(Updated below) Erroll Southers, President Obama’s nominee to head the Transportation Security Administration, has withdrawn his nomination, according to the White House. Southers was nominated in September, but his nomination has been stalled in the Senate for months. Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., placed a hold on Southers’ nomination; DeMint was worried that Southers would allow TSA employees to join labor unions. We’ll have more on this, on the blog and the homepage, throughout the day. Update, 11:10 a.m.: Responses are starting to trickle in from union leaders. Here’s Colleen Kelley, the president of the National Treasury Employees Union: I am…
Monthly Archives: January, 2010
The Federal Procurement Data System-Next Generation has a new look, which went live yesterday. The site has lots of nifty new tools right on the home page, such as a series of rotating charts that show various trends for both Recovery Act and fiscal 2009 spending. My personal favorite is the fiscal 2009 chart (if you follow the link, click on “trend”) that shows month-by-month spending levels for the fiscal year. This may come as a surprise, but most government spending happens in September, just as the fiscal year is ending. It’s shocking, I know. But it is also fun…
We hear kids these days are mighty fond of the Twitter and the Facebook, so we decided to get in on the act. You can sign up to follow our Twitter account here, and FedLine’s Facebook page can be found here. Federal Times also has its own Facebook page here, in case you get tired of playing Mafia Wars and want the latest federal government news.
If a company inscribes a rifle with code from the Bible, but is neither required to nor prohibited to take such an action by the contract, have any rules been broken? That’s the question I have after reading this ABC News report about rifle aiming equipment manufacturer, Trijicon, inscribing its military scopes with references to New Testament passages about Jesus Christ. The article suggests the inscribed scriptural references violate military rules banning proselytizing in the war zone. The rules exist out of concern U.S. actions in Iraq and Afghanistan would be viewed as a new Crusade. But it is not…
NASA’s having a garage sale, and everything must go! Seriously, everything. The three-decade-old space shuttle program is winding down later this year, and NASA has decided to sell the three remaining shuttles to museums. The only problem is they’re not getting much interest. So last Friday, NASA did what any motivated seller would: Slash the price. NASA is now selling shuttles Atlantis and Endeavour for $28.8 million — nearly a third less than their original price tag of $42 million. (Shuttle Discovery has been promised to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum’s Udvar-Hazy center in Northern Virginia, which currently houses the…
A partially decomposed body of a 6-foot tall white man was found on Plum Island, N.Y., home of the the government’s Animal Disease Center, according to a New York Daily News report. A facility guard found the body, which reportedly had no signs of trauma, on a beach that was part of a secure area of the island. This is the latest mystery on an island shrouded in mystery. Some of the world’s most lethal livestock diseases are researched here. During the Cold War, it was home to the government’s bilogical weapons program. Plum Island’s history as a super-secure animal…
The Washington Post is reporting that the White House and unions have reached a tentative deal on the excise tax on so-called “Cadillac” health care plans: Lawmakers said the agreement would raise the cost of unusually generous health policies and ignore secondary coverage, such as vision and dental plans. Health plans negotiated as part of collective-bargaining agreements would be exempt for two years after the 2013 effective date, giving labor leaders time to negotiate new contracts.
The Michael E. DeBakey Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Houston, Texas, today became the 100th facility in the U.S. to be certified through the Green Building Initiative’s Green Globes rating system. The medical center joins another 15 VA facilities that have been certified through the Green Globes system, which recognizes achievements in energy efficiency and environmental management practices. In the U.S., Green Globes has trailed behind the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) as the preferred tool for measuring and certifying green buildings. But like the little engine that could, Green Globes is steadily making inroads in the…
The White House and Office of Management and Budget hosted a forum today (it is going on right now actually) to gather ideas from industry executives about how government can use technology to modernize and streamline operations. The idea is to improve services to citizens by equipping agencies with the basic tools prevalent in the private sector, like online booking, electronic applications for benefits, and similar advances. But the administration isn’t only interested in hearing from industry on this topic. OMB director Peter Orszag invited members of the public, which includes you dear FedLine readers, to weigh in as well…
My avatar is going to look like George Clooney, and I can’t tell you the computer skills we needed to make that happen. Retiring — and remarkably candid — intelligence chief human capital officer Ron Sanders on an upcoming “virtual” job fair that will let job seekers adopt avatars and chat live with agency officials.