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The Dazer Laser comes in two handheld models, the Defender and the Guardian, which can be mounted on a rifle or a shotgun, the company said. The Defender emits an eye-safe green beam with a diameter of 0.2 m to 2.5 m (about 1 to 8 ft) into what the company calls the Dazer Zone, the range of which can adjust from as close as 1 m to the target to up to 2400 m away, or nearly a mile-and-a-half.

The beam, when shined in the face of a perceived aggressor, temporarily blinds them, impairs his or her balance, and gives them motion sickness that lasts for several hours, making it difficult for them to move, according to company publications. It can control people even with their eyes closed.

The Guardian operates with a smaller diameter beam and a shorter range of up to 100 m, or about 328 ft. Potential pplications for the lasers include homeland security, prison security, and crowd control in riots, the company said. Both models can also operate in non-daze mode as searchlights.

Laser Energetics said its Dazer Laser Light Fighting Technologies, which it called “a new tool to fight our enemies and threats,” was well received during the parade, which included all branches of the military, police and firemen. A speech by New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg closed the event.

“This was the most appropriate place to begin our role out of the ‘ultimate nonlethal weapon’,” said Laser Energetics founder and CEO Robert D. Battis. “This weapon is humanitarian and will save the lives of both the enforcer and the threat at longer ranges. No longer will the enforcer have to risk their lives to bring the threat in closer to them in order to engage them, which puts the enforcers life at risk.”

The Dazer Laser can be fired continuously, giving the user the ability to aim the beam at the threat and fire until they hit it, unlike other nonlethal weapons that have to be reloaded and only work at close range, Battis said. The weapons can be used during the day or at night, in light rain snow or fog.

The company said it has completed engineering on both units and is now fabricating parts. It anticipates having working units of the prototypes by the end of the summer, with designing and engineering of the production line to manufacture the units taking place now.

“We anticipate proposals of over $200 million before the end of the summer 2009,” wrote Battis Wednesday on the company’s Web site. “Our first round of presentations over the last month have gone better than we could have imagined.”

Oil has gained 28 percent in May as equities rose and the U.S. dollar weakened, spurring demand for commodities. Japan said today that its industrial output climbed the most in at least six years in April, improving the outlook for a rebound in fuel demand.

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Crude oil for July delivery rose as much as 36 cents, or 0.6 percent, to $65.44 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. It was at $65.40 at 2:46 p.m. in Singapore. Yesterday, the contract gained $1.63, or 2.6 percent, to settle at $65.08 a barrel, the highest since Nov. 5.

Now, the 54-year-old businessman and father of five has a backup generator, a water filter, a grain mill and a 4-foot-tall pile of emergency food tucked in his home in the San Diego suburb of La Jolla.

Wiseman isn’t alone. Emergency supply retailers and military surplus stores nationwide have seen business boom in the past few months as more Americans spooked by the economy rush to stock up on gear that was once the domain of hard-core survivalists.

These people snapping up everything from water purification tablets to thermal blankets shatter the survivalist stereotype: They are mostly urban professionals with mortgages, SUVs, solid jobs and a twinge of embarrassment about their newfound hobby.

From teachers to real estate agents, these budding emergency gurus say the dismal economy has made them prepare for financial collapse as if it were an oncoming Category 5 hurricane. They worry about rampant inflation, runs on banks, bare grocery shelves and power failures that could make taps run dry.

For Wiseman, a fire protection contractor, that’s meant spending about $20,000 since September on survival gear.

The surge in interest in emergency stockpiling has been a bonanza for camping supply companies and military surplus vendors, some of whom report sales spikes of up to 50 percent. These companies usually cater to people preparing for earthquakes or hurricanes, but informal customer surveys now indicate the bump is from first-time shoppers who cite financial, not natural, disaster.

Top sellers include 55-gallon containers, freeze-dried foods, water filters, purification tablets, glow sticks, lamp oil, thermal blankets, dust masks and first-aid kits.

Online interest in survivalism has increased too. The niche Web site SurvivalBlog.com has seen its page views triple in the past 14 months to nearly 137,000 unique visitors a week. Jim Rawles, a self-described survivalist who runs the site, calls the newcomers “11th-hour believers.” He charges $100 an hour for phone consulting on emergency preparedness and says that business also has tripled.

