Zapatero, who has led his country since 2004, said achieving an EU-wide economic recovery would come from making European economies "more productive, innovative and sustainable."

"Europe needs far-reaching changes"

He said however that this should not be accomplished at the expense of ordinary Europeans.

"To achieve this we must rely on both workers and businesses, to make our companies more productive and our workforce better qualified without losing sight of that great European symbol: the welfare state and social policies," Zapatero said Friday in a video posted on the Spanish government's official EU presidency Web site.

The shutdown of the Ignalina plant - at 11pm local time on 31 December - is being carried out in line with Lithuania's EU accession promise following concerns that its Chernobyl-type reactor is unsafe.

The small, post-Soviet country is building a new reactor expected to go online between 2018 and 2020 and will in 2015 and 2016 benefit from new electricity supply "bridges" to Poland and Sweden.

The interim period is set to see power prices spike by up to 70 percent at a time of recession, however.

It will also see Lithuania almost entirely reliant on imports of energy from Russia amid the prevailing belief in former Iron Curtain countries that Moscow uses gas and oil cut-offs as a tool of political pressure on its former vassals.

Also see article quoting Jerome a Paris.

*Traitor*, n.
A benighted individual who perceives an illusory distinction between serving his nation and abetting the criminals who govern it.

David Cameron's attempts to boost the green credentials of the Tories have been dealt another blow after one of his party's most senior environmentalists announced he is to quit the Commons at the next election.

John Gummer, who had advised the Tory leader on green issues, said he wanted to take up a full-time role fighting for tougher anti-climate change measures after the "deeply disappointing" failure of the recent summit in Copenhagen to reach a legally binding agreement. He said his new role would not leave him enough time to perform his duties as a constituency MP.

Mr Cameron has already been struggling to silence those in his party who remains sceptical about man-made climate change. Mr Gummer co-chaired the Tory party's "quality of life" policy group, which advised Mr Cameron on creating a green economy for Britain.

The European Union may set up a new volunteering organisation, the European Peace Corps, after the European Parliament adopted a resolution on democracy building in external relations in the EU.

Item 17  calls on the council, Commission and Member States "to consider the establishment of a volunteer European Peace Corps, while taking into account the positive experience of the European Voluntary Service (EVS)." The resolution was first suggested by ALDE but has broad support in the European Parliament, becoming part of a composite resolution being tabled by the Greens/ALE, S&D, ECR, EPP and ALDE groups.

The American Peace Corps was set up in 1961 and over 200,000 individuals have joined, usually serving for two years all over the world, including Eastern Europe. It has three goals;

• To help the people of interested countries and areas in meeting their needs for trained workers
• To help promote a better understanding of Americans on the part of the peoples served
• To help promote a better understanding of other peoples on the part of Americans

Replace the word American with European and it is easy to see why this idea would find support. The issue is at a very early stage and, so far, there has been little discussion or consultation about the aims and reach of the proposed EPC.

"I am Elena Sisti and I am from the "Associazione Genitori Antismog" in Milan. The "Genitori Antismog" began in 2001, in fact it was called "Mamme Antismog" {Antismog mothers}. At that time, mayor Albertini asked mothers, so as not to expose their children to the risk of smog, to keep them in the house. The mothers decided that it was time to say "enough" to this attitude in relation to the smog and they presented themselves with empty pushchairs in front of Palazzo Marino {Town Hall in Milan}.
From that moment on, we have never stopped campaigning about the issue of the smog in Milan and to work on two fronts: on the one hand, to raise the awareness of the citizens and thus the parents about the risk, the danger and the seriousness of the smog and on the other hand to lobby the Public Administration. Among the projects that we have carried out up until now there has been Eurolifenet, that was in collaboration with the High Schools. It was a really great project: for a few weeks the youngsters went around with a dust-measuring metre and they had the perception of how they were exposed during every moment of the day. In the years that followed, we promoted a petition that led to free travel on public transport in Milan for children. Today those up to the age of ten travel free. Whereas when we put in the request, they had to pay as soon as they were taller than one metre. Thus it became more expensive for any family with more than two children to move around on public transport.

well done!

Beppe Grillo's Blog

The main objective is to comply with the limits set for us by Europe, namely to limit particulate levels to less than 50 micrograms per cubic metre for a maximum of 35 days per year. In Milan, during November - according to an article in "Il Corriere della Sera" - we had already reached a level of 70, with certain measuring stations recording levels of 103 /120 micrograms, in other words double or even triple the amount supposedly allowed by law.

when it rains in milan, there's a short moment of pleasure as the air becomes briefly breathable.

the rest of the time it is appalling.

"Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do." Jim Hightower

Outlook for 2010: German Economy on Brink of Radical Restructuring - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International

The German economy coped astonishingly well with the global crisis in 2009. But in 2010 it will need to lay the foundations for a radical restructuring if it wants to cope with chronic overcapacity in its aging industries and fend off powerful new competitors from China and India. Does the country need a new business model? SPIEGEL provides an outlook for 2010.

The world's third-largest economy will be boosted by double-digit growth in real estate investment and mild inflation, the State Council's Development Research Centre said in a report published in the China Economic Times.

"In 2010, the external environment will remain rather grim but it will not deteriorate further," Zhang Liqun, a macroeconomist at the centre, said in the report.

Zhang added that exports -- a key driver of economic growth -- would start to grow again in the coming year.

You'll...notice a couple of pics of Pension Pulse's Men of the Year above, Bernie Madoff and Harry Markopolos. Why Mr. Madoff? Because he represents the essence of what is wrong with our corrupt financial system. He's a despicable individual who scammed his fellow Jews and lots of other innocent investors as he criminally profited from one of the largest Ponzi schemes ever.

And Harry Markopolos represents what the system needs, namely, more competent and courageous people who are not afraid to speak up and tell the truth. His warnings were ignored as he vividly recounted in his testimony to the Senate. I applaud him for what he stands for and consider him a humble hero.

Compiling the monthly data of Treasury Disbursements for Unemployment Insurance Benefits and then superimposing it with the total number of people receiving Insurance Benefits as disclosed by the Department of Labor is a useful exercise, as the two series have historically correlated with an R2 of well over 0.90. Below is an indexed comparison of UIB outlays and Unemployment Insurance Receivers for Fiscal 2007.

Surely this is logical: the more unemployed collecting benefits from the government, the more the outlays.

Yet what struck us is the when this chart is presented from 2007 until today. Something unusual emerges. An absolute chart of the money spent by the government superimposed with the total insured unemployed is presented below:

Yet the best way to see what this chart indicates is on an indexed basis with a September 2007 baseline.

What becomes obvious is that a correlation which used to be almost 1.000 has diverged massively, and now the relative outlays surpass what the government highlights are the number of people actually collecting benefits by 32%! This implies two things: either the average unemployment monthly paycheck has surged, which is not the case, or there is some gray unemployment area which is not disclosed by the government, and which accounts for a shadow unemployed insurance economy. Because while the DOL indicates there are about 9.5 million total unemployed, for the correlation to return to its near 1.0 trendline the number of unemployed on benefits has to be 14 million. At least this is what the actual cash outlays by the Treasury suggest: the government spent a record $14.7 billion on Unemployment Insurance Benefits as of December 30, a 24% jump sequentially from the $11.8 billion in November. Yet the DOL has disclosed a mere 1.7% increase in those to whom insurance benefits are paid: from 9.4 million to just under 9.6 million. To put the $14.7 billion number in perspective, in December the Federal Government paid a total of $14 billion ($700 million less) in Federal Salaries! A cynic could be temped to say that effectively the number of people employed by the government is double what is disclosed. A yet bigger cynic could claim that America is now the biggest socialist state in the world. Both cynics would not necessarily be wrong.

And some more perspective: in calendar 2009 the government has paid $140 billion in Unemployment Insurance Benefits. This is yet  another economic stimulus that nobody in the administration discusses, yet which undoubtedly has the biggest impact on the economy, as all those millions unemployed can moderate their pain courtesy of a passable weekly check from the government which should just about cover the rent and beer. Which is why more than anything, Obama is dead set on extending insurance benefit payments in perpetuity: because if the 10 million official and 14 million unofficial people who are on benefits (not to mention the tens of millions of unemployed unlucky enough to even get their weekly allowance from Uncle Sam) start thinking about their true predicament and their real "employability", then a landslide loss by this administration at the mid-term elections will actually be an upside surprise to what it can objectively expect.

As the Dutch said while fighting the Spanish: "It is not necessary to have hope in order to persevere."

NEW YORK -- McClatchy has obtained previously undisclosed documents that provide a closer look at the shadowy $1.3 trillion market since 2002 for complex offshore deals, which Chicago financial consultant and frequent Goldman critic Janet Tavakoli said at times met "every definition of a Ponzi scheme."

