Bob Hale regularly demonstrated his better qualities during testimony before Congress, delivering highly complex facts and judgments about the Defense Department’s spending and budgets to the public with a knowing humor delivered with the sort of gravelly voice you’d expect from one of those old country lawyers.  Hale served as DoD comptroller from 2009 to 2014, and, before… Keep reading →

WASHINGTON: This summer’s unpaid leave for federal workers was unpleasant enough. If the government shuts down October 1st, though, this fall’s furloughs are just going to be crazy. A patchwork of legal exceptions and grey areas will not only prevent most federal civilians from getting work done but, indirectly, keep many military servicemembers from getting… Keep reading →

How will the Defense Department handle the all-but-inevitable government shutdown on October 1st? In a few minutes, Pentagon comptroller Robert Hale will lay out the answers for the media — and for hundreds of thousands of anxious civil service employees, many of whom will be watching via webcast. What he’ll be briefing people on is… Keep reading →

The House of Representatives will vote on the 2014 National Defense Authorization Act later this week. Sequestration will be the giant hiding behind the door as the House Armed Services Committee has marked its bill to the Obama budget request, which means that the effects of sequestration are ignored by the bill (as they are… Keep reading →

No federal civilian furloughs — for a while — even if sequester hits, SecDef Panetta says: http://1.usa.gov/U0Wtfw SydneyFreedberg