Obama described the talks as "terrific" as he and Xi walked side by side Saturday through the manicured gardens of the sprawling Sunnylands estate. In the spirit of the informal atmosphere at the meetings, the men went without jackets and ties.

The presidents rejoined advisers for a session expected to focus on economic issues, along with additional discussions on North Korea and cybersecurity. The White House said after a two-hour bilateral meeting, the presidents ended their visit by having tea with Xi's wife and the wife of the Chinese ambassador for about half an hour. There were no closing statements or final images of the leaders together.

The White House said in a statement shortly after Xi departed the sprawling estate that the two nations agreed to work together for the first time to reduce hydrofluorocarbons, a potent greenhouse gas. It is commonly used as a coolant in refrigerators, air conditioners, hair spray and other household items, along with industrial applications.

At a news conference Friday night, Obama said the United States and China were in "uncharted waters" regarding computer security. The presidents carefully avoided accusing each other's nation of high-tech intrusions, but acknowledged an urgent need to find a common approach on addressing the matter.

"We don't have the kind of protocols that have governed military issues and arms issues, where nations have a lot of experience in trying to negotiate what's acceptable and what's not," Obama said.

Obama also sought to distinguish between China's alleged cyberspying and his own government's monitoring of U.S. phone and Internet records. He insisted the two issues were separate and distinct, and that concerns over hacking and intellectual property theft shouldn't be confused with the debate over how governments collect data to combat terrorist threats.

"That's a conversation that I welcome," he said.

Xi, who called rapid technological advancements a "double-edged sword," claimed no responsibility for China's alleged cyberespionage. He said China was also a victim of cyberspying but did not assign any blame.

U.S. officials cast the summit as an opportunity for Obama and Xi to hold candid talks on the many issues that define the relationship between the two powers, including the economy, climate change and North Korea's nuclear provocations.

It was the leaders' first meeting since Xi took office in March.

They originally were scheduled to hold their first talks in September, on the sidelines of an economic summit in Russia. But both countries agreed there was a need to meet earlier.

U.S. officials see Xi as a potentially new kind of Chinese leader. He has deeper ties to the U.S. than many of his predecessors and appears more comfortable in public than the last president, Hu Jintao, with whom Obama never developed a strong personal rapport.

Many of the same issues that defined Obama's relationship with Hu remain.

Xi was expected to press China's claims of business discrimination in U.S. markets and to express concern over Obama's efforts to expand U.S. influence in the Asia-Pacific region. China sees that as an attempt to contain its growing power.

On North Korea, U.S. officials said Obama was looking to build on Xi's apparent impatience with North Korea's nuclear provocations. The U.S. has welcomed Xi's recent calls for North Korea to return to nuclear talks, though it's unclear whether the North is ready to change its behavior.

Xi was due to depart for China in the afternoon. Obama planned to stay in California through the weekend, though he had no public events planned.

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Associated Press writer Darlene Superville contributed to this report.

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Follow Julie Pace at http://twitter.com/jpaceDC

(Reuters) - The New York Rangers have fired head coach John Tortorella after another disappointing early exit from the playoffs, the National Hockey League (NHL) team said on Wednesday.

The decision to release Tortorella, an outspoken coach who has been fined several times by the NHL for his often brusque style with the media, comes four days after the Rangers were eliminated in the Eastern Conference semi-finals.

It marked a disappointing end to a season that started with high expectations after Tortorella led the team to their second most wins all-time with 51 during the 2011-12 campaign before falling in the conference finals.

"Every coach has a shelf life," Rangers General Manager Glen Sather told reporters on a conference call. "I've told every guy that I've hired that at some point in time it's going to change.

"Our goal is to win the Stanley Cup. And we didn't achieve that goal this year and I had to make the decision and I did."

Sather made no other staff changes, saying further decisions would wait for the team's organizational meetings next month. He also said he hoped to have a new head coach in place before the NHL Draft on June 30.

Tortorella, 54, compiled a 171-115-29 record with New York since being named the 34th coach in Rangers franchise history in February 2009. He was also an assistant coach for the Rangers for the 1999-2000 campaign, where he served as head coach for the final four games of the season.

Prior to rejoining the Rangers, Tortorella coached the Tampa Bay Lightning for seven seasons and, in 2004, led them to a Stanley Cup championship and was named coach of the year.

