Source: http://news.feedzilla.com/en_us/stories/politics/top-stories/297627520?client_source=feed&format=rss
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Tuesday, April 9, 2013
Newtown victims' families in Washington, quietly pushing gun control
By Deborah Zabarenko
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Family members of the Newtown school shooting victims flew into Washington on Air Force One to press for gun-control legislation, but kept a low profile as they held private meetings with senators on Tuesday.
After coming to the capital aboard the presidential plane on Monday evening, the families had breakfast with Vice President Joe Biden. He said after the two-hour meeting, "I wish the members of Congress had been able to eavesdrop on the discussion in my home today."
The 11 family members stayed largely out of sight on the first of three days of lobbying in Washington, maintaining that private meetings with lawmakers would serve their cause better than grandstanding. They did hold a conference call with reporters.
"We're just private citizens who are now part of a club we never wanted to be in," said Bill Sherlach, whose wife Mary was the school psychologist at Sandy Hook Elementary School, one of six adults and 20 children killed in the December 14 attack.
"We're not up on all the political wranglings that go on," Sherlach said. "We're just the ordinary public, coming to the people that we elected to the offices nationwide and try to bring a program to the table that will be wide-ranging."
The shooting in the small Connecticut town horrified the country and prompted President Barack Obama to seek ways to prevent such massacres, including gun control. But his administration has struggled to gain support for legislation amid strong opposition from the powerful National Rifle Association.
The Newtown families are pushing for background checks to prevent criminals and the mentally ill from buying guns, and they want a provision to limit the capacity of gun magazines.
KEEPING POLITICS TO A MINIMUM
The families planned a series of private meetings with Democratic and Republican senators, but declined to name the lawmakers, except for Sen. Charles Grassley, an Iowa Republican who they said had agreed to be identified.
They said no senator had declined to meet with them. Senator Mark Pryor, an Arkansas Democrat who faces a tough re-election race next year in a state where gun control faces stiff opposition, said his office would try to schedule a meeting.
Making the Capitol Hill meetings private would keep politics to a minimum, the families said.
Tim Makris, executive director of the advocacy group Sandy Hook Promise, said private meetings let legislators open up in a way public meetings don't.
"When it's public, unfortunately at times it can turn political and then nothing happens," he said.
The Senate is expected to hold a preliminary, test vote on a gun-control measure on Thursday, but Democratic Leader Harry Reid said the bill may not get past Republican procedural hurdles. Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said there was no bipartisan support for the effort.
Obama's proposals include expanded background checks for gun buyers, a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines.
Makris said the Sandy Hook shooter brought 30-bullet magazines to the school and left smaller magazines at home.
"We know when the shooter stopped to reload, he made it possible for 11 children to escape," Makris said. "And we're left to wonder, if he had carried smaller magazines, and been forced to reload up to three times more ... would more children be alive?"
The group sought to present a human face to lawmakers.
Asked what the group could bring to the debate what other gun-control advocates could not, Mark Barden, whose 7-year-old son Daniel was killed in the shooting, told the conference call:
"Lots of people can discuss the issues from an intellectual perspective, but we bring a personal perspective."
(Reporting by Deborah Zabarenko; Additional reporting by Roberta Rampton and Richard Cowan; Editing by Frances Kerry)
Source: http://news.yahoo.com/newtown-victims-families-washington-quietly-pushing-gun-control-233101254.html
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10 Tips for Maintaining Your Rental Properties | AOL Real Estate
By Sharon Vornholt
Just about everyone takes care of the maintenance on their personal home; it's a matter of pride for most of us. We all know that it doesn't take too long for little problems to become big problems. Over the years, I have found that many landlords just aren't as diligent when it comes to resolving problems in their rental property.
So What's the Problem?
Why is it that they don't get taken care of in a timely manner? I think it's primarily the lack of having a system to help them stay on track. Landlords certainly know that the failure to diligently monitor the condition of their properties can lead to costly damage over time.
Another downside to not taking care of routine maintenance is that it will always lead to unhappy tenants, and unhappy tenants move out. This leaves you not only with a lot of costly repairs you have to do anyway but delays in getting the home rented again.
It's time to stop procrastinating. Here's a quick checklist you can use for keeping your properties in tip top shape.
This article was originally published on BiggerPockets.com.
Find homes for rent in your area.
See more on BiggerPockets.com:
The Ultimate Beginner's Guide to Real Estate Investing
Tenant Screening: The Ultimate Guide
9 Steps to Flipping Houses
More on AOL Real Estate:
Find out how to calculate mortgage payments.
Find homes for sale in your area.
Find foreclosures in your area.
See more celebrity real estate.
Follow us on Twitter at @AOLRealEstate or connect with AOL Real Estate on Facebook.
Source: http://realestate.aol.com/blog/2013/04/08/rental-property-maintenance-tips/
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In China, You Can Pay Women To Play Video Games With You
In many parts of Asia, there is a job called "beer companion". It's exactly as its name implies. Young women working for a bar or a beer company dress in relatively skimpy outfits to drink with and to entertain bar guests. It's already hit the West, but this seems this type of service is now moving towards the video game world in China.
