Breaking news:

Following up on Holly’s recent post, Mike Brown has indeed resigned his post as director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). AP reports:

Federal Emergency Management Agency director Mike Brown resigned Monday, three days after losing his onsite command of the Hurricane Katrina relief effort. The White House picked a top FEMA official with three decades of firefighting experience as his replacement.

R. David Paulison, head of FEMA’s emergency preparedness force, will lead the beleaguered agency, according to two senior administration sources who spoke on condition of anonymity because the announcement had not yet been made.

Well, duh.

Sorry to put it in such a monosyllabic fashion, but this can hardly come as a surprise to anyone. I’m still not sure how much blame Brown deserves for the post-Katrina screw-up, and it may just be that he’s the most obvious scapegoat for the larger federal mishandling of the initial relief and recovery efforts, but there was simply no way he could remain as FEMA’s director for much longer, not without any credibility whatsoever, and his recent transfer back to Washington was obviously little more than a face-saving prelude to his resignation. (That is, he was fired but allowed to resign.)

The problem is, Brown isn’t the only official who needs to be held accountable for what went wrong. After all, someone appointed him to the position, no? Again, I know there’s a lot of blame to go around, but clearly some of it needs to be directed at President Bush, even if he himself won’t take responsibility for what went wrong.

For more, see Kevin Drum, Oliver Willis, Josh Marshall, and Think Progress.

UPDATE I: Here’s the latest from AP in The Washington Post:

R. David Paulison, head of FEMA’s emergency preparedness force, will lead the beleaguered agency, according to three administration sources who spoke on condition of anonymity because the announcement had not yet been made.

Paulison is a career firefighter from Miami who was among emergency workers responding to Hurricane Andrew in 1992 and the crash of ValuJet Flight 592 in the Florida Everglades in 1996, according to a biography posted on FEMA’s Web site. He also has led the U.S. Fire Administration since December 2001, according to the site.

As chief of the Miami-Dade Fire Rescue Department, Paulison led 1,900 personnel under a $200 million operating budget. He was also in charge of Dade County’s emergency management office, according to his biography.

Paulison will lead an agency that has been under fire for its response to the Katrina disaster. Local officials and members of Congress have cited confusion and a lagging response to the Gulf Coast devastation.

Brown had taken much of the heat and was relieved of his onsite command on Friday. In an interview Monday with The Associated Press, Brown said he resigned “in the best interest of the agency and best interest of the president.” He said he feared he had become a distraction.

“The focus has got to be on FEMA, what the people are trying to do down there,” Brown said.

His decision was not a surprise. Brown was abruptly recalled to Washington on Friday, a clear vote of no confidence from his superiors at the White House and the Homeland Security Department. He also was accused of padding his resume, which Brown has denied.

So he thinks he’d become a distraction, eh? I wonder what gave it away.

UPDATE II: From CNN:

Asked Monday about the resignation as he toured the devastated city of Gulfport, Mississippi, President Bush said he had not talked with Chertoff and could not comment.

Brown’s fall came quickly. On September 2, five days after the storm hit, Bush told the 50-year-old lawyer, “Brownie, you’re doing a heck of a job.”

Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts applauded the move. “I think it is clearly in the country’s interest,” he told CNN.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said he was not surprised. Frist, a heart surgeon, visited the region soon after the hurricane hit and found the response wanting.

“Things didn’t go as well as it should have,” said the Tennessee Republican. But, Frist added, “Now, I am very pleased where we are.”

Well, that makes us all feel so much better, Dr. Frist. I’m sure you know what you’re talking about.

Here’s Ed Kilgore (admittedly, a Democrat) at TPM Cafe:

Man, what a career: from underemployed lawyer to failed horse show “czar,” back to underemployed lawyer; then rapidly up through the ranks of FEMA to director. And in the space of eleven days, he’s told on national television by the president that he’s doing “a heckuva job;” is then “fired in place;” then reassigned to Washington to oversee “national disaster planning”–perhaps a Freudian slip, there–without losing his title. And now comes the end, soon, no doubt, to be followed with the inevitable explanation that Brownie’s decided to “pursue new challenges in the private sector,” maybe as a FEMA contractor or something.

The President, meanwhile, continues to say any admission of mistakes by his administration would represent “playing the blame game.”

Yes, but those who were responsible must pay, mustn’t they?