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For microscopic animals living in the Gulf, even worse than the toxic oil released during the 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster may be the very oil dispersants used to clean it up, a new study finds. More than 2 million gallons (7.5 million liters) of oil dispersants called Corexit 9527A and 9500A were dumped into the Gulf of Mexico in an effort to prevent oil from reaching shore and to help it degrade more quickly. However, when oil and Corexit are combined, the mixture becomes up to 52 times more toxic than oil alone, according to a study published online this...

"The U.S. government temporarily banned BP Plc from federal contracts on Wednesday over its "lack of business integrity" in the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in 2010, a move that the British company had said could force it to rethink its entire U.S. operations. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said the suspension was "standard practice" following criminal actions. . . . The suspension means that BP will not be able to secure any new contracts with the U.S. government, including the lease of new exploration territory in the federal Gulf of Mexico, one of BP's biggest oil production regions globally. Some...

(Reuters) - BP Plc (BP.L) has accused the U.S. government of withholding evidence that may show the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill was smaller than federal officials claimed, a key issue in determining the oil company's liability. A reduction in the size of the spill would lower the maximum civil fine BP could be forced to pay under the U.S. Clean Water Act, a sum now estimated as high as $17.6 billion. The government is one of many plaintiffs suing BP over the April 20, 2010 explosion of the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, which killed 11 workers and triggered...

U.S. prosecutors are preparing what would be the first criminal charges against BP PLC employees stemming from the 2010 Deepwater Horizon accident, which killed 11 workers and caused the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history, said people familiar with the matter. Prosecutors are focused on several Houston-based engineers and at least one of their supervisors at the British oil company, though the breadth of the investigation isn't known.

A blog hosted by the Center for American Progress, headed by top Obama ally John Podesta, is blasting the U.S. Chamber of Commerce for its tangential ties to the Egyptian government while ignoring the extensive lobbying activities of John’s brother Tony Podesta for the Egyptian government. “There is at least one powerful, multinational entity that has continually stood by Mubarak and the Egyptian elite and has continually fought efforts to democratize the country,” says the blog post, weaving a complicated tale of the Chamber’s Egypt affiliate lobbying on behalf of the Mubarak regime. The problem is: Mubarak’s top Washington ally...

NEW ORLEANS The only thing keeping millions more gallons of oil out of the Gulf of Mexico right now is a rush job: an experimental cap that has held for more than two weeks but was never meant to be permanent. As soon as this week, crews will be pumping in some insurance. Engineers are preparing to launch a so-called static kill as early as Monday evening, shoving mud and perhaps cement into the blown-out well to make it easier to plug the gusher up forever and end the Summer of the Spill. The effort carries no certainty, and BP...

I really need to move on to other tasks this morning, but right now I can't pull myself away from the atrocity that's happening in the Gulf Coast and the criminal activity inside the Oval and Congress regarding this oil spill catastrophe. In the words of a commenter at HotAir's post "Coast Guard shuts down oil-skimming barges due to … lack of life vests onboard": Good grief! We have Ray Nagin sitting in the White House.The newest appointment of a “czar” solves nothing. It is just one more layer of bureaucracy that the other alphabet soups have to clear.Amendment...

Governor Palin discussed Obama’s eight-week-long non-response to the BP oil rig disaster with Bill O’Reilly today, as she called for energy independence and government working with energy companies to verify the their statements and hold them accountable for their actions. Use Conventional and Alternative Sources, Don’t Let Industry Players Define Facts Gov. Palin said that we must drill here, simultaneously pursuing alternatives. We cannot be dependent on enemy nations who we must then supplicate to ramp up production for us. She said that we cannot let industry players define facts, which is precisely what eight weeks of bureaucratic malaise has...

I guess Barack Obama is now subscribing to the Bill Maher theory of how a "real black president" should act: He's looking for some ass to kick! And the DUmmies are urging him on. Never mind that BO is not actually DOING anything about the BP oil spill. They just want Oilbama to act angry and outraged--in other words, more like a DUmmie. Several threads on this over at DUmmieland. The two main ones we're using are this THREAD, "On the epic BP environmental clusterf***: "Obama Looking for Whose Ass to Kick"!!!" and this THREAD,"Barack Obama: I'm Talking To...

Video-- Officials from Jefferson Parish claim BP bused 400 cleanup workers into Grand Isle on Friday in time for a visit from President Barack Obama.