Judging by the all too many economic flashpoints around the globe, the Australian Reserve Bank's bet on a V-shaped global recovery would seem to be anything but a sure thing.

The future is on the way.  Leading-edge innovators, we are assured, have already moved on, and are earnestly focusing on the just the sort of problems - manufacturing, energy, transportation (and I'd add healthcare) - that urgently require imaginative solutions.

Life-saving high-tech pharmaceuticals get delivered to Ugandans inflicted with the HIV virus in remote and primitive regions of this poverty-stricken country to great success.

For several weeks now it’s been clear that Putin won’t attend this month’s NATO summit in Chicago. NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen recently spoke with Russia’s new/old president and explained that it’s “not possible and not practical” for Putin to participate because of his “busy domestic calendar.”

Everyone knows presidents have larger-than-life size egos. It goes with the job. But changes on the official White House website reveal that we've never had a self-regarding narcissist quite like the oval Office's current occupant.

"The choice in this election is between an economy that produces a growing middle class and that gives people a chance to get ahead and their kids a chance to get ahead, and an economy that continues down the road we are on, where a fewer and fewer number of people do very well and everybody else is running faster and faster just to keep pace."

Last week I wrote about the standings in the presidential race and said it looked like a long, hard slog through about a dozen clearly identified target states, much like the contests in 2000 and 2004. Call it the 2000/2004 long, hard slog scenario.