Jake Tapper, the White House correspondent for ABC News, pointed out that the administration had lauded brave reporting in distant lands more than once and then asked, “How does that square with the fact that this administration has been so aggressively trying to stop aggressive journalism in the United States by using the Espionage Act to take whistle-blowers to court?”

He then suggested that the administration seemed to believe that “the truth should come out abroad; it shouldn’t come out here.” Fair point. The Obama administration, which promised during its transition to power that it would enhance “whistle-blower laws to protect federal workers,” has been more prone than any administration in history in trying to silence and prosecute federal workers.

The Espionage Act, enacted back in 1917 to punish those who gave aid to our enemies, was used three times in all the prior administrations to bring cases against government officials accused of providing classified information to the media. It has been used six times since the current president took office.

Setting aside the case of Private (First Class) Bradley Manning, an Army intelligence analyst who is accused of stealing thousands of secret documents, the majority of the recent prosecutions seem to have everything to do with administrative secrecy and very little to do with national security. In case after case, the Espionage Act has been deployed as a kind of ad hoc Official Secrets Act, which is not a law that has ever found traction in America, a place where the people’s right to know is viewed as superseding the government’s right to hide its business.

Harry Dent, author of the new book The Great Crash Ahead, says another stock market crash is coming due to a bad ending to the global debt bubble. He has pulled back on his earlier prediction of a crash in 2012, as central banks around the world have been flooding markets with money, giving stocks an artificial short-term boost. But a crash is coming in 2013 or 2014, he warns. "This will be a repeat of 2008-09, only bigger, when it finally hits," Dent told USA TODAY.

Gerald Celente, a trend forecaster at the Trends Research Institute, says Americans should brace themselves for an "economic 9/11" due to policymakers' inability to solve the world's financial and economic woes. The coming meltdown, he predicts, will lead to growing social unrest and anti-government sentiment, a US dollar with far less purchasing power and more people out of work. Celente won't rule out another financial panic that could spark enough fear to cause a run on the nation's banks by depositors. That risk could cause the government to invoke "economic martial law" and call a "bank holiday" and close banks as it did during the Great Depression. "We see some kind of threat of that magnitude," Celente, publisher of The Trends Journal newsletter, warned in an interview.

Robert Prechter, author of Conquer the Crash, first published in 2002 and updated in 2009, is still bearish. He says today's economy has similarities to the Great Depression and warns that 1930s-style deflation is still poised to cause financial havoc. Prechter predicts that the major US stock indexes, such as the Dow Jones industrials and Standard & Poor's 500, will plunge below their bear market lows hit in March 2009 during the last financial crisis. The brief recovery will fail as it did in the 1930s, he says. If he's right, stocks would lose more than half of their value. "The economic recovery has been weak, so the next downturn should generate bad news in a big way," Prechter said in an email interview.

"Now more than ever, families need to work at saving and paying off any outstanding debts," said Howard Dvorkin, a certified public accountant and founder of the credit counseling service Consolidated Credit. After a few months of reducing credit card debt levels, Dvorkin said, Americans are starting to return to their reliance on debt. "People made some progress in reducing card debt earlier in the year, but in the last few months, as the stock market started to rise, they started to return to their old ways of charging things," he explained.

In December 2011, the total consumer debt - which is the combination of non-revolving and revolving debt - rose by some 9.3 percent to $2.498 trillion, according to the latest Federal Reserve Board numbers. Both revolving debt and non-revolving debt increased. Revolving debt, which is credit-card debt, went up by 4.1 percent. Non-revolving debt, which includes loans for cars and education, rose 11.8 percent, the central bank's report said. The trend - month to month, quarter to quarter and year to year - is rising steeply.

Within hours, a Philippine surveillance plane, patrol ships and light attack aircraft arrived in the disputed area of Reed Bank in the South China Sea. By then the Chinese boats had left after chasing away the survey ship, Veritas Voyager, hired by UK-based Forum Energy Plc. But the tension had become so great Forum Energy chief Ray Apostol wanted to halt two months of work in the area.

"They were so close to finishing their work. I told them to stay and finish the job," Sabban, who heads the Western Command of the Philippine Armed Forces, told Reuters at his headquarters in Puerto Princesa on Palawan island. Over the next few days, President Benigno Aquino would call an emergency cabinet meeting, file a formal protest with China, and send his defense secretary and armed forces chief to the Western Command in a show of strength.