According to People's Daily, this gaming companion service is a recent thing in China. The service comes in two different types. The first type is a promotion and the other you for pay. In the promotion category, a game company offers a promotion where players can play games with pretty ladies. For pay service, gamers can pay for companions to play online games with them.
What this comes down to is that Chinese players are paying to play with companions online...and paying to play with companions in person.
This service seems to be geared towards male gamers. A quick search online for the phrase gaming companion (MM??) brings up girls looking cute to solicit gamer clients. It should be noted that MM in China refers to "younger sister" (mei mei??), which is also a term often associated with sex workers.
According to the People's Daily, this concept first came about when news broke out about a high-end World of Warcraft club that offered online companion services 24/7. Basically, a member of the WoW club would log on, request a companion and then have someone to play with until they log off.
After the revelation of the WoW club, enterprising "gamers" started advertising similar services of companion play. Some of them offered to in person gaming at a local Internet cafe, others were just online play. The prices vary greatly. It appears playing with a "ranked" gamer will cost about 8 dollars an hour whereas an "amateur" will go for about 3 dollars an hour.
One shop on Chinese e-commerce supersite Taobao.com that Kotaku questioned about services said that pretty much most of the services are "agencies". The shop that we contacted offered the services of a "Dear Sue". The person running the shop chatted with us online through the QQ account of a woman, but we have no way verify her gender. "She" was offering services in games such as Defense of the Ancients, League of Legends, and Counter Strike.
"We have lots of different girls of different skills that can play with you," said 'Sue', despite the fact that her site only advertised her services. "We offer online play only, 1 vs. 1."
This agent also said that "she" couldn't guarantee that we would win our match. On top of that "she" also said that they used the YY TeamChat program to converse.
While there is nothing too sinister about the concept of companion play, searches into the subject leads to some pretty sketchy stuff. Halfway through a search on Taobao.com, the results return with some pretty pornographic material. It's unclear what this entails about the whole situation.
So far, we haven't been able to contact a shop offering in person companion play.
[???????????DotA??20?] [People's Daily]
[Taobao search for MM??] [Taobao.com]
Kotaku East is your slice of Asian internet culture, bringing you the latest talking points from Japan, Korea, China and beyond. Tune in every morning from 4am to 8am.
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Source: http://kotaku.com/in-china-people-are-paying-women-to-play-video-games-w-471161999
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Senator: NASA to lasso asteroid, bring it closer
FILE - In this Jan. 13, 2013 file photo, the Orion Exploration Flight Test 1crew module is seen in the Operations and Checkout building during a media tour at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla. Senate Science and Space subcommittee Chairman Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla. says President Barack Obama and NASA are planning for a robotic spaceship to lasso a small asteroid and park it near the moon. Then astronauts would explore it in 2021. Nelson said the plan would speed up by four years an existing mission to land astronauts on an asteroid by bringing the space rock closer to Earth. (AP Photo/John Raoux)
FILE - In this Jan. 13, 2013 file photo, the Orion Exploration Flight Test 1crew module is seen in the Operations and Checkout building during a media tour at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla. Senate Science and Space subcommittee Chairman Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla. says President Barack Obama and NASA are planning for a robotic spaceship to lasso a small asteroid and park it near the moon. Then astronauts would explore it in 2021. Nelson said the plan would speed up by four years an existing mission to land astronauts on an asteroid by bringing the space rock closer to Earth. (AP Photo/John Raoux)
WASHINGTON (AP) ? NASA is planning for a robotic spaceship to lasso a small asteroid and park it near the moon for astronauts to explore, a top senator said Friday.
The ship would capture the 500-ton, 25-foot asteroid in 2019. Then using an Orion space capsule, a crew of about four astronauts would nuzzle up next to the rock in 2021 for spacewalking exploration, according to a government document obtained by The Associated Press.
Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., said the plan would speed up by four years the existing mission to land astronauts on an asteroid by bringing the space rock closer to Earth.
Nelson, who is chairman of the Senate science and space subcommittee, said Friday that President Barack Obama is putting $100 million in planning money for the accelerated asteroid mission in the 2014 budget that comes out next week. The money would be used to find the right small asteroid.
"It really is a clever concept," Nelson said in a press conference in Orlando. "Go find your ideal candidate for an asteroid. Go get it robotically and bring it back."
This would be the first time ever humanity has manipulated a space object in such a grand scale, like what it does on Earth, said Robert Braun, a Georgia Institute of Technology aerospace engineering professor who used to be NASA's chief technology officer.
"It's a great combination of our robotic and human capabilities to do the kind of thing that NASA should be doing in this century," Braun said.
Last year, the Keck Institute for Space Studies proposed a similar mission for NASA with a price tag of $2.6 billion. There is no cost estimate for the space agency's version. NASA's plans were first reported by Aviation Week.
