the committee r sponds to what the president sends up and one way that relationship can bes improved is that the president includes in his request sufficient funding for those issues that both the executive branch and congress find important, and i think once you get to that point where a request comes up and congress is endorsing it and not that congress is putting something in or a back channel conversation is going about what's needed, that is an indication of a good balance that we were talking about here. >> you wanted to address this and i do want to ask you about this because we're in a moment where we have a terrible unemployment crisis. people talk about -- they don't really want to hear about middle east right now. they want to hear about jobs. >> so i'll let you juxtapose that. you're absolutely right. it's a tough environment in which to make the case for funding this kind of work, but, i think, tim and paul have made an important point that budget is important, it's meaningful and it's meaningful as a signal to the bureaucracy and it's also meaningful in practice and the