Healthcare experts see bumpy road ahead: “Shift happens”

The healthcare industry in South Florida, like the rest of the country, faces huge challenges in the year ahead as major federal reforms kick in, experts told about 700 people at a University of Miami conference on Friday.

“We are at a critical time in health policy,” said Mark McClellan, former head of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. “There are going to be some bumps along the way,” especially starting in 11 months, when the biggest changes in the Affordable Care Act kick in.

“Bumps may be understating what we may go through,” said Patrick Geraghty, chief executive of Florida Blue, the state’s largest health insurer.

They spoke at the conference on the Business of Healthcare Post-Election. The speakers accepted the federal reforms — often referred to as Obamacare — as not only inevitable but necessary. As Tom Daschele, a former Democratic U.S. senator from South Dakota, put it, “having 50 million uninsured is just unacceptable.”

But the reform act, signed into law in 2010, contains more than 2,000 pages, plus thousands of pages more of enabling regulations — details that will have major, and perhaps unexpected, impacts on the healthcare industry, which now makes up almost 20 percent of the nation’s economy.

In October, insurance exchanges will open for enrollment — groups that will allow individuals and small businesses to purchase policies with no exclusions for pre-existing conditions. Starting next January, virtually everyone will be required to have insurance, Medicaid will expand in many states, and businesses with more than 50 full-time equivalent employees will be required to provide insurance or pay fines.

“Jan. 1 is a very significant date,” said Steven Ullmann, director of health policy at the UM business school. He called reforms “a process” that will change over time.

“The one thing we know is that healthcare reform will be reformed,” said Chris Jennings, a Washington health policy advisor for the Clinton administration and three senators.

Karen Ignagni, president of America’s Health Insurance Plans, the insurers’ trade group, said she had strong ideas about tweaks that could minimize disruption. One arcane, but crucial provision of the law requires that an older person’s policy can be no more than three times as expensive as a young person’s.

The provision will mean huge increases in the policies of younger persons, to pay for the much higher costs of their elders. Insurers are asking for that policy to be postponed for two years, retaining the present maximum spread of about five to one, so that younger people could sign up for insurance without huge sticker shock.

For example, if a 25-year-old now pays $100 and a 60-year-old pays $500, the new rule would hike the younger person’s premium to $150 and cut the older person’s premium to $550 — a 50 percent increase for one and a 10 percent decrease for the other.

The thinking of lawmakers was that by lowering ratio, the costs of healthcare would be spread out and shared more equally by the population.

Anne Phelps, a healthcare principal with Ernst & Young, said she favored another change in the law, which now requires that next year a company with the equivalent of 50 employees to provide insurance for anyone working more than 30 hours a week or pay a fine. She thought the threshold should be raised to 32 or 34 hours.

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Long before FBI raid, Sen. Menendez tried to help donor’s Dominican Republic business

Sen. Bob Menendez used his influence to advocate for a Dominican Republic business deal that helped a longtime friend and donor whose South Florida office was raided by federal agents this week.

Menendez questioned Obama administration officials at a July hearing about what it was doing to help U.S. businesses that he felt were being unfairly treated by the government of the Dominican Republic and other Latin American countries.

One company Menendez was apparently referring to: ICSSI, acquired the year before by Dr. Salomon Melgen, a Palm Beach County eye doctor and friend. The firm was seeking to enforce a contract it had won to X-ray Dominican Republic port cargo, that could be worth $500 million to $1 billion over two decades.

“You have another company that has American investors that ... has a contract actually given to it by the — ratified by the Dominican Congress — to do X-ray of all of the cargo that goes through the ports,” Menendez, a Democrat from New Jersey, said at the July 31 hearing of the Senate Foreign Relations Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere. “And they don’t want to live by that contract either.”

Menendez didn’t mention ICSSI by name in talking to Francisco J. Sánchez, the Commerce Department’s undersecretary for international trade and Matthew Rooney, the deputy assistant secretary in the Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs for the State Department.

Menendez’s office said the senator did nothing improper. Senators, especially on the Foreign Relations Committee that Menendez will soon chair, frequently advocate for U.S. business abroad.

In addition to trade, the senator’s office said he was concerned about fighting drugs.

