The oncology community is still riding the high of the success of daraxonrasib—the first drug to show real promise in treating metastatic pancreatic cancer. The drug doubled overall survival for patients in the phase III RASolute-302 trial.
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At the same time, science continues to become increasingly politicized. The White House Office of Management and Budget released a 412-page proposal May 29 that inserts political appointees into all stages of reviewing and awarding of federal research grants, centralizes OMB control over awarding federal funds, lists “specific principles” that must be applied to review of research programs of all federal entities, including NIH.
In this episode of In the Headlines, Paul Goldberg, editor and publisher of The Cancer Letter, and Jacquelyn Cobb, associate editor, talk about how these two stories are inseparable. Political review could put future breakthroughs like daraxonrasib in jeopardy when politicization of science is rooted in distrust.
“I was actually thinking of talking to someone who understands Project 2025 to talk about the roots of this kind of dislike for science, which is…I mean, what’s not like? Is a treatment for pancreatic cancer a bad thing?” Paul said.
Daraxonrasib’s success is thanks to the decades of basic, translational, and clinical research that preceded it, largely funded by federal research dollars. Indeed, the NCI RAS Initiative jumpstarted the field of RAS in 2013.
“To me, the best part of the story, your story, was going back to the link to the NCAB-BSA joint meeting where you could see these guys, with Harold Varmus presiding, deciding what they want to do with the RAS Initiative. By then, you had a pretty good idea that RAS mattered and that it was worth studying. There were already drugs and it was happening.”
“It was not a waste of time, but it was also a bet. And it was a smart bet that only NCI could place, and that’s why we need to have political appointees—on either party, I don’t even care—to look at the entire process, lest those intellectuals get into their idiot heads to cure some other cancer. I mean, my God, that would be awful.”
Stories mentioned in this podcast include:
- Pancreatic cancer finally starts to budge as daraxonrasib doubles overall survival
- The story of daraxonrasib is the ultimate hero’s journey: A narrative curve with twists, turns, intrigue, drama—and a blow to a mighty foe
- Political appointees to be inserted into all stages of making research funding awards if OMB rule becomes final
- At Senate hearing, Brown’s El-Deiry and other witnesses say they were targeted for arguing that mRNA vaccine may be linked to cancer
- Eric Small, ASCO’s immediate past president, speaks on the toll of toxicity—financial, emotional, physical—in cancer
- Cancer patients could be exempted from Medicaid work requirements if they prove they are “medically frail”
- Richard Pazdur joins Friends board
This episode is sponsored by City Of Hope. Learn more at www.cityofhope.org.
This episode was transcribed using transcription services. It has been reviewed by our editorial staff, but the transcript may be imperfect.
The following is a transcript of this week’s In the Headlines, a weekly series on The Cancer Letter Podcast:
Jacquelyn Cobb: This week on The Cancer Letter Podcast…
Paul Goldberg: It was a very strange week to-
Jacquelyn Cobb: To be a journalist?
Paul Goldberg: Yes, to be a journalist and to see the very best and the very-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Other things that happened, yes. Yes, yes, I hear you, I hear you.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah. It also shows me, every time I end up at an alternative medicine, ivermectin kind of whatever universe, is that nothing ever goes away. By the way, antineoplastons were mentioned and Stanislav Brzezinski was mentioned, this is all by Ron Johnson. And that stuff doesn’t go away.
You’re listening to The Cancer Letter Podcast. The Cancer Letter is a weekly independent magazine covering oncology since 1973. I’m your host, Paul Goldberg, editor and publisher of The Cancer Letter.
Jacquelyn Cobb: And I’m your host, Jacquelyn Cobb, associate editor of The Cancer Letter. We’ll be bringing you the latest stories, groundbreaking research and critical conversations shaping oncology.
Paul Goldberg: So, let’s get going.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Life moves fast. It’s fierce, persistent, determined. At City of Hope Cancer Center, they are too. Their groundbreaking research and discoveries have impacted millions of lives globally. They’re moving science forward with the hope, passion, and speed every diagnosis deserves for a cancer-free future. City of Hope, pursuing cancer cures at the speed of life. Learn more at www.cityofhope.org.
Hello, Paul. How are you?
Paul Goldberg: Hi, Jacquelyn. How are you?
