because i think neither democrats nor republicans were the mood to compromise until their 100% max malposition was voted down -- maximal position was voted down in the senate, we lost some time. we may not be able to fully resolve this and meet next week's deadline for the continuing resolution, which means that there may be potentially one more short-term extension. but let me just make some broad points about this. number one, we can't keep running the government based on two-week extensions. that's irresponsible. wove' got a war -- we've got a war in afghanistan going on. we've got a wide range of issues facing the country on a day-to-day basis. notion that we can't get resolved last year's budget in a sensible way with serious but prudent spending cuts, i think, defies common sense. so we should be able to get it done. point number two. there are going to be certain things that house republicans want that i will not accept. and the reason i won't accept them is not because i don't think we've got to cut the budget. we do and we've already put forward significant cuts in the discretionary b