“It’s never going to happen that the government at gunpoint says, ‘You’re going to have a tracking chip,’” said Katherine Albrecht, who with Liz McIntyre authored “Spychips,” a book that warns of the threat to privacy posed by Radio Frequency Identification. “It’s always in incremental steps. If you can put a microchip in someone that doesn’t track them… everybody looks and says, ‘Come on,’” she said. “It’ll be interesting seeing where we go.”

According to a report at Mobiledia, the US military’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency has confirmed plans to create nanosensors to monitor the health of soldiers on battlefields. The devices also would report data to doctors. But privacy analysts have expressed concern that the implants could be used not just to monitor health but to keep track of and possibly control people.

DARPA describes the technology on which it is working as “a truly disruptive innovation,” which would diagnose, monitor vital stats and “even deliver medicine into the bloodstream.” According to LiveScience.com, “Solving the problem of sickness could have a huge impact on the number of soldiers ready to fight, because far more have historically died due to illness rather than combat.”

The gloomy surveys clashed with the picture painted by European Central Bank President Mario Draghi, who on Thursday spoke of a gradual recovery taking place in the euro zone during the course of the year - although he did speak about risks. In the United States, a government report showed employers added a disappointing 115,000 workers to payrolls last month and, critically, many Americans stopped looking for work. Economists had expected 170,000 new nonfarm jobs, and the report could hurt President Barack Obama as he steps up a re-election campaign that will likely hinge on the state of the economy.

Though the US unemployment rate edged down to 8.1 percent from 8.2 percent, the SPX fell sharply as fears grew that the erratic recovery of the world's largest economy was sputtering. "This shows just how painfully slowly the US economy is growing," said Thanos Bardas, a portfolio manager at Neuberger Berman in Chicago, which manages nearly $200 billion in assets.

The US government did, however, revise upward earlier estimates of payroll growth in February and March, and the euro zone surveys indicated better progress among Chinese companies.

But positive signs were few.

This isn't the premise of the latest doomsday thriller. Massive solar storms have happened before — and another one is likely to occur soon, according to Mike Hapgood, a space weather scientist at the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory near Oxford, England. Much of the planet's electronic equipment, as well as orbiting satellites, have been built to withstand these periodic geomagnetic storms. But the world is still not prepared for a truly damaging solar storm, Hapgood argues in a recent commentary published in the journal Nature.

What exactly is a solar storm?

Solar flares mainly emit X-rays — we also get radio waves from these things, and white light in the brightest of flares. They all travel at the same speed as light, so it takes eight minutes to arrive. There are some effects from flares, such as radio interference from the radio bursts. But that's a pretty small-beer thing. The big thing is the geomagnetic storms [on Earth] that affect the power grid, and that's caused by the coronal mass ejections [from the sun].

What happens when those particles reach Earth?

There can be a whole range of effects. The classic one everyone quotes is the effect on the power grid. A big geomagnetic storm can essentially put extra electric currents into the grid. If it gets bad enough, you can have a complete failure of the power grid — it happened in Quebec back in 1989. If you've got that, then you've just got to get it back on again. But you could also damage the transformers, which would make it much harder to get the electric power back.

How else could people be affected?

You get big disturbances in the Earth's upper atmosphere — what we call the ionosphere — and that could be very disruptive to things like GPS [the network of global positioning system satellites]. Given the extent we use GPS in everyday life [including for cellphone networks, shipping safety and financial transaction records], that's a big issue. The storms can also disrupt communications on transoceanic flights. Sometimes when that happens, they will either divert or cancel flights. So that would be like the disruption we had in Europe from the volcano two years ago, where they had to close down airspace for safety reasons.

The implications of French and Greek elections for the region's drive to impose fiscal austerity will be crucial, while March readings on industrial production in Spain, Germany, Italy and France will also highlight the challenges facing the region. China takes centre stage towards the end of the week with the release of inflation, retail and factory output numbers, as signs of a weaker US economic performance and the deepening recession in Europe make Asia's strength more crucial.

The disappointing 115,000 increase in US non-farm payrolls in April reported on Friday has served to heighten fears the recovery in the world's biggest economy is fading, and will put speculation about the Federal Reserve's next move high on the agenda. For global asset managers the week's news and data should not significantly alter a view that has been dominated by moderate risk-on positions weighted towards US and Asian equities and some commodities, offset by an underweight holding of European assets.

