From soda to ketchup, many processed foods and beverages contain fructose, which affects the region of the brain that regulates appetite, according to a study by the Scientific American, which was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Researchers measured the hypothalamus, which regulates hunger-related signals, of 20 healthy adult volunteers to study their responses to consuming sweetened beverages.

Upon receiving a 300-calorie drink sweetened with 75 grams of fructose, the volunteers had a more active hypothalamus and showed greater signs of hunger. When the volunteers received a similar drink that was instead sweetened using glucose, their hypothalamus was less active and the participants showed signs of fullness.

Drinking glucose “turns off or suppresses the activity of areas of the brain that are critical for reward and the desire for food,” Yale University endocrinologist Dr Robert Sherwin, who was involved with the study, told the Associated Press. With fructose, “we don’t see those changes,” he added. “As a result, the desire to eat continues – it isn’t turned off.”

Glucose and fructose are metabolized differently, and the excessive use of fructose in American food staples is taking its toll. Even table sugar, which some incorrectly believe is made up solely of glucose, is half fructose. And the US uses lots of it.

Researchers at the University of Southern California and the University of Oxford found that out of 42 countries studied, the US has the highest per-capita consumption of high-fructose corn syrup. The US also has the highest obesity rate in the world, with more than one-third of adults (35.7 percent) being classified as ‘obese’ by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

After hearing of the bill’s passage, [Mr] Obama stated,

“Today’s agreement enshrines, I think, a principle into law that will remain in place as long as I am President: The deficit needs to be reduced in a way that’s balanced. Everyone pays their fair share. Everyone does their part. That’s how our economy works best. That’s how we grow.”

Welcome to [Mr] Obama’s “balanced approach”: Doublethink at its best.

For every dollar spent by government, an offsetting dollar is crowded out of the productive economy. While [Mr] Obama steadfastly refuses to cut government spending, his new mantra of “we can’t cut our way to prosperity” is the polar opposite of what needs to happen, namely, shrink the government so that the economy can expand. As long as government grows, the economy will shrink.

In short, nothing has been solved. [Mr] Obama and his spend-crazy Administration are not restrained in the least and the dividing lines between Democrats, Republicans and conservatives are more vitriolic than ever. This writer expects that the credit rating agencies will be inclined to further downgrade US debt...

The real problem the British people have had with the ‘European project’, as its insiders call it, is that they have never really begun to understand its real nature, and what was always intended to be its ultimate goal. The chief reason for this is that our politicians have never properly explained it to us. What makes this so much worse is that those who were most enthused by it, such as [Mr] Heath, knew full well what ‘the project’ was really about — the plan to weld all Europe together under an unprecedented form of super-government.

They deliberately decided to conceal it from us, for fear that our anxieties about our loss of sovereignty might prevent them from being allowed to join. [Mr] Heath got what he was after: entry to the club — although he still pretended that the Common Market was little more than a trading arrangement. On the day we entered, he told the British people on television that any fears that ‘we shall in some way sacrifice independence and sovereignty’ were ‘completely unjustified’.

The response of the EU’s leaders has been to call for yet ‘more Europe’, and a new treaty to force the eurozone members into ‘full political union’. This is now leaving Britain more obviously marginalised than ever, condemned to remain in the outer ring of a club, many members of which would now be only too pleased to see the back of us.

In 1973, as a junior member of [Mr] Heath’s Cabinet, Margaret Thatcher made all the approved noises about how wonderful it was for Britain to join this club. Once in office, however, she went on a painful learning curve, as she saw from the inside just what the real game was and how ruthlessly it was played. She was brought down in 1990 by an alliance of Europhiles in her party and their Brussels allies, because she was the last real obstacle to their Maastricht Treaty.

What really riled them was that she had seen through their true agenda and the disastrous course on which they were set. ‘That such an unnecessary and irrational project as building a European super-state was ever embarked on,’ wrote Lady Thatcher, ‘will seem in future years to be perhaps the greatest folly of the modern era. And that Britain... should ever have become part of it will appear a political error of the first magnitude.’

He was explaining a deal he had done with the Republican leadership in the Senate - it puts taxes up for those families earning over $450,000 (£277,000; €340,000) a year and puts off planned spending cuts for two months.

American politicians certainly know how to take it to the wire. And just a little bit beyond. The plan was to vote on it before the midnight deadline. They didn't make it. Officially, the US has tumbled over the fiscal cliff. But we don't yet know what the impact will be. It is possible, even likely, that it will float gracefully upwards again, wafted on the winds of Congressional approval.

Then again, disgruntled Republicans in the House could send it crashing to the ground, with a sickening thump. There is a lot for them to dislike in this deal, and they will have a point when they say it does little to cut spending. But to stand on their principle would also be to oppose tax cuts for most Americans. They might decide it would be foolish to play chicken with their reputations.

They can, however, afford to grandstand a little longer. It is an easy thing to do on New Year's Day, when the markets are closed and the federal government is shut, so there is no-one to panic, and no-one to impose any savage cuts. But play it very much longer and real damage begins to be done to the economy. This has not yet played out. There are unhappy Democrats, as well. But their party had its act together and their president had a plan.

The Republicans look passionate but rudderless, mistaking ardour for strategy. This inglorious episode is not yet over but it will reinforce the average American's contempt for Congress.

The summit's draft conclusions argue - albeit in a rather short statement right at the end - that any new steps towards strengthening economic governance will need to be accompanied by "further steps towards stronger legitimacy and accountability".

But critics point to a more fundamental issue. They wonder whether anyone has really been consulted about the whole notion of closer integration in the first place. "Originally we were promised a monetary union, without political or economic union," says Sampo Terho, an MEP from a Eurosceptic Finnish party, the True Finns. But that of course has not worked, which creates the current dilemma.

"I personally don't think we can move forward anymore in political union without having a referendum," Mr Terho says. "I feel we have a responsibility to our own people back home to explain what is going on because I am quite certain that they don't even realise how far we are going with this EU project."

But other voices are being raised, asking whether such fundamental change is really necessary. From outside the eurozone, the UK has made it clear that it will play no part. The Czech Republic and others are also sceptical. Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte suggested in a recent interview with several European newspapers that some EU powers should be returned to member-states. Even France is cautious, as it always has been, about German proposals to hand more powers to centralised European institutions in Brussels.

In a union well-versed in the art of compromise, expect something less than a federal super-state but much more than a group of countries acting in unison.

He told the BBC "associate member" status would mean the UK giving up much of its influence in the EU. "We're now at a point where there ought also to be the option of various formal tiers of membership," he said.

Mr Duff said there was no enthusiasm in the EU for more British grumbling, the BBC's Matthew Price reports from Brussels. But he said he did not want to see the UK leave the EU altogether. His group only speaks for a section of EU thinkers, our correspondent says, but the ideas will feed into the debate about the UK's future relationship with the EU.

The Confederation of British Industry lobby group is pressing for Britain to keep its place and status within the European Union, to push for freer trade. The CBI's director-general, John Cridland, said: "The UK has ensured its values of free and open trade have been at the heart of Europe over the last 40 years, helping to create one of the biggest successes of the European Union - the single market."