dr. kevin hassett, and dr. stone. i no there are others who will be asking questions and making statements. i will be brief. i wanted to first of all make the following assertion. i don't think there is any disagreement on this committee and throughout most of the country about the need to reduce the deficit and have a strategy to do that. i think it is if shared in a bipartisan manner, and we are all of one minds to do that. the questions that we are trying to resolve year is about the timing of that and what policies yield the best results. on these questions i think there is honest disagreement but also significant disagreement. we are having a robust debate about it as we speak and throughout the next couple of weeks and months. today's hearing is part of that debate and is important we have this debate at this time. we have a lot of able economists across the country and several here today who offer their perspective. i want to provide a little bit of context in terms of the way i see this in terms of some of the