As rich economies sink deeper into a slough of debt after yet another wave of euro financial and banking stress and US hiring hesitancy, everyone is looking back to the US Federal Reserve, European Central Bank, Bank of England and Bank of Japan to stabilize the situation once more.

What's for sure is that quantitative easing, whereby the "Big Four" central banks have for four years effectively created new money by expanding their balance sheets and buying mostly government bonds from their banks, is back on the agenda for all their upcoming policy meetings.

Government credit cards are all but maxed out and commercial banks' persistent instability, existential fears and reluctance to lend means the explosion of newly minted cash has yet to spark the broad money supply growth needed to generate more goods and services.

In other words, electronic money creation to date - whether directly through bond buying in the United States or Britain or in a more oblique form of cheap long-term lending by the ECB - is not even replacing what commercial banks are removing by shoring up their own balance sheets and winding down loan books. Global investors appear convinced more QE is in the pipeline.

The song became very popular in the US soon after the 9/11 attacks and the 2003 invasion of Iraq, and it was originally planned to be the rousing finale of the kindergartens' musical show at the June 20 commencement. The kids would have waved tiny American flags to the song, New York Post reports. But the principal walked in while the kids rehearsed the song and ordered the CD playing the song turned off. She told the teachers to drop the song from the program, saying, "We don't want to offend other cultures."

According to the New York Post, the latest incident comes amid growing tension in the school between the principal and the teachers. Hawkins has been called a bully and tyrant by some of the teachers. New York Post reports that the Department of Education (DOE) reprimanded her in 2010 after some teachers complained that she called them "racist." According to the complaint, she said: “I’m black. Your previous principal was white and Jewish. More of us are coming.”

‘There are indeed discussions, and we are asked to clarify what is foreseen in EU treaties,’ said Commission spokesman Olivier Bailly following a raft of press reports claiming this had happened. He refused to reveal the precise details of the talks but admitted some of these ideas had been discussed under ‘disaster scenarios’.

He said the commission is ‘providing information about EU laws regarding treaties,’ that mean capital ‘restrictions are possible’ on the grounds of ‘public order and public security.’ However, he stressed that the commission was not planing on the basis that Greece would leave the euro depending on the outcome of elections on Sunday. ‘At the commission, there is no plan whatsoever pre-supposing a Greek exit from the eurozone,’ Mr Bailly added.

‘If there are people within member states or elsewhere who are studying risks, that's their responsibility.’ Greek elections on Sunday could see angry voters back radical left-wing parties opposed to austerity – pushing Athens closer to an exit from the euro. James Hickman, managing director of Caxton FX, the contingency plan in case Greece drops out of the single currency is ‘hardly surprising’. ‘The situation in the eurozone is worrying to say the least and any responsible institution should of course be preparing for the worst-case scenario,’ he added.

A further third, 33 per cent, believe that there should be a vote “in the next few years” in revealing people’s deep dissatisfaction with Brussels in our popular crusade to get Britain out of the EU. We have consistently said Europe has changed so dramatically since 1975 – when Britons last had a referendum – that another is long overdue.

Yesterday’s survey by Populus underlined the strength of feeling and will fuel many MPs’ calls for greater urgency. Labour MP and former minister Kate Hoey said: “This poll shows that the message the Daily Express has been carrying for many months is resonating with the public. A referendum is not a sideline issue – it is crucial to the public and must happen.”

Leading Tory eurosceptic MP Peter Bone said: “The political elite are scared of asking the question. They know people don’t want the EU, they don’t want the £41 billion membership fee, they want border controls returned, they want decisions made in Parliament.” Meanwhile, eurosceptic think tank Open Europe said yesterday that failure quickly to rewrite our terms of membership would result in unstoppable public support FOR WHAT IT BELIEVES WOULD BE A DAMAGING EXIT.

Government plans to open marriage to gay couples by 2015 could undermine its status as the state church, it said.

The Home Office said religious bodies would not have to conduct gay marriages and that it was considering all views.

The plans do not allow for religious organisations in favour of change to conduct gay marriages.

Gay rights campaigners accused the Church of "scaremongering".

The Church of England said by opening marriage to gay couples, an institution defined for centuries to be exclusively between a man and a woman would have its meaning "hollowed out" and reduced to the level of a "content free", "consumerist", agreement.

