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Thursday, May 3, 2012

Jessica Simpson: Giving Birth RIGHT NOW!

Jessica Simpson has looked like she's been ready to pop for weeks, but that little Johnson wriggling around inside her wasn't ready to come out ... until NOW!

The 31-year-old and several members of her family arrived at an L.A. hospital earlier this morning, because her soon-to-be born daughter Maxi is coming!!

Jessica, her mother Tina and her sister Ashlee Simpson just arrived, along with fiance Eric Johnson's parents. It's baby time, people. You can stop worrying.

Good luck Jessica! Let us know how it goes!!! With pics!!!!

Jessica Simpson won't look like this for much longer!

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Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Late-night poll: Do you use the external speaker on your Android phone?

We talk a lot about listening to music and watching video on our Android phones around here. Android handles multimedia well, and streaming services like YouTube and Google Music work really nicely on Android. Something most of us talk less about, but equally important is making phone calls. These are designed to be phones first and foremost. Both have one thing in common -- the speakers. There's pretty much three ways to get the sound from your phone to your ears; a wired headphones/headset, a Bluetooth set-up, or one of the speakers.

Personally, I hate using the speaker on any phone or tablet. When I talk on the phone, I pick it up like a phone and hold it against my head. The only reason I have a Bluetooth headset is to test and review Android phones. I'm picky about the way calls sound, because with today's tech there's no reason for them to not sound good. When it comes to music, games or video, I prefer and use a wired headset -- small easy-to-carry ear buds if I'm out, or a big honking set of over-the-ear 'phones around the house. Nobody else wants to hear what I'm listening to -- if so they would ask.

But since everyone's different, I gotta ask. Answer in tonight's poll.

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REVIEW - Mashable

Product: The Mu Folding USB Adapter

Price: ?25 (approx. $40)

What It?s Good For: Slimline smartphone charging.

Who It?s Good For: Anyone who wants a compact charging solution on the go.

Bottom Line: The Mu improves the traditional British plug with its innovative folding design.

A Look at The Mu

After its clever concept product design went viral, UK firm Made in Mind brought an altered version of the product to the British market.

In 2009, designer Min-Kyu Choi?s YouTube video (embedded above) showed a cunning concept that dramatically reduced the size and bulk of the British plug. Choi?s vision hit a chord with consumers, and was quickly shared online, covered by tech blogs around the world, and went on to win design awards.

Choi explains how the design came about. ?I was frustrated by the dimensions of the traditional plug, and felt that the existing unit, which dates back to 1947, was out of touch and incongruous with modern design. My idea was very simple ? redesign the plug to bring it in line with the clean look and feel of today?s technology, without compromising functionality.?

While a laptop charger is still in the works, the Mu, a folding USB adapter for smartphones, is now available for purchase in the British Isles.

A small, white device, the Mu folds out to reveal three prongs, two of which swivel to take the traditional plug shape, ready to charge your USB-powered smartphone. When folded down, the Mu is compact and (crucially) safe to chuck in your bag, without fear of the prongs damaging your kit.

At ?25, the Mu is a pricey alternative to an iPhone USB plug (OEM versions can be picked up for a couple of pounds), but it is a price many design aficionados and digital nomads will be happy to pay. And if its fold-down design prevents the pain of stepping on an upended plug even once, it?s priceless.

View As Slideshow ?

1. The Packaging

The Mu's sleek, white packaging and simple, curvy logo complements the slimline design of the device.

The name was crowdsourced from the original folding plug concept's fan community.

Robin Freeman came up with "mu." It's Greek for "micro."

2. The Mu

The small device is made of white plastic. Although small, it feels sturdy.

3. Dimensions

The Mu measures 14mm x 55mm x 60mm.

4. Compared to an Apple USB Plug

In this image you can see the Mu compared to a British Apple iPhone USB plug. The Mu's design is not only space-saving, but reduces the chance of scratches from the traditional plug's prongs.

5. Opened Up

Once you open the Mu, you see the three prongs.

6. With the Prongs Turned

You rotate the two bottom prongs to ready it for use.

7. Ready for Use

Then, it's just a matter of inserting your smartphone's USB cable into the port at the back and plugging it in.