Jacquelyn Cobb: I am good. I have a very different view than normal today. I am looking out, right now actually, at the Washington Monument, which is very cool. So I’m just a few miles from you and we’re going to be heading over to the National Press Club tonight, to hopefully pick up some awards potentially. We have some finalists placements, I don’t know how to properly explain that. So it’s a big day for us, so very excited to be here. That’s how I am.
Paul Goldberg: This is great, because we’re all ready to go, I’m dressed as you can see. So are you.
Jacquelyn Cobb: I’m so ready, clearly.
Paul Goldberg: Yes, yes, yes. It’s a little too glamorous.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yes. Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: But what do you do?
Jacquelyn Cobb: Got to do what you got to do, exactly.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah. And as journalists, we’re supposed to look somewhat schlumpy.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Exactly. That’s the point, we have to.
Paul Goldberg: There is a look to look schlumpy.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah. You taught me that.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah.
Jacquelyn Cobb: It sounded like an insult, but I was being legit.
Paul Goldberg: I’m just the guy to teach that. Schlumpiness is next to godliness.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Agreed. We got to write that down. We got to write a journalist handbook and put that in there.
Paul Goldberg: Yes.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Before we ramble too much, I will walk us through last week’s headlines. The cover story was sort of a bigger, bolder celebration story of the RASolute-302 trial results in metastatic pancreatic cancer. We had covered this story in The Cancer Letter when the results came out just in a press release a few weeks ago and then we also talked about it on last week’s podcast, because that was when the ASCO results came out and it was just… I think I said it in last week’s podcast, it would have felt weird to not acknowledge that. But in last week’s issue of The Cancer Letter, we had sort of this beautiful big story about it with a lot of art and a lot of history and stuff like that. So we’ll be talking about that more.
And then the second story was also about that trial and sort of what this means for the field, but it was a clinical guest editorial, we call it Trials and Tribulations, by former NCI director, Kimryn Rathmell. And she’s such a distinct writer, so same story basically, but she just really puts her own expert spin on it and it’s really beautiful writing.
So our third story was a collaboration between Paul and Claire about a recent OMB proposed rule, it’s not final yet. But it has a pretty intense implication, it says that political appointees would be inserted into all stages of making research funding awards if this rule becomes final. So we might dive into that a little bit if Paul feels so inclined to share with us. But the third story is a story about a Senate hearing featuring sort of the star of that story, was former Brown Cancer Center Director, Wafik El-Deiry, basically brought up their alleged concern that there is a link between mRNA vaccines and cancer. So that’s a very, very like… We are not necessarily saying that, we are just reporting what the hearing is about. But we’ll dive into that maybe a little bit more if you’re up for it, Paul. But we’re also going to have another story on it this week, I believe.
And then our last story was a coverage of a talk at ASCO by Eric Small, the immediate past president of ASCO. And he just gave a really powerful talk about the toll of toxicity and that includes financial, emotional, physical, in a cancer journey and on the patients and everybody supporting them. So it was really just like powerful talk and we just wrote it up, basically Claire did a really nice job on that. Cancer policy had a couple really good things, or important things, I should say. Cancer patients could be exempted from Medicaid work requirements if they prove that they’re medically frail, but that there’s more to that story as well.
So I’m not going to ramble too much, except I do just want to point out one other small tidbit of news for oncology people in cancer policy, is that Richard Pazdur joined the Friends of Cancer Research board of directors. So that’s where I’ll stop. Paul, before we dive into the pancreatic cancer story, because again, there’s not that much newsy, newsy, newsy stuff, there’s a lot to chat about. But I’m kind of curious about the OMB thing, if you don’t mind starting there, just because I haven’t even really caught up on that because I was in ASCO world last week.
Paul Goldberg: Well, it’s just basic politicization of the grant review process from start to finish. It’s not just at the end, there is a cancer, there is a person who is an appointee that says, “Okay, pay it out.” It’s from start to finish. I don’t understand why that’s necessary, but neither does anyone else, except maybe OMB. Is it just another effort to put a finger in the eye of the medical establishment or scientific establishment? Maybe.
I think the way to do it, the way to look at this story is to look back at Project 2025, because that comes down to this RASolute. Would be interesting to know what drives that way of thinking. Oh, by the way, also they could yank a research project that will not spend the money, all kinds of fun stuff is in there. It’s very unlikely that this can be stopped in an appropriations bill.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Oh, really?
