Three explosions rocked India's busy financial capital at rush-hour Wednesday, killing at least 17 people and injuring 54 in what officials described as another terror strike on the city hit by militants nearly three years ago..
Television footage showed dozens of police officials, several of them armed, at the sites of the explosion and at least one car with its windows shattered.. A photograph showed victims of a blast at the Jhaveri Bazaar crowding into the back of a cargo truck to be taken to a hospital..
Indian media reported the Home Ministry had called the separate blasts in three busy locations a terror attack.. No officials there could be independently reached for comment..
The explosions happened around 7 pm.. when all the neighborhoods would have been packed with office workers and commuters..
The blasts.. if confirmed as a terror strike.. would mark the first major attack on Mumbai since 10 militants laid siege to India's financial capital for 60 hours in November 2008..
That attack, which targeted two luxury hotels.. a Jewish center.. and a busy train station.. killed 166 people and was blamed on Pakistan-based militant groups.. The attacks escalated tensions between the nuclear-armed rivals and prompted them to suspend peace talks..
However, the talks have recently resumed..
This latest attack will certainly cast a pall over discussions to come.. for if Pakistan can't control the Taliban and al Qaida, it loses whatever strategic value it still holds..

President Obama collected $86 million combined for his re-election campaign and the Democratic party during the past three months, giving him a large fundraising advantage over the Republican field seeking to challenge him in 2012..
Obama has a large fundraising lead over Republicans..
President Obama collected $86 million combined for his re-election campaign and the Democratic party during the past three months, giving him a large fundraising advantage over the Republican field seeking to challenge him in 2012..
Obama has a large fundraising lead over Republicans.
Obama campaign manager Jim Messina said in a video posted early Wednesday that it raised more than $47 million and the Democratic National Committee brought in more than $38 million through the end of June, building a foundation for advertising and get-out-the-vote efforts in next year's election. Obama's team had set a public goal of $60 million combined..
Mind you, the fund raising's nowhere near over yet.. and it could well take every penny in the war chest to offset the negativity of unemployment figures over 9%.. inflation on the rise.. and an economy which appears to be at the best, flagging..
Mind you, the timing of the return of American Forces from Afghanistan is key.. it's one of the few positive pieces of news this administration will have over the next 16 months or so..
There are some who believe the American man on the street will give Barack another kick at the can..
But, with all the indicators we have in place.. it will likely be a Republican administration, with Mitt Romney carrying the colours..
Regardless of who sits in the Oval Office, this plan Barack's fighting for tooth and nail in the House and Senate for a long term commitment, rather than another three or four month postponement of yet another debate..
The World's markets are in turmoil, as the US debates it's own future.. with a default looming in the air..
It's bad enough the States is on the verge of bankruptcy.. with the same scenario developing in Europe, it's an even bleaker future in the offing..

Newspaper proprietors, editors and politicians including the Prime Minister face being called to give evidence under oath before a far-reaching inquiry into the hacking scandal, David Cameron announced.. Cameron named Lord Justice Leveson as the head of a two-pronged inquiry that will trawl through the details of journalistic malpractice and police failings and also craft a new system of press regulation..
He said he would be happy to give evidence himself as he said the relationship between the media and politicians had to change..
Cameron, who this afternoon is due to meet the family of Milly Dowler, the murdered schoolgirl whose phone was hacked, said of the inquiry: “We want it to be one that is as robust as possible. One that can get to the truth fastest and get to work the quickest. And one that commands the full confidence of the public.”
Mind you, if the goal of these investigations is to eradicate yellow journalism.. it is doomed to utter failure from the start.
There will always be a segment of the British public who lives for their 'stories'.. the likes of Corrie or Eastenders.. and who will fight for the right to see embarrassing photo's of our celebrities.. and who's having illicit affairs with whom..
Already there are plans on the table for a 'Sunday Sun'.. the newspaper of 'Page 3' fame.. The gap in the market left by the News Of The World will not remain vacant for long..
The market's too great to be ignored.. and these replacement publications for tabloid journalism will see the niche filled quickly..

Now, try to make sense of this..
UK unemployment fell 26,000 in the three months to May.. to 2.45 million.. official figures show..
The unemployment rate was 7.7%, according to the Office for National Statistics .. down from 7.8% in the previous quarter..
However and herein lies the conundrum.. the number of people claiming Jobeekers's Allowance in June rose by 24,500 to 1.52 million.. the biggest such increase in two years.. the total number claiming unemployment benefits reached its highest level since March 2010, while the claimant count rate held steady at 4.7%..
It is the second month in a row that the claimant count has risen while the unemployment total.. which is based on a separate survey.. has fallen..
Makes no sense to us, either..But anyone, posed with such a question, would be forced into an honest assesment, amounting, on the whole, to a re-evaluation of what a job's worth..
If it's redundant to the power of two that would save us some £45thousand a yeat, while allowing those who could do well well..

Ministers, parliamentarians and thousands of other people joined the Afghan president Hamid Karzai to bury his half-brother Ahmed Wali Karzai, a political strongman who was praised for his efforts to bring peace to the southern province of Kandahar..
Ahmed Wali Karzai.. dubbed the president of Kandahar.. was killed on Tuesday at his home by his long-trusted Security Chief..
The Taliban have claimed responsibility for killing Ahmed Wali Karzai..
Speaking at a press conference on Tuesday Karzai said.. "This is the life of the people of Afghanistan. Afghan families, every one of us, have suffered from it and we hope, God willing, for our suffering to be over.. Once again I call on the Taliban, my dears, my brothers and friends, come and join me in building the country.. Stop destroying the country.."

David Cameron delivered a major blow to News Corporation’s takeover bid for BSkyB today by supporting a call for the company to abandon the attempt.. MPs will vote tomorrow on a Labour motion calling on Rupert Murdoch to withdraw his bid “in the public interest”..
This partiular 'blind eye' turned by the man who is, when push comes to shove, has the final say.. the man resposible.. stands to lose not only his credibility, but his fortune..
The lawsuits stemming from some 4 thousand who are alleged to have their privacy breached.. their phones hacked.. stands to cost News International a staggering amount of compensation..
The police investigation into newspaper hacking claims, has turned it's attention towards 'The News Of The World'in particular.. The Met's informed Mp's that the newspaper 'thwarted' the original investigation.. Ex-Deputy Assistant Commissioner Peter Clarke said while probing the claims in 2006, he came across "prevarication and what we now know to be lies"..
Assistant Commissioner John Yates said the firm "appears to have failed to co-operate" during his review of the case.. However, Assistant Commissioner John Yates said the firm "appears to have failed to co-operate" during his review of the case..
Committee Chairman Keith Vaz said Mr Yates's evidence was "unconvincing"..
A police investigation began in 2005, triggered by stories about Prince William's health in 'The News Of The World'..
In other developments..
Labour leader Ed Miliband will meet David Cameron and Deputy PM Nick Clegg to discuss the fall-out of the scandal..
MPs will vote on Wednesday on a Labour motion urging News Corporation boss Rupert Murdoch to withdraw his bid..
News International's Chief Executive Rebekah Brooks, Chairman James Murdoch and Rupert Murdoch have been asked to appear before the Culture, Media and Sport Committee in the Commons next Tuesday.. The company says it will co-operate and is awaiting the "formal invitation".. Labour leader Ed Miliband has a meeting with the family of murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler, whose phone was allegedly hacked, and tells..
In other developments..
Labour leader Ed Miliband will meet David Cameron and Deputy PM Nick Clegg to discuss the fall-out of the scandal..
MPs will vote on Wednesday on a Labour motion urging News Corporation boss Rupert Murdoch to withdraw his bid for BSkyB.. All three main party leaders have now said they will lend their support to the motion..
News International's Chief Executive Rebekah Brooks, Chairman James Murdoch and his father, Rupert Murdoch have been asked to appear before the Culture, Media and Sport Committee in the Commons next Tuesday. The company says it will co-operate and is awaiting the "formal invitation.."
The final edition of the News of the World on Sunday sold 3.8 million copies, 1.1 million more than the previous week..
The websites TheSunOnSunday.co.uk and SunOnSunday.co.uk are transferred to News International, amid speculation a seven-day edition of The Sun is in the planning stage..


Accoding to French authorities.. Mohammar's envoys say the Libyan leader is "prepared to leave.. "The Libyan regime is sending messengers everywhere, to Turkey, to New York, to Paris" offering to discuss Gaddafi's exit, French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe told French radio..
Juppe told France Info radio today.. "We are receiving emissaries who are telling us.. 'Gaddafi is prepared to leave.. Let's discuss it..'
"There are contacts but it's not a negotiation proper at this stage."
Juppe did not say who the emissaries were..
Mr Juppe told France Info radio on Tuesday: "We are receiving emissaries who are telling us: 'Gaddafi is prepared to leave. Let's discuss it.'
"There are contacts but it's not a negotiation proper at this stage.."
Juppe did not say who the emissaries were..nor he give any indication as to what powers of negotiation they might hold.. But Juppe added that such contacts did not constitute negotiations..
But it's interesting the French are so intimately involved in any plan to relocate Mohammar, having been the most involved in his removal..
One of the terms for his leaving Libya.. will be a guarantee that all criminal charges be revoked.. and that at least a portion of his personal fortune be returned..

