In a strongly worded speech in the European Parliament this morning, UKIP leader Nigel Farage warned that the EU is increasingly being controlled by big business and centralised bureaucracy, stating that the forthcoming European elections would be the battleground to bring back national democracy.

He went on to argue that people don’t want a ‘United States of Europe’ but a Europe of sovereign states trading and working together. Farage also said the European elections would ‘mark a watershed’ in the battle for national democracy.

Bacteria harboring the encoding gene that makes them resistant have been found on every continent except for Antarctica. Tests at two wastewater treatment plants in northern China revealed antibiotic-resistant bacteria — “superbugs” carrying New Delhi Metallo-beta-lactamase (NDM-1), a multidrug-resistant gene first identified in India in 2010 — were not only escaping purification but also breeding and spreading their dangerous cargo.

NDM-1 is able to make such common bacteria as E-coli, salmonella, and K pneumonias resistant to even the strongest available antibiotics. Tests at two wastewater treatment plants in northern China revealed antibiotic-resistant bacteria were not only escaping purification but also breeding and spreading their dangerous cargo.

The study, led by Rice University environmental engineer Pedro Alvarez, appeared this month in the American Chemical Society journal Environmental Science and Technology Letters. “It’s scary,” Alvarez said. “There’s no antibiotic that can kill them. We only realized they exist just a little while ago when a Swedish man got infected in India, in New Delhi. Now, people are beginning to realize that more and more tourists trying to go to the upper waters of the Ganges River are getting these infections that cannot be treated.”

The figures, scheduled for release at 9 am tomorrow in Washington, were inadvertently posted on the Treasury’s website. Japan’s holdings rose $12 billion to $1.186 trillion, the figures showed.

China’s swelling foreign-exchange reserves, reported today to have reached a world record $3.82 trillion at the end of December, may sustain the nation’s appetite for US debt. Capital inflows and intervention to limit gains in the yuan have contributed to China building up currency holdings that are a third of the global total.

This is being hailed as the first home appliance "botnet" and the first cyberattack from the Internet of Things. A botnet is a series of computers that seem to be ordinary computers functioning in people's homes and businesses, but are really secretly controlled by hackers.

The Internet of Things, is a new term in the tech industry that refers to a concept where every device in your house gets its own computer chip, software, and connection to the Internet: your fridge, thermostat, smart water meter, door locks, etc.To a hacker, they all become computers that can be hacked and controlled.

In this case, hackers broke into more than 100,000 everyday consumer gadgets, such as home-networking routers, connected multi-media centers, televisions, and at least one refrigerator, Proofpoint says. They then used those objects to send more than 750,000 malicious emails to enterprises and individuals worldwide.

It’s triggered by the recent spending bill passed by Congress – all 1, 582 pages of it. Wouldn’t you think that before authorizing something so massive that our members of Congress would have read it? Or at the very least, have hired someone to read it and summarize it for them? Nope.

According to one very amused congressman, Earl Blumenauer (Democrat for Oregon) nobody read this massive bill. Trust me, this is really funny. You’ll laugh too.

On Capitol Hill on Thursday, CNSNews.com asked Blumenauer: “The omnibus bill yesterday, it was 1,582 pages, did you have a chance to read all the pages before voting on it?” Blumenauer laughed and said: “Nobody did!” “Nobody did?” said the CNSNews.com reporter. “Nope,” said Blumenauer.

This isn’t even “corruption.” It goes way beyond that. This is our elected representatives giving us the middle finger and then laughing about it. Because it’s all a big joke to them. They make salaries most of us can only dream about earning and they don’t even have enough respect for those of us who put them into office to, I don’t know, do their jobs!

How much do they make, you ask? Members of Congress are paid $174,000 per year for their “service.” Some with special jobs receive more. For Example, House Speaker John Boehner receives $223,500.

Then, of course, there is a budget for each office. Are you sitting down?

Each office budgets between $1.27 million to $1.546 million. Congress has 535 members. So at the minimum, $679,450,000 is paid to run the offices of these people who do not care enough to read the bills that they are voting on… in our best interests, of course. Almost $700 million dollars is spent on staffing and office expenses, and no one had time to read a bill before voting ‘yes’ and signing it into law.

The second came from London where the UK government once again revealed its views of a united Europe through a rather hysterical reaction to the recent lifting of restrictions for Romanian and Bulgarian workers. The UK’s response, which was strongly criticised by many in Brussels, did not come as a surprise.

Regardless of the fact that the British reaction is narrow minded and only seems to be playing into the hands of the Eurosceptics, the fact is that the UK has always had a rather different idea about Europe.

