Fresh off victory, NRA holds convention in Houston

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) ? Fresh off a huge victory over President Barack Obama on gun control, the message from the National Rifle Association is clear: The fight has just begun.

The powerful gun rights lobby gathers in Houston this weekend for its annual convention and organizers anticipate a rollicking, Texas-sized party ? both to celebrate the victory in Washington and recharge for more political struggles as gun control advocates tally their own successes in states around the country.

"If you are an NRA member, you deserve to be proud," Wayne LaPierre, the NRA's brash, no-compromises chief executive wrote last week to the organization's 5 million members, telling them they "exemplify everything that's good and right about America."

The NRA couldn't have picked a friendlier place to stage its annual event. More than 70,000 people are expected to attend the three-day "Stand and Fight"-themed convention, which includes a gun trade show, political rally and strategy meeting.

Texas, with its frontier image and fierce sense of independence, is one of the strongest gun rights states in the country. More than 500,000 people are licensed to carry concealed handguns, including Gov. Rick Perry, who once bragged about shooting a coyote during a morning jog.

Concealed handguns are allowed in the state Capitol, where simply showing a license allows armed visitors to bypass metal detectors.

Friday's big event is a political forum with speeches from several state and national conservative leaders, including Perry, former GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin, former Pennsylvania senator and presidential candidate Rick Santorum and Sen. Ted Cruz, a Republican Texas firebrand who has become one of the top tea party voices in Washington since being elected last year. LaPierre speaks to the convention Saturday before the "Stand and Fight" rally at night.

NRA spokesman Andrew Arulanandam predicted the convention will draw the largest crowd in its history.

"The geography is helpful," Arulanandam said. "The current (political) climate helps."

For NRA member Mike Cox, a concealed handgun license instructor from rural Wimberley, the recent Senate vote showed not only the NRA's power, but demonstrated to its members the need to dig in and recruit.

"There's a lot of enthusiasm right now," Cox said. "This isn't over by any means."

Gun control advocates say they will have a presence around the convention, with plans for a vigil for victims of gun violence, a petition drive to support background checks and a Saturday demonstration outside the George R. Brown Convention Center.

Sandy Phillips, whose daughter Jessica Ghawi was killed in the Colorado theater shooting last July, met privately with Cruz in San Antonio this week. Phillips said Cruz refused to budge on expanding background checks and told her he considered it the first step toward government confiscation of guns.

"They're always good at saying the right thing, 'I'm so sorry for you loss and da da da da da,'" Phillips said. "If you're really sorry for my loss, do something about it."

In an interview Thursday with The Associated Press, Cruz called efforts by Obama and gun control advocates to push for expanded background checks an attempt to "undermine the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms."

Despite polls that show most Americans favor some background checks expansion, Ladd Everitt, spokesman for the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence, said a big challenge facing gun control advocates is matching the NRA's grassroots organizing, or as he called it "closing the passion gap."

"The NRA knows this issue is very much in play. People were sickened by that Senate vote," Everitt said.

Sen. Joe Manchin, a West Virginia Democrat, has said he will re-introduce the bill to require criminal and mental health background checks for gun buyers at shows and online. And despite their loss on the federal level, gun control advocates have scored some significant victories at the state level.

Colorado lawmakers passed new restrictions on firearms, including required background checks for private and online gun sales and a ban on ammunition magazines that hold more than 15 rounds. Connecticut recently added more than 100 firearms to the state's assault weapons ban and now requires background checks for private gun sales.

Maryland and New York have passed sweeping new guns laws, and in Washington state, supporters of universal background checks recently announced a statewide campaign to collect 300,000 signatures to put the issue straight to voters.

"There have been significant victories (at the state level). We expect that to continue and we're not giving up on the federal level," Everitt said.

John Ridlehuber, a gun dealer from Lott, Texas, a rural hamlet of about 700 people, said NRA members see no room for compromise on new gun restrictions. Gun rights advocates have given up far too much ground over the years, he said.