Yet another 'care' home is facing a police investigation following allegations of sub-standard treatment of patients, and four members have staff have been arrested on suspected physical attacks..
Rose Villa in Bristol is the latest of care home scandals and closures.. one person was suspended at Rose Villa in June following allegations made by a whistle-blower..
In the past week, two members of staff have been suspended after inspectors from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) raised safeguarding concerns.. It is believed a further member of staff has been suspended after allegations that a patient was mishandled..
One cannot express adequately, the outrage such reports inspire. That those who are the most need from this society, are the one's mistreated by their carers..
If it were an isolated case, it might be understood the vetting process could hire the odd sociopathic type..
But it's carelssness at the best.. but criminal at it's worst..
This is a an ever growing problem.. and the source of some concern for an ever growing demographic.. With the government capping a social safety net at £5 thousand for those needing nursing or palliative care.. many are wordering if their 'golden years' may have become lightly gilded brass, at best..
These tens of thousands who hit the streets in pension contribution protests.. hsve need to take into account the economy, and what sacrifices must be made to repair this broken machine..
While it still an abhorrent situation to hear of the mistreatment of patients.. the wage paid are not outstanding.. and it takes a certain personality to deal with geriatrics..
But with our economy in the state it's in, it will be years before we see disposable income keep up with inflation..

International Markets are in something of a panic over the ever expanding problems with the Eurozone.. fears that the debt crisis in the Eurozone may spread to Italy and Spain are rife.. Italy's main index fell 4% at one point, before recovering to rise 0.4%. Spanish shares and the UK's FTSE 100 have both shed 1%..
Italy moved with alarming speed from the fringe of the European Union’s financial crisis to its very centre.. as efforts to prevent the debt contagion from spreading beyond Greece.. Ireland.. and Portugal failed.. even threatening to engulf the United States..
The spread to Italy is disturbing evidence that even the largest economies, none of which seemed to share any of the worst economic traits of Greece, are not immune from investors’ fears that debt loads are simply becoming too big to be paid off.. Waning growth in the Western world is only intensifying the belief that debt defaults may be inevitable, a potentially catastrophic scenario that would slaughter the banks and cut off the credit required to keep companies functioning..
EU Finance Ministers, who met Monday to discuss Greece.. ahead of a regularly scheduled session.. reiterated their vow to safeguard financial stability and said they are prepared to bolster “the scope and flexibility” of the existing bailout fund, known as the European Financial Stability Facility. The changes, they said in a statement released Monday night, would lengthen the bailout loan maturity dates and drop their interest rates. Greece has already been treated to lower bailout loan costs.. Eire and Portugal will soon be asking for the same concessions..
Whether new bailout terms will help Greece or other rescued countries avoid default remains an open question. Many economists believe nothing but a default, followed by debt reduction of 50 per cent or so, would allow Greece to support its debt..
Plunging prices for trading in Italian debt presented Brussels with a nightmare scenario.. The potential bailout of the third-largest economy in the euro zone could be unaffordable, and could result in the destruction of the common currency..
Italy’s economy is as big as Britain’s and bigger than Canada’s.. Most economists think it would be too big to bail out.. Italy’s turmoil “adds a new ingredient to Eurostress,” Deutsche Bank economist Gilles Moec said..
A group of European banks that own the battered debt of Greece and other weak countries pleaded for the EU to buy back the debt.. “It is essential that euro-area member states and the IMF act in coming days to avoid market developments spinning out of control and risk contagion accelerating,” the banks said in a paper presented Monday to finance ministers of the Euro Zone, the 17 EU countries that share the common currency..
The Italian cabinet recently approved €47-billion in spending reductions and tax hikes between now and 2015, but the bulk of the austerity program comes in the last two years, leading to speculation that Prime Minister Tremonti will be forced to accelerate the program to scare off the investors who are betting that the Italian debt markets have nowhere to go but down..
Italy was supposed to be fire-proof.. and some economists think the plunging bond prices are unwarranted, even if the Italian economy has stalled and the political landscape is unstable.. thanks to Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s never-ending sex and corruptions scandals..
They note, for instance, that Italy’s budget deficit – the difference between the amount it takes in and the amount it spends – is expected to be only 4 per cent of gross domestic product this year, down from 4.6 per cent in 2010. Italy’s 2011 figure is below the euro zone’s average expected deficit and well below Britain’s (7.6 per cent) and the United States’s (10.4 per cent), according to the latest Deutsche Bank forecasts..
But should the worst case scenario take place.. it would spell the end of this attempt to unify Europe.. the end of the Euro itself in those countries who see the advantage of bailing on their debts, returning to their own currency, and putting devaluation on the table..
Now no doubt a door would be left open for all those countries who might leave the Euro.. an open invitation to all those governments to return to the fold, as it were, once economic stability returns..
But what effects these possible moves could have on France and Germany.. indeed even Serbia.. has yet to be seen..
The yields on Italian and Spanish bonds also continued to rise as worries over the two countries grew..
Yesterday, Eurozone finance ministers said they were ready to pass new measures to stop the crisis spreading..
The Euro was also lower, falling to a four-month low against the dollar at $1.3835..
The concern is that Italy and Spain may have to follow Greece, Portugal and the Republic of Ireland and seek a European Union and International Monetary Fund (IMF) bail-out..
Yesterday, Eurozone Finance Ministers said increased efforts to "improve the euro area's systemic capacity to resist contagion risk".. measures would include "enhancing the flexibility and the scope" of the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF)..
This is the bail-out fund to which eurozone member states contribute..
Finance ministers also agreed to look at lowering the interest rates that Greece, Portugal and the Irish Republic have to pay, plus lengthening the maturities of their loans..
Not that this can be seen as a long-term solution.. Lowering the interest rates will merely leave those countries which made the original loans, out of pocket..
And it will make the IMF and the loaning members of the Eurozone even more reluctant to make bailouts.. with the chances of defaults increasing..
This experiment with a single European currency is turning out to be a no go.. As we noted several years ago, that any country in the EU, has tied itself to the lowest economy in the group..

An interesting use for Facebook is now under police investigation Terrorist cells are using the networking sites to arrange attacks..
This use of this medium had to be expected..
The UK's updated counter-terrorism strategy suggests terrorists' use of social media to disseminate information and radicalise people is "commonplace"..
It said there was evidence of extremist groups seeking "to invade Facebook"..
Home Secretary Theresa May said the UK must react to this threat but stressed Osama bin Laden's death had left al-Qaeda in its weakest state since 2001..
Last year the government identified cyber warfare as one of the most serious "Tier 1" threats to the UK's security and set aside £650m in additional money to make key infrastructure more resilient..
Defence Secretary Liam Fox recently revealed that his department had dealt with more than 1,000 "potentially serious" attempted cyber attacks in the past year..
The government's updated counter-terrorism strategy, published on Tuesday, warns that the number of attacks on IT systems will likely increase and that extremists were increasingly sophisticated in their use of social networking and video sharing sites..
"Since the death of Osama Bin Laden, al-Qaeda has explicitly called not only for acts of lone or individual terrorism but also for 'cyber-jihad'.." according to the document..

Journalists from 'The Sunday Times' and 'The Sun' obtained information from Gordon Brown’s legal files, bank account and his young son’s medical record, according to reports released today..
Documents and a phone recording suggest "blagging" was used to obtain private financial and property details..
The Browns also wonder how medical records relating to their son Fraser.. whom the Sun revealed in 2006 to suffer from cystic fibrosis, may have been obtained..
News International said it would investigate the claims..
In a statement.. the company said.. "We note the allegations made today concerning the reporting of matters relating to Gordon Brown. So that we can investigate these matters further, we ask that all information concerning these allegations is provided to us."
Full disclosure may well be demanded by the courts themselves, as investigations into criminal charges continue..
In other developments in the phone-hacking scandal..
Evidence has been found suggesting a News of the World reporter tried to buy a phone book containing Royal Family numbers..
Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall may have also been targets of phone-hacking conducted at the News of the World, according to 'The Guardian'..
Scotland Yard says it believes stories have been leaked to the media as part of a "deliberate campaign to undermine" its inquiry into claims that bribes have been paid to some officers..
Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt confirms that he is referring News Corp's bid to take over BSkyB to the Competition Commission. It comes after News Corporation withdrew its proposed undertaking to sell 'Sky News' as part of its bid..
The family of the murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler met Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg to discuss concerns that her phone may have been hacked by the News of the World.. The Dowler family called on Rebekah Brooks.. the newspaper's editor at the time.. to resign as chief executive of 'News International'..
It's understood Rebekah Brooks could be questioned by police as a witness, rather than a suspect.. Mrs Brooks has denied having had any knowledge of hacking while she was editor from 2000 to 2003..
Labour MP Tom Watson says the position of John Yates, assistant commissioner at the Metropolitan Police who led the original investigation into phone hacking, is "untenable"
The Prime Minister said he had had no information to suggest Andrew Coulson knew about phone hacking when he employed him but if "those assurances were untrue, I would be incredibly angry and incredibly let down..
The latest allegations relate to personal details it is claimed were obtained for a front-page Sunday Times report that Mr Brown, who later became Prime Minister.. had purchased a flat owned by Robert Maxwell at a "knock-down price".. In other developments in the phone-hacking scandal..
Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt confirms that he is referring News Corp's bid to take over BSkyB to the Competition Commission. It comes after News Corporation withdrew its proposed undertaking to sell Sky News as part of its bid.
Rebeka Brooks has denied having had any knowledge of hacking while she was editor from 2000 to 2003..
Labour MP Tom Watson says the position of John Yates, assistant commissioner at the Metropolitan Police who led the original investigation into phone hacking, is "untenable"..
Our Prime Minister.. David Cameron.. said he had had no information to suggest Andy Coulson knew about phone hacking when he employed him but if "those assurances were untrue, I would be incredibly angry and incredibly let down..
'Be Prepared' has always has valitity as a safe option..

