they are rhettically, because it can be waived. he can -- we can clang the law. hopefully we will not, certainly we must not. all of these steps are important to helping control the damage to our budget and to our future. but they are together a small part of the solution. that's why president obama create add bipartisan fiscal commission to tackle the most pressing long term challenges. i've long been an advocate for fiscal commission. i was the only leader of either party that testified on behalf of the creation of the commission before senator konrad and senator gray. i'm glad to see that two proven budget balancers have been appointed as co-chairs. a former clinton white house chief of statue and former republican senator alan simpson. congress must act on the commission proposals at the end of the year. we did not pass statutory commission. i was for statutory commission. we did not pass it. president obama did what he could do in tde@@@@ r bd and both majority leader reid and speaker pelosi and myself, i scheduled legislation, that pledged that we will put