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August 30, 2007
Headlines - GAO Report on Railroad Bridges and Tunnels
- Committee Requests Information on Reports of Lost White House E-mails
- August 2007 Natural Gas Monthly
- Joint Economic Committee: Income Down, Poverty Up Since 2000
- FTC Report: Spring/Summer 2006 Nationwide Gasoline Price Increases
- DOD OIG Audit of Ice Delivery Contract During Katrina Recovery
- NASA Safety Review Finds No Evidence of Improper Alcohol Use by Astronauts Before Space Flight
- White House Issues Fact Sheet on Two-Year Anniversary of Hurricane Katrina
- Anonymous Lawmaker Helps to Build OpenCRS Database
- NIST Guide to Secure Web Services
 GAO Report on Railroad Bridges and Tunnels Railroad Bridges and Tunnels: Federal Role in Providing Safety Oversight and Freight Infrastructure Investment Could Be Better Targeted, GAO-07-770, August 6, 2007. "Freight railroads account for over 40 percent (by weight) of the nation's freight on a privately owned network that was largely built almost 100 years ago and includes over 76,000 railroad bridges and over 800 tunnels...Little information is publicly available on the condition of railroad bridges and tunnels and on their contribution to congestion because the railroads consider this information proprietary and share it with the federal government selectively." Committee Requests Information on Reports of Lost White House E-mails "Today Chairman Waxman wrote [Letter to Fred Fielding] to request information from the White House Office of Administration about reports that millions of e-mails that may have been lost from the White House e-mail system." Related postings on White House e-mail investigation August 2007 Natural Gas Monthly August 2007 Natural Gas Monthly (08/30/2007): "Natural and supplemental gas production, supply, consumption, disposition, storage, imports, exports, and prices in the United States. This report is updated during the first week of each month." Joint Economic Committee: Income Down, Poverty Up Since 2000 Follow up to August 28, 2007 posting Census Bureau Reports Household Income Rises, Poverty Rate Declines, see today's press release: "Senator Charles E. Schumer, Chairman of the Joint Economic Committee (JEC) and Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney, Vice Chair of the JEC, today reacted to the U.S. Census Bureau's release of its 2006 report on income, poverty and health insurance coverage in the United States. Although median household income rose slightly in 2006, after adjusting for inflation, the report showed that all but the richest of American households have seen their incomes decline since 2000. The Census Bureau also revealed that while the national poverty rate declined by 0.3% in 2006, the number of people in poverty living in poverty has risen by 4.9 million since 2000, an increase in the poverty rate of one percentage point. Additionally, the number of children under 18 in poverty has skyrocketed under the Bush Administration, rising 10.7 percent in the last 6 years." The JEC also released three fact sheets taking an in depth look at the findings in the Census Report: The Number of Americans without Health Insurance Rose Again in 2006 Household Income Up Slightly in 2006, but Down Since 2000 Nearly One in Eight Americans Living in Poverty FTC Report: Spring/Summer 2006 Nationwide Gasoline Price Increases Press release: "Market factors explain increases in the national average retail price for gasoline during the spring and summer of 2006, according to a report sent to the President today by the Federal Trade Commission and the U.S. Department of Justice's Antitrust Division. In April 2006, while the FTC was completing its intensive investigation of petroleum industry conduct and gasoline pricing following Hurricane Katrina, President Bush directed DOJ to work with the FTC and the Department of Energy to conduct inquiries into rising gasoline prices. Today's Report on Spring/Summer 2006 Nationwide Gasoline Price Increases, which builds on the investigative work done in connection with the post-Katrina report, describes staff's factual findings and economic analysis that price increases during the spring and summer of 2006 were attributable to six factors: (1) seasonal effects of the summer driving season; (2) increases in the price of crude oil; (3) increases in the price of ethanol; (4) capacity reductions stemming from refiners' transition from the fuel additive methyl tertiary-butyl ether to ethanol; (5) refinery outages resulting from hurricane damage, other unexpected problems or external events, and required maintenance; and (6) increased consumer demand for gasoline beyond the seasonal effects of the summer driving season. The determination that the price increases were attributable to these six factors also supports the conclusion that the increases did not stem from violations of the antitrust laws." Dissenting Statement of Commissioner Leibowitz DOD OIG Audit of Ice Delivery Contract During Katrina Recovery D-2007-118 Contract Administration of the Ice Delivery Contract Between International American Products, Worldwide Services and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers During the Hurricane Katrina Recovery Effort (08/24/2007) (777KB) (Project D2006-D000CG-0075.000) PDF and Summary. NASA Safety Review Finds No Evidence of Improper Alcohol Use by Astronauts Before Space Flight Press release: "A NASA safety review released Wednesday found no evidence to support claims that astronauts were impaired by alcohol when they flew in space. NASA chief of Safety and Mission Assurance Bryan O'Connor conducted the monthlong review to evaluate allegations included in the Astronaut Health Care System Review Committee's report, which was released in late July." Below are the Space Flight Safety Review and openings statements from Administrator Griffin and Bryan O'Connor, Chief, Office of Safety and Mission Assurance. A transcript and video of the event are posted below. Administrator Griffin's Opening Remarks Opening Remarks of Bryan O'Connor Space Flight Safety Review Video (WindowsMedia) Transcript: Aug. 29, 2007 News Conference
Anonymous Lawmaker Helps to Build OpenCRS Database "A member of Congress has agreed to provide [Center for Democracy and Technology} CDT with a running list of new Congressional Research Service reports in order to help bolster CDT's OpenCRS project, which provides the reports to the public at no cost. CRS generates in-depth, non-partisan research on a wide range of issues critical to Americans, but while the taxpayer-funded reports are unclassified, the government has never made them readily available to the public. Drawing on the catalog provided by the lawmaker -- who asked to remain anonymous -- CDT has created a list of "fugitive" reports that are not yet in the database. OpenCRS is an interactive project that encourages users to obtain and add new reports to the database." Press Release: OpenCRS August 23, 2007 OpenCRS Fugitive CRS Reports Guide to CRS Reports on the Web | LLRX.com NIST Guide to Secure Web Services August 29, 2007: " NIST announces the publication of Special Publication (SP) 800-95, Guide to Secure Web Services (128 pages, PDF). SP 800-95 seeks to assist organizations in understanding the challenges in integrating information security practices into Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) design and development based on Web services. The publication also provides practical, real-world guidance on current and emerging standards applicable to Web services, as well as background information on the most common security threats to SOAs based on Web services. SP 800-95 presents information that is largely independent of particular hardware platforms, operating systems, and applications. Supplementary security devices (i.e., perimeter security appliances) are considered outside the scope of this publication. Interfaces between Web services components and supplementary controls are noted as such throughout this publication on a case-by-case basis."
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