The Metropolitan Police admits officers were "overwhelmed", but insists the threat they faced was unparalleled. The violence in Tottenham was sparked by the death of local man Mark Duggan, who was shot by police on Thursday 4 August. His death is under investigation by the Independent Police Complaints Commission (IPCC). His friends and family, angered by a lack of information from the police, marched to Tottenham police station on the afternoon of Saturday 6 August.

They remained outside for several hours, and frustration grew when no senior officer spoke to them. Violence erupted later that night, when a police car was set on fire, and shops were attacked and looted. David Gilbertson is a retired Deputy Assistant Commissioner at the Metropolitan Police who served as a senior officer in Haringey Borough, which includes Tottenham. Having spoken to the police who were on the ground that day, he is very critical of the behaviour of their senior officers.

"There was a disgraceful absence of visible leadership, and that should be shaming for the Metropolitan Police," he told BBC Radio 4's The Report programme. "With rank comes responsibility, and part of the responsibility is visible command. And secondly, there didn't appear to be a strategy [to deal with the demonstrators]. It's blindingly obvious to say that you push them away from target-rich environments; a shopping area, a retail park, all of the places that were trashed by the rioters." Local community leaders also insist the police should have been better prepared.

The prediction of an escalation in cases is being made by Jake Zamansky, the US attorney nicknamed "Jaws" who spearheaded the successful pursuit of the investment banks after the dotcom crash. It follows a move by Lloyd Blankfein, the chief executive of Goldman Sachs, to hire Reid Weingarten, one of America's top criminal defence lawyers, to help him address claims that the bank misled clients in the run-up to the financial crisis and, afterwards, Congress.

"I consider this to be a very significant event. For Lloyd Blankfein to be hiring a top criminal lawyer indicates that there may be allegations of wrongdoing forthcoming from the Department of Justice [DoJ]," Zamansky said. "Investors are asking why there have been no criminal cases against Goldman Sachs or any investment bank arising from the financial crisis. This may be a sign of more cases to come. It may be the beginning of a series of cases against Wall Street firms".

Back in 2001, as the internet bubble was bursting, Zamansky filed the very first lawsuit against Merrill Lynch's Henry Blodget, then a top-rated technology analyst caught pushing shares to investors which internal emails showed he actually rated as "dogs". The case proved to be a catalyst for a legal assault on Wall Street which resulted in the banks signing some huge cheques.

Shares in Goldman fell in late trading on Monday after Weingarten's appointment emerged - shedding 4.7% to $104.25, their lowest level since April 2009. They had dropped again on Tuesday.

The earthquake was one of the strongest ever recorded on the east coast of the US and forced the evacuations of parts of the Capitol, White House and Pentagon. There were no immediate reports of deaths, but fire officials in Washington said there were some injuries. The US Geological Survey said the quake registered magnitude 5.8 and was centred about 40 miles north-west of Richmond, Virginia.

Two nuclear reactors at the North Anna power station were taken off line. Around the tiny town of Mineral, Virginia, masonry crumbled. In Washington DC, thousands poured into the streets as offices, including in the Pentagon and the Capitol, were evacuated. The Holland tunnel under the Hudson River, which links New York and New Jersey, was closed, promising delays. Manhattan's forest of skyscrapers could be felt gently shifting from side to side. A press conference by the Manhattan district attorney Cyrus Vance, who was set to address the Dominique Strauss-Kahn case, was evacuated as it began. Pictures of panicked journalists fleeing the room were carried live. Mobile phone networks in New York and Washington DC also partially stopped working.

As in the real world, on Twitter fear soon gave way to humour. Some cracked jokes about the possible entry of the portly New Jersey governor into the 2012 presidential election contest. "I think Chris Christie just jumped into the race," tweeted Salon political blogger Alex Pareene. It also prompted a wave of mocking humour from people on America's west coast, where moderate quakes are common. "The entire west coast is laughing at us right now," tweeted Lisa Hoffman, a social media specialist in North Carolina.

