AUSTRALIA - In a virtually uninhabitable section of South Australia, a discovery has been made which could rock the world. Some are calling it the biggest discovery of oil in 50 years.
USA - The USDA 'rubber-stamped' the first of many 'dangerous' new genetically engineered (GE) seeds Friday under the department's new streamlined approval process.
SWITZERLAND - To avoid paying taxes, the rich are emptying their bank accounts in Switzerland and investing in art. This has spawned a new business of storing such works tax- and duty-free in warehouses across the world.
APARECIDA, BRAZIL - Pope Francis urged Catholics to resist the "ephemeral idols" of money, power and pleasure during a pilgrimage Wednesday to one of the most important shrines in Latin America
CHINA - Another “growth story” is dying before our very eyes. China is rapidly approaching ZERO growth. This is not less growth, but ZERO growth as in full-scale economic collapse from the days of 12% GDP growth per year.
CHINA - China's manufacturing engine lost further momentum in July and the job market weakened, a survey showed on Wednesday, complicating a transition to consumer-driven growth and boding ill for so many leveraged to the world's second-largest economy.
UK - It is one of the many wonders of our Royal Family that its babies are perfectly, almost eerily, timed with the economic cycle. Prince Charles' birth in 1948 coincided with the start of a 25-year period of strong economic recovery, while Prince William's arrival in June 1982 heralded the end of a bitter recession and a quarter century of unparalleled prosperity.
USA - The pension nightmare that is at the heart of the horrific financial crisis in Detroit is just the tip of the iceberg of the coming retirement crisis that will shake America to the core.
USA - Detroit declared bankruptcy due in no small part to $3 billion in unfunded public employee pensions owed a sprawling city workforce that kept growing even as the city’s population shriveled, but a Washington Examiner analysis found that 19 major American cities have even bigger ratios of such workers to residents.
USA - Twelve years later, the cranes and earthmovers around the National Security Agency are still at work, tearing up pavements and uprooting trees to make room for a larger workforce and more powerful computers.
ITALY - Three Italian ministries have signed a decree banning the cultivation of a type of genetically modified maize, citing environmental concerns, the agriculture ministry said on Friday.
UK - Low impact: that's how Professor Nigel Gibbens, Defra's chief vet, describes the effect of the Schmallenberg Virus on our farming industry. He might have extensive experience of exotic diseases and their control, but I and everyone who has experienced the effects of this crippling disease would describe it as far from "low impact".
USA - The Department of Justice told a federal court this week that the NSA’s spying “cannot be challenged in a court of law”. This is especially dramatic given that numerous federal judges and legal scholars – including a former FISA judge – say that the FISA spying “court” is nothing but a kangaroo court.
USA - 10 Things You Could Do (in the USA) in 1975 That You Can't Do Now:
USA - If full-body scanners and TSA pat-downs make you feel uncomfortable, you now have an alternate option – making the agency like you and paying a fee of $85 every five years.