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The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

FEMA head planned to quit before Katrina

Compiled from wire reports The Spokesman-Review

Washington Michael Brown was days away from announcing plans to resign as director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency when Hurricane Katrina hit Aug. 29, according to e-mails released by separate House and Senate investigations into the government’s flawed response to the disaster.

Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, chairman of the Senate investigation, questioned whether Brown’s status played a role in the response.

“The fact that it appears that Michael Brown was planning to resign may explain in part his curious detachment during the Katrina catastrophe,” Collins said.

Brown resigned on Sept. 12, but the Department of Homeland Security then contracted with him at his full $148,000-a-year salary to serve as a consultant on a review of the response to Hurricane Katrina.

Nuclear ‘bunker-buster’ plans dropped

Washington The Bush administration has abandoned research into a nuclear “bunker-buster” warhead, deciding instead to pursue a similar device using conventional weaponry, a key Republican senator said Tuesday.

Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., said funding for the nuclear bunker-buster as part of the Energy Department’s fiscal 2006 budget has been dropped at the department’s request.

The nuclear bunker-buster had been the focus of intense debate in Congress, with opponents arguing that its development as a tactical nuclear weapon could add to nuclear proliferation.

EU says if it’s feta, it has to be Greek

Brussels, Belgium The European Union’s highest court finally settled the fate of feta cheese on Tuesday, decreeing it a traditional Greek product deserving protection throughout the 25-nation bloc in a ruling that went against other European producers.

Germany and Denmark, backed by France and Britain, had challenged the designation of origin for the salty, crumbly cheese and turned it into a gastronomic fight lasting almost two decades and involving lobbyists, the European Commission and, finally, the European Court of Justice.

“The court upholds the name ‘feta’ as a protected designation of origin for Greece,” the Luxembourg-based court said in its ruling.