The President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology has released a report today calling on the federal government to take far-ranging action to spur energy innovation and create fundamental change in the way American’s consume energy. Also, perhaps a pony and a giant trampoline. The report looks at ways to change the nation’s energy system within 10 to 20 years, and said that it would take action at all levels of society to move away from a traditional dependence on fossil fuels and encourage renewable alternatives and energy efficiency. Co-Chairs John P. Holdren and Eric Lander Unleashing this innovation…
Browsing: Uncategorized
Gene Dodaro’s nomination to become the next U.S. comptroller general got a green flag Tuesday from the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, which approved it on a unanimous voice vote. The comptroller general runs the Government Accountability Office, the watchdog arm of Congress. Dodaro, a 37-year GAO veteran, has held the job on an acting basis since March 2008; President Obama nominated him for a full 15-year term in September. The committee’s chairman, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., said recently that that he hopes to win final Senate confirmation for Dodaro’s nomination before lawmakers end their lame-duck session. “We…
On Nov. 19, the Obama administration proclaimed a new path for government information technology procurement. But an overview of one agency’s travails suggests that a steep climb lies ahead. The agency is the Housing and Urban Development Department; the newly released Government Accountability Office review finds that HUD officials had a hard time just coming up with a congressionally mandated plan to lay out its IT buying strategy. That document is required by a spending bill approved last December. Under its terms, HUD can’t obligate more than 25 percent of available money for IT modernization until the House and Senate…
In the wake of WikiLeaks’ disclosure of some 250,000 State Department cables, the Obama administration is ordering executive branch departments and agencies to review procedures for protecting classified information. “The recent irresponsible disclosure by WikiLeaks has resulted in significant damage to our national security,” Office of Management and Budget Director Jack Lew wrote in a memo released this morning. “Any failure by agencies to safeguard classified information pursuant to relevant laws . . . is unacceptable and will not be tolerated.” Effective immediately, all agencies that handle classified information must set up security assessment teams to review implementation of procedures…
As it appeals the denial of an “exigent” rate increase request, the U.S. Postal Service is arguing that the Postal Regulatory Commission’s turndown was “arbitrary and capricious,” according to a brief filed late this afternoon with the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. Among other points, USPS lawyers contend that the five-member commission established “new requirements that were not shared with or explained to the Postal Service,” according to an agency summary. “Instead, the PRC simply denied the request as a whole and punted the Postal Service’s entire financial crisis to Congress,” the brief concludes. The…
The U.S. Postal Service and the American Postal Workers Union have agreed to keep negotiating until Dec. 1, following the expiration of an earlier extension of contract talks at noon today, USPS spokesman Mark Saunders said this afternoon. In a release posted soon after on the union’s web site, APWU President Cliff Guffey confirmed the extension and said that bargaining would resume Monday. The union remains hopeful that a settlement can be reached, he reiterated. The union’s contract had originally been set to expire at midnight Saturday, but both sides had agreed to the initial Tuesday extension. An impasse has…
After an initial bargaining deadline passed Saturday, the U.S. Postal Service will keep talking to the American Postal Workers Union for at least another two days, but said that negotiations with the National Rural Letter Carriers’ Association had reached an impasse, thereby potentially leaving it up to arbitration to decide the outcome, according to a USPS news release. Contracts with both unions had been set to expire at midnight Saturday, but the Postal Service and the APWU agreed to an extension until noon Eastern Standard Time on Tuesday, the union said in its own release. “We do not have a new contract,…
None too soon for the Obama administration, Jack Lew was sworn in early Friday afternoon as Office of Management and Budget director after winning Senate confirmation the preceding evening, according to a spokesman. Lawmakers acted Thursday after Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., dropped a hold placed on Lew’s nomination in late September in a bid to force the administration to end a six-month moratorium on deepwater oil and gas drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. The administration yielded more than a month ago, but Landrieu had continued the hold, saying she wanted an “action plan” for putting the industry back to work. In a news…
If you’re an advanced Tweeter, you’ve probably started the purging process and are now updating your account(s) to reflect changes in the House and Senate. If not, maybe this will help you get started. Or there’s always the unofficial list for the 112th Congress to make sure you don’t leave anyone out. Researchers at HP Labs have narrowed the list down to the 100 most influential members of Congress on Twitter based on an analysis of 22 million tweets. They developed an algorithm to identify “influential users,” who “not only catch the attention of their followers” but “also overcome their followers’ predisposition to remain passive,” Ethan…
Remember Attorney General Eric Holder’s memo last year stating that agencies should administer the Freedom of Information Act with a presumption in favor of disclosure? One private research organization is wondering whether some of Holder’s subordinates got the message, based on their attempt to thwart full release of a report detailing Nazi-hunting efforts in the United States. “Here you’ve got the Justice Department flouting the direct guidance of the attorney general,” Tom Blanton, director of the National Security Archive, based at The George Washington University, said Wednesday in a phone interview. “Holder should be outraged.” The report is a history…