Cameron has vowed to "put people in charge" as he unveiled his plan for changes to public services in England..
In a speech in London, the prime minister said public services were the "backbone" of the country but too often their results were not good enough..That could well be a tacit mention of the recent strikes, and thos slated to come..
A different approach would give people "more freedom, more choice and more local control" in schools, health and other services, Mr Cameron argued..
Labour said there was "nothing new" in the government's proposals.. And business leaders have accused Mr Cameron of moving too slowly on the changes.. which are central to his vision of the Big Society.. in the face of union and Liberal Democrat pressure..
The Public Services White Paper had been due to be unveiled in January but has been held up by Whitehall argument over its contents..
The key elements of the plan, outlined by David are..
Companies, charities and community groups to bid to run everything from local health services to schools, libraries and parks..
People to be given new legally-enforceable "right to choose" services..
State to have to justify retaining monopoly service in most areas..
Councils to be given new funding streams..
Providers to be able to make profits in some areas like getting people off benefits and into work, but not in others such as health care..
Unveiling the proposed legislation today.. Mr Cameron said it was about "ending the old big-government, top-down way of running public services, releasing the grip of state control and putting power in people's hands".. "The old dogma that said Whitehall knows best.. it's gone..There will be more freedom, more choice and more local control.."
It would almost sound as though David's counting on the devolution of the Union.. for by far the largest voice in the economic forum left after the formation Scottish nation.. a Welsh devolved Parliment.. would certainly leave the English in at bat..
Leaked documents earlier this year suggested ministers were scaling back the role of the private sector in their plans amid concerns that the public would find widespread outsourcing of services "unpalatable"..
But Cameron dismissed suggestions that the government was "pulling back or losing heart" over the plans.. describing the task as "urgent" and saying ministers were "determined" to see it through..
"We are as committed to modernising our public services as we have ever been," he said..
The Opposition Labour said public services faced "significant challenges" in the current financial climate but that ministers were not advocating anything that had not already been tried by the last administration..
"It appears from the way in which this White Paper has been launched that the Cabinet Office are more preoccupied with spin and presentation than the provision of substantive proposals..".. according to Shadow Cabinet Office Minister Tessa Jowell..
"Because this White Paper contains few new ideas and even fewer new proposals and in most of the cases referred to past plans.. the government are lagging behind the actions of the last Labour government.."
Ovbiously we're meant to conveniently forget it was the former Labour Government which caused the economic problems we face today, and that they've neglected to offer any viable alternative to Tory debt reduction plan..
In a typical union statement.. TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said: "Of course they are skilfully wrapped up in warm words, but when the prime minister talks of charities and voluntary groups, he means parcelling up public services for private companies..'
An obvious target.. an obvious stragtegy..
And opposition to a plan.. mere condemnation with no visble resolution..

Weather.. it's breakfast table conversation throughout this island..
In Dallas, Texas.. it's become much the same..
For ten days, sweltering summer temperatures in Dallas have topped 100 degrees ..as The National Weather Service reported Monday that heat advisories and warnings are in place in parts of 18 states from as far north as Michigan, as far west as Oklahoma, and as far south as Georgia.. Temperatures in those places may not reach 100 degrees, but the heat index could make it feel like triple digits..

Barack vowed Monday to seek "the largest possible deal" to cut future budget deficits, but he said the onus is on Republicans to compromise as much as he and his fellow Democrats already have..
With a 10-year, roughly $4 trillion plan that he's floating already tilted 4-to-1 in favor of spending cuts, Obama said reaching agreement will be difficult because of intransigence on taxes among rank-and-file Republicans..
"I don't see a path to a deal if they don't budge, period," said Barack.. Later, he added, "I'm operating with some political constraints here, because whatever I do has to go through the House of Representatives."
House Speaker John Boehner responded to Obama just 30 minutes before their talks were to resume by again refusing to consider tax increases and complaining that the White House isn't serious about cutting government..
A compromise, Boehner said, should mean that Obama gets to raise the nation's $14.3 trillion debt limit and Republicans get to slash spending. "Adding tax increases to the equation doesn't balance anything," he said..
The Republicans have had the upper hand in the on-again, off-again talks.. They have dissented, walked out and changed the terms of debate whenever Democrats insisted that tax increases on upper-income Americans be part of the agreement..
By contrast, on issues dear to Democrats, such as the future of Medicare and Social Security, Obama said, "I'm prepared to take on significant heat from my party to get this done.."
Obama said he would meet "every single day" with leaders of both parties in an effort to work out a deal that would cut trillions of dollars from budget deficits.. while raising the nation's $14.3 trillion borrowing limit..
Without a deal by Aug. 2, the government faces a first-ever default on its obligations..
By contrast, on issues dear to Democrats, such as the future of Medicare and Social Security, Obama said, "I'm prepared to take on significant heat from my party to get this done."
Obama said he would meet "every single day" with leaders of both parties in an effort to work out a deal that would cut trillions of dollars from budget deficits while raising the nation's $14.3 trillion borrowing limit. Without a deal by Aug. 2, the government faces a first-ever default on its obligations.
By contrast, on issues dear to Democrats, such as the future of Medicare and Social Security, Obama said, "I'm prepared to take on significant heat from my party to get this done.."
But the president said he would not sign a short-term package that merely extended borrowing authority for a period of months.. something Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell has hinted might be required..
Barack's been dropped in the same pile of economic offal as the rest of the world in this 'recession..'and has a far larger deficit to try and manage than perhaps any other..
But the president said he would not sign a short-term package that merely extended borrowing authority for a period of months — something Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell has hinted might be required..
"This is the United States of America. We don't manage our affairs in three-month increments," says Barack.. forgetting, perhaps, that the White House and Congress worked in two- and three-week increments earlier this year to pass a budget and avoid a partial government shutdown..
If this borrowing increase is dragged past the August 2d dealine.. bodes exceely ill for the worlds largest ecomony.. and even worse for the world in general..
"This is the United States of America. We don't manage our affairs in three-month increments.." Barack's forgetting, perhaps, that the White House and Congress worked in two- and three-week increments earlier this year to pass a budget and avoid a partial government shutdown..
The negotiations were set to resume at the White House at 2pm today, but there were no signs of progress following a rare Sunday night session in which Obama argued for a major deal, Boehner said only a midsize, $2.4 trillion deal was possible, and Democratic leaders vowed to protect the middle class, Medicare and Social Security..
The "big deal" would end former president George W. Bush's tax cuts for people earning above $200,000 and couples earning above $250,000, beginning in 2013. Otherwise, Obama said it would allow "authors of best-selling books off the hook" — perhaps a reference to himself.
That deal also would end a variety of special-interest tax breaks for oil and gas companies, hedge funds, private jet owners and others, in exchange for lower income tax rates..

South Sudan became an independent country yesterday.. breaking away from Sudan after more than 50 years of on-and-off war..
The country's finance minister, David Deng Athorbie, said today the new currency would be called the 'South Sudan pound' and will replace 'the Sudan pound' currently in use.. It is scheduled to arrive by cargo plane beginning Wednesday and will go into circulation next Monday.. It will have a one-to-one value with the Sudan pound.
After the Cabinet was sworn in, the finance minister told a news conference that there would be difficulties in paying government salaries on time because Sudan's government had not sent an adequate supply of the northern Sudanese currency..
Minster of the Interior Gier Chuang Aluong said the government was in the process of preparing the country's passports and urged patience..
Ahh.. the costs of establisment of a new country.. Scotland might do well to pay some attention..

China today told the Philippines and Vietnam to use "diplomatic wisdom" to resolve tensions in the South China Sea, amid criticisms that Beijing was being increasingly aggressive in its claims..
"It is important to manage the conflicting points," Chinese Vice Foreign Minister Fu Ying said in a speech on "China's peaceful development and international environment" in Hong Kong on Monday..
acknowledging the countries in the territorial dispute all felt strongly about their claims..
China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia and Taiwan have overlapping claims to parts of the South China Sea.. which is believed to have vast oil and gas deposits.. while its shipping lanes are vital for global trade..
Vietnam and the Philippines have in recent months accused China of taking increasingly aggressive actions in staking its claims..
"It takes diplomatic wisdom from China, from Vietnam and from the Philippines to make sure that our differences will be contained, well-managed and we will be able to not allow the differences to affect our relationship..
"You could see we are moving in that direction," she said..
In May, Vietnam said Chinese marine surveillance vessels cut the exploration cables of an oil survey ship inside Hanoi's exclusive economic zone..
And Philippine President Benigno Aquino has accused China of inciting at least seven recent incidents, including one in which a Chinese vessel allegedly opened fire on Filipino fishermen..
Seems the news from China, is released when.. and if China wants..

The leaders of the Chinese and American militaries sought on Monday to cast aside decades of hostility between the two institutions, pledging at a joint news conference here to pursue what they separately called a “great opportunity” to create a “shared vision” of cooperation..
But neither indicated that his government was willing to alter positions on divisive issues, the likes of Taiwan and the South China Sea, that have long hamstrung better relations.. And the Chinese military chief, Gen. Chen Bingde, quickly voiced a string of complaints about American military policies that suggested their shared vision remained a distant dream..
General Chen and Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, were midway through three days of talks today, following up on a visit to Washington in May by General Chen.. the Chief of the People’s Liberation Army general staff.. Both men are under orders to improve the military relationship, one outcome of a summit last January between President Barack Obama and President Hu Jintao of China..

