But it's largely because no one has believed default will happen. America's own debt drama has been one in which investors have been willing, if not happy, to leave the stage to the politicians. It was little surprise when talks between Obama and John Boehner, the top Republican in Congress, collapsed under the weight of these questions late on Friday. So that leaves a matter of days to achieve the far more modest objective of raising the debt ceiling and avoiding default. As negotiations enter a final, fraught week expect to see:

1, Markets take a greater role in this drama. Investors know a bounce in bond or stock markets isn't going to give the talks the sense of urgency they clearly need.

2, Plenty of worried head-scratching among investors because no one really knows to how to protect themselves if there is a default. US government bonds are the oxygen of the world's financial system. Pollute them and well...

3, Talk of America losing its AAA credit rating to increase. Ratings agency Standard & Poor's warned earlier this month that preserving it, and the lower borrowing costs that go with it, would depend on striking a serious long-term deal on the deficit. Raising the debt ceiling without it would, according to S&P, spell trouble.

4, Increasing signs of concern and anger from US businesses if a more ambitious deal isn't agreed. No one believes another 12 months of uncertainty and argument over the deficit will help an economy that slowed in the first half of the year.

Boehner's decision to abandon negotiations with President Obama puts an end to a deal that would have cut spending by up to $3.5 trillion over the next 10 years and increased tax revenues by close to a trillion dollars. But the $14.3 trillion debt ceiling must be raised by August 2nd to avoid a government default. "We have now run out of time," a visibly angry Obama declared at a hastily arranged press conference in the White House briefing room.

He said he has summoned Boehner, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid to the White House for an emergency meeting at 11am on Saturday. "I expect them to have an answer as to how they will get this thing done over the next week," Obama said. Both sides agree that a proposal should be hammered out over the weekend.

Talks now begin between Boehner and senate leaders on a far less ambitious a Plan B. Boehner held his own press conference after 7 pm Friday night and said the talks broke down because "The White House moved the goal posts." Boehner sent a letter to his Republican colleagues explaining his decision to pull out of talks for a "grand bargain." Here are some highlights:

"It has become evident that the White House is not serious about ending the spending binge that is destroying jobs and endangering our children's future," he wrote, adding, "A deal was never reached, and was never really close. The president is emphatic that taxes have to be raised... The president is emphatic that we cannot make fundamental changes to our entitlement programs," Boehner wrote. "For these reasons, I have decided to end discussions with the White House and begin conversations with the leaders in the Senate in an effort to find a path forward."

Last night a campaigner against the excesses of medical research said he was disgusted that scientists were 'dabbling in the grotesque'. Figures seen by the Daily Mail show that 155 'admixed' embryos, containing both human and animal genetic material, have been created since the introduction of the 2008 Human Fertilisation Embryology Act. This legalised the creation of a variety of hybrids, including an animal egg fertilised by a human sperm; 'cybrids', in which a human nucleus is implanted into an animal cell; and 'chimeras', in which human cells are mixed with animal embryos.

Scientists say the techniques can be used to develop embryonic stem cells which can be used to treat a range of incurable illnesses. Three labs in the UK - at King's College London, Newcastle University and Warwick University - were granted licences to carry out the research after the Act came into force. All have now stopped creating hybrid embryos due to a lack of funding, but scientists believe that there will be more such work in the future.

Last night he said: 'I argued in Parliament against the creation of human-animal hybrids as a matter of principle. None of the scientists who appeared before us could give us any justification in terms of treatment. Ethically it can never be justifiable - it discredits us as a country. It is dabbling in the grotesque. At every stage the justification from scientists has been: if only you allow us to do this, we will find cures for every illness known to mankind. This is emotional blackmail.'

'Of the 80 treatments and cures which have come about from stem cells, all have come from adult stem cells - not embryonic ones. On moral and ethical grounds this fails; and on scientific and medical ones too.'

Josephine Quintavalle, of pro-life group Comment on Reproductive Ethics, said: 'I am aghast that this is going on and we didn't know anything about it. Why have they kept this a secret? If they are proud of what they are doing, why do we need to ask Parliamentary questions for this to come to light? The problem with many scientists is that they want to do things because they want to experiment. That is not a good enough rationale.'

Human-animal hybrids are also created in other countries, many of which have little or no regulation.

But in other markets closely watched for signs of contagion, rallies petered out. Italian and Spanish bond yields rose and the euro dropped against the dollar. "The trouble with all this is that the crisis will only be on its way to full resolution when it becomes clear the eurozone, and in particular the periphery have achieved satisfactory growth rates," said Andreas Utermann, chief investment officer at RCM, the equity fund manager owned by Allianz.

