Crisis Bureaucracy: Homeland Security and the Political Design of Legal Mandates

Policymakers fight over bureaucratic structure because it helps shape the legal interpretations and regulatory decisions of agencies through which modern governments operate. In this article, we update positive political theories of bureaucratic structure to encompass two new issues with important implications for lawyers and political scientists: the significance of legislative responses to a crisis, and the uncertainty surrounding major bureaucratic reorganizations. The resulting perspective affords a better understanding of how agencies interpret their legal mandates and deploy their administrative discretion. We apply the theory to the creation of the Department of Homeland Security. Two principal questions surrounding this creation are: (1) why the President changed from opposing the creation of a new department to supporting it and (2) why his plan for such a department was far beyond the scope of any other existing proposal. We argue that the President changed his mind in part because he did not want to be on the losing side of a major legislative battle. But more significantly, the President supported the massive new department in part to further domestic policy priorities unrelated to homeland security. By moving a large set of agencies within the department and instilling them with new homeland security responsibilities without additional budgets, the president forced these agencies to move resources out of their legacy mandates. Perversely, these goals appear to have been accomplished at the expense of homeland security. Finally, we briefly discuss more general implications of our perspective: first, previous reorganizations (such as FDR's creation of a Federal Security Agency and Carter's creation of an Energy Department) also seem to reflect presidential efforts to enhance their control of administrative functions, including some not directly related to the stated purpose of the reorganization; and, second, our analysis raises questions about some of the most often-asserted justifications for judicial deference to agency legal interpretations.

Pair-induced spectral changes and variability in compact X-ray sources

Inverse Compton scattering of ultraviolet photons by GeV electrons produces γ-rays which in turn create electron–positron pairs if the source is sufficiently compact. The pairs modify the emergent radiation spectrum through their own inverse Compton scattering and through thermal Comptonization after they have cooled to sub-relativistic temperatures. Recent calculations of spectral reprocessing under these conditions are extended to situations in which the Thomson optical depth of the pair plasma exceeds unity, and to demonstrate time-dependent behaviour explicitly. The relevance of our results to X-ray observations of active galactic nuclei, binary X-ray sources and γ-ray bursters is discussed briefly

Use of supplemented kitchen refuse for feeding growing - finishing pigs (30-90 kg.)

The experiment was carried out in a commmercial pig farm located on the left bank of the Cauca river, in the northeastern part of Cali. The farm has an average temperature of 23° C, an average rainfall of 1000 m.m. and is at 1003 m. above the sea level. Sixty crossbred pigs weighing an average of 32.5 kg were distributed at random with three treatments and three replications per treatment. The treatments were : TI. Kitchen refuse ad libitum + 0.75 kg/day of 14 % crude protein commercial feed, T2. Kitchen refuse ad libitum + 0.412 kg/day of 43.6 % crude protein supplement. The experimental period lasted 113 days. The results for average daily weight gain (g) and feed conversion (kg D.M. consumed/ kg Iive weight gain) were: TI. 510 and 5.24; T2. 567 and 3.91, respectively. The analysis of variance did not show significant differences for daily weight gain, but  there were differences for feed conversion (pEl ensayo se realizó en una granja comercial, localizada en la margen izquierda del río Cauca, al Nororiente de la ciudad de Cali; situada a 1003 m.s.n.m., con una temperatura promedio de 23°C y una precipitación anual promedio de 1000 m.m. Se emplearon 60 cerdos híbridos comerciales de los cruces de las razas Hampshire, Duroc, Yorkshire y Landrace, con un peso promedio inicial de 32.5 kg, distribuidos al azar en dos tratamientos con tres repeticiones cada uno. Los tratamientos evaluados fueron: I. Lavazas a voluntad + 0.75 kg/día de concentrado comercial del 14 % de P.B. II. Lavazas a voluntad + 0.412 kg/día de un suplemento proteico del 43.6 % de P.B. El tiempo máximo del experimento fue de 113 días. Los valores obtenidos para ganancia promedio diaria (g) y conversión alimenticia (kg M.S./kg. aumento) fueron: I. 510 y 5.24 y II. 567 y 3.91, respectivamente. No se presentaron diferencias significativas para ganancia de peso, pero sí para conversión alimenticia (p and lt; 0.05), favorable para la dieta de Lavazas + suplemento proteico. El análisis económico determinó mayor rentabilidad para las Lavazas + suplemento proteico. Así mismo se comparó la utilización de las dos dietas contra concentrado comercial, hallándose pequeñas diferencias para varios rasgos de  comportamiento, pero notándose mayor utilidad a favor del uso de Lavazas + suplemento