Arlen Specter

I note that it is in the budget for $219 million.

We could do more than that. That was the appropriation for fiscal year 2010.

I would like you to go back to your office and review what could be accomplished with the $500 million, in as specific terms as you could.

The successes have been monumental in what you have done for prolonging and saving lives.

Many programs fail and many programs succeed.

What is your professional judgment as to the kind of priority attention that the CAN ought to receive?

A lot of money to be saved by research; tremendous amounts of money to be raised by research.

The scientific is going to have to become a lot more politically active blowing your horn.

This year's funding is also disgraceful, in my opinion, at $1 billion.

Last year's funding was disgraceful, at $772 million.

My view, as expressed repeatedly, is that the National Institutes of Health are the crown jewels of the Federal Government--perhaps the only jewels.

Perhaps this is something where there could be some assistance from the Veterans Administration.

I think there was a warning from Arlen Specter as well, because he said that he thought the president was very fiery today, very strong, but he said he wishes the president was this fiery back in the State of the Union, two months ago.

He said he wishes the president was this fiery back in the 'State of the Union.' Two months ago.

What will matter is getting the votes to push this through and what I thought was a hopeful sign for this president was that after this speech one of the Senators from Pennsylvania, Arlen Specter, came out and reiterated that he's still on…

Thank you for jogging my memory on it.

The Mon Valley Expressway is really of critical importance to southwestern Pennsylvania.

What kind of a timeframe do you see for a decision to make an allocation of the $45 million to Pennsylvania?

A very important project in Pennsylvania is the Mon Valley Expressway, and it connects Uniontown... to the city of Pittsburgh.

It's the kind of legislation that I would favor and would be inclined to introduce.

We're talking about a figure of $600 billion. Is that realistic, from the point of view of the administration? I hope so.

I think it is a technology which is expensive, but I think it would be worth it.

Thank you for liberating it.

I wrote you, back on December 23, asking you not to reprogram the money.

I'd like to get that worked out, at the staff level, so we can figure out to----