The March 2011 incident is considered a turning point for the Aquino administration. The president hardened his stance on sovereignty rights, sought closer ties with Washington and has quickened efforts to modernize its military. A year later, Forum Energy is planning to return. Top company executives told Reuters the company intends to sail to Reed Bank within months to drill the area's first well for oil and natural gas in decades, an event that could spark a military crisis for Aquino if China responds more aggressively.

The US military has also signalled its return to the area, with war games scheduled in March with the Philippine navy near Reed Bank that China is bound to view as provocative.

So how come Japan can borrow for 10 years at a measly 1 percent versus 5.45 percent for Italy, the world's eighth-largest economy. And why isn't anybody talking about the unthinkable: that Japan, the world's third-largest economy, could default? Japan can borrow much more cheaply than Italy can for two reasons. First, Japan borrows in a currency it controls. Second, almost all of Japan's public debt is money it owes to its own people. Conversely, consider Italy. Because only the European Central Bank can print euros, it's actually possible for Italy to run out of euros. If investors think that this might happen - or if they think that other investors think this might happen - they'll dump Italian bonds and send interest rates soaring. It's a classic bank run, but on a national level.

The same can't happen to Japan, because it has its own central bank, the Bank of Japan (BOJ). Japan can't run out of yen. If a panic did grip Japanese bonds, the BOJ could step in as a buyer of last resort. More importantly, it's rare for a country to default on itself. Usually countries that default, like Iceland, are stiffing foreign creditors. Japan, however, has run massive current account surpluses for the past thirty years. They are net lenders to, rather than borrowers from, the rest of the world. Put simply, they don't at all rely on foreigners to finance their debt. Italy does.

But that might be changing. With their nuclear plants idled following the tsunami, Japanese energy imports have skyrocketed in the past year - pushing them much closer to a point where they would need to borrow from abroad. It's not clear if is just a one-time blip, or the beginning of a new long-term trend. If it's the latter, Japan could be in trouble.

Foreign investors would probably demand higher interest rates on Japanese bonds than domestic investors. This isn't a question of patriotism. Rather, Japanese banks and insurance companies can be regulated into buying their government bonds, even at negligible interest rates. International investors don't face that pressure. They can shop around the globe for the best deal. So Japan would have to pay more to borrow. And that could be toxic. A vicious circle where higher interest rates increase deficits, causing investors to demand even higher interest rates could set in. The BOJ could intervene, but, in the nightmare scenario, all other buyers would disappear. Japan would be left with a grim choice between outright default and hyperinflation.

Question: Do you have any people being paid by the CIA who are contributing to a major circulation journal?

Answer: We do have people who submit pieces to American journals.

Question: Do you have any people paid by the CIA who are working for television networks?

Answer: This I think gets into the details I'd like to get into in executive session (so the public doesn’t hear how we control all the networks).

Considering that this was going on in the 1950's, it is highly likely that this is happening now and to a much larger extent. The CIA and other government agencies literally control the corporate controlled media. Anytime you hear a story on the major networks that has any implication in US foreign or domestic policy rest assured that it was, at the very least, vetted by the CIA before being released. In the early 90's CNN was also used to test Army psychological operations.

The rise in US public debt is a serious threat to the whole world if Washington fails to rein it in, the head of the Institute of International Finance warned Saturday. "Countries that are occasionally immature in their ability to manage their economic affairs as well as they should - and that includes most of them - are going to find that the world is at risk," Dallara said.

"These countries are going to wait for the marketplace to give them a shower of cold water. And we know that when that happens... it can give a shower of cold water to the global economy." The non-partisan US Congressional Budget Office estimates that President Barack Obama will finish his first mandate with four consecutive fiscal years showing a deficit above $1 trillion.

Earlier this month an administration official said Mr Obama's budget for the current fiscal year projects a $1.3 trillion deficit, slightly higher than the $1.296 trillion in 2011. According to estimates from the International Monetary Fund, the US national debt surpassed the country's Gross Domestic Product in 2011 and should rise to more than 107 percent of GDP this year.

But US debt remains attractive to international investors, allowing Washington to borrow at extremely low rates.