Stocks on Wall Street took a tumble on Monday, following Asian and European markets lower, as concerns about the Euro Zone debt crisis continued to overwhelm investors around the world..
today’s weak start in the financial markets reflected a series of blows.. with a hangover of disappointing economic news from the United States over jobs data and debt talks last week.. along with lingering worries as European officials met in Brussels to discuss fiscal troubles in the Euro Zone..
fter weeks of uncertainty related to bailouts for Greece, the Italian authorities moved to rein in short-selling on the Milan stock exchange as fears mounted that Italy could become the next victim of the sovereign debt crisis..
By midafternoon, the Dow Jones industrial average was down 151.93 points, or 1.20 percent, to 12,505.27. The broader Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index fell 23.06 points, or 1.72 percent, to 1,320.74. The Nasdaq composite, heavy with technology shares, lost 54.51 points, or 1.91 percent, to 2,805.30..
“There is so much going on in the world that you almost need a scorecard to keep up,” Kevin H. Giddis, the executive managing director and president for fixed-income capital markets at Morgan Keegan & Company, wrote in a research note.. “Domestically, we have the debt ceiling, the budget, the economy, jobs, inflation and taxes. Internationally, we have Greece, Italy, the E.C.B., China and a potential contagion,” he said, referring to the European Central Bank..
“If Italy becomes more of a problem, then it could spiral out of control and cause the much-feared contagion that some have predicted,” according to Giddis.. “If that is the case, then a global economic slowdown will likely hit our shores here and take the legs out of an already wounded U.S. economy..”
As risk aversion stepped up, United States Treasuries were trading higher. The euro fell 1.4 percent to $1.4017..

The Syrian government has an almost complete checklist for President Bashar al-Assad's crowning overture to the opposition..
A vast swanky conference room in Damascus.? Check..
Huge oval table to seat hundreds of delegates to Syria's national dialogue conference..? Secured..
Select media coverage to televise the event..? In the bag..
Regime loyalists, including Syrian Vice President Farouk al-Sharaa..? Front and center..
Just one item is missing.. representatives of the blood-splattered streets who have braved bullets, snipers, tanks, threats of imprisonment, torture or worse for 17 weeks now. They are boycotting..
Today, the conference aimed at political reconciliation continued on its second day even as the meeting itself was being roundly rejected by prominent opponents both at home and in exile..
Elsewhere in the capital.. Assad's goading of the West sharply escalated as pro-regime thugs attacked the U.S Embassy in Damascus.. smashing windows.. raising a Syrian flag on the grounds.. and writing anti-U.S graffiti on the walls..
The mob also allegedly attacked U.S Ambassador Robert Ford's residence in the Syrian capital, as well as the French Embassy.. The assaults appeared to be in response to visits by the U.S. and French ambassadors last week to the restive Syrian city of Hama, where they met with anti-government demonstrators.,
Meanwhile, some 200 people, mainly members of the ruling Ba'ath Party as well as former and current independent parliamentarians, attended the "Dialogue" sessions, which opened on Sunday with a minute's silence for the country's "martyrs" (no mention of who killed them), and the national anthem. Anti-government demonstrators had designated last Friday's nationwide marches "No Dialogue," to underline their objection to the meetings. The lack of prominent opposition elements led some critics to brand the conference a "monologue"; one Arab commentator quipped that "Bashar was hosting a dialogue with Assad.".. A case of Lucillus dining with Lucillus it would seem..
But that's not to say that the regime wasn't called to task by voices at the conferences in a manner unthinkable just months ago. "We should dismantle the security state that dominates the whole society. Now we are suffering the consequences of the police state," said Tayyeb Tizini, a professor of philosophy and one of the few opposition members to attend the government-sponsored event. "The police state will destroy every aspect of society as it keeps tabs on every Syrian citizen.."
That.. would seem to be a 'given'..





.

This promises to be a hard winter to come..
One in four households and nearly 12 million people will officially fall into fuel poverty after British Gas said that it would increase domestic energy prices by 18 per cent, or an average of £180 a year..
With the rest of the energy supply industry looking certain to follow British Gas.. and the 19 per cent rise announced by ScottishPower last month.. Consumer Focus, the industry watchdog, said that millions more would struggle to pay their bills this winter..
The hike by British Gas means that 9.3 million customers will be paying on average an extra £116 a year for their gas.. and 6.6 million electricity customers will be paying £64 more for their electricity.. at £465..
Those who are on dual fuel with the company and pay by monthly direct debit will on average pay £1,209 per year. That makes British Gas, for now, the most expensive supplier in the land.. even ahead of ScottishPower. Family households will be paying significantly more than the average..
Not good news.. it's going to have a significant effect on this faltering economy..
And again, those who'll be effected the most, will be those on fixed incomes..
One mus wonder, how many years it's going to be, before we see a light at the end of the tunnel..

The news from Washington's what only be called 'dire'..
The job market is defying history..
A dismal June employment report shows that employers are adding nowhere near as many jobs as they normally do this long after a recession has ended..
Unemployment has climbed for three straight months, and is now at 9.2 percent.. There's no precedent, in data going back to 1948, for such a high rate two years into what economists say is a 'recovery'..
Workers' hourly pay fell in June.. simply because they worked fewer hours..
And 16.2 percent of those who wanted to work were either unemployed, forced to settle for part-time jobs or had given up looking for work. That figure was up from 15.8 percent in May..
The economy added just 18,000 jobs in June.. a fraction of the 90,000 jobs economists had expected and a sliver of the 300,000 jobs needed each month to shrink unemployment significantly..
The excruciatingly slow growth is confounding economists.. spooking consumers...and dismaying job seekers..
Friday's report forced analysts to re-examine their assumption that the economy would strengthen in the second half of 2011..
Employers have good reason to wait, says economist Ken Mayland at ClearView Economics.. A political standoff over the federal debt limit threatens to send the U.S. government into default next month. That would send interest rates soaring and might tip the economy back into recession..
Even if Barack and Congressional Republicans agree to raise the borrowing limit, the deal will likely require deep cuts in government spending and possibly tax increases.. Combined, those steps could slow the economy further..
The tax base has already lost 493,000 government jobs since the recession ended, most of them eliminated by cash-short cities and counties.. Now it faces the prospect of big cuts by the federal government as well..

White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley told ABC television that Pakistan had "taken some steps that have given us reason to pause on some of the aid"..
He said the US raid that killed Osama Bin Laden in May had affected ties but he insisted the relationship "must be made to work over time"..
The $800m (£500m) equates to about a third of the annual US security aid to Pakistan, according to White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley told ABC television that Pakistan had "taken some steps that have given us reason to pause on some of the aid".,
He said the US raid that killed Osama Bin Laden in May had affected ties.. somewhat of an understatement there.. but he insisted the relationship "must be made to work over time"..
US officials say the $800m (£500m) equates to about a third of the annual US security aid to Pakistan.. it might be safe to say the rest of that aid could be tied to some agreement being reached between Pakistan and the US.. have been 'poor', to say the least.. the man on the street thinks his government is 'soft' on the US.. allowing an American covert operation to take out bin Laden..

The News of the World is closing amid a major scandal over phone hacking and alleged payments to police officers, but once upon a time journalists went even further to get the ultimate story, writes Neil Root..
There was a time when everything and anything was done in pursuit of the perfect crime news story..
The allegations being made about dubious journalistic practices at the News of the World are shocking and immoral if proven to be true..
But the current row takes us back to the 1940s and 1950s when hacks on that very same tabloid and other even more prestigious papers were just as clandestine in their methods, and with even fewer legal restrictions..
The three serial killers Neville Heath, a "charmer" who murdered two or possibly three women.. John George Haigh, who murdered at least six people and disposed of their bodies in acid.. and John Christie, the monster of Rillington Place who killed seven or eight people, and watched Timothy Evans hang for one of those murders..
These dangerous men were made into macabre pin-ups by the popular press of the time, the immediately post-war world where London and other cities were cratered and scarred by Hitler's bombs..
The practices of two legendary Fleet Street crime reporters - Norman "Jock" Rae of 'The News of the World' and Harry Procter of 'The Mail' and later 'The Sunday Pictorial'.. stand out from the rest of their peers..
With the chequebooks of their editors in hand, these hardened and tenacious hacks chased down the stories of these murderers, and tried to get them at any cost..
These were the days when 'The News of the World' sold more than 8 million copies every Sunday, and every effort was made to get a crime scoop.. the more grisly the better..
Fleet Street's crime reporters were star journalists then, and became known as the Murder Gang, with incredible contacts amongst the police, judiciary and legal system..Payments were made without a second thought, and papers such as 'The News of the World' and 'The Sunday Pictorial' got the best inside morsels of information for the simple reason the Sunday papers paid more than the dailies..
Incredibly, these hacks got the full inside stories on Heath, Haigh and Christie, and in return paid their legal defence costs.. in two cases, they made substantial payments to the families of two of the killers after they were executed..
Sunday's crime confession scoops were always tomorrow's fish and chip paper, but copies were sold on the day, and that was all that was important. Today laws and media regulations prevent criminals profiting from their crimes, but in 1946-53, there were no such restrictions..
Rae and Procter were highly regarded by their editors.. as their crime stories produced great spikes in circulation.. When a rival paper bought a helicopter to get to stories faster in the late 1940s, Procter's editor said: "They may have a helicopter, but we've got a Harry Procter."

South Sudan has formally declared its independence in front of thousands of citizens singing and dancing in celebration and international dignitaries.. including the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.,
“We, the democratically elected representatives of the people, based on the will of the people of South Sudan, and as confirmed by the outcome of the referendum of self-determination.. hereby declare South Sudan to be an independent and sovereign nation,” said James Wani Igga, speaker of the new country’s parliament, reading the formal proclamation in its capital, Juba..
South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir unveiled a statue of civil war hero John Garang, the man who signed the 2005 peace deal which ended decades of hostilities with the north which killed at least two million people..
We'll be discussing the economics of this division over the next few weeks, as it becomes clearer what factions the new government will favour..
Meanwhile, insurgencies continue in regions of Darfur and Southern Kordofan. The United Nations Security Council voted yesterday to establish a force of up to 7,000 peacekeepers for South Sudan..
Many of South Sudan’s nine million citizens lack the most basic services.. The country is home to all but one of the world’s deadly diseases.. vaccination rates are the world’s lowest.. almost half the population has no access to clean water, while more than a third go hungry even when the harvests are good..
It has the world’s worst maternal mortality rates and one in seven children who survives birth will die before the age of 5..
Illiteracy is rampant.. even among civil servants and legislators..
Only one in ten children finishes primary school and the rate for girls is even lower..
This separation of the countty was brought about through inequality.. the vast gulf between the depths of poverty, and stolen assetts..
Yet the country is rich in oil.. and it's now up to the government of this new country to build an infrastructure which will see an end to endless fighting.. a beginning of public projects the likes of irrigation and farming techniques.. and education..
With the interest already shown by foreign investors, this should be easily achieved.. even taking the traditional 'baksheesh' into account..