Paul Goldberg: Well, yeah, because appropriations bills-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Doesn’t, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Should be done a little bit… This is going to be done quicker.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: So at some point it becomes enforced, unless Congress acts quickly, which it may or may not, because we don’t know.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: I have no idea.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: It’s one of those stories to watch and not to go too far out on a limb to predict how it’s going to play out, because it can play out in a whole ton of ways and they will make a… It’s foolish to predict.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah. Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Just because you can do an okay job, doesn’t mean you should try. You can predict-
Paul Goldberg: Just because there’s no one to stop you, it doesn’t mean you should predict.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah. I think I was curious because after this podcast, I guess starting tomorrow, I’m going to be writing a story about it as well. So I think I’m, selfishly, was just looking for a little bit of background.
Paul Goldberg: No, but what’s your story? I forgot.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Standup for Science had a whole sort of emergency meeting-
Paul Goldberg: Yeah.
Jacquelyn Cobb: About that. So, I’ll be covering that. That’ll be coming up in this week’s issue. And again, we’re not going to be necessarily doing any predicting, but there were like nobel laureates there and I’m curious about the depths of it, which is why I asked Paul before I got into my story.
Paul Goldberg: Well, I’m looking forward to reading it and editing it. I was actually thinking of talking to someone who understands Project 2025.
Jacquelyn Cobb: I know.
Paul Goldberg: To talk about the roots of this kind of dislike for science, which is interesting.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: I mean, what’s not to like? Is a treatment for pancreatic cancer a bad thing?
Jacquelyn Cobb: Such a good segue, Paul.
Paul Goldberg: You know.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: No, but really.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Literally, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Really, is it? I don’t know.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah. And this is the result, right? I mean, we talked about this a little bit last week and I think we’ve talked about this with other drugs that we’ve covered in the past that have been really promising. I think dostarlimab is one that we’ve done in this way. But just looked at like actually what is the research history of this drug? How did it happen? How do we now have this drug that can double survival in metastatic pancreatic cancer when that has never been possible before? And so the one real key for me, I think, was the idea that, well, back up a little bit. There was the RAS initiative, and because that was from NCI, it was like a large scale project to focus on this basic science. And they have actually developed, I think it’s like three drugs in 10 years, to be clear. So it’s not like they’re just hanging out in the basic science world. But the goal was to really transform targeted therapy with the scope of RAS.
And just as a sidebar, RAS is the primary mutational driver in pancreatic cancer, it’s like 90% of patients. But RAS is mutated in lots of other cancers, right. So we’re talking about sort of this like, Rathmell called pancreatic cancer, “The shadow,” in her story about it and I thought that was really powerful. Pancreatic cancer has sort of been just this looming, horrible disease that we haven’t been able to make any progress on. And so that’s obviously really exciting, but like I said, the RAS excitement, because this drug is just the beginning of a larger sort of breakthrough in being able to target RAS, is so much bigger than just pancreatic cancer. And just honestly, specifically RAS targeted drugs, right. It’s going to be like a blown up thing and all of that.
So anyway, I got off track here. So my point was that the RAS initiative happened and then literally, I forget exactly, I have to look at my story, but it was like two years later, a year later, or no, it was within the same year, there was a person from UCSF who showed that the KRAS was technically drugable, because that was the whole thing, that it’s just impossible to drug, it’s too smooth, it’s like a golf ball, there’s nowhere to actually bind to, that’s the whole thing. So basically those two things happened and it jump started the whole field and that was the only reason, again, hypothetically looking back, I’m creating this narrative, I’m not trying to predict in reverse here. But that was the only reason really, that Revolution Medicines, which is the company that developed the pancreatic cancer drug, Daraxonrasib. It is such a hard one to say, I got to get that one down.
But their whole company is only focused on RAS. And that to me, once I saw that, I was like, oh, you know what I mean? Like if there wasn’t this sort of independent, science-driven, large scope, these people had the sense to see, oh, RAS is a huge target, we need to be focusing on this, even if it’s going to take years and years and years before we see any progress in this.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Well, I mean, I have a quote I want to read, but I can come back to that, I’ve been rambling for a while.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah, no. To me, the best part of your story, was going back to the link to the NCAB BSA joint meeting, where you could see these guys, with Harold Varmus presiding, deciding what they want to do with the RAS initiative. But then you had a pretty good idea that RAS mattered and that was worth studying. There were already drugs and it was happening, it was not a waste of time. But it was also a bet and it was a smart bet that only NCI could place and that’s why we need to have political appointees on either party. I don’t even care-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah. Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: To looking at the entire process, less those intellectuals get into their idiot heads to cure some other cancer. I mean, my God-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Literally.
