As a physicist and an avowed admirer of the Swabian housewife, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, leader of the center-right Christian Democrats (CDU), is seeking to establish binding rules in the midst of the chaos of financial and monetary crises. Her desire for order was reinforced recently when the prospect of Greece collapsing under a mountain of debt triggered turmoil in the European Monetary Union.

The first national bankruptcy on European soil in decades was only prevented because the remaining countries in the euro zone came to the aid of their faltering fellow member with billions in loans and loan guarantees. The chancellor, determined not to allow the Greek debacle to be repeated elsewhere, proposed the establishment of a procedure to ensure "orderly national bankruptcies." The German chancellor hoped that the plan would create "an important incentive for the euro-zone members to keep their budgets under control."

Finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble, in complete agreement with Merkel, said: "We have to think about how, in an extreme situation, member states could become insolvent in an orderly fashion without threatening the euro zone as a whole." If the plans are implemented, banks and investors will not be the only ones bearing the burden when countries in the euro zone encounter financial difficulties. THE DEBT-RIDDEN COUNTRIES THEMSELVES WILL ALSO HAVE TO MAKE SUBSTANTIAL SACRIFICES, AND THEIR GOVERNMENTS WILL CEDE SOME OF THEIR POWER.

Castro writes opinion columns, or "Reflections," for Cuba's state-run media that in recent weeks have focused on his prediction that nuclear war will soon break out, sparked by a conflict between the United States and Iran over international sanctions against Iran's nuclear activities.

"The empire is at the point of committing a terrible error that nobody can stop. It advances inexorably toward a sinister fate," he wrote on July 5. The "empire" is how Castro usually refers to the United States, his bitter foe from the time he took power in Cuba in a 1959 revolution. In a column published on Sunday night, Castro said the "principal purpose" of his writings has been to "warn international public opinion of what was occurring."

The columns have attracted little attention internationally and caused little reaction in Cuba, but Castro promised to continue his lonely fight to warn the world of the coming disaster.

There is a widespread feeling that the government doesn't work, that it is incapable of solving America's problems. Americans are fed up with Washington, fed up with Wall Street, fed up with the necessary but ill-conceived stimulus program, fed up with the misdirected healthcare program, and with pretty much everything else. They are outraged and feel that the system is not a level playing field, but is tilted against them. The millions of unemployed feel abandoned by the president, by the Democratic Congress, and by the Republicans.

The fundamental problem is starkly simple: jobs and the deepening fear among the public that the American dream is vanishing before their eyes. The economy's erratic improvement has helped Wall Street but has brought little support to Main Street. Some 6.8 million people have been unemployed in the last year for six months or longer. Their valuable skills are at risk, affecting their economic productivity for years to come. Add to this despairing army the large number of those only partially employed and those who have given up their search for work, and we have cumulative totals in the tens of millions.

Many people who joined the middle class, especially those who joined in the last few years, have now fallen back. It's not over yet. Millions cannot make minimum payments on their credit cards, or are in default or foreclosure on their mortgages, or are on food stamps. Well over 100,000 people file for bankruptcy every month. Some 3 million homeowners are estimated to face foreclosure this year, on top of 2.8 million last year. Millions of homes are located next to or near a foreclosed home, and it is the latter that may determine the price of all the homes on the street. There have been dramatically sharp declines in home equity, representing cumulative losses in the trillions of dollars in what has long been the largest asset on the average American family's balance sheet. Most of those who lost their homes are hard-working, middle-class Americans who had lost their jobs. Now many have to use credit cards to pay for essentials and make ends meet, and they are running out of credit.

Americans today strongly support a pro-growth economic agenda that includes fiscal discipline, limited government, and deficit reduction. They fear the country is coming apart, while the novelty of Obama has worn off, along with the power of his position as the non-Bush. His decline in popularity has emboldened the opposition to try to block him at every turn.

The promise of economic health that might salvage industries and jobs, and provide a safety net, has proved illusory. The support for cutting spending and cutting the deficit reflects in part the fact that the American public feels the Obama-Congress spending program has not worked. As for the healthcare reform bill, the most recent Rasmussen survey indicates that 52 percent of the electorate supports repeal of the measure - 42 percent of them strongly.