A strong earthquake jolted on Sunday the same area of northeastern Japan that was hit by a massive quake in March, but there was no sign of further damage along the coast or to the crippled Fukushima nuclear power plant, according to officials..
The Japan Meteorological Agency lifted a tsunami alert for the region before noon today after initially urging residents in the disaster area to stay clear of the coast..
The U.S. Geological Survey estimated the magnitude of the earthquake at 7.0 and said it had occurred at a depth of 18 km (11 miles) off the northeastern coast of Japan just before 10 am local time..
This is the second quake to hit that area this week..

We began with mentioning the difficulties who winter will pose for some.. How inflation, a frozen bank rate, will affect many of those among us who live on fixed incomes..
We end with the same theme..
As the numbers of those without work increases.. as the numbers of those who dream of a lifestyle which disappeared decdades ago when there was still hope.. as the numbers of those who still live in the past when there was a work ethic and dream of a return to those ways.. for those who still believe in a chicken in evey pot and a car in every driveway..
The best of British luck to all.. for those are the attitiudes we want, and need..
And are sadly lacking..

What’s in a name? An entire cultural and national identity if you are from Sudan’s oil-producing south..
The region of southern Sudan is now less than seven months away from a referendum on whether it should split away to form Africa’s newest country.. Already, foreign investors confidence of a smooth transition of power have brought some 33% increase in the bonds of the new country, and the same increase in oil leases yet to be negotiated..
While the story which sees most media attention is the plight of the hundreds of thousands who have fled from the violence.. the abuse.. the torture still being committed against those who have brought this change from a pipedream to a reality..
Seems one of the most pressing problems facing the new country, is what to call irself..
Juwama vs. the Nile Republic.. The simplest option would be to stick to what people call it now.. South Sudan or Southern Sudan..
But there are some serious branding issues.. Say “Sudan” to most outsides and they will immediately think of a list of nastiness.. Darfur... he never-ending north-south civil war.. military coups.. militancy and crippling debt..
But Sudan became the first state to recognise the independence of its oil-producing south Friday, smoothing the way for the division on Saturday of Africa's largest country into two.. but not dispelling fears of future tensions between them..
A new nation might be grateful for a new name with a clean slate..

There will be no prize awarded for guesses as to what story leads the media throughout Britain.. We have discussed the closure of The News Of The World at some length earlier.. and for the time being, we'll wait for further developments before speculating even more on the consequences of this closure..
It must be mentioned that this tabloid managed to effect some significant social changes.. and brought a vast amount of money into charities around the country..
George Orwell wrote in the opening lines of his 'Decline of the English Murder'..
"t is Sunday afternoon, preferably before the war. The wife is already asleep in the armchair, and the children have been sent out for a nice long walk. You put your feet up on the sofa, settle your spectacles on your nose, and open the News of the World. Roast beef and Yorkshire, or roast pork and apple sauce, followed up by suet pudding and driven home, as it were, by a cup of mahoganybrown tea, have put you in just the right mood. Your pipe is drawing sweetly, the sofa cushions are soft underneath you, the fire is well alight, the air is warm and stagnant. In these blissful circumstances, what is it that you want to read about?”
A question answered over the decades by that very paper.. It must be remembered with some gravity, that yesterday a little bit of England died.. and it is a moment to mourn.. For what its readers have wanted to read for more than a century and a half, they found in their copy of the News of the World on a Sunday..
Nevertheless..

For the second month in a row, American employers added barely any jobs in June, showing that the economic recovery has hit a serious speed bump..
With all levels of government laying off workers, the Labor Department reported that employers eked out just 18,000 new nonfarm payroll jobs in June.. The already low number created in May was also revised downward to a dismally small 25,000 new jobs, less than half of what was originally reported last month..
These numbers do not bode well for Barack.. unless he manages to get a significant number of Americans back on the job over the next 18 months.. his term as President could well be a short one..
And the record of the first black President could be stained with financial failure, of such a drasic nature as not seen since the Great Depression..

With the news this past week, that Japanese mobile manufacturers are losing business to those who're catering to the demographic which changes it's phones, or least the skins, following the fashion of the moment..
Japanese and Taiwanese manufacturers have been more concerned with developing a mobile phone platform for Google's Android.. Verizon Wireless followed AT&T by scrapping its unlimited-data plans for new smart phone subscribers and introducing Tired Payment Schemes based on the gigabytes of data used.. Wireless operators in
America have rapidly moved away from "all you can eat" plans for customers.. and are providing more selective pricing menus in anticipation of the increased appetite for services from high-speed networks..
And included here simply to underscore the real value of what might at first seem to be an idiotic idea in this cyberworld we live in.. It emerged that Twitter has begun another effort to raise capital from private investors, which could value the microblogging website at $7billion. In February, during a previous fund-raising round, privately held Twitter was thought to be worth $4.5 billion..
Now that's what one msu call positive growth figures..

Still with economics for a moment.. Portugal's reacted angrily to Moody's downgrade of its sovereign debt to "junk" status, complaining that it had not considered the country's recent austerity measures, or new political consensus after an election..
Moody's made the cut on the basis that Portugal will have trouble raising funds in the markets, if private investors take a hit in a second rescue deal for Greece..
More European feathers were ruffled when Standard & Poor's became the first ratings agency to confirm that it may consider French proposals for private investors to roll over their Greek debt to be a "selective default"..
This is the financial 'black hole' we've mentioned many times before..

Less than two months ago Dominique Strauss-Kahn, favourite in the polls for next year’s French presidential election, was locked up in a New York jail and on suicide watch.. following his arrest on charges of attempted rape and sexual assault..
Now, just as the French had faced up to his disqualification from public life, the case against the former IMF boss seems close to collapse.. A Manhattan judge’s decision on July 1st to free DSK, as he is known, from house arrest, amid doubts about the credibility of his accuser, has again knocked France sideways..
The latest episode in this torrid saga involving power, money, sex, politics and transatlantic incomprehension came from revelations about the plaintiff, a hotel maid..
The district attorney’s office in New York catalogued a devastating string of lies.. on her application for asylum, on her tax return, to the housing authorities, to a grand jury and, repeatedly, to the prosecutors, including over what happened in the hotel after the alleged assault on May 14th..
A report in the New York Times claims she made a phone call to a jailed man a day later, in which she discussed potential financial gain.. he and others had deposited some $100,000 into her bank account over the past two years..
For the French, stunned yet again by the DSK affair.. the most pressing question is whether he might be able to revive his political career, and even his presidential hopes..
Recent history suggests that nobody is disqualified forever from French politics..Alain Juppé, now Foreign Minister, was once convicted of political corruption..
On paper, nominations for the Socialist presidential primary are due to close on July 13th. But various party leaders, including Martine Aubry, the Socialists’ boss and herself a candidate, have made clear that this timetable could be stretched..
Such revelations leave the accuser’s credibility in tatters, whether or not her account of what took place in the hotel room is true. The maid’s lawyer, Kenneth Thompson, insists that “she has never once changed a single thing” in her story of the sexual assault.. and DNA evidence suggests that a sexual encounter did indeed take place.. Yet the case still looks likely to fall apart. It could even be dismissed ahead of Mr Strauss-Kahn’s next scheduled court appearance on July 18th..
In fact, this possibility is almost a certainty.. and the French media will undoubtedly afford Domenique all the sympathy any Frehcn politician.. falsely accused and humiliated by both the police and the American Press.. would recieve in such a high profile case..

Health experts are now saying that the financial crisis "almost certainly" led to an increase in suicides across Europe..
The analysis by British and American researchers found a rise in suicides was recorded among working age people, from 2007 to 2009 in nine of the 10 nations studied..
According to 'The Lancet'.. The increases varied between 5% and 17% for under 65s.. after a period of falling suicide rates..
Researchers said investment in welfare systems was the key to keeping rates down..
In particular, they argued supporting people back into work or having programmes to stop them losing their jobs in the first place.. was more important than giving them benefits..
The team used World Health Organization data to compare rates in the 10 countries, including the UK..
And while it may well be stating the obvious.. it is at least official recognition of a growing problem..

Moday's Moroccan vote deserves a mention.. even this far after the date..
A constitutional referendum, pressed by officials who wanted a strong turnout for what has been as much a test of King Mohammed VI’s popularity, as a poll about reform..
Businessmen backing the yes vote held celebratory street parties.. Imams at Morocco’s mosques were instructed to preach in favour of what was heralded as the King’s constitution.. But even in conservative Benslimane, a sleepy little town in the north of the country.. some 800 dissidents campaigned for a boycott..
A headmaster at a local school serving as a polling station was overheard muttering that the whole exercise was a masquerade..
The result.. 98.5% in favour.. was branded a risible by members of the February 20th movement.. This coalition of leftists, independent liberals and Islamists from the banned Justice and Spirituality movement, surprised many when its protests for social justice and democracy drew thousands of sympathisers across the kingdom earlier this year.. It called for a boycott of the referendum..
Now it's not as though this new Constitution in itself is a joke.. The new constitution includes some important reforms..
It establishes human rights as core principles.. recognises Berber, spoken by many Moroccans alongside Arabic, as an official language.. and calls for gender equality..
It gives new powers to the Prime Minister and Parliament.. and inaugurates a much-needed overhaul of the judiciary..
It no longer deems the king sacred, though he is still “Commander of the Faithful”..
Critics complain that many of the new constitution’s articles refer to “organic laws” that have not yet been written.. making the extent of some changes uncertain.. Others depend on the creation of special commissions, mostly headed by the King.. Political parties, a majority of whom backed the “yes” vote, only saw a draft of the constitution at the last minute..
No mention is made of King Mohammed’s promise, which came in a speech in March, of moving towards a Parliamentary Monarchy.. The King remains..directly or indirectly.. in control of the executive, legislative and judicial branches of government..
Or as the new constitution puts it, a “supreme arbiter” of political and institutional life..
In many respects, the new constitution merely codifies an existing method of governing that allows the palace to micromanage at its whim..
Whether this will satisfy the Opposition, or indeed the general population, is doubtful..