Other investors criticised the failure to put in place a proper firewall between Greece, Ireland and Portugal, which have all received bail-out deals, and Italy and Spain, which have been the focus of nervousness in recent weeks. The 109 billion euros bail-out unveiled late on Thursday involved an estimated 26.5 billion euros reduction in Greece's 350 billion euros debt load. "We would have argued for a 40 per cent haircut," said Kian Abouhossein, an analyst at JPMorgan. "The real mistake here is that EU regulators are not pushing the banks to raise capital, as happened in the US through the Tarp programme."

Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, defended the Greek rescue agreement. "I want Europe to come out of the crisis stronger than it went in," she said. "It is our historic task to protect the euro. Europe without the euro is unthinkable." In Brussels, EU officials hailed the agreement as a decisive response to the crisis and a new chapter in European integration. YET THEY STRUGGLED TO EXPLAIN ITS COMPONENTS, with confusion among diplomats about the numbers behind the second rescue plan and how much represented new money.

Adding to the uncertainty, EU officials acknowledged that many of the numbers involved - particularly governing private bondholder participation - were estimates and would not be fixed for some time.

There were rainfall totals as high as 7 inches as the storm moved noisily through the Chicago area after midnight, resulting in flash flood warnings from the National Weather Service and enough flooded roads and highways to make life miserable for passengers headed to or from O'Hare International Airport and make a mess of traffic overnight and into Saturday morning. The north side got the brunt of the rain, with O'Hare International airport getting 5.53 inches in two hours, according to ChicagoWeathercenter.com. Some other totals of note reported by the Weather Center: 6.41 inches in Glenview, 5.4 inches in Arlington Heights and 5.49 inches in Elk Grove Village.

At Little Village Academy on Chicago's West Side, the total was 7.84 inches, and the rain still hasn't left town for good. More rain is expected when some storms move in from the west. The storm also interrupted electrical service for some. About noon, ComEd reported that about 74,000 customers were without power: 40,000 north of the city, 27,000 in Chicago, and 3,000 west and south of the city. The utility, which has about 350 crews out working to restore power, said that more than 150,000 customers experienced power outages at some point.

Many of the old all-time high temperature records in the Northeast were set during the Dust Bowl era with several occurring on dates during the blistering summer of 1936. In a number of other locations, the nasty heat waves during July 1966 and August 1918 set the marks to beat. Elsewhere, the all-time list is scattered about various decades through the past century. The high at Washington Dulles Airport was among those that set new all-time records. The mercury soared to 105 degrees, breaking the previous all-time high of 104 set on July 16, 1988. Newark - New Jersey, Reading - Pennsylvania, Hartford and Bridgeport both in Connecticut were also cities which tied or broke their all-time records.

AccuWeather.com RealFeel(R) Temperatures will be significantly higher than the actual temperatures. In some cases, the RealFeel topped 120 degrees during the hottest afternoon hours! While similar to the apparent temperature and heat index, the RealFeel temperature incorporates a half-dozen or so additional variables and gives a more accurate "how it really feels" temperature. Relief is coming to the Northeast in a gradual sense over the weekend into next week. However, no real relief is in sight for the South Central states.

Survivors of the shooting spree have described hiding and fleeing into the water to escape the gunman, but a police briefing Saturday detailed for the first time how long the terror lasted - and how long victims waited for help. The shooting came on the heels of what police told The Associated Press was an "Oklahoma city-type" bombing in Oslo's downtown: It targeted a government building, was allegedly perpetrated by a homegrown assailant and used the same mix of fertilizer and fuel that blew up a federal building in the US in 1995.

In all, at least 92 people were killed in the twin attacks that police are blaming on the same suspect, 32-year-old Norwegian Anders Behring Breivik. Earlier in the day, a farm supply store said they had alerted police that he bought six metric tons of fertilizer, which can be used in homemade bombs. That's at least one metric ton more than was found at the farm, according to police.

Police confessed to not knowing much about the suspect, but details trickled out about him all day: He had ties to a right-leaning political party, he posted on Christian fundamentalist websites, and he rented a farm where police found 9,000-11,000 pounds (4,000-5,000 kilograms) of fertilizer.

Police have charged Breivik under Norway's terror law. He will be arraigned on Monday when a court decides whether police can continue to hold him as the investigation continues. Authorities have not given a motive for the attacks, but both were in areas connected to the Labor Party, which leads a coalition government.

The Norwegian police has been unable to confirm how many explosions hit Oslo Friday afternoon in a bomb attack on Norway's government complex that caused widespread chaos. "We cannot confirm that the bomb was planted in a vehicle," Egil Vrekke, an assistant chief constable of the Oslo police, told the BBC in a blitz interview.