For his career, Tortorella has compiled a 410-330-37-67 record and ranks first on the NHL's all-time wins list among U.S.-born head coaches.

During his tenure with the Rangers, the team missed the playoffs once, suffered two opening-round exits and lost in the conference semi-finals and finals once each.

"It wasn't one thing," said Sather, who told also reporters that Tortorella was shocked when told he was fired.

"After the analytical work that we do every year at the end of the season, trying to decide how we are going to improve the team and how we are going to move forward, this is the decision that I made."

(Reporting by Larry Fine in New York; Editing by Frank Pingue)

s Xbox One wont surround you with holographic fir trees, azaleas and mountain laurels, nor, as far as I know, will it dish out interactive porn. But itis going to be listening and capturing data, and transmitting that data back to Microsoft in ways no device in your household has ever listened to or observed you before.

When Stan Lee wrote With great power comes great responsibility in Amazing Fantasy#15 back in 1962, he packed a longstanding philosophical notion into six culturally resonant words. Those words couldnt be more relevant today, with our lives awash in cloud-connected technology, generating and beaming back mountains of abstractly defined information thats quietly sifted by complex machine algorithms and pored over by corporations in search of new ways to further secure footholds in our future lives.

So with Xbox One, which promises to streamline how we interact with TV, movies, music and games by introducing always-on, always-connected digital ears and eyes to our living rooms, Id argue the burden on Microsoft to safeguard our privacy (and articulate that in a meaningful, non-pandering way) just shot through the roof.

Consider whatfor starters: The new console will come with Microsofts refined Kinect sensor, a detachable hammerhead-like camera with microphone that youll probably position somewhere high up in your entertainment center, where its upgraded 1080p widescreen eye can easily sweep your play-space. Unlike the Xbox 360, which functions whether the Kinect camera is attached to the console or not, Xbox One wont work without Kinect plugged in. At least part of the reason for this is that Microsoft wants its new system to be instantly responsive and interactively seamless so tuned to your physiology that the company is saying it can even measure your heartbeat simply by looking at you (courtesy its new infrared camera). But that sort of granularity also raises obvious and completely reasonable privacy concerns.

Microsofts been making the rounds in post-Xbox-One-reveal interviews, claiming that itll provide configurable privacy settings, but its been elliptical about what that means in specific terms; all we know for sure is that, at minimum, Kinect will have to be attached to the system for Xbox One to function. (To be fair, some of this pre-launch hedging is doubtless intentional, as the design team makes last minute changes and decisions about exactly how much control over privacy well be allowed.)

Weve also been told that while Xbox One wont cease to function should you a suffer temporary loss of Internet, Internet connectivity will, as rumored, be required; we dont have full details yet, but it sounds like the console will require a hotlineback to Microsoft HQ at least once a day.

Bearing these things in mind, heres my initial question list about Xbox One, narrowly focused on privacy and security concerns.

Will we be able to shut Xbox Ones camera and microphonecompletely off?

In , Xbox group program manager Jeff Henshaw explained that while we wont be able to remove Kinect without crippling the system, wewill be able to completely disable the camera. That should please anyone worried about having to shell out extra for duct tape (you know, to manually cover the lens). But assuming Henshaws properly describing the final shipping product here, note that he says nothing about disabling the microphone. Will we be able to disable Xbox Ones ears, too? And can we disable both of these things permanently, or will we have to do so each time we reengage the console?

Can we opt out of transmitting general behavior and performance data?

Many companies allow you to transmit information about how you use their services, but allow you to opt out completely if you so choose; , for instance, lets you transmit information about how you use OS X, but doesnt require it. Microsoft, by contrast, already requires certain types of data collection when using Kinect with the Xbox 360. For instance, according to the companys referring to Kinect Performance Data:

This information helps us continuously improve Kinect performance. It does not personally identify you, and collection of this data cannot be disabled. As you play, we collect information on how your Kinect device and platform software are functioning, usage patterns within the Xbox Dashboard applications, and other data that does not directly or personally identify you.

Notice the reference to other data that does not directly or personally identify you. That reference reappears in subsequent sections describing other types of Kinect data.Are claims of anonymity sufficient without disclosing what this other data is?

