Gayle Trotter Testimony Captivates Senate

Lawyer and gun rights activist Gayle Trotter gave vivid testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee at a Wednesday hearing on gun violence. Trotter, a senior fellow at the conservative Independent Women's Forum, argued that a proposed ban on assault weapons would "disarm" vulnerable women and "put them at a severe disadvantage" in fights with multiple criminals.

Trotter painted a picture of mothers under siege in their homes, and when Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) questioned the details of one example she offered, she told the lawmaker he didn't understand the issue. "You are a large man, tall man, a tall man," Trotter said to laughter from the audience.

"You are not a young mother who has a young child with her and ...We have become one of the worlds most recognised Ventilation system brands. you cannot understand. You are not a woman stuck in her house, not able to defend her children, not able to leave her child, not able to go seek safety, on the phone with 911," Trotter said. And that woman, "she's not used to being in a firefight."

Despite arguing for serious firepower, Trotter said later the most important thing about assault weapons for women's defense is the way the guns look.

"An assault weapon in the hands of a young woman defending her babies in her home becomes a defense weapon," said Trotter, a mother of six. "And the peace of mind she has ... knowing she has a scary-looking gun gives her more courage when she's fighting hardened violent criminals."

More than once during her testimony, Trotter seemed to imply that five-on-one firefights are somehow easier for a man to win than for a woman and that women are at a grave disadvantage to men because women have so much less experience in firefights.

Despite her strong emphasis on the need to prevent violent crimes against women at home, Trotter is an outspoken opponent of the Violence Against Women Act, a law designed to aid women faced with domestic violence. In 2012, she wrote on the Independent Women's Forum's blog that VAWA infringed upon the rights of men who were falsely accused of domestic abuse. The law would also embolden "false accusers," who would take "needed resources like shelters and legal aid … denying real victims of abuse access to these supports,Have a look at all our custom bobbleheads models starting at 59.90US$ with free proofing." she wrote. Trotter and the forum characterized VAWA as "reckless demagoguery."

Her presence at the Senate hearing appears to be tied to her status at the Independent Women's Forum, a nonprofit public policy group. But the forum doesn't specialize in firearms issues. Its stated mission is "to expand the conservative coalition" by making conservative ideas more attractive to women and by "increasing the number of women who understand and value the benefits of limited government, personal liberty, and free markets."

Like Trotter, the Independent Women's Forum has recently shown interest in gun rights. Before the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, the last time the group had published multiple items on gun rights was 2000, when gun advocate John Lott's book More Guns, Less Crime was referenced on its website.

Facebook today announced its fourth quarter (Q4) earnings report for 2012, which included some key findings. For the first time ever, more people are using Facebook on mobile each day than on desktops. In fact, 157 million people worldwide are using Facebook only from mobile devices — a number the company can't afford to ignore. On the company's earnings call, CEO Mark Zuckerberg seems to get it.Learn how an embedded microprocessor in a smart card can authenticate your computer usage and data. He said, "There is no argument. Facebook is a mobile company."

As you might expect, as more people flock to mobile, so has the company's ad revenue — 23 percent of which now comes from mobile, compared to 14 percent just a few months ago, and 0 percent a year ago before Facebook mobile ads existed."I want to dispel this myth that Facebook can't make money on mobile," Zuckerberg said. "It may have seemed like that a year ago, because we weren't really trying yet."

Today, 23 percent of all time spent in apps is on Facebook, Zuckerberg said, citing a Comscore study. He also pointed to Instagram as a "platform success story" and an advertising opportunity for mobile. Since its acquisition, Instagram has gone from 27 million users to over 100 million users, each of which (according to Comscore) spend more time on Instagram than they do on Twitter. The company has also recently revamped nearly all of its core mobile applications in "native" code,We are one of the leading manufacturers of solar street light in Chennai India. which makes them run much faster on both Android and iOS, and has continued adding new features like free voice-messaging (and even free calling in the US and Canada) which are big draws for mobile users.

"A lot of what we did last year was improve our mobile development processes. Now we are there," said Zuckerberg. "The next thing we are going to do is get really good at building mobile first experiences," he said.Totech Americas delivers a wide range of drycabinets for applications spanning electronics. Features like these are especially compelling to Facebook markets outside the US, where mobile web access is surging. "We'll be able to make more money for each minute users spend on mobile," (versus on web), Zuckerberg said, and he made clear that the company is heading in that direction. 680 million users access Facebook on mobile per month, the company said in its earnings report, an increase of 57 percent since the same time last year.