Ben Summerskill, chief executive of Stonewall, which campaigns for gay rights, said: "There's manifestly no evidence that the recognition of long-term same-sex relationships has any impact on the institution of marriage for heterosexuals. It seems odd that the Church of England should be obsessing about A FEW THOUSAND GAY COUPLES ONCE AGAIN WHEN THERE ARE CURRENTLY THREE MILLION CHILDREN IN BRITAIN LIVING IN SINGLE-PARENT HOUSEHOLDS."

Italian officials privately expressed concern that the €100 billion or $125 billion, that Europe pledged to Spanish banks might not stop the troubles from spreading. Italy’s main stock index was Europe’s worst performer on Monday, a day when United States stocks were also dragged down and investors flocked yet again to the safe harbor of American and German government bonds.

Even the Italian prime minister, Mario Monti, a European technocrat who came to office after the euro crisis forced out Silvio Berlusconi last November, has begun to acknowledge the dangers posed to his country’s 1.56-trillion-euro economy ($1.95 trillion). The main fear is that Italy cannot grow its way out of a recession fast enough to pay a mountainous national debt. Other concerns include the fact that Italy, with the third-largest euro zone economy after those of Germany and France, will have to shoulder a large portion of the bailout bill even as it grapples with its own sharp economic downturn.

Because Italy does not have enough economic growth to generate the money itself, the government will probably have to borrow it at high interest rates, adding to an already heavy debt load. “There is a permanent risk of contagion,” Mr Monti told an economics conference near Venice over the weekend, speaking by telephone. “That is why strengthening the euro zone is of collective interest.”

Chinese airlines, which have been told by Beijing not to comply with the EU's Emissions Trading Scheme, refused to meet a March 31 deadline for submitting carbon emissions data. EU Climate Commissioner Connie Hedegaard has said carriers have until mid-June to submit their data before enforcement action is taken.

"Chinese airlines are unanimous on this. We won't provide the data," Wei Zhenzhong, secretary general of the China Air Transport Association, said on the sidelines of an International Air Transport Association (IATA) meeting in Beijing. The Chinese group represents major airlines there, including the big three state-controlled carriers Air China, China Southern Airlines, and China Eastern Airlines.

"The government at least will take the same kind of measures and these anti-sanction moves will be lasting," Wei said. However he said: "We would try to avoid any trade war." A raft of countries including China, India, Russia and the United States have protested against the inclusion of all flights using EU airports into the emissions scheme. "It's not about the money. It's an issue of sovereignty," said Paul Steele, IATA's director of aviation environment.

Seoul’s armed forces held the exercise on Monday because of a "series of peculiar activities", a Defense ministry spokesman told AFP. It was ordered by the country’s Defense Minister Kim Kwan-Jin so the military could "immediately retaliate against sources of provocations and supporting forces as well as core command forces". The drill involved the ballistic missile command, front-line artillery units and the Air Force, South Korean media has reported.

Tension increased between the neighboring states after the North’s threat against South Korean media outlets for what Pyongyang has called critical coverage of its internal policies. The two countries often exchange threat of military action, but have managed to avoid a full-scale armed conflict.

Politics is a strange business, and one of its premier oddities is that monumental changes are rarely heralded by great speeches. Addresses indicating a shifting course tend not to be of the visionary variety. And the public attention paid to such utterances often has no relation to their far-reaching consequences. Often, in fact, it is only a tiny verbal adjustment that hints at a great change. Or a slightly different tone presaging a new direction.

Listening closely to Chancellor Angela Merkel in recent weeks has revealed just such a change in tone. It has been a careful shift, extremely nuanced. But it has become clear that her well-known melody is now a new one. "We need a so-called fiscal union," she said during an appearance on German public broadcaster ARD last week. "Which means more joint budgetary policy." Up to that point, Merkel had merely repeated that which she always demanded. But then came the new tone: "More than anything, we need a political union," she said. "That means that we must, step by step through the process, give up more powers to Europe as well and allow Europe oversight possibilities."

Merkel is carefully preparing the public for the possibility that great changes are coming and that established certainties are no longer valid. Her message is that Europe only has a future when the Germans too give up large portions of their national sovereignty. That is the extent of her message, but it is plenty nonetheless.