“Senator Menendez has over the last few years advocated for more attention to the spread of narco-trafficking throughout Central America and the Caribbean,” chief of staff Danny O’Brien said. “It is an issue of protecting our national security, and these drugs end up on our streets and in our communities, fueling crime and addiction.”

Still, Menendez’s close ties to Melgen have been under a white-hot spotlight ever since federal agents raided the eye doctor’s West Palm Beach office on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The raid included agents from the FBI and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, which are investigating the doctor for alleged Medicare fraud.

At the same time, the FBI is conducting a separate corruption probe of the doctor and his relationship with Menendez, including trips they took to the Dominican Republic.

The FBI began examining the two last year after the group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington forwarded a batch of emails from a shadowy tipster who claimed Menendez and Melgen had hired underage prostitutes at the ophthalmologist’s Dominican home — charges both deny.

An FBI agent tried, but failed to meet with the tipster, who refused to even phone the agent.

As the conservative press began circulating the reports about the two, the New Jersey Republican Party filed a complaint against Menendez for flying on Melgen’s private plane to the Dominican Republic but failing to disclose the gifts.

Menendez’s office checked his schedule and realized the senator had flown twice on Melgen’s plane without paying for it in 2010. On Jan. 4, Menendez cut a check for $58,500 — the air-charter rate for the pricey flights —to fully settle the matter.

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Sony ignites talk of PS4 unveil with Playstation meeting

TOKYO (Reuters) – Sony Corp will this month host its first major Playstation meeting in two years, sparking a flare-up in online speculation the Japanese consumer electronics giant is preparing to unveil the successor to its 70 million-selling PS3 games console.

Sony declined to say whether it would release a new product at the meeting in New York on February 20. “We will be talking about the Playstation business,” spokesman Masaki Tsukakoshi said on Friday. A Google search for “Sony Feb 20 Playstation” returned more than 7 million hits.

The last time Sony held a Playstation event, in January 2011, it presented a protoype of its handheld Vita console. Before that, it convened a gathering in 2005 two months after it first demonstrated the PS3 concept. A meeting in 1999 revealed designs for the PS2.

It has been more than six years since Sony launched the PS3 home console, a longer gap than between it and its PS2 predecessor, adding to the anticipation that it will soon disclose its next gaming concept.

Since Sony’s last home console launch, the games market has been transformed by the boom in smartphones and tablet computers that have wooed players with free or cheap games.

Sony and other console makers Nintendo Co Ltd and Microsoft Corp now have to contend with competition from hand-held devices made by Apple Inc, Samsung Electronics and others.

Analysts expect that tablets and other mobile devices will match the power and graphics of today’s games consoles within a few years.

Struggling under competitive pressure, Nintendo on Wednesday cut its sales target for the Wii U, successor to its 100 million-selling Wii, to 4 million machines by the end of March from its launch in November, compared with an earlier forecast for 5.5 million.

(Reporting by Tim Kelly; Editing by Daniel Magnowski)

Gaming News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Deion Sanders Talks Possible Destiny's Child Super Bowl Show

While die hard fans debate whether or not Destiny's Child will actually perform together at the Super Bowl, according to NFL Network's Deion Sanders, there's only one logical outcome.

PICS: Inside Beyonce's Super Bowl Rehearsals!

"You gotta think about her heart and her character," said the NFL hall of famer, who assumes that fans can expect some sort of reunion between the girls. "She would want to share this stage with her friends or those persons that are responsible for her being who she is."

Before Primetime sat down with ET's Rocsi Diaz, alongside NFL Network host Rich Eisen, Beyonce turned a Super Bowl press conference into a mind-blowing concert by singing the national anthem live a capella. But for Sanders, the most indelible moment happened away from the podium.

"I've been suffering from a bit of insecurity all my life as you all know," joked the former brash NFL star. "To have Beyonce recite the lyrics to my hit song [Must Be the Money] and do my dance -- I quit."

Find out whether the Destiny's Child Super Bowl reunion will happen when the big game airs Sunday on CBS.

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Free Sandy biz inspection

ALBANY — Gov. Cuomo said yesterday the state will offer free safety and health inspections to businesses hit by Hurricane Sandy, saving each of them more than $4,000.

