(Washington Post)

With the housing market retreating, unemployment lingering and top officials at the Federal Reserve in open disagreement over what to do, Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke is under rising pressure to offer solutions in an address Friday that is likely to be his most important since the end of the financial crisis. The central bank's policy intentions have been unusually muddled in the past two months, according to a widespread view among economists and people in the financial world. They say it is unclear how likely it is that the Fed will undertake major new efforts to try to support the economy, what economic conditions would trigger such actions and what form those actions would take.