ITALY - Italy’s president asked a former International Monetary Fund official to try to form a new government, hours after he blocked the formation of a government supported by two euroskeptic, anti-establishment parties. Sparking a new political crisis, Sergio Mattarella refused to approve the 5 Star Movement and the League’s pick to head the economy ministry, Paolo Savona, an 81-year-old economist who has criticized the euro. The president said he feared a new government with Mr Savona as economy minister could put Italy’s membership in the single currency at risk. In a closely watched meeting, Mr Mattarella asked Carlo Cottarelli to instead try to form a new government. But he is unlikely to win a vote of confidence in parliament and would remain as the head of a caretaker government until fresh elections are called.

ITALY - Italy’s pro-euro elites have overreached disastrously. President Sergio Mattarella has asserted the extraordinary precedent that no political movement or constellation of parties can ever take power if they challenge the orthodoxy of monetary union.  He has inadvertently framed events as a battle between the Italian people and an eternal ‘casta’ with foreign loyalties, playing straight into the hands of the insurgent Five Star ‘Grillini’ and anti-euro Lega nationalists. He unwisely invoked the spectre of financial markets to justify his veto of euroscepticism. Taken together, his actions have made matters infinitely worse.

ITALY - Any move by Italy’s insurgent government to issue parallel liquidity will set off a red alert in financial markets and call into question the survival of Europe’s monetary union, Standard & Poor’s has warned. The rating agency said the ‘minibot’ plan being prepared by anti-euro Lega nationalists and the alt-Left Five Star Movement would create a rival payment structure based on ‘IOU’ notes. This subverts the monetary control of the European Central Bank and risks a disastrous chain-reaction. “People need to be very careful. It is equivalent to introducing a quasi-second currency,” said Jean-Michel Six, S&P’s European strategist.

EUROPE - Europeans hoping to read the Los Angeles Times this morning were out of luck. So were those who peruse the Chicago Tribune, New York Daily News, and Baltimore Sun. Instead of the latest headlines, they saw messages reading the sites were unavailable, and the papers were unavailable and exploring options to return to the EU market. It was all due to the launch of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), an EU initiative aimed at giving citizens more control over their personal information. At least two media conglomerates, Tronc and Lee Enterprises, were affected by the rule change, which requires companies to get a user’s express consent to gather personal information or face large fines, up to 4% of its global turnover or $20 million euros ($23.4 million), whichever is higher.

UK - Attacks on small businesses by vegan activists are on the rise, according to the Countryside Alliance. Death threats, stoked by social media and encouraged by international groups of activists, have caused butchers and farmers to "live in fear." Marlow Butchers in Ashford, Kent, was targeted earlier this month by activists who daubed red paint on the doors and windows of the shop. Since then, the business has been subjected to online abuse. Wayne Marlow, who runs the business with his father and brother, told Kent Online: "On the internet it has been very threatening. It has got ridiculous - activists from as far away as Australia are getting involved. They usually attack small independent businesses rather than taking on the big boys - it's quite cowardly."

USA - One of the fastest ways to ruin anything is to get lawyers involved, and lawyers are running amok in America today.  Several decades ago, Supreme Court Chief Justice Warren Burger warned that our nation would become “a society overrun by hordes of lawyers, hungry as locusts”, and that is precisely what has happened.  There are more than 1.3 million lawyers in the United States today, and it is estimated that those lawyers produce more than 40 million lawsuits each year. 

VATICAN - “They call me a heretic.” Not the words you’d expect to hear from the head of the Roman Catholic Church. But that’s what Pope Francis told a group of fellow Jesuits in Chile earlier this year, acknowledging the fierce pushback from arch-conservatives in the Vatican.

USA - Arizona is preparing for an influx of evacuees after the next major earthquake.  We all know it’s coming but how ready are we and where would we go as disaster strikes?  As CBSLA’s Elsa Ramon reports, Arizona is holding practice runs just outside of Phoenix, preparing for 400,000 evacuees from California.  Deputy Director for FEMA Wendy Smith-Reeve says the training will last three-and-a-half days on the softball field at the National Guard base near Phoenix.  Smith-Reeve says the goal is to make sure all agencies can work together and to spot any potential problem areas.