"Europe is definitely going to be an 'ex-growth' part of the world just because of the bank deleveraging going on, and that's not even bringing into play the euro crisis." But for now Robertson said fear is a dominant sentiment in the markets, centered on whether euro zone bank restructuring and government spending reforms will take place. "Investors are far from convinced. Apart from the ECB, the rest of the policymakers are not acting tremendously dynamically."

The new bureaucrat, who would not be directly elected by voters, is set to get sweeping control over the entire EU and force member countries into ever-greater political and economic union. Tellingly, the UK has been excluded from the confidential discussions within the shady “Berlin Group” of Europhile politicians, spearheaded by German foreign minister Guido Westerwelle.

Opponents fear the plan could create a modern-day equivalent of the European emperor envisaged by Napoleon Bonaparte or a return to the Holy Roman Empire of Charlemagne that dominated Europe in the Dark Ages. They are concerned that David Cameron’s coalition Government is doing nothing to prevent the sinister plot. The secret talks were uncovered by Independent Labour peer Lord Stoddart of Swindon.

“This is a plot by people who want to abolish nation states and create a United States of Europe,” he said. “The whole thing is barmy. These people are determined to achieve their final objective. The only hope for Britain is to leave the EU and become an independent nation.” The move will give further momentum to the Daily Express’s hugely popular crusade for Britain’s withdrawal from the EU.

Tory backbench MP Douglas Carswell said: “It doesn’t matter how you arrange the offices of these technocrats, they are useless at arranging our lives for us and they are not elected so they have no legitimacy. My worry is that the president will end up having the charisma of Van Rompuy and the economic management skills of Barroso.”

Euro-MP Paul Nuttall, of the UK Independence Party, said: “This is a truly ridiculous idea that must never be allowed to happen. It sounds as if they are trying to go back to the days of the Holy Roman Emperor.”

The shutdown leaves Japan without nuclear power for the first time since 1970 and has put electricity producers on the defensive. Public opposition to nuclear power could become more deeply entrenched if non-nuclear power generation proves enough to meet Japan's needs in the peak-demand summer months. "Can it be the end of nuclear power? It could be," said Andrew DeWit, a professor at Rikkyo University in Tokyo who studies energy policy. "That's one reason why people are fighting it to the death."

Japan managed to get through the summer last year without any blackouts by imposing curbs on use in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami. Factories operated at night and during weekends to avoid putting too much stress on the country's power grids. A similar success this year would weaken the argument of proponents of nuclear power.

In Japan, a delay in setting up a new, more independent Nuclear Regulatory Agency due to deadlock in a divided parliament is further clouding the outlook. Some analysts say the government is not going to turn public opinion unless it admits that nuclear power is never going to be absolutely safe. "The debate needs to be recast," said Bob Geller, a professor of geophysics at Tokyo University. "They have to come clean, and say, in effect - look we know they're not perfectly safe but we've made a careful evaluation of the risks, which we'll make public."

Wages and benefits have been slashed, unemployment has rocketed and thousands of businesses have collapsed. Furious Greeks have been turning to small, anti-bailout parties to punish traditional politicians they blame for the crisis. A record 8-10 parties are expected to enter parliament, and public outrage with the main parties could turn at least four small groups into potential power-brokers.

The last polls published before the election showed the conservative New Democracy and socialist PASOK parties - which between them dominated Greece for decades and now rule jointly - would scrape just enough votes to renew their uneasy coalition. They are the only parties to support the bailout. No new surveys have been allowed to be published for two weeks and pollsters warn the result may be a surprise.

"We voted for them since the 1980s and we feel cheated," municipal worker Christina Theodorakou, 50, said of the two big parties. She has seen her monthly salary cut by €500 since the crisis began. "We built a life over the years and they destroyed it overnight. Their campaigns are addressing idiots. I'll vote for a small party," she said. Her daughter Alexandra, 18, a nursing student who was joining her for lunch in the western port city of Patras, is old enough to vote for the first time but said she probably wouldn't bother: "Why go? Nobody can promise us a better future."

He told the Daily Telegraph the banks "had to lend to someone". His comments came after Bank of England boss Sir Mervyn King admitted he should have flagged up the looming crisis. Mr Hammond, who helped formulate David Cameron's economic strategy in opposition, told the newspaper lifestyle expectations had "run away with us".