The quake's biggest impact was perhaps to show that news is often about where something happens, and to whom. On Monday night, a quake struck in Colorado, far from any cities. It registered as a 5.3 and was the largest to hit the state in over a century, but barely merited a headline. Or, indeed, a tweet.

As concerns mounted that BoA will need to take huge additional write-offs on bad mortgages, the cost of insuring the group's debt jumped to record levels and investors became increasingly concerned that the financial system could be facing a fresh credit crunch. BoA's share-price fall followed a 7.9% drop on Monday, which took the stock to less than half its value at the start of the year - a decline that wiped about $65 billion from its market capitalisation.

"It does sap investor confidence to see a bank of this stature struggling so mightily," said David Dietze, chief investment strategist at Point View Financial Services in New Jersey. "It casts a shadow over the entire financial sector and puts a negative spin on the growth picture," added Nick Kalivas, of MF Global Research in Chicago.

Dennis Dick, of Bright Trading in Detroit, said: "Every day it's the same story. BoA keeps leading the charge down on financials and every trader is probably using that as an indicator to trade the rest of the financials too." BoA, which last week announced a further 3,500 redundancies, was forced to hold a conference call to appease more than 6,000 analysts and investors this month, in the wake of the group's tumbling share price.

Japan is preparing to elect its sixth leader in five years to replace unpopular Prime Minister Naoto Kan, under fire for his handling of the response to a March tsunami and subsequent radiation crisis at a crippled nuclear power plant. The downgrade, while not out of the blue, served as another reminder of the debt burdens that nearly all of the world's major advanced economies shoulder, even as policymakers struggle to agree on ways to stimulate sub-par growth without massive new spending.

The United States lost its top-tier AAA rating from Standard & Poor's earlier this month, and Moody's warned in June that it may downgrade Italy as Europe's sovereign debt crisis festers. Moody's new rating on Japan's debt is three notches below coveted AAA status, which Tokyo lost in 1998, but is still classified as high grade. Japan is now the same level as China, which surpassed it last year to become the world's second-largest economy, and one notch below Italy and Spain.

"Over the past five years, frequent changes in (Japan's) administrations have prevented the government from implementing long-term economic and fiscal strategies into effective and durable policies," Moody's said. Moody's had warned in May that it might downgrade Japan's Aa2 rating due to heightened concerns about faltering growth prospects and a weak policy response to rein in bulging public debt, already twice the size of its $5 trillion economy.

Early Wednesday, the hurricane is centered about 400 miles (650 kilometers) southeast of Nassau in the Bahamas and is moving west-northwest near 9 mph (15 kph). In North Carolina, tourists on Ocracoke Island, which is accessible only by boat, have been told to evacuate ahead of the hurricane. It will be a test of whether people in the crosshairs of what could be the first monstrous storm in years along the East Coast will heed orders to get out of the way.

That means the debt that our federal government owes a whole lot of somebodies including China has increased $4,247,000,000,000 in just 945 days. That's the fastest increase under any president ever. Remember the day the Democrat promised to close the embarrassing Guantanamo Bay Detention Facility within one year? That day the national debt increased $4,247,000,000. And each day since that the facility hasn't been closed.

Same for the day in 2009 when Obama flew all the way out to Denver to sign the $787 billion stimulus bill that was going to hold national unemployment beneath 8% instead of the 9.1% we got today anyway? Another $4,247,000,000 that day. And every day since, even Obama golfing and vacation days. Same sum for the day Obama flew Air Force One nearly four hours roundtrip to Columbus, Ohio for a 10-minute speech about how well the stimulus was working in the politically crucial Buckeye state. Ohio's unemployment rate just jumped to 9% from 8.8% anyway. Or last week's three-day Midwestern tour in the president's new $1.1 million Death Star bus? National debt went up $16,988,000,000 while he rode around speaking and buying ice cream cones.

Numbers with that many digits are hard to grasp, even for a Harvard head. So, let's put it another way: One billion seconds ago Bill Clinton was nearing the end of his two terms and George W Bush's baseball collection was still on the shelves in the Austin governor's office.The nation's debt increased $4.9 trillion under President Bush too, by the way. But it took him 2,648 days to do it. Obama will surpass that sum during this term. Now, how to portray a trillion, or 1,000 billions. One trillion seconds ago much of North America was still covered by ice sheets hundreds of feet thick. And the land was dotted by only a few dozen Starbuck's.