The Vatican meanwhile warned Italian prosecutors against using information in papers seized last week from the bank's ex-president, saying it may be covered by the Holy See's "sovereign prerogatives". Ettore Gotti Tedeschi, who was appointed by Pope Benedict to bring the Vatican into line with international regulations on money laundering, was dismissed last month from the presidency of the bank, known as the Institute for the Works of Religion (IOR).

The financier was last week reported to have prepared a series of dossiers to be sent to named individuals in the event of his sudden death. According to an Italian prosecutor, Gotti Tedeschi has said his problems at the bank started after he demanded to see "information about accounts that were not in the church's name".

The Red Cross, Humane Society and other aid groups mobilized to help evacuees while at least 400 firefighters, aided by air tankers and helicopters from as far away as Canada battled the fire about 15 miles west of Fort Collins.

"The hope for containment today, I will tell you, is tenuous," incident commander Bill Hahnenberg said. The fire nearly doubled in size overnight to 36,930 acres, or more than 57 square miles, Larimer County Sheriff's Office Executive Officer Nick Christensen said Monday. It had been estimated at 20,000 acres Sunday night.

The fire is "very large, unpredictable, aggressive," Christensen said. It was moving at 20 to 40 feet per second, or about 1 mile an hour - fast for a fire, Christensen said. Flames of 15 to 20 feet were commonplace, with some reaching 300 feet, he said.

The deluge could persist until July, sparking fears of flash floods and travel chaos. Although the South, South-west, West and North are likely to get the worst of it, the whole country is braced for the worst storms for a decade. Jonathan Powell, of Vantage Weather Services, said: “The deluge is expected to get going from Monday with some extremely heavy and persistent downpours on the way. We are on course for the wettest June on record, without a doubt.”

The first of its kind in the United States, the law was adopted after the state Supreme Court went too far in one of its rulings last year, according to supporters. The case in question involved a man who assaulted an officer during a domestic violence call. The court ruled that there was “no right to reasonably resist unlawful entry by police officers.”

The National Rifle Association lobbied for the new law, arguing that the court decision had legalized police to commit unjustified entries. Tim Downs, president of the Indiana State Fraternal Order of Police, which opposed the legislation, said the law could open the way for people who are under the influence or emotionally distressed to attack officers in their homes. “It’s just a recipe for disaster,” Downs told Bloomberg. “It just puts a bounty on our heads.”

These genes make crops toxic to pests but are claimed to pose no danger to the environment and human health. Genetically modified brinjal, whose commercial release was stopped a year ago, has a toxin derived from a soil bacterium called Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt).

Till now, scientists and multinational corporations promoting GM crops have maintained that Bt toxin poses no danger to human health as the protein breaks down in the human gut. But the presence of this toxin in human blood shows that this does not happen.

Scientists from the University of Sherbrooke, Canada, have detected the insecticidal protein, Cry1Ab, circulating in the blood of pregnant as well as non-pregnant women. They have also detected the toxin in fetal blood, implying it could pass on to the next generation. The research paper has been peer-reviewed and accepted for publication in the journal Reproductive Toxicology. The study covered 30 pregnant women and 39 women who had come for tubectomy at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Sherbrooke (CHUS) in Quebec. None of them had worked or lived with a spouse working in contact with pesticides.

They were all consuming a typical Canadian diet that included GM foods such as soybeans, corn and potatoes. Blood samples were taken before delivery for pregnant women and at tubal ligation for non-pregnant women. Umbilical cord blood sampling was done after birth.

Cry1Ab toxin was detected in 93 per cent and 80 per cent of maternal and fetal blood samples, respectively and in 69 per cent of tested blood samples from non-pregnant women.

"If Europe does slip into a crisis, it is going to be a very difficult time. There is no escaping from that. Though we (government and the Reserve Bank) have a team that is working on different scenarios, to see how we will react, it will be a lie to say that we have the strength to weather that. It will hit us in the face," Basu told an Exim [Export/Import] Bank organised here over the weekend.

Stating that a deeper European crisis was not impossible, he said there would be a jolt and it could spin Europe into a big crisis. "It is going to be a difficult one or two years for the world for sure." However, he said on the positive side, "Thankfully, Europe is no longer our biggest export destination, to the Middle East we probably export more today."

But he warned that the impact on us will be indirect. "Europe being a major driver of growth and if it slows down, even if we don't get a direct hit, the US is going to get hit immediately, China is going to get hit immediately. So the impact on us will come to us through our trading partners."