The documents include the offering circulars for 40 of Goldman's estimated 148 deals in the Cayman Islands over a seven-year period, including a dozen of its more exotic transactions tied to mortgages and consumer loans that it marketed in 2006 and 2007, at the crest of the booming market for subprime mortgages to marginally qualified borrowers.

....

McClatchy reported on Nov. 1 that in 2006 and 2007, Goldman peddled more than $40 billion in U.S.-registered securities backed by at least 200,000 risky home mortgages, but never told the buyers it was secretly betting that a sharp drop in U.S. housing prices would send the value of those securities plummeting. Many of those bets were made in the Caymans deals.

At the time, Goldman's chief spokesman, Lucas van Praag, dismissed as "untrue" any suggestion that the firm had misled the pension funds, insurers, foreign banks and other investors that bought those bonds. Two weeks later, however, Chairman and Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein publicly apologized -- without elaborating -- for Goldman's role in the subprime debacle.

Goldman's wagers against mortgage securities similar to those it was selling to its clients are now the subject of an inquiry by the Securities and Exchange Commission, according to two people familiar with the matter who declined to be identified because of its sensitivity. Spokesmen for Goldman and the SEC declined to comment on the inquiry.

The big challenge of this new decade will be coping with the emergence of a global plutocracy - the hyper-educated, internationally minded meritocrats who have been the chief beneficiaries of globalisation and the technological revolution.

<...>

Rightwing intellectuals, who before the crisis tended to deny that income inequality was increasing or argue that it did not matter, are beginning to pay more explicit attention to the issue, too. Jim Manzi, a software entrepreneur and fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think-tank, worries in a new essay that "if we let inequality and its underlying causes grow unchecked, we will hollow out the middle class - threatening social cohesion and eventually surrendering our international position".

One of Mr Manzi's fears is that income inequality has created a social and cultural gap between the highly educated, hard-working elite and everyone else. He compares the personal and family customs of America's new super-rich with those of the old Wasp ascendancy. The genius of that elite was its ability to bring the American dream within reach of nearly everyone. If it hopes to emulate the longevity of America's Wasps, and, more importantly, the political system they created, today's global plutocracy must figure out how to do the same.

The writer is the FT's US managing editor

The Obama administration's $75 billion program to protect homeowners from foreclosure has been widely pronounced a disappointment, and some economists and real estate experts now contend it has done more harm than good.

Since President Obama announced the program in February, it has lowered mortgage payments on a trial basis for hundreds of thousands of people but has largely failed to provide permanent relief. Critics increasingly argue that the program, Making Home Affordable, has raised false hopes among people who simply cannot afford their homes.

Yemeni officials say more than 30 operatives of al Qaeda's Yemeni offshoot, al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), were killed and 29 others captured in raids in recent weeks that foiled attacks on the British embassy in the capital Sana'a and Yemeni oil facilities. Human rights activists and al Qaeda charge that scores of innocent civilians died in the attacks.

US support for the raids reflects concerns on both sides of the Atlantic that multiple conflicts in Yemen - including the fight against al Qaeda, a five-year war against tribal rebels in the north that has dragged neighboring Saudi Arabia into the hostilities, a secession movement in the south, rampant inflation and unemployment, dwindling oil revenues and an acute water shortage - could turn Yemen into the strategic region's next failed state alongside Somalia.

"We are already a failed state. We can no longer protect the rights of our citizens," said Yemeni opposition politician Abubakr Badeeb. "Al Qaeda is renewing itself and has sympathizers in the Yemeni security and intelligence forces," terrorism expert Said Ali Jemhi told Deutsche Welle.

...One of a string of US officials and politicians to have recently visited Sana'a, Lieberman quoted a US official in the Yemeni capital as saying that "Iraq was yesterday's war. Afghanistan is today's war. If we don't act preemptively, Yemen will be tomorrow's war."

...Analysts warn that US involvement in military operations aimed to stop AQAP in its tracks could boomerang if they involve increased civilian casualties given the Yemen government's fragility. Princeton University Yemen expert Gregory Johnson told Deutsche Welle that pictures of dead women and children such as the ones that circulated after the most recent raids could make "recruiting a field day for al Qaeda."

Judge Ricardo Urbina said prosecutors violated the defendants' rights by using incriminating statements they had made under immunity during a State Department probe to build their case.

"The government used the defendants' compelled statements to guide its charging decisions, to formulate its theory of the case, to develop investigatory leads, and ultimately to obtain the indictment in the case," Urbina ruled.

