I believe her nomination is an inspired choice.

But what is disturbing to me is this was a spot check over 2 days and it found so many vacancies.

When the Department of Homeland Security was established, Congress recognized the important role that technology must play in securing our Nation.

OMB has developed a system known as the Program Assessment Rating Tool (PART), and it is a performance results system that is intended to evaluate the effectiveness of Federal programs.

Why can we not get our act together when it comes to websites for tracking spending?

In government procurement, ensuring the best value for the American taxpayer is important under the best of circumstances, but it is crucial when our Nation is at war and our fellow citizens are serving in harm's way in Iraq, Afghanistan…

If it is accurate, then it is an alarming situation that demands action by the State Department.

What concerns me about that assessment is the nature of some of the deficiencies.

I guess that would be extremely poor performance.

In the previous Administration, OMB tried to use low PART ratings as a justification for terminating or reducing funding for various programs.

Now tell me how that differs from a best value approach to awarding the contract.

You have mentioned in your testimony and confirmed to Senator McCaskill that you are losing $1 million a month on this contract.

I think that we really should look at a change in legislation that would give us a best value way of appraising this.

I would like you to get back to me on that issue because your testimony says that it was a matter of cost, not technical qualifications.

This year alone, the Federal Government will spend more than $70 billion on IT projects, and yet OMB every year, through its tracking system, identifies billions of dollars of wasted spending on IT.

If that is not a true statement, then the Department of State should not be saying it.

The President has committed to making this Administration more transparent, and that is something that I completely support.

Shouldn't that information be shared?