Businesses can schedule a free inspection by calling (888) 469-7365. Appointments can also be made through the state Department of Labor’s Web site.

Cuomo said the free inspections should allow businesses to reopen sooner.

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Mompreneur jumps into the ‘Shark Tank’

It all started with a 4 a.m. email nearly a year ago: “Do you think a baby bib could change the world? I do...”

Then Susie Taylor included a link to her website, bibbitec.com, and off it went to Shark Tank, the popular ABC television show where entrepreneurs pitch their companies to investors on the show — and by extension, 7 million viewers.

Four months later, as the “mompreneur” was leaving her Biscayne Park home to pick up her kids from school, she got a call from the show asking her to pitch on the spot. Driving with her phone on her shoulder, she told the Bibbitec story.

Shark Tank bit. After a few more back and forths, her segment was filmed last summer.

Friday night, Taylor is scheduled to be on the show pitching Bibbitec’s main product, “The Ultimate Bib,” a patented generously sized, stain-resistant and fast-drying child’s bib made in the USA — Hialeah, to be exact. Bibbitec’s $30 bib can be a burp cloth, changing pad, breast feeding shield, full body bib, place mat, art smock and more, Taylor says.

We won’t be getting any details on what happens Friday night when she and her husband, Stephen Taylor, get into the tank with Daymond John, Mark Cuban and the other celebrity sharks; Taylor has been contractually sworn to secrecy. But whatever the outcome, she believes it will be worth it for the marketing pop.

Taylor was inspired to create her bib after a long and very messy plane ride with her two young sons and started Bibbitec in 2008. She and her team — her husband is CFO, her sister, Heather McCabe, handles sales and marketing, her uncle, Richard Page, is in charge of production, and her aunt, Marcia Kreitman, advises on design — have expanded the line to include The Ultimate Smock for older children and the Ultimate Mini for babies. Coming soon: a smock for adults.

Taylor already got a taste of what a national TV show appearance can do for sales. In September, Bibbitec’s sales jumped 40 percent after she was on an ABC World News "Made in America" segment. “Within 30 seconds, we started getting sales from all over the country and they didn’t even mention our name on the air,” Taylor says. She said that confirmed her belief that a Shark Tank appearance would be worth it.

Plus, Taylor has been hooked on Shark Tank since the first time she watched it in 2008 as she was developing her product. Trained in theater, she admits she didn’t know much about business and learned from the show. She would practice how she would answer the questions.

“I’m all about empowering women who are sitting on the couch watching, because that’s what I was four years ago,” says Taylor. “All I wanted to do was to be on Shark Tank because I believed if I got on Shark Tank the world will see what I am trying to do and that’s all I need. I know it’s a great product.”

Will that theater training come in handy Friday night? Stay tuned. Shark Tank airs at 9 p.m. on ABC and Taylor hopes viewers will join in on Twitter using the hashtag #sharkbib.

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Limo rides for kids with cancer

Sometimes, we really do entertain angels unaware. Michael Fischer is one. Several years ago he came up with a way to bring a little hope to cancer-stricken children by providing limo rides for those whose parents didn't have a car, when it was time for then to take their cancer treatments. The idea is called Drops of Hope.

Fischer, who not only is the founder of the organization, but is head chauffeur, told me the idea for Drops of Hope came to him after he remembered that as a child, he had a friend who died of cancer.

"I also had relatives who died of cancer," he said. "Giving these kids a ride to the hospital in a kid-friendly limo — with games and snacks — is like a fantasy for them. Some of the children we transport would have to take public transportation if we didn't help out," he said. "And they can't afford to miss a treatment."

Everything was working well with Drops of Hope until last Christmas, when his only limo was stolen. Fischer said he had taken the 14-year-old limo in for repairs and the place he took it went out of business. He later found the limo, stripped, in an alley.

"Now," he said, "I pay limo companies to pick up the kids who need transportation to their treatment. But it's so expensive. It's like $100 for a few hours. And if a child goes for treatment in the morning, sometimes he doesn't finish until the afternoon. We have to wait for them. Many of these sick and terminally ill children, from low- to no-income families, take the bus by themselves to chemotherapy appointments. Drops of Hope provide this free service to and from the treatment sessions for children, who otherwise would miss immediate medical care because of a lack of transportation. We nicknamed our service, 'Hope on the Go,' because when the limo pulls up and you see the smile on the kids' faces, you know these kids really need a day of royal treatment."