"In short, the government had utterly failed to prove that it made no impermissible use of the defendants' statment or that such use was harmless beyond a reasonable doubt."

The guards had been charged with killing 14 Iraqi civilians and wounding 18 others using gunfire and grenades during an unprovoked attack at a busy Baghdad intersection.

The CIA issued the confirmation after media reports said as many as eight CIA employees were killed in the attack Wednesday, in which a Taliban bomber managed to penetrate the defenses of a base in the province of Khost, detonating an explosives belt in a room described as a gym.

CIA chief Leon Panetta told the agency "today that seven of their colleagues were killed and six others were injured on Wednesday at a Forward Operating Base in Khost Province, Afghanistan. The casualties were the result of a terrorist attack," the CIA said in a statement.

Iranian opposition leader Mirhossein Mousavi raised the stakes in Iran's ongoing political crisis on Friday with the announcement that he was ready "to become a martyr" in his drive to challenge the June 12 re-election of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

"I am not unwilling to become a martyr like those who made that sacrifice after the election for their rightful national and religious demands," Mousavi said on his Kaleme.org website, his first public statement since opposition demonstrations on Sunday were violently put down by police.

The opposition leader's nephew was among at least eight people killed during the protests, which took place on the Shiite holy day of Ashura.

AFP - Senegal's Muslim President Abdoulaye Wade has issued a apology to Christians following remarks that triggered street protests, the Senegal news agency APS reported.

Wade said Monday that Jesus Christ was not viewed as God by the country's majority Muslims.

Young Christians clashed with security forces in the capital on Wednesday after Cardinal Theodore Adrien Sarr, the archbishop of Dakar, accused the government of insulting Senegal's Christians.

China maintains strict censorship of the Internet to curb what the government deems to be unhealthy content including porn and violence -- an effort that has become known as the "Great Firewall of China".

Authorities in December offered rewards of up to 10,000 yuan (1,465 dollars) to Internet users who report websites that feature pornography.

According to figures published by the ministry of public security late Thursday, 5,394 people were arrested last year under the Internet porn crackdown, and 9,000 illegal porn-related sites were shut down.

The ministry, in a statement on its website, did not specify if all of those arrested were later prosecuted.

KINGSTON, Jamaica (JIS) -- On Wednesday, January 6, thousands of Jamaicans and a few in-the-know foreigners will travel to St Elizabeth to partake in one of the country's best kept secrets - the annual Maroon Festival in Accompong.  The day usually starts with a ceremony paying respect to Maroon ancestors at the Peace Cave, which is thought to be the site of the signing of the 18th century treaty between the Maroons and the British. This is usually followed by feasting, dancing and traditional Myal drumming. It culminates in a parade and street dance that continues throughout the night.

NAIROBI, Kenya - Property prices in Nairobi are soaring, and Somali pirates are getting the blame.

The hike in real estate prices in the Kenyan capital has prompted a public outcry and a government investigation this month into property owned by foreigners. The investigation follows allegations that millions of dollars in ransom money paid to Somali pirates are being invested in Kenya, Somalia's southern neighbor and East Africa's largest economy.

Even as housing prices have dropped sharply in the United States, prices in Nairobi have seen two- and three-fold increases the last half decade.

"There is suspicion that some of the money that is being collected in piracy is being laundered by purchase of property in several countries, this one being one of them," said government spokesman Alfred Mutua. "Especially at this time when we are facing global challenges of security such as terrorism and others, it is very important for us to know who is where and who owns what." The investigation will also help the government catch tax evaders, he said.

Kenya may be the most attractive spot for pirates to launder their money because it shares a roughly 500-mile (800-kilometer) border with Somalia and has investment opportunities and a large Somali community of up to 200,000 people, Mutua said.

Reporting from Washington - The White House is poised to order all federal agencies to evaluate any major actions they take, such as building highways or logging national forests, to determine how they would contribute to and be affected by climate change, a step long sought by environmentalists.

Environmentalists say the move would provide new incentives for the government to minimize the heat-trapping gas emissions scientists blame for global warming. Republicans have opposed it as potentially inhibiting economic growth.

The new order would expand the scope of the National Environmental Policy Act, or NEPA, a landmark statute that turns 40 today. The act already requires federal agencies to consider environmental impacts such as land use, species health and air and water quality when approving projects.

