Hillary Clinton Criticized for ‘ignorant’ statement About guns after Las Vegas shooting

Hillary Clinton took heat Monday for issuing what critics called an “ignorant” and “irrelevant” statement going after the NRA and silencers in the hours after the Las Vegas mass shooting.

As details were still emerging about the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history – which killed at least 58 people – the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee took to Twitter to imagine how much deadlier the massacre might have been if silencers had been used.

“The crowd fled at the sound of gunshots. Imagine the deaths if the shooter had a silencer, which the NRA wants to make easier to get,” she tweeted, adding: “Our grief isn't enough. We can and must put politics aside, stand up to the NRA, and work together to try to stop this from happening again.”

It was an apparent reference to the NRA’s push to ease federal rules for silencers.

But conservative critics quickly hit back, saying silencers probably would only moderately dampen the sound of gunfire in this kind of attack – especially from what was described as a high-powered weapon.

“Suppressors only reduce by a few decibels, still same decibel level as a jackhammer,” tweeted Dana Loesch, a talk radio host and NRA spokeswoman.

Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro, editor in chief of The Daily Wire, blasted Clinton’s tweets as “Ignorant, irrelevant and exploitative.”

Radio host and CIA veteran Buck Sexton had a similar take: “Appallingly stupid, and entirely irrelevant, Mrs Clinton She knows nothing about firearms, and even worse, she doesn't care.”

It’s unclear what weapons the shooter, identified as 64-year-old Stephen Paddock, was using. Witnesses described the sound of rapid automatic gunfire – which many believed to be firecrackers – ringing out as thousands ran for cover. One vendor told Fox News that “it sounded like a machine gun.” Authorities said the shooter had more than 10 rifles in the hotel room where he fired on concert-goers below.

The casualties in the attack exceeded those of the Pulse nightclub tragedy in Florida more than a year ago. As with the Pulse attack, the Las Vegas shooting led to prompt calls from Democrats – not just Clinton – for gun legislation, though the party has struggled to tighten laws even when the Obama administration was in power.

Connecticut’s senators, who have been especially outspoken on gun control ever since the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, were among the first to issue statements Monday.

“Nowhere but America do horrific large-scale mass shootings happen with this degree of regularity,” Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., said in a statement. “This must stop. It is positively infuriating that my colleagues in Congress are so afraid of the gun industry that they pretend there aren't public policy responses to this epidemic. There are, and the thoughts and prayers of politicians are cruelly hollow if they are paired with continued legislative indifference. It's time for Congress to get off its ass and do something."

Connecticut’s other Democratic senator, Richard Blumenthal, issued a similar statement.

“It has been barely a year since what was previously the largest mass shooting in American history – the deadly attack at Pulse nightclub. In the interim, thousands more have been lost to the daily, ruthless toll of gun violence. Still, Congress refuses to act. I am more than frustrated, I am furious,” he said.

As the lawmakers seemed to acknowledge, gun legislation stands little chance of passing under a Republican-controlled Congress and White House.

After the Pulse shooting, Senate Democrats launched a 15-hour filibuster followed by a Democratic sit-in on the House floor in a high-profile push for gun control legislation. But the divided Senate ultimately rejected all four gun measures put on the floor for a vote.

The battle over gun restrictions has, meanwhile, played out in a more substantive fashion on the state level – and at the courts.

Most recently, a federal appeals court last week delivered a win for gun rights activists by keeping in place another court’s ruling that it was unconstitutional for the District of Columbia to require gun owners to provide a “good reason” for legally carrying a concealed weapon in the nation’s capital. The dispute could be on a path to the Supreme Court. 

New Jersey Reception For Trump iS a chilly One

Outside the confines of his golf club in Bedminster, New Jersey, President Donald Trump isn’t exactly vacationing in friendly territory.

It’s not just the organized protest motorcades around the club, or the nearby cornfield where the word “RESIST” has been cut in 70-foot letters, along with the female sign, visible from the air.

Aside from Gov. Chris Christie’s warm welcome, the president is getting a chilly reception from the state’s political class, which is greeting his presence in New Jersey with a shrug — or worse.

“It’s not like he’s really here. He’s not going to walk down Main Street and buy an ice cream cone,” said Democratic state Sen. Richard Codey, who served 18 months as governor. “Perhaps he might see Christie there.”




Trump’s approval rating in New Jersey was at an anemic 28 percent in a June poll. Trump lost the state — which a Republican presidential candidate hasn’t carried since 1988 — by 13 points. Even tony, traditionally Republican Somerset County, home to Trump’s golf club, went for Hillary Clinton by a 20,000 vote plurality (Trump won Bedminster by just 8 votes).

The president’s standing is such that some local Republicans seem to be hoping Trump keeps a low profile. The campaign of Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno, who’s running for governor in the November election, didn’t respond to two phone calls seeking comment on how she felt about the president vacationing in her home state.

“I don’t have really a feeling one way or the other about it,” said Assembly Republican leader Jon Bramnick, who harbors ambitions for higher office.

