United States, they've also taken root at US universities, where students have staged rallies and walk-outs from classes.

Mo Tarafa stood before students at a small, outdoor concrete auditorium at Florida International University and called for volunteers to sit in the 10 chairs before her. Each chair, she said, represented 10 percent of the wealth in the United States and 10 percent of the population.

Skip to next paragraph

The students, mostly in their 20s and wearing jeans and T-shirts on a balmy autumn afternoon in Miami, took their places. Then Tarafa asked nine of the students to squeeze together into five of the chairs. This, she said, was the distribution of wealth in 1996.

Next she asked nine students to fit into three of the chairs. This, she said, is the distribution of wealth today.?"How are you all feeling right now?" she said.

"Uncomfortable," said one of the students piled up on one another.

RECOMMENDED:?Top 5 targets of Occupy Wall Street

The exercise was part of a teach-in that took place recently at FIU and dozens of other campuses across the country in solidarity with Occupy Wall Street. As the protests have grown to cities across the United States, they've also taken root at US universities, where students have staged rallies and walk-outs from classes. On Thursday, students were among the thousands who took part in protests across the country.

They've even set up their own tent cities: At the University of California, Berkeley, where 40 people were arrested in a violent confrontation with police last week, officers removed 20 tents on Thursday. At Harvard University, dozens of students have set up tents in the middle of campus.

The students' concerns: The rising costs of tuition, seemingly insurmountable student debt and weak job prospects ? issues unique to them, but which student organizers see as directly connected to the larger issues being raised by the Occupy protests against economic inequality.

"I love my education. I think it was completely valuable; however, I feel I'm not using it on a daily basis," said Natalia Abrams, 31, a recent University of California at Los Angeles graduate who has been helping organize students through Occupy Colleges, a loose coalition of universities across the country. "We didn't go back to school to have $20,000 in debt to work at Starbucks."

Whether the protests mark a rejuvenation of student activism in the United States is yet to be seen, but already some important distinctions are being made from their involvement in politics and society over the last few decades. In the 1960s, students held sit-ins to protest racial segregation and marched against the Vietnam War. But since then, activism on campus has tended to focus on specific issues, like rape awareness, anti-sweatshop campaigns, and equality for gays and lesbians, notes Robert Self, a history professor at Brown University.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/D8yu0KuituA/Occupy-protests-spread-to-US-college-campuses

toyota recall order of operations carrie underwood eric church martina mcbride sara evans lionel richie

Obama prepares to wrap up Asia-Pacific trip (CNN)

Share With Friends: | | Politics - Top Stories Stories, RSS Feeds and Widgets via Feedzilla.

Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/163930322?client_source=feed&format=rss

power rangers jungle fury power rangers jungle fury texas high school football ufc 139 fight card cloudy with a chance of meatballs houston nutt houston nutt

Iowa Thanksgiving Family Forum: Republicans Seek Social Conservatives' Nod

You can watch a livestream of the Thanksgiving Family Forum here.

By Associated Press

DES MOINES, Iowa -- Most of the Republican presidential candidates, with the notable exception of Mitt Romney, set their sights on early-voting Iowa for a discussion on the role of religious faith in public life, along with hot-button social issues such as marriage and abortion.

The setting was a forum Saturday night hosted by a new evangelical group trying to leave its mark on the campaign in a state where influential social conservatives have struggled to rally behind an alternative to Romney. While the former Massachusetts governor has stayed near the top of national polls, some Republican activists have misgivings about his record on cultural issues.

Romney's six more socially conservative challenges are actively competing in Iowa to emerge as the preferred candidate among Christian conservatives with just six weeks to go until the Jan. 3 caucuses.

"People are getting close to decision time," former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum told The Associated Press at a campaign stop in Des Moines. "I think you're going to see some coalescing in the next couple of weeks."

Jobs, the economy and the deficit are voter priorities in Iowa and nationally, but it was a focus on social issues that drew the 2012 hopefuls to the event sponsored by The Family Leader, an organization started last by a former Republican candidate for governor, Bob Vander Plaats.

Scheduled to join Santorum were Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann, businessman Herman Cain, former U.S. House Speaker Newt Gingrich, Texas Rep. Ron Paul and Texas Gov. Rick Perry.

Romney declined the invitation and was campaigning in New Hampshire. He is not competing aggressively for the social conservative vote in Iowa as he did in the 2008 presidential race. His leaner Iowa campaign is focused more on holding supporters from his second-place finish four years ago and appealing to economic conservatives.

But Romney also has avoided multicandidate events in early-voting states, even one this month in Iowa by the National Association of Manufacturers and co-hosted by Gov. Terry Branstad, a pro-business Republican.

Former Utah Gov. Jon Huntsman also planned to skip the event. He, too, has a mixed record on social issues, has avoided campaigning in Iowa and is focusing his early-state campaign on New Hampshire, home of the leadoff primary.

___

Online:

'; var coords = [-5, -72]; // display fb-bubble FloatingPrompt.embed(this, html, undefined, 'top', {fp_intersects:1, timeout_remove:2000,ignore_arrow: true, width:236, add_xy:coords, class_name: 'clear-overlay'}); });

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/19/iowa-thanksgiving-family-forum_n_1103030.html

oakland texas judge texas judge tom brokaw maria shriver andy irons ethan zohn