then as david said, the numbers shot off the charts. the state of the union is a hellacious process because all of the pressures come to bear on one point. mainly the speech writing office. this will be a non-clinton one, i suspect. one of the advantages for obama in having lost the house and therefore having lost the chance for any big accomplishments, it opens up more space for a more thematic speech. i suspect we'll get a more coherent literary kind of speech. >> you've been in america for a long time but you're british. is this sort of like the queen's speech to parliament? how does this strike you? >> as a process i would never ever want to be involved with. listening to this. i think it's interesting that you mentioned the clinton -- a