Pot licenses to cost $1,000 under draft Washington state rules

By Jonathan Kaminsky

OLYMPIA, Washington (Reuters) - After months of study, the Washington state agency charged with overseeing the first-of-its-kind recreational cannabis market released its draft rules for the industry on Thursday.

Under the proposed guidelines issued by the Washington State Liquor Control Board, licenses to grow, process and sell the marijuana would each cost $1,000 per year - in addition to a $250 application fee - with growers and processors barred from doubling as retailers.

The draft rules do not specify the number of retail licenses to be made available, but stipulate that they be issued on a county-by-county basis. For counties with more qualified applicants than licenses, a lottery will be held.

By contrast, no limits are expected to be set on the number of grower and processor licenses, nor on the size of those operations but the draft rules specify that pot must be grown indoors and tested for contaminants and potency.

The proposed rules "create a very tightly controlled and regulated market but at the same time allow for reasonable access for small and large businesses to participate," said Mikhail Carpenter, a spokesman for the Liquor Control Board.

"We've been working on this for eight months and we're still working on it, but it's the first time that people get to see what it's going to look like," he said.

'BLUEBERRY HAZE'

Voters in Washington state and Colorado passed ballot initiatives to legalize the recreational use of marijuana in November. A bill enabling Colorado to set up such a market is still awaiting signature by that state's governor.

The drug is still illegal under federal law, and the Obama administration has yet to say whether it intends to sue to block the states from implementing their recreational-use markets.

The proposed rules are open to public comment, after which a second draft will be released in June. They are expected to be finalized in July, with applicants having a one-month window to apply for licenses beginning in September. The board plans to issue its first cannabis licenses in December, with the retail stores set to open sometime in 2014.

Under the ballot initiative, growers, processors and retailers will each pay a 25 percent excise tax, in addition to the state and local sales taxes paid by consumers.

Under the draft rules, licenses will be available to people with criminal records, but a felony conviction within the past decade, or two misdemeanors within the past three years, would disqualify most prospective applicants.

Exceptions are provided for misdemeanor marijuana possession convictions - addressing a concern raised by many who have expressed interest in entering the market, Carpenter said. The draft rules also specify that applicants must have been living in Washington state for at least three months.

Marijuana businesses will not be allowed to operate within 1,000 feet of schools, public parks, transit centers, playgrounds and day care centers.

Also included are guidelines for how the drug will be labeled. The proposed labels include the name of the drug, such as "Blueberry Haze," its potency and a warning that it "may be habit forming."

Left unaddressed is the state's largely unregulated and lightly-taxed medical marijuana industry, the exact size of which is not known. Seattle estimates that it is home to over 150 dispensaries.

The state's Department of Revenue reports collecting $1.2 million in fiscal year 2012 taxes from 52 likely medical marijuana businesses, but spokesman Mike Gowrylow said that, because the industry exists in a legal gray area, some medical cannabis providers aren't paying taxes on advice from lawyers.

State lawmakers are weighing legislation asking the Liquor Control Board and two other agencies to study and make recommendations on how to regulate medical marijuana similarly to the recreational industry.

(Editing by Dan Whitcomb and Tim Dobbyn)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/pot-licenses-cost-1-000-under-draft-washington-233633261.html

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149 die, more cry for help at Bangladesh collapse

SAVAR, Bangladesh (AP) ? Workers trapped in the wreckage of a collapsed factory building in Bangladesh cried out for help Thursday, as rescuers struggled to reach survivors of a disaster that killed at least 149 people and reignited questions about the often lethal conditions the country's garment industry.

Army Brig. Gen. Mohammed Siddiqul Alam Shikder said many people are still trapped in the building, which housed a number of garment factories employing hundreds of people when it came tumbling down Wednesday morning. A clearer picture of the rescue operation would be available by afternoon, he said.

The disaster in the Dhaka suburb of Savar came less than five months after a factory fire killed 112 people and underscored the unsafe conditions faced by Bangladesh's garment workers, who produce clothes for global brands worn around the world.

Workers said they had hesitated to enter the building on Wednesday morning because it had developed such large cracks a day earlier that it even drew the attention of local news channels. Just hours later it came tumbling down.

