That once-great news organisation seemed determined to turn every bulletin into a seminar on the life and opinions of Ralph Miliband [Marxist father of the leader of the Opposition in Parliament]. As Lefties would say, there was a sub-text here. The BBC went well beyond objectivity. It was using the Miliband affair to attack its enemies. In so doing, it was also exposing its own cast of mind.

When John Birt became director-general of the BBC, he realised that there was a problem with many of his journalists. In recent years, there had been an infestation of soggy Leftism (my paraphrase, not his words). These characters often lived in an intellectual bubble, socialising solely with their colleagues and with others who held the same opinions. They never met anyone who argued that there might be a case for the death penalty, or that Maggie was not a monster any more than Reagan was a slow-witted war-mongering cowboy.

As they all held the same views, they also persuaded themselves that theirs were the only permissible ones and that anyone who disagreed was morally inferior. Some Marxists used to talk approvingly of “fused groups”: cells of like-minded comrades who would reinforce each others’ revolutionary rigour. The BBC was in danger of becoming a fused group.

Egypt was hit by a series of terrorist attacks on Monday in apparent retaliation against the country's security forces for deadly clashes the previous day which left at least 53 people dead. In the Suez Canal city of Ismailia, six Egyptian soldiers were killed in a drive-by shooting on their patrol. Shortly afterwards, a car bomb detonated outside South Sinai's security directorate, killing four people and injuring 48.

Another attack, by rocket-propelled grenade, damaged a satellite dish, part of the country's main television transmission system, in the upmarket Cairo suburb of Maadi. Satellite television stations, some private, have played a major role in drumming up support for the army's takeover of Egypt from the Muslim Brotherhood's President Mohammed Morsi.

The Grid said reserve supplies of electricity will be wafer thin after a dramatic fall in the amount of coal-based power plants operating across the UK. And it warned it may have to issue NISMs – warnings to industry to bring mothballed plant into action or increase generation to cope.

National Grid expert Chris Train said that in a cold winter, the UK's electricity "margin" or safety buffer will be just 5 per cent, almost half last year's level and the lowest since early in 2007. He told an industry conference this morning: "Things will be tighter than they have been historically."

He insisted it was wrong to say Britain faced blackouts and that he was confident extra energy would flow from the Continent if the country risked a supply shortage. He would not comment on the likelihood manufacturers may be forced to cut back on their electricity or gas use at times of peak demand.

The courses where Barack Obama plays at Andrews Air Force Base and Fort Belvoir (146 rounds to date as president, he’s probably on the links as I write this) are still open. The commisaries are closed. People can’t shop for groceries. But the President gets to play golf.

Mr Obama can play golf on a course which demands upkeep, watering, staff etc, but this couple in their 70s, who own their home outright, who don’t need any federal employee assistance, don’t get to sleep in their own bed. That is pretty messed up.

In a crony capitalist world some are more equal than others.

From TheLibertyPaper.org: Last Thursday park rangers arrived at the elderly couple’s home and forced them to leave. Their home sits on federal lands. Even though the Spencers have owned their home for more than 4 decades, the park ranger told them they could not return until a budget was passed. “I had to be sure and get his walker and his scooter that he has to go in,” Mrs Spencer said of her husband Ralph.

A fire at Camp Pendleton, a major Marine Corps base north of San Diego, caused 230 residents to evacuate their homes in a housing unit, the Associated Press reports. The base’s hospital suffered a power outage, leading to the evacuation of 30 patients. By late Sunday night, the 2,500-acre fire was nearly one-fourth contained.

Another fire further north in Orange County broke out at a plant nursery, causing 23 area residents to evacuate, and smoke from a small fire blanketed a key interchange in northern Los Angeles County, bringing traffic to a halt for 90 minutes. Southern California is currently in peak wildfire season, where hot, dry conditions are exacerbated by Santa Ana winds, which include gusts of nearly 100 mph.

Most of the activists are described in the population registry as Jewish. In its 26-page ruling, the court explained it did not have the authority to determine ethnicity or statehood. In an editorial, the Haaretz newspaper described the move as a "defeat for Israeliness."