Joe Branin, owner of the online emergency supply store Living Fresh, said he’s seen a 700 percent increase in orders for water purification tablets in the past month and a similar increase in orders for sterile water pouches.

He is shipping meals ready to eat and food bars by the case nationwide.

“You’re hearing from the people you will always hear from, who will build their own bunkers and stuff,” he said. “But then you’re hearing from people who usually wouldn’t think about this, but now it’s in their heads: ‘What if something comes to the worst?’ ”

One Austin shop that specializes in the kinds of goods people stockpile says there has not been an increase in the survivalist business in this area.

“It’s no different than it’s ever been with me,” said Ed Hall, who owns Quonset Hut, a military surplus store north of the University of Texas.

“I do see people come in and ask for gun parts — there’s a spike in that, for sure,” said Hall, who sells magazines but not ammunition.

“As far as straight-up survivalists, I don’t think it’s changed any. People are always talking about wanting to have an emergency stand-by pack in case of storms, like the hurricanes down south, or essentials on hand if electricity goes out for days. But I don’t see too many people worried about the country collapsing. There was more concern around Y2K.”

Art Markman, a cognitive psychologist, said he’s not surprised by the reaction of some to the nation’s financial woes, even though it may seem irrational. In an increasingly global and automated society, most people are dependent on strangers and systems they don’t understand — and the human brain isn’t programmed to work that way.

The U.S. Treasury will provide financing for GM while the asset sale is arranged to a company formed by the government, according to a regulatory filing today. June 1 was the deadline set by the U.S. for GM to restructure outside court.

GM, which would follow Chrysler LLC into bankruptcy, plans to build a new business around assets such as the Cadillac and Chevrolet brands. The 100-year-old automaker, a victim of tumbling sales, fell short in a bid to cut debt by $44 billion by June 1.

“By freeing GM of tens of billions of dollars in debt, bankruptcy will give it a new lease on life,” Lynn LoPucki, a law professor at the University of California, Los Angeles, said before the news of Detroit-based GM’s strategy.

Visteon, the former parts unit of Ford Motor Co , said the No. 2 U.S. automaker had made a commitment to support bankruptcy financing for its restructuring efforts to ensure continued supply of parts.

The filing comes at a time when Ford, the only U.S. automaker operating without emergency government loans, is struggling to survive the worst auto sales in nearly three decades which has sent Chrysler into bankruptcy and pushed General Motors Corp to the brink of failure.

GM had moved closer to filing the largest-ever bankruptcy for a U.S. industrial company, but GM and the U.S. Treasury had made a new offer for a crucial debt exchange that is backed by a committee for bondholders.

Ford, still Visteon’s biggest customer and which accounted for about 31 percent of its $1.35 billion of sales last quarter, did not detail the size of its bankruptcy financing for Visteon. Ford spun off Visteon in 2000.

“We have committed to support debtor-in-possession financing, but we anticipate others will also be involved,” Ford spokesman Todd Nissen said.

Kirk Ludtke, senior vice president at CRT Capital Group, said depending on the size, the bankruptcy financing may not have a significant impact on Ford’s liquidity.

“But Visteon is not the only troubled supplier. This could well start to add up,” Ludtke said.

Earlier this month, Ford assumed a $163 million secured revolving credit facility from Visteon’s lenders.

The health of the U.S. auto parts supply base has been a priority for Ford with Chrysler in bankruptcy and GM close to a government-imposed deadline of June 1 to restructure or follow Chrysler down that road.

“Ford’s top priority is to ensure we have sufficient parts and material to protect our production,” Ford global purchasing chief Tony Brown said in a statement.

“Ford has no intention of changing our fundamental business relationship with Visteon, including not buying back businesses or manufacturing operations,” Brown said, adding that Ford had not experienced any production issues as a result of Visteon’s business issues.

Data for gasoline, which showed a smaller-than-expected stock drawdown, and a lower-than-forecast supply increase for distillate stocks were deemed overall bullish by traders.

Prices were already above $64 on better-than-expected U.S. economic data and a decision by OPEC to keep output steady, as expected, betting on a strengthening world economy and tentative signs of increased demand to boost oil prices.

U.S. unemployment in April reached its highest rate in more than a quarter century and is still rising, helping propel mortgage delinquencies and foreclosures to record highs.

