SHHHHHHHHH!

USDA quietly declares emergency in Washington state, reports the Sacramento Bee. That's my favorite kind of emergency - the quiet kind. "The U.S. Department of Agriculture has quietly declared an 'extraordinary emergency' because of the discovery of a Holstein infected with mad cow disease in Washington state. The declaration was published Monday in the Federal Register, a daily publication of all rules, regulations and notices issued by the federal government. Other than the Federal Register notice, the department made no public announcement an emergency had been declared.

Boy, an "extraordinary emergency" sounds like a big deal, huh? But no, quite the contrary: "It's not a big deal," Jim Rogers, a spokesman for the USDA, said Thursday. It's simply that "the department has determined that the state may be unable to adequately take the measures necessary to quarantine and dispose of animals that may be infected with or exposed to BSE." Oh. Well, that's encouraging.