Obama is saying yes, we can get control of the national debt. But ominously every time he says that he adds that trillions of dollars in infrastructure repairs are badly needed across the country. And with interest rates so low, according to the thinking on Obama's planet, now is an excellent time to borrow even more money. So, it looks like not too long before Americans learn what comes after 1,000 trillions. It's quadrillion. But for Bernanke's sake, please don't tell anyone in Washington.

Darlington pervert Bryan Hall, 54, along with three others, went to the Court of Appeal to overturn Sexual Offences Prevention Orders (Sopos), which are designed to protect children from abuse, complaining they infringed their human rights. The court ruled they breached the "right to family life" and total bans on using the internet "restricts the use of an essential part of everyday living". It also overturned blanket bans on paedophiles coming into contact with young people aged 16 to 18.

The ruling has come under criticism from children's charities. Claude Knights, director of Kidscape, said children were statistically more at risk from adults they know than from strangers. He said: "It is extremely surprising and disappointing that the Human Rights Act can be used in this way. The safety of children should come first and whoever has decided this needs to do some serious explaining."

Married, Hall - who ran a mobile disco - was found with more than 6,000 images of children being abused on his home computer. Earlier this year, he pleaded guilty to 16 counts of making indecent images of children and one charge of possession of indecent pictures. Hall was given a six-month prison sentence, suspended for two years, and banned from living or working with children. He was also ordered to go on a sex offenders' treatment course.

The expectation is that a new administration would be based on the National Transitional Council, or NTC, formed by the rebels in Benghazi in the early days of the revolution. That still leaves open the question of who would be Libya's new leader after nearly 42 years of Colonel Gaddafi's rule.

The frontrunner is the NTC's chairman, Mustafa Abdul Jalil. A former justice minister, he is popular in the east and has a reputation for integrity. "He was the only one who would stand up to Gaddafi, who would tell him 'No'," said one Benghazi resident. But Mr Abdul Jalil has threatened to resign several times and it is not clear how much he really wants the job.

Mahmoud Jibril, the head of the NTC's cabinet, the Executive Board, could step in. He has the reputation of being a capable technocrat and is said to make many of the day-to-day decisions involved in running the NTC. Mahmoud Jibril is responsible for many of the daily decisions about the running of the NTC. His colleague, Ali Tarhouni, also has a very high profile, having returned from exile abroad to take charge of the vital issue of finance for the rebels.

Another name sometimes mentioned is Shokri Ghanem, a former prime minister who helped liberalise the economy, though he is outside Libya now and did not become part of the NTC. If, or when, Colonel Gaddafi is finally pushed aside, the difficulties could really begin for a new government. Widespread looting, revenge attacks against Colonel Gaddafi's loyalists or internecine fighting are all potential threats to order and stability as the new regime attempts to come into being. The NTC itself is a loose collection of different factions - Islamist and secular, former members of the regime and longstanding exiles - some with little more in common than their desire to get rid of Colonel Gaddafi. The rebel movement is also an uneasy coalition between the east and west of the country.

Mr Abdul Jalil said he would resign if commanders did not respect the rule of law - an extraordinary admission that parts of the military may be outside political control. No single charismatic, political personality has emerged yet on the rebel side, the kind of figure who could force dissident elements of the rebel forces into line and heal the divisions in the country. But, after more than four decade of Colonel Gaddafi's rule, Libyans may feel that another strongman is exactly what they do not want.

They include bans on kite flying on a beach, sack races for children and pins used to secure commemorative poppies. But experts have warned of many cases where risks are under appreciated. The HSE said complying with health and safety regulations was often used as a "convenient excuse" for organisations to justify unnecessary decisions. Among examples on its list were a school's decision to ban football games unless the ball was made of sponge, and a ban on street parties to mark the Royal Wedding in April.