"We have capitulated in far too many places. We should never give anything up again," Ridlehuber said. "We're not the bad guys. We're the good guys."

___

Associated Press writer Alan Fram in Washington contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fresh-off-victory-nra-holds-convention-houston-180934457.html

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FDA lowers age for buyers of Plan B pill to 15

This undated image made available by Teva Women's Health shows the packaging for their Plan B One-Step (levonorgestrel) tablet, one of the brands known as the "morning-after pill." The Plan B morning-after pill is moving over-the-counter, a decision announced by the Food and Drug Administration just days before a court-imposed deadline. On April 30, 2013, the FDA lowered to 15 the age at which girls and women can buy the emergency contraceptive without a prescription ? and said it no longer has to be kept behind pharmacy counters. Instead, the pill can sit on drugstore shelves just like condoms, but that buyers would have to prove their age at the cash register. (AP Photo/Teva Women's Health)

This undated image made available by Teva Women's Health shows the packaging for their Plan B One-Step (levonorgestrel) tablet, one of the brands known as the "morning-after pill." The Plan B morning-after pill is moving over-the-counter, a decision announced by the Food and Drug Administration just days before a court-imposed deadline. On April 30, 2013, the FDA lowered to 15 the age at which girls and women can buy the emergency contraceptive without a prescription ? and said it no longer has to be kept behind pharmacy counters. Instead, the pill can sit on drugstore shelves just like condoms, but that buyers would have to prove their age at the cash register. (AP Photo/Teva Women's Health)

WASHINGTON (AP) ? In a surprise twist to the decade-plus effort to ease access to morning-after pills, the government is lowering the age limit to 15 for one brand ? Plan B One-Step ? and will let it be sold over the counter.

Today, Plan B and its generic competition are sold behind pharmacy counters, and people must prove they're 17 or older to buy the emergency contraception without a prescription. A federal judge had ordered an end to those sales restrictions by next Monday.

But Tuesday, the Food and Drug Administration approved a different approach: Plan B could sit on drugstore shelves next to condoms, spermicides or other women's health products ? but to make the purchase, buyers must prove they're 15 or older at the cash register.

Manufacturer Teva Women's Health, which had applied for the compromise path, said it planned to make the switch in a few months.

The question is whether Tuesday's action settles the larger court fight. Earlier this month, U.S. District Judge Edward Korman of New York blasted the Obama administration for imposing the age-17 limit, saying it had let election-year politics trump science and were making it hard for women of any age to obtain emergency contraception in time for it to work.

The FDA said Tuesday's decision was independent of the court case and wasn't intended to address it. The Justice Department remained mum on whether it planned to appeal Korman's ruling by Monday's deadline, and the White House had no immediate comment.

The women's group that sued over the age limits said Tuesday's action is not enough, and it will continue the court fight if necessary.

Lowering the age limit "may reduce delays for some young women but it does nothing to address the significant barriers that far too many women of all ages will still find if they arrive at the drugstore without identification," said Nancy Northup, president of the Center for Reproductive Rights.

The FDA said the Plan B One-Step will be packaged with a product code that prompts the cashier to verify a customer's age. Anyone who can't provide such proof as a driver's license, birth certificate or passport wouldn't be allowed to complete the purchase. In most states, driver's licenses, the most common form of identification, are issued at age 16.

"While an improvement over current policy, today's announcement is still disappointing," said Marcia D. Greenberger of the National Women's Law Center. "Because all women will be required to show an ID to establish their age, those without IDs could be denied access."

Other advocates called the move promising. "This decision is a step in the right direction for increased access to a product that is a safe and effective method of preventing unintended pregnancies," said Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash. "It's also a decision that moves us closer to these critical availability decisions being based on science, not politics."

Social conservatives had opposed any efforts to loosen restrictions on sale of the morning-after pill, arguing that it was important for parents and medical professionals to be involved in such decisions involving young girls.