Tens of thousands of people gathered at the site, weeping and searching for family members. Searchers worked through the night to get through the jumbled mess of concrete with drills or their bare hands, passing water and flashlights to those pinned inside the building.

"I gave them whistles, water, torchlights. I heard them cry. We can't leave them behind this way," said fire official Abul Khayer.

Abdur Rahim, who worked on the fifth floor, said a factory manager gave assurances that the cracks in the building were no cause for concern, so employees went inside.

"After about an hour or so, the building collapsed suddenly," Rahim said. The next thing he remembers is regaining consciousness outside.

On a visit to the site, Home Minister Muhiuddin Khan Alamgir told reporters the building had violated construction codes and that "the culprits would be punished."

Abdul Halim, an official with the engineering department in Savar, said the owner was originally allowed to construct a five-story building but he added another three stories illegally.

Local police chief Mohammaed Asaduzzaman said police and the government's Capital Development Authority have filed separate cases of negligence against the building owner.

Habibur Rahman, police superintendent of Dhaka district, identified the owner as Mohammed Sohel Rana, a local leader of ruling Awami League's youth front. Rahman said police were also looking for the owners of the garment factories.

Among the textile businesses in the building were Phantom Apparels Ltd., New Wave Style Ltd., New Wave Bottoms Ltd. and New Wave Brothers Ltd. According to their website, the New Wave companies make clothing for major brands including U.S. retailers The Children's Place and Dress Barn, British retailer Primark and Spanish retailer Mango.

Jane Singer, a spokeswoman for The Children's Place, said that "while one of the garment factories located in the building complex has produced apparel for The Children's Place, none of our product was in production at the time of this accident."

"Our deepest sympathies go out to the victims of this terrible tragedy and their families," Singer said in a statement.

Dress Barn said that to its knowledge, it had not purchased clothing from the factories involved since 2010. Primark, a major British clothing retailer, confirmed that one of the suppliers it uses to produce some of its goods was located on the second floor of the building.

In a statement emailed to The Associated Press, Primark said it was "shocked and deeply saddened by the appalling incident." It added that it has been working with other retailers to review the country's approach to factory standards and will now push for this review to include building integrity. Meanwhile, Primark's ethical trade team is working to collect information, assess which communities the workers come from and provide support "where possible."

Mango denied reports it was using any of the suppliers in the building. However, in an email statement to the AP, it said that there had been conversations with one of them to produce a batch of test products.

Kevin Gardner, a spokesman at Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., the second-largest clothing producer in Bangladesh, said the company is investigating to see if a factory in the building had been producing for the chain at the time of the collapse.

"We remain committed and are actively engaged in promoting stronger safety measures, and that work continues," Gardner said.

Charles Kernaghan, executive director of the Institute for Global Labour and Human Rights, which has an office in Dhaka, says his staff is investigating. He's hoping his team, working with local workers' groups, will be able to find out which brands were having their products made at the time of the collapse.

"You can't trust many buildings in Bangladesh," Kernaghan said. "It's so corrupt that you can buy off anybody and there won't be any retribution."

An enormous section of the concrete structure appeared to have splintered like twigs. Colorful sheets of fabric were tied to upper floors so those inside could climb or slide down and escape.

An arm jutted out of one section of the rubble. A lifeless woman covered in dust could be seen in another.

Sumi, a 25-year-old worker who goes by one name, said she was sewing jeans on the fifth floor with at least 400 others when the building fell.

"It collapsed all of a sudden," she said. "No shaking, no indication. It just collapsed on us."

She said she managed to reach a hole in the building where rescuers pulled her out.

Firefighters and soldiers with drilling machines and cranes worked with volunteers to search for survivors.

Rescuers carried the body of a young boy from the building; it was not immediately clear what he had been doing inside. The building housed a bank and various shops in addition to the garment factories.

Mosammat Khurshida wailed as she looked for her husband. "He came to work in the morning. I can't find him," she said. "I don't know where he is. He does not pick up his phone."

The morgue of the medical college echoed with the sobs of people waiting for the bodies of their loved ones.

"Where's my mother? Where's my mother? Tell me, tell me, oh Allah, oh Allah!" Rana Ahmed cried.

Asaduzzaman, the local police chief, said nearly 100 bodies had been handed to their families as of Thursday morning.