THE herbalist stall of Dr Zachari in Juba, the capital of South Sudan, offers “cures” for AIDS, madness, lost love and “manhood misfires”, but most popular with customers coming to his tin-shack in the sprawling Konyo-Konyo market is “business advice”. South Sudan will be independent from July 9th and investors, entrepreneurs and jobseekers are pouring into the capital, lured by the prospect of equipping a new state.

Bars on the steamy banks of the White Nile are filled with Kenyan traders.. Ethiopian waiters.. Chinese engineers.. American security contractors.. Eritrean restaurateurs.. and Ugandan motorbike drivers..
Expatriate South Sudanese are also coming home in droves after decades of civil war. The most prominent are the “Cuban Jubans”, a group long ago sent to Havana for education.. they run the loudest bar in town..
Outside its doors, Hummers and other pricey cars bounce along yet-to-be-paved roads..
The embryonic nation is severely handicapped by a lack of infrastructure.. Tarmac is almost non-existent..
The information minister, Barnaba Marial, says, “We never had roads. We are starting from below zero.”
Sending a shipping container from a port in neighbouring Kenya to landlocked Juba costs almost $10,000.. “They want to tax you at every roadblock,” says Charles Opolot, a Ugandan fruit trader..
A recent report by the International Finance Corporation ranks Juba 159th out of 183 places worldwide for ease of doing business..
For a city ruined by war, and one estimated to have tripled in size since a 2005 peace deal.. that is not a terrible start.. It has had some success in attracting investors.. SABMiller built a brewery.. Oil companies are active..
And recent reports indicate that foreign investment firms have bought out some 30% of the available lad, either for development, or for exploitation..

And a few more thoughts as the day's progresses..
Police say they've managed to recover the numbers of more than 4 thousand people hacked by The News Of The World..
And that tabliod has announced that it's last edition will be published this Sunday.. ending a run since 1843..
First.. it appears The News Of The World is paying the ultimate price.. it's final edition will be, as mentioned, this Sunday's.. and that takes the reading mateial away from some 2,812,005 readers, on a weely basis taken from fugures released in 2010..
This is expensive damage control by James Murdoch, Rupert's son.. a clear indication to any future Court action, that the parent company was unaware of, and condemned wholeheartedly, even to the extent of closing the rag down, the unethical journalism which had become the standard for the publication..
A In a release issued late this afternoon.. James admitted News International’s mistakes.. saying that he hopes everyone acknowledges that it is doing its “utmost to fix them, atone for them, and make sure they never happen again.."
"Having consulted senior colleagues, I have decided that we must take further decisive action with respect to the paper.. This Sunday will be the last issue of the News of the World..In addition, I have decided that all of the News of the World’s revenue this weekend will go to good causes.."
"While we may never be able to make up for distress that has been caused, the right thing to do is for every penny of the circulation revenue we receive this weekend to go to organisations.. many of whom are long-term friends and partners.. that improve life in Britain and are devoted to treating others with dignity. ”..
"We will run no commercial advertisements this weekend. Any advertising space in this last edition will be donated to causes and charities that wish to expose their good works to our millions of readers..”.
Bet this one sells out however many printings they run.. A collectors item if nothing else..
Perhapsd also the last edition of the paper, which led to a 'legislated' set of journalistic ethics being forged.. the paper which opened the door for the politicians..

As for police role in all of this.. those investigating allegations of phone hacking by the News of the World have called for patience as they contact almost 4,000 people whose names appear in documents seized back in 2005..
The Met's Deputy Assistant Commissioner Sue Akers said she understood people were more than upset.. but time was needed while officers pored through 11,000 pages of notes.. as well as dealing with more in the public eye who fear they were targets as well..

News International said allegations against its paper had been horrifying..
Five journalists and newspaper executives suspected of involvement in the News of the World phone-hacking scandal, are expected to be arrested within days.. this amid a growing political and public outcry into unethical journalistic practices.. specifically phone-tapping..
News International, the parent company owned by Rupert Murdoch said yesterday.. that it was close to identifying who authorised a private investigator to listen to messages on the phone of the murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler and people involved in other high-profile stories.. Rupert himself has called these revelations 'despicable'.. and has promised those responsible will be held accountable.
Now as mentioned before, 'The News Of The World' is not what one would call an 'analytical' paper.. scandal and photo's of overweight stars in bathing suits is it's stock and trade.. it's yellow journalism at it's very lowest standards..
But oddly enough, it's the one you'll likely seen left in rush hour tube carriages or busses..
Tabloid journalism has been around, as long as broadsheets were first printed.. and unethical news gathering, and outright lying, have been part of a 'good story' for those publications who cater to a certain demographic..
While it may well be time for the Courts to step in, and award backbreaking awards to those who's privacy has been unethically invaded.. it would be yet another thing for the Government to impose restrictions on the media. David's promised the formation of one, perhaps two separate Investigations into this issue.. and one must as the government, in any way, attempt to tread lightly on the right to free speech....

There is a widespread trend these days in primary schools, wherein how the old basics of 'reading, writing, and arithmetic' were first introduced to our young minds, to opt for a system called synthetic phonics.. Rather than learning the sound each individual letter makes in combination with others.. this system is where children are taught the individual sounds of each letter and group of letters, then how to blend those sounds to make words..
The problem being, that while studies have shown the system works, those students who read for enjoyment has decreased significantly.. It would appear that by reducing words to mere expression, we have removed the imagination which the various meanings of any particular word might inspire.
It's reflected equally as well, in text-type.. that peculiar language one uses when sending a text by telephone..
It could become a serious problem a decade or so down the line.. when those looking for viable employment, struggle to write a CV without using a computer template..

According to the first flagship report of the new agency 'UN Women'...More than half of working women in the world.. some 600 million.. are trapped in insecure jobs without legal protection. About the same number do not have even basic protection against domestic violence it finds, while sexual assault has become a hallmark of modern conflict..
For millions of women in both rich and poor countries.. the search for justice is filled with difficulty, and is often expensive.. laws and legal systems frequently discriminate against them..
In Cambodia.. for example.. the forensic test necessary to lay a rape charge costs two weeks' wages, while in Kenya a land claim in an inheritance case can cost $800 and extend across 17 different administrative stages..
Now of course the vast majority of those women who're still struggling through a fight fought in the West fifty years ago, and still goes on today.. That figure deals, for the most part, with the plight of those in Muslim, or other African countries..
The fight for freedom and equality.. a Constitution.. a free economy.. involve those of both sexes..
And while this UN department will keep a close eye on women's progress as the various situations change.. it's doubtful it will achieve any impact on the situations it's described.. Only time will do that.. and the ability to achieve..

It would appear the Osama saga's not quite finished yet..
Pakistani authorities say they will not allow bin Laden's family to be repatriated to Saudi Arabia, until prosecutors are satisfied they can shed no more light on his the most wanted man in the world managed to live in a house in Pakistan, a couple of hundred yards from a Military Academy, for five years without someone knowing something about it all..
The government set up the commission.. headed by a senior judge.. last month amid mounting public fury over the U.S. raid that killed bin Laden, which many Pakistanis see as a breach of their sovereignty..
Its mandate is to look into how bin Laden could have lived in Pakistan for so long and how the United States was able to conduct the raid without the military's knowledge..
The decision to block the repatriation of the family could set it on a collision course with the country's security establishment.. if the commission says the military was complicit in hiding bin Laden..
Embarrassing, to say the least.. should it turn out there were those in either the government or the military who knew he was there..
Yet, common sense would dictate that indeed, some Pakistani agency knew..