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'Hunger Games,' 'Bridesmaids' top MTV Movie Awards

FILE - In this file image released by Lionsgate, Jennifer Lawrence portrays Katniss Everdeen, left, and Liam Hemsworth portrays Gale Hawthorne in a scene from "The Hunger Games." "The Hunger Games" on Monday, April 30, 2012 was nominated for eight MTV Movie awards, including bids for best cast, breakthrough performance, and movie of the year. (AP Photo/Lionsgate, Murray Close, File)

FILE - In a Monday, March 12, 2012 file photo, cast member Jennifer Lawrence arrives at the world premiere of "The Hunger Games" in Los Angeles. "The Hunger Games" on Monday, April 30, 2012 was nominated for eight MTV Movie awards, including bids for best cast, breakthrough performance, and movie of the year. (AP Photo/Matt Sayles, File)

LOS ANGELES (AP) ? This year's MTV Movie Awards will be a showdown between a bevy of bridesmaids and a cast of killer kids.

"Bridesmaids" and "The Hunger Games" top nominees at MTV's annual film honors with eight nods apiece, including bids for best cast, breakthrough performance and movie of the year. Rounding out the best-picture contenders are "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2," ''The Help" And "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1."

MTV announced nominees Monday in 12 categories, including six new ones such as "best on-screen dirtbag" and "best gut-wrenching performance." Also new this year: Nominees were selected by a panel of actors, producers, agents and industry tastemakers instead of via online vote from the public.

Fans can still choose the winners, though. Voting begins online Tuesday at 8 a.m. Eastern time.

The 21st annual MTV Movie Awards will be presented June 3 at the Gibson Amphitheatre in Universal City and broadcast live on MTV.

___

The complete list of nominees:

Movie of the year: "Bridesmaids," ''The Hunger Games," ''Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2," ''The Help," ''The Twilight Saga: breaking Dawn-Part1."

Female performance: Emma Stone, "Crazy, Stupid, Love"; Emma Watson, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2"; Jennifer Lawrence, "The Hunger Games"; Kristen Wiig, "Bridesmaids"; Rooney Mara, "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo."

Male performance: Channing Tatum, "The Vow"; Daniel Radcliffe, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2"; Joseph Gordon-Levitt, "50/50"; Josh Hutcherson, "The Hunger Games"; Ryan Gosling, "Drive."

Breakthrough performance: Elle Fanning, "Super 8"; Melissa McCarthy, "Bridesmaids"; Liam Hemsworth, "The Hunger Games"; Rooney Mara, "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo"; Shailene Woodley, "The Descendants."

Comedic performance: Jonah Hill, "21 Jump Street"; Kristen Wiig, "Bridesmaids"; Melissa McCarthy, "Bridesmaids"; Oliver Cooper, "Project X"; Zach Galifianakis, "The Hangover Part II."

Cast: "21 Jump Street," ''Bridesmaids," ''Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2," ''The Help," ''The Hunger Games."

On-screen transformation: Colin Farrell, "Horrible Bosses"; Elizabeth Banks, "The Hunger Games"; Johnny Depp, "21 Jump Street"; Michelle Williams, "My Week With Marilyn"; Rooney Mara, "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo."

Fight: Channing Tatum & Jonah Hill vs. kid gang, "21 Jump Street"; Daniel Radcliffe vs. Ralph Fiennes, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2"; Jennifer Lawrence & Josh Hutcherson vs. Alexander Ludwig, "The Hunger Games"; Tom Cruise vs. Michael Nyqvist, "Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol"; Tom Hardy vs. Joel Edgerton, "Warrior."

Kiss: Channing Tatum & Rachel McAdams, "The Vow"; Jennifer Lawrence & Josh Hutcherson, "The Hunger Games"; Robert Pattinson & Kristen Stewart, "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1"; Rupert Grint & Emma Watson, "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2"; Ryan Gosling & Emma Stone, "Crazy, Stupid, Love."

Gut-wrenching performance: Jonah Hill & Rob Riggle, "21 Jump Street"; Kristen Wiig, Maya Rudolph, Rose Byrne, Melissa McCarthy, Wendi McLendon-Covey and Ellie Kemper, "Bridesmaids"; Ryan Gosling, "Drive"; Bryce Dallas Howard, "The Help"; Tom Cruise, "Mission Impossible: Ghost Protocol."

On-screen dirtbag: Bryce Dallas Howard, "The Help"; Colin Farrell, "Horrible Bosses"; Jennifer Aniston, "Horrible Bosses"; Jon Hamm, "Bridesmaids"; Oliver Cooper, "Project X."

Music: "The Devil is in the Details," Chemical Brothers, "Hanna"; "Impossible," Figurine, "Like Crazy"; "Party Rock Anthem," LMFAO, "21 Jump Street"; "Pursuit of Happiness," Kid Cudi (Steve Aoki Remix), "Project X"; "A Real Hero," College with Electric Youth, "Drive."

