Researchers link BPA to health problems

CHICAGO—Federal officials, scientists and health advocates gave different assessments Tuesday of the effects of exposure to bisphenol A at a scientific hearing of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Bisphenol A, commonly known as BPA, is used extensively in lining of food and beverage containers and in polycarbonate plastics used to make products including baby bottles and sippy cups. The chemical has also been found in drinking water, dental sealants and even household dust.

A study released before the hearing offered the first scientific evidence that adults with higher levels of BPA in their bodies were more likely to develop cardiovascular disease, type 2 diabetes and liver-enzyme abnormalities like diseases.

This month the federal National Toxicology Program reported the chemical may affect the development of the brains and prostate glands of fetuses and young children.

New York City braces for financial fallout

NEW YORK—The demise of two venerable Wall Street giants reverberated around the city earlier this week as thousands of financial workers awoke to find legendary companies in upheaval, jobs in jeopardy and the city braced for the economic ripple effect from catastrophe in its leading industry.

Mired in the credit crisis, 94-year-old financial services firm Merrill Lynch & Co. abruptly agreed to sell itself to Bank of America while 158-year-old investment bank Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. filed for bankruptcy protection. The disintegration of the two firms and the potential loss of thousands of jobs will trim municipal and state tax coffers and rock the New York City economy with repercussions in the commuter communities of New Jersey and Connecticut.

Best Buy to acquire Napster for $54 million

SAN FRANCISCO—Best Buy Co. has signed a deal to acquire digital music provider Napster Inc. for $54 million, giving the retailer a means of taking on Wal-Mart in the increasingly important online-distribution channel.

Under the deal, Best Buy will pay Napster $2.65 a share in cash, a premium of 95 percent over the value of the stock at the end of last week. The retailer also is paying about $67 million for cash and short-term investments on Napster’s balance sheet as of June 30. The deal will give Best Buy an online digital music retail outlet as well as a subscription streaming service that has about 700,000 subscribers.

Terrorists murder a television crew in Iraq

BAGHDAD—The Iraqi TV crew brought the gifts that had come to be the trademark of their reality show: some basic household appliances and a delicious supper to break the Ramadan fast for a family of little means.

They had done it many times before. But this episode did not get made. Gunmen seized four of them from their vehicles, hauled them down the street and executed them.

The show is called “Your Iftar on Us,” after the Arabic word for the evening feast, and it airs on the privately-owned Sharqiya network. It did not have much in the way of production values but it had a wide following. People watched it because it made them feel good.

U.S. relatively safe, while South Asia in turmoil

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan—Seven years after Sept. 11, al-Qaida and its allies are gaining ground across the region where the plot was hatched, staging their most lethal attacks yet against NATO forces and posing a growing threat to the U.S.-backed governments in Afghanistan and nuclear-armed Pakistan.

The insurgency now stretches from Afghanistan’s border with Iran through the southern half of the country. The Taliban are now able to interdict three of the four major highways that connect Kabul, the capital, to the rest of the country.

Experts inside and outside the U.S. government agreed that a key reason for the resurgence is a growing popular sympathy for the militants because an over-reliance on the use of force, especially airpower, by NATO has killed hundreds of civilians.

Presidential candidates address Wall Street woes

(MCT) GRAND RAPIDS, Mich.—Sen. John McCain blamed Wall Street’s “casino culture” and Sen. Barack Obama blamed Republicans on Wednesday for the financial turmoil that led to the government’s takeover of the nation’s largest insurer.

“The government was forced to commit $85 billion,” McCain said in a statement Tuesday night about the Federal Reserve’s loan to American International Group. “These actions stem from failed regulation, reckless management and a casino culture on Wall Street that has crippled one of the most important companies in America.”

Obama pounced, calling McCain’s views “an 11th-hour conversion to the language of reform” after decades of support for Republican policies deferring to markets and cutting government regulation of them.