In response to the HSE report, employment minister Chris Grayling said members of the public should "challenge health and safety myths" and over-zealous practices. "We have seen an epidemic of excuses wrongly citing health and safety as a reason to prevent people from doing pretty harmless things with only very minor risks attached," he said. "This has to stop. The law does not require this to happen - people must be encouraged to use their common sense."

One health and safety expert said the law required people to approach risks in a balanced and proportionate manner. "Over zealousness about trivial risks gives health and safety a bad name but there are actually many more cases where people are under-hitting," said Roger Bibbings, occupational safety adviser for the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents. Good health and safety practice was all about "exercising judgement", he added.

Skyscrapers swayed in New York, and frightened workers spilled into the streets. The National Cathedral in Washington said its central tower and three of its four corner spires were damaged. There were no immediate reports of deaths, but fire officials in Washington said there were at least some injuries. The US Geological Survey said the quake registered magnitude 5.8 and was centered 40 miles northwest of Richmond, Virginia.

The White House said advisers told President Barack Obama there have been no reports of major damage to the nation's infrastructure, including airports and nuclear facilities. Two nuclear reactors at the North Anna Power Station, in the same county as the epicenter, were automatically taken off line by safety systems, said Roger Hannah, a spokesman for the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

The earthquake came less than three weeks before the 10th anniversary of the September 11 attacks, and in both Washington and New York it immediately triggered fears of something more sinister than a natural disaster. At the Pentagon, a low rumbling built until the building itself was shaking, and people ran into the corridors of the complex. The shaking continued there, to shouts of "Evacuate! Evacuate!"

The Park Service closed all monuments and memorials on the National Mall, and ceiling tiles fell at Reagan National Airport outside Washington. All flights there were put on hold. In lower Manhattan, the 26-storey federal courthouse in lower Manhattan, blocks from ground zero of the September 11 attacks, began swaying, and hundreds of people streamed out of the building. A magnitude of 5.8 would make the quake among the most powerful to strike the eastern United States. In 1897, a magnitude-5.9 quake was recorded at Giles County, Virginia, the largest on record in that state. East Coast earthquakes are far less common than in the West, but they tend to be felt over a broad area.

The German tabloid newspaper Bild sharply criticized Taylor on its website, writing: "This man is betting against the euro." If that is what he is doing, he is certainly successful. While Greece is threatened with bankruptcy, Taylor is listed among the world's 25 highest-paid hedge fund managers. A well-read man, Taylor likes to philosophize about the Congress of Vienna and the Treaties of Rome. But is this man really out to speculate the euro to death? And does he have Greece on his conscience?

Taylor grimaces and sighs. He was expecting these questions. "The big problem is that in some cases these politicians are looking for the easy way out and want to blame somebody else and say speculators are taking Europe apart, taking the euro down and ruining the prosperity of our country," he says, characterizing such charges against hedge fund managers as "nonsense." "My capital isn't the capital of the Rothschilds," he says, insisting that he is working with the "capital of the people," and that his goal is to protect and increase this capital. Taylor points out that no one from any of the German pension funds that invest their money with him has ever called him on the phone to tell him not to bet against the euro.

The truth is that the financial markets are controlling the politicians. If Sarkozy interrupts his vacation, the markets interpret his sudden return as a sign that the situation there is worse than they thought - and promptly set their sights on the country. And if there is an argument between Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and Finance Minister Giulio Tremonti, then the markets target Italy, because they doubt that the Italian government is serious about introducing austerity measures. The markets take advantage of every weakness and every rumor to speculate against one country after the next.

In doing so, they aggravate the crisis. Once a country has become the subject of rumors and speculation, other investors become nervous. Fearing further price declines, pension funds and insurance companies also start selling stocks and bonds. In the end, fear nurtures fear and a panic ensues.

Stock markets are currently in turmoil. There is no calm in sight for the global economy. Sharp declines on the stock market and crises have become an everyday reality. This raises the question of why the financial markets are so erratic. They have developed into a permanent threat to the global economy. But what can be done to avert this risk?