I realize other services (say,) gather reams of anonymous, generalized usage metrics in trade for service access, then shop that data out to third parties, but just because no ones cared enough to raise a fuss doesnt mean it ought to be status quo. With Xbox One, the possibility of capturing consumer data at an unprecedented data-point resolution level in traditionally off-limits environments may seema godsend to corporate marketing departments, but at what point does trading away your ability to control how information youve generated is used for access to whatever service cross the line between reasonable and invasive? If youre going to turn your consumer base at least partially into free marketing fodder, you should at least give them the option not to participate.

Why are Microsofts references to targeted advertising are so vague?

I believe Microsoft when it says Xbox One wont try to target-advertise to individuals based on what they say or do while engaging with Xbox One. But Im not at all convinced Microsoft wont pass aggregatedata on to third parties to use in more general terms. In a sense, youre looking at a hypothetically vast and unparalleled sociological experiment about to embark, where companies can quietly gather behavioral information about us from within the intimacy of our households, collate that data (all while claiming, probably accurately, that its being done anonymously) then use it for marketing and who-knows-what-other purposes, potentially extending well beyond the scope of Xbox One. As noted earlier, just because collected taste-related datas being anonymized doesnt preclude us from being targeted at the demographic level.

How is Microsoft safeguarding Xbox One from hackers? What sort of security measures is it taking, both on the client and server sides?

This isnt just paranoid thinking. Consider the case against furniture retailer Aarons Inc., which whether itself or via franchisees , computers that eventually sent some 185,000 emails containing sensitive information back to corporate computers. The idea that computers in intimate settings might, for one reason or another, surreptitiously capture what were doing and transmit that information illicitly isnt fanciful worst-casing: its already happened.

Over the past few years, weve seen everything from s PlayStation Network to Stratfor to the C.I.A. hacked, whether to deface or disrupt web services or to pilfer personal information or shame companies by distributing that information en masse. An always-on, always-listening system that lives with us in our homes requires extraordinary attention to security much more than just a wink and a smile from Microsoft in its terms and conditions assuring that everythings under control.

Should companies that hope to place a device like this into tens of millions of households have to submit to independent, periodic security reviews? Its worth asking the question. I dont want to overreach, but then imagine how people might react if someone managed to hack into Xbox One server- or client-side captured someone engaged in highly sensitive activity, then pushed that online for public viewing.

Less a question than a request: Dont patronize us in your upcoming Xbox One privacy FAQ, and dont assume the only thing we care about when it comes to data aggregation and transmission is anonymity (or that thats a sufficient definition of privacy and security).

Im not fundamentally opposed to the idea that technology might track my comings and goings and doings at home, or that it might relay that information on to a company like Microsoft, which Im sure intends to use it in at least some capacity to simply improve the service. Making what you do friendlier, more efficient and more relevant is an important aspect of any contemporary, Internet-connected service and theres definitely a glass half full angle to much of this. But we deserve better explanations about these processes as well as reasonably broad control over how they work. And while I have no issue with a console requiring Internet connectivity to function in 2013, I do take issue with this idea that giving up certain privacy rights is an acceptable exchange for access to Xbox Ones traditional services.

In other words, if Microsoft wants to kick this eyes and ears in your home can down the road some more, fine, but the barrier to entry ought to be higher a lot higher than its ever been before.

If confirmed, the death of Waliur Rehman would be a strong blow to the militant group responsible for hundreds of bombings and shootings across Pakistan. The United States has a $5 million bounty out on Rehman, who Washington has accused of involvement in the 2009 suicide attack on a U.S. base in Afghanistan that killed seven Americans working for the CIA.

Missiles fired by a U.S. drone slammed into a house early Wednesday in Miran Shah, the main town of the North Waziristan tribal region, killing five people including Rehman, Pakistani officials said.

Two officials said their informants in the field saw Rehman's body, while a third said intelligence authorities had intercepted communications between militants saying Rehman had been killed. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief reporters.

A spokesman for the Pakistani Taliban denied the reports.

"This appears to me to be false news. I don't have any such information," said Ahsanullah Ahsan.

White House spokesman Jay Carney declined to confirm if Rehman was dead. He said if the reports were true, Rehman's death would deprive the militant group of its chief military strategist involved in "horrific attacks" on a CIA base in Afghanistan and other attacks against Pakistani civilians and soldiers.

Most of North Waziristan is under militant control, and journalists cannot access the rugged region near the Afghan border, making independent confirmation difficult.

The missile attack was the first since Pakistan's May 11 elections in which the American drone program was a hotly debated topic.

