Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) is proposing the Veterans Health Administration reduce its number of regional medical administrative offices as part of a larger effort to streamline healthcare for veterans, Military Times reports. Burr told writer Patricia Kime these offices divert money largely towards overhead and other costs unrelated to healthcare. The VHA currently operates 21 [...]
Gen. Mark Welsh has been nominated to serve as the Air Force‘s next chief of staff, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced in a release Thursday. If confirmed, Welsh would succeed Gen. Norton Schwartz, who began serving as chief of staff in August 2008 and will complete his four-year term this coming August. Panetta said he [...]
By a largely party-line vote, the House passed a bill to replace defense cuts required under sequestration with cuts to social programs, The Hill newspaper’s Erik Wasson reports. In the 218-199 vote, 16 Republicans voted no to the Sequester Replacement Reconciliation Act and all Democrats opposed it. Nearly $72 billion in cuts to the Pentagon’s [...]
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) believes the Defense Department should be in charge of defending the U.S. and critical infrastructure against cyber attacks, he wrote in a letter to the country’s highest-ranked cyber military officer. In the letter obtained by Federal News Radio’s Jason Miller, McCain told Army Gen. Keith Alexander that he, like Alexander, believes [...]
The House Appropriations Committee has proposed a budget authorizing a 6.5 percent increase in the information technology budget for the Department of Veterans Affairs, reports Alice Lipowicz for Federal Computer Week. The bill proposes a $3.3 billion budget for VA’s IT systems, a $200 million raise for VA CIO Roger Baker’s office from the previous [...]
The FBI wants legislation that would require Internet companies to build backdoors into their communication technologies that would allow government surveillance, CNET reports. White House, Senate and FBI representatives held a meeting discussing technological shifts in communication that make it difficult for investigators to conduct wiretapping and other “going dark” surveillance practices. Proposed legislation would [...]
The federal government should give healthcare organizations more time before starting the next phase of implementing electronic health records, according to letters from a group of health industry chief information officers. The College of Healthcare Information Management Executives told the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services and the Office of the National Coordinator for Health [...]
Sequestration is more than a buzz word in the GovCon industry and Center for Security Policy President Frank Gaffney has crunched the numbers to show just how significant directed cuts are to GovCon operations and the American population. Gaffney penned his findings in the Spring 2012 edition of GovConExec magazine, which is published by Executive Mosaic, the parent company [...]
Army Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn has been nominated to serve as director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta announced in a release Tuesday. He currently serves as assistant director of national intelligence for partner engagement at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. In June 2009, he assumed the role of [...]
The National Strategy for Trusted Identities in Cyberspace wants to award a two-year contract by May for parts of the ID ecosystem, Federal News Radio reports. Jeremy Grant, senior adviser for NSTIC, said the office wants to manage a future set of working groups. Awardees will be selected out of a field of 12 submissions, [...]