It cannot be a coincidence that the number and scope of disruptions have increased with the expansion of the financial industry. The Asian financial crisis in the 1990s was followed by the bursting of the Internet bubble at the turn of the millennium. When Lehman Brothers went bankrupt in 2008, the financial world suddenly found itself on the brink of collapse. Now that the euro is at risk, and millions of people are afraid of their currency collapsing. A number of countries, including the United States, are groaning under debt burdens that run into the trillions.

Naturally the financial industry - all those who trade in securities, currencies, money and the products derived from them, known as derivatives - is not responsible for all the crises in the global economy. Politicians also share some of the blame, for having accumulated too much debt and given the banks too much leeway. But without the destructive power of the banks, hedge funds and other investment companies, the world would not be where it is today - at the edge of an abyss.

But amid all the relief and satisfaction that Gadhafi's departure would bring, commentators caution that it will be difficult to convert Libya to democracy. After decades of dictatorship, the country lacks crucial institutions such as a constitutional court or parliament.

The conservative Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung writes: "One thing is certain. Without the support of NATO, the Libyan uprising against Gadhafi would have been bloodily crushed. It was worth the deployment of Western weapons. But gaining freedom or at least gaining the ability to take fate into one's own hands - that is up to the Arab peoples or tribes. It involves making sacrifices, of which they can be rightly proud one day, when the blood-letting is over."

The left-wing Berliner Zeitung writes: "The strategy was risky but it paid off. The NATO air strikes have helped the rebels succeed against dictator Gadhafi. Who would have thought it possible a few months ago? Libya is almost free. But that doesn't mean that democracy and freedom will immediately take hold here. The Libyan Transitional Council is weak. The state could disintegrate into tribal territories. The decisive phase in the liberation of Libya is only just beginning. The West took responsibility for the fight against Gadhafi, now it must help to set up a democratic state. That is more difficult than running bombing sorties."

The center-left Suddeutsche Zeitung writes: "The fall of Gadhafi, even though it was aided by NATO bombs, would give the uprsings in Syria or Yemen fresh impetus. Even more than the comparatively swift victories in the Tunisia and Egypt, the long six months in Libya prove that endurance pays off in the end, that the toppling of Ben Ali and Mubarak weren't regional anomalies, that the twilight of the dictators has only just begun."

At the same time, the cost doubled to reach $68 billion in 2010 - more than a third of the amount the US government received in corporate income tax last year - which means the program has started to attract the attention of some Republican lawmakers looking for ways to cut the nation's budget deficit.

Despite the bipartisan support for the program in the past, some of the recent political rhetoric has food stamp advocates worried. Presidential hopeful Newt Gingrich last year derided Democrats as "the party of food stamps". And Republican leaders in the House of Representatives propose changing the program so that the funding is through a "block grant" to the states, rather than allowing it to grow automatically when needed due to an emergency, such as a natural disaster or economic crisis.

So far in the recovery, jobs growth has been concentrated in lower-wage occupations, with minimal growth in middle-income wages as many higher-paid blue collar jobs have disappeared. And 6 percent of the 72.9 million Americans paid by the hour received wages at or below the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour in 2010. That's up from 4.9 percent in 2009, and 3 percent in 2002, according to government data. Bolen said just based on income, minimum wage single parents are almost always eligible for food stamps.

Sharma, 55, "was ready for new challenges" after helping S&P separate its data, pricing and analytics business from its ratings business, McGraw-Hill said in a statement. The company unveiled that restructuring at S&P late last year. Peterson, 53, will take over the helm of S&P starting September 12. Sharma will stay on as an adviser at the parent company until the end of the year.

McGraw-Hill's statement did not mention the August 5 downgrade that sent shock waves through global financial markets and was sharply criticized by the Obama administration, which said the agency's analysis was fundamentally flawed. Other major rating agencies have maintained their AAA ratings on the US.

It also did not refer to recent reports that the Justice Department was investigating whether S&P improperly rated dozens of mortgage securities in the years leading up to the financial crisis in 2008. Those reports sent McGraw-Hill's shares tumbling last week. The company said only that Sharma was eager to pursue other opportunities.