Just as the French socialist politician and self-proclaimed Europeanist, Michel Rocard, stressed in his 2008 book titled “Oui à la Turquie”, the UK was always of a different view regarding the future of Europe.

“I realised”, wrote Rocard, “that the project of a federal Europe died in 1972 after the adhesion of the UK”. In his opinion, Great Britain has diligently pushed back on all possible enlargements, blocking any acceleration of integration. What the UK really wants is a free community of customs and trade and not a Unified Europe, according to this French politician.

The UK’s view is in stark contrast to the dream of a United States for Europe.

Wang Min, the party chief of Liaoning province in northeast China where the vessel is reportedly being built, said the carrier’s construction would take six years and added that China’s navy eventually planned to build four such carriers.

Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post estimated that the new carrier, which is being built in the northeastern port of Dalian, would be completed by 2018. Chinese language reports about the carrier’s development were reportedly deleted over the weekend, prompting claims that Beijing had hoped to keep the project “low profile”.

However, military strategists and Xi Jinping, the Chinese president, have made no secret of their desire to see China build a powerful “blue water navy” that will boost the country’s international status and its controls over the seas.

Take a look at a key player in the paradox: sugar growers. In Florida it is called, Big Sugar. In other states it is beets, maple syrup and most ubiquitous of all: high-fructose corn syrup extracted from an unlimited corn crop heavily subsidized by taxpayers.

“30-40 percent of healthcare expenditures in the USA go to help address issues that are closely tied to the excess consumption of sugar.” (Credit Suisse Report: “Sugar: Consumption At A Crossroads," September 2013) In Forbes Magazine, contributor Dan Monroe summarized, “Basically, the US healthcare system spends about $1 trillion per year (and possibly more) fighting the effects of excess sugar consumption.”

“Higher health spending per capita tends to be associated with lower mortality rates and higher life expectancy, but this is not the case for the United States” (“OECD: Switzerland tops 34 nations for life expectancy at 82.8," UPI, January 7, 2014). American politics are organized to protect corporate interests that make voters and taxpayers sick, and there is no better example: in a candy bar or a bowl of healthy granola, sugar is the big stake in the heart of American health.

ABC 11, January 18, 2014: Folks still have fears. “After the Japan accident and the big scare from that… this is something to be concerned about a fire at a nuclear plant power,” said Raleigh resident Brad Henningsgaard.

The fire is the latest problem at the plant. It just went back online last month after the Nuclear Regulatory Commission shut it down after a flaw was found in the reactor. It was also taken offline in May, when an inspection revealed early signs of corrosion in the reactor’s vessel. “I hope that Duke pulls this together and gets this thing straight,” said Henningsgaard.

“It’s a nuclear power plant and it poses a danger to the surrounding area,” added Raleigh resident Peter Henkel. People are concerned considering how many incidents have happened within a one-year time span.

The FT reports that The Sleepwalkers by Cambridge historian Christopher Clark, 1913 by Florian Illies, and Der Grosse Krieg by German political scientist Herfried Münkler have all questioned a German-centric account of the blame for WWI — and they’ve sold very well accordingly. These sales match up with public opinion polls that show only 19 percent of Germans believe their country was “chiefly responsible” for WWI.

The question of guilt in WWI is complex, but this shift in German sentiment has more to do with underlying cultural changes in the united Berlin Republic than with millions of Germans flocking to the historical archives to make deep studies in early twentieth century history. Both Germany and Japan are becoming ‘normal countries’ again, reasserting their right to define and act in their national interest. Nationalists in Japan still welcome their close US alliance given their concerns about China.

In Germany, the situation is different. Russia is a nuisance rather than a threat in the eyes of most Germans, and it is harder to make a compelling case for a US alliance to younger Germans than to older ones. The wave of German adulation over Obama temporarily patched things over, but the NSA revelations have damaged Brand US more in Germany than just about anywhere else.

A new generation of Germans is looking at the world and at German history and is likely to see things in different ways than their parents and grandparents.

“The pope is consistent with all he said as a cardinal, and as pope he will undoubtedly make happen what he said he would do when he was a cardinal,” Argentinian Rabbi Abraham Skorka, a friend of the pope, told The (London) Sunday Times, based on conversations with Francis.

“What we said to each other was between us, but I believe that, yes, he will open the archives… The issue is a very sensitive one and we must continue analyzing it,” he said. Francis’s close ties to the Jews of Argentina is fairly well known. He and Skorka have been close friends since the days when Francis was known as Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio, archbishop of Buenos Aires.

In September 2013, in fact, Skorka spent a week at St Martha’s House, the papal residence at the Vatican. The two have also coauthored a book, On Heaven and Earth, and have prayed from each other’s pulpits. Earlier this month, the pope confirmed a much-anticipated first official visit to the Holy Land, scheduled for May 24-26, during which he will visit Israel, the West Bank and Jordan.