He confirmed that 2 persons have been killed, and eight others have been wounded, and said that the Oslo police is focusing on the ongoing rescue operation.

People are reportedly phoning from Utoya saying they are benig shot at. Multiple ambulances are being sent to the site. The alleged shooter was dressed as a police officer. He travelled on a boat to the island in the uniform and when he arrived he started shooting with a handgun, according to reports. Unconfirmed reports of four dead.

Officials said some people were still inside the damaged buildings, some of which were on fire. No-one has said they were behind the attack. Television footage from the scene showed rubble and glass from shattered windows in the streets - smoke was rising from some buildings where fires were burning. The wreckage of at least one car was on one street.

All roads into the city centre have been closed, said national broadcaster NRK, and security officials evacuated people from the area, fearing another blast. Mr Stoltenberg said all government ministers were believed to be safe, Reuters reports. He said he had been advised by police not to reveal his current location.

Egil Vrekke, Assistant Chief Constable of Oslo police told the BBC: "The latest information we have is that there has been a heavy explosion, quite near the government buildings in Oslo this afternoon and there was extensive damage to the buildings. And we can confirm that people are dead and injured," he said.

Analysts have likened the exercise that the chief executive would be forced to undertake to triage: the frantic, on-the-fly process by which physicians and nurses decide which patients arriving at a hospital's emergency room most urgently require medical attention, and which patients, however great their suffering, must be ignored for the moment.

"Not everything is going to be paid, and someone has to decide what's not going to be paid," said Ron Haskins, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution. "The bills are higher than the income." An analysis by the Bipartisan Policy Center, using previous budget figures to project federal revenues and outlays for the month of August, found that the shortfall would be approximately $160 billion. That figure declines a bit - to approximately $135 billion - if one starts one's calculations for the month on August 3, the day after the Treasury exhausts its reserve funds.

On that date, a large set of Social Security and disability checks is set to go out, worth a total estimated value of $23 billion. Obama has suggested he is uncertain whether those checks would in fact be sent out on that date, in the absence of a deal on the $14.2 trillion debt ceiling. Others suggested the president's statement was either designed to influence Republican lawmakers in the ongoing negotiations or one that might only be true for a limited period of time. In the latter scenario, the Social Security checks would go out on August 4 or 5.

The very first bills the federal government would pay, according to Jay Powell, a former undersecretary of the Treasury under President George H W Bush who is now a visiting scholar at the Bipartisan Policy Center, would be interest on outstanding debt - even if that debt is held by foreign creditors.

"We really have no choice; you need to pay the interest," Powell told Fox News. "If we default on a bond, no one knows what would happen, but it could actually collapse the world's financial system, as almost happened in 2008. It would make the Lehman Brothers event potentially look like a tempest in a teapot. I honestly tell you it's not a risk that anybody in the Treasury Department would ever take - and they shouldn't."

The report was partly based on an independent review of coverage by Steve Jones, Professor of Genetics at University College, London. Although he found no evidence of bias in BBC output, he suggested where there is a "scientific consensus" it should not hunt out opponents purely to balance the story. He highlighted climate change as an example along with the controversy over the Measles, Mumps and Rubella vaccine potentially leading to autism.

Lord Lawson, chairman of the sceptical Global Warming Policy Foundation, said, "The BBC is already extremely one-sided on this issue. They have a settled view which is politically correct. The idea that because scientific opinion falls largely on one side you can't have a debate is outrageous. Because there's a strong majority in basic science doesn't mean the issue is off the table, yet the BBC says it should be."

The foundation's director, Dr Benny Peiser, said the report would lead to biased coverage of climate change and stifle any real debate. Dr David Whitehouse, the foundation's editor and a former BBC science correspondent, said the corporation had "lost the plot" when it came to science journalism.

He said the corporation was "grouping sceptics with deniers" which would result in a lack of valid scientific input to its reports. He said: "A sceptic is not a denier, all good scientists should be sceptics. The BBC has got itself into a complete muddle. In seeking to get the science right it has missed the journalism which is about asking awkward questions and shaking the tree."

Sergeant Reed - who eventually arrested a suspect after staking out a Kern County vineyard - is just one of dozens of deputies on the front lines of agricultural crime in California, home to the nation's most productive farms and the people who prey on them. While thievery has long been a fact of life in the country, such crimes are on the rise and fighting them has become harder in many parts of California as many grants for rural law enforcement have withered on the vine.