It was also the first strike in Pakistan since President Barack Obama's speech last Thursday during which he discussed more restrictive rules he was implementing on drone use in places such as Pakistan and Yemen.

The tribal region in northwestern Pakistan is home to local and Afghan militant outfits, including al-Qaida-linked fighters. The U.S. has often criticized Pakistan, saying it does not vigorously target militants in these areas who then attack American troops in Afghanistan.

Pakistani officials say their military is already overtaxed fighting militants in the tribal regions and in the southwestern province of Baluchistan, and that the casualties they've already incurred have not been properly recognized.

Washington's drone program remains deeply unpopular in Pakistan, even though the number of strikes has dropped significantly since the height of the program in 2010. The strikes usually target al-Qaida-linked insurgents or other militants who fight in Afghanistan, although some strikes have killed militants at war with the Pakistani government.

The Pakistani Taliban, officially called the Tehrik-e-Taliban, has been battling government forces for years in a bid to push them from the tribal regions, cut Pakistan's ties with the U.S. and eventually establish their brand of hardline Islam across Pakistan.

Rehman has been on the U.S. radar for years. In 2010, Washington offered $5 million for information leading to Rehman under their "Rewards for Justice" program.

While Rehman was mostly known for his activities in Pakistan, the U.S. said in its announcement that he also participated in cross-border attacks in Afghanistan against U.S. and NATO personnel.

The U.S. wanted Rehman in connection with his alleged involvement in an attack on a U.S. base in Khost, Afghanistan in 2009. The attack on Camp Chapman killed seven Americans working for the CIA, a Jordanian intelligence officer and wounded six other CIA personnel.

Pakistan's incoming prime minister, Nawaz Sharif, has repeatedly said he is against the use of American drones on Pakistani soil, and Pakistani officials have demanded publicly that the program be stopped.

Sharif has said he would be open to negotiating with the Pakistani Taliban in order to end the fighting in the tribal agencies. Rehman's death could complicate that.

"He was a very cool-minded person, a very intelligent person and he was someone that the government could talk to," said Mansur Mahsud, director of administration and research at the Islamabad-based FATA Research Center.

Rehman was believed to be about 42 or 43 years old and was from South Waziristan, Mahsud said. He had already been fighting American troops in Afghanistan when the TTP was created in late 2007 and he turned his focus onto Pakistani targets.

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the drone strike Wednesday but made no mention of Rehman in their brief statement.

"The Government of Pakistan has consistently maintained that the drone strikes are counter-productive, entail loss of innocent civilian lives, have human rights and humanitarian implications and violate the principles of national sovereignty, territorial integrity and international law," the ministry said.

Senior civilian and military officials are known to have supported some of the attacks in the past, but many say that is no longer the case.

Pakistan has been hit by 355 such attacks since 2004, according to the New America Foundation, a U.S.-based think tank. The figure does not include Wednesday's strike. Up to 3,336 people have died in the strikes, according to the think tank.

Obama's speech last Thursday was his most extensive comments to date about the secretive drone program, which has come under increased criticism for its lack of accountability.

The president cast drone strikes against Islamic militants as crucial to U.S. counterterrorism efforts but acknowledged that they are not a "cure-all." The president also said he is deeply troubled by civilians unintentionally killed in the strikes and announced more restrictive rules governing the attacks measures that his advisers said would effectively limit drone use in the future.

White House spokesman Carney said the new standards do not mean the administration would discuss details of every counterterrorism operation.

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Shahzad reported from Islamabad. Associated Press reporter Rebecca Santana in Islamabad also contributed to this report.

TORONTO (Reuters) - Two top aides quit Toronto Mayor Rob Ford's office on Monday as the embattled leader of Canada's biggest city faces lingering allegations he was caught smoking crack cocaine on video, accusations he has firmly denied.

The departures of the mayor's press secretary and deputy press secretary came just days after Ford fired his chief of staff. The mayor confirmed on Monday that both George Christopoulos and Isaac Ransom left of their own accord.

"I wish them the best of luck in their future endeavors and I want to thank them for working hard in this office," he told a crush of journalists outside his office. "That's it, it's business as usual."

Christopoulos and Ransom could not be reached for comment. But their departures renewed questions about whether the mayor would be able to weather his most serious controversy to date.

Ford has been under fire since reporters from the Toronto Star and Gawker Media said in separate reports on May 16 that they had seen a video that purports to show Ford smoking crack. The mayor directly denied the allegations on Friday, after initially dismissing the media stories as "ridiculous," without giving a full statement.