This solar lull is baffling scientists, because right now the Sun should be awash with activity. It has reached its solar maximum, the point in its 11-year cycle where activity is at a peak. This giant ball of plasma should be peppered with sunspots, exploding with flares and spewing out huge clouds of charged particles into space in the form of coronal mass ejections.

But apart from the odd event, like some recent solar flares, it has been very quiet. And this damp squib of a maximum follows a solar minimum - the period when the Sun's activity troughs - that was longer and lower than scientists expected.

The era of solar inactivity in the 17th Century coincided with a period of bitterly cold winters in Europe. Londoners enjoyed frost fairs on the Thames after it froze over, snow cover across the continent increased, the Baltic Sea iced over - the conditions were so harsh, some describe it as a mini-Ice Age. And Professor Lockwood believes that this regional effect could have been in part driven by the dearth of activity on the Sun, and may happen again if our star continues to wane.

The report reveals some disturbing truths about the methods taken by the Waqf to remove any ties that the Jewish people have to the Temple Mount and how Israeli institutions cooperated with these actions. Kaspi said the confidential report strongly criticizes the policies of former Attorney General Menachem Mazuz, who prevented legal authorities from acting on the Temple Mount.

"The report paints a picture of incompetence, negligence and indifference of all government officials related to the most important archaeological site in the state of Israel," Kaspi fired. "The IAA, and the Israeli police, the Jerusalem Municipality - none of them have dealt effectively with the problem. Attorney General Menachem Mazuz abandoned the place to the mercy of the Muslim Waqf and stopped the ability of law enforcement agencies to address the issue."

Kaspi claims that Mazuz lied when he stated that he was unaware of the issue. "We know the police approached him and so did the IAA; we also reported the destruction and vandalism [on the Mount]," Kaspi stated. "Today there is some improvement, but there are still serious problems - the Waqf continues to destroy all archaeological finds on the Mount as a matter of policy."

Kaspi's remarks follow news earlier this month that the Waqf has been illegally drilling on Judaism's holiest site, as revealed through telling video footage. In addition to frequent vandalism, the Temple Mount is frequently closed to Jewish visitors and is often the site of anti-Jewish discrimination. Jews are prevented from praying or performing any other religious rituals, while Muslim visitors pray freely.

Muslim anger over the site has escalated since MKs have announced efforts to equalize prayer rights at the site, through legislation which would allow full religious freedom.

It is expected to be stressed to the foreign ambassadors that their stand is unacceptable and creates the impression they are only looking for a platform to blame Israel. Minister Lieberman was instructed to tell the summoned ambassadors that Israel is making great efforts in order to allow the continued dialogue with the Palestinians, and that the position taken by these countries, aside from being biased and unbalanced while ignoring reality, significantly harms the possibility of an agreement being reached.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dismissed international critics of Israel's West Bank settlements as hypocrites. Speaking to foreign journalists, Netanyahu said Thursday that claiming settlements were an obstacle to peace was "bogus".

According to him, the EU summoned Israeli ambassadors and protested the construction in the West Bank over "a few houses", but did not summon Palestinian diplomats over Palestinian misdeeds. "I think it is time to stop this hypocrisy," he concluded, "Israel, which goes to great length in order to maintain peace and battle terror for the benefit of both Israelis and Palestinians, is always criticized."

Deep beneath desert sands, an embattled Middle Eastern state has built a covert nuclear bomb, using technology and materials provided by friendly powers or stolen by a clandestine network of agents. It is the stuff of pulp thrillers and the sort of narrative often used to characterise the worst fears about the Iranian nuclear programme. In reality, though, neither US nor British intelligence believe Tehran has decided to build a bomb, and Iran's atomic projects are under constant international monitoring.

The exotic tale of the bomb hidden in the desert is a true story, though. It's just one that applies to another country. In an extraordinary feat of subterfuge, Israel managed to assemble an entire underground nuclear arsenal – now estimated at 80 warheads, on a par with India and Pakistan – and even tested a bomb nearly half a century ago, with a minimum of international outcry or even much public awareness of what it was doing.

Despite the fact that Israel's nuclear programme has been an open secret since a disgruntled technician, Mordechai Vanunu, blew the whistle on it in 1986, the official Israeli position is still never to confirm or deny its existence. When the former speaker of the Knesset, Avraham Burg, broke the taboo last month, declaring Israeli possession of both nuclear and chemical weapons and describing the official non-disclosure policy as "outdated and childish" a rightwing group formally called for a police investigation for treason.