Oil futures extended their seemingly relentless advance Wednesday, rising to a new record near $124 a barrel as investors captivated by the market's upward momentum looked past the government's report of an increase in crude and gasoline supplies. At the pump, gas prices rose for the first time since last week. 

Light, sweet crude for June delivery hit a new trading record of $123.93 in after-hours activity on the New York Mercantile Exchange after settling up $1.69 at a record close of $123.53 a barrel.  . . .  

At the pump, meanwhile, the average national price of a gallon of regular gas rose Wednesday for the first time since last week, adding 0.8 cent to $3.618, according to a survey of stations by AAA and the Oil Price Information Service. Gas prices are back within a cent of the record $3.623 a gallon set last week, and are expected to rise to an average of $3.73 a gallon next month, according to the latest Energy Department forecast. 

Some analysts predict prices could rise to a national average of $4 in coming weeks; prices are already that high in some areas, including parts of Hawaii and California.

Bush once again will press the Saudis to increase oil production to help bring pump prices down. Bush did the same during his meetings in January with Abdullah — a request that ultimately was ignored.

Hadley defended Bush against criticism that he doesn't have enough sway with the Saudis. "Capacity is limited in the Middle East," he said.

But OPEC nations such as Saudi Arabia have considerable additional production capacity, pumping a little over 8.5 million barrels a day and acknowledging the ability to produce as much as 11 million barrels a day.

Hadley suggested Bush will outline for Abdullah the recent string of bad news in the U.S. economy in hopes of effecting a different outcome this time. This could pose an awkward argument for a president who focuses at home on predictions that the U.S. economy is fundamentally strong enough that it will bounce back from its troubles.              

April, for whatever statistical reason, has shown the highest number of birth/death jobs for any month. In 2007, the BLS estimated that 262,000 were created in April that they could not account for in the survey of businesses. Somehow, the spreadsheets at BLS had them add 267,000 jobs in April of 2008. That number includes an estimated 45,000 new jobs in construction! And this in a time when both residential and commercial construction are contracting. The actual survey results showed that construction jobs fell by 61,000. 

And somewhere, they estimate that 8,000 new jobs in finance were created. As Philippa Dunne notes: “It may be that the gains in our old friend, bars and restaurants, are the [birth/death] model's creation; it added 83,000 to the leisure and hospitality sector. With vacation plans at near-record lows, and restaurants reporting reduced traffic, many of these job gains could disappear in the next benchmark revision.” 

Without that addition from the birth/death number, total private employment would have dropped by 296,000. Now, if that had been the headline number, the market would have tanked. Now, I have no doubt that the economy did create a lot of new jobs last month. But when the final revisions are in, we will see that job losses were well south of 100,000.  

The battle over dioxin contamination in this economically stressed region had been raging for years when a top Bush administration official turned up the pressure on Dow Chemical to clean it up. 

On Thursday, following months of internal bickering over Mary Gade's interactions with Dow, the administration forced her to quit as head of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Midwest office, based in Chicago. 

Gade told the Tribune she resigned after two aides to national EPA administrator Stephen Johnson took away her powers as regional administrator and told her to quit or be fired by June 1. 

The call came as the Tribune was preparing to publish a story about the dioxin issue and Gade's crusade. . . .  

Gade has been locked in a heated dispute with Dow about long-delayed plans to clean up dioxin-saturated soil and sediment that extends 50 miles beyond its Midland, Mich., plant into Saginaw Bay and Lake Huron. The company dumped the highly toxic and persistent chemical into local rivers for most of the last century. 

Many local residents see Dow as a lifeline in region plagued by plant closings and layoffs. But all along the two wide streams that cut through this old industrial town, signs warn people to keep off dioxin-contaminated riverbanks and to avoid eating fish pulled from the fast-moving waters. Officials have taken the swings down in one riverside park to discourage kids from playing there. Men in rubber boots and thick gloves occasionally knock on doors, asking residents whether they can dig up a little soil in the yard. 

Gade, appointed by President Bush as regional EPA administrator in September 2006, invoked emergency powers last summer to order the company to remove three hotspots of dioxin near its Midland headquarters. 

She demanded more dredging in November, when it was revealed that dioxin levels along a park in Saginaw were 1.6 million parts per trillion, the highest amount ever found in the U.S. 

Dow then sought to cut a deal on a more comprehensive cleanup. But Gade ended the negotiations in January, saying Dow was refusing to take action necessary to protect public health and wildlife. Dow responded by appealing to officials in Washington, according to heavily redacted letters the Tribune obtained under the Freedom of Information Act. 

Regional EPA administrators typically have wide latitude to enforce environmental laws, but in April Gade drew fire from officials in Washington after she sent contractors to test soil in a Saginaw neighborhood where Dow had found high dioxin levels. The levels in one Saginaw yard were nearly six times higher than the federal cleanup standard, and 65 times higher than what Michigan considers acceptable. 

On Thursday, Gade said of her resignation: "There's no question this is about Dow. I stand behind what I did and what my staff did. I'm proud of what we did."