The group Concerned Women for America charged that health officials were putting politics and so-called progress ahead of the health of children as well as women.

"It makes no sense that kids need parental permission to take aspirin at school, but they're free to buy and administer Plan B," Penny Nance, CEO and president of CWA, said in a statement.

Half the nation's pregnancies every year are unintended, and doctors groups say more access to morning-after pills could cut those numbers. The pills contain higher doses of regular contraceptives and, if taken within 72 hours of unprotected sex, can cut the chances of pregnancy by up to 89 percent. But they work best if taken in the first 24 hours.

The FDA had been poised to lift all age limits and let Plan B be sold over the counter in late 2011, but Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, in an unprecedented move, overruled her own scientists. Sebelius said some girls as young as 11 are physically capable of bearing children but shouldn't be able to buy the pregnancy-preventing pill on their own.

President Barack Obama supported Sebelius' move and a spokesman said the president's position hadn't changed.

The Justice Department could appeal Korman's ruling and seek a stay. If granted, the appeals process would move through the courts, while Plan B is sold over the counter whenever Teva has the product repackaged to meet the FDA's requirements.

Absent a stay, "we will want to go back to court as quickly as possible and ask the judge to hold them in contempt," said Janet Crepps, a senior counsel for the Center for Reproductive Rights.

The FDA said Tuesday that Teva had provided data proving that girls as young as 15 could understand how Plan B works and use it properly, without the involvement of a health care provider. Teva plans to conduct a consumer-education program and indicated it is willing to audit whether stores are following the age requirement, the agency said.

The FDA said its ruling applies only to Plan B One-Step, and not to generic versions of the pill, which would remain behind pharmacy counters with the age-17 restriction.

If a woman already is pregnant, the morning-after pill has no effect. It prevents ovulation or fertilization of an egg. According to the medical definition, pregnancy doesn't begin until a fertilized egg implants itself into the wall of the uterus. Still, some critics say Plan B is the equivalent of an abortion pill because it may also be able to prevent a fertilized egg from attaching to the uterus, a contention that many scientists ? and Korman, in his ruling ? said has been discredited.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/89ae8247abe8493fae24405546e9a1aa/Article_2013-05-01-Morning-After%20Pill/id-67a559647e1a4ac2b7c0d308e22e6f23

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Google Partners With Monotype To Bring Its Web Fonts To The Desktop

Google’s Web Fonts collection of open source fonts is now available on the desktop (Mac and Windows). At first glance, that doesn’t make all that much sense, given that the whole idea of Web Fonts is that they bring new typography options to the Web that were previously only available on the desktop. As Google notes, however, having these fonts available locally on your desktop means that your browser doesn’t actually have to spend time fetching them over the web. Google is using SkyFonts, a tool from font specialist Monotype, to allow you to install these fonts. The advantage of this, the company says, is that this tool also ensures that the fonts are regularly updated when new characters are added or the designers make other changes to it. Google launched Web Fonts in 2011. The service currently offers access to over 620 font families and all of these, of course, are now also available on the desktop. When it launched Web Fonts, Google said that it was doing so to free designers from having to use Flash or embed text in images to bring better and more interesting typography to the web. Google is obviously just one player in this market. Adobe, for example, offers similar features with its freemium TypeKit service and Edge Web Fonts for free and open source fonts. It’s also worth noting that many of the fonts available through Google Web Fonts were already available for the desktop.

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

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Lex Machina Raises $4.8M First Round Led By Cue Ball Capital As IP Litigation Reaches New Highs

One of the fundamental problems in intellectual property (IP) litigation is the lack of information available to both plaintiffs and defendants. The identity of the plaintiff and the defendant, the district(s), judge(s), and lawyers involved in a particular case, have a significant impact on the outcome of a litigation, including whether a particular litigation will proceed at all. While legal professionals have anecdotal and scholarly information on individual districts and judges, granular data on lawyers, courts, judges, and districts can be invaluable in litigation decision making.

