This report discusses issues debated in the 107th Congress while is considering various proposals to amend the Endangered Species Act of 1973 (ESA). Major issues in recent years have included changing the role of science in decision-making, changing the role of critical habitat, reducing conflicts with Department of Defense activities, incorporating further protection for property owners, and increasing protection of listed species, among others. In addition, many have advocated including significant changes to ESA regulations made during the Clinton Administration in the law itself.

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After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the United States recognized the independence of all the former Central Asian republics and established diplomatic relations with each by mid-March 1992. This report provides an overview of U.S. policy concerns after the Soviet collapse. The report presents the U.S. policy attention and aid to support conflict amelioration, humanitarian needs, economic development, transport (including energy pipelines) and communications, border controls, democracy, and the creation of civil societies in the South Caucasian and Central Asian states. The United States has some economic and business interests in Central Asia, particularly in oil and natural gas development in Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

The U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement (FTA), implemented as P.L. 107-43, breaks new ground in including multiple worker rights provisions in the body of a U.S. trade agreement, rather than as a side agreement, for the first time. For this reason, it adds some controversy to the congressional debate over whether worker rights provisions should be included in future trade agreements. This report will be updated as events warrant.

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Tri-weekly student newspaper from Abilene Christian University in Abilene, Texas that includes local, state and campus news along with advertising.

A weekly publication, the Texas Register serves as the journal of state agency rulemaking for Texas. Information published in the Texas Register includes proposed, adopted, withdrawn and emergency rule actions, notices of state agency review of agency rules, governor's appointments, attorney general opinions, and miscellaneous documents such as requests for proposals. After adoption, these rulemaking actions are codified into the Texas Administrative Code.

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John Cornyn, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether the Texas Department of Insurance is authorized to examine certain nonprofit health corporations under Insurance Code articles 20A.17 and 20A.18C (RQ-0534-JC)

Document issued by the Office of the Attorney General of Texas in Austin, Texas, providing an interpretation of Texas law. It provides the opinion of the Texas Attorney General, John Cornyn, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether the Public Information Act provides for sanctions against an electricity market participant for filing with the Office of the Attorney General groundless claims of confidentiality as to its records held by the Public Utility Commission that are requested under the Act (RQ-0536-JC)

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "A number of well-publicized announcements about financial statement restatements by large, well-known public companies have erased billions of dollars of previously reported earnings and raised questions about the credibility of accounting practices and the quality of corporate financial disclosure and oversight in the United States. Industry officials and academics have speculated that several factors may have caused U.S. companies to use questionable accounting practices. Some officials have stated that increased focus and guidance by the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) on accounting issues in the late 1990s may have prompted more companies to restate previously reported financial statements. Although the number of restating companies continues to make up a small percentage of all publicly listed companies annually, the number of restatements due to accounting irregularities grew significantly--145 percent--from January 1997 through June 2002. The 845 restating companies GAO identified had restated their financial statements for many reasons--for example, to adjust revenue, costs or expenses, or to address securities-related issues. From January 1997 to June 2002, issues involving revenue recognition accounted for almost 38 percent of the 919 announced restatements. Finally, different parties can prompt a restatement, …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The federal government is in period of profound transition requires a comprehensive review, reassessment, reprioritization, and reengineering of what the government does, how it does business, and, in some cases, who does the government's business. Agencies will need to transform their cultures so that they are more results oriented, customer focused, and collaborative in nature. At the same time, GAO's work over years has amply documented that agencies are suffering from a range of long-standing management problems that are undermining their abilities to efficiently, economically, and effectively accomplish their missions and achieve results. On September 9, 2002, GAO convened a roundtable to discuss the application and the related advantages and disadvantages of the Chief Operating Officer (COO) concept and how it might apply within selected federal departments and agencies as one strategy to address certain systemic federal governance and management challenges. The invited participants have current or recent executive branch leadership responsibilities, significant executive management experience, or both."

A weekly student newspaper from the Rice University in Houston, Texas that includes campus news and commentaries along with advertising.

Weekly newspaper from Dallas, Texas that includes local, state, and national news and advertising of interest to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) community.

Beams for heavy-ion fusion (HIF) are expected to require substantial neutralization in a target chamber. Present targets call for higher beam currents and smaller focal spots than most earlier designs, leading to high space-charge fields. Collisional stripping by the background gas expected in the chamber further increases the beam charge. Simulations with no electron sources other than beam stripping and background-gas ionization show an acceptable focal spot only for high ion energies or for currents far below the values assumed in recent HIF power-plant scenarios. Much recent research has, therefore, focused on beam neutralization by electron sources that were neglected in earlier simulations, including emission from walls and the target, photoionization by radiation from the target, and pre-neutralization by a plasma generated along the beam path. The simulations summarized here indicate that these effects can significantly reduce the beam focal-spot size.

This document summarizes progress on Cooperative Agreement DE-FC26-01NT41185, Pilot Testing of Mercury Oxidation Catalysts for Upstream of Wet FGD Systems, during the time period July 1, 2002 through September 30, 2002. The objective of this project is to demonstrate at pilot scale the use of solid honeycomb catalysts to promote the oxidation of elemental mercury in the flue gas from coal combustion. The project is being funded by the U.S. DOE National Energy Technology Laboratory under Cooperative Agreement DE-FC26-01NT41185. EPRI, Great River Energy (GRE), and City Public Service (CPS) of San Antonio are project co-funders. URS Group is the prime contractor. The mercury catalytic oxidation process under development uses catalyst materials applied to honeycomb substrates to promote the oxidation of elemental mercury in the flue gas from coal-fired power plants that have wet lime or limestone flue gas desulfurization (FGD) systems. Oxidized mercury is removed in the wet FGD absorbers and co-precipitates in a stable form with the byproducts from the FGD system. The coprecipitated mercury does not appear to adversely affect the disposal or reuse properties of the FGD byproduct. The current project will test previously identified, effective catalyst materials at a larger, pilot scale and in a commercial …

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This report provides statistical information and possible solutions to the multilateral and bilateral debt of Africa. Possible solutions include debt forgiveness options, yet this comes with the consequence of limited future aid from multilateral agencies.

Semi-weekly newspaper from Clifton, Texas that includes local, state, and national news along with advertising.

Semi-monthly newspaper from Corpus Christi, Texas published by the Diocese of Corpus Christi that includes news of interest to Diocese members along with advertising.

The shape of the spectrum associated with the quasicontinuous (QC) decay of superdeformed rotational bands in even- and odd-mass Pb isotopes is sensitive to the gap in level density at finite temperature and angular momentum at normal deformations. This gap in level density was deduced to be {approx}0.95 MeV at 6{Dirac_h} for {sup 194}Pb and {approx}0.4 MeV at 10{Dirac_h} for {sup 192}Pb, while the shape of the QC spectrum for {sup 195}Pb is consistent with no gap in the level density at about 11{Dirac_h}.