___

Online:

http://www.mtv.com/ontv/movieawards/2012/

Associated Press

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Blind Chinese activist makes dramatic escape from house arrest

Chen Guangcheng is now sheltering in the US embassy.

Chen Guangcheng's blindness was a help and a hindrance as he made his way past the security cordon ringing his farmhouse.

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He knew the terrain ? he had explored his village in rural China as a blind child and moved as easily in darkness as in daylight. He was alert for the sounds of people, cars and the river he would have to cross.

But he stumbled scores of times, arriving bloody at a meeting point with a fellow dissident ? the first of an underground railroad of supporters who eventually escorted him to safety with U.S. diplomats.

RECOMMENDED: Six famous Chinese dissidents

A self-taught lawyer who angered authorities by exposing forced abortions, Chen is now presumed to be under U.S. protection, most likely in the fortress-like American Embassy in Beijing. Details of his improbable escape ? making his way last week through fields and forest, then being chased by security agents in Beijing ? are emerging in accounts from the activists who helped him.

Chen and his family had been harassed and kept under house arrest since the summer of 2005, except for a four-year period when Chen was jailed on charges of disrupting traffic and restrictions were eased on his wife and daughter. The couple's young son lives with his mother's sister.

After Chen's release in September 2010, the family was again placed under house arrest, their movements severely restricted, with even 6-year-old daughter Kesi subjected to searches when she came home from school. Chen and his wife, Yuan Weijing, were beaten several times.

The 41-year-old activist hatched his escape plan months ago with a simple idea ? he would just lie still, said Bob Fu, founder of the Texas-based rights group ChinaAid and one of a handful of people to speak to Chen since he fled his village.

For weeks on end, Chen stayed in bed, saying he was too feeble to rise.

In fact, Chen wasn't well; his stomach was bothering him as it had for years. But he exaggerated his condition to lull the guards into a sense of complacency.

The ruse worked. The guards didn't look in on him constantly, assuming he was still bedridden, and when he escaped under cover of darkness, it took three days for them to notice.

"He did a darn good job. ... He prepared for months, at least two months," Fu said. "He didn't really move much, just laying in bed and making the impression that he couldn't move."

The night was cool with just a sliver of crescent moon in the sky on April 22 when Chen slipped out of his farmhouse in eastern China's Shandong province. Blinded by fever as a child, Chen grew up exploring the nearby cornfields and dirt paths sightless, so he had his bearings.

It wasn't the first time he had run away from Dongshigu village and his bitter, nearly decade-long feud with local officials.

In 2005, Chen, his wife and a friend made a dash out of the village, running through a cornfield to evade guards. He and his friend got all the way to Beijing, where they met with diplomats and journalists, but his wife was captured. Days later, Chen was seized by security guards on the streets of the capital and returned to house arrest.

On that brief escape he had been helped by his sighted friend; this time Chen was alone.

He followed a path to a field and from there took a road he knew would lead him to a narrow river. After crossing it, he entered a wooded area that gave way to less familiar territory, ground that continually tripped him up. He fell at least 200 times, he would tell his supporters.

He walked for hours, trying to put as much distance between himself and his heavily guarded home as possible before daring to slip a battery into his mobile phone and call He Peirong, a Nanjing-based English teacher-turned-activist who had promised to help. She was waiting with a car.

When she finally found him, Chen was wet, covered in mud and blood, and had numerous cuts and bruises.

"He was in very unbelievable shape when he was picked up," said Fu, citing a conversation with He. Chen "was trembling, was physically weak. ... But he was determined to escape from that miserable condition."

Fu said Chen took a few days to recuperate before making a video appeal.

Uploaded to YouTube and Boxun.com five days after Chen's escape, it showed the blind activist wearing a Nike windbreaker and his trademark black sunglasses, looking relaxed and sounding strong. In it, he pleaded with Premier Wen Jiabao to punish the local authorities who had subjected Chen and his family to 20 months of house arrest, repeatedly beating them.

It was apparently taped in Beijing after He drove Chen north and handed him off to another activist, who brought him to the capital.

He herself was detained Friday by police. Hours before, she told The Associated Press she had been in contact with Chen's relatives, who told her that when the local village chief discovered Chen was gone, "he was furious."

They beat Chen's wife, his brother and his adult nephew, she said.

In Beijing, Chen was mainly aided by Guo Yushan, founder of a think tank set up in 2007 in the capital's university district.

He also met with prominent activists Hu Jia and Zeng Jinyan, posing for smiling snapshots with the couple ? pictures they later posted to Twitter. They discussed Chen's plan, saying he wanted "justice and freedom," and insisted he had no intention of leaving China.