Until he can get another limo, Fischer, who does litigation inspections for homeowners, pays the tab to rent limos from other companies. He is looking for a decent, used limo that he can fix up and get it "street safe."

The limo rides are not the only thing that Drops of Hope does for terminally ill children. They also do room makeovers, to help brighten the children's day.

If you know of someone who would like to help Fischer and his volunteers (nobody gets paid; the organization is operated solely by volunteers), you may call him at 954-428-4552.

Rabbi to talk about happiness

The community is invited to hear Rabbi Lazer Brody speak On "Sustenance, Health, Marriage and Children: It's Possible to Have it All," at 7:30 p.m. on Feb. 10, at Syklake Synagogue, 1850 NE 183rd St. in North Miami Beach.

The Rabbi also will speak at 7:30 p.m. on Feb. 11, at Young Israel of Kendall, 7880 SW 112th St. His topic will be "The Garden of Gratitude: A Life Changing Approach to Happiness."

According to a press release, Brody is the "English voice of Israeli rabbi Rav Shalom Arush, and the English translator of the book, The Garden of Emuna and numerous other Rav Arush's works. Brody is also the host of his own radio show, Lazer Beams aired on Israel National Radio. He is known worldwide as a lecturer and author who travels the globe enlightening others about the life-changing benefits of Emuna.

Both events are free. To make reservations for the Skylake lecture, email: skylakes613@gmail.com. For more information on the lecture at Young Israel, call 305-244-6880 or email: zdevorah@yahoo.com .

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Timeline: From RIM to BlackBerry, a company in transition

(Reuters) – Research In Motion Ltd has launched its new line of re-engineered BlackBerry smartphones, taking the wraps off the long-delayed devices at a series of events around the world on Wednesday.

The company used the occasion to announce that it was changing its name to BlackBerry, hoping a new brand identity will polish its tarnished image and help give it a fresh start.

The company, which has steadily lost ground in the hyper-competitive market to Apple Inc’s iPhone and devices running Google Inc’s Android operating system, is gambling its future on the BlackBerry 10. It sees the new line as make-or-break – its best hope for a comeback in an industry it once dominated.

Here are important milestones in the company’s history:

February 1985 – Mike Lazaridis and Douglas Fregin co-found Research In Motion as an electronics and computer science business based in Waterloo, Ontario, the Canadian university city where Lazaridis studied.

1989 – RIM develops a network gateway later introduced as RIMGate, a predecessor to its BlackBerry Enterprise Server.

1992 – Jim Balsillie joins RIM as co-CEO, mortgaging his house and investing $ 250,000.

1994 – RIM launches a handheld point-of-sale card reader, which verifies debit and credit transactions directly to a bank.

1995 – RIM builds its own radio modem for wireless email.

1997 – RIM lists on the Toronto Stock Exchange, raising more than $ 115 million.

January 1999 – RIM launches rebranded BlackBerry email service across North America, offering the first wireless device to synch with corporate email systems. Sales jump 80 percent to $ 85 million. The next year revenue reaches $ 221 million.

Late 1999 – The company lists its shares on Nasdaq, raising another $ 250 million. RIM introduces BlackBerry 850 Wireless Handheld, combining email, wireless data networks and a traditional “Qwerty” keyboard. Demand explodes.

Sept 11, 2001 – People trapped in New York’s World Trade Center use their BlackBerrys to communicate after cellular networks collapse.

November 2001 – NTP sues RIM for patent infringement, the start of a five-year legal tussle. Late in the battle, the U.S. Justice Department says a threatened BlackBerry shutdown would damage the public interest due to the government’s reliance on the system.

2002 – RIM adds voice transmission to the BlackBerry.

2004 – RIM’s subscriber base surpasses 1 million BlackBerry users.

March 2006 – RIM pays $ 612 million to settle NTP dispute.

January 2007 – Apple Inc’s Steve Jobs unveils first iPhone, and the company launches the BlackBerry competitor in June. Time magazine honors the phone as Invention of the Year.

