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WEST CHESTER, Ohio (The Blaze/AP) — Briefcases with handwritten signs attached were left at the front door of U.S. House Speaker John Boehner’s Ohio office, bringing out a bomb squad. Investigators in the Cincinnati suburb of West Chester tell multiple media outlets that the bomb squad blew the cases apart on Sunday and found they contained only papers. No one was hurt. WCPO-TV captured the bomb squad robot removing the briefcases and exploding them:

Congressional leadership reacted on Friday after House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio., ended debt limit talks with the White House.House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va.:"Tonight, months after we had begun negotiations with President Obama, Vice President Biden, and the Administration, Speaker Boehner and I are ending discussions with the White House and beginning conversations with Senate leaders in the hopes of finding a solution to the debt limit debate in order to avoid default. Throughout the months of discussions, we have worked to identify real spending cuts, binding budget reforms, structural changes to save our entitlement programs, and significant debt reduction....

Just a fan of the show. Years ago Pat Paulsen ran for President. Colbert has run for president. Why not a robot?

Robots will soon be able to feel heat or gentle touching on their surfaces. Researchers at Technische Universitaet Muenchen are now producing small hexagonal plates which when joined together form a sensitive skin for "machines with brains." This will not only help robots to better navigate in their environments, it will also enable robot self-perception for the first time. A single robotic arm has already been partially equipped with sensors and proves that the concept works.Our skin is a communicative wonder: The nerves convey temperature, pressure, shear forces and vibrations – from the finest breath of air to touch to...

I’m not sure how to square this with this. Automation is bad for unemployment, except when it’s good for unemployment? Or full automation is bad, but partial automation is okay? Either way, it’s nice to see him talking up the job-creating benefits of technology. I think he should run with it. Take over the ATM manufacturing industry, then massively expand it as part of a new jobs program. Coming soon: A cash machine every 100 feet, coast to coast. Of course, there’s been a real debate about where to invest and where to cut, and I’m committed to working with...

President Barack Obama says technological innovations such as robots can help pump jobs into the economy and spur growth in clean energy and advanced manufacturing. In his radio and Internet address Saturday, the president echoed a plan he unveiled Friday in Pittsburgh to join the federal government, universities and corporations and re-ignite American manufacturing with an emphasis on cutting-edge research and new technologies. "Their mission is to come up with a way to get ideas from the drawing board to the manufacturing floor to the marketplace as swiftly as possible, which will help create quality jobs, and make our businesses...

Sometimes it happens. Sometimes you’re having one of those days where you just need a hug, but none of your loved ones is around to give you one. Well, now there’s something you can do about that. The new Japanese Sense-Roid jacket allows you hug yourself. Yes, you read that right. You can hug yourself. (Let’s leave aside the question of whether this would make you feel better … or worse.) In order to use Sense-Roid, you put on a jacket that contains 36 pager motors that can vibrate and several air compressors. The jacket is connected by wire...

Robot, drone fail on Japan nuke-plant missions By MARI YAMAGUCHI, Associated Press – 5 hours ago TOKYO (AP) — Two high-tech machines intended to help workers at Japan's tsunami-hit nuclear plant malfunctioned Friday, including a long-awaited Japanese robot making its first attempt to take important measurements in areas too dangerous for humans. The other machine that failed was a drone helicopter that made an emergency landing on a reactor roof at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant. /snip The machine got stuck at a staircase landing and failed to go downstairs, TEPCO spokesman Junichi Matsumoto said. A cable that was...

THE WHITE HOUSE Office of the Press Secretary FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE June 23, 2011 DAILY GUIDANCE AND PRESS SCHEDULE FOR FRIDAY, JUNE 24, 2011 In the morning, the President will visit Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh to highlight the importance of manufacturing to the U.S. economy, and key steps that government, the private sector and universities will take together to create new industries and new jobs. While visiting Carnegie Mellon, the President will tour the university's National Robotics Engineering Center (NREC) and see a range of cutting-edge technologies that have the potential to transform and assist the manufacturing sector, from...

Robot Expo at #Fukushima I Nuke Plant: Now Sweden's Blokk Is Coming The CEO of the company says his machine is the best and the toughest, having been tested in decommissioning and cleanup at the Chernobyl nuke plant. From Robotland blog (5/5/2011): "Swedish Brokk, the world´s leading manufacturer of remote controlled demolition machines, is delivering two Brokk 330 Diesel robots and a brand new larger robot to Fukushima nuclear plant in Japan. "The first task for the machines is to provide access to highly contaminated areas and clean up contamination. “One key difference between Brokk’s demolition robots and other robots...

