Archive for June, 2010
Oil Spill May Cost $4.3 Billion in Property Values
June 11th, 2010Via: Bloomberg: BP Plc’s oil spill may drive down the Gulf Coast’s shore-area property values by 10 percent for at least three years, according to CoStar Group Inc. Losses may total $4.3 billion along the 600-mile (966- kilometer) stretch from the Louisiana bayous to Clearwater, Florida, the property-information service estimates. “It’s just another blow to […]
Musical Chairs with Peter Sutherland
June 11th, 2010Goldman Sachs Sold $250 Million of BP Stock Before Spill: The brokerage firm that’s faced the most scrutiny from regulators in the past year over the shorting of mortgage related securities seems to have had good timing when it came to something else: the stock of British oil giant BP. According to regulatory filings, RawStory.com […]
“These Are Company Towns”
June 11th, 2010Via: ABC News: Reporting is often about access, but journalists along the Gulf Coast covering the BP oil spill have had some trouble getting it. As BP faces more pressure from the government and from its own shareholders unhappy with the company’s falling stock price, it seems to be clamping down on who can talk […]
Experts Double Estimate of BP Oil Spill Size
June 11th, 2010Experts also tell us what the unemployment numbers are. So, double or triple it again and maybe we’ll be in the ballpark. Via: BBC: As many as 40,000 barrels (1.7m gallons) of oil a day may have been gushing out from a blown-out Gulf of Mexico well, doubling many estimates. The US Geological Survey says […]
Coast Guard Admiral Sees Game Changer as Oil Awaits Atlantic Hurricanes
June 10th, 2010Via: Bloomberg: Coast Guard Rear Admiral Mary E. Landry was up early on Saturday, April 24, preparing to brief news reporters on the deadly explosion at the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig when BP Plc called with bad news: The well was leaking oil into the Gulf of Mexico, 5,000 feet below the surface. She dashed […]
Images of Missile and Cluster Munitions Point to U.S. Role in Fatal Attack in Yemen
June 10th, 2010Via: Amnesty International: Amnesty International has released images of a US-manufactured cruise missile that carried cluster munitions, apparently taken following an attack on an alleged al-Qa’ida training camp in Yemen that killed 41 local residents, including 14 women and 21 children. The 17 December 2009 attack on the community of al-Ma’jalah in the Abyan area […]
Britain: Thousands of Anti-Terror Searches Were Illegal
June 10th, 2010Via: BBC: Thousands of people across the UK might have been stopped and searched illegally, figures released by the Home Office suggest. Powers under Section 44 of the Terrorism Act were used in “error” after the proper authorisations were not given. In one example, for April 2004, the Met Police wrongly stopped 840 people. Dozens […]
Efforts to Limit the Flow of Spill News
June 10th, 2010Via: New York Times: When the operators of Southern Seaplane in Belle Chasse, La., called the local Coast Guard-Federal Aviation Administration command center for permission to fly over restricted airspace in Gulf of Mexico, they made what they thought was a simple and routine request. A pilot wanted to take a photographer from The Times-Picayune […]
“Indefinite Incarceration” Over $300 Lumber Yard Debt?
June 10th, 2010Via: Star Tribune: You committed no crime, but an officer is knocking on your door. More Minnesotans are surprised to find themselves being locked up over debts. As a sheriff’s deputy dumped the contents of Joy Uhlmeyer’s purse into a sealed bag, she begged to know why she had just been arrested while driving home […]
Many Americans Too Broke to File for Bankruptcy
June 9th, 2010Via: USA Today: Bankruptcy filings are nearing the record 2 million of 2005, when a new law took effect that was aimed at curbing abuse of the system. Filings could reach 1.7 million this year, says law professor Robert Lawless, but few experts believe that debtors are now gaming the system. Instead, concern exists about […]