October 2007 – RIM passes 10 million subscribers. News of a China distribution deal boosts shares, making it for a time the most valuable company in Canada by market capitalization.

November 2007 – Google’s open source Android platform is unveiled. It launches in October 2008.

May 2008 – RIM introduces the Bold, a major redesign and still one of its top-tier products. The new model matches the resolution, but not size, of Apple’s iPhone screen.

July 2008 – Apple opens App Store in 22 countries and releases iPhone 3G, preloaded with App Store support.

November 2008 – RIM launches BlackBerry Storm, its first touchscreen and keyboard-less device. The screen uses a tactile feedback technology known as haptics, allowing a user to click down to select actions. The model bombs.

April 2009 – RIM’s App World goes live.

June 2009 – Apple announces and releases iPhone 3GS.

June 2010 – RIM pays C$ 200 million for QNX Software Systems, getting an industrial-strength operating system used in massive Internet routers, nuclear power plants and car infotainment systems. In same month Apple launches iPhone 4.

August 2010 – RIM launches BlackBerry Torch, a touchscreen phone with slide-out keyboard and improved web browser.

Sept 27, 2010 – RIM announces the PlayBook tablet, running on a version of the QNX system.

December 2010 – RIM acquires user interface company The Astonishing Tribe.

February 2011 – Nokia, the world’s largest smartphone vendor by volume, abandons its Symbian operating system to form alliance with Microsoft Corp.

March 2, 2011 – Apple unveils iPad 2 and ships it later in the same month.

April 19, 2011 – RIM launches PlayBook in United States and Canada. Early reviews pan the tablet for lacking core BlackBerry functions such as email and organizer functions. The company says it plans to add them in February 2012.

April 28, 2011 – RIM slashes an already dismal financial forecast for current quarter but maintains a full-year earnings outlook of $ 7.50 a share.

June 16, 2011 – RIM misses its lowered quarterly revenue target, gives more limp forecasts and resets the full-year outlook to between $ 5.25 and $ 6 a share. It says it will slash more than 10 percent of its workforce and buy back stock.

July 12, 2011 – Executives deflect criticism at annual general meeting after an activist shareholder withdrew a motion to force co-CEOs Lazaridis and Balsillie to relinquish their other shared role as board chairmen.

Sept 6, 2011 – A second activist shareholder asks the board to wrest control from Lazaridis and Balsillie and consider RIM putting itself up for sale or spinning off units.

Sept 15, 2011 – RIM reports another poor quarter including a sharp drop in phone and tablet shipments. It points to the low end of latest full year earnings outlook.

Oct 10-13, 2011 – Millions of BlackBerry users on five continents are left without email, Internet and instant messaging service by a massive failure of RIM’s infrastructure.

Nov 29, 2011 – In an acknowledgement of its slipping grip on the corporate sector, RIM offers to manage rival devices including Apple’s iPhone and iPad.

Dec 2, 2011 – The company books a huge writedown on PlayBook inventory, which it is discounting heavily to provoke sales.

Dec 15, 2011 – RIM delays its QNX-based BlackBerry 10 phones until late 2012 and gives tepid short-term outlook. The co-CEOs agree to an immediate pay cut to $ 1 each.

Jan 22, 2012 – RIM says Lazaridis and Balsillie are stepping down from their shared roles as chief executives and chairmen roles they share. The company appoints Thorstein Heins as CEO and Barbara Stymiest as chair of the board.

March 29, 2012 – Heins promises a strategic overhaul as RIM reports a slump in BlackBerry shipments and says RIM will no longer issue financial forecasts.

May 29, 2012 – RIM says it has hired bankers to assist with a strategic review and warns that it will likely report a fiscal first-quarter operating loss.

June 28, 2012 – RIM delays BlackBerry 10 again, putting off the launch to early 2013.

Sept 24, 2012 – RIM’s Toronto-listed stock touches C$ 6.10, its lowest level in nearly a decade.

Sept 27, 2012 – RIM surprises investors with a narrower-than-expected loss and boosts its cash reserves, sparking a rally that will extend into late December.

Nov 12, 2012 – RIM says it will launch BlackBerry 10 on January 30.

Dec 21, 2012 – RIM shares plunge more than 20 percent on fears that a new fee structure for its high-margin services segment could put pressure on a business that has set the company apart from its competitors.