It’s a stark contrast to President Barack Obama’s first term, when Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine — seeking reelection — held two public rallies in front of thousands with Obama (Corzine wound up losing to Christie).

There has been some controversy about Trump’s visits to Bedminster, though it’s largely been practical.

Early on, local officials fretted about increased costs for their local public safety agencies, but that was largely allayed by Trump’s golf club qualifying as a “residence of the president,” making Bedminster eligible for federal funds to cover its costs.

The tight security has local airports and their associated businesses complaining that the extensive no-fly zone around Trump’s golf course is hurting their bottom lines.

“I was the person responsible, at least in part, for making sure that Bedminster was included as a place that was covered for reimbursement from the federal government for the expenses of local law enforcement,” said GOP Rep. Leonard Lance, whose district includes Bedminster. “I’ve written federal authorities, and I hope the federal authorities might look at the fact that local airports are concerned because of their business.”

But Lance — who has held several town halls packed with anti-Trump constituents — said he hasn’t heard much feedback about Trump’s vacation in the district.

“I have not. I understand there have been some who have been protesting and that’s part of the American tradition,” Lance said. “Those who have protested have not discussed it with me.”

“He is completely insulated from those voters — even those who demonstrate are kept, I’m sure, a safe distance out of his eyesight and hearing,” said Democratic state Sen. Loretta Weinberg.

Analilia Mejia, executive director of the New Jersey Working Families Alliance, has helped organize car caravans carrying protest signs every Saturday. Mejia said the strategy came about when authorities put protesters in a “free speech zone” down the road from the golf club.

Mejia said she’s noticed that local politicos for the most part aren’t up in arms about Trump’s visits.

“It’s so infuriating. One, he’s costing New Jersey and Bedminster money. It does cost the state some resources, adding insult to injury ‘Chris Christie’s friend,” Mejia said. “I wish that the establishment Democratic Party leaders or political leaders were putting as much skin in the game as regular people are in defense of their health care, in defense of trying to prevent our families from being ripped apart.”

Still, the most outrage to come out of Trump’s visit wasn’t from the president or his local detractors, but resulted from a snarky Boston Globe article that trafficked in New Jersey stereotypes and decade-old pop culture references, headlined “Forget scenic traditions — Trump vacations in the land of spray tans.”

“Just another reason to ignore the Boston Globe!” Christie tweeted Saturday, just before heading overseas for his own vacation.

Even Trump’s most caustic New Jersey critics, like Democratic Rep. Bill Pascrell, who has been on a crusade to force the release of Trump’s tax returns, didn’t begrudge him a pleasant stay in the Garden State.

“We welcome him here. I hope he has one of our famous weiner hot dogs and tries to stuff himself with that,” Pascrell said. “ I hope he has a relaxing 17 days because he has all kinds of stuff.”

Technology Kills Man as He Uses His iPhone in His Bath

A man has died after dropping his iPhone in the bath while it was charging.

Richard Bull, 32, was in the bath, resting his phone, which was charging via an extension cord in the hallway, on his chest in December last year.





When the water touched his phone, he was electrocuted to death. He suffered acute burns on his chest, arm and hand. His wife Tanya found him in the bath, and thought he had been attacked he was so badly injured. She phoned for an ambulance, but unfortunately he was already dead by the time the paramedics arrived.


Credit: Facebook

Richard was getting ready to meet his family and exchange Christmas gifts when he was electrocuted. Such a horrific tragedy.


While people know to keep hairdryers away from the bath, people might not think that something as small as a mobile phone could potentially electrocute you if it comes in contact with water.

His brother Andrews said: "We can all be careless at times. You don't think there is enough electricity to do this, but there is."


"It was such a needless and tragic accident."

His mum Carole commented: " I worry so many people, and especially teenagers who can't be separated from their phones, don't know how dangerous it is."

Assistant coroner Dr Sean Cummings is writing a report to send to Apple about how dangerous iPhones can be if they come into contact with water - if they're connected to a charger.


It's pretty unlikely that you would get electrocuted from a laptop or mobile phone if it was not being charged because the voltage is low - but you should still not take it into the bath with you.

But if the phone, laptop or tablet is connected to a charger plugged into the mains electricity supply, there is a huge increase in the risk of being electrocuted.

Bill Gates Likens Donald Trump To JFK But On One Condition

Billionaire and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates thinks Donald Trump has the chance to be like JFK during his presidency If he establishes American leadership through innovation.

Gates told CNBC Tuesday that he thinks Trump has the opportunity to establish “American leadership through innovation,” adding that a lot of Trump’s message since his candidacy has been about “where he sees things not as good as he’d like.”





He continued: “But in the same way President Kennedy talked about the space mission and got the country behind that,” Gates continued, “I think whether it’s education or stopping epidemics … [or] in this energy space, there can be a very upbeat message that [Trump’s] administration [is] going to organize things, get rid of regulatory barriers, and have American leadership through innovation.”


Gates has recently spoken to the President-elect on the phone about the “power of innovation,” he told CNBC, adding that “he’s sure” there will be more conversation on the matter in the future. The conversation was the first time the two had ever spoken, he said.

