“The Clearinghouse for the Open Research of the United States (CHORUS) is a not-for-profit public-private partnership to increase public access to peer-reviewed publications that report on federally funded research. Conceived by publishers, CHORUS: Provides a full solution for agencies to comply with the OSTP memo on public access to peer-reviewed scientific publications reporting on federally-funded… Continue Reading
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Monthly Archives: February 2014
President Obama to declare more than 500,000 acres protected
Outside Magazine: “In January, the White House issued a report showing that 7.3 million acres of federal land have been leased for oil and gas drilling as of December, while 2.9 million acres have been permanently protected. Seems disproportionate. On Sunday, however, the Washington Post reported that in a bold move that might change America’s public land policy, the Obama administration, using its… Continue Reading
New GAO Reports – Coal Leasing, Commercial Space Launches, Federal Contracting, Private Health Insurance, Motor Carrier Safety
COAL LEASING – BLM Could Enhance Appraisal Process, More Explicitly Consider Coal Exports, and Provide More Public Information, GAO-14-140, Dec 18, 2013 COMMERCIAL SPACE LAUNCHES – FAA’s Risk Assessment Process Is Not Yet Updated, GAO-14-328T, Feb 4, 2014 FEDERAL CONTRACTING – Commercial Item Test Program Beneficial, but Actions Needed to Mitigate Potential Risks, GAO-14-178, Feb 4, 2014 PRIVATE HEALTH INSURANCE – The… Continue Reading
Financial Assets and Conflict of Interest Regulation in the Executive Branch
Financial Assets and Conflict of Interest Regulation in the Executive Branch, Jack Maskell – Legislative Attorney, January 17, 2014 “The underlying principle of the financial conflict of interest laws adopted by Congress, and of the regulations promulgated in the executive branch, embodies the axiom “that a public servant owes undivided loyalty to the Government,” and that decisions, advice, and recommendations… Continue Reading
IRS Criminal Prosecutions Rise 23% Under Obama
Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse: “During the Obama administration, the number of criminal prosecutions referred each year by the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has risen by nearly a quarter — 23.4 percent — over the Bush years. Prosecutions in fiscal year 2013 alone are up 30.6 percent from the previous year. Convictions are also drawing slightly longer average… Continue Reading
The National Business Ethics Survey of the U.S. Workforce
“On behalf of the Ethics Resource Center (ERC), we are delighted to share the National Business Ethics Survey® (NBES®) for 2013. We are now in our 19th year of the NBES series, which has become the pre eminent source of information about workplace conduct and ethics through the eyes of employees themselves. Invariably, the results provide… Continue Reading
NIH study offers insight into why cancer incidence increases with age
“The accumulation of age-associated changes in a biochemical process that helps control genes may be responsible for some of the increased risk of cancer seen in older people, according to a National Institutes of Health study. Scientists have known for years that age is a leading risk factor for the development of many types of cancer,… Continue Reading
Agricultural Act of 2014 – The Farm Bill
National Wildlife Federation, Lara Bryant: “Today, the farm bill passed the Senate by a vote of 68-32, its final major hurdle to becoming law for next five years. The White House reports that President Obama will sign the bill, so after a long, long wait, and lots of hard work, wildlife lovers can celebrate a farm bill that… Continue Reading
Regulatory Reform, Stability, and Central Banking
Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy – Brookings – Paul Tucker Harvard Kennedy School and Business School January 16, 2014 “…Although at times preoccupied with local reform debates, the capitals of the world’s major economies confronted common issues in redrawing the rules of the road for finance. Combined with a shared desire to preserve open, global financial markets, this… Continue Reading
European Law via WorldLII
EuroLII – “Securing widespread free access to legal information (legislation, cases, legal literature) has become important globally. Europe is an example of coexistence of different legal systems where a vast amount of legal information content is provided at Community and national level. Free access facilities for comparative law research is a crucial issue, both in… Continue Reading
DOT Announces Roadway Safety Smart Car Program Using Vehicle-to-Vehicle Communications
“The U.S. Department of Transportation’s (DOT) National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) announced today that it will begin taking steps to enable vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communication technology for light vehicles. This technology would improve safety by allowing vehicles to “talk” to each other and ultimately avoid many crashes altogether by exchanging basic safety data, such as speed… Continue Reading
The Capital and Loss Assessment under Stress Scenarios (CLASS) Model
Federal Reserve Bank of New York Staff Reports – Beverly Hirtle, Anna Kovner, James Vickery, and Meru Bhanot: “The CLASS model is a top-down capital stress testing framework that projects the effect of different macroeconomic scenarios on U.S. banking firms. The model is based on simple econometric models estimated using public data and also on assumptions about loan loss provisioning, taxes, asset… Continue Reading
