The end of the world as we know it

The end is nigh for America's dominance as a world superpower, according to a US intelligence organisation report which the Guardian splashes on today.

The National Intelligence Council report warns the world is entering an increasingly unpredictable period in which western-style democracy is no longer assured and nuclear war and global environmental threats are imminent.

The Times pulls out one of the most alarming sections, with this quote:

"The world of the near future will be subject to an increased likelihood of conflict over resources, including food and water, and will be haunted by the persistence of rogue states and terrorist groups with greater access to nuclear weapons."

Produced by the council every four years, the global trends review warns that the country Barack Obama will inherit on January 20 will no longer be able to "call the shots" and that by 2025 the spread of western capitalism could not be taken for granted.

In an analysis of the report the Guardian says: "Just four years ago the NIC declared globalisation irreversible and assumed ongoing American supremacy. Energy supplies were plentiful; climate change hardly mentioned. Terrorism was the main challenge the US faced. Now these certainties have been blown away ... the NIC identifies scarcity - of land, water, oil and food, and especially, 'airspace' for carbon emissions - as the hallmark of tomorrow's world."

* Guardian: Sun sets on US power: report predicts end of global dominance
* Times: National Intelligence report: sun setting on the American century
* Guardian: Blowing away certainties
* Guardian: The full global trends review (pdf)

FROM FIRE SALES TO FIREWORKS

More than one in five homes are on the market because their owners cannot afford the mortgage repayments, according to a report in the Times today. It cites a survey suggesting that at least 5,000 properties a week are being put up for sale by people in financial turmoil.

Meanwhile, the Mail splashes on a piece about Alistair Darling's exasperation with the "moral failure" of banks to help small businesses and families. It reports that the chancellor is studying legal options - such as the creation of a "bank enforcer" to supervise lending behaviour, or a cap on interest charged on business loans to ease the burden.

However, all this pales in comparison to a dazzling display overnight in Dubai, which was the location for the sumptuous STG15m celebration to launch the Atlantis Palm Jumeiriah hotel.

The party, thrown by the South African tycoon Sol Kerzner, came complete with 4,000 lobsters, 500 chefs (including four with Michelin stars), a STG3m fireworks display and a performance by Kylie Minogue, for which she was reportedly paid STG2m.

* Times: Mortgage debt forces thousands to sell up
* Mail: Darling threatens to force banks to lend to firms and families
* Guardian: Recession Dubai style: 500 chefs, 4,000 lobsters and Kylie
* Telegraph: Dubai resort, the Atlantis stages most expensive launch party ever

BROUGHT TO BOOK OVER LIBRARY DAMAGE

Farhad Hakimzadeh, a Harvard-educated businessman, publisher and intellectual, is facing prison today after vandalising 150 books - mostly dating from the 16th and 17th century - from the British Library.

It remains a mystery why the Iranian academic took a scalpel to the books, which have been in the library's collection for centuries, causing £400,000 of damage.

Hakimzadeh, 60, has pleaded guilty to 14 specimen charges of stealing maps, pages and illustrations from 10 books at the British Library and four from the Bodelian Library in Oxford. He will appear in Wood Green crown court for sentencing today.

* Guardian: History's missing pages: Iranian academic sliced out sections of priceless collection * Times: The gentleman thief who took a leaf out of the British Library's rarest travel books

LITTLE (KNOWN) BROWN BOOK

On to more modern literary tomes, and Gordon Brown's new book on war heroes, which had apparently been due to be published in April, has now made it to the shelves.

Wartime Courage: Stories of Extraordinary Courage by Ordinary People in World War Two has sold just 193 copies for the fortnight it has been on sale.

It has not been helped by some scathing reviews, including James Delingpole in the Independent calling it a "leaden, clunken-fisted cuttings job".

"His opening and closing essays are waffly, trite and, in so far as they attempt to make political capital from the achievements of people who have nothing whatsoever to do with him or his grisly ideology, offensive," he writes.

Brown may have more pressing concerns with the figures however: while he is teetering around the 200 copy sales mark, the latest instalment of Jordan's autobiography, Pushed to the Limit, has notched up 4,446 sales in the same period.

* Guardian: As voters trickle back, readers stay away in droves