The mayors of several Italian cities are rebelling against a European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruling that bans the crucifix from public classrooms. The ECHR found that the display of crucifixes in state schools is a "violation of the right to education taken jointly with the freedom of thought, conscience and religion."

Just when they thought they could not be under more surveillance or monitored more often, English people discovered Sunday that inspectors from the Department of Health will soon be permitted almost unrestricted and completely unprecedented entry to the homes of parents whose children are reported to be “at risk.”

The United Nations has entered the climate change debate in an interesting way: "There can be no food security without climate security," UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon told the World Summit on Food Security (aka, the "Hunger Summit") in Rome recently. There is an undeniable connection between climate and food production, although throughout most of human history a warm climate has been associated with large food surpluses. Europe, about one thousand years ago, was much warmer than Europe today.