By formalizing a requirement to consider effects on climate -- a step some agencies already take -- the administration would introduce a broad new spectrum of issues to be considered. It could also open up new avenues for environmentalists to attack, delay or halt proposed government actions. The environmental impact statements originally required by the act have become routine battlegrounds for environmentalists, developers and others.

A report by German insurance company Munich Re says 2009 was a year of relatively few natural disasters. But it warns that climate change remains a threat in 2010 and beyond, impacting on insurance costs.

In an annual look at the cost of natural disasters, Munich Re, one of the world's largest reinsurers, said that natural catastrophes took many fewer lives and caused much less damage on average in 2009 than in the previous decade.

It put the death toll in 2009 at "around 10,000," well below the average of 75,000 in each of the past 10 years.

The single most deadly event was a 7.6 magnitude earthquake in Indonesia on September 30, killing nearly 1,200 people in and around the city of Padang, on the island of Sumatra.

Asian storms meanwhile killed thousands more and caused widespread damage in the Philippines, Vietnam and Taiwan.

Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux said in a statement that 405 arrests were made across the country and 11 police officers injured but "no major incidents" were reported. The official toll of burned cars was due later, he said.

In the eastern city of Strasbourg, traditionally a hotspot for New Year's disturbances, media said about 70 cars had been set on fire. Police in the Hauts-de-Seine district near Paris reported 32 cars burned.

Early on Friday police in Paris said 171 arrests were made in the capital, mainly for burning cars and throwing objects at officers, but no major clashes with police were reported.

The interior ministry had mobilised 8,000 police in the capital and 45,000 nationally for the night, after authorities counted 1,147 cars set on fire a year ago.

OKLAHOMA CITY - An alternative fuel for diesel engines is off to a shaky start this year though it emits fewer pollutants and cuts down on petroleum use because it's made from environmentally friendly waste and vegetable oil. A federal tax credit that provided makers of biodiesel $1 for every gallon expired Friday. As a result, some U.S. producers say they will shut down without the government subsidy.

Biodiesel's woes come on top of a year of problems for the fledgling biofuel industry -- an irony given the push to cut down on greenhouse gases and ease the nation's need for foreign oil. A key driver for the alternative fuel -- the high cost of oil -- disappeared as diesel prices dropped 18 percent since the beginning of the recession. Then in March the European Union placed import-killing tariffs on biodiesel and other biofuels. It was a huge hit for U.S. biofuel makers, with Europe taking 95 percent of all global exports.

Biodiesel, which is usually blended with traditional fuel, had over the past few years been the fastest growing fuel among fleet vehicles like buses, snow plows and garbage trucks. Those fleets, however, can shift to traditional fuel, as some have, when the prices of diesel drops.

The biodiesel industry is now operating at only 15 percent of its potential capacity, according to the National Biodiesel Board, largely because the price of traditional diesel has collapsed. There are close to 180 biodiesel plants operating in about 40 states.

LOS ANGELES - On a strip of California's Mojave Desert, two dozen rare tortoises could stand in the way of a sprawling solar-energy complex in a case that highlights mounting tensions between wilderness conservation and the nation's quest for cleaner power.

Oakland, Calif.-based BrightSource Energy has been pushing for more than two years for permission to erect 400,000 mirrors on the site to gather the sun's energy. It could become the first project of its kind on U.S. Bureau of Land Management property, leaving a footprint for others to follow on vast stretches of public land across the West.

The construction would come with a cost: Government scientists have concluded that more than 6 square miles of habitat for the federally threatened desert tortoise would be permanently lost. The Sierra Club and other environmentalists want the complex relocated to preserve what they call a near-pristine home for rare plants and wildlife, including the protected tortoise, the Western burrowing owl and bighorn sheep.

"It's actually a good project. It's just located in the wrong place," said Ileene Anderson of the Center for Biological Diversity, a Tucson, Ariz.-based environmental group.

The dispute is likely to echo for years as more companies seek to develop solar, wind and geothermal plants on land treasured by environmentalists who also support the growth of alternative energy. In an area of stark beauty, the question will be what is worth preserving and at what cost as California pushes to generate one-third of its electricity from renewable sources by 2020.

The average Russian drinks 14 liters of pure alcohol annually. Hundreds of thousands of Russians die from alcohol consumption every year. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has launched a campaign to fight alcohol abuse in his country, the most recent example of which is a new minimum price for vodka.

Beginning on Friday, a half-liter bottle of vodka must, by law, cost at least 89 rubles (two euros; $3). The minimum price is to be reviewed each year by a government commission and is meant to discourage over-drinking.

