Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Military News: Medal Of Honor For Staff Sergeant Salvatore Giunta
Friday, October 8, 2010
Leadership: National Security Advisor Jim Jones To Leave White House
Wow, this is a stunner! Jim Jones is out and Tom Donilon is in. Secretary Gates is quoted as saying Tom Donilon is a ‘disaster waiting to happen‘ in Bob Woodward’s book. From his bio, he has no military background whatsoever. Yikes. We will see how this pans out and I would love to hear what McChrystal or Petraeus thinks of this one? –Matt
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National Security Adviser Jones to leave White House
By Sam Youngman
10/08/10
President Obama’s National Security Adviser Jim Jones will resign from the White House in two weeks, a senior administration official said.
Obama will announce that Jones, a retired Marine general, will be replaced by Deputy National Security Adviser Tom Donilon in a Rose Garden statement Friday afternoon.
Jones’s departure is just the latest personnel room for a West Wing increasingly turning over before the midterm election.
White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel departed on Friday to run for mayor of Chicago. Larry Sumers, Obama’s chief economic adviser, is leaving after the election and two other members of Obama’s team left the White House over the summer.
Donilon, who had been seen as a possible successor to Emanuel, is not a surprising choice to replace Jones, who reportedly viewed Donilon as his replacement from the beginning of the administration.
According to “Obama’s Wars” by Bob Woodward, Jones gave Donilon three pieces of advice during a performance review.
Jones said Donilon needed to travel to Iraq and Afghanistan, something he had not done before. He also needed to learn to tone down his declarative opinions of military leaders he had never met and develop a feel for the personal lives of NSC staffers.
Friday, April 16, 2010
Legal News: ‘To Deny Hostage Takers The Benefits Of Ransom’–W.H. Somali Piracy Policy
U.S. government policy is “to deny hostage takers the benefits of ransom, prisoner releases, policy changes, or other acts of concession,” the White House said in a statement today.
*****
This is the only article I could find that listed the administration’s follow up statement on the matter. This quote was also added as an update to this article. I have not seen a lot of stuff written on this, primarily because it is still kind of new and vague. A reporter needs to nail down the White House on this, because I am sure there are shipping companies out there just scratching their head. Does this new order expressly prohibit paying ransoms to pirates or not?
If a lawyer (in the article below) states that this is vague and could be interpreted one way or the other, I tend to think that the American shipping industry is pretty confused right now.
It could also mean that this is a hint that the administration is dropping on the US shipping industry. A hint that says ‘you guys should probably think about doing something other than paying the salaries of Somali pirates with 3 to 5 million dollar ransoms’. Who knows, and we will see how this turns out. –Matt
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Obama Order May Block Ransoms Paid to Somali Pirates
April 15, 2010 (updated)
More From Businessweek
(Adds White House comment in fifth paragraph.)
By Gregory Viscusi
President Barack Obama signed an executive order freezing the assets of Somali militias that could also make it illegal for U.S. ship owners to pay ransoms to pirates.
The executive order signed late yesterday bars any U.S. citizens and companies, as well as their overseas branches, from having financial dealings with a list of 11 militia leaders and the Islamic guerrilla group al-Shabaab, as well anyone that has “engaged in acts that directly or indirectly threaten the peace, security, or stability of Somalia.”
While never using the word “ransom,” the order includes “acts of piracy and armed robbery at sea” among those acts.
“The wording could definitely be construed to make payments of ransoms illegal,” Bruce Paulsen, a partner at Seward & Kissel in New York, who negotiated a ransom payment with Somali pirates for a U.S. owned ship hijacked in 2008, said in a telephone interview.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Washington DC: White House Security Breach
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Industry Talk: White House Press Release–Memorandum on Government Contracting
So do companies that contract with the government, get a bail out too? Or are they too ‘evil’ and ‘wasteful’ to get that kind of hand out? lol (sorry, I had to say it)
Seriously. This is interesting, and we’ll see if the necessary changes happen, to make contracting a more efficient and well managed process. I applaud the effort and I would like to emphasize that this is not an ending of contractor use, but a critical look at how the government does business. The true test of this effort, will be the end result out in the field and actual money saved.
Will the government do the necessary things to implement and manage these contracts out there, or will it all be more talk as usual? Will they put enough staff and manpower in place to manage this stuff? I am sure they will save money with this new framework, but will they truly get involved with watching these contracts out there, to insure people don’t get hurt or killed? Will these new measures, insure that another soldier doesn’t get electrocuted in a shower, or that another Custer Battles doesn’t come on to the scene? Only time will tell.
Also, is the government truly interested in contracting “non-inherently governmental activities that can be provided commercially” that “are subject to the forces of competition”? Or will this turn into a knee jerk reaction by the government that hinders those forces of free market competition? Plus, I will be really interested to hear what the government’s definition of ‘inherently governmental activities’ is? There is a war going on, so choose wisely….please. –Matt
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THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
March 4, 2009
Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies
Subject: Government Contracting
The Federal Government has an overriding obligation to American taxpayers. It should perform its functions efficiently and effectively while ensuring that its actions result in the best value for the taxpayers.