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The war on drugs and frequent raids by federal drug agents have helped support the local economy — keeping prices for street sales of pot high and keeping profits rich.

We have taken into account hard assets like land, estimated lifetime savings based on work history, inheritance, homes, and money paid for services, which include things as diverse as their salary as Collector of Customs at the Port of New York to membership on Fortune 500 boards. Royalties on books have also been taken into account, along with ownership of companies and yields from family estates.

The accident comes at a difficult time for BP — the largest single owner of the pipeline operator, holding 47 percent — as it struggles to plug a gushing Gulf of Mexico oil well.

The shutdown followed a series of mishaps that resulted from a scheduled fire-command system test at Pump Station 9, about 100 miles south of Fairbanks, said Alyeska Pipeline Service Co, the operator of the 800-mile oil line.

The power outage triggered opening of relief valves, causing an unspecified volume of crude oil to overflow a storage tank into a secondary containment. There were no injuries, but the approximately 40 people at the work site were evacuated, Alyeska spokeswoman Michele Egan said.

North Slope oil producers have cut their flow into the pipeline’s Prudhoe Bay intake station to 16 percent of their normal rates, Egan said. There is enough storage capacity to allow the line to be shut down for 48 hours as long as producers maintain the 16 percent flow rate, she said.

It is unclear how long the shutdown will last.

“We’re going to take as long as we need to make sure the site is safe before we start back up,” Egan said.

The volume of spilled oil is unknown. “We’ve estimated the spill is several thousand barrels,” she said. All has been held within the secondary containment, which has capacity to hold 104,500 barrels, she said. The amount spilled is “nowhere near” the containment area’s capacity, she added.

Alyeska is a consortium owned by five oil companies. Major owners are BP, ConocoPhillips and Exxon Mobil. Unocal and Koch hold minor shares.

JOHN CLARKE: $1 trillion each.

BRYAN DAWE: Correct. Who to?

JOHN CLARKE: Mainly France, Britain and Germany.

BRYAN DAWE: Correct. And how are Germany, France, Britain going Roger?

JOHN CLARKE: Well they’re struggling a bit, aren’t they?

BRYAN DAWE: Correct. Why?

JOHN CLARKE: Well ‘cause they’ve lent all the vast amounts of money to other European economies that can’t possibly pay them back.

BRYAN DAWE: Correct so what are they go to go have to do?

JOHN CLARKE: They’re going to have to bail them out.

BRYAN DAWE: Correct. Where are they getting the money to do that Roger?

In at least one case, an inspector for the Minerals Management Service admitted using crystal methamphetamine and said he might have been under the influence of the drug the next day at work, according to the report by the acting inspector general of the Interior Department.

The report cites a variety of violations of federal regulations and ethics rules at the agency’s Louisiana office. Previous inspector general investigations have focused on inappropriate behavior by the royalty-collection staff in the agency’s Denver office.

The report adds to the climate of frustration and criticism facing the Obama administration in the monthlong oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, although it covers actions before the spill. Millions of gallons of oil are gushing into the Gulf, endangering wildlife and the livelihoods of fishermen, as scrutiny intensifies on a lax regulatory climate.

The report began as a routine investigation, the acting inspector general, Mary Kendall, said in a cover letter to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, whose department includes the agency.

“Unfortunately, given the events of April 20 of this year, this report had become anything but routine, and I feel compelled to release it now,” she wrote.

Her biggest concern is the ease with which minerals agency employees move between industry and government, Kendall said. While no specifics were included in the report, “we discovered that the individuals involved in the fraternizing and gift exchange — both government and industry — have often known one another since childhood,” Kendall said.

Their relationships took precedence over their jobs, Kendall said.

Stephen Davis, a seven-year veteran of drilling-rig work from San Antonio, told The Guardian’s Suzanne Goldenberg today that he was held on a boat for 36 to 40 hours after diving into the Gulf from the burning rig and swimming to safety. Once on a crew boat, Davis said, he and the others were denied access to satellite phones or radio to get in touch with their families, many of whom were frantic to find out whether or not they were OK.

Davis’ attorney told Goldenberg that while on the boat, his client and the others were told to sign the statements presented to them by attorneys for Transocean — the firm that owned the Deepwater Horizon — or they wouldn’t be allowed to go home. After being awake for 50 harrowing hours, Davis caved and signed the papers. He said most of the others did as well.

Davis’ story seems to be backed up by a similar account given to NPR by another Deepwater Horizon crewmember earlier in the month. Christopher Choy, a roustabout on the rig, said that the lawyers gathered the survivors in the galley of a boat and said, “‘You need to sign these. Nobody’s getting off here until we get one from everybody.’ … At the bottom, it said something about, like, you know, this can be used as evidence in court and all that. I told them, ‘I’m not signing it.’ ”

Choy said that once he was finally allowed to get off the boat, he was shuttled to a hotel, where he met up with his wife. At the hotel, representatives from Transocean confronted him again and badgered him to sign the statement. Exhausted, traumatized and desperate to go home, Choy said that he finally relented and signed.

Choy’s lawyer, Steve Gordon, is incensed over what transpired in the hours after the explosion. He, along with other attorneys for Deepwater Horizon workers, is trying to get the documents voided by the courts.

Issued last September by General David Petraeus, the order authorized an escalation that included boosting military and intelligence assistance to help Yemeni forces strike al Qaeda targets, as well as deployment of more unmanned aerial drones to collect information and track high-value targets.

The order also authorized U.S. Special Operations units to work with local security forces to counter al Qaeda and other threats, a goal Pentagon officials have made no secret of.

As the head of the U.S. military’s Central Command, Petraeus oversees U.S. wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and plays a major role in planning for any possible military action against Iran over its nuclear program.

The order was first reported by the New York Times, which quoted a document it obtained as saying the goal was to build networks that could “penetrate, disrupt, defeat or destroy” al Qaeda and other militant groups as well as “prepare the environment” for future attacks by U.S. or local military forces.

The newspaper said the directive also appeared to authorize specific operations in Iran, most likely to gather intelligence about its nuclear program or identify dissident groups that might be useful for any future military offensive.

Some of the covert military operations that followed the secret order have been reported. These include a September 2009 attack by helicopter-borne Special Operations Forces on a car carrying one of east Africa’s most wanted al Qaeda militants, Kenyan-born Saleh Ali Saleh Nabhan.

Central Command has been positioning Reaper drones at a base in the Horn of Africa. Officials said the drones can be used against militants in Yemen and Somalia, and even against pirates who attack ships traversing the Gulf of Aden and the Indian Ocean.

“They (the drones) are part of it but it is much broader than that,” one U.S. official said of the order.

In February, Defense Secretary Robert Gates authorized $150 million in security assistance for Yemen for fiscal 2010, up from $67 million last year.

Officials told Reuters the money would be used in part to bolster Yemen’s special operations forces to lead an offensive targeting al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, which claimed responsibility for a failed plot to blow up a U.S. passenger plane on Christmas Day.