HUFFPOST HILL – JULY 29TH, 2010

With the August recess quickly approaching it looks like Congress won’t be able to pass the comprehensive energy reform oil spill bill before September. There was, however, enough time for a House panel to drop 13 ethics charges on veteran Rep. Charlie Rangel and, less significantly, for a group of senators to voice their concerns about Red Bull vodkas. Those of you upset by legislative inaction could learn a thing or two from the eternally upbeat Rand Paul, who is turning lemons (decimated mountains) into lemonade (strip malls?). This is HUFFPOST HILL for Thursday, July 29th, 2010:

EXCLUSIVE: OIL, DISPERSANTS FOUND DEEP IN GULF FOOD CHAIN – So much for the emerging narrative that the BP spill wasn’t a big deal. Scientists tell HuffPost’s Dan Froomkin that they’ve found signs of an oil-and-dispersant mix under the shells of “almost all” of the tiny blue crab larvae collected in the Gulf of Mexico, the first clear indication that the unprecedented use of dispersants in the BP oil spill has broken up the oil into toxic droplets so tiny that they can easily enter the food chain. The orange blobs have been spotted all the way from Grand Isle, Louisiana, to Pensacola, Fla. — more than 300 miles of coastline — said Harriet Perry, a biologist with the University of Southern Mississippi’s Gulf Coast Research Laboratory.

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