The man appointed to handle a $20 billion oil spill compensation fund from BP, Kenneth R. Feinberg, yesterday told spill claimants, "No more beating up on BP." He also promised that personal claims would be processed in 48 hours. [LAT]

Remember when the government said "there's absolutely no evidence" of "any significant concentration of oil" left in the Gulf of Mexico a couple of weeks ago? Surprise! There's a lot of oil left, and it's spreading along the ocean floor.

Now that BP's oil well is plugged, government scientists can start looking at what 1.8 million gallons of the chemical dispersant Corexit did to the environment, and seafood in the Gulf of Mexico. The FDA says don't sweat it!

BP today will cement the top of the Gulf oil well after the "static kill" succeeded in stopping the oil flow. And reports now say the spill was not as bad as originally thought. Great! No harm no foul, right?

[If BP is successful with its "static kill" of the oil well — plugging the well with cement and mud — the company will move on to the final "bottom kill" phase with a relief well. Image via AP]

"Static kill," the first step to permanently plug the BP oil spill, could begin tomorrow.

The "BP squad," a group of federal investigators, are preparing a criminal probe of three companies involved in the Gulf oil spill: BP, Transocean, and everyone's favorite war profiteers, Halliburton. The companies' ties to regulators will be examined. [WaPo; Getty]

The former chief electronics technician on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig yesterday told investigators that critical fire and gas leak alarms had been disabled for a year so that the rig's crew could sleep in. Sleepy time is important!

Remember the heady days of last weekend, when it seemed that BP had finally capped the leaky oil well? So much for that! Government tests yesterday detected a "seep a distance from the well." [Bloomberg; pic: AP]

Oil is seeping from the sea bed near the Deepwater Horizon well, and the choke valve may need to be reopened.

It's been three days since BP's latest oil well cap was fitted, and so far no evidence of further leakage has been found. BP is hopeful the cap will contain the oil until a relief well is finished next month.

BP claims the new oil well cap is working nearly 48-hours after being fitted. VP Kent Wells said, "At this point there's no evidence that we don't have integrity." Ha! Oh, he was talking about the cap's integrity, not BP's.

BP's got a new cap for the leaking oil well in the Gulf of Mexico, and it might be working—NewsHour tweeted that oil had stopped flowing, but one camera in their live feed seems to show otherwise. [AP]

BP is hot today! Shares in the company are up over 5% in early London trading amid reports that the well cap in the Gulf is working and that another responsible company, ExxonMobil, is planning a hostile takeover. Pic: AP

Analysts predicted that it would only be a matter of time before oil from the Gulf spill would make its way up the east coast. On Thursday locals at Crescent Beach, in northeast Florida, found tar balls on the shore.

Why remove the oil beneath the sand along Gulf beaches when you can just let it sit there forever? It's not hurting anyone. That's the thinking of some "experts," at least. What you can't see won't hurt you!

Want to hear some pretty disturbing news? The Gulf of Mexico has at least 27,000 abandoned oil and gas wells, and no one has bothered to check if they are leaking. Some even date back to the 1940s.

Yesterday, U.S. District Judge and oil investor Martin Feldman blocked President Obama's "blanket, generic, indeed punitive" offshore oil drilling moratorium. But Interior Secretary Ken Salazar will seek a stay on the ruling, pending an appeal by the administration. [NYT]

BP's in-house magazine BP Planet is putting a positive spin on the oil spill: "Much of the region's businesses—particularly the hotels—have been prospering because so many people have come here" to clean up BP's mess. Thanks, BP!

The president of Transocean Ltd, owner of the leaky Deepwater Horizon oil rig, Steven Newman said today that Obama's "arbitrary six-month time limit" on new offshore oil drilling should be lifted, because companies like his are responsible, honest and competent.