The collapse was even deadlier than the November factory fire that drew international attention to working conditions in Bangladesh's $20 billion-a-year textile industry. The country has about 4,000 garment factories and exports clothes to leading Western retailers, and the industry wields vast power in the South Asian nation.

The Tazreen factory in the fire lacked emergency exits, and its owner said only three floors of the eight-story building were legally built. Surviving employees said gates had been locked and managers had told them to go back to work after the fire alarm went off.

___

AP Retail Writer Anne D'Innocenzio in New York contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/149-die-more-cry-help-bangladesh-collapse-040400455--finance.html

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Chorus grows against Obama administration's sanctions-heavy Iran policy

America?s nuclear negotiators with Iran got it all wrong, according to a growing chorus of critics arguing that over-reliance on pressure and sanctions may be jeopardizing a diplomatic deal.

The Obama administration has implemented a host of crippling sanctions on Iran targeting its central bank and lifeblood oil exports. The goal has been to pressure Iran into giving up its most sensitive nuclear work, which could be a pathway to an atomic bomb.

But a year of high-profile talks between Iran and world powers has yielded little progress. Now a number of senior former US officials and analysts say a White House obsession with the pressure track may be backfiring, and are calling for a pivot toward the diplomatic track to reestablish balance.

RECOMMENDED: How much do you know about Iran? Take our quiz to find out.

?I was in the [State] Department when they kept talking about the so-called two-track policy, and it was clear the whole thing was nonsense, there never were two tracks,? says John Limbert, the former US deputy assistant secretary of state for Iran from 2009 to 2010.

?The sanctions took all the air out of the room. It was 95 percent sanctions, and that was on a good day.?

THE US 'KNOWS' SANCTIONS

One reason for the sanctions focus is ?we know how to do them. It?s familiar. And to do them, we don?t have to deal with the Iranians; we deal with the British, the United Nations, the Russians, the Chinese,? says Ambassador Limbert, who was also held captive in Iran during the 1979 to 1981 hostage crisis, and speaks fluent Persian.

?Whereas diplomacy with Iran, that?s hard. Nobody knows how to do that, and every time we?ve tried, we?ve failed, and as soon as we fail we?ve given up and gone back to doing what we know how to do.?

Limbert, who now teaches at the US Naval Academy, is among a growing number of people calling for a recalibration of the American strategy on Iran ? a greater emphasis on diplomacy and real incentives, like substantial sanctions relief ? in exchange for real concessions by Iran.

?It is time for the administration to make the sweat equity investment in negotiations equal to what it has done on sanctions and the potential to use military force,? Tom Pickering, the former US Under-Secretary of State for Political Affairs, said at the launch last week in Washington of a report by The Iran Project, an independent group of former officials and professionals that seeks to improve official US-Iran ties.

?First and foremost we believe the President needs to make that decision ? ?I want a deal? ? and instruct his people to get a deal," he said.

Ambassador Pickering and Limbert were among 35 signatories of the report, which included other veteran diplomats and officials like Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Jimmy Carter's national security advisor; Ryan Crocker, former ambassador to Afghanistan, Iraq and other trouble spots; Lee Hamilton, a former congressman and vice chairman of the 9-11 Commission; and former Central Intelligence Agency chief Michael Hayden.

There are signs that message is getting through. Despite a strong desire on Capitol Hill and in Israel for more sanctions against Iran, Secretary of State John Kerry asked Congress last Thursday to hold off: ?We don?t need to spin this up at this point in time?. You need to leave us the window to try to work the diplomatic channel,? he said.

FEWER OPTIONS

The widening bid for better diplomacy comes after the latest round of nuclear talks in the Kazakh city of Almaty earlier this month failed to narrow differences between Iran and the P5+1 group (the US, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany).

Calling for ?strengthening the diplomatic track in order to seize the opportunity created by the pressure track,? The Iran Project notes that while US policies ?possibly slowed the expansion of Iran?s nuclear program,? they also ?may have narrowed the options for dealing with Iran by hardening the regime?s resistance to pressure.?

The report states that ?it seems doubtful that pressure alone will change the decisions of Iran?s leaders,? though stronger diplomacy ?that includes the promise of sanctions relief in exchange for verifiable cooperation? could lead to a deal. Another risk of current policy, warns the report: ?Sanctions-related hardships may be sowing the seeds of long-term alienation between the Iranian people and the United States.?