Philip Hammond, the Defence Secretary, signed a new defence co-operation agreement with Kazakhstan which the British Government hopes will enable an estimated £4 billion of equipment – including tanks and armoured personnel carriers – to be shipped out of northern Afghanistan. Britain and its Nato allies have been desperately seeking alternative routes following Pakistan's decision to close the vital supply route from Karachi to Afghanistan. Pakistan closed the border crossing after the Americans mistakenly killed 24 Pakistani troops last November.

Relations between Washington and Pakistan were already tense following last year's successful raid by US Navy Seals to kill Osama bin Laden, which was carried out without Islamabad's knowledge. While diplomats expect Pakistan to reopen the border at some point in the future, Britain has decided that it can no longer rely on Pakistan's co-operation as it begins the immensely complex operation of withdrawing troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2014, when all Nato combat operations are due to cease.

Mr Hammond now hopes to open a new supply route through Central Asia following the signing of the pact with Kazakhstan's defence ministry that guarantees Britain air transit rights over the massive Central Asian republic, a country which is equal in size to the whole of Western Europe.

British diplomats in Argentina are trying to clarify what happened. Tensions have risen recently, as the 30th anniversary of the Falklands war approaches. Argentina claims ownership of the islands, which it calls the Malvinas, but the UK has rejected calls for talks on the archipelago's sovereignty. Around 3,000 people live on the islands, most of whom are British citizens.

The Adonia and the Star Princess, which are both operated by the Carnival Group, arrived off the port of Ushuaia on Monday morning. The BBC's World Affairs Correspondent Peter Biles said both ships are reported to have been denied entry and both vessels had just visited the Falkland Islands.

Jane Archer, one of the passengers on board the Adonia, told the BBC: "It's simply the fact that we were in the Falklands." The Foreign Office said it was very concerned to hear the two ships had been refused access to Ushuaia. A spokesperson said there could be no justification for interference in free and legitimate commerce. It is understood the two vessels are now heading for Punta Arenas in Chile.

Farrakhan spent much of his oration decrying what he cast as Satan's influence over racist forces in politics and society before asking a pointed rhetorical question: "Do you think they're wicked enough to be plotting OUR BROTHER'S assassination as we speak?"

Farrakhan delivered his speech to an enthusiastic crowd of adherents packed loosely into the United Center for the Nation of Islam's annual observance of Saviours' Day, which celebrates the birth of the faith's founder, W Fard Muhammad. This year's events marked the 82nd year of the religion's existence in North America. With his finger jabbing at the air above him and his voice frequently raising to an indignant shout, Farrakhan, 78, delivered his message to a crowd of men in dark suits with bow ties and women in shimmering white gowns and scarves.

On domestic policy, Farrakhan said the national debt has reached unsustainable levels, and he challenged Mr Obama's assertion in his recent State of the Union speech that the country is not in decline. "America is on her deathbed. The vital signs of America are not good," he said. Near the close of his speech, Farrakhan spent several minutes comparing Mr Obama's political situation to that of Abraham Lincoln, who was assassinated after winning a second term, and suggested an assassination plot against Mr Obama might involve a "patsy," a person set up to take the blame for a broader conspiracy. "I believe they want a Muslim to kill President Obama," he said.

Such a policy would require a further €40 billion or €50 billion of cuts and accelerate the downward spiral already underway, beyond the 1.7 percent contraction expected this year by the International Monetary Fund. The unemployment rate would rise to well over 25 percent with six million out of work by the end of the year, equivalent to 30 percent under the old definition used in the last jobless crisis in the early 1990s.

"We have reached the point where `taxes kill taxation'. The therapy is turning fatal and is starting to take on a highly political tone. SIXTY YEARS AFTER THE END OF THE WAR, GERMANY IS AGAIN COMING TO BE SEEN AS AN OVERBEARING ENEMY, and an atmosphere of hostility is building up in a Continent divided between a rich and flourishing North and a South in danger of being reduced to a protectorate. If we carry on like this we are going to destroy the European project," he said.

The popular pressure gauge has been rising for months but the mass protests of the last two weeks have had a new and sharper edge - even if you disregard the outbreak of violent street clashes with police in Valencia, already dubbed the "Valencia Spring".

The Spanish have good reason to feel maligned by North Europe's self-serving narrative of the EMU crisis. They never violated the Maastricht debt rules. They ran a budget surplus of 2 percent of GDP during the boom. What is needed to save the South must endanger the North. Germany would overheat, pushing its inflation to 4 percent or 5 percent until Bild Zeitung erupts in Teutonic fury. IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO RECONCILE THE CONFLICTING IMPERATIVES.