Reuters cannot confirm the existence of the video or its content.

The video, according to The Star and Gawker, was being shopped around by people involved in the drug trade. Both media outlets declined to pay the six-figure sum requested by the video's owners.

The controversy has made headlines across Canada and outside the country and drawn ridicule from late-night TV humorists Jimmy Kimmel, Jay Leno and Jon Stewart.

Speaking on his weekly radio show on Sunday, Ford brushed off the scandal, calling the media a "bunch of maggots," and promised to run in the next election.

"I'll be the first putting my name on that ballot," he said.

Ford apologized for his maggot comment on Monday.

The drug-use allegations are the latest in a string of scandals for the mayor, who has been chided for ignoring city work to coach high school football and was briefly ordered out of office last year after he was found guilty of conflict of interest.

While some of Ford's opponents have called for him to step down, one municipal affairs specialist said there was little that could be done under the current system to force a Toronto mayor from office.

"There is no recall or impeachment provision," said John Mascarin, a lawyer with Aird & Berlis LLP. "Stupidity is not one of the things" that can get you removed.

Elected officials can be removed from City Hall by court order in a conflict-of-interest situation, or if they do not attend council meetings for several months without being formally excused.

'FORD NATION'

Also on Ford's side is the steadfast backing of his core supporters, said Ivor Tossell, a journalist and author of the biography 'The Gift of Ford'.

"One of Ford's great political assets is he plays on a sense of marginalization and grievance among his supporters. He likes to play the little guy," he said. "In a way, the more the institutions like the media attack him, the stronger he gets."

The latest controversy does not appear to have hurt Ford's popularity, according to a Forum Research Inc poll released over the weekend, although he is at risk of being ousted in a 2014 election.

The poll, taken on Friday after Ford denied the drug-use claims, found the mayor would still lose a one-on-one battle if pitted against Olivia Chow, a former city councilor and current federal member of Parliament widely touted as a candidate.

It showed Ford would get 36 percent of the vote, in line with a May 10 poll taken before the latest scandal broke, while Chow would get more than half the vote.

The mayor's popularity has been attributed to the support of the "Ford Nation," suburban voters who pushed Ford into the city's top office in 2010 and back his agenda of cutting taxes and reducing city spending.

"Rob Ford is really both the Teflon and Kevlar Mayor - nothing sticks to him and nothing penetrates his armor," Forum Research founder Lorne Bozinoff said in a statement.

"His recent troubles have had absolutely no effect on his electoral prospects."

(Additional reporting by Susan Taylor; Editing by Jeffrey Hodgson and Peter Cooney)

The team's website reported Tuesday, the first day of organized team workouts, that Romo underwent the procedure last month and could return for the mandatory minicamp that starts June 11. He will be ready for training camp in July.

Romo became the highest-paid player in franchise history in March when he signed a six-year, $108 million extension with $55 million guaranteed, more than Super Bowl winner Joe Flacco of Baltimore.

The Dallas Morning News reported that the outpatient procedure was performed before the NFL draft. Romo was restricted to light conditioning work in April but has been cleared to throw.

"If this was the regular season and I had to play next week, I could," Romo told the newspaper Monday. "That's why I did it now. This will have no effect on training camp."

Cowboys owner Jerry Jones has said Romo will have an expanded role in the offense, and his quarterback has committed to "Peyton Manning-type time" in trying to turn Dallas into a Super Bowl contender again.

Backup Kyle Orton will take most of the snaps in Romo's absence. He signed as a free agent last year but played in just one game, a blowout loss to Chicago. The Cowboys also have second-year player Nick Stephens and undrafted rookie Dalton Williams on the roster.

A healthy Romo is a huge factor with coach Jason Garrett's job on the line in 2013. Garrett is unlikely to return if the Cowboys miss the playoffs for the fourth consecutive season.

The last time Romo missed significant playing time, former coach Wade Phillips was fired and replaced by Garrett in the middle of a 6-10 season in 2010. Romo was out 10 games with a broken collarbone.

Romo played through a broken rib early in the 2011 season and stayed healthy last year. Both seasons ended with losses to NFC East rivals in finales with playoff berths on the line.

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Online: http://pro32.ap.org and http://twitter.com/AP_NFL

Mattingly's comments came an hour after GM Ned Colletti said his manager is "doing fine" and has kept the team steady despite its last-place showing in the NL West.

