This report discusses the violent crime control and law enforcement act of 1994, the federal death penalty that became available as a possible punishment for a substantial number of new and existing civilian offenses.

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "This testimony discusses the Preparedness Against Domestic Terrorism Act of 2001 (H.R. 525). To improve federal efforts to help state and local personnel prepare for domestic terrorist attacks, H.R. 525 would create a single focal point for policy and coordination--the President's Council on Domestic Terrorism Preparedness--within the White House. The new council would include the President, several cabinet secretaries, and other selected high-level officials. H.R. 525 would (1) create an executive director position with a staff that would collaborate with other executive agencies to assess threats, (2) require the new council to develop a national strategy, (3) require the new council to analyze and review budgets, and (4) require the new council to oversee implementation among the different federal agencies. Other proposals before Congress would also create a single focal point for terrorism. Some of these proposals place the focal point in the Executive Office of the President and others place it in a lead executive agency. Both locations have advantages and disadvantages."

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "The extent and quality of federal voter assistance for military personnel and overseas citizens varied considerably during the November 2000 election. The Department of Defense (DOD) has developed some useful information tools, but many overseas military personnel were unaware of them. Moreover, the military services did not always comply with DOD requirements to appoint and train Voting Assistance Officers, brief military personnel on how to go about voting, or maintain enough supplies of voting materials. Lack of emphasis by commanders and limited oversight by service Inspectors General and installation commanders appear to be the chief reasons why some military installations did not fully comply with DOD guidance on how voting assistance programs should be carried out. Many states have worked with DOD's Federal Voting Assistance Program to make it easier for military personnel and overseas citizens to register, obtain ballots, and vote; however, voters continue to face challenges. Information on the precise number of military and overseas absentee votes that local jurisdictions disqualified nationwide in the November 2000 election and the reasons for the disqualification is not available. Many local officials said that they did not track data …

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Federal employees who report waste, fraud, and abuse shouldn't have to fear discrimination and retaliation. Despite laws designed to protect whistleblowers, some have experienced or believed that they have experienced reprisals. Proposed legislation--the Notification and Federal Employee Antidiscrimination and Retaliation Act of 2001--would provide additional protections for federal employees and would provide important data to decisionmakers. First, the act would require agencies to report the number of discrimination and whistleblower reprisal cases. Because of a lack of data, the federal government currently doesn't have a clear picture of the volume of discrimination and whistleblowing reprisal cases involving federal employees. Such data could be a starting point for agency managers to understand the nature and scope of issues in the workplace involving reprisals and discrimination. Second, the act would make agencies and their leaders accountable for providing fair and equitable workplaces. In addition, individuals would be held accountable for their actions in cases in which discrimination has occurred. Finally, the act would require agencies to notify employees in writing of their rights and protections. This provision reinforces existing requirements that employees be notified of the rights and remedies concerning …

A letter report issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "GAO audited the financial statements for the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation's (FDIC) Bank Insurance Fund, Savings Association Insurance Fund, and FSLIC Resolution Fund for 2000 and 1999. GAO found that (1) the financial statements of each fund are presented fairly in conformity with U.S. generally accepted accounting principles; (2) although certain internal controls should be improved, FDIC had effective internal control over financial reporting and compliance with laws and regulations; and (3) there was no reportable noncompliance with the laws and regulations."

This paper presents the results of laboratory measurements on the mechanical and acoustic properties of weakly cemented granular rock. Artificial rock samples were fabricated by cementing sand and glass beads with sodium silicate binder. During uniaxial compression tests, the rock samples showed stress-strain behavior which was more similar to that of soils than competent rocks, exhibiting large permanent deformations with frictional slip. The mechanical behavior of the samples approached that of competent rocks as the amount of binder was increased. For very weak samples, acoustic waves propagating in these rocks showed very low velocities of less than 1000 m/sec for compressional waves. A borehole made within this weakly cemented rock exhibited a unique mode of failure that is called ''anti-KI mode fracture'' in this paper. The effect of cementation, grain type, and boundary conditions on this mode of failure was also examined experimentally.