The current P5+1 offer, which has been seen by The Christian Science Monitor, calls upon Iran to halt enrichment of uranium to 20 percent purity ? which is a few technical steps away from bomb-grade of more than 90 percent ? and ?reduce readiness? of a deeply buried enrichment facility by disconnecting and removing key equipment.

After those steps, the P5+1 would provide partial sanctions relief on gold transfers and petrochemical exports, but not on far more painful financial or oil sanctions. Iran says the offer is unbalanced, and wants a more ?reciprocal? approach.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei stated in February that pressure and sanctions are akin to the US ?pointing a gun at Iran and say[ing] either negotiate or we will shoot.? In March, Khamenei said, ?if the Americans sincerely want? to resolve the nuclear issue ?they should stop being hostile towards the Iranian nation in words and in action.?

Both sides in the nuclear negotiations have staked out positions unacceptable to the other. Iran has signaled repeatedly in the past two years a willingness to cap its 20 percent enrichment, but has balked at the low price on offer.

?I think the answer is probably pretty simple. We?re going to have to sweeten the offer on sanctions relief,? former US assistant secretary of state under the George W. Bush administration and veteran troubleshooter James Dobbins said at the report launch. Sanctions should be suspended, not dropped, he said, until Iran also demonstrates it can hold to its side of any bargain.

?Is the level of mistrust so high, that it doesn?t matter at the end of the day what we offer?? asks Limbert. ?Anything short of a full surrender ? and maybe even that ? the Iranians are going to say, ?Well, obviously this is some trick?we?re not sure how you?re doing it, but we know you are.??

The same applies to US suspicions of Iran, adds Limbert: ?That?s exactly the way the two sides operate. This nuclear issue has gotten so invested with manhood [that] neither side feels it can back down.?

HAS OBAMA ALREADY FAILED?

The Iran Project report is only the latest critique of White House handling of Iran that raises questions about missed opportunities and even the desire to make a deal.

The Atlantic Council earlier this month called for the US to prepare a roadmap that clarifies a ?step-by-step reciprocal and proportionate plan? to lift sanctions as Iran?s makes its own moves. ?To make meaningful concessions, Iran needs to see off-ramps and an endgame,? the Washington think tank concluded.

Likewise, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Federation of American Scientists this month determined: ?Washington?s overwhelming focus on coercion and military threats has backed US policymakers into a rhetorical corner.?

Yet a further report, published by the International Crisis Group in February, noted how Iran and the West ?view the sanctions through very dissimilar prisms.? While the US and Europe count on a ?cost-benefit analysis? such that Iran will eventually cave in to hardship, ?the world looks very different from Tehran [where] the one thing considered more perilous than suffering from sanctions is surrendering to them.?

That disconnect has bedeviled the Obama White House, writes former administration official Vali Nasr in a book published this month, ?The Dispensable Nation.?

?The dual-track policy only gave Iran a reason to dig in deeper and clutch its nuclear ambitions tighter,? writes Mr. Nasr, who is now dean of the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University.

?In the end, Obama?s Iran policy failed. He pushed ahead with sanctions for the same reason Lyndon Johnson kept up the bombing of North Vietnam ? neither could think of anything else to do," asserts Nasr. "Obama?s sanctions-heavy approach did not change Iranian behavior; instead it encouraged Iran to accelerate its race to nuclear capability.?

Creating a solution may require a change in approach, say the authors of The Iran Project report.

?We have to do something the Iranians aren?t expecting, that gets them to stop and say, ?Wait a minute? maybe the Americans are serious,?? said James Walsh, a non-proliferation expert at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, at the report launch.

?The only way this hard stuff will get done is if the President of the United States makes it his issue,? added Walsh. ?Absent that, we?re going to continue to do what we?ve done over and over again, only it will get worse.?

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Source: http://news.yahoo.com/chorus-grows-against-obama-administrations-sanctions-heavy-iran-162700005.html

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MacBook Pro is the best performing Windows laptop

The MacBook Pro was judged to be the "best performing" Windows laptop, according to a new study by PC services company Soluto. Soluto used "frustration analytics" to make the determination, according to Brooke Crothers at CNet.

