Business Blog

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court won’t order new legislative elections in Mississippi over complaints about the timing of the state’s redistricting. The Mississippi NAACP had challenged the state’s 2011 state elections because the Legislature did not immediately use the 2010 census to draw new district lines in 2011. The state House and Senate instead [...]

“Just Out of Reach” by Mississippi attorney Belinda Stevens tells the story of young love and dark secrets in the turbulent Sixties. Inspired by her own experiences as a Yazoo City High School student, Stevens writes about the impact President Kennedy’s assassination, James Meredith’s integration of the University of Mississippi and the Vietnam War had [...]

The Associated Press Media Editors Association condemns, in the strongest possible terms, the actions of the Justice Department in seizing phone records of The Associated Press. In condemning this action, APME joins the Society of Professional Journalists, the Radio Television Digital News Association and many other journalists across the country. “In a continuing witch hunt [...]

JACKSON, MISSISSIPPI — Energy exploration companies that do horizontal drilling in Mississippi will pay  80 percent less in taxes next year   on oil and gas they extract. The prospect of an economic bonanza from extracting shale oil from below ground in Mississippi, especially  the southwest part of the state, led Gov. Phil Bryant to make [...]

VICKSBURG, MISSISSIPPI — The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Vicksburg District is accepting sealed bids from individuals or groups that are interested in leasing agricultural – grazing land in Yazoo County. The tract consists of exactly 27 acres on the Yazoo River levee system, west of Yazoo City on River Road near Highway 16. The [...]

TUPELO, Miss. — Federal agents of all sorts invaded northeast Mississippi several days ago, on a mission: Find the man who sent a poison-laced letter to the president. But the United States government quickly found itself entangled, once again, in a misunderstood land dominated by squabbling tribes and petty vengeances, the L.A. Times reports. Agents [...]

If you are a federal worker on furlough this week — or an airline passenger delayed by federal furloughs — you might save your blood pressure, and go read another story. This one is about all the money the U.S. government spends on . . . nothing. As reported in the Washington Post, it is one of [...]

  Aviation business professionals say it was glaringly obvious what the Federal Aviation Administration was up to with its initiative to cut off funding to “contract” air traffic control towers. If you want to get a politician’s attention, promise to whack contract towers at around 150 regional airports and shut down another 30 or so [...]

NEW YORK (AP) — Searching for compromise on a divisive issue, the Boy Scouts of America is proposing to partially lift its long-standing exclusion of gays — allowing them as youth members but continuing to bar them as adult leaders. The proposal, unveiled Friday after weeks of private leadership deliberations, will be submitted to the [...]

Former state justice Oliver Diaz talks about recent analysis of the Voting Rights Act.