Swamp Gas, January 22, 2008

by Frank James

A quick guided tour of some of the most important, most interesting, or both, Washington-relared stories.

The Federal Reserve cut a key interest rate by three-quarters of a percentage point, surprising many observers by not waiting till its regular next week to make the move, and acting amid global worries that a recession in the U.S. economy could slow the world's economies, concerns that have sent the world's financial markets into a tailspin.

U.S. financial markets plunged sharply immediately upon opening this morning, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average falling more than 400 points after opening, amid rising anxieties that the U.S. economy is either in or about to enter a recession.

The Democratic presidential candidates had their fiercest face-to-face exchange yet in a debate in Myrtle Beach, S.C. in which both Senators Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama questioned each other's integrity as John Edwards, the former North Carolina senator, tried to stay above the fray.

The Republican presidential prospects descended on Florida whose primary is just a week away and where a win would give a huge boost to any of several campaigns and a loss would likely doom at least one, that of Rudy Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, who has staked his entire effort on winning that state.

The ability of new mine resistant vehicles in use by the U.S. military in Iraq has come under question after a soldier was killed in one following the explosion of a buried roadside bomb.

Mexico's federal government has launched a military crackdown on the well-armed forces of Mexican drug cartels who have, in alliance with corrupt police officials in certain states, expanded their illegal activities and violence in recent decades.

The fall of the national abortion rate has been accompanied by a steady increase in the use of RU-486, the French made drug that induces abortion and has made ending a pregnancy more discreet and possible away from abortion clinics.

The White House scrapped an e-mail archiving system that the Clinton Administration had put in place and that was required by court order and federal law, meaning that millions of e-mails have been lost, including those that would show the communications stream in the run up to the Iraq War.

Americans with criminal records, including drunken driving and shoplifting violations, are being increasingly turned away as they try to cross into Canada as that nation's border agents gain better access to data bases with such information.