"Frustration analytics," in this case, tracks the crapware that PC makers put on machines fresh from the factory. Apple doesn't make new MacBook owners jump through hoops to have a useable machine, so the MacBook Pro wins.

Soluto feels their comparison is valid because it looks at computers used in the field, as opposed to how they can optimally be set up to run. Other "frustration metrics" measured by Soluto include crashes per week, hangs per week, average boot time, and frequency of "Blue Screens of Death."

Getting Windows working on the Mac takes some extra steps, though - installing Boot Camp or virtualization software and a fresh copy of Windows, for example. Soluto also dings Apple for possible driver issues.

Do you use Windows on a Mac? Are you doing it with Boot Camp or virtualization software? How's your experience, compared to a regular PC laptop?

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TheIphoneBlog/~3/SK5VOsJI-KU/story01.htm

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Activists pressure Obama on Keystone

Power Players

Environmental activists are turning up the heat on President Obama as he faces what could be the trickiest decision of his second term: whether or not to approve the controversial proposed Keystone XL pipeline, which could reach his desk this summer.

The project, which would transport oil from the tar sands of Alberta to the Gulf of Mexico, promises jobs and energy. But critics say it will ravage the environment and send oil overseas.

?We put him in the White House because we thought he was the best chance of really making progress on the issue of climate,? the Sierrra Club?s Courtney Hight told ?Power Players.?

?He?s strongly said that he wants to do something?and this is one of his best opportunities to actually follow through,? she said.

Hight is no ordinary environmentalist. She was one of the first foot soldiers for Obama in New Hampshire in 2007 and later led his campaign?s outreach to youth voters in swing-state Florida.

In 2008, she joined the administration as a member of the president?s Council on Environmental Quality, but later quit her post disillusioned by what she saw as Obama?s weak commitment to cleaning up the earth.

?I worked for the president because I believed that he would change the way Washington fundamentally worked,? Hight said. ?It?s still important to me, and I think part of governing is that you need people to push.?

And push she has. Hight has helped to mobilized hundreds of young people to boycott the pipeline in Washington. During one protest, she was arrested in front of the White House fence.

With Obama no longer under pressure of re-election, it?s unclear what leverage Hight and fellow activists may have. Polls show a strong majority of Americans favor of approving the pipeline. It?s also backed by labor unions and business groups.

?It?s not just about denying this pipeline,? Hight said. ?It?s about, you know, making good on his investment or his promise to invest in clean energy and put that money into that, into clean energy opportunities verses into oil.?

The State Department, which is reviewing the pipeline plan, has released a favorable environmental review. However, the Environmental Protection Agency this week raised objections over the potential for harmful impacts.

What does Hight predict President Obama will do, and what are the potential consequences of his decision? Check out this episode of ?Power Players.?

ABC's Eric Wray, Alexandra Dukakis, Freda Kahen Kashi, Dick Norling, and Shari Thomas contributed to this episode.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/blogs/power-players-abc-news/former-obama-staffer-leads-white-house-protests-against-111050839.html

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Too Early to Know Whether Democrats Will Fall Prey to Second-Term Jinx

This early in the 2014 congressional midterm-election cycle, it?s impossible to know what the election will be about?whether there will be a wind in favor of either party and, if so, what the velocity and impact will be. Recently, we have had three back-to-back wave elections, with 2006 and 2008 in favor of Democrats and 2010 benefiting Republicans. While 2012 cannot really be considered a wave, the election did display certain dynamics that benefited Democrats?at least in national races, although not in gubernatorial ones.

It?s important to remember that wave elections are not the norm?they are actually the exception to the rule. The adage by the late Democratic House Speaker Tip O?Neill that ?all politics is local? would more accurately be ?all politics is local, except when it is not.? In the 1980 elections, Ronald Reagan unseated President Carter by a 10 percentage-point margin, and Republicans gained 12 seats in the Senate and 34 in the House; this was the first wave election our country had seen since the 1974 Watergate upheaval. The next true wave election after 1980 was in 1994, during the Newt Gingrich-led Republican takeover of the House, which resulted in a 52-seat gain, accompanied by a strong eight-seat gain in the Senate. (Note: Sen. Richard Shelby of Alabama switched from the Democratic to the GOP the day after the election, bringing the total Republican gain to nine.) After 1994, there was not another wave for 12 years. Then we saw three consecutive wave elections: 2006, 2008, and the reverse wave in 2010, when Republicans were the beneficiaries and Democrats were the victims.