Paul Goldberg: That would be awful.
Jacquelyn Cobb: I have a quote from the joint BSA and NCAB meeting that you were talking about, that I think, again, not exactly, but I just think it’s helpful to see how they were talking about it at that time. So he said, “Many, if not most, in the cancer research community, much less the lay public, most don’t understand what it really takes to develop a new therapy. And so even if there’s an enormous progress made here, it’s not going to mean a drug in the clinic next year or the year after or the year after that. And so setting up very clearly for all to understand what success looks like, I think will be key.”
And reading that after hearing what you just said, Paul, I feel like is quite interesting as well, just like, they’re saying we’re successful even if we don’t do these things. And now here we are with a successful drug, you know what I mean? Like this high, pie in the sky excitement.
Paul Goldberg: And it’s just the beginning.
Jacquelyn Cobb: And it has been a few years to the… What?
Paul Goldberg: That’s the part that’s fascinating, it’s just the beginning. I think what we’ve got to do, since The Cancer Letter is the running record of oncology, like it or not.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Going back to 1973, we can go back to initial coverage of this and just lay it out in the cancer history project. And that would be so cool to do.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah. That’s in the works.
Paul Goldberg: And we should just sit down and make the time and do it.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Absolutely. Yeah, that’s in the works. I’m really hoping to get an interview with someone soon, like a long form interview, about really like the ins and outs, the history, like really get into the depths of it. But I think that plus what you’re saying, I’m so excited. I could spend all my time in RAS world.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah.
Jacquelyn Cobb: So.
Paul Goldberg: Well, yeah. Yeah, yeah, no, I think you should. And I mean, come back every now and then and write and then go back to RAS world and, yeah.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Sounds like Jurassic World or Jurassic Park-
Paul Goldberg: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Or something like that, yeah. Yeah. It was very fun and we had some really beautiful… The story was just such a joy to write because it was so celebratory. We had some incredible art, an old pancreatic, or not an old, but a previous pancreatic cancer source that I worked with closely, had a video of the standing ovation from ASCO and that we were able to use and just some of the information from the slides at ASCO were so powerful. It really came together. And like you said, seeing Varmus sitting in the NCAB like, I don’t even know what, what do you call that room? Just a conference room, I guess.
Paul Goldberg: Oh, oh, the no longer used conference room.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah, yeah.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: I love that conference room.
Jacquelyn Cobb: It’s nice.
Paul Goldberg: I swept so well there. I was just-
Jacquelyn Cobb: When you were supposed to be listening, is that what you’re saying?
Paul Goldberg: No, no, I was just, sometimes kind of.
Jacquelyn Cobb: I know, just… Okay. For those of you not watching, Paul has slumped in his chair a little bit. Oh my gosh. Yeah, that’s-
Paul Goldberg: Well, it’s not a good enough chair for that kind of thing, you need a much larger chair with a stronger back support and then it’s just so… Those chairs weren’t very comfortable for sleeping, but I’ve done some serious snoring and-
Jacquelyn Cobb: And still you managed. Incredible.
Paul Goldberg: And still I managed to understand what’s been going on, just because it was hard to miss. So no, but the thing that was hard to miss was that some really great things were happening all around us and we really need to document some of this sort of incredible stuff, since we can.
Jacquelyn Cobb: And since there’s a growing perspective that science is bad for people, that it’s unhealthy, that-
Paul Goldberg: These egg heads and they’re all dangerous.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Sorry, I snorted because you said egg head, I feel like that’s only fair.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah. That’s what, do you know?
Jacquelyn Cobb: No, I-
Paul Goldberg: Those f-ing intellectuals-
Jacquelyn Cobb: I mean, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: And Bethesda should come around a little. No, but I’ve seen that done, by the way, on Cameroon Hill usually, is where it happens.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Oh no.
Paul Goldberg: Intellectuals get kicked around. Oh, sure, they got kicked around last week.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, last week. That’s what I was going to ask, is that, are you counting that? Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Oh God, that’s a perfect example of it. “Oh, they gave us the mRNA vaccine and it’s…” My favorite guy in that hearing, and we’re really skipping around-
Jacquelyn Cobb: I know.