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/9qRiSNG_jY4/

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Generic competition cuts Merck's Q1 sales, profit

WHITEHOUSE STATION, N.J. (AP) ? Drugmaker Merck & Co. is reporting lower first-quarter results and cutting its 2013 profit forecast by 15 cents a share. It also is announcing a huge share buyback, up to $15 billion worth of its stock.

Merck's first-quarter profit fell 8.3 percent and revenue by 9 percent, mainly because competition from generics slashed sales of its top seller, asthma and allergy drug Singulair.

The Whitehouse Station, N.J. company says net income was $1.59 billion, or 52 cents per share, down from $1.74 billion, or 56 cents per share, a year earlier.

Adjusted earnings were 85 cents per share, a nickel more than analysts expected.

Revenue totaled $10.67 billion, down from $11.73 billion. Analysts expected $11.11 billion.

Merck shares fell 99 cents to $46.01 in premarket trading.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/f70471f764144b2fab526d39972d37b3/Article_2013-05-01-Earns-Merck/id-863c20500c4244728ec00a958c497ccf

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Archaeologists Uncover Hundreds of Mysterious Orbs in Ancient Temple

In news that will likely delight Apollo 11 deniers, Roswell frequenters, and Illuminati enthusiasts alike, archaeologists have discovered hundreds of mysterious, once-metallic spheres buried deep beneath an ancient pyramid in Mexico City. And we have absolutely no idea what they're for.

Described by Jorge Zavala, an archaeologist at Mexico's National Anthropology and History Institute, as an "unprecedented discovery," the orbs have called one of the most important temples in an ancient, pre-Hispanic city home for the past 1,800 years.

But this wasn't just your average ancient township; the city, Teotihuacan, was once one of the biggest in the world, boasting over 100,000 residents at a time when the Earth itself only held around 200 million. And it's this relatively massive population that makes the city's total abandonment for "mysterious reasons" in 700 AD all the more puzzling.

Plus, it seems that the Teotihuacans knew damn well they weren't coming back. Before fleeing the famine and/or alien invasion that consumed their home, people had filled their beloved temple's tunnels with so much debris and ruins that it took scientists several years of planning alone before they could dig their way in.

Unearthing the Tomb

The fruit of all that prepatory labor? A team of wireless robots working together to offer a glimpse into an increasingly esoteric past.

The robotic system, dubbed Tlaloque, includes a larger rover to take over carpool duty for two smaller mechanisms it chauffeurs around the ruins' dilapidated tunnels. Once the trio arrives at an actual chamber, one vehicle will break off and take infrared shots of the entire space while its smaller, flight-enabled drone friend zooms around to capture video footage.

In this case, it's the infrared scanner that stumbled upon the orb-loaded chambers, which held hundreds of the clay-cored, yellow-tinted balls currently stumping scientists.

Fool's Gold

They yellow color comes from jarosite, which forms as pyrite?or fool's gold?oxidizes. So back in 300 AD, when the Teotihuacanos used these variously sized (1.5 to 5 inches) balls in whatever ceremonies or rituals they engaged in, they were looking at what might have seemed like beautiful, glimmering balls of gold.

As George Gowgill, professor emeritus at Arizona State University told Discovery News:

Pyrite was certainly used by the Teotihuacanos and other ancient Mesoamerican societies. Originally the spheres would have shown brilliantly. They are indeed unique, but I have no idea what they mean.

As the walls themselves were also dusted with pyrite?which would have given a lovely golden sheen to the pottery and crystal-covered masks scattered around the room?the archaeologists believe that "high-ranking people, priests, or even rulers went down to the tunnel to perform rituals."

Ancient Intentions

What these golden-ball-necessitating rituals might have entailed, though, remains just as inconclusive. As Zavala succinctly and ominously states: "No one can establish their function."