"We started living a lifestyle both in private consumption and in public consumption that we could not afford," he told the newspaper. "We borrowed to top it up... now the day of reckoning has come and we are adjusting. Households were spending more than they earned. That's why household debt rose." At the annual Today Programme Lecture on Wednesday, Bank of England Governor Sir Mervyn King said he should have "shouted from the rooftops" that a system had been built in which "banks were too important to fail".

But Mr Hammond said: "People say to me, 'It was the banks'. I say, 'hang on, the banks had to lend to someone'. People feel in a sense that someone else is responsible for the decisions they made. Of course, if banks don't offer credit, people can't take it. But there were two consenting adults in all these transactions, a borrower and a lender, and they may both have made wrong calls. Some people are unwilling to accept responsibility for the consequences of their own choices."

As a result, the labor force is now at its smallest size since the 1980s when compared to the broader working age population. "We've been getting some job growth and it's been significant, but it hasn't yet been strong enough that you start to get people re-engaging in the labor market," said Keith Hall, a senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center and former commissioner of the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

A person is counted as part of the labor force if they have a job or have looked for one in the last four weeks. Only about 64% of Americans over the age of 16 currently fall into that category, according to the Labor Department. That's the lowest labor force participation rate since 1984. It's a worrisome sign for the economy and partly explains why the unemployment rate has been falling recently. Only people looking for work are considered officially unemployed.

The Chicago Fed expects the labor force participation rate will keep falling, hitting 62.4% by 2020. That poses a problem for a variety of reasons. It hits tax revenue and makes it harder to fund social safety nets like Social Security. Not to mention, it's likely to increase income inequality. Most importantly though, it makes the US economy less productive and weighs on growth.

But Martin Weiss noted last month: Four of the world’s largest central banks have gone absolutely berserk, running the money printing presses like never before in history:

The Bank of Japan (BOJ) had already been printing money like crazy ever since their bubble economy burst in the early 1990s. So when the debt crisis struck in 2008, the size of their balance sheet assets, which measure the cumulative total of a central bank’s money printing operations, was already the biggest in the world: About 20% of their economy. Then, when the shock waves of the Lehman Brothers collapse struck Japan, what did they do? They stepped up their money printing operations EVEN further — to about 30% of GDP.

At the US Federal Reserve, no Fed Chairman in history — not even notorious easy-money advocates like Arthur Burns or Allen Greenspan — had EVER run the money printing presses for any extended period of time. But Fed Chairman Bernanke changed all that. Soon after the debt crisis hit in 2008, he nearly TRIPLED the size of the Fed’s balance sheet from about 6% of GDP to almost 17% of GDP. And in the years since, he has pumped it up even further to about 20% of GDP! Last month, the International Monetary Fund released its annual review of US economic policy… The IMF has effectively pronounced the US bankrupt.

The Bank of England (BOE) has mostly been expanding its balance sheet in lock step with the Fed.

But in the global race to print money, it’s the European Central Bank (ECB) which has been leading the pack in the past year or so, suddenly expanding their balance sheet from about 20% of GDP to close to 30% GDP (blue line). This is absolutely massive!

The European Investment Bank, for example, recently required Greek borrowers to agree to a mechanism for repaying loans if Greece abandons the euro. No one knows, of course, precisely when a fatal euro-zone crisis will occur or exactly what might trigger it. And although the ultimate failure of the euro would cause immense economic and financial shocks worldwide, in the short run the US economy might actually benefit. International investors are already pulling their money out of the most troubled European countries and moving it to safer havens.

If the euro zone itself breaks up, lots of that hot money could pour into US markets. Over the longer term, though, the specific impact will depend on how the euro zone unravels. Basically, there are four scenarios, listed here from most to least likely in the short run:

1. France and other countries persuade Germany to agree to pro-growth policies.

2. Austerity policies force most of Europe into recession.

3. The weakest countries get pushed out of the euro zone one by one.

4. The euro zone splits into two separate currency areas.

There may, in fact, be no ideal solution. In all four scenarios, there is major financial disruption ahead. They differ only in the severity of the eventual crisis and its timing. The worst policies are the most extreme ones: doing nothing, or being purely harsh and punitive. The best would be to try to maintain some measure of economic growth while preventing countries that are already overindebted from adding too much to their borrowing. The most realistic goal at this point may simply be to avoid making matters worse and to try to minimize the damage.