USA - Facebook used its apps to gather information about users and their friends, including some who had not signed up to the social network, reading their text messages, tracking their locations and accessing photos on their phones, a court case in California alleges. The claims of what would amount to mass surveillance are part of a lawsuit brought against the company by the former startup Six4Three, listed in legal documents filed at the superior court in San Mateo as part of a court case that has been ongoing for more than two years. A Facebook spokesperson said that Six4Three’s “claims have no merit, and we will continue to defend ourselves vigorously”.

IRELAND - ‘Yes’ voters jubilant as anti-abortion campaign concedes defeat in Ireland. As final votes counted, polls show almost 70% say yes to repealing amendment which has made termination of pregnancy illegal except in cases where it endangers mother's life. A leading anti-abortion group said Saturday that Ireland’s historic abortion referendum has resulted in a “tragedy of historic proportions” in a statement that all but admitted defeat, as two exit polls predicted an overwhelming victory for those seeking to overturn the country’s strict ban on terminations.

UK - Bishops in the diocese of Lichfield have issued new guidance to parishioners and clergy reminding them that LGBT people "can be called to roles of leadership and service in the local church".  The guidance, titled "welcoming and honouring LGBT+ people", warns that the church's reputation as being unwelcoming towards gay and transgender people is stopping young people attending. "We very much hope that they, like everyone else, feel encouraged to serve on PCCs, or as churchwardens and worship leaders, for instance, and are supported in exploring vocations to licensed lay and ordained ministries," the guidance says.  "Nobody should be told that their sexual or gender identity in itself makes them an unsuitable candidate for leadership in the Church." 

ITALY - In 1972, a time of great stress in the White House and in the Italian economy, President Richard Nixon asked to reflect on the fate of Italy’s currency, famously snapped: “I don’t give a '****' about the lira!” His line, recorded amid his Watergate travails, points to Italy being of peripheral concern to the world’s great ones.

GERMANY - Germany has had enough of American foreign policy. Angela Merkel’s visits to Russia and China are a testament to that.

On May 10, 2018, German Chancellor Angela Merkel openly said that Europe can no longer count on the United States to protect it, hinting that the European continent would begin to “take destiny into its own hands.” The comments were, of course, a direct reference to US President Donald Trump’s ludicrous but anticipated decision to completely nuke the Iranian nuclear accord, also known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA). “It is no longer such that the United States simply protects us, but Europe must take its destiny in its own hands. That's the task of the future," Merkel reportedly said during a speech honoring French President Emmanuel Macron.

USA - Today, America is nearly 70 trillion dollars in debt, and that debt is shooting higher at an exponential rate.  Usually most of the focus is on the national debt, which is now 21 trillion dollars and rising, but when you total all forms of debt in our society together it comes to a grand total just short of 70 trillion dollars.  Many people seem to believe that the debt imbalances that existed prior to the great financial crisis of 2008 have been solved, but that is not the case at all.  We are living in the terminal phase of the greatest debt bubble in history, and with each passing day that mountain of debt just keeps on getting bigger and bigger. 

USA - It was supposed to be a joyous occasion, marking the commencement of a new and better phase in the life of nearly 1000 graduates. Instead, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told the 984 new lieutenants who are graduating from the US Air Force Academy to prepare for the worst: war. To be sure, this is not the first time time Mattis urged those around him to prepare for war. And while not as intense, the warning is similar to that issued by a US Marine Corps general who last December, warned troops stationed in Norway to be prepared for a coming war. “I hope I’m wrong, but there’s a war coming,” General Robert Neller told them. The warnings came a day before Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told troops at Fort Bragg, North Carolina, that "storm clouds are gathering" over the Korean Peninsula.