The flagship of the plan is the Grand Renaissance Dam being built in the Benishangul-Gumuz region near to Sudan; currently 21% complete, it will have a 6 gigawatt capacity once finished.

The Chief Executive Officer of the state-run Ethiopian Electric Power Corporation, Mihret Debebe, said that “the dam is being built in the middle of the river so you can't carry out construction work while the river flowed.” The diversion of the Nile around the site “now enables us to carry out civil engineering work without difficulties. The aim is to divert the river by a few meters and then allow it to flow on its natural course.”

“We see building evidence of a cyclical downturn,” said Fredrik Nerbrand, HSBC’s global asset guru. “We find it highly troubling that the eurozone is still marred in a recession at the same time as our cyclical indicators appear to have peaked.” The bank said there is a market “disconnect” between the world’s gloomy outlook and talk of tapering by the US Federal Reserve, the supposed moment when it starts to wind down its $85 billion of monthly bond purchases.

It is surprising to me that HSBC’s leading indicator has taken so long to buckle, since commodities topped in September and the Dutch CPB index of world trade contracted over the February-March period. Rarely has there ever been such an equity boom on such quicksand. Mr Nerbrand said slowing momentum “should send shivers down the spine of any investors that are long risk”.

After almost five years we are still in a contained global depression, struggling with a world record saving rate of 25 percent, and a chronic shortage of demand. The US has kept the world afloat by running down its own saving rate to 2.7 percent this year. This is not a remotely tenable equilibrium. Hang on to your seats when that snaps back.

The new set of regulations is known as “Basel III”, and it was developed by the Bank for International Settlements. The Bank for International Settlements has been called “the central bank for central banks”, and it is headquartered in Basel, Switzerland. 58 major central banks (including the Federal Reserve) belong to the Bank for International Settlements, and the decisions made in Basel often have more of an impact on the direction of the global economy than anything the president of the United States or the US Congress are doing.

All you have to do is to look back at the last financial crisis to see an example of this. Basel II and Basel 2.5 played a major role in precipitating the subprime mortgage meltdown. Now a new set of regulations known as “Basel III” are being rolled out. The implementation of these new regulations is beginning this year, and they will be completely phased in by 2019. These new regulations dramatically increase capital requirements and significantly restrict the use of leverage.

Those certainly sound like good goals, the problem is that the entire global financial system is based on credit at this point, and these new regulations are going to substantially reduce the flow of credit. The only way that the giant debt bubble that we are all living in can continue to persist is if it continues to expand. By restricting the flow of credit, these new regulations threaten to burst the debt bubble and bring down the entire global economy.

Not that the current global financial system is sustainable by any means. Anyone with half a brain can see that the global financial system is a pyramid scheme that is destined to collapse. But Basel III may cause it to collapse faster than it might otherwise have.

At the same time, people "who through no fault of their own do not know the Gospel of Christ and his church but sincerely seek God and, moved by grace, try to do his will as it is known through the dictates of conscience can attain eternal salvation," Rosica wrote. He added, "No person is excluded from salvation simply because of so-called original sin; one can only lose their salvation through serious personal sin of their own account."

Francis made headlines when he said in a May 22 homily: "The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the blood of Christ - all of us, not just Catholics. Everyone! 'Father, the atheists?'" Francis said, as if asking himself. "Even the atheists. Everyone!" Francis said in answering his Socratic-style question. "And this blood makes us children of God of the first class!" Francis said. "We are created children in the likeness of God, and the blood of Christ has redeemed us all! And we all have a duty to do good. And this commandment for everyone to do good, I think, is a beautiful path towards peace."

Atheist Hemant Mehta wrote in his Friendly Atheist blog: "Atheists, according to Christians, are going to hell unless we accept Christ's divinity. We already knew that. It was still an unusual and welcome gesture from the pope to recognize that everyone, regardless of beliefs, can do good and 'be saved' - at least it was a step up from what we're used to hearing."

"Conversations With God" author Neale Donald Walsch told United Press International Tuesday evening: "It is regrettable that the hidden hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church chose to officially retract the recent statement on eternal damnation bravely made by its new leader, Pope Francis. This rapid retrenchment wiped out what appeared to be one of the major advances in theological thinking within that institution in the past 500 years."

"The restoration of unity among all Christians is one of the principal concerns of the Second Vatican Council. Christ the Lord founded one Church and one Church only." The Catholic Church believes that the Church is necessary for salvation and that only through the Catholic Church alone that a person can obtain salvation.