While other states have their own agricultural intrigue - cattle rustlers in Texas, tomato takers in Florida - few areas can claim a wider variety of farm felons than California, where ambushes on everything from almonds to beehives have been reported in recent years. Then there is the hardware: diesel fuel, tools and truck batteries regularly disappear in the Central Valley, the state's agricultural powerhouse, where high unemployment, foreclosures and methamphetamine abuse have made criminals more desperate, officials say.

"All of our ag crimes are up," said Sergeant Reed, who oversees a unit of two full-time detectives - down from three a year ago - all patrolling a county about eight times the size of Rhode Island. A wet winter and warm summer, after all, have meant healthy crops, he said, and a healthy market means happy thieves.

"Everything this year is doing well," Sergeant Reed said. "And if it's doing well here, there's somebody looking to steal it."

Portions of a National Ground Intelligence Center study on the lethal effects of electromagnetic pulse (EMP) and high-powered microwave (HPM) weapons revealed that the arms are part of China's so-called "assassin's mace" arsenal - weapons that allow a technologically inferior China to defeat US military forces.

EMP weapons mimic the gamma-ray pulse caused by a nuclear blast that knocks out all electronics, including computers and automobiles, over wide areas. The phenomenon was discovered in 1962 after an above ground nuclear test in the Pacific disabled electronics in Hawaii.

The declassified intelligence report, obtained by the private National Security Archive, provides details on China's EMP weapons and plans for their use. Annual Pentagon reports on China's military in the past made only passing references to the arms.

"For use against Taiwan, China could detonate at a much lower altitude (30 to 40 kilometers)... to confine the EMP effects to Taiwan and its immediate vicinity and minimize damage to electronics on the mainland," the report said.

In the end, there were important resolutions to announce after all. Euro-zone heads of state and government agreed on Thursday evening to a second emergency aid package for Greece "and some other things," said German Chancellor Angela Merkel following the special summit of the 17 euro-zone member states in Brussels. She exuded satisfaction and said it had been an "important day."

In the weeks prior to the summit, Merkel had repeatedly insisted that there was no need for the special summit and she made it clear that she was not enthusiastic about participating. As recently as Tuesday, she warned that one should not expect any "spectacular" moves. And the Thursday agreement does indeed fall short of being spectacular, but it provides the clarity that was so badly needed.

The new package provides for 109 billion euros worth of credit for Athens. The majority of the fund comes from the euro backstop fund known as the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) and from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Private creditors are to contribute an additional 50 billion euros by 2014 via a combination of debt buybacks and swaps. The level of private involvement in the plan is much higher than had been expected and reflects the position that Germany had been insisting on for months. It can be seen as a personal success for Merkel.

At the same time, the EFSF is to be granted additional, pre-emptive competencies to prevent the euro crisis from spreading to additional countries. Among other measures, the EFSF will have the ability to buy state bonds on secondary markets - from banks and insurance companies for example - in order to support debt-ridden euro-zone countries. It is a further step in the direction of the kind of transfer union that Germany has long insisted must be avoided.

The plan will likely lead rating agencies to downgrade Greece to default status for several days this autumn. But government leaders consider the risk to be manageable. Once the new bonds, guaranteed by the EFSF, are issued, Greece will be upgraded again - according to the plan, at least. How exactly the markets will react, however, remains to be seen.

As much as 50% of the US population was under a heat advisory, officials said. Meteorologists have put the temperatures down to a "dome" of high pressure in the atmosphere. On Thursday, many regions in the central US and parts of the eastern seaboard also saw heat indexes - a combination of temperature and humidity - topping 43C.

"This is an exceptionally strong ridge of high pressure that really has an exceptional scope and duration," Eli Jacks, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service, told the BBC. "The air is sinking, as it sinks it compresses and gets warmer." It also dries out, so few clouds form to block the high early-summer sun, he said.

The combination of high heat and high humidity made it hard for the human body to cool itself - because sweat does not evaporate efficiently, he added. Across the central and eastern US, people and animals alike have been struggling to keep cool amid the oppressive heat and humidity. As the heat peaks in major population centres on the east coast, the number of deaths is expected to rise, officials warn.

By Friday, the low pressure system moving east is expected to bring thunderstorms with hail to the north-eastern US. Meanwhile, as half of the country's 310 million residents sizzle, states in the north-western region of the country were experiencing abnormally cool temperatures. "I didn't know it could be this cold in July. It is absolutely freezing here in Seattle," said one user of the micro-blogging website Twitter.

The most severe heat-wave in modern North American history took place during the Great Depression in 1936. The heat that summer was blamed for more than 5,000 deaths in the US and Canada.