ASMC The Business of Defense

  • November 22nd and November 24th, 2010 Join us for a conversation with authors.

    November 22, 2010
  • With recent statistics reporting high attrition rates for those new to public service, what can agencies do to support and keep young feds? What do millennials want out of their federal career? Young Government Leaders Vice-President Dave Uejoi and Press Secretary JR Wycinsky and Steve Ressler, president and founder of GovLoop, are the guests this week. November 19, 2010

    November 19, 2010
  • John Gage AFGE National President J. David Cox AFGE National Secretary-Treasurer Jane Nygaard AFGE 8th District National Vice President Sharon Pinnock AFGE Membership & Organization Director

    November 19, 2010
  • The U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, a congressional advisory commission says in its annual report that lawmakers should require a Pentagon assessment of the military\'s capacity to withstand a Chinese air and missile assault on American regional bases and the implications of a similar assault on Taiwan\'s air defenses. The commission was set up by Congress in 2000 to advise, investigate and report on U.S.-China affairs.

    November 17, 2010
  • Canada confirmed Tuesday that 950 soldiers and support staff will remain in Afghanistan in a training role after Canada\'s combat mission ends in 2011. Foreign Affairs Minister Lawrence Cannon said they will be stationed in the Kabul area and will stay until 2014. The pledge of support may help plug a critical shortage of trainers for NATO\'s year-old mission to bolster Afghan security forces. The training mission would be confined to military bases.

    November 17, 2010
  • In theory, plants could be the ultimate \"green\" factories, engineered to pump out the kinds of raw materials we now obtain from petroleum-based chemicals. In reality, its been an elusive goal. Now, in a first step toward achieving industrial-scale green production, scientists from the Department of Energy\'s Brookhaven National Lab and their collaborators report engineering a plant that does produce the levels of compounds that could potentially be used to make plastics. The raw materials for most precursors currently come from petroleum or coal-derived synthetic gas. Additional technology is needed, but researchers say they\'ve now engineered a new metabolic pathway in plants for producing a kind of fatty acid that can be used as a source of precursors to chemical building blocks for making plastics such as polyethylene.

    November 15, 2010
  • The Department of Commerce and National Telecommunications and Information Administration have released a report called \"Digital Nation II,\" that analyzes broadband Internet access across the United States. The study is the the most comprehensive of its kind. It finds that even after accounting for socioeconomic differences, large gaps persist along racial, ethnic, and geographic lines. The report analyzes data collected through a survey of 54,000 households conducted by the Census Bureau. It shows that while virtually all demographic groups have experienced increases of broadband Internet use at home, and 64 percent of households overall have the service, there are still historic disparities among demographic groups. Officials worry that Americans who lack broadband Internet access are cut off from educational and employment opportunities.

    November 15, 2010
  • The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has just completed a major update of the agency\'s primary education resource portal; the website Education.noaa.gov. The aim is to better connect educators and students interested in NOAA\'s education and science resources. The website serves as a portal to lesson plans, educational multi-media, data sources, career profiles, and other education content from across the agency. The content contains five themes. Teachers can find information about hurricanes, tides, climate change, the water-cycle or other earth science topics on the site. The site also provides information on professional development, academic scholarships, career exploration, and education grants. NOAA\'s mission is to understand and predict changes in the Earth\'s environment, and to conserve and manage coastal and marine resources.

    November 15, 2010
  • It\'s the latest innovation by international drug traffickers. U.S. prosecutors say South American gangs are buying old jets and other planes, filling them with cocaine and flying them more than 3,000 miles across the ocean to Africa. At least three gangs have struck deals to fly drugs to West Africa and from there to Europe, according to U.S. indictments. Most of the cocaine flown to Africa is bound for Europe, where demand has been rising over the last decade.

    November 15, 2010
  • Almost 100 years after his death, a black Union Civil War vet from South Carolina finally has a veterans marker on his grave. The Associated Press reports, the white gravestone for Henry Benjamin Noisette was dedicated Thursday during a Veterans Day ceremony at a small black cemetery near an interstate. Noisette\'s military past was not discovered until recently by a researcher with the African American Historical Alliance, a nonprofit working to increase awareness of the role of blacks in the war and Reconstruction in South Carolina. Noisette escaped slavery and joined the U.S. Navy in 1862.

    November 15, 2010
  • November 17th, 2010 Listen to a discussion on key milestones or changes that have come out of the first year of President Obama\'s Open Government Directive (OGD).

    November 15, 2010
  • Futurologists gather to discuss the workforce of 2020.

    November 14, 2010
  • More than 60 years after world war two, Germany is still very sensitve how it deploys it\'s troops in foreign countries. The government has announced it will extend three military deployments including its contribution to an EU naval force tracking pirates off Somalia. Germany has more than 300 troops participating in the anti-piracy force. There are 120 soldiers to Bosnia, and it\'s considering sending a ship with 220 soldiers to take part in NATO\'s Active Endeavour operation patrolling in the Mediterranean. Germany also has 4,900 troops in Afghanistan.

    November 10, 2010
  • Missile launches off the coast of California are commonplace --but this one was a mystery. Military officials said early on it didn\'t represent a threat to the United States. They also said it was not a launch by a foreign power. The video captured by a news helicopter showed an object shooting across the sky and leaving a large vapor trail. DoD said it wasn\'t involved, and that it might have been created by something flown by a private company. Which could lead to big trouble for that company.

    November 10, 2010