Zeng said he seemed thinner and his hair was grayer than she remembered it, but that he was full of conviction.

"He was very certain and very clear," Zeng said. "He wants justice for his case and his family and he doesn't want to go abroad, doesn't want exile."

Despite his desire to stay in China, Fu now says China and the U.S. are close to a deal that would see Chen and his family given asylum in the United States. It could be announced within days, he said Monday.

Several others besides Guo helped Chen in Beijing, but Zeng and Fu declined to name them for fear they would be rounded up by security agents.

He, the former schoolteacher, has not been heard from since her detention Friday; Guo was detained and released but did not respond to a request for an interview. Colleagues said it wasn't "convenient" for him to talk, suggesting he is under pressure from authorities to stay silent.

Zeng and her husband also were questioned, with Hu spending 24 hours in custody.

The only tidbit Fu dared to offer about Chen's experience in Beijing was that he was involved in a car chase by security officials while being driven by a fellow dissident. But the agents were after the driver and didn't even know Chen was in the car.

"If they had known Chen was there, they probably would have shut down all of Beijing's traffic," Fu said.

RECOMMENDED: Six famous Chinese dissidents

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Obama denies ?excessive celebration? of bin Laden anniversary

President Barack Obama denied charges that he has improperly politicized the first anniversary of the raid that killed Osama Bin Laden, declaring Monday, "I hardly think that you've seen any excessive celebration taking place here."

The Obama campaign has been criticized by Republicans for a campaign ad that implies Mitt Romney would not have ordered the surprise attack on Bin Laden's Abbottabad, Pakistan compound. Senator John McCain called the ad?"a cheap political attack."

"I think that people, the American people, rightly remember what we as a country accomplished in bringing to justice somebody who killed over 3,000 of our citizens," Obama said at a White House press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda.

"And it's a mark of the excellence of our intelligence teams, and our military teams, a political process that worked. And I think for us to use that time for some reflection, to give thanks to those who participated, is entirely appropriate. And that's what's been taking place," Obama said.

Romney,? looking to play down Obama's decision to green-light the raid, said Monday that "even Jimmy Carter would have given that order." (In fact, Carter gave "that order," sending elite forces on a mission to rescue the American hostages in Iran, with disastrous results that helped cost him reelection.)

"As far as my personal role and what other folks would do, I'd just recommend that everybody?take a look at people's previous statements in terms of whather they thought it was appropriate to go into Pakistan and take out bin Laden," Obama said.

"I assume that people meant what they said when they said it," he told reporters. "That's been, at least, my practice. I said that I would go after Bin Laden if we had a clear shot at him, and I did. If there are others who have said one thing and now suggest they would do something else, I'd go ahead and let them explain it."

During the 2008 presidential campaign, Romney criticized Obama for saying he would order American forces to go after Bin Laden, even on Pakistani soil. "I do not concur in the words of Barack? Obama in a plan to enter an ally of ours. ? I don't think those kinds of comments help in this effort to draw more friends to our effort," Romney told reporters on the campaign trail. He specified that what he objected to was openly discussing such operations. Romney also said he would not move "heaven and earth" to get bin Laden, then underlined that he meant that the war on terrorism was not about just one man.

Romney campaign spokeswoman Andrea Saul criticized Obama for trying to "use what was a good day for all Americans as a cheap political ploy and an opportunity to distort Governor Romney's strong policies on the war on terror."

"President Obama's feckless foreign policy has emboldened our adversaries, weakened our allies, and threatens to break faith with our military," she said. "Gov. Romney has always understood we need a comprehensive plan to deal with the myriad threats America faces."

The back-and-forth came one day before the ninth anniversary of George W. Bush's triumphant landing on the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln, where Bush declared "victory" in Iraq under a giant "Mission Accomplished" banner.

Democrats were apoplectic at the time. Republicans not only defended the move but made very much the same kinds of comments about John Kerry that they now decry when Obama makes them about Mitt Romney (Slate has compiled a list).

Update 5:21 pm: This post has been updated to add a reaction from Mitt Romney spokeswoman Andrea Saul.

More popular Yahoo! News stories:

??Marco Rubio joins long list of pols?including past vice presidential candidates?fined by FEC

? Chris Christie says he may end up as Mitt Romney's running mate

??Scott Brown touts Democratic endorsements in Massachusetts

Want more of our best political stories? Visit The Ticket or connect with us on Facebook, follow us on Twitter or add us on Tumblr. Handy with a camera? Join our Election 2012 Flickr group to submit your photos of the campaign in action.

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Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Ex-aide's wife: Edwards knew about money (cbsnews)

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