Republicans showed new signs of flexibility to break a budget impasse yesterday, but the White House raised the ante.. pushing for more deficit reduction and taking a pugnacious tone casting the GOP as defenders of corporate tax giveaways..
First.. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor.. declared he was open to closing tax loopholes that the White House says are wasteful and ineffective and that would generate some money toward reducing deficits over the long term..
Then.. Democratic officials.. said Barack wants far more deficit reduction than the $2 trillion over 10 years that for weeks has been the target for budget negotiators..
Obama in April proposed deficit reduction of $4 trillion over 12 years and White House spokesman Jay Carney said Wednesday that goal remained "something to aspire to.."
The US has precious little time to sort out an agreement which would allow them to raise their borrowing ceiling, and avoid defaulting on their debt structure.. They have until the second of next month to pay up.. or risk an economic crisis the likes of which we cannot even imagine

There's been a series of underhanded tactics by the British media of late.. celebrities and politicians having their emails hacked or their phones tapped.. But perhaps the one case which brings this all into focus, is the Milly Dowler case..
Claims that the murdered teenager's mobile phone was hacked by a private investigator working for the News of the World are "truly dreadful", says David Cameron..
And equally as despicable.. The parents of murdered Soham girls Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman have been visited by police investigating phone-hacking by journalists.. those two young girls were murdered by Ian Huntley.. back in 2002..
This is not 'investigative journalism'.. but a shame shared by all those who make their living providing the public with information.
In journalism, it is indeed a case of being 'as pure as Caesars wife..' Of being the providers of the truth, acquired through ethical means.
Of course, there is a place for singular opinion.. this being an example.. but when it comes to reporting 'the news', there can be one story only, subject to topical revision..
One would hope that the parents of those children take, specifically The News of The World, to the cleaners.
While no amount of money can ever compensate the loss, it can certainly hurt those who obtained their information through vile and despicable means..
Now a development in this story.. Police have seized some 11 thousand documents from the offices of 'The News Of The World'.. in an effort to establish just how many policemen.. court reporters.. are actually on the payroll of that tabloid.. Loose lips in pubs and clubs frequented by both journalists and policemen, have led to the release of many a detail which perhaps should have been kept confidential..
But this must be kept in perspective.. not turn into a witch hunt.. While it is true many a case is discussed over a pint.. this often clarifies a situation, and gives journalists a different perspective on a case, or an issue..
But the prime responsibility of any journalist, is to take an honest approach to investigative reporting.. To have gathered their facts in an ethical and systematic manner..
This country loves a scandal.. Tabloids compete with a vengeance for their readership and in more case than one, if the absolute facts don't match what they toss across a banner headline.. the headline takes precedence..
And again if a lawsuit follows, that makes for even more headlines..
Yellow journalism must be taken as just that.. As the National Enquirer is in North America, so are the Sun, The News of the World, and their ilk to be taken with a rather large spich of salt..
It is indeed, a case of 'consider the source'.. and consider the ethics of the publication..
Rupert Murdoch, who owns News International which owns The News of the Word, has defended his Editor in Chief..Rebeckah Brooks.. but has condemned the phone hacking allegations as 'deplorable'
More headlines..
Mind you, News International stock fell a couple of points in late trading.. Perhaps a small price for the publicity..

One of the UN's African humanitarian leaders.. Antonio Guterres.. says the levels of malnutrition among children fleeing Somalia's drought could lead to a "human tragedy of unimaginable proportions.."
Estimates are that a quarter of Somalis are either displaced within their own country, or living outside as refugees..
The drought which has destroyed effectively all the crops in the south of the country is compounded by the violence in south and central areas.. In north-east Kenya's Dadaab refugee camp, some 1,400 refugees are arriving every day.. and the tide has yet to turn..
The extreme weather in the Horn of Africa has been, and will continue to be, a problem unimaginable to the Western mind.. Prolonged drought in that area is the immediate cause of the severe food crisis already affecting around 10 million people in parts of Kenya, Ethiopia, Djibouti and Somalia. Rains have failed over two seasons, with a strong La Niña event having a dramatic impact across the east coast of Africa..
Now this year's wet season has officially ended, there is little prospect of rain or relief before September..
Put's one's own problems in a somewhat different perspective..
Especially considering the bumper crops of soya and corn in the American mid-west this year..

Barack's going to be fielding question on.. of all things.. Twitter this evening.. that's 2pm EST.. 7pm GST..
The event is supposed to be devoted to jobs and the economy, through tweets to the hashtag #AskObama cover issues ranging from Afghanistan and education to the quality of school lunches and whether to legalize marijuana..
The goal is "to try and find new opportunities to connect with Americans throughout the country," according to Macon Phillips, the Director of New Media for the White House.
"The focus is to bring in a lot of new perspectives.."
How quickly this world is changing.. The next logical step, is voting online..

This is an important week for Barack.. and for the entire US for that matter..
The joint Houses must come to some agreement, on how the national debt will be reduced.. If an agreement is delayed, the US risks being downgraded in the Bond Market..
Not a good thing..
Barack prodded members of both the Senate and the House.. to get on with finding an equitable agreement.. which likely will include tax hikes on the wealthy.. a move strongly opposed by the Republicans.. Obama said he was summoning leaders of both parties to the White House tomorrow to try to break the Congressional impasse and beat an Aug. 2 deadline to avert a first-ever federal default that could shake economic markets worldwide..
A massive understatement there..
"We need to come together over the next two weeks to reach a deal that reduces the deficit and upholds the full faith and credit of the United States government and the credit of the American people," Obama said at the White House..
Yet another massive understatement..
The two sides have identified roughly $2 trillion in spending cuts, which would enable lawmakers to say they are taking steps to get the national debt under control while they sign off on further borrowing... and could hold off any reduction in their Credit Ratings.. But the main stumbling block appears to the Republic intragecies is rainf some £200 billion through tax hiles for the very wealthy, and in corporate loopholes..
Somehow, it's broght the Beatle's 'Taxman' to mind.. Those American billionaires don't appreciate their situation..
$200 billion.. a drop in the bucket..

And we complain about the state of the NHS.. we don't know how lucky we are..
To curb rising Medicaid costs, about a dozen American States are starting a new budget year by reducing payments to doctors, hospitals and other health care providers that treat the poor..
Besides South Carolina.. other states reducing Medicaid payments to physicians this month are Colorado.. Nebraska.. Oregon.. and South Dakota.
Arizona, which cut rates in April, will impose another cut in October..
States reducing payments to hospitals include Colorado.. Connecticut.. Florida.. Nebraska.. New Hampshire.. North Carolina.. Oregon.. Pennsylvania.. South Carolina.. Texas.. Virginia.. and Washington.
New York cut hospital payment rates in April..
The numbers of those needing treatment which will feel this cut most deeply, are those who simply have nothing but a social safety net to keep them alive..
But then, compare the deaths caused by this cut, to the numbers being tallied daily in Somalia..

Portugal may need to join Greece in seeking a second bailout because it will struggle to hit its deficit-reduction targets, Moody’s said as it slashed the country’s credit rating to junk..
That relegation's not one to be taken lightly.. it means confidence in Greek government bonds, is non-existent.. Their paper is worth nothing..
It's a new setback in efforts to quell the Euro crisis.. the credit ratings agency downgraded Portugal’s rating to Ba2 from Baa1, and assigned a negative outlook to the nation..
That makes Moody’s the first of the top three credit ratings agencies to assign Lisbon junk status during the Eurozone crisis. It puts Portugal’s rating at the same level as El Salvador and Armenia. The euro slid against the dollar, trading at $1.4426 and dropped to 89.76p against Sterling..
This is not looking good, at all..

A reduced ability to control privatisations is going be a bitter pill for Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou to swallow, as he confronts civil unrest on the streets of Athens and a slender majority in the country’s parliament..
A further shadow was cast over Greece’s future yesterday after a leading European policymaker warned that the debt-stricken country’s sovereignty would have to be reined in..In plain language, the leading countries in the EU will have a rather large share of influence, when public companies go on the block..
Effectively, Greece has, by accepting Eurozone bailout money, abrogated it's financial right to govern to those from whom they borrowed the money.. and this will certainly not sit well with the average Greek man on the street..
It was always going to be a problem.. joining a hegemony the likes of the EU, means that while a country can expect help in times of fiscal meltdown, it can also expect to lose sovereignty.. the right to govern themselves as they see fit.
It would do well, for contries the likes of Serbia to examine this scenario thoroughly.. for if they need help in re-establishing a separate economy, they may not get it unless they're willing to give up their right to govern to the EU.. specifically Germany and France.
We warned a couple of years ago, that a union of European States would eventually lead to a central government.. as in a republican model, wherein States must defer to a Central Administration..
This may well be the path for the future.. as individual countries decide the advantages outweigh the disadvantages of going it alone..
Prey Britain doesn't fall into this mishmash of a coalition.. for as there were problems deciding what was the purview of the individual States when the US was formed.. there will be far greater concessions demanded from countries, when they choose to fall under the European umbrella..

Accoding to American military sources, hundreds of American 'Special Forces' members will be shipped into Afghanistan, to ensure the Karzai government isn't over-run by factions undesirable to the West..
A mini-surge of Navy Seals, Army “Green Beret” Rangers and other special units is being drafted from across the world.. including Iraq and the Philippines.. to ensure that there is enough combat power to expand covert raids as America withdraws 33 thousand troops over the next 15 months.. The secret deployment reflects the concerns of military commanders that the withdrawal will be a blow to military progress in the country..
By 'military progress'.. read government stability..
While Barack wants to ensure that America’s withdrawal is well under way before the next presidential election, he is also anxious that it will not be seen to have undermined the gains that allied forces have made against the Taleban..
And that, is going to prove difficult. For just a scenario came to pass when the Russians pulled out.. rival tribal factions, terrorist groups, all those the US and Britain have fought so hard to at least contain, if not eradicate, will come flooding back into the country..
Never has an armed force managed to bring peace to Afghanistan since the days of the Ottoman Empire.
It's doubtfull the US has managed to achieve any more than any other..

A mention of the former Serbian General Ratko Miladic.. He's not refusing to attend his trial in the Hague.. boycotting the proceedures so to speak..
Not that it will have much impact on the outcome of the trial..

Professor Martin Lombard, England's National Clinical Director for Liver Disease, has delivered some disturbing news.. half a million British children are at serious risk of liver disease, due to obesity..
These are kids between the ages of 4 to 14..
The British diet, or at least that enjoyed by some, could well lead to diabetes and cirrhosis of the liver later in life..
Now While the rate of increase in childhood obesity seems to be flattening out, the total number of overweight children is still very high.. to say the very least..
Government figures for child obesity in England in the school year 2009/10 showed that nearly a fifth of children in reception class (aged four) were obese or overweight..
Among thos children in their 6th year of primary school.. that would be 10 to 11-year-olds.. the figure was one in three..
This is bordering on the obscene.. that we would allow our children to get into such a state..
One can see yet another government agency stepping in, for this over-eating would seem to preclude some deeper problem, both with the parents of these children, and with the kids themselves..

