Louisiana Protesters Lash BP, Feds

Protesters took to the streets of New Orleans yesterday as BP weighed yet another strategy to plug the 6-week-old oil spill after the crushing failure of the "top kill" approach. "The federal government's inaction is horrible," a protester told the Times-Picayune. "We didn't know it was this bad in New Orleans until this past week or two."

New Orleans residents are catching on, and suspicions that BP has no reliable plan other than drilling a relief well—which may not be complete until as late as August—are growing stronger. Oil drifting away from the site of the Deepwater Horizon explosion on April 20 continues to infiltrate coastal Louisiana, with patches of oil reported off four parishes.