No Furloughs at Customs and Border Protection
IRS Employees to Receive $70 Million in Bonuses
Uncharted Financial Waters at Defense
Postal Service Eyes Cuba
Should Leaders Ever Lie?
Unions: Efficiency Board Is 'Offensive,' 'Unwise'
AUTHOR ARCHIVES
Bob Brewin
Editor at Large
Bob Brewin joined Government Executive in April 2007, bringing with him more than 20 years of experience as a journalist focusing on defense issues and technology. Bob covers the world of defense and information technology for Nextgov, and is the author of the “What’s Brewin” blog.
Fed Spectrum Sharing and Wi-Fi
5:31 PM ET
FROM NEXTGOV
As I reported today, President Obama wants all federal agencies to devise plans to share valuable and mission critical spectrum with commercial wireless carriers to support the use of iThings by everyone in the country but me and my dumb phone. The carriers, though, have already found ready-to-use spectrum -- ...
Pentagon to Wireless Industry: We Need Our Spectrum
5:28 PM ET
FROM NEXTGOV
The Defense Department must retain exclusive access to some spectrum in order to support military training and other critical national security needs, Pentagon Chief Information Officer Teri Takai told participants in a wireless forum sponsored by the Washington Post yesterday. On June 14, President Obama detailed plans for governmentwide spectrum ...
VA Integrates Electronic Systems to Speed Claims Processing
2:01 PM ET
FROM NEXTGOV
The Veterans Affairs Department has integrated its eBenefits portal with its automated Veterans Benefits Management System in an effort department officials say will expedite claims processing. VA set up the eBenefits website in 2009 in partnership with the Defense Department. Its integration with VBMS “marks a major milestone in VA’s ...
S. Korea Plans Navigation System to Defeat the North's GPS Jamming
June 18, 2013
FROM NEXTGOV
Faced with relentless jamming of GPS signals by North Korea, South Korea has decided to install a type of land-based radio navigation system abandoned by the United States in 2010. The country’s plan to deploy an enhanced Long Range Navigation System, known as eLoran, as a complement to GPS, was ...
Senate Panel Backs More Money for VA Claims Hardware and Overtime
June 18, 2013
FROM NEXTGOV
The Senate Appropriations Committee panel that handles funding for the Veterans Affairs Department and military construction added $20 million to VA’s 2014 budget request to buy additional hardware for the Veterans Benefits Management System, its automated disability claims processing system, and $10 million in overtime for claims personnel, Sen. Barbara ...
Pentagon Awards Microsoft and Oracle Software Contracts Valued at Nearly $700 Million
June 18, 2013
FROM NEXTGOV
While smartphones and tablets may represent the future of computing, the Defense Information Systems Agency and the Navy just invested $679 million in old-fashioned software from Microsoft and Oracle Corp. Yesterday, DISA awarded Microsoft a five year contract with a total value of $412.2 million for technical and support services ...
More Spectrum for Everyone -- Except Feds, Apparently
June 17, 2013
FROM NEXTGOV
That seems to be the thrust of the spectrum sharing memo issued by President Obama last Friday. He wants to open up federal spectrum to commercial carriers so they can support more iThing users (my favorite are the iPad-wielding toddlers I’ve seen in strollers) while sharply restricting federal users. The ...
Goodbye Paper: VA Installs Automated Claims System in All Regional Offices
June 17, 2013
FROM NEXTGOV
The Veterans Affairs Department finished installing its paperless Veterans Benefits Management System last week in all 56 of its regional offices. VBMS is key to helping the department eliminate its backlog of disability claims, senior officials have said. “Now that the system is in place, much work continues to be ...
China Wins the Supercomputer Crown
June 17, 2013
FROM NEXTGOV
If there’s a supercomputer arms race, China just won. A new machine developed by the country’s National University of Defense Technology performs just under 34 quadrillion calculations per second, or almost double the speed of the previous record holder, a Cray system installed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. In a ...
Special Ops Command Extends Booz Allen’s IT Management Deal
June 13, 2013
FROM NEXTGOV
The folks in the Special Operations Command’s contracting shop evidently have no intention of letting the largest leak of top secret intelligence in history keep it from extending a contract with Booz Allen Hamilton, the employer of the now on-the-lam leaker, Edward Snowden, to help run its global information technology ...