It is clear that the magical moment of Obama's campaign conveyed a spell that is now broken in the context of the growing public disillusionment. Obama's rise has been spectacular, but so too has been his fall.

But the synod decided women bishops should be able to decide the identity of any bishop entering their dioceses. They would also have the ability to dictate the functions these bishops could carry out. The BBC's religious correspondent Robert Pigott said women bishops would have only to consult a code of practice guiding them in their dealings with traditionalists. He said the decision made during a synod meeting at York University had left a lot of division in its wake. Members of the synod decided there was no need for further delay to the progress of a draft law allowing women to be made bishops.

But traditionalists have warned that the decision could result in many of them leaving the Church of England. The Reverend Prebendary David Houlding, a leading member of the Catholic Group on the General Synod, said he was concerned and he felt as if traditionalists were running out of options. He told PA: "There are several people who will be making hard decisions about their future.

"I am staying in the Church of England for the time being until I am driven out. I am not going willingly, I will only go if forced. The more this goes on in this manner, the more it seems as if the door is shutting. The scope for remaining in the Church of England is getting more and more narrow and the options are rapidly closing."

His intervention came as Michael Scott-Joynt, the Bishop of Winchester, warned the row could 'destroy' the Church amid fears clergy and churchgoers might leave en masse. Liberals who voted down compromise proposals that would have allowed dioceses that rejected women bishops to have an additional male bishop were accused of 'intolerance'. One insider said: 'Unless there is some extraordinary development, people will go.'

Sources said significant numbers of bishops could defect when the Roman Catholic Church launches formal moves to court disaffected Anglicans later this year. In his sermon, delivered at York Minster, Dr Sentamu diverged from the published text to repeat a story told by Desmond Tutu, who asked a child what John the Baptist might have told Jesus after he baptised him. The child said: 'Now you are a child of God, start behaving like one.'

However, it could become increasingly difficult for him to stick to his position as the Obama administration pushes harder to revive the negotiations. Netanyahu hasn't agreed to either demand, and has so far curbed but not frozen settlement activity. He insists negotiations should be held without any preconditions.

Later this week, White House envoy George Mitchell is to meet with Abbas and is expected to lay out some gestures Israel is prepared to make to bring Abbas back to the table, said an Abbas aide. The Palestinians have said that after 17 years of intermittent talks, they don't want to start all over again, especially with an Israeli leader who has retreated from positions presented by his predecessors.

Abbas aide Yasser Abed Rabbo told Palestinian radio Sunday that the Palestinians don't want to enter open-ended negotiations with Israel. "There must be a... timetable, a framework for these negotiations," he said. "We will not enter new negotiations that could take more than 10 years."

The Palestinians want to establish a state in the West Bank, Gaza and east Jerusalem, territories Israel captured in the 1967 Mideast War. They have said the 1967 borders must be the baseline for negotiations, but that they are ready to swap some land to enable Israel to keep some of the largest settlements it has built on occupied land since 1967.

Netanyahu says he will not relinquish any part of Jerusalem and has not presented his own border plan.

The attack on the rugby club, where crowds sat outside watching a large-screen TV, left 49 dead, police said. Fifteen others were killed in the restaurant explosion. Kampala's police chief said he believed Somalia's most feared militant group, al-Shabab, could be responsible for the attack. Al-Shabab is known to have links with Al Qaeda, and it counts militant veterans from the Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan conflicts among its ranks. Simultaneous attacks are also one of Al Qaeda's hallmarks.

In Mogadishu, Somalia, Sheik Yusuf Sheik Issa, an al-Shabab commander, told The Associated Press early Monday that he was happy with the attacks in Uganda. Issa refused to confirm or deny that al-Shabab was responsible for the bombings. "Uganda is one of our enemies. Whatever makes them cry, makes us happy. May Allah's anger be upon those who are against us," Sheik said.

International militants have flocked to Somalia because the country's government controls only a few square miles of the capital, Mogadishu, leaving most of the rest of the country as lawless territory where insurgents can train and plan attacks unimpeded.