Robots detect dangerous spike in reactor 3 radiation French-style air coolers eyed in effort to bring down the heat By Kanako Takahara Staff writer Remotely operated robots detected a high radiation level of up to 57 millisieverts per hour Monday in a reactor building of the crippled Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant, an obstacle that hinders workers from engaging in key repair work inside for long hours, the government's nuclear watchdog said Monday. On Sunday, the U.S.-made robots checked the radiation level, temperatures and oxygen concentrations of reactor units 1 and 3 to see if workers can go deep inside...

WEST MELBOURNE, Fla. — A Brevard County man blasted away with an assault rifle at a SWAT robot while wearing nothing but his birthday suit. The suspect's dog was the only onlooker as the robot approached the door at the West Melbourne home on Del Mar Circle. Authorities said a man with several guns was suicidal and threatening authorities. "He said he'd shoot anyone he could," said Lt. Bruce Barnett with the Brevard County Sheriff's Office. Instead of risking any lives, deputies sent the $65,000 robot into the home. The robot has cameras, which record all of its actions. The...

Cancer patients are being denied a pioneering treatment that offers their only hope of survival - even though millions of pounds have been spent on the technology behind it. Doctors referred Lesley Whiting, 56, from Sussex, for a robotic radiosurgery procedure called Cyberknife, which is widely used across the world, but only became available on the NHS last year. (Snip) But NHS bureaucrats refused to fund the treatment, which costs the health service around £10,000 per treatment- despite the fact almost £9 million has been spent buying the robotic technology for three NHS hospitals.

Robots designed to deal with nuclear accidents await duty in Europe while Japan asks: Where are ours? By Brian Vastag, Sunday, March 27, 8:09 PM Inside a nondescript warehouse south of Mannheim, Germany, a dozen robots, ranging in size from a low-slung inspection bot no bigger than a toy wagon to a 22-ton Caterpillar excavator, stand ready to respond to a nuclear emergency. With their electronics hardened to withstand radiation, the versatile machines can handle fuel rods as well as monitor doses that would kill a human engineer. A similar robotic quick-response squad is housed near the Chinon nuclear power...

Incredibly cool or insanely creepy? Yes, that is an actual robot. Japanese researchers have blurred the lines between man and machine with their latest robot, the incredibly realistic Geminoid DK. It is the third of the Geminoid series, a line of androids designed by Hiroshi Ishiguro, a professor at Osaka University and his team at Japan's Advanced Telecommunications Research Institute International (ATR) in Nara. The robot has been constructed to look exactly like Henrik Scharfe, an associate professor of Aalborg University in Denmark and is the first of the series based on a non-Japanese person. "Geminoid|DK will be the first...

Bill Hemmer interviews Ray Kurzweil about his new documentary. Video Link

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2011/01/german-researchers-build-terminator-robot-hand/ Because this is a wired.com article, it must be link only, per Free Republic rules.

n the 'Terminator' universe, Skynet was built as a Global Digital Defense Network, an artificial intelligence that could command all computerized military hardware. The military installed Skynet because it would remove human error and guarantee faster, more efficient reaction time. It also guaranteed nuclear armageddon when it gained self-awareness and forced the surviving humans into slave labor. So that part was bad. But the first thing, the network command of all computerized hardware, that was a good thing, right? Hey, guess what, everybody! That first thing is starting to happen, and its name is RoboEarth! And just in case you're...

Autonomous military robots that will fight future wars must be programmed to live by a strict warrior code, or the world risks untold atrocities at their steely hands. The stark warning, which includes discussion of a "Terminator" style scenario in which robots turn on their masters is part of a hefty report funded for the US Navy High Tech and secretive office of Naval Research

<p>The restaurant, which opened this month in Jinan in northern Shandong province, is touted as China's first robot hotpot eatery where robots resembling Star Wars droids circle the room carrying trays of food in a conveyor belt-like system.</p> <p>More than a dozen robots operate in the restaurant as entertainers, servers, greeters and receptionists. Each robot has a motion sensor that tells it to stop when someone is in its path so customers can reach for dishes they want.</p>