Testimony issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "Medicare provides valuable and extensive health care coverage for beneficiaries. Nevertheless, significant gaps leave some beneficiaries vulnerable to sizeable financial burdens from out-of-pocket expenses. Medigap is a widely available source of supplemental coverage. This testimony discusses (1) beneficiaries' potential financial liability under Medicare's current benefit structure and cost-sharing requirements, (2) the cost of Medigap policies and the extent to which they provide additional coverage, and (3) concerns that Medigap's so-called "first dollar" coverage undermines the cost control incentives of Medicare's cost-sharing requirements. GAO found that Medicare's benefits package and cost-sharing requirements leave beneficiaries liable for high out-of-pocket costs. Medigap policies pay for some or all Medicare cost-sharing requirements but do not fully protect beneficiaries from potentially significant out-of-pocket costs such as prescription drug coverage. Medigap first-dollar coverage eliminates the ability of Medicare's cost-sharing requirements to promote prudent use of services."

Embedded systems often have real-time constraints. Traditional timing analysis statically determines the maximum execution time of a task or a program in a real-time system. These systems typically depend on the worst-case execution time of tasks in order to make static scheduling decisions so that tasks can meet their deadlines. Static determination of worst-case execution times imposes numerous restrictions on real-time programs, which include that the maximum number of iterations of each loop must be known statically. These restrictions can significantly limit the class of programs that would be suitable for a real-time embedded system. This paper describes work-in-progress that uses static timing analysis to aid in making dynamic scheduling decisions. For instance, different algorithms with varying levels of accuracy may be selected based on the algorithm's predicted worst-case execution time and the time allotted for the task. We represent the worst-case execution time of a function or a loop as a formula, where the unknown values affecting the execution time are parameterized. This parametric timing analysis produces formulas that can then be quickly evaluated at run-time so dynamic scheduling decisions can be made with little overhead. Benefits of this work include expanding the class of applications that can be …

A better understanding of thermal cook-off is important for safe handling and storing explosive devices. A number of safety issues exist about what occurs when a cased explosive thermally cooks off. For example, violence of the events as a function of confinement are important for predictions of collateral damage. This paper demonstrates how adjacent materials can be gauged to measure the resulting pressure wave and how this wave propagates in this adjacent material. The output pulse from the thermal cook-off explosive containing fixture is of obvious interest for assessing many scenarios.

Results of radiation dose measurements of the insertion devices for the year 2000 have been added as Figures 29-35.

Correspondence issued by the General Accounting Office with an abstract that begins "A January report by the National Science Foundation (NSF) identified a $5 billion gap between the amount of money that federal agencies reported as research and development (R&D) support and the amount of money that those who did the R&D work reported as spent in 1998. According to NSF, federal agencies earmarked about $72 billion for R&D support in 1998, while those who carried out the R&D reported spending about $67 billion. GAO found that this gap results primarily from annually comparing two separate and distinct types of financial data--federal obligations and performer expenditures--that are not comparable. In addition, R&D funding are collected on a yearly basis, but,in reporting, the period that defines a year can vary. Furthermore, agencies and performers do not always agree on what type of activities fall under the category of R&D. Because the gap results from comparing two dissimilar types of financial data, it does not necessarily reflect poor-quality data, nor does it reflect whether performers are receiving or spending all the federal R&D funds obligated to them. Thus, even if the data collection and reporting issues were addressed, a gap would still …

The neutrino factory[1-3] consists of a target section where pions are produced and captured in a solenoidal magnetic field. Pions in a range of energies from 100 Mev to 400 MeV decay into muons in an 18-meter long channel of 1.25 T superconducting solenoids. The warm bore diameter of these solenoids is about 600 mm. The phase rotation section slows down the high-energy muon and speeds up the low energy muons to an average momentum of 200 MeV/c. The phase-rotation channel consists of three induction linac channels with a short cooling section and a magnetic flux reversal section between the first and second induction linacs and a drift space between the second and third induction linacs. The length of the phase rotation channel will be about 320 meters. The superconducting coils in the channel are 0.36 m long with a gap of 0.14 m between the coils. The magnetic induction within the channel will be 1.25. For 260 meters of the 320-meter long channel, the solenoids are inside the induction linac. This paper discusses the design parameters for the superconducting solenoids in the neutrino factory phase-rotation channel.