Hugo Chavez is no more. The President was just 58, and had been 14 years in power. He has been battling cancer for the last two years, but when news of his death was announced, it came as a shock. The cause of freedom, socialism and humanity has lost a courageous champion.

In a period of crisis and decline of capitalism, to many people religion is the one certainty to cling on to. But if the Pope himself is no longer convinced he can keep his position until his death, this illusion of solidity begins to break down. The effect of the surprise announcement of his retirement by Pope Benedict XVI on the consciousness of over a billion Roman Catholics is going to be that of a spiritual earthquake, and it is surely going to have political consequences too.

Whom the gods wish to destroy, they first make mad, goes the saying. It is an apt description of the warring factions of the US political establishment, especially the Republicans, who are engaged in a ferocious battle over the government budget, and to hell with the consequences. This fiscal “war” between the Establishment parties threatens near paralysis in the world’s largest economy