Russia’s continuing weakness could cost the country its membership in one of the most identifiable and esteemed investor acronyms – the BRIC nations.

The world markets have begun a correction – and the governments are determined to stop it…the days of ’stuff lust’ are long gone. Replacing private spending with public spending…in the fight against global financial illness the Fed can’t cure the patient. The U.S. empire may be too old and tired to battle this downturn…the 50th anniversary of Cuba’s revolution…tune into the Critic’s Choice Awards on VH1 tonight and cheer for I.O.U.S.A.!…and more!

Many people are in sticker shock thanks to high gas prices and oil that punched through the $135-a-barrel level recently, before sliding back.

The pace of inflation in the Euro zone accelerated in March to its fatest pace since 1992, reports The New York Times.

Eurostat, the European statistics agency, said prices rose in March at a 3.5 percent annual rate in the 15 countries that share the euro, the highest rate since June 1992. The rate in February was 3.3 percent, which had itself been a record. Inflation is running far above the European Central Bank’s 2 percent guideline.

The concern about rising prices is not confined to the euro zone. In a speech on Monday, the governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, noted that “food prices on world markets are more than 50 percent higher, and oil prices two-thirds higher, than…