The two leaders - former Republican senator Alan Simpson of Wyoming and Erskine Bowles, White House chief of staff under President Bill Clinton - sought to build support for the work of the commission, whose recommendations due later this year are likely to spark a fierce debate in Congress.

"There are many who hope we fail," Simpson said at the closing session of the National Governors Association annual meeting. He called the 18-member commission "good people with deep, deep differences" who know the odds of success "are rather harrowing."

Bowles said that unlike the current economic crisis, which was largely unforeseen before it hit in fall 2008, the coming fiscal calamity is staring the country in the face. "This one is as clear as a bell," he said. "This debt is like a cancer."

The commission leaders said that, at present, federal revenue is fully consumed by three programs: Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. "The rest of the federal government, including fighting two wars, homeland security, education, art, culture, you name it, veterans - the whole rest of the discretionary budget is being financed by China and other countries," Simpson said.

"We can't grow our way out of this," Bowles said. "We could have decades of double-digit growth and not grow our way out of this enormous debt problem. We can't tax our way out... The reality is we've got to do exactly what you all do every day as governors. We've got to cut spending or increase revenues or do some combination of that."

The European Central Bank, the Bank of England and the International Monetary Fund have all recently warned of a looming crunch, especially in Europe, where banks have enough trouble raising money as it is.

Their concern is that banks hungry for refinancing will compete with governments - which also must roll over huge sums - for the bond market's favor. As a result, credit for business and consumers could become more costly and scarce, with unpleasant consequences for economic growth.

"There is a cliff we are racing toward - it's huge," said Richard Barwell, an economist at Royal Bank of Scotland and formerly a senior economist at the Bank of England, Britain's central bank. "No one seems to be talking about it that much." But, he added, "it's of first-order importance for lending and output."

Banks worldwide owe nearly $5 trillion to bondholders and other creditors that will come due through 2012, according to estimates by the Bank for International Settlements. About $2.6 trillion of the liabilities are in Europe.

While the weak economy dominated the official agenda at the summer meeting here of the National Governors Association, concern over immigration policy pervaded the closed-door session between Democratic governors and White House officials and simmered throughout the three-day event.

At the Democrats' meeting on Saturday, some governors bemoaned the timing of the Justice Department lawsuit, according to two governors who spoke anonymously because the discussion was private. "Universally the governors are saying, 'We've got to talk about jobs,'" Governor Phil Bredesen of Tennessee, a Democrat, said in an interview. "And all of a sudden we have immigration going on." He added, "It is such a toxic subject, such an important time for Democrats."

But David Axelrod, the president's senior adviser, said on Sunday on CNN's "State of the Union" that the president remained committed to passing an immigration overhaul, and that addressing the issue did not mean he was ignoring the economy. "That doesn't mean we can't have a good, healthy debate about the economy and other issues," Mr Axelrod said.

The nation's total federal debt next year is expected to exceed $14 trillion, and Mr Simpson, a former Republican senator from Wyoming, and Mr Bowles, a Democrat and the White House chief of staff under President Bill Clinton, offered a gloomy assessment if spending is not brought under control even more.

"This debt is like a cancer," Mr Bowles said. "IT IS TRULY GOING TO DESTROY THE COUNTRY FROM WITHIN."

Kahlili accused the Obama Administration of being naive. According to him, the American overtures are viewed by the Iranian regime as a sign of weakness, while the Iranian people consider the efforts to engage the regime an act of betrayal against their struggle for freedom.

"THIS IS A MESSIANIC REGIME. There should be no doubt - they are going to commit the most horrendous suicide bombing in human history. THEY WILL ATTACK ISRAEL, EUROPEAN CAPITALS, AND (THE) PERSIAN GULF REGION AT THE SAME TIME," said Kahlili in one of his first public appearances.

Kahlili said he joined the Revolutionary Guard following the Islamic revolution of 1979, but volunteered to work for the CIA when he became disillusioned with the Khomeini regime after witnessing acts of rape, torture and murder. For 10 years, under the code name "Wally," he relayed the secret operations of the IRGC back to American intelligence, eventually fleeing to the United States. In the aftermath of 9/11, Kahlili reestablished contact with his sources in Iran and began once again providing information to the CIA, according to the Washington Institute.

