NEW ORLEANS — BP is arguing that victims of last year’s Gulf oil spill should not be paid any more claims for future losses because the areas affected by the spill have recovered and the economy is improving.

The British oil company makes its case in a 29-page document filed
with the Gulf Coast Claims Facility, which administers the $20 billion
fund for victims.

It criticizes several aspects of the fund’s policies and claims that
at some times it has paid victims more than is allowed under the federal
Oil Pollution Act.

Washington (CNN) — A budget deal reached last week to avert a government shutdown won approval Thursday from both the House and Senate, sending it to President Barack Obama for his signature.

The measure cuts $38.5 billion in spending while funding the government for the rest of the current fiscal year, which ends September 30. With its passage, the White House and Congress will now focus on what are expected to be more rancorous battles over a budget for fiscal year 2012 and the upcoming need to raise the federal debt limit.

(CNN) — She was a mother of three living in a small apartment and working four jobs. And then, as if in a fairy tale, she won her state’s lottery last year. But the story doesn’t have the happy ending you might expect.

She didn’t do anything overly extravagant after the $1.3 million got slashed in taxes. She bought a house, got a new wardrobe at the Salvation Army, cut work down to just one job and invested the rest.

And then came the phone calls: promises, marriage proposals, accusations, threats. People who used to volunteer to help her do things wanted money for their trouble. Family members, she says, tried to run her life, and control her money.

HARTFORD, Conn. — An attorney who represented Kennedy cousin Michael Skakel in his murder trial was sentenced Wednesday to one year and one day in federal prison for failing to pay about $420,000 in income taxes.

Michael “Mickey” Sherman, who has appeared frequently on national television shows as a legal analyst, had pleaded guilty in June to two misdemeanor counts of willful failure to pay income taxes.

He admitted he could have paid the taxes, but spent the money on country club memberships and other lavish expenses.

LAVEEN, Ariz — Don’t tread on Andy C. McDonel.

This year, Mr. McDonel began flying a yellow “Don’t Tread on Me” flag on his roof in this unincorporated area just outside Phoenix. The historic banner — which dates to 1775, when it was hoisted aboard ships during the initial days of the Revolutionary War — has been adopted by the Tea Party movement. But Mr. McDonel said that he had unfurled the flag for its historical significance and nothing else

WASHINGTON — Senate Democrats on Thursday gave up plans to attempt to pass an energy-global warming bill that caps greenhouse gases, abandoning a priority of President Barack Obama.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said no Republican was willing to back a comprehensive energy bill, a development he called “terribly disappointing.”

Democrats have been trying for more than a year to pass a plan that charges power plants and other large polluters for their heat-trapping carbon emissions, which contribute to global warming. The House voted 219-212 last year for a “cap and trade” plan featuring economic incentives to reduce heat-trapping gases from power plants, vehicles and other sources.

New Orleans, Louisiana (CNN) — The House of Representatives on Thursday passed a bill that removes limits on financial damages that can be awarded for accidents off the U.S. coastline, such as the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig that killed 11 workers.

The bill updates maritime laws that have been on the books since the mid-1800s and early 1920s. Those laws restricted the amount of money families could obtain to compensate for lost wages and funeral expenses. The bill passed by the House Thursday would allow compensation for non-monetary losses such as pain and suffering.

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (CNN) — Brazil’s high court has halted the return of a 9-year-old boy to the United States, his American father told CNN.

Thursday’s ruling comes one day after a lower court unanimously upheld a decision last June by the 16th Federal Court in Rio de Janeiro, which ordered Sean Goldman returned to his home with his father, David Goldman, in New Jersey. That decision was made in accordance with the 1980 Hague Convention on the Civil Aspects of Child Abductions.

“It is very, very discouraging,” David Goldman told CNN’s Wolf Blitzer. “I’m very disappointed. This ruling … has nothing to do with the merits of the case.”

TEPCO, Japan’s largest utility, has entered a binding agreement with project partners for the purchase of 1.8 million tonnes per year (mtpy) of liquefied natural gas (LNG) for a period of 20 years, Exxon said in a statement.

The contracted volume includes the plant’s recently expanded output of 0.3 mtpy, which means all of the project’s 6.6 mtpy capacity has now been contracted, project partner Oil Search (OSH.AX) said in a separate statement.

Exxon and partners have not yet finalized two other gas sale agreements with Taiwan’s CPC Corp and Japan’s Osaka Gas Ltd 9532. ahead of a self-imposed deadline of December 8 for the project’s final investment decision.

WASHINGTON – The Supreme Court said Monday it will decide whether two people can do the work of five when it comes to resolving labor-management disputes in the workplace.

The National Labor Relations Board, which for decades has had the responsibility to police many of these disputes, has operated with only two members — and three vacancies — for more than a year. The reason for this is that Democrats who retook control of Congress in 2006 objected to President George W. Bush’s labor policies, and thus refused to confirm his nominees.

But the two NLRB members still in place have continued to issue decisions, making about 400 in the last 16 months.