While there are thousands of asteroids around 25-feet, finding the right one that comes by Earth at just the right time to be captured will not be easy, said Donald Yeomans, who heads NASA's Near Earth Object program that monitors close-by asteroids. He said once a suitable rock is found it would be captured with the space equivalent of "a baggie with a drawstring. You bag it. You attach the solar propulsion module to de-spin it and bring it back to where you want it."
Yeomans said a 25-foot asteroid is no threat to Earth because it would burn up should it inadvertently enter Earth's atmosphere. These types of asteroids are closer to Earth ? not in the main asteroid belt between Jupiter and Mars. They're less than 10 million miles away, Braun said.
"It's probably the right size asteroid to be practicing on," he said.
A 25-foot asteroid is smaller than the size rock that caused a giant fireball that streaked through the sky in Russia in February, said Apollo 9 astronaut Rusty Schweickart, head of the B612 Foundation, a nonprofit concerned about dangerous space rocks.
The robotic ship would require a high-tech solar engine to haul the rock through space, something that is both cutting-edge and doable, Braun said. Then NASA would use a new large rocket and the Orion capsule ? both under development ? to send astronauts to the asteroid.
There would be no gravity on the asteroid so the astronauts would have to hover over it in an extended spacewalk.
Exploring the asteroid "would be great fun," Schweickart said. "You'd have some interesting challenges in terms of operating in an environment like that."
Nelson said the mission would help NASA develop the capability to nudge away a dangerous asteroid if one headed to Earth in the future. It also would be training for a future mission to send astronauts to Mars in the 2030s, he said. But while it would be helpful for planetary defense, "that's not your primary mission," Schweickart said.
George Washington University Space Policy Institute Director Scott Pace, a top NASA official during the George W. Bush administration, was critical of the plan, saying it was a bad idea scientifically and for international cooperation.
Instead, NASA and other countries should first join forces for a comprehensive survey of all possible dangerous space rocks, Pace said.
The government document describing the mission said it would inspire because it "will send humans farther than they have ever been before."
___
Online:
NASA: http://www.nasa.gov
The Keck Institute plan: http://www.kiss.caltech.edu/study/asteroid/asteroid_final_report.pdf
B612Foundation: http://b612foundation.org
___
Seth Borenstein can be followed at http://twitter.com/borenbears
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Blackmagic announces Production Camera 4K, $995 Pocket Cinema Camera with MFT mount (hands-on)
A sub-$1,000 price tag makes any product a relative steal on the floor of NAB -- impressive specs and industry standard compatibility are just icing on the cake. If such figures are any indication, however, Blackmagic's new Pocket Cinema Camera, which leaked earlier today and ships in July, is potentially a very solid buy at $995, with a Super-16 Cinema 1080HD sensor with 13 stops of dynamic range, CinemaDNG RAW recording, SD card storage, Micro HDMI monitoring and a Micro Four Thirds lens mount. We got an early look at the shooter on the showroom floor, and the compact size is truly striking -- the body is comparable in size to any other mirrorless camera, though it definitely pushes the limits of what we'd consider pocketable. The design is very similar to Blackmagic's larger Cinema Camera launched at last year's NAB, with the same Micro Four Thirds lens mount. There's a very sharp built-in matte LCD for viewing footage and adjusting settings, and the build is quite solid -- it's significantly heavier than you'd expect.
Naturally, the camera isn't as capable as Blackmagic's pricier NAB model, the Production Camera 4K, which also made its debut today and ships in July. With that flavor, $3,995 buys you a Super 35 sensor with native Ultra HD and 4K support, a built-in SSD recorder, compressed CinemaDNG RAW and compatibility with EF lenses. We spent a few minutes with that model as well, and were equally impressed. The screen was very bright, sharp and not at all reflective, and the camera includes your standard array of inputs and outputs, including dual mic jacks, an SDI port, power and control. Both models are very competitively priced, as you might expect from Blackmagic, and with this wide range of appeal, there's now a little something for everyone. Be sure to head past the break to check out our hands-on video as we take a closer look at both models.
Filed under: Cameras
Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/qdDMlMus8HQ/
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Razer promises sneakier sneak attacks with $130 Orbweaver Stealth Edition mechanical keypad
That guard you just stealth-killed in Dishonored never heard you coming. But everyone else did. Which is why you might want to consider a noise-dampened mechanical keyboard of some sort. There are a few of 'em out there, not least the Matias Quiet Pro we reviewed last year, and now Razer has a keypad option solely for gamers: a new Stealth Edition of the original Orbweaver that came out in January. The price is unchanged at $130, as are the main specs and adjustable design, but Razer promises "silent tactile feedback" that provides an "entirely new feel," alongside a slightly reduced actuation force of 45g (instead of 50g). Perhaps your long-suffering colleagues will throw in a decent headset to go with it.
Filed under: Desktops, Gaming, Peripherals
Source: Razer
Source: http://feeds.engadget.com/~r/weblogsinc/engadget/~3/Qm_2CXBpZ4I/
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