"For it is through Christ's Catholic Church alone, which is the universal help towards salvation, that the fullness of the means of salvation can be obtained." The Ecumenical movement is an initiative of the Catholic Church in order to attain Christian unity. Heresy was the main reason why Christian unity was severed, and up to now the Church through God's grace is finding ways to reunite with her separated brethren.

"The term Ecumenical movement indicates the initiatives and activities encouraged and organized, according to the needs of the Church and as opportunity offered to promote Christian unity."

The Pope has asked the universal Church to pray for two intentions during the hour of adoration:

For the Church spread throughout the world and united today in the adoration of the Most Holy Eucharist as a sign of unity.

- For those around the world who still suffer slavery and who are victims of war, human trafficking, drug running, and slave labor. For the children and women who are suffering from every type of violence.

- Also, for all those who find themselves in economically precarious situations, above all for the unemployed, the elderly, migrants, the homeless, prisoners, and those who experience marginalization. That the Church’s prayer and its active nearness give them comfort and assistance in hope and strength and courage in defending human dignity.

Meet SheZow, the star of a cartoon debuting Saturday on the Hub, a kids' cable channel co-owned by cable programming giant Discovery Communications and toy manufacturer Hasbro Inc. In "SheZow," a 12-year-old boy — named Guy — uses a magic ring to transform himself into a legendary crime fighter. When evil lurks, Guy says, "You go girl!" and becomes SheZow.

"When I first heard about the show, my reaction was 'Are you out of your minds?'" said Margaret Loesch, chief executive of the Hub. "Then I looked at it and I thought, 'This is just funny.'" The Hub is hoping some of SheZow's magic powers rub off on it so it can better battle the giants of children's television: Nickelodeon, Disney Channel and Cartoon Network.

The report by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, a top policy advisory group for the developed world, summed up the bind America's central bank now faces. Low interest rates have helped the US economy, but could inflate bubbles in the financial market. That suggests the Fed might have to slow down its bond buying program "in the near future," the OECD said.

The risk is that investors might respond to this by bidding interest rates sharply higher. This would likely hit the stock market and home prices, while also hurting exporters by raising the value of the dollar.

They didn’t just vote it down, they did it overwhelmingly: 71 to 27. Let’s be clear — this wasn’t a bill that would have mandated the labeling of foods with genetically modified ingredients. No, it was far less provocative. This measure would have simply said it was okay for states to decide to do that for themselves.

“The concept we’re talking about today is a fairly commonsense and non-radical idea,” said the amendment’s sponsor, Senator Bernie Sanders (Independent for Vermont) according to the Huffington Post. “All over the world, in the European Union, in many other countries around the world, dozens and dozens of countries, people are able to look at the food that they are buying and determine through labeling whether or not that product contains genetically modified organisms.”

Vermont and more-recently Connecticut have both decided to label foods in their state. But they are concerned big-wigs like Monsanto will sue, particularly in light of this failure of a decision in the Senate. One of the many senators who voted against what would seem to be commonsense and non-radical, Debbie Stabenow (Democrat for Michigan) says that labeling GMO foods runs counter to what we “know” about them. This knowledge, she says, is that GMO foods are safe, no more dangerous than their “conventional counterparts.”

Apparently ignoring any of the research that runs to the contrary of that being put out by Monsanto-supporters, Senator Stabenow talks about GMO crops as if they are the answer to the world’s prayers. That they are able to “resist crop diseases and improve nutritional content.” Stabenow and others like her must be getting their briefs directly from those within Monsanto itself.

Google is currently engaged in a battle over unpaid taxes in the UK, and which has led political commentators to now call for a new system of global taxation. Not surprisingly, this has become the chief topic of discussion at a series of global summits taking place during May and June.

So is Google supplying the Trojan horse needed to implement a global taxation system that many have been warning about for so many years? Maybe. Will Bilderberg’s global elite use this perfect crisis moment as a pretext to build the framework for global taxation? Most likely. If the idea passes through Bilderberg in June, will it then be rubber stamped later at the G8? Highly likely.

Although happy to float such a revolutionary idea in the media in advance of back-to-back Google and Bilderberg summits at the Grove Hotel, and later at the G8, one thing which global taxation advocates fail to mention here is that if you institute a global taxation system then you would then need a global government to administrate it. Yes, you heard that right: global taxation = global government.