(Full article - http://business.time.com/2012/05/02/four-ways-the-euro-could-fail/?hpt=hp_t3)

Adding their voices to the already noisy 2012 apocalypse brigade, Growing in Grace International are led by the charismatic Jose de Luis de Jesus, who openly calls himself the antichrist and makes his followers tattoo 666 onto their bodies. The Puerto Rican national states that calling himself the antichrist is appropriate because it is wrong to worship the 'Jewish teachings' of Jesus, but rather to study the teachings of the Apostle Paul, who de Jesus claims to be in direct contact with.

Antichrist according to de Jesus means 'no longer following Jesus of Nazareth as he lived in the days of his flesh.' Spreading the word about June 30th has seen the Miami based-group invest in billboards featuring a smiling de Jesus and his 666 symbols prominently displayed imploring people to phone up his group and repent.

'That day, the body of Jose de Luis de Jesus, who is a human like you and me, his flesh is going to be immortal,' said Alex Poessy, the bishop of Growing in Grace International in Canada. 'He's going to be living forever. And that will happen to him, but also his followers. All those that are not believers are going to be destroyed.' With followers in 35 different nations, 287 radio stations and a 24-hour Spanish language television network, Growing in Grace International is not the first group to pick a date this year as the end of the world,

Religious and sociological experts have expressed concern about this latest prediction of armageddon. University of Waterloo sociologist Dr Lorne Dawson explained that a deadline is a sign that the 'movement is starting to run into trouble'. 'It's a strong indicator that their authority is slipping, they're losing followers, not acquiring followers at a level that they used to. And nothing galvanises a group and galvanises attention like a new mention of an apocalypse.'

Yesterday's figures from the Bank of England show how banks have been steadily increasing overdraft rates. In March 2009 when the Bank cut the base rate to 0.5 per cent the average authorised overdraft rate was 18.62 per cent. It has been climbing steadily, reaching a high in February and going up again in March – the latest available figure – to 19.52 per cent.

That is the highest level since the data was first recorded in 1995. In a toxic combination, research published this week said millions of savers are being hit by the worst returns in history. As a result, families are seeing interest charges on their overdrafts at record highs while rates paid to savers are close to rock-bottom. The financial information firm Defaqto said the worst-hit are those who have left money to languish in the lowest-paying instant access accounts offering rates of only 0.01 per cent.

A saver who put £1,000 into such an account three years ago and left it there would by now have received interest of just 24p after basic rate tax. Simon Rose, from the campaign group Save our Savers, said: 'Rock bottom rates are causing misery to people who thought they had sensibly made provision for themselves.'

Earlier this year Britain's big five banks – HSBC, Santander, Barclays, Lloyds and Royal Bank of Scotland – revealed they made profits of £10.7 billion between them from their high-street banking operations last year, excluding the cost of compensation to their payment protection insurance victims.

Since the banking collapse in 2008, net lending in the form of loans to firms has been negative almost every single month. Net lending is the difference between the amount of loans handed out by banks to businesses and the total amount which they pay back. On a bleak day for small firms, the shocking Bank of England figures showed the amount banks have raked in but then refused to lend reached £96.5 billion between November 2008 and March 2012.

Lord Oakeshott, a Lib Dem peer who resigned in February last year over Project Merlin – the Government's failed attempt to get banks to lend – said the consequences of the ruthless behaviour were dire. He said: 'There is no way our economy can grow when the banks keep sucking the lifeblood out of business. Around £11 billion of negative net business lending over the past three months makes it a £100 billion bank attack on business, jobs and growth over the past three-and-a-half years.'

The figures emerged just days after the Prime Minister insisted solving the small business lending crisis was one of the most urgent problems the Government needed to address.

He also said it should have done more to convince the Government to recapitalise banks sooner and said a decision to take away the power of regulation from the Bank in 1997 returned "to haunt us". Sir Mervyn said he sympathised with people who felt angry about the banking crisis, which sparked a deep recession that caused one million job losses.

He added: "To many of you, this will seem deeply unfair, and it is. I can understand why so many people are angry." The root of the last crisis was that banks over-extended their activities in the run-up to the financial crisis, with their balance sheets increasing from around a half of national income to more than five times in a generation.