@@ THE circumstances were not auspicious.Less than two hours before Ben Bernanke, chairman of America's Federal Reserve, made his semi-annual report to Congress on July 19th, new data showed that American inflation,yet again, was unexpectedly high.The core consumer-price index (CPI), which excludes food and energy, jumped 0.3%in June and is now 2.6% higher than it was a year ago, well above the maximum with which Mr Bernanke is thought to be comfortable.
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