But doctors worry that the minimum price will instead lead to increased numbers drinking industrial alcohol, antifreeze or other homemade spirits, all dangerous alternatives.

Medvedev also turned his attention to the dangers of alcohol during his live end-of-year interview with state television, calling for a return to the country's former zero tolerance toward drunk driving.

"One who drinks, loses his head. And we know people drink here! First one shot--that's allowed. Then two, three and 'ok, let's go.' I think we should ban getting behind the wheel in an intoxicated state," Medvedev said.

He announced that he will introduce legislation bring back the zero tolerance policy, which was lifted in July 2008.

AFP - Australian researchers have cracked the genetic origin of the deadly cancer that is threatening to wipe out Tasmanian devils, raising hopes Friday that the animal's future is safe.

Australian National University scientists said they have unlocked the genetic "fingerprint" of the contagious cancer which starves the dark, furry marsupial to death by disfiguring its face so badly it cannot eat.

"It's a uniquely horrible cancer, and it is critical to know about it at the genetic level," Professor Jenny Graves said.

"It has wiped out around 60 percent of the world's devils and is likely to lead to their extinction in the wild within 30 to 50 years."

Of the 78% who failed, many had focused on the downside of not achieving the goals; they had suppressed their cravings, fantasised about being successful, and adopted a role model or relied on willpower alone.

"Many of these ideas are frequently recommended by self-help experts but our results suggest that they simply don't work," Wiseman said. "If you are trying to lose weight, it's not enough to stick a picture of a model on your fridge or fantasise about being slimmer."

On the other hand, people who kept their resolutions tended to have broken their goal into smaller steps and rewarded themselves when they achieved one of these. They also told their friends about their goals, focused on the benefits of success and kept a diary of their progress.

People who planned a series of smaller goals had an average success rate of 35%, while those who followed all five of the above strategies had a 50% chance of success, the study found.

During the middle third of the 20th century, Americans had impressive faith in their own institutions. It was not because these institutions always worked well. The Congress and the Federal Reserve exacerbated the Great Depression. The military made horrific mistakes during World War II, which led to American planes bombing American troops and American torpedoes sinking ships with American prisoners of war.

For transcript, click on Open interactive transcript to the right of About this talk

The vertical hole, in the volcanic Marius Hills region on the moon's near side, is 213 feet wide and is estimated to be more than 260 feet deep, according to findings published in Geophysical Research Letters, a journal of the American Geophysical Union.

More important, the scientists say, the hole is protected from the moon's harsh temperatures and meteorite strikes by a thin sheet of lava. That makes the tube a good candidate for further exploration or possible inhabitation, the article says.

...

Lava tubes have previously been discovered on the moon, but the scientists say the new hole is notable because of its lava shield and because it does not appear to be prone to collapse.

The story of the ending of white racial supremacy in South Africa has for its cast men and women in political, church, cultural and other such groups whose members mostly ended in prison or exile in the 40-year struggle. Was there another case, like that of Dennis Brutus, of an individual who built up on his own personal initiative and toil a process which brought the evils of apartheid to a world-wide constituency and bit by bit won its war against the perpetrators of apartheid and their complacent, blinkered allies in many countries? Was there a man who actually forced the South African government to yield, at a high price to himself and at the cost of much suffering?

Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister, has turned to writing love songs as he recovers from an attack that left him with a broken nose and two broken teeth, according to reports.

"In 2010, there will be a new record, the fourth, of the musical duo Berlusconi and (guitarist Mariano) Apicelli...," the daily Corriere della Serra claimed in a report.

Mr Berlusconi, who worked as a cruise ship singer in his youth, first collaborated with his friend Apicelli in 2003.

MOSCOW -- It is not, from a purely technical standpoint, impossible to make fun of Vladimir V. Putin. His head is shaped a bit like a light bulb, with eyes that are heavy-lidded, as if to convey that he has just been reading your dossier. He has a needle nose, a prizefighter's swagger and a fondness for posing shirtless. If all else fails, there is always the matter of height.

But caricatures of the Russian prime minister long ago vanished from state-controlled television. Ten years ago, the creators of the show "Kukly" came under such pressure from the Kremlin to retire their grotesque puppet of Mr. Putin that they responded, rather sardonically, by depicting him as a burning bush. The show was eventually canceled, and caution has prevailed since then. A talk show, "Real Politics," included Mr. Putin in cartoons, but he was seen only from the neck down.