Commenting on the German parliament's vote on the Greek bailout, Kathleen Brooks, research director at Forex.com, said: “In the absence of much economic data all eyes will be on the vote that takes place at 1400GMT/ 0900 ET. It is expected to be passed, although a dozen or so members of Merkel’s own party are against the second bailout for Athens. However, what is more worrying is the lack of support from the German public over more bailout funds for Greece. According to a poll conducted by a Sunday newspaper, 62% of Germans polled are against the rescue package.”

“Merkel may not go to the polls until 2013 but she will be keenly aware that public opinion is shifting, which may make her ultra-cautious when it comes to pledging more German taxpayer funds to sorting out the Eurozone’s woes. Added to that, if French Socialist Presidential candidate Hollande wins the election in May, then Germany could lose its austerity ally.”

“So just as the German public is losing faith in bailouts, so too could the German leader lose her ability to demand concessions in the form of austerity from bailed out nations. This could hamstring Germany, the only country in the currency bloc with the funds necessary to sort out this crisis.”

Ex-fireman Mr Jones, a former member of the Household Cavalry, said he experienced an ‘Orwellian nightmare’ after commenting on the ease with which a Muslim passenger ahead of him – who had her face almost completely covered by a hijab – had passed through security without showing her face. As he placed his scarf and other belongings into a tray to pass through the X-ray scanner, Mr Jones, 67, said to an official: ‘If I was wearing this scarf over my face, I wonder what would happen.’

To his astonishment, he was stopped by security staff on the other side of the checkpoint at Gatwick and accused of racism after a Muslim security guard who heard the remark said it had caused her offence. Mr Jones, who was flying with his two grown-up daughters to Faro in Portugal – he now lives in the Algarve, where he runs a restaurant – was then subjected to a one-hour stand-off involving security staff, a British Airways manager and a policeman as security tried to make him apologise.

He said yesterday: ‘What I said had nothing to do with the woman’s religion. It was the fact that her face was covered and she seemed to have passed through that part of the security process without showing it.' Mr Jones, originally from Ealing, West London, said: ‘Something like George Orwell’s 1984 now seems to have arrived in Gatwick airport. I feel my rights as an individual have been violated. What I underwent amounts to intimidation and detention. I am not opposed to having this level of security but it must be equal for all.’

He demanded that the officer should arrest him if there was a case against him, but was told ‘that we now live in a different time and some things are not to be said’.

"This is the best visible achievement I have made so far," said Willems, who is based at the law firm's Brussels office and has been representing Chinese clients in trade disputes against their European competitors since 1995. At the beginning of this month, the European Court of Justice annulled anti-dumping duties the EU slapped on Hong Kong shoemakers Brosmann Footwear HK Ltd and Risen Footwear (HK) Co Ltd and Guangdong shoemakers Seasonable Footwear (Zhongshan) Ltd and Lung Pao Footwear (Guangzhou) Ltd.

This has led to the likelihood that another 400 to 500 Chinese and Vietnamese shoemakers, which have been paying 16.5 percent of revenues in anti-dumping duties since 2006, may win lower rates of duty. Willems said that since 2006 the shoemakers had paid more than $1 billion in such duties. "Other shoemakers may request the EU to undertake individual assessments after the ruling, although the EU courts may argue that the cases are too many for it to handle," said Willems, urging the EU to treat the Chinese shoe exporters fairly.

On the European Commission's website there are currently 34 ongoing trade defense investigations listed from the beginning of 2011. Of that total, 20 involve Chinese companies.

Whatever tensions exist could be exacerbated by the looming crisis that provides a backdrop for the election-year meeting. Israel believes time is running out for a military strike against Iran that would prevent the Islamic republic from developing nuclear weapons, something Israel sees as an existential threat. Administration officials acknowledge the Iranian nuclear issue is coming to a head, but US officials have cautioned Israel against a strike that would threaten stability in the Middle East and the global economy.

It’s possible the Obama-Netanyahu meeting next week could determine both countries’ course of actions for Iran. The relationship between Mr Obama and Mr Netanyahu is going to be tested like never before,” said David Makovsky, a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “It doesn’t have to happen on March 5… but if they don't see eye-to-eye, the prospect of Israel going off on its own dramatically increases.”