The media have dubbed it “the new age of epidemics.” From SARS to cancer, diabetes to the flu, we live in a world of increasingly powerful germs and diseases.

When asked about their outlook for the crisis-ridden U.S. housing and financial-services markets, two U.S. financial experts provided outlooks that completely contradicted one another – once again underscoring how tough it is for investors to predict when the U.S. economy will turn around.

In 2004, then Treasury Secretary John Snow was traipsing about the globe trying to “talk the dollar down.” Why? In a word: debt.

Monetary policy “walking a tightrope”…1,300 jobs go in the Square Mile… Britain’s second largest bank to go cap in hand to shareholders for a large dollop of cash..? Rice hits a record $1,000 a tonne…and one in ten face that old wealth destroyer from the early ‘90s: negative equity. So where to start..?

In the currency market, the dollar firmed against the euro. Late Thursday, the euro was trading at $1.5895 vs. $1.595 on Wednesday.

America’s triple-A credit rating may be in danger, says Standard and Poor’s. If the country has to bail out Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac through a prolonged recession, it could cost the nation’s treasury as much as 10% of GDP.

“We’re beginning to see the whole world financial situation as a U.S. problem. There is a lot going on…but the big story seems to be about America and Britain, to the extent it shared the Anglo-Saxon economic model…its money, its wealth and its place in the world…” says Bill Bonner.

“America’s triple-A credit rating may be in danger”, says Standard and Poor’s.

George Soros first made a name for himself with The Quantum Fund, a hedge fund that’s often described as the first real global investment fund, which he and partner Jim Rogers founded in 1970.

Say what you may, you certainly cannot accuse Hillary Clinton of inflexibility. Following the Democrat motto of “Do as I say, not as I do,” the Clinton campaign has become a living kamasutra of moral contortionists — a migrant carnival of double-jointed confidence artistes whose spectacular limberness would normally earn someone a place in Ripley’s Believe it or not!

More bottoms than a burlesque show…rebounds that turn even base metals into precious ones.The fuzzy edges of a moral system…China! What to make of it? An intriguing investment – in Iceland…the crisis of the countryside arrives in the city…and more!