joining us right now is frits van paaschen. ceo of starwood hotels and resorts. frits is also a member of the fix the debt leadership council. >> great to be back. >> we know that the hotel industry, the tourism, the travel industry, seems to have been doing fairly well for awhile. how have things been holding up as you've been getting into the holiday? >> i'd like to say so far so good. in other words we haven't seen a real effect yet around the uncertainty. but -- about the fiscal cliff. if we fall off the cliff, i think that could change pretty quickly. but right now it's steady as she goes. >> the front page of "the wall street journal" today lays out that consumers, there are some concerns around the edges. you start looking at consumers and friday's preliminary university of michigan consumer confidence showed a huge plunge. do you think that's because of the fiscal cliff? >> it could very well be that. i think that from a business perspective, uncertainty is very costly. and so the longer we go without understanding what