sell to his base first. if the president had his base lined up to do chain cpi and some gradual over 30 years increase in the medicare age limit, boy, i think it would be easy to get revenue out of the republicans. infinitely easier, and i think we could have a big deal which mike and i agree, the big deal if we announced it would cause the economy to explode. >> exactly. >> it would explode. but the president doesn't stand up to his base. he attacks republicans who have been so dumb politically over the past four years that they're perfect straw men. and that's fine. it's great for him politically, but it doesn't get us any closer to a deal. >> let me ask you a question, governor. before you were governor, you had another executive position, your first executive position, you were mayor of philadelphia. you came into the mayoralty, and the city was in tough shape as a lot of cities are today. what did you do when you got in there?