It would be only a temporary solution to the catastrophe that the federal government estimates has poured between 87 million and 172 million gallons of oil into the Gulf as of Saturday. Hope for permanently plugging the leak lies with two relief wells, the first of which should be finished by mid-August. The failure of the blowout preventer, a massive piece of equipment designed to stop the unchecked flow of oil, is partly to blame for the size of the spill. "That will be an important question to ask when we pull the blowout preventer up to the surface and we'll figure out where that pipe ultimately landed," Wells said.

After the flange transition spool is bolted in place, the new cap - called a capping stack or "Top Hat 10" - can be lowered. The equipment, weighing some 150,000 pounds, is designed to fully seal the leak and provide connections for new vessels on the surface to collect oil. The cap has valves that can restrict the flow of oil and shut it in, if it can withstand the enormous pressure. That will be one of the key items for officials to monitor, said Paul Bommer, a professor of petroleum engineering at the University of Texas at Austin. "If the new cap does work and they shut the well in, it is possible that part of the well could rupture if the pressure inside builds to an unacceptable value," Bommer wrote in an e-mail Saturday.

The plan, which was accelerated to take advantage of a window of good weather lasting seven to 10 days, didn't inspire confidence in the residents of the oil-slicked coast. "This is probably the sixth or seventh method they've tried, so, no, I'm not optimistic," said Deano Bonano, director of emergency preparedness for Jefferson Parish.

"Shutting off the oil is a very important step, but we should not assume this disaster is over," said Larry Schweiger, president of the National Wildlife Federation. "I think it's important to recognize that there's an enormous amount of oil still in the Gulf."

The chemical in question, TERTIARY BUTYLHYDROQUIONE, is A PETROLEUM-BASED PRODUCT that can cause health effects such as stomach tumors in lab animals when administered in high doses. The compound, used in McDonald's Chicken McNuggets, meets Chinese food safety standards. However, Liu Qingchung, a nutritionist at the General Hospital of Armed Police Forces, was quoted in China Daily as stating that the chemical used in McDonald's chicken nuggets is "toxic to some extent."

The additive is also used in McDonald's restaurants in the US and Japan, where it also meets national health standards. Meanwhile, China's State Food and Drug Administration will continue to monitor the safety of McNuggets.

The situation is of particular concern in a nation where poultry is the second most-consumed meat after pork. Bloomberg Businessweek reports that demand this year is estimated at more than 12.6 million tons, adding that safety concerns about food have risen in China since contaminated milk powder killed at least six babies in 2008 and sickened about 300,000 children. That same year, pesticide-tainted dumplings imported from China sickened at least 10 people in Japan.

"The preliminary analysis was done at an academic analytical chemistry laboratory. Looking for the likely pollutants from the deep water Horizon Oil spill. It was focused on the detection of benzene and propylene glycol. Benzene and other highly toxic contaminants were very low however the concentration of propylene glycol was between 360 and 440 parts per million."

"Just 25 parts per million is known to kill most fish and propylene glycol is just one of many ingredients found in Corexit. In short, the Gulf is being poisoned by BP's usage of the dispersants even after the EPA asked them to stop back in May. We are willing to provide ANY respected/known laboratory these samples or provide them with more."

"This is very serious to all people and marine life in and around the Gulf."

Abbas, who is serving as head of the PA after unilaterally extending his term in office, has made several statements in recent years that have raised concerns as to his true intentions. In 2008, as Israel and the PA engaged in peace talks, Abbas told a Jordanian paper that he opposed terrorism "at present" but that "things may change."

In March 2010, the PA held a ceremony naming a main square in Ramallah for a terrorist who led a cell that murdered 37 Israelis. In June, a broadcast on official PA television referred to Jews as "our enemies" and to the entire state of Israel as "Palestine."

Earlier this week, Abbas eulogized terrorist Abu Daoud, the mastermind of the 1972 Munich Olympics massacre, calling him "one of the leading figures in Fatah. Israel has officially referred to Abbas as a "moderate" leader, as opposed to the leadership of Hamas, whose charter calls clearly for destroying Israel.