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First of all, I did embrace Simpson-Bowles. I'm the one who created the commission. If I hadn't pushed it, it wouldn't have happened, because congressional sponsors, including a whole bunch of Republicans, walked away from it ... Now, to your larger point, you're absolutely right. Our whole foreign policy has to be anchored in economic strength here at home. And if we are not strong, stable, growing, making stuff, training our workforce so that it's the most skilled in the world, maintaining our lead in innovation, in basic research, in basic science, in the quality of our universities, in the transparency of our financial sector, if we don't maintain the upward mobility and equality of opportunity that underwrites our political stability and makes us a beacon for the world, then our foreign policy leadership will diminish as well.
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