Mattingly said he talked with team president Stan Kasten within the past couple of days and didn't get any indication he was about to be replaced.

"As far as any kind of rumors or whatever they are, I talked to Stan the other day. He didn't fire me that day," Mattingly said. "I'm still here. Ned didn't tell me I wasn't going to be here tomorrow or today. That's the way I look at it."

There has been plenty of speculation that Mattingly's job is in jeopardy. The Dodgers entered Monday night's game in Milwaukee with a 17-25 record despite a $215 million payroll.

When asked whether he thought he would be managing the team Friday if it didn't win the three-game series with the Brewers, Mattingly said: "I have no idea. I really haven't gotten any feeling that Ned's like on the edge of like, 'Donnie you're the problem here.'"

Asked if it was false to say Mattingly would be fired this week, Colletti simply said: "My perspective hasn't changed. I'm done talking about it."

Mattingly said he was concentrating on finding ways for his team to play better, and said the stars on the club would have to perform well for the Dodgers to win.

He referred to comments from Magic Johnson, part of the Dodgers ownership group, that superstars have to carry teams in the NBA playoffs.

"That's really what it's going to boil down to," Mattingly said. "(Clayton) Kershaw's going to have to pitch great. (Zack) Greinke's going to have to pitch great. You know? Our big boys are going to have to play big."

The big boys in the Dodgers' lineup haven't produced as in years past. A group that includes Matt Kemp, Adrian Gonzalez, Carl Crawford and Andre Ethier ranks next-to-last in the majors in runs.

The bullpen also has been a sore spot, and shortstop Hanley Ramirez has played in only four games due to injuries.

Mattingly didn't criticize any players, but said the middle of his lineup would have to perform well for the team to win.

"We can sit here and say, you know, Nick Punto having a great year is really nice, but Nick Punto's not taking us to the promised land. I'll say that in an honoring way," he said. "Dee Gordon has to do his thing. Mark Ellis has to do his thing. But they're not taking us to the promised land.

"Adrian and Matt, Hanley when he gets back, Andre, those are the guys, the guys in the middle of the order, that you count on to be run producers," he said. "That's what we do. How do you not stay with those guys? You don't just abandon ship and say, 'What do you do?'"

Colletti also said he expects better performances from the players, and blaming one person is an easy way out.

The manager and general manager met in Mattingly's office before the game, and Mattingly said they simply talked about the team and not his job.

Despite the turmoil, Mattingly said he wasn't concerned about his status.

"You know what? I don't even worry about that part of it," he said. "I only worry about turning it around. Really, I never get away from my base. All I worry about is us playing our best baseball. And I worry about our team, and getting us to perform up to the best of our ability, and try to keep the team going in a position to have success."

Ramirez is on the disabled list with a strained left hamstring.

"I think as you look around our lineup you should have four players that are capable of hitting 20 or more home runs," Colletti said. "One of them has only played a couple of games this year."

Los Angeles is batting .226 with runners in scoring position, which ranks 23rd in the majors. The bullpen blew late leads in each of the past two games.

"We need to score more runs," Colletti said. "We need to do better in the clutch, be better with runners in scoring position. I think if we were to do that you'd see a different dynamic, including in the 'pen.

"When you are asked to protect a 1-0 lead, or a 2-0 lead, or one-run leads, or close games every day, it takes a lot," he said. "It doesn't mean that they shouldn't do it. It doesn't mean they get a free pass because it's a 1-0 or a 2-0 game, but I think it makes a difference. When you have no margin of error it's tougher. And a lot of our games have been no margin of error."

Mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday that the rate on the 30-year loan ticked down to 3.83 percent. That's the lowest since long-term mortgages began in the 1950s. And it's below the previous record rate of 3.84 percent reached last week.

The 15-year mortgage, a popular option for refinancing, dropped to 3.05 percent, also a record. That's down from last week's previous record of 3.07 percent.

Low mortgage rates haven't done much to boost home sales. Rates have been below 4 percent for all but one week since early December. Yet sales of both previously occupied homes and new homes fell in March.

There have been some positive signs in recent months. January and February made up the best winter for sales of previously occupied homes in five years. And builders are laying plans to construct more homes in 2012 than at any other point in past 3 1/2 years. That suggests some see the housing market slowly starting to turn around.

