I am very disappointed with the amount allocated in the President's budget for conservation programs.

In my view, these programs are now more important than ever, especially as we work to address significant environmental concerns.

I am glad to see that you have kept the mandatory funding levels for other programs like the CRP and CSP.

I am a little concerned, I must note for the record, about the proposed cutbacks in the WRP program and the EQIP program in the budget proposal.

I support streamlining that could be done over there.

So again, I'm back to square one. Is this a fair allotment of money?

I'm still wrestling with that. I still don't understand that.

Do you have any idea about when we might be able to really get some body of evidence or something that we could rely on to say for prevention, we ought to be doing this and that pre-natal care and pregnant women ought to take certain…

I know the statistics on cancer. I've fought as hard as anyone for more money for cancer research.

It seems to me that concerning the program you talked about, the Grant Opportunity Program, the GO Grants, it is my information that the purpose of this program is to support high-impact ideas that require significant resources for a…

It's not just geared toward the American people, and so with all of that research we have to keep thinking about, what's that translational research, what's it going to translate into?

We have to be cognizant of this issue and do our best to answer those problems.

Should we put so much of that into just one disease rather than spreading it out more?

It seems to me that if you put most of the money in the RO1 grants and you do it for 2 years rather than 4 years, what happens after 2 years?

I just want to see how we judge the success of the Recovery Act funding.

Maybe this grant leads to a new compound that a pharmaceutical company wants to develop into a new drug and that means more money in our economy.

Would you tell us what, if anything, is being done to expand the research portfolio for this lethal form of cancer?

We provided $1.1 billion for comparative effectiveness in the Recovery Act.