This report covers concerns and issues relating to governance, elections, election fraud/nepotism, human rights, and Afghan culture in Afghanistan. It discusses the pros and cons of U.S.A. intervention in the shaping of these endeavors.

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "Since enactment of the Water Resources Development Act of 2007, 49 project studies have undergone peer review but it is unclear how many were performed in response to section 2034 requirements because the Army Corps of Engineers (Corps) does not make specific determinations or track if a peer review is being conducted under section 2034. In February 2011, in response to section 2034, the Corps submitted its initial report to Congress summarizing its implementation of the peer review process. In its report, however, the Corps did not distinguish which studies had been selected for peer review in accordance with section 2034 and therefore, did not provide Congress information that would help decision makers evaluate the requirements of section 2034 at the end of the trial period."

A letter report issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "While repayments, dividends, and interest from institutions participating in the Capital Purchase Program (CPP) have exceeded the program’s original investment disbursements, the number of missed payments has increased over the life of the program. As of January 31, 2012, the Department of the Treasury (Treasury) had received $211.5 billion from its CPP investments, exceeding the $204.9 billion it had disbursed. Of that amount, $16.7 billion remains outstanding, and most of these investments were concentrated in a relatively small number of institutions. In particular, as of January 31, 2012, 25 institutions accounted for $11.2 billion, or 67 percent, of outstanding investments. As of November 30, 2011, Treasury estimated that CPP would have a lifetime income of $13.5 billion after all institutions exited the program. As of January 31, 2012, 341 institutions had exited CPP, almost half by repaying CPP with funds from other federal programs. Institutions continue to exit CPP, but the number of institutions missing scheduled dividend or interest payments has increased. For example, as of November 30, 2011, the number of institutions that had missed their quarterly payments rose to 158, a marked increase from …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "GAO identified several factors and challenges that contributed to the Department of Defense’s (DOD) implementation of Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) 2005 and the results achieved. In contrast to other BRAC rounds that were primarily focused on achieving savings by reducing excess infrastructure, the Secretary of Defense identified three goals for BRAC 2005. Specifically, BRAC 2005 was intended to (1) transform the military, (2) foster jointness, and (3) reduce excess infrastructure to produce savings. These goals and the primary selection criteria’s focus on enhancing military value led DOD to identify numerous recommendations that were designed to be transformational and enhance jointness, thereby adding to the complexity the BRAC Commission and DOD faced in finalizing and implementing the recommendations. Some transformational-type recommendations needed sustained attention by DOD and significant coordination and planning among multiple stakeholders. To improve oversight of implementation of the recommendations, the Office of the Secretary of Defense (OSD) required business plans for each BRAC 2005 recommendation to better manage implementation. In addition, DOD developed recommendations that were interdependent on each other. However, this led to challenges across multiple recommendations when delays in completing one recommendation led …

Testimony issued by the Government Accountability Office with an abstract that begins "In March 2011 and February 2012, GAO reported on 6 areas where the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) or Congress could take action to reduce overlap and potential unnecessary duplication, and 9 areas to achieve cost-savings. Of the 22 actions GAO suggested be taken in March 2011 to address such issues, 2 were fully implemented, 14 were partially implemented, and 6 have not been addressed. GAO’s February 2012 report identified 18 additional actions to address overlap, potential duplication, and costs savings."

An archaeological survey report of the proposed site of the Marine Creek Corridor Linear Park Improvements Project in Fort Worth, Texas to determine whether there were any cultural resources in the area.

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The sessions will focus on:  Attosecond science;  Strong-field processes in molecules and solids;  Generation of harmonics and attosecond pulses;  Free-electron laser experiments and theory;  Ultrafast imaging;  Applications of very high intensity lasers;  Propagation of intense laser fields.

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The National Compact Stellarator Experiment (NCSX) was designed to test physics principles of an innovative fusion energy confinement device developed by the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) and Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) under contract from the US Department of Energy. The project was technically very challenging, primarily due to the complex component geometries and tight tolerances that were required. As the project matured these challenges manifested themselves in significant cost overruns through all phases of the project (i.e. design, R&D, fabrication and assembly). The project was subsequently cancelled by the DOE in 2008. Although the project was not completed, several major work packages, comprising about 65% of the total estimated cost (excluding management and contingency), were completed, providing a data base of actual costs that can be analyzed to understand cost drivers. Technical factors that drove costs included the complex geometry, tight tolerances, material requirements, and performance requirements. Management factors included imposed annual funding constraints that throttled project cash flow, staff availability, and inadequate R&D. Understanding how requirements and design decisions drove cost through this top-down forensic cost analysis could provide valuable insight into the configuration and design of future state-of-the art machines and other devices.

The PET radionuclides, 18F and 11C consist of very high radiation to mass amounts and should be easily adapted to new technologies such as “chip chemistry” with nanofluidics. However, environmental contamination with nonradioactive fluorine, carbon and other trace contaminants add sufficient mass, micrograms to milligrams, to prevent adapting PET radiochemistry to the nanochip technologies. In addition, the large volumes of material required for beam irradiation make it necessary to also remove the 18F and 11C from their chemical matrices. These steps add contaminants. The work described in this report was a systematic investigation of sources of these contaminants and methods to reduce these contaminants and the reaction volumes for radiochemical synthesis. Several methods were found to lower the contaminants and matrices to within a factor of 2 to 100 of those needed to fully implement chip technology but further improvements are needed.

The F-Area Tank Farm (FTF) Performance Assessment (PA) utilizes waste speciation in the waste release model used in the FTF fate and transport modeling. The waste release modeling associated with the residual plutonium in Tank 18 has been identified as a primary contributor to the Tank 18 dose uncertainty. In order to reduce the uncertainty related to plutonium in Tank 18, a better understanding of the plutonium speciation in the Tank 18 waste (including the oxidation state and stoichiometry) is desired. Savannah River National Laboratory (SRNL) utilized Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and X-ray Diffraction (XRD) to analyze Tank 18 samples to provide information on the speciation of plutonium in the waste material. XRD analysis of the Tank 18 samples did not identify any plutonium mineral phases in the samples. These indicates the crystalline mineral phases of plutonium are below the detection limits of the XRD method or that the plutonium phase(s) lack long range order and are present as amorphous or microcrystalline solids. SEM analysis of the Tank 18 samples did locate particles containing plutonium. The plutonium was found as small particles, usually <1 {micro}m but ranging up to several micrometers in diameter, associated with particles of an iron matrix …

Saltstone Disposal Unit 2 contains a sheet drain fabric intended to separate solids from drain water to be returned to the Salt Feed Tank. A similar system installed in Vault 4 appears to be ineffective in keeping solids out of the drain water return lines. Waste Solidification Engineering is considering installation of an additional fabric membrane to supplement the existing sheet drain in SDU 2. Amerdrain 200 is the product currently installed in SDU 2. This product is no longer available, so Sitedrain 94 was used as the replacement product in this testing. Fabrics with apparent opening sizes of 10, 25, 50 and 100 microns were evaluated. These fabrics were evaluated under three separate test conditions, a water flow test, a solids retention test and a grout pour test. A flow test with water showed that installation of an additional filter layer will predictably reduce the theoretical flux through the sheet drain. The manufacturer reports the flux for Sitedrain 94 as 150 gpm/ft{sup 2} by ASTM D-4491. This compares reasonably well with the 117 gpm/ft{sup 2} obtained in this testing. A combination of the 10 micron fabric with Sitedrain 94 could be expected to decrease flux by about 10 times …