'Weighty implications'

"The state and its legislators must relate to all its citizens as Israeli citizens and eliminate the nationality line item in the Population Registry," the paper said. The court said that any recognition of Israeli nationality would have "weighty implications" on the state of Israel and endanger Israel's founding principle: To be a Jewish state for the Jewish people, the Associated Press news agency said.

As President Barack Obama proclaimed a few years ago on this occasion, "Our citizens of German descent excel in every discipline and open our minds to the expanses of human possibility. When we drive across a suspension bridge, listen to music played on a Steinway piano, or send a child to kindergarten, their unique traditions and customs surround us."

So why are there so many German-Americans in the United States anyway? For some history, we turn to an English translation of "The German-Americans: An Ethnic Experience" by Willi Paul Adams from the Max Kade German Center. A slow but steady stream of Germans immigrated to the US starting in the 1680s, coming to represent 9% of the total population around the close of the 18th century. It all started with that fateful day in October:

On October 6, 1683, thirteen Quaker families from Krefeld arrived in Philadelphia. From the outset, their settlement on the northern outskirts of Philadelphia was called Germantown. From then on, the tolerant Quaker colony of Pennsylvania served as a beachhead for the immigration of pietistic and other Protestant minorities, notably dissidents of the Reformed and Lutheran persuasion. When the first American census was taken in 1790, Pennsylvania's German population was put at 225,000 which amounts to a third of the state's entire population.

If we further count those Germans who in the course of the 18th century settled in the English colonies of New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia and South Carolina, especially those from the Palatinate, Baden and Wurttemberg, and include their children, then Americans of German origin were about 9% of the total population of the youthful United States around the close of the 18th century.

The demand for German military presence in the immediate vicinity of Israel has been raised in Berlin already in 2002 and is being systematically pursued ever since, particularly via the German naval mission off the Lebanese coast. An eventual Gaza intervention would not only serve to prevent further combat, but, as in the Lebanon mission, also reinforce the friendly forces - on both sides. With this in mind, Berlin and the EU have been active for years in the Palestinian Autonomous Territories and have influential structures at their disposal also in Israel.

In the meantime, the German government is seeking to benefit from the conflict, through allegedly non-partisan "mediators". Turkey and Arab allies are being used as proxies. Since the founding of the state of Israel, the establishment of a military balance of forces has been sought between the parties to the conflict, permitting Western industrial nations to play one off against the other.

"A necessary condition to getting a true solution [to the Israeli-Palestinian] conflict was and remains clear as the sun: ending the refusal to recognize the right of the Jews to a homeland of their own in the land of their fathers," Netanyahu said. "That is the most important key to solving the conflict."

Netanyahu's words came at the start of a conference marking 20 years since the founding of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, the site of Netanyahu's famous "Bar-Ilan speech" from four years ago, where he stated his willingness for a two-state solution. Those who anticipated that Netanyahu might use the same venue to again break new-ground on the Palestinians issue were disappointed.

Rather then present a "vision" speech of where he thought the negotiations with the Palestinians were headed, Netanyahu used the opportunity to emphasize that a Palestinian recognition of Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people was a necessary condition to any agreement. He said that since the first Arab attack on a home housing Jewish immigrants in Jaffa in 1921, the root of the conflict has not been the "occupation," the "territories" or the settlements, but rather an Arab refusal to recognize the Jews' right to a sovereign state in their historic homeland.

The nation has been at the debt limit since May 17. Since then, the Treasury Department has undertaken what it calls "extraordinary measures," which include delaying pension fund payments and drawing down an emergency fund.

Once those measures are exhausted, the government would have only enough money to pay its bills as it has revenue on any given day. As of October 17, the Treasury expects its cash-on-hand will be reduced to $30 billion. The government typically spends $60 billion every day.

It's unclear exactly how Treasury would juggle those payments. During the last debt-limit crisis in 2011, the Treasury Department ruled out many stopgap measures to maintain spending and pay its debts, such as selling off assets. The United States has more than $350 billion in gold reserves on its balance sheet, for example, but Treasury officials said a "fire sale" on gold would hurt the dollar and the economy, according to a 2012 report from the Treasury Office of the Inspector General.

