Congress

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The White House Big Data Report: The Good, The Bad, And The Missing

Jeremy Gillula and Kurt Opsahl and Rainey Reitman | Electronic Frontier Foundation | May 4, 2014

Last week, the White House released its report on big data and its privacy implications, the result of a 90-day study commissioned by President Obama during his January 17 speech on NSA surveillance reforms. Now that we’ve had a chance to read the report we’d like to share our thoughts on what we liked, what we didn’t, and what we thought was missing...

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The White House Comedy Club

Kathleen Parker | Washington Post | October 25, 2013

While the nation’s attention has been riveted on the Keystone Congress, the executive branch was busy developing its own comedy routine. Picture the cast (you know the characters) shrugging their shoulders in unison: “Who, me?” Read More »

Top 10 Medical Research Trends To Watch In 2013

Margaret Anderson | Huffington Post | January 11, 2013

Congress has pushed the date of the "sequester" off another two months, delaying the prospect of automatic 8.2 percent cuts in the budgets of NIH, FDA, and other federal science programs. But a sequester (or other cuts) could still happen. [...] Read More »

Troops With Traumatic Brain Injury Show Symptoms 5 Years Later

Bob Brewin | Nextgov | July 3, 2013

A high proportion of the 273,859 troops diagnosed with traumatic brain injury since the start of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq continued to experience “significant symptoms and problems” five years after injury, the Pentagon said in its first take on a 15-year TBI study mandated by Congress. Read More »

Twitter Breaks Rank, Threatens To Fight NSA Gag Orders

Brendan Sasso | Nextgov | February 6, 2014

Twitter threatened to launch a legal battle with the Obama administration on Thursday over gag orders that prevent it from disclosing information about surveillance of its users. Read More »

U.S. Efforts To Regulate Consultants Face Big Obstacles

Ben Protess and Jessica Silver-Greenberg | DealBooks | April 10, 2013

Federal regulators are facing pressure from Capitol Hill to rein in a multibillion-dollar consulting industry after the companies stumbled during their recent review of mortgage foreclosure abuses. But the efforts could be stymied, given regulators’ close ties to consultants and limited legal authority to penalize them. Read More »

University System Of Maryland To Test Open-Source Pilot Program

Fatimah Waseem | The Diamondback | September 3, 2013

A student-driven initiative plans to turn the page on skyrocketing textbook costs by promoting an affordable, online educational resource that’s picking up steam across the nation: open-source textbooks. Read More »

Unlocking The Secretive Trans Pacific Trade Deal

Staff Writer | Aljazeera America | February 13, 2014

The Trans Pacific Partnership is the largest proposed trade deal in history impacting everything from how we use the internet to prescription drug prices. Public interest groups don’t have access to the negotiations, which involve 11 countries plus the U.S., but corporate lobbyists do. Given the potential for change, should the public have a say? Read More »

UPDATE 1-Apple, Google, Dozens Of Others Urge U.S. Surveillance Disclosures

Staff Writer | Reuters | July 19, 2013

Dozens of companies, non-profits and trade organizations including Apple Inc, Google Inc and Facebook Inc sent a letter on Thursday pushing the Obama administration and Congress for more disclosures on the government's national security-related requests for user data. Read More »

US Defense Secretary Pushes For Overhaul Of Military Sexual Assault Cases

Karen McVeigh | The Guardian | April 9, 2013

Chuck Hagel proposes taking away commanders' controversial ability to nullify verdicts under 'convening authority' system Read More »

US Provides $40 Million To Tackle Infectious Diseases

Jan Piotrowski | SciDev.Net | March 11, 2014

Developing countries will receive extra support to prevent, detect and respond to health threats as the US government announced plans last month (13 February) to boost funding for nations at high risk from infectious disease. Read More »

US Scientists Are Leaving The Country And Taking The Innovation Economy With Them

Janet Rae-Dupree | Forbes | September 25, 2013

Federal funding cuts, and the insidious damage caused just since March by federal budget sequestration, have forced nearly one in five U.S. scientists to consider moving overseas to continue their research. Read More »

VA And Defense Dept. Began Paying For New Records System While Still Funding Abandoned One

Noel Brinkerhoff | AllGov | August 29, 2013

Members of Congress have been demanding for years that the Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) work together so the records of military personnel could be seamlessly shared between the two agencies, and that veterans could avoid paperwork problems that delay receiving health and disability benefits... Read More »

VA And DoD Hint At iEHR Mobile?

Lt. Dan | HIStalk Connect | June 26, 2013

Department of Defense and Veterans Affairs have announced that they will begin working on a mobile app that will integrate data from the electronic health records of both departments and combine them into a single mobile platform for clinicians. Read More »

VA And DoD’s Reversal On Electronic Health Records Criticized

Steve Vogel | The Washington Post | February 27, 2013

The decision this month by the departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs to scrap plans to create a single electronic health record came under renewed attack Wednesday on Capitol Hill as the Government Accountability Office questioned the departments’ assertion that the action will enable them to deliver improved health care more quickly and for less money. Read More »