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There's one group of people who should be giving thanks daily for the Enron scandal: the partners of KPMG, one of the Final Four accounting firms. That's because the fallout from Enron is what allowed KPMG to extract a favorable settlement from the Justice Department last week. The firm agreed to fork over less than a year's profit in return for not being indicted on a zillion counts of cheating the government by peddling sleazy, dishonest tax shelters for six years.

It is a familiar role for KBR, which under longstanding contracts has delivered the engineering equivalent of first aid to the Navy and other military and government agencies after natural disasters for more than 15 years. This time, the Halliburton unit's performance is likely to be watched especially closely, as its work under separate contracts in Iraq has come under extensive criticism in the past two years.

The resignation comes after Sen. Charles E. Grassley sent Defense Department Inspector General Joseph E. Schmitz several letters informing him that he was the focus of a congressional inquiry.

Some lower-level U.S. Air Force and Pentagon officials do not yet fully recognize the need to overhaul defense procurement to make it more transparent and avoid problems of the past, the U.S. military's top internal watchdog said on Thursday.

The Pentagon's chief internal watchdog said on Thursday his agency continues to investigate the abuse of Iraqi prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison in Baghdad, although he declined to give details.

After fighting mad cow safeguards, the US beef industry complains about the consequences - a multi-billion dollar decline in exports - and a shortage of imported beef because of inadequate domestic testing and labeling.

Joseph Schmitz, the Pentagon's chief internal watchdog since March 2002, has quit to join a defense contractor involved in private security services, the Pentagon announced on Wednesday.

The report found that the total value of military weapon sales worldwide in 2004 rose to the highest level since 2000, reaching nearly $37 billion.

With $15.7 billion in orders, India edged out China, with $15.3 billion, to become the developing world's biggest weapons buyer for the eight-year period up to 2004 reviewed by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service.

Cunningham's possible abuse of his clout has opened a window on the congressional appropriations process, giving the public a rare glimpse at the growing premium that contractors place on obtaining influence on Capitol Hill.