According to its recent 10-Q, Citi had $38 billion of deferred tax assets as of September 30, more than a third of the bank's tangible common equity of $107 billion. Backing that out, Citi's TCE ratio — the inverse of leverage — is reduced from 5.7 percent to 3.7 percent. And when Citi adopts new accounting rules for off-balance-sheet assets, THE RATIO WILL BE REDUCED FURTHER TO 2.8 PERCENT.

BANK REGULATORS SHOULD BE CONCERNED. To fortify their balance sheets so they can withstand systemic events without government support, banks need genuine capital available to absorb losses. Deferred tax assets, or DTAs, don't fit that bill. Imagine an individual in a bankruptcy court asking to pay off his credit card debt with tax-loss carry-forwards.

So long as Citi generates profit, its DTAs have value. But earnings could evaporate quickly if the Fed decides it has to prick the new asset price bubble being inflated by near-zero rates, or if an unanticipated systemic event puts stress on Citi's balance sheet.

Lord Smith of Finsbury believes that implementing individual carbon allowances for every person will be the most effective way of meeting the targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. It would involve people being issued with a unique number which they would hand over when purchasing products that contribute to their carbon footprint, such as fuel, airline tickets and electricity.

Like with a bank account, a statement would be sent out each month to help people keep track of what they are using. If their "carbon account" hits zero, they would have to pay to get more credits. Those who are frugal with their carbon usage will be able to sell their unused credits and make a profit.

Lord Smith will call for the scheme to be part of a "Green New Deal" to be introduced within 20 years when he addresses the agency's annual conference on Monday.

Guillain-Barre Syndrome (GBS) is the name given to anyone who exhibits a particular set of neurological symptoms including muscle weakness and muscle spasms. GBS is now increasingly occurring following H1N1 vaccine injections. It was diagnosed in thousands of patients following the 1976 swine flu vaccine scare, and it appears to be recurring here in 2009 as the swine flu vaccine makes it into more widespread distribution.

Health authorities, however, remain adamant that H1N1 vaccines are never the cause of GBS, and that such diagnoses are "pure coincidence." This blatantly unscientific PR tactic is designed to dismiss any and all concerns over the neurological side effects of H1N1 vaccines by simply denying they exist.

To date, the CDC has received reports of five additional people being diagnosed with GBS following swine flu vaccinations, but it dismisses them all as coincidence. "IT'S MUCH LESS THAN WE'D EXPECT," says CDC official Dr Claudia J Vellozzi (WHICH IS SORT OF INTERESTING ALL BY ITSELF, BECAUSE IT REVEALS THAT THE CDC EXPECTS A LOT MORE PEOPLE TO GET GBS FOLLOWING VACCINE INJECTIONS...).

At the same time, part of the reason the CDC isn't receiving many reports on neurological disorders caused by H1N1 vaccines is because they participated in a massive media brainwashing event that prepped the population to dismiss all side effects by pre-announcing the bizarre idea that "side effects experienced after vaccine injections are not related to vaccines."

Aside from a lunch with a member of the House of Lords, Wilders doesn't have much to do in London, but he needs a few more photos. A limousine takes him from Heathrow Airport to the Houses of Parliament, where he intends to give a press conference. A group of Islamists is already standing in front of the parliament building, shouting "Wilders, go to hell!" and carrying signs that read "ISLAM WILL RULE THE WORLD." Wilders couldn't have wished for a more perfect setting for one of his appearances.

He gives a speech, which is short, probably because there isn't really much to say. He says that his being in London is a victory, not a victory for him personally, but "a victory for freedom of speech." The usual questions follow: Why do you want to ban the Koran? Do you want to ban the Bible, too? Wilders gives his standard responses. Islam, he says, is not a religion but a fascist ideology, and the Koran is no different from Hitler's "Mein Kampf." And if that book is banned, he says, THE KORAN SHOULD ALSO BE BANNED.

When making this argument Wilders, usually quotes the great British statesman WINSTON CHURCHILL WHO, AS HE IS QUICK TO POINT OUT, ONCE MADE THE SAME COMPARISON.

While the move breathes new life into "old eggs" and could also remove genetic illnesses, it is likely to provoke an ethical storm as critics believe it could lead to hybrid or genetically modified children. "If we could transfer these constructed new embryos, I believe the success rate would be high," Atsushi Tanaka, the lead author told the New Scientist.

IVF often fails in older women because there are abnormalities in the outside of their eggs, known as cytoplasm, which surrounds the nucleus. The team at St Mother Hospital in Kitakyushu, Japan, believe one way around the problem would be to implant the healthy nucleus - which contains most of the information to produce a baby - into the cytoplasm of a donor, usually a younger mother.

