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Reconciliation is an expedited process under the 1974 Congressional Budget Act used to change mainly entitlement and revenue laws in order to implement budget resolution policies.

This report provides a brief overview of federal law with respect to five selected advertising issues: alcohol advertising, tobacco advertising, the Federal Trade Commission Act, advertising by mail, and advertising by telephone. There are numerous federal statutes regulating advertising that do not fit within any of these categories; as random examples, the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act requires disclosures in advertisements for prescription drugs ; the Truth in Lending Act governs the advertising of consumer credit ; and a federal criminal statute makes it illegal falsely to convey in an advertisement that a business is connected with a federal agency.

Exploring a possible compromise between an impeachment and taking no congressional action, certain Members of Congress and congressional commentators have suggested a congressional “censure” of the President to express the Congress’ disapproval of the President’s conduct which has been the subject of an ongoing independent counsel investigation. This report provides and overview and discussion of the legal basis and congressional precedents regarding a congressional “censure” of the President.

This report is a primer for those who wish to familiarize themselves with the defense budget process. The report defines basic defense budget-related terms, describes the structure of the defense budget, briefly reviews the budgeting process within the Department of Defense (DOD), and outlines the successive phases of the congressional defense budget process. It also provides a short review of the budget execution process. This report will be updated only in the event of significant changes to the defense budget process.

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The 105th Congress enacted tax provisions relating to Superfund brownfields sites, transportation- and defense-related environmental provisions, a border smog bill, EPA funding as well as reinstating the tax that supports the Leaking Underground Storage Trust Fund. There were various actions on regulatory reform, the budget resolution, appropriations, highway- and defense-related environmental provisions, Superfund reform bills and underground storage tanks. It is too early to tell if these will be issues for the 106th Congress.

This report discusses selected funding and policy issues related to Food and Drug Administration.

Appropriations are one part of a complex federal budget process that includes budget resolutions, appropriations (regular, supplemental, and continuing) bills, rescissions, and budget reconciliation bills. This report is a guide to one of the 13 regular appropriations bills that Congress passes each year. It is designed to supplement the information provided by the House and Senate Subcommittees on VA, HUD and Independent Agencies Appropriations.

In recent years, there have been various legislative efforts to modify or supplement the existing H-2A temporary agricultural program authorized by the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). Concern has centered on making the program easier for growers to use while still maintaining protections for domestic labor. Growers have made limited use of the program in the past and a few years ago program usage was in decline. Current trends, however, show an increase due in part to increased demand from tobacco growers. This report provides information on the H-2A program, illustrates current trends, discusses issues raised by the proposed changes, and tracks pending legislation.

This report discusses primarily, the controversy over encryption concerns what access the government should have to encrypted stored computer data or electronic communications (voice and data, wired and wireless) for law enforcement purposes.

Currently, in most parts of the United States, timepieces are moved forward one hour in the spring and back one hour in the fall to provide an extended daylight period during the summer months. This is known as Daylight Saving Time (DST). Much debate and many changes led to this present practice. This report provides a brief history of the issues surrounding DST, an outline of the legislation that created and modified it, and a list of references to more discussions.

Science, technology, and medicine are an integral part of many of the policy issues that might come before the Congress this second session. This report provides an overview of several of these issues and identifies CRS reports that treat them in more depth

On July 31, 1997, the Environmental Protection Agency proposed a new regulatory program to reduce "regional haze." The proposed program would require the states to develop and implement long-term strategies to attain a congressionally the mandated goal of remedying the impairment of visibility in national parks and wilderness areas resulting from man-made air pollution.

Section 110 of the IllegalImmigrationReformand ImmigrantResponsibility Act of 1996 (IIRIRA; Division C of P.L. 104-208) mandates the development of an automated entry/exit control system to create a record for every alien departing from the United States and match it with the record for the alien arriving at the United States. Section 110 also requires that this system identify nonimmigrants who overstay the terms of their admission through online computer searching. The FY1999 Omnibus Consolidated and Emergency Supplemental Appropriations Act (P.L. 105-277) amends Section 110 to extend the original implementation deadline of September 30, 1998, to March 31, 2001, for land border and seaports of entry, but leaves the end of FY1998 deadline in place for airports of entry. Further, P.L. 105- 277 includes a clause directing that the entry/exit control system must “not significantly disrupt trade, tourism, or other legitimate cross-border traffic at land border ports of entry.”

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.

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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; State Board of Education adoption of sex educatio curriculum and textbooks (RQ-942)

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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification: Whether the colonias statute, Local Gov't Code ch. 232 subch. B, applies to employee housing provided by the Webb Consolidated Independent School District (RQ-902)

Letter opinion 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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether Tax Code section 312.402(d) precludes a commissioners court from entering into a tax abatement agreement with a corporation in which a commissioners court member owns a very small percentage of shares (ID# 39608)

Letter opinion 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, Dan Morales, regarding a legal question submitted for clarification; Whether county may settle lawsuit relating to alleged wrongful acts of former sheriff and two deputies, where county is not named as defendant (RQ-1045)

We have studied the restoration of chiral symmetry in lattice QCD at the finite temperature transition from hadronic matter to a quark-gluon plasma. By measuring the screening masses of flavour singlet and non-singlet meson excitations, we have seen evidence that, although flavour chiral symmetry is restored at this transition, flavour singlet (U(1)) axial symmetry is not. We conclude that this indicates that instantons continue to play an important role in the quark-gluon plasma phase.

The results of studies of energy consumption and emission inventories in Asia are discussed. These data primarily reflect emissions from fuel combustion (both biofuels and fossil fuels) and were collected to determine emissions of acid-deposition precursors (SO{sub 2} and NO{sub x}) and greenhouse gases (CO{sub 2} CO, CH{sub 4}, and NMHC) appropriate to RAINS-Asia regions. Current work is focusing on black carbon (soot), volatile organic compounds, and ammonia.

Agreement on a focused, limited approach to MCO monitoring has been documented. While the value of monitoring has been understood by those interested in the SNF Project, there had been a diversity of opinion on details of approach and implementation. For this reason, MCO monitoring had been identified as a technical issue. A cooperative effort involving the contractor, RL, and the technical assistance group (TAG), resulted in the definition of an approach agreeable to all and of the remaining details to be resolved through conceptual engineering. MCO monitoring will consist of temperature, pressure, and gas composition monitoring of 4 to 6 MCOs for up to two years. High pressure detection capability for the duration of interim storage for every MCO will also be evaluated and implemented within the current project baseline, if possible. Otherwise a BCR will be prepared and submitted.