Still, many would-be buyers can't qualify for loans or afford higher down payments required by banks. Home prices in many cities continue to fall. That has made those who can afford to buy uneasy about entering the market. And for those who are willing to brave the troubled market, many have already taken advantage of lower rates mortgage rates have been below 5 percent for more than a year now.

Mortgage rates are lower because they tend to track the yield on the 10-year Treasury note. Slower U.S. job growth and uncertainty about how Europe will resolve its debt crisis have led investors to buy more Treasurys, which are considered safe investments. As demand for Treasurys increases, the yield falls.

To calculate the average rates, Freddie Mac surveys lenders across the country on Monday through Wednesday of each week.

The average rage does not include extra fees, known as points, which most borrowers must pay to get the lowest rates. One point equals 1 percent of the loan amount.

The average fee for 30-year loans was 0.7 last week, down from 0.8 the previous week. The fee on 15-year loans also was 0.7, unchanged from the previous week.

The average on one-year adjustable rate was 2.73 percent last week, down from 2.7 percent the previous week. The fee on one-year adjustable rate mortgages was 0.5, down from 0.6.

QIANTUN, China (Reuters) - Two years short of 70, Zhang Guosheng spends his days caring for an 81-year-old fellow villager - washing his clothes, bringing meals to his bed, and keeping him company - a routine he'll keep up until he himself needs the type of care he is now giving.

"Living here is better than staying at home alone. We help each other and have a common language," said the spritely Zhang, an enthusiastic dancer. "We are very happy here."

With younger villagers who would traditionally have looked after their parents and grandparents flocking to the booming cities to seek work as part of Beijing's urbanization drive, Qiantun village in northern China's Hebei province has had to pioneer a new model - the old looking after the even older.

Surrounded by green wheat fields that stretch across a flat plain, Qiantun is unremarkable among countless rural Chinese communities, but its old-age care model is now a prototype cited by central government as a solution to the daunting challenge of caring for a vast and rapidly greying rural population.

One of every four Chinese will be older than 60 by 2030, according to the Ministry of Civil Affairs.

Massive rural-to-urban migration will further strain the rural areas' ability to provide care for the elderly, as personal savings and family support remain the primary pillars of old-age care.

"Migrants to urban areas are mainly young adults, leaving mostly the elderly in villages with children," said Wang Dewen, an expert with the World Bank's Beijing office. "The formal eldercare system in rural areas is very weak, and basically a blank spot in many places."

As a result, the gap between the number of elderly in rural and urban areas is expected to balloon over the next 15 years, to 11 percentage points from today's 1.24 percentage points, the ministry projects.

The costs of caring for China's rapidly expanding elderly population are likely to be too heavy a burden for the government, forcing Beijing to find cost-effective and creative ways to provide care in myriad localities. The self-help model practiced among the 1,500 residents of Qiantun offers a cheaper and streamlined alternative to a state-run system.

More than 95 percent of China's rural elderly still adhere to the traditional practice of seeking old-age care within their families, Wang said. But families are no longer able to cope, with youth and even middle-aged people heading to cities to find work, leaving the elderly behind to fend for themselves.

THE "LIGHT" OF FEIXIANG

In their search for affordable eldercare models, Beijing's leaders have turned their attention 450 km (280 miles) to the south in Hebei's Feixiang county, where Qiantun lies. The practice of old people taking care of each other posed a simple and attractive solution.

Labeled "mutual assist eldercare", the Feixiang model is set to be expanded to the rest of rural China, with 3 billion yuan ($490 million) set aside by the central government to get it started over the coming three years.

"The light of Feixiang will shine across China," Li Liguo, minister of civil affairs, declared enthusiastically during a trip to Feixiang in 2011. "Feixiang has set an example for the whole country."

But not everyone is as optimistic about the model.

"As people get older, they don't tend to get healthier. So if you have somebody in their sixties caring for somebody in their nineties, are they going to be able, and trained and strong enough themselves to care for somebody who has chronic conditions?" said Tony Buccheri, a manager with Right at Home International, a U.S.-based senior home care provider that offers services in China through a partner.

Buccheri's concern echoes that of Cai Qingyang, pioneer of the model and Qiantun's village chief.

"Old people with critical illnesses need more than the very basic care provided here, and we will have to think of other ways to care for them," said the 61 year-old former soldier Cai, watching several old villagers dancing in the yard.

