Evangelos Venizelos is a glutton for punishment. As Greece's finance minister when the the debt crisis exploded last summer he was involved in the intense, soul-shredding negotations that led his country, the EU and the global economy to the edge of the abyss.

His boss, former Prime Minister George Papndreou, resigned under the strain. Venizelos was briefly hospitalized with stress.

The Latvian capital has become one of the centers for the disturbing trend in much of the eastern borderlands of Europe for glorifying Nazi collaborators. The marches have become a flashpoint. 1,000 police lined the route the 1,500 Nazi nostalgics marched along.

Many locals regard the Latvian Legion of the Waffen-SS as freedom fighters, who fought the Soviet Union. Others regard the legion as Nazi collaborators.

Once again the Guardian has scooped the world. This time with a trove of e-mails purportedly written by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and his wife, Asma, and others of their inner circle.

Today a new name was thrown into the mix, that of Assad's father-in-law, Fawaz Akhras, who is a cardiologist based in London.

Apparently over the last few months he has been offering fatherly advice to his son-in-law on how to spin the British press.

Since the new era of anti-globalization/anti-capitalism protests hit Britain a decade ago, the police have used a method of crowd control called a "kettle."  Basically protesters can go into an area, but then they cannot get out until the police deem the steam to have risen and dissipated through the spout. Or the police can allow a few out at a time.