The safer way to look at congressional elections is to start off assuming that any election will be a normal ?all politics is local? situation, while constantly looking closely for signs that it might not be. Keep an eye out for the chance that it turns out to be a wave year, rather than a relatively level battlefield.

Another thing to remember is that just because it?s a ?normal? election doesn?t necessarily mean that it?s a calm one. In any election following a surge or wave election?two years later in the House or six years later in the Senate?there can be a decline or a corrective election, wherein the party that benefited from the wave in the previous election loses some or all of its gains in the next cycle. This can occur not necessarily because there are strong countervailing dynamics against the winning party as much as because certain seats gained in a wave election can?t be held in another election where that party isn?t enjoying the strong, beneficial dynamics of the previous election. In a wave election, many extremely strong, bright, and talented candidates win along with some fairly strong, reasonably intelligent, and somewhat talented candidates. Often, some of the candidates who win in these cycles aren?t that good?they just had the good fortune of running in a terrific year for their party. These candidates woke up on a Wednesday morning and discovered that they had just been elected to Congress, whether they were deserving of it or not. These seats are the ones that are often the first to go in an adverse or even normal election year. The Democratic gains in 1986 serve as a pretty good example of this. While the second-term Reagan White House was dealing with the Iran-Contra scandal?which no doubt sapped some of its strength?the GOP saw losses in the Senate. This can be interpreted as a rebound from some ?exotic? candidates who won on Reagan?s coattails in 1980 but weren?t sufficiently strong to win on their own six years later.

The temptation at this point in an election cycle is to assume that the dynamics that were in place in the last election will just carry forward into the next one. We assume we?ll see the political equivalent of generals who fought in the last war returning for the next one. Occasionally, a party has two or more favorable elections in a row, such as the 1932-34-36 trifecta for Democrats; the years 1974-76 for Democrats; and, of course, 2006-2008 for the Democrats. But that?s three times in the last 40 years?not that frequent of a pattern to depend on.

Coming out of the 2012 elections, the Republican Party is clearly facing some challenges. Some problems are demographic, specifically the damage to its brand among many minority, female, and younger voters. Others are more ideological: To many voters in the middle, the rhetoric and positioning of the GOP in the past few years has been much more off-putting to these nonideological individuals than that of Democrats. It?s important to note that at other times, the shoe is still on the other foot, and Democrats are the offending party to those middle-of-the-road voters.

Finally, Republicans have fallen behind when it comes to campaign technology. They have gone from a state-of-the-art operation in 2004, with the George W. Bush reelection effort led by Karl Rove and Ken Mehlman, to now appearing to be, on a multitude of levels, one, two, or three steps behind their Democratic foes. How long it will take the Republicans to catch up remains to be seen, but campaign-technology experts point out that given the rapid pace of technological change, any advantage by one party is only a temporary edge built on sand. It is not that hard for the other party to catch up or leapfrog ahead.

Historically, we have seen unfortunate political patterns appear during second presidential terms. The party occupying the Oval Office has suffered significant House and/or Senate losses in five of the last six second-term, midterm elections. Since World War II, the party holding the White House for two consecutive terms has also lost it in five out of the six subsequent elections. Will the dominant dynamic be a continuation of earlier problems for the GOP, or will the historical pattern of the second-term jinx hold?

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/too-early-know-whether-democrats-fall-prey-second-221457105--politics.html

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Florida AG: BP should pay $5 billion for spill

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) -- Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi has disclosed that she's seeking more than $5.4 billion in damages from BP over the 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

Bondi told reporters on Tuesday that she offered to settle the state's claim but never got a response from BP.

She filed suit Saturday on the three-year anniversary of the rig explosion that killed 11 workers and spoiled 1,100 miles of beaches and marsh along the Gulf of Mexico.

Bondi explained she is pursuing lost tax revenue because of decreased tourism. Environmental damages will be addressed by other state agencies.

She said pretrial matters will be handled in Louisiana but the trial will be held in Florida. Louisiana and Alabama sued BP earlier and are in federal court in New Orleans determining liability.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/fla-ag-says-bp-pay-193445707.html

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