BP has been slowly recovering from the horrific four month-long oil spill that followed an oil rig explosion on 20 April in the Gulf of Mexico.

But dampening that recovery was the announcement by the US Justice Department last Wednesday that it was suing the oil giant and eight others for negligence in relation to the incident, signalling the start of a lengthy legal saga.

Since 2006, 28,000 people have been killed in Mexico’s brutal turf war over the illegal drugs trade.

But in the past year the violence has gotten a lot worse.

As a result, Mexican President Felipe Calderon is desperately trying to resolve the crisis, but given the root causes, he also needs help from his neighbour to the north. 

The new reality

The world’s biggest economy is in deep trouble. The government and Federal Reserve have effectively tried everything they can to fix the problem but have failed.

That problem is weak consumer demand, which has been caused by the demise of America’s middle class.

Now it seems the question is not whether the American economy will go back into recession, but whether it will be a recession or a depression.

America has dealt a major blow to the Obama presidency just two years after they voted him and his Democrats into power in November 2008.

The opposition Republicans have fought back from their disastrous defeat at the end of the President Bush presidency to claim the majority of seats in the House of Representatives in Tuesday’s midterm elections.

But given the Republicans’ agenda, it may not only be a blow for Obama, but indeed for America and the world.

On Tuesday, Americans will vote in their most important elections outside of the presidential election.

In fact, these elections are arguably the most important because they decide who makes the country’s laws.

And with Americans angry over their economy, it looks as though that law-making power is going to shift way from President Obama’s Democrats and towards the Republicans.

The midterm elections

They say the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.

It’s a sentiment that clearly rings true for the millions of immigrants that try to cross the Mexican/US border every year in search of the ‘American dream’.

Yet despite the relative prosperity in the US, the border region is fraught with dangers associated with illegal immigration, national security and drug trafficking.

You may not have heard of the “Valley of Heart’s Delight”, but you will know the area by its other name – Silicon Valley.

It is the nurturing ground to many of the cutting edge, high-tech inventions that change the way we live.

Covering a region of the San Francisco Bay area in California, Silicon Valley owes its famous name to the high concentration of companies that developed silicon-based technology during the 1970’s.

After commemorations marking the ninth anniversary of 9/11 on Saturday, passionate protesters were out in the streets of New York in what many see is part of a growing hatred or fear of Islam in America.

This emerging ‘Islamophobia’ has shown its face in recent weeks thanks to a proposed Islamic cultural centre two blocks from Ground Zero and a subsequent threat to burn copies of the Koran (Islamic version of the bible).

The same problem that triggered the world’s economic decline in 2008 is again threatening to derail the global economy.

That problem is the American housing market, and in so far as helping it, the US government is just about out of moves.

In fact, some experts believe the government should just let it crash and get it over with. But the domino effect that might cause around the world is frightening.

American news reports quite often talk of things like sufficient votes in Congress, Senators blocking a reform bill, or a power shift in the House of Representatives.

But who are these shadowy characters and institutions?

Together they are the United States Congress – the centre of American power and a political force that is largely unknown or misunderstood.

Simply put, the congress makes laws while the White House runs the country.