Handcuffs that give you an electric shock?

Progress?

(Credit:
Patent Bolt)

Sometimes an invention comes along that makes you excited about the future.

For a long time, it seems that handcuffs have been stuck in the movies of old. They restrain you, but, odd for our interactive world, that's all they seem to do.

Might I tempt you toward futuristic handcuffs that will offer you a small involuntary judder?

I am grateful to Gizmodo for discovering that Patent Bolt has lucked upon a patent that offers bound(less) excitement.

For these are handcuffs that offer surprises. Indeed, they might make the idea of being tased, bro, not quite so bad.

The patent is called "Apparatus and System For Augmented Detainee Restraint."

The augmentations it offers are truly quite something. You see, these handcuffs are "configured to administer electrical shocks when certain predetermined conditions occur."

These shocks might be "activated by internal control systems or by external controllers that transmit activation signals to the restraining device."

This progressive tool is the brainchild of Scottsdale Inventions.

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And while you might be shocked or even excited by the idea of handcuffs with electric shock capabilities, might I move you further?

For Patent Bolt points out that this patent also allows for the idea of a substance delivery system. Yes, these handcuffs might also be used to, well, inject the detained with who knows what -- to achieve "any desired result."

Clearly, the desires of the detained and the detainer might differ. Yet, this patent allows for the possibility of the substance being in the form of "a liquid, a gas, a dye, an irritant, a medication, a sedative, a transdermal medication or transdermal enhancers such as dimethyl sulfoxide, a chemical restraint, a paralytic, a medication prescribed to the detainee, and combinations thereof."

Yes, you really did read the word "paralytic."

Naturally, some will be wondering whether, as in fine restaurants, the arresting officer will ask whether the detained has any allergies.

Some might be concerned, though that -- at least theoretically -- this creation might put quite some power into the hands of those who might not always be lucid or learned enough to use that power wisely.

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Anger at Australian radio station over royal hoax

LONDON The British hospital that fell victim to a prank call from two Australian DJs asking questions about the pregnant Duchess of Cambridge condemned the hoax on Saturday, as the radio station behind the prank tried to defend itself against rising anger a day after the nurse who took the call was found dead.

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The body of Jacintha Saldanha, 46, was found early Friday at nurses' housing provided by the London hospital where Prince William's wife, the former Kate Middleton, was being treated for acute morning sickness this week.

Police have made no connection between her death and the prank call, but people from London to Sydney have been making the assumption she died because of the stress.

The DJs have apologized for the hoax and taken the show off the air, but station 2day FM was forced to yank its Facebook page after it received thousands of angry comments and complaints have reportedly flooded into Australia's media regulator.

Rhys Holleran, CEO of 2DayFM's parent company Southern Cross Austereo, said the hosts were shocked and devastated by news of Saldanha's death.

"This is a tragic event that could not have been reasonably foreseen and we're deeply saddened by it," Holleran said during a news conference in Melbourne on Saturday. "I spoke to both presenters early this morning and it's fair to say they're completely shattered."

Greig and Christian have been offered counseling, Holleran said.

"These people aren't machines, they're human beings," he said. "We're all affected by this."

Holleran would not say who came up with the idea for the call, only that "these things are often done collaboratively." He said 2DayFM would work with authorities, but was confident the station hadn't broken any laws.

Australian 2Day FM radio presenters Michael Christian and Mel Greig Dec. 4, 2012, in a grab from footage posted on the Internet as they joke about their successful hoax call to the King Edward VII Hospital in London.

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Rex Features via AP Images

Lord Glenarthur, the chairman of King Edward VII's Hospital, wrote the chairman of the radio station's owner, saying the consequence of the prank "was the humiliation of two dedicated and caring nurses who were simply doing their job tending to their patients."

"The longer term consequence has been reported around the world and is, frankly, tragic beyond words," he wrote in the letter.

A photo of King Edward VII hospital nurse Jacintha Saldanha, who is thought to have committed suicide, released Dec. 8, 2012.

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Metropolitan Police/PA Wire

Police released a grainy photo of Saldanha on Saturday. A native of India, she had lived in Bristol in southwestern England with her family for the past nine years, Scotland Yard confirmed.

Police said her death is being treated as "unexplained," though they said they didn't find anything suspicious. A coroner will make a determination on the cause next week.

