Rep. Walter B. Jones (R-NC) paid tribute to military intelligence officer Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer in a statement entered into the Congressional Record yesterday.
“Col. Shaffer’s storied career has been distinguished by his willingness and ability to work at the cutting edge of our nation’s intelligence community,” Rep. Jones said.
Though it was not mentioned by the Congressman, Shaffer is also the author of a book called “Operation Dark Heart,” which was memorably and ineffectively censored by the U.S. Government. The Pentagon purchased 10,000 copies of the original version of the book in order to destroy them, but then a small number of uncensored review copies became public anyway. (“Behind the Censorship of Operation Dark Heart,” Secrecy News, September 29, 2010)
In anticipation of future known and unknown health security threats, including new pandemics, biothreats, and climate-related health emergencies, our answers need to be much faster, cheaper, and less disruptive to other operations.
To unlock the full potential of artificial intelligence within the Department of Health and Human Services, an AI Corps should be established, embedding specialized AI experts within each of the department’s 10 agencies.
Investing in interventions behind the walls is not just a matter of improving conditions for incarcerated individuals—it is a public safety and economic imperative. By reducing recidivism through education and family contact, we can improve reentry outcomes and save billions in taxpayer dollars.
The U.S. government should establish a public-private National Exposome Project (NEP) to generate benchmark human exposure levels for the ~80,000 chemicals to which Americans are regularly exposed.