Jan 30, 2013 – Heins formally unveils the BlackBerry 10 at a glitzy launch event in New York, with simultaneous gatherings in other cities around the world.

In conjunction with the launch, Heins announces that the company is changing its name to BlackBerry.

(Reporting by Alastair Sharp and Allison Martell; Editing by Peter Galloway)

Linux/Open Source News Headlines – Yahoo! News

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Josh Groban Talks Dating Katy Perry, Being Madly in Love with January Jones

Josh Groban isn't one to open up much about his personal life, but in a rare moment, the singer breaks his silence on high-profile exes Katy Perry and January Jones.

"We were madly in love," Groban tells Details magazine of Jones, whom he began dating in 2003 for a period of two-and-a-half years. "It was definitely my longest relationship."

Unfortunately, the twosome couldn't make it work, but Groban says he still longs to find his special someone.

Pics: They Dated?! Surprising Celebrity Hookups

"I'd love to get into another serious relationship," he says. "I am a real romantic at heart."

When asked about all those rumors he and Katy Perry had a fling, Groban was hesitant (at first) to admit they'd ever been involved.

"We're very good friends," he explains. "We met before her first album was even released, and we hit it off because we're both goofballs."

Video: Josh Groban Turns Kanye West Tweets Into Song Lyrics

When pushed, Groban divulges that he and the superstar had a brief connection, although it never became serious.

"We might have skated on the line of dating," he concedes.

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‘Shear’ bravery beats guns: feds

WASHINGTON — Is your workplace getting shot up by a crazed gunman?

No problem — just grab a pair of scissors and fight back!

That’s some of the helpful advice in a new instructional video from the Department of Homeland Security that was posted on the agency’s Web site just a month after the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut.

“If you are caught out in the open and cannot conceal yourself or take cover, you might consider trying to overpower the shooter with whatever means are available,” says the narrator in the video, which shows an office worker pulling scissors out of a desk drawer.

The video, titled “Options for Consideration,” also advises that people who get caught in an “active shooter” situation should run away, hide under a desk or take cover out of the line of fire.

The nearly four-minute-long video opens with chilling scenes from the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre, the 2009 mass shooting at Fort Hood in Texas, and the 2011 attempted assassination of Gabrielle Giffords.

But the video quickly shifts to hokey footage of office workers scampering under desks, crouching in corners and racing into closets to hide from a rampaging gunman on the loose.

“To protect your hiding place, lock the door if you can. Block the door with heavy furniture,” recommends the male narrator, speaking in measured, authoritative tones.

Other survival strategies promoted in the video include hiding “behind large items such as cabinets or desks. Remain quiet. Silence your cellphone or pager. Even the vibration setting can give away a hiding position.”

Richard Feldman, president of the Independent Firearm Owners Association, said he has a better option for consideration than a pair of scissors when confronting an armed mass murderer — a legal firearm.

“That’s why I prefer a gun, and I usually do carry a gun when it is lawful to do so,” said Feldman. “Clearly, you use whatever you can” to fight for your life, he said.

So if scissors are all you’ve got, grab them by all means.

The video is part of the Obama administration’s ongoing campaign to reduce firearm violence in the wake of the horrific mass murder last month of 20 children and six teachers in Newtown, Conn., said a Homeland Security official.

Homeland Security has operated an active-shooter preparedness-training program for years, and the “Options for Consideration” video was in production prior to the Dec. 14 shooting in Newtown.

The video was released to coincide with President Obama’s sweeping proposals to curb gun violence in America, said the official.

Obama’s most controversial proposals include a ban on military-style assault rifles and high-capacity ammo clips, as well as expanded background checks for firearm purchases.

Security consultant Andrew Scott called the information in the video “adequate.”

He conceded that Homeland Security was correct in recommending that people use scissors to attack a gunman but only in a “last, worst-case scenario.”

“Just the suggestion [to fight back] is a positive move,” said Scott, a former SWAT commander in North Miami Beach. “You don’t want to be sheep for the slaughter.”

But if you do arm yourself with shears, the narrator warns you to drop them when cops arrive.

“Put down any items. Immediately raise your hands,” is the closing advice.

smiller@nypost.com

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