Flowers were left outside the hospital's nurses' building. Attached to the red, white and blue flowers, a note read: "Dear Jacintha, our thoughts are with you and your family. From all your fellow nurses, we bless your soul. God bless."

Britain's Press Association reported she had a partner, Benedict Barboza, and a teenage son and daughter. In a statement, Saldanha's family said they were "deeply saddened" by the death and asked for privacy.

"She was a lovely, lovely person who always spoke to you when you saw her in the street," neighbor Mary Atwell told the agency. "She fitted in well around here, they all did. They've lived here for at least 10 years and were very quiet and pleasant."

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Dallas Cowboys Player Arrested in Teammate's Death

Dallas Cowboys nose tackle Joshua Price-Brent was arrested on an intoxication manslaughter charge today after a single vehicle roll-over killed his passenger, Jerry Brown Jr., who had been a linebacker on the team's practice squad and his former teammate at the University of Illinois.

Price-Brent, 24, was allegedly speeding "well above" the posted 45 mph speed limit at about 2:21 a.m. when he hit a curb, causing his vehicle to flip at least one time before landing in the middle of a service road, Irving Police Department spokesman John Argumaniz said.

Authorities were alerted to the accident by several 911 callers, Argumaniz said. When police arrived, they found Price-Brent pulling Brown from his 2007 Mercedes, which had caught fire.

Brown, 25, was unresponsive and was transported to a local hospital, where he was pronounced dead, Argumaniz said.

It was not known where the men were coming from or where they were going, but Argumaniz said officers suspected alcohol may have been a factor in the crash and asked Price-Brent to perform field sobriety tests.

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"Based on the results of the tests, along with the officer's observations and conversations with Price-Brent, he was arrested for driving while intoxicated," Argumaniz said.

This is the second week in a row an NFL player has been accused of being involved in another person's death. Jovan Belcher of the Kansas City Chiefs killed his girlfriend early Dec. 1, then committed suicide while talking to team officials in the parking lot at Arrowhead Stadium.

Jovan Belcher: Police Release Dash-Cam Videos of NFL Star's Final Hours

Price-Brent was taken to a hospital for a mandatory blood draw where he was treated for minor scrapes, Argumaniz said. He was then booked on an intoxication manslaughter charge after it was learned Brown had died of injuries suffered in the crash.

It is expected that results from the blood draw could take several weeks, the police spokesman said.

Price-Brent is scheduled to be arraigned Sunday at 10 a.m., when bond will be set, police said.

The second-degree felony intoxication manslaughter charge carries a sentence of two to 20 years in prison and a $10,000 fine. It was not yet known whether Price-Brent had retained an attorney.

The 6-foot-2, 320-pound nose tackle left the University of Illinois as a junior for a career in the NFL. He was picked up by the Cowboys during the 2010 NFL supplemental draft and has played three seasons with the team.

The Cowboys are set to take on the Cincinnati Bengals in Ohio on Sunday.

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Syrian rebels elect new military commander

AMMAN (Reuters) - Syrian rebel groups have chosen a former officer to head a new Islamist-dominated command, in a Western-backed effort to put the opposition's house in order as President Bashar al-Assad's army takes hits that could usher his downfall.

In Turkey, a newly formed joint command of Syrian rebel groups has chosen Brigadier Selim Idris, one of hundreds of officers who have defected from Assad's army, as its head, opposition sources said on Saturday.

Idris, whose home province of Homs has been at the forefront of the Sunni Muslim-led uprising, was elected by 30 military and civilian members of the joint military command after talks attended by Western and Arab security officials in the Turkish city of Antalya.

The unified command includes many with ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and to Salafists, who follow a puritanical interpretation of Islam. It excludes the most senior officers who have defected from Assad's military.

On the Damascus battlefront, Assad's forces used multiple rocket launchers on Saturday against several suburbs that have fallen to rebels who have fought their way to the edge of the city's international airport, where foreign carriers have suspended all flights.

Rebels, who have overrun several army bases near Damascus over the last month, appeared to be holding their ground, encircling a main military base in the northeastern suburb of Harasta, known as "idarat al markabat", near the main highway to Aleppo, according to opposition campaigners.