The team successfully did this in 31 eggs and of these seven formed "early stage embryos" when injected with sperm in a test tube. Under the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act, this kind of treatment – or any that involves genetically modifying an egg – remains illegal in Britain but the government has put in place a framework to relax the rules if and when science shows it can have a positive impact on health.

A small percentage of Hizbullah's current arsenal of tens of thousands of missiles can reach almost 190 miles, Ashkenazi said, well over the distance from southern Lebanon to Jerusalem and Tel Aviv.

Meanwhile, the joint air defence exercise, Juniper Cobra, was completed on Tuesday to the satisfaction of all levels of command. Top brass in both the Israeli and US armies called the exercise a great success. In the final operation, ten Patriot missiles were shot down by unmanned planes within a matter of hours. Approximately 1,400 personnel, each from the US military and the IDF, took part in the fifth operation of the biennial exercise.

Major Omri Maost, an anti-aircraft commander in the South, sat in the control room during the launching and was directly responsible for some of the missiles that were launched. He said that the success of the operation boosted soldiers' confidence.

Lech Walesa, a Nobel Peace Prize winner and co-founder of the Polish labor union Solidarity (Solidarnosc), affirmed this Monday in Berlin at the celebration of the day East and West Germany were reunified. He stated that the future of a united Europe should be built on the foundation of truth, not on lies. With this assertion, he added that the historical truth was THAT FREEDOM FOR EAST GERMANY WAS NOT DUE TO POLITICIANS ALONE.

"Truth is very important when we speak of the course of history," said Walesa. He suggested that THE FALL OF THE IRON CURTAIN WAS DUE IN A LARGE PART TO POPE JOHN PAUL II and the Solidarity labor movement. A visual presentation during Walesa's address depicted the visit of Pope John Paul II to Poland, and the effects of that visit on unifying Europe in freedom. The Polish Pontiff's trip to his native country in June of 1979 made a great impact, as it was the first visit of a Pope to a Communist country.

On June 4, 1979, John Paul II said to the representatives of the Communist regime: "Allow me, venerable gentlemen, to continue to consider Poland's interest as my own, and to participate in it as profoundly as if I still lived in this country and were a citizen of this nation." Recalling those years, and the events that followed, Walesa affirmed, "EUROPE DESPERATELY NEEDS THE VALUES THAT SPARKED THIS REVOLUTION."

Additional bonus payments for the rest of year could take the total above the £53 million paid out to MoD officials in 2008/09. THERE ARE 85,000 CIVIL SERVANTS AT THE MOD, ONE FOR EVERY TWO ACTIVE TROOPS. Around 50,000 of them will get a performance bonus this year.

The MoD has claimed that the bonuses would average less than £1,000, but some officials will get much bigger payments. Last year, the department had 95 senior employees who were paid salaries of more than £100,000; and the average bonus for a senior civil servant in the department was £8,000.

An Army private can be paid as little as £16,681, with a £2,380 bonus for serving in Afghanistan. The disclosures come as British troops are dying in Afghanistan at a rate not seen since the Falklands war, and polls show voters are turning against the mission.

Oregon, Nevada, Florida, New Jersey, Illinois and Wisconsin round out the list of the 10 states with the worst economic decay, the Pew Center said in the report, "Beyond California: States in Fiscal Peril." Pew's conclusions are drawn from an analysis around the experiences of California, which ranks as the world's eighth largest economy, during the recent recession, the longest and deepest since the Great Depression. The study looked at how a surging foreclosure rate and rising unemployment led to a steep fall in California's revenues, with the state's political structure and record of poor fiscal problems crippling the ability to respond to the crisis.

Pew said the nine other states in its top-10 list "face hardships nearly as daunting." Arizona, also hurt by the housing downturn, has been "hamstrung by voter-imposed spending constraints, a tax structure highly reliant on a growing economy and a series of tax cuts." The recession did not discriminate among states, and has left most gasping to cover spending needs. While recovery is spreading in the national economy, most experts do not expect states' finances to heal any time soon.

"Several states on the top 10 list were unable to muster the political resolve to make long-term fixes to their fiscal problems," the study said.

Aaron Regent, president of the Canadian gold giant, said that global output has been falling by roughly 1m ounces a year since the start of the decade. Total mine supply has dropped by 10 per cent as ore quality erodes, implying that the roaring bull market of the last eight years may have further to run. "There is a strong case to be made that we are already at 'peak gold'," he told The Daily Telegraph at the RBC's annual gold conference in London.

"Production peaked around 2000 and it has been in decline ever since, and we forecast that decline to continue. It is increasingly difficult to find ore," he said. Ore grades have fallen from around 12 grams per tonne in 1950 to nearer 3 grams in the US, Canada, and Australia. South Africa's output has halved since peaking in 1970.

