by Richard Morrison
June 20, 2008

1. ENERGY

One million Americans sign a petition urging Congress to allow offshore drilling for oil and gas.

CEI Expert Available to Comment: Director of Energy Policy Myron Ebell on the folly of banning offshore exploration:

“…the offshore areas currently banned from development likely contains a mean estimate of 18.92 billion barrels of oil and 85.79 trillion cubic feet of natural gas that are ‘technically recoverable.’ Yet the United States is the only developed country in the world that bans development of most of its offshore gas resources. This self-imposed ban has put our nation at a competitive disadvantage with Cuba and China. Cuba recently announced that it has negotiated lease agreements with China to explore oil and gas production just 50 miles off the coast of Key West, Florida. The United States can’t develop resources in the Florida Straits, yet Cuba and China can.”

2. BUSINESS

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson calls for the Federal Reserve to be given more power to intervene in the workings of Wall Street firms.

CEI Expert Available to Comment: Senior Fellow Eli Lehrer and Center for Entrepreneurship Director John Berlau on what U.S. finance firms need to flourish:

“America needs a fundamental rethinking of its system of financial regulation that asks questions about what activities properly fall under governmental regulation, which ones might be dealt with through semi-private means, and which ones belong entirely in the hands of the free market.”

3. LEGAL

The Supreme Court strikes down a California law that restricted the ability of companies to speak out against union activities.

CEI Expert Available to Comment: Special Projects Counsel Hans Bader on the Court’s new labor opinions:

“[The Court] ruled in Chamber of Commerce v. Brown that a California law imposing limits on employer speech by companies that receive state funds is preempted by the National Labor Relations Act. That was one of four decisions on labor and employment law the Supreme Court issued today. The court also made it easier for workers to sue their employer for age discrimination in one case (a so-called disparate-impact case), and harder for some workers in another. It also made it easier for employees to sue under ERISA for alleged conflicts of interest.”

Blog feature: For more news and analysis, updated throughout the day, visit CEI�s blog, Open Market.

FOR MORE INFORMATION

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