"The fighters made slight progress today. They captured a weapons depot and got to a tank repair facility in the base, but all 20 tanks inside were inoperational," said Abu Ghazi, a rebel who was speaking from the area.

"The weather cleared and MiG fighters hit rebel positions around the base. Rocket launchers did not stop for the last three days. The site is crucial for the regime," he added.

BOMBARDMENT NEAR AIRPORT

Heavy army bombardment was also reported on the town of Harran al-Awamid near the airport, which is 20 kilometers southeast of Damascus, and on the suburb of Hajar al-Aswad, at the southern entrance of the capital, which has been at the forefront of the Sunni-led revolt against Assad.

Western officials have begun speaking about faster change on the ground in a conflict that is becoming increasingly sectarian and deepening the Shi'ite-Sunni fault lines in the Middle East, a hallmark of politics in the region since the 1979 Iranian revolution.

Like his father, the late President Hafez al-Assad who ruthlessly put down an Islamist challenge, the younger Assad is portraying himself as the only hope for survival of the Alawite minority, an offshoot of Shi'ite Islam that has dominated power in majority Sunni Syria since the 1960s.

Moscow, Assad's strongest foreign backer, and Washington, which says it supplies only "non-lethal" aid to the rebels, sounded downbeat about the prospects of a diplomatic push to end the conflict after talks this week.

The head of Germany's foreign intelligence agency said Assad's government is its final stages and will be unable to survive as more parts of the country slip from his control.

"Armed rebels are coordinating better, which is making their fight against Assad more effective," Gerhard Schindler told the Frankfurter Allgemeinen Sonntagszeitung newspaper, in an interview made public on Saturday.

"Assad's regime will not survive. "Evidence is mounting that the regime in Damascus is now in its final phase," Schindler said

Setbacks for the Alawite-led military, whose core units are stationed in Damascus and on hill tops surrounding the capital, have raised Western concerns that the ruling elite may use chemical weapons to turn the tide of the war.

In a letter to the United Nations Security Council published by official state media, the Syrian foreign ministry said "Syria will not use chemical weapons under any circumstances".

"We are seriously afraid that some countries that support terrorism would supply chemical weapons to the terrorist armed groups and claim that the Syrian government is the one that is using them," the letter said.

(Reporting by Khaled Yacoub Oweis, Amman newsroom; Editing by Stephen Powell)

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China's disabled face discrimination in finding work

BEIJING: While the plight of the disabled in China has improved significantly over the years, many still face discrimination at work.

The lack of job opportunities and job discrimination are cited as the main challenges faced by the disabled in China.

There is an estimated 83 million disabled yet their unemployment rate in 2010 stood at 8.6 percent, twice as high as the national average.

Twenty-seven-year-old Song Yichuan is paralyzed from the waist down after an accident a few years ago.

A talented singer and songwriter, Song's biggest wish is to write a song that everyone will listen to and fall in love with.

But achieving his dream seems like an uphill battle.

"No matter how good and musically-talented I am, and no matter how the audiences love me, they tell me there are practical considerations of moving me around. It's not convenient for me to fly in a plane or even ride in a bus. They even tell me it would be so much better if my condition is not so bad and if I could walk with a walking stick," said Song.

Thirty-two-year-old Xiong Yan is also familiar with work discrimination.

She lost both her arms after being electrocuted when she was merely two.

She now relies on her feet to get things, whether it's in writing, or picking up a book - moves that often earned uncomfortable looks from her colleagues.

Gao Yanqiu, a communications manager at Handicap International, said: "The disabled faces discrimination at work due to society's lack of understanding and knowledge about them. It's easy for them to be marginalized, and job opportunities are hard to come by."

Given the widespread discrimination faced by the disabled, many have argued that the government should take the lead not just in hiring but also in allocating and even reserving certain jobs for the disabled.

The government has made it mandatory for all government departments and institutions to employ at least 1.5 per cent disabled people among its workforce.

But this has seldom been followed, and the situation is even worst in the private sector.

Even though the disabled can sue employers for discrimination, this has seldom been practiced.

Like most disabled, Xiong Yan's biggest wish is to be accepted for who she is.

"It's very simple. I wish that people won't see me as different. We're all similar. If everyone else is relaxed, I will be relaxed. If I am relaxed you'd also be relaxed," said Xiong.

- CNA/fa

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