The supply crunch has helped push gold to an all-time high, reaching $1,118 an ounce at one stage yesterday. The key driver over recent days has been the move by India's central bank to soak up half of the gold being sold by the International Monetary Fund. It is the latest sign that the rising powers of Asia and the commodity bloc are growing wary of Western paper money and debt. CHINA HAS QUIETLY DOUBLED HOLDINGS TO 1,054 TONNES and is thought to be adding gradually on price dips, creating a market floor.

The message arrived amid intense debate over strategy, with President Obama yet to make a decision on troop numbers. This dramatic intervention seems to put the envoy at odds with generals wanting reinforcements, correspondents say. On Wednesday, Mr Obama held his eighth meeting in a series aimed at refocusing Afghan policy. Mr Eikenberry, a former US commander in Afghanistan, also raised CONCERNS ABOUT CORRUPTION WITHIN THE AFGHAN GOVERNMENT. He said it was "not a good idea" to send more troops, the BBC has been told.

The cable arrived days before Mr Obama held a crucial strategy session - to discuss the question of whether to send tens of thousands more troops to confront and push back the Taliban. The cable appears to be a dramatic and last-minute intervention by the ambassador, BBC Washington correspondent Adam Brookes reports.

It comes right at the end of weeks of White House deliberation over how to proceed in Afghanistan, and appears to put the ambassador at odds with the US army, whose generals favour reinforcing and intensifying America's campaign in Afghanistan.

These newly proposed wars are only the Obama phase of what is likely to be an endless 21st-century crusade called "the war on terrorism."

Yet what we justifiably fear - terrorists acquiring a nuclear weapon and detonating it in the United States - cannot be prevented by the United States imposing itself on one country after another in the Middle East or elsewhere. A more plausible strategy is to address the grievances and problems that lead people to want to strike out against the West in general, and the United States in particular.

The bond market is telling us not to worry. BUT IF HISTORY IS ANY GUIDE, THE BOND MARKET IS WRONG. I'm referring to Treasury Inflation Protected Securities, TIPS for short, in particular those that reflect long-run inflation expectations. The current spread tells us to expect annual inflation averaging a bit over 2 percent for the next 30 years. That would be fairly benign. And fairly wrong. Why? Because it assumes US political leadership will put the country on a sustainable fiscal path. I highly doubt it will happen.

In a note to clients last month, Société Générale strategist Dylan Grice explained the connection between debt and inflation. Turning Milton Friedman on his head, Grice argued that "inflation is always and everywhere a fiscal phenomenon." Money printing may be the vehicle, but the "root cause" of INFLATION TENDS TO BE "A GOVERNMENT UNABLE TO PAY ITS WAY."

The appointments will be made by the leaders of the 27 member states, by a qualified majority vote. Belgium's Prime Minister, Herman van Rompuy, has emerged as a frontrunner for the post of EU president. On Monday Sweden's PM Fredrik Reinfeldt said he was half-way through consultations with the governments on their preferred candidates.

Under Lisbon, the president of the European Council will be appointed by the governments for a term of two-and-a-half years, renewable once. The goal is to achieve more continuity and stability in major EU policy areas. Besides Mr Van Rompuy, leading candidates for the job are said to include Dutch Prime Minister Jan Peter Balkenende and his Luxembourg counterpart Jean-Claude Juncker.

The centre-left former Italian Prime Minister Massimo D'Alema is a frontrunner for the new post of High Representative for Foreign Affairs. Whoever gets that job will also become vice president of the European Commission. THE LISBON TREATY WILL COME INTO EFFECT ON 1 DECEMBER.

This President and administration know the lies behind all this and they couldn't give a flying piece of rubbish because they also know most of us are too busy to care. We are too busy to research real science and find out this is total fraud. In truth, environmentalists couldn't care less about trees, polar bears and climate. THEY ONLY CARE ABOUT CONTROLLING YOU, WHAT YOU EAT, DRINK, BUY AND SELL, WHILE CONVINCING YOU TO GIVE THEM MONEY.

What do you think this nightmare lie of Cap and Trade is about? It is designed to support the unholy trinity of regulation, taxation and litigation as it collects your money. You know, it's an international emergency so many of you actually feel great about paying in. You are helping to save the troubled planet. The other direct arm of control and communism will be seen if this Government health care bill passes. THIS WILL BE THE LARGEST GRAB OF POWER INTO THE EXECUTIVE BRANCH IN OUR NATION'S HISTORY.

Why is Government health care such a severe take over? Because this administration will attach our health care to everything we do, buy and sell. Your gun records and even right to own guns will be monitored and tracked to health care, its cost and lack thereof; your mental health records, past and present will be tracked, monitored and probably sold to all the wrong people. My prediction is that even transportation, the work we do and food we eat will be tracked and known.

Health care and Environmentalism are multi-trillion dollar industries that create the regulations, taxation and controls to reign in the population and seize what is left of our freedoms. You wonder what happened to the teeth and vision of the old communist party? You are watching it tighten around your neck as we speak.