It seems entirely possible, though, that they served some sort of religious purpose; Teotihuaca?translation: the place where men become gods?began as a religious center for the region, and the site has been thought to include a burial ground. The Teotihuacan people worshiped eight gods, and were known to practice human sacrifices during the dedication of buildings like, say, giant temples. All of which would have looked quite compelling against a gleaming gold backdrop.

Full answers may still come, and soon; there are still three chambers left for the researchers (and their robot friends) to go digging through. That last one might yield an even bigger surprise, its thick walls were demolished about 1,800 years ago so that the Teotihuacan people could deposit "something very important" in the safest part they could. Forget golden orbs; we might just be in for crystal skulls. [Mexico National Institute of Anthropology and History via Discovery News]

Source: http://gizmodo.com/archaeologists-uncover-hundreds-of-mysterious-orbs-in-a-486026749

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Red Letter Edition - WEEKDAYS! "Unplugged From ... - Internet Radio

On his show, Comedian Rodney Perry covers arts and entertainment, everything from comedy and politics to music and acting, with his signature comedic slant.

MashUp Radio is a 30-minute podcast that discusses the fusion of technology, life, culture and science. Host Peter Biddle, engineer and executive for Intel?s Atom Software, dishes up a thought-provoking discussion.

Joy Keys provides her listeners with insight to improve their lives mentally, physically, monetarily and emotionally. Past guests on the show have included Meshell Nedegeocello, Blair Underwood, in addition to an impressive list of CEOs, humanitarians and authors.

Host Barry Moltz gets small businesses unstuck. He has founded and run small businesses with a great deal of success and failure for more than 15 years. This is a business radio show where he shares all the craziness of small business. It?s that craziness that actually makes it exciting, interesting and totally unpredictable.

The Bottom Line Sports Show is hosted by former NBA stars Penny Hardaway, Charles Oakley, Mateen Cleaves. Tune in to get the inside scoop on what's happening in sports today.

Hits Radio covers basketball, sports culture and entertainment with past guests including Jason Kidd, Robin Lundberg and Chris Herren.

Listeners get an earful on The Halli Casser-Jayne Show, Talk Radio for Fine Minds. Whether it?s the current political cocktail or the latest must-read award-winning book, Halli tackles all topics and likes to stir ? and sometimes shakes ? things up.

Official Internet radio show of forthcoming epic paranormal investigation book by Eric Olsen and "Haunted Housewife" Theresa Argie.

Award-winning World Footprints is a leading voice in socially responsible travel and lifestyle. Hosts Ian & Tonya celebrate culture and heritage and bring a unique voice to the world of travel.

Football Reporters Online is a group of veteran football experts in the fields of coaching, scouting, talent evaluation, and writing/broadcasting/media placement. Combined, the group brings well over 100 years of expertise in sports.

Host John Martin interviews the nation's leading entrepreneurs and small biz experts to educate small business owners on how to be successful. Past guests have included Emeril Lagasse and Guy Kawasaki.

The Movie Geeks share their passion for the art through interviews with the stars of and creative minds behind your favorite flicks and pay tribute to big-screen legends. From James Cameron and Francis Ford Coppola to Ellen Burstyn and Robert Duvall, The Geeks have got'em all.

Sylvia Global presents global conversations pertaining to women, wealth, business, faith and philanthropy. Sylvia has interviewed an eclectic mix from CEOs and musicians to fashion designers and philanthropists including Randolph Duke and Ne-Yo.

Mr. Media host Bob Andelman goes one-on-one with the hottest, most influential minds from the worlds of film, TV, music, comedy, journalism and literature. That means A-listers like Kirk Douglas, Christian Slater, Kathy Ireland, Rick Fox, Chris Hansen and Jackie Collins.

Paula Begoun, best-selling author of Don't Go to the Cosmetics Counter Without Me, separates fact from fiction on achieving a radiant, youthful complexion at any age. She?s regularly joined by health and beauty experts who offer the latest on keeping your skin in tip-top shape.

Source: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/tri-communications/2013/04/29/red-letter-edition--weekdays-what-did-jesus-say

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