Author Archive
Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
Tom Temin | Editor's Desk: A new Hill view
With Democrats gaining control of Congress, liberal Rep. Henry Waxman, will likely chair the House Committee on Government Reform, replacing the peripatetic Tom Davis (R-Va.).
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
Tom Temin | Editor's Desk: Brave New World
One thing about Lurita Doan: She doesn't mince her words. Or actions. The new administrator of the General Services Administration has clear marching orders.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Cybersecurity
Agencies claim readiness on HSPD-12
It remains to be seen whether Homeland Security Presidential Directive 12 is one of those mandates that the government actually meets.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
Tom Temin | Editor's Desk: Software's moonshot
When Lockheed Martin Corp. recently won a major competition to build a new generation of to-the-moon spacecraft, or Crew Exploration Vehicle, all I could think was: Lord, the software.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
HP rolls out new products
Hewlett-Packard, its boardroom leaks apparently not affecting its product development, spilled out several new computers at a New York press briefing yesterday.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
Tom Temin | Editor's Desk: How 9/11 recalls days of Sputnik
Sergei Korolev, I'll bet, isn't a name you can place. Yet this Soviet engineer's work sparked a huge wave of fear and recrimination in the United States almost 50 years ago, equal in some ways to that caused by Osama bin Laden five years ago.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
Editor's Desk | Technology's limits
Watching the war between Israel and Hezbollah ought to have U.S. military leaders reviewing their net-centric warfare doctrine.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
Tom Temin l Editor's Desk: Baseball lessons
The proposed construction of a federal spending database is technically possible, wouldn't do much to change spending patterns or habits.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Cybersecurity
Editor's Desk | Unwanted bounty
The government's table is straining from the weight of security lapses. The State Department got an old-fashioned hacking. A Veterans Affairs computer laden with data was stolen. NIH called in the cops on an identity theft ring. Agriculture, the IRS, Social Security and the Navy have joined the crowd.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Cybersecurity
Poor data 'governance' underlies security lapses
Inadequate governance policy is the common thread running through events ranging from theft of a data-laden laptop to granting disaster housing money to prison inmates, according to the Data Governance Council.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
Editor's Desk | Smart use of new tools
The Huffington Post it ain't. So if you're looking for a titillating, gossipy blog, you won't see it from Dale Meyerrose, CIO of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
Doan starts tenure at GSA with splash
Lurita Doan promised one thing in her first public address since taking the reins at the General Services Administration last month'change. Her first big one was bringing in Jim Williams, the program manager for one of the government's highest-profile, politically toughest challenges'the U.S. Visit project at the Homeland Security Department.
- By Rob Thormeyer and Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
Tom Temin | Editor's Desk: Good help deterred
For every technology company that participates in the federal market, there are probably 12 that wouldn't touch it. Those who master the ins and outs of the federal market find their efforts rewarded with profitable business. Successful contractors can command premium prices in the merger and acquisition markets.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
EDITOR'S DESK: Meet the elite
This issue honors the elite of government career workers. The 12 profiled in this special issue have shown they can get things done. Important things that move the missions of their agencies and affect the lives of their constituents and fellow workers, done in an environment typically written off as impossibly bureaucratic.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
EDITOR'S DESK: Fear of outsourcing
Outsourcing is high on both private industry's and government's lists of concerns. No credible economic or social argument can be made against outsourcing. The difference in service doesn't depend on who's doing the work, but on who specifies and oversees it.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
EDITOR'S DESK: When to fold 'em
You've got to credit the beleaguered Homeland Security Department for yanking the contract on its Emerge2 financial systems program.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
EDITOR'S DESK: Resolve to let go
Here is a list of things the government should resolve not to do in 2006.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Infrastructure
The finer points of searches
Searching is all the rage right now, with pitched battles among Google Inc., Microsoft Corp. and Yahoo Inc.
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
EDITOR'S DESK: Better searches still need good data
Do burgeoning search technologies less-en the need for discipline in structuring databases?
- By Thomas R. Temin
Digital Government
HUD, other agencies worked around Katrina's telecom conundrum
It's no surprise that the scale of destruction from Hurricane Katrina exceeded every agency's worst-case predictions.
- By Thomas R. Temin