This might have been expected..
New York’s district attorney is expected to drop the criminal case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn after the chambermaid who accused him of sexual assault was alleged to be married to a drug dealer who sought to make money from the charges..
The former head of the IMF was arrested in New York last month and charged with seven counts of sexual assault, attempted rape and false imprisonment..He spent a weekend in jail..appeared dishevelled and weary in a New York Court.. was publicly humiliated as his other indiscretions were publicly aired.. and lost his job as the head of IMF Fund.. Then, cracks appeared in the credibility of the complainant..so he was put under house arrest.. and his bail and bond was returned.
Strauss-Kahn has denied all charges..
The days of political assassination have yet to pass it would seem..

Muammar is welcome to live out his retirement inside Libya as long as he gives up all power.. acording to Libya's rebel chief Mustafa Abdel Jalil.. the clearest concession the rebels have so far offered..
Gaddafi has fiercely resisted all international calls for him to go and vowed to fight to the end, but members of his inner circle have given indications they are ready to negotiate with the rebels.. including on the Libyan leader's future..
This could put a different complexion on this standoff.. If Mohammar stays in Libya, it's going to be difficult for the Courts to extradite him to face charges of genocide.. which could be one of the most pressing points on his mind.
After all, they hanged Saddam..

In February, the wheelchair-bound, gray-haired Shi'a anti-government activist Abduljalil al-Singace was released from a six-month prison stint in Bahrain.. that was short lived.. A week ago, Singace was sentenced to death in a military court, along with seven other prominent Bahraini activists, the highest-profile verdict in the weeks since the regime began trying arrested members of the opposition. Another 13 were handed sentences ranging from two to 15 years in prison..
Now while the government is taking a softer stance on protesters.. it's Courts are going the job of removing the leaders of the opposition for it.
International Observers at the trials of those above, described the proceedings as a travesty.. Human Rights Watch issued a note declaring the country's ongoing trials as unjust on the 14th of June.. saying "International human rights bodies have determined that trials of civilians before military tribunals violate the right to be tried by a competent, independent, and impartial tribunal.."
Yet another Western backed regime, falling to bits..

As millions of Americans struggle in foreclosure with little hope of relief, big banks are going to borrowers who are not even in default and cutting their debt or easing the mortgage terms, sometimes with no questions asked..
Two of the nation’s biggest lenders, JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, are quietly modifying loans for tens of thousands of borrowers who have not asked for help but whom the banks deem to be at special risk..
Mind you, this is indeed on the quiet.. what they don't need are tens of thousands of applications for reductions from those who feel their position is untenable..
But if the other banks follow suit.. it could be the boost homeowners need..
But it won't offset fuel prices, and the unemployment problem..

The big news, is that Domenique Strauss-Kahn has been released from house arrest with no bail demands, as the prosecution case against him is in a total state of collapse.
The maid lied, is the long and the short of it.. But the consiquences of this debacle has had far reaching effects..
Will his replacement as head of the IMF prove to be the right move..? As he was planning on stepping down anyway for the French elections.. he had plans for running against Sarkozy.. and those plans may well still be in the works.
For not only is that man one of the most astute economic minds on the planet, but he now has the sympathy of the entire French nation behind him.
It was staged. That implies there are those who planned this entire episode..
Begs a question..
Yet.. there have been questions raised in the minds of some Frenchmen.. not many mind you.. concerning the private lives of their elected officials.. However, while this attitude might well affect a British or North American Prime Minister or President, it remains to be seen how important this issue will become in France. The Continental attitude is not Calvanist, to say the least.. and while an investigation may well be launched, and a few slaps on the wrists delivered.. It may well be that the treatment he recieved at the hands of the American authorities will cancel out past indescretions.. simply because he will be found innocent of this latest incident..
Time will tell..

Not good news.. Growth in UK manufacturing activity slid to a two-year low.. output in other European countries also suffered a setback, suggesting that the global rebound is losing steam..
The Market/CIPS Purchasing Managers’ Index of factory output fell to 51.3 last month, just above the 50 reading that marks the divide between expansion and contraction..
This is not to be unexpected. The effects of a profligate economy.. which lasted nearly 40 years.. will take decades to put right..
Not a harbinger of doom here.. merely observing the light of the end of the tunnel is miles away..

And to aggravate the situation.. Work and Pensions Secretary William Hague has once again brought up the issue of immigration.. of how foreigners are taking jobs which should be filled by British workers..
Mind you.. business leaders immediately responded by suggesting British workers were less useful than foreign-born migrants who work harder..
Ian's is going public on concerns he has expressed to Cabinet colleagues which go to the heart of tension with the Liberal Democrats, on how migration should be restricted.. David said recently that he would have imposed tighter restrictions on people coming into the country if he were not in a coalition..
Is this yet the beginning of another move to distance Britain from the EU..?

And there's more to update this evening.. We mentioned a few weeks ago that the price of petrol, gas, in the US, could well put a roadblock in the path of their already fragile recovery..
Say your car takes 20 gallonsUS.. that's a hundred bucks.. and depending on the car you drive and how much it's used by various members of the family, you'll be topping up again in three days or so.. The question on many minds now.. at least 9.2% of the population.. is 'how?'
It's quite something to imagine.. the US.. the financial bulwark.. is five weeks away from defaulting on it's debts..
Both Senators and Congressmen have cancelled their scheduled 4th of July plans.. both Houses will be sitting until some bi-partisan agreement is hammered out..
Now.. both sides have agreed on about $1.5 trillion in spending cuts over 10 years, including interest savings, but only if the remaining parts of the deal fall into place.. Republicans want far more in spending cuts..
The negotiations are aimed at cutting future deficits by more than $2 trillion.. not the $4 trillion originally sought by both sides.. "A couple trillion dollars is nothing to sneeze at," said one of the two officials who weren't authorized to comment on the negotiations..
Barack wants more than $400 billion in higher taxes on what he calls "millionaires and billionaires".. but much of it would affect individuals with income above $200,000 and couples above $250,000.. The biggest item.. limiting the value of itemized deductions for that income group which would raise $290 billion over a decade.. has failed to pass Congress before..
Now both sides are frantically courting potential votes in the House and Senate.. knowing that any compromise will need support from both Republicans and Democrats..
The stakes of the debate were underscored when a Standard & Poor's executive said the credit-rating agency would give the government its lowest rating should lawmakers fail to agree on raising the borrowing limit and cause a federal default..
The hole gets deeper, and deeper..
It's even hitting individual States within the Union now.. In Minnesota..In an echo of the debate unfolding in Washington, Minnesota hurtled toward a midnight government shutdown this morning.. in a dispute over taxes and spending that could force thousands of layoffs.. bring road projects to a standstill.. and close state parks just ahead of the Fourth of July weekend..
Though nearly all states are having severe budget problems this year.. Minnesota stood alone on the brink of a shutdown, thanks to Democratic Governor Mark Dayton's determination to raise taxes on high-earners to close a $5 billion deficit and the Republican Legislature's refusal to go along..
Republican Sen. Michelle Benson said she wasn't about to budge, either..
"If we don't start taking a different approach to how we manage our government, we're going to swing from one bad economic circumstance to another," Benson said. "We can't just keep throwing more money at government and hoping that makes things better."
Begs the question.. what if on the macrocosmic scale. the House and Senate take the same approach.. and the White House doesn't get it's borrowing ceiling raised..

Now to Greece.. at least for the time being, their fat appears to have been pulled from the fire.. German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble..
Since the bulk of this bailout payment was coming from German coffers, politicians in Athens must have heaved a collective sigh of relief..
But again, it begs the ubiquitous question.. are we not throwing good money after bad..?
Now what could possibly be a viable solution, would be for the highly industrialised EU countries, to not only send the cash to build factories producing commodities aimed at, for the most part to begin, the domestic market, but to send German and French skilled workers, to teach the Greeks.. to give them their own skilled workforce..
Rather than handing overt trillions of Euro's to the government.. the EU and the IMF should be negotiating with contractors and those manufacturers still in business..directly.
While a portion of the loan would of course go to the government.. pay the salaries of civil service people and maintain essential services.. But it might be a better plan to allocate some of those monies for the development of private companies, with the EU and the IMF in partnership..
Unemployment is the most pressing of this world's problems, and that excludes no economy.. a pooling of the labour force in those countries which have them, and distribution of skilled workers to countries building factories built by the IMF and the EU.. could go a long was towards easing our problems..
Hoover did it.. Roosevelt did it.. Now it needs doing on a global scale.. with global agreement..

The Tankan Index.. a business sentiment survey used as a bellweather in Japan.. has indicated that Japan's big manufacturers have turned pessimistic about business conditions in the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami..
Now these Tankan Surveys have an effect on Japan's monetary policy.. The business sentiment index plunged 15 points to minus nine in June.. but all going well.. the index for September quarter is forecast to rise to plus two..
However, while the problem persists, it's unlikely we'll see Japan take it's place as the second largest economy in the world, for quite a while..

Disturbing. A review by the government indicates that some 100,000 people with terminal illnesses die every year without properly planned care, so they are shuttled in and out of hospital..
Now.. there are Paliative Care Homes, but there are vast disparities in how much money is spent on services, with some patients receiving 30 times as much as others..
Many endure substandard nursing care and have no chance to plan where they wish to die..
This is such an horrific subject for this ageing population.. the thought that when one is unable to take care of one's self while a disease eats what remains of your life.. and having to spend that time in the confines of a hospital ward..
The review concludes that while some services were good, many of the up to 457,000 people needing good palliative care were getting a piecemeal service.. A total of 92,000 were simply “not being reached,” it added..
A sad reflection..