So what's your read on what's happening in the moment and how does that connect with the history of how we got here?

Well, to a large extent, it is a continuation of a longstanding debate as to who really should be in control.

In the 1940s, the Democrats felt very strongly that the politicians should be in control and the Republicans felt that the scientists, they should be the ones in control.

In the mid-1960s, President Johnson complained that the agency was spending way too much money.

on basic science, it set off a panic, which eventually settled down.

But it was another example.

In the 1970s, there were members of Congress, I think at that time, Republican members of Congress, who said that they thought that members of Congress should decide each individual grant and which grant should be funded.

But do you think this is a moment where we can use to think about how do we restructure the system? How do we make sure that we don't create another misaligned incentive that might lead us to, again, being in a system that is full of bureaucracy and might not actually lead to optimal results that we're looking for.