The Treasury has no practical way of reducing payments by an across-the-board percentage to stay under the debt limit. "If we have insufficient cash on hand, it would be impossible for the United States of America to meet all of its obligations for the first time in our history," Lew said.

An Associated Press analysis of households in the 10 biggest economies shows that families continue to spend cautiously and have pulled hundreds of billions of dollars out of stocks, cut borrowing for the first time in decades and poured money into savings and bonds that offer puny interest payments, often too low to keep up with inflation.

"It doesn't take very much to destroy confidence, but it takes an awful lot to build it back," says Ian Bright, senior economist at ING, a global bank based in Amsterdam. "The attitude toward risk is permanently reset."

A flight to safety on such a global scale is unprecedented since the end of World War II.

The implications are huge: Shunning debt and spending less can be good for one family's finances. When hundreds of millions do it together, it can starve the global economy.

MasterCard will be the first major payment network to join FIDO. The Alliance is developing an open industry standard for biometric data such as fingerprints to be used for identification online. The goal is to replace clunky passwords and take friction out of logging on and purchasing using mobile devices.

Instead all those giving evidence in court would make a secular pledge which it is thought would make it fairer and more relevant for people to help them understand the importance of what they are saying. The proposals are to be debated this month by the Magistrates’ Association, and if agreed will be put forward to the Ministry of Justice.

Ian Abrahams, a magistrate from Bristol, said he had often seen people shrug their shoulders when presented with the religious oath, not caring that they are being asked to swear on the bible.

Under his proposals all holy books of all religions would be removed and people would instead read an affirmation promising “very sincerely” to tell the truth.

Backed by Tory and Labour Eurosceptics, he is set to force a Commons vote on the issue in five weeks’ time.

If he wins, it would mean Parliament will rule that the referendum should be fast-forwarded to next October. Mr Cameron reacted with fury when he learned of the proposal last night – and immediately vowed to stop it at all costs. Downing Street made it clear the Prime Minister will refuse point-blank to accelerate the referendum.

In a defiant response, a No 10 spokesman said: ‘We will not allow this amendment to be passed under any circumstances. The PM will not let it stand.’ Aides would not say how the PM intended to veto the amendment but he is prepared to withdraw the entire legislation if Mr Afriyie wins. And he may simply defy the parliamentary vote. It sets the scene for an extraordinary confrontation when MPs vote on the issue on November 8.

A senior Government source said: ‘This is a deliberate attempt to sabotage the Prime Minister’s referendum plan. It is simply not possible to renegotiate our membership of the EU in under 12 months.’ Windsor MP Mr Afriyie, who earlier this year was accused of plotting a Tory leadership bid, has even named the exact date he wants the referendum: October 23 – the anniversary of the Battle of El Alamein, the turning point in the Second World War.

Mr Afriyie, a self-made millionaire, will tomorrow table an amendment to the legislation which paves the way for the 2017 vote in an attempt to bring it forward to 2014. The rebel, who says Britain should cut its ties with Brussels unless key powers are returned, claims he has ‘widespread support’ from Tory and Labour MPs.

It is therefore right to ask, “Is Germany taking its responsibilities seriously for its neighbors in the East, the Middle East and the southern Mediterranean? What contribution should Germany make to winning the emerging powers as partners in the international order? And if we seek a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, what role are we prepared to play in crises in far-off regions?”

Behind his myriad phrases about “freedom”, “peace” and “prosperity”, Gauck made his real concerns abundantly clear. In future, Germany should participate far more actively in military interventions. “Our main interest,” according to Gauck, is “to preserve the political and military order and make them fit for the future, especially in confusing times.” Gauck’s speech emphasized that the next government — regardless of its eventual composition — will pursue a much more aggressive foreign policy.

What is the political significance of Gauck’s speech? It shows that the period of Germany’s relative foreign policy reserve after the Second World War is over. Against the background of a return of the euro crisis and the intensification of class antagonisms in Germany and internationally, Gauck is committing the ruling elite to pursue Germany’s geo-strategic and economic interests by military means once again.