"But this really is the only feasible way given the local elder care situation. The village and the government simply can't afford proper institutional care for every aged rural resident," Cai added.

In 2008, Cai sought to do something about the lack of care for rural elderly left behind as young adults sought better paying work in cities. He turned an abandoned brick house into an old-age home, where 25 elderly villagers moved into 11 rooms, keeping each other company, sharing meals, as well as farming and doing housework.

His innovation has thrived under state support and more than a dozen other provinces have replicated the model.

OLD BEFORE RICH

What separates China's ageing pattern from that in other Asian societies such as Japan, South Korea and Singapore is that the country is still relatively poor on a per capita basis. The phrase "getting old before rich" reflects the fact that even though China's economic growth remains robust, its demographics work against it.

Those in the emerging middle class have more options among at-home care providers, and public as well as private senior homes, and are more likely to find them affordable.

The rural elderly have fewer resources and fewer choices, while youth migration patterns unstitch the traditional family safety net. And despite years of efforts by China's leaders, the income gap between urban and rural residents has increased. A report published by the World Bank last year noted that rural elderly have "remained consistently poorer than the urban elderly over time".

Nor is that likely to change. Two-thirds of elderly Chinese currently live in rural areas, and although migration patterns cloud demographic estimates, many demographers believe the majority of China's elderly will remain in the countryside.

To meet the challenge, says the World Bank's Wang, China must make its urbanization an equalizer of basic social services for urban and rural residents. To do that, he adds, it must reform the household registration system that ties social services to people's registered home, to facilitate family migration to cities and receive care there.

But in the short term, rural areas such as Qiantun, which has three times as many elderly residents as young adults, can only make do with the resources they have. The government provides 600 yuan ($97.68) a year in subsidies for each of the 30 elderly Qiantun villagers at the centre. Their average age is 75.

By contrast, offering professional care at an old-age care institution would cost a minimum of ten times as much, 6,000 yuan a year, according to government estimates, offset by a mere 120 yuan annual subsidy from the government.

At the Qiantun villager centre, "old" Zhang, as he is known, talks about the future as he brings a bowl of dumplings and medicine to the bedside of his charge, bedridden by a broken thigh bone.

"He can't move around now, I help him," said a still spry Zhang. "When I can't move, someone will also care for me."

($1 = 6.1428 Chinese yuan)

(Editing by Ben Blanchard and Ian Geoghegan)

Republican Senators Rand Paul, Mitch McConnell and Rob Portman continued Sunday to press the Obama administration on the Internal Revenue Service scandal that's engulfed the White House.

On CNN's "State of the Union," Paul told Candy Crowley he heard about a "written policy" that encouraged IRS officials to target "those who are critical of the president."

"And when that comes forward, we need to know who wrote the policy and who approved the policy," Paul said.

The Kentucky senator seemed to backtrack when pressed about the existence of yet another controversial document.

"Well, we keep hearing the reports and we have several specifically worded items saying who was being targeted," Paul said. "I don't know if that comes from a policy, but that's what's being reported in the press and reported orally. I haven't seen a policy statement, but I think we need to see that."

Memo or no memo, McConnell said it's clear that political bullying is being cultivated by the Obama White House.

"There is a culture of intimidation throughout the administration," McConnell, the Senate Minority Leader, said on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday. "The nanny state is here to tell us all what to do and if you start criticizing, you get targeted."

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Earlier this month, an inspector general report disclosed that the IRS improperly scrutinized certain conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status. On Sunday's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos, Portman called for a bipartisan investigation into inspector general's report.

"What we do know is that politics was put ahead of the public interest," Portman said. "And it was done in two of the most sensitive areas of our government."

"So, it seems to me that there's a lot of issues here we need to get bottom of," the Ohio Republican added. "We need to find out what really happened and ensure that we can begin to regain some trust in our government. That's my concern."

Meanwhile, White House senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer accused the GOP of conducting "" ahead of next year's midterm elections.

"I think we've seen this playbook from Republicans before," Pfeiffer said on "Meet The Press" Sunday. "What they want to do when they are lacking a positive agenda is try to drag Washington into a swamp of partisan fishing expeditions, trumped-up hearings and false allegations. We're not going to let that happen."

Obama appears to be weathering the storm, the Associated Press noted. A poll released on Sunday by CNN/ORC International showed President Obama has a 53 percent approval rating, with just 45 percent saying they disapprove.