Such economic conditions drove up foreclosures of prime fixed-rate mortgages, which represented the largest share of new foreclosures for the first time since the rapid growth and the ensuing collapse of the subprime loan market.

“We clearly haven’t hit the top yet in terms of delinquencies or the bottom of the housing market,” Jay Brinkmann, the association’s chief economist, said in an interview.

Prime fixed-rate loans, made to borrowers with high credit quality, comprise 65 percent of the $9.9 trillion in outstanding first mortgages, according to the industry group.

“The housing market depends on the employment situation,” he said, “and we don’t expect unemployment to bottom out until the middle of next year, so then normally housing would not recover until after employment recovers.”

A record 12.07 percent of loans on one-to-four unit residences were at least one payment past due or in the foreclosure process in the first quarter, on a non-seasonally adjusted basis.

Foreclosure actions were started on an all-time high 1.37 percent of first mortgages in the quarter, a record increase from 1.08 percent the prior quarter.

The share of loans in the foreclosure process rose to a record 3.85 percent from 3.30 percent in the fourth quarter and 2.47 percent a year earlier.

California, Florida, Arizona and Nevada accounted for nearly half of the new foreclosure activity in the quarter and half of the increase in prime fixed-rate foreclosure starts.

Those severely hit states, the biggest winners in the five-year housing boom earlier this decade, continue to worsen as recession overtakes problems spawned by lax lending standards.

“Every job loss, every divorce, every incident like that is going to be turning into a foreclosure because they are so far under water with the homes already,” Brinkmann said.

When a house is “under water,” its price has fallen below the size of the mortgage.

Nearly 70 percent of the economy is based on consumer spending. To keep the economy going we need to keep spending but not waste money in the process. This is where the frugal millionaires come in. They’ve been smart with their money all along and haven’t lost it all and had to remake it. These are the kind of people you want to learn from when it comes to spending your money.

Spending philosophy.

Thousands of Automatic Number Plate Recognition cameras are already operating on Britain’s roads.

Police forces across England, Wales and Scotland will soon be able to share the information on one central computer.

Officers say it is a useful tool in fighting crime, but critics say the network is secretive and unregulated.

Kent’s Chief Constable, Michael Fuller, commented: “We’ve seen an increase of some 40% of arrests since we’ve been using this technology.

“I’m very confident that we’re using it properly and responsibly, and that innocent people have nothing to fear from the way we use it.”

A number of local councils are signing up their Closed Circuit Television (CCTV) systems to the ANPR network. As long as the cameras are technically good enough, they can be adapted to take the software.

In towns such as Bradford, Portsmouth and Luton that means greater coverage for the police and more journeys captured and recorded.

John Dean, who is co-ordinating the ANPR network for the Association of Chief Police Officers, said: “It’s the finest intelligence-led policing tool we’ve got.

“It covers so many different areas from crime reduction, crime detection to road safety and everything in between.”

Marked car

But not everyone thinks it is such a good thing.

John Catt found himself on the wrong side of the ANPR system. He regularly attends anti-war demonstrations outside a factory in Brighton, his home town.

“I was threatened under the Terrorist Act. I had to answer every question they put to me, and if there were any questions I would refuse to answer, I would be arrested. I thought to myself, what kind of world are we living in?”

Sussex police would not talk about the case.

The police say they do not know how many cameras there are in total, and they say that for operational reasons they will not say where the fixed cameras are positioned.

‘Limited resources’

Information Commissioner Richard Thomas, whose job it is to protect personal data, has concerns about the lack of regulation.

He said: “There’s very little monitoring. I mean, my office has very limited powers.

“We have very limited resources. We are not actively monitoring that area. You’re right to ask the question. No one’s checking it at the moment”

The BBC TV series Who’s Watching You? asked the Home Secretary, Jacqui Smith, to comment on the Commissioner’s views.

“It’s something that we will look at further legislation about where necessary,” she said.

“I don’t think we should lose sight of the very considerable benefits that this technology also brings us, brings law enforcement.”

Recent research by Huddersfield University found that the public seemed to share that view. The study took place in Leeds as the ANPR system was being introduced. The vast majority supported the cameras if they caught law breakers, with only a few mentioning concerns about police surveillance.