“Of course, my whole career has been along those lines [innovation],” he said. “And he was interested in listening to that.”

The Top 4 Technology Stocks to Buy Instead of Amazon or Facebook for 2017

Semiconductor and cybersecurity stocks are poised for growth—and relatively cheap.

The weeks before Thanksgiving brought a cornucopia of good news to tech investor Paul Wick. Five companies he owned in the Columbia Seligman Communications and Information Fund were acquired in rapid succession as an M&A wave swept the semiconductor industry—a slice of the technology sector to which Wick has dedicated nearly half of his $4.4 billion fund. Meanwhile, shares in the Silicon Valley–based portfolio manager’s biggest holding, LAM Research, hit an all-time high. “Yet there’s still considerable upside,” says Wick. “We’re more bullish about the semi­conductor industry than we are about software or the Internet sector.”

Technology, though one of the most profitable and fastest-growing S&P 500 sectors, also tends to be relatively expensive. And investors are jittery about how President Trump’s policies might ­affect some of the largest players: After Facebook  , Amazon  , Netflix , and Google   sold off in the wake of the election, DoubleLine CEO Jeffrey Gundlach advised investors “to stay away from these things in a big way.” But investors like Wick are finding exceptions to that ­sentiment—particularly in less glamorous but no less important corners of the industry.

Though it might seem imprudent to recommend a stock that’s already risen 35% this year, LAM Research   still trades at 13 times its 2017 estimated earnings. That means the stock trades at a 21% discount to the S&P 500 and is 18% cheaper than the technology sector. (For what it’s worth, LAM’s run pales beside that of the S&P 500’s best-performing stock in the first 11 months of 2016, the chipmaker Nvidia , whose stock has almost tripled.)

LAM doesn’t make the chips themselves, but rather equipment that companies like Samsung (one of its largest customers) use to put “flash” memory into semiconductors that are used in everything from iPhones to fitness trackers to Tesla  cars. Flash memory—so called because it processes data faster and with less heat than traditional hard disk drives—has become essential in enabling companies like Apple   to make its MacBooks more powerful and smaller at the same time, while allowing companies like Amazon and Spotify to retrieve music from their massive cloud libraries instantaneously.

Historically, LAM’s stock has traded at a discount because its earnings “tend to have a lot of wiggle,” fluctuating depending on electronics’ product cycles, says USAA’s head of equities John Toohey, who is also a fan of the stock. But for the past three years LAM has grown consistently, increasing sales at a rate of 18% annually and averaging earnings growth of 56%. Wick expects that robust growth to continue in 2017, as the accelerating pace of innovation keeps semiconductor foundries buzzing: “There is no such thing as a semiconductor cycle anymore,” he says. Plus, LAM pays a dividend yielding nearly 2%—and with almost two-thirds of its cash offshore, it could benefit from a potential tax-repatriation holiday in the U.S.

As the number of devices connected to the Internet has expanded, so has concern over how to keep that data safe. Spending on cybersecurity equipment, including firewalls, was on pace to grow about 13% in 2016, to $10.6 billion, Gartner says, but that rate is expected to slow to 8% over the next few years. Still, Palo Alto Networks  , which makes state-of-the-art security systems known as next-generation firewalls, is growing its sales about four times as fast. “They’re really on the cutting edge to help people protect their infrastructure,” says Margaret Vitrano, portfolio manager of the $4 billion ClearBridge Large Cap Growth Fund. Although ups and downs in businesses’ cybersecurity spending can mean volatility for Palo Alto’s earnings and its stock, the company expects to grow revenue 31% next fiscal year, making its 2017 estimated P/E of 49 look fairly reasonable.

Elsewhere in cybersecurity, Wick likes Check Point Software Technologies , a cheaper option (a P/E of 17). Founded in Israel in the pre-dotcom-boom 1990s, Check Point has proved to be “much more shareholder-friendly” than some of its younger peers and social media companies, Wick says; the company has bought back stock from shareholders for 13 straight years through 2016.

Other investors are rethinking what it means to be a tech stock—finding opportunities in other industries where companies are using technology to make over their business models. Henry Ellenbogen, who manages the $16.3 billion T. Rowe Price New Horizons Fund, points to Vail Resorts   . Once just an elite place to ski in Colorado, Vail has adopted a subscription model for lift tickets the way Salesforce   has done for software and startup ClassPass has done for yoga and spinning classes: Think of it as a season’s pass with unlimited access to 13 different mountains in six states, Canada, and Australia. The company offers an app and harnesses its data to make chairlift lines more efficient—one reliable way to keep customers coming back. And Vail has been regularly acquiring new property and tucking it into its network, giving the company a scale that has helped Vail generate returns on capital unprecedented for its industry. The stock trades at a 2017 P/E ratio of 31, but Ellenbogen expects Vail to grow earnings organically 10% to 13% next year.

PICKS:
LAM Research   
Palo Alto Networks  
Check Point Software Technologies  
Vail Resorts  

This is part of Fortune’s 2017 Investor’s Guide feature,