Swamp Gas, May 29, 2007

Posted by Frank James at 6:35 am CDT

A quick guided tour of some of the day's most important or imteresting (or both) Washington-related stories.

Iraqi refugees driven out of their country by violence have increasingly turned to working as dancers in Syrian nightclubs or as prostitutes in the neighboring country.

Pressure mounts in Washington on President Bush and congressional Democrats to find an end to the Iraq War with the summer poised as a critical moment in determining the success or failure of the military surge.

American and Iranian diplomats met in Baghdad's Green Zone, the first such face-to-face meeting between emissaries of the two nations in nearly 30 years. But they agreed on very little except that they both thought Iraq's fortunes would improve if the other side left that war-torn nation.

The coal industry and its backers are pushing for large subsidies for liquefied versions of the fuel, saying it offers energy independence. But environmentalists say liquefied coal would worsen global warming.

President Bush had decided to increase the economic pressure on Sudan for that government's role in the humanitarian crisis in its Darfur region.

Impeachment talk targeted at President Bush and Vice President Cheney may be gaining ground in some parts of the nation but not with Washington Democrats who don't yet see impeachable offenses in White House actions and fear a voter backlash.

Immigration-reform legislation now before Congress is critically flawed in the eyes of business groups who say the legislation would increase the demands, costs and liability on employers. Despite such concerns, some business interests hope to fix the bill.