Paul Goldberg: Like maniacs. Maybe we should land this airplane, for at least long enough so people would know that I’m not losing my grip on reality. There was also a hearing of a subcommittee in the Senate, the subcommittee of the… What is that subcommittee? National Security Permanent Investigation Subcommittee. It was Ron Johnson.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: It’s correctly stated in the story.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: So he had a bunch of people over there who were anti-COVID vaccine skeptics, vaccine deniers, very sort of interesting. Oh, pro-Ivermectin, some of them pro everything you need to know. I mean, depending on whether you want to deworm the horse that you rode in on, or clean your aquarium. And perhaps unfortunately, Wafik El-Deiry, who ended up on that panel and he seemed to be having a good time with his hypothesis that spike proteins cause cancers. It’s a legitimate question that you can answer and ask, but I don’t think you should be asking it in a situation where the person next to you on the witness table is talking about how cancers in the royal family are caused by mRNA vaccine, and that was a little weird, having him there.
Testifying for the team Planet Earth was Julie Gralow, the chief medical officer of ASCO.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: And to me, the oddest story and that’s kind of like watch this space next week, is what happened the next day, which was, Wafik El-Deiry said that he had just been offered a job as president of Leidos, their biotechnology arm and the director of their Frederick Lab and that offer was given to him two days before and rescinded. So rescinded immediately after that hearing, I would argue as a consequence of that hearing and I think he would argue probably the same thing. And it’s an interesting job to give to somebody who’s talking about this sort of thing, because this is where a lot of mRNA work was done. In fact, in 2016, Frederick Lab was not recompeted from Leidos, because they delayed it, for national security reasons. It wasn’t actually, I’m sorry, it was 2020. So basically this is a very important place-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: For vaccines, for immunology, for many RAS initiatives.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yep, that’s where the RAS initiative is housed as well.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah. So this is a big deal.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: … Job and Wafik will not be taking that job, Wafik El-Deiry will not be taking the job. Because he’s actually different from some of the folks who were sitting next to him on the witness table, because he’s respected, he can walk in through the doors, as we saw-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Of some of the most prestigious institutions-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: And people won’t stay out of his way or be seen. People do want to be seen, “Look, I mean, I consider him a friend.”
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: And yet there it was, you have to be really careful of whom you are speaking when you’re sitting next to.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: And that crowd was pretty strange. It was also very strange to listen to Ron Johnson-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Because he was the one testifying at his own hearing. Oh yeah, he was doing some soliloquies in there that I quoted in the story.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: And you say, “Okay, well-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: “Just write a balanced story, get it out there and there’s nothing you can do about it.” So anyway. But then again, compare that with story one, which, it’s a different universe.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, literally, literally.
Paul Goldberg: Literally.
Jacquelyn Cobb: It’s-
Paul Goldberg: Yeah. Except one universe funds the other, I guess.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: It was a very strange week to-
Jacquelyn Cobb: To be a journalist?
Paul Goldberg: Yes, to be a journalist and to see the very best and the very-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Other things that happened, yes. Yes, yes, I hear you, I hear you.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah. It also shows me, every time I end up at an alternative medicine, Ivermectin kind of whatever universe, is that nothing ever goes away. By the way, antineoplastons were mentioned and Stanislav Brzezinski was mentioned, this is all by Ron Johnson. And that stuff doesn’t go away.
Jacquelyn Cobb: No, no. It’s like in public record, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah, it does not, it’s just, people really… I don’t know why it doesn’t go away. Data doesn’t make it go away.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Oh, you’re saying that the beliefs don’t go away-
Paul Goldberg: Yeah.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Even in the case of data? Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: The data won’t kill the beliefs.
Jacquelyn Cobb: I know, yeah. I know.
Paul Goldberg: One of the saddest things I heard, I heard from a former NCI director from yesteryear-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: I don’t know if I can quote him by name or not. I won’t. He said one of the saddest things to him when being in this high position in Washington, was seeing that discussion doesn’t lead anywhere.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Wow.
Paul Goldberg: People will go in with one view, no matter how misguided and they will leave with the same view.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Wow, that’s horrible.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah. So this idea that two people or two sides can sit down and hash out the reasoning for their position and then see each other’s data and say, “Oh, you were right. I was wrong.” That does not happen in Washington D.C.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Wow. Yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: And he was very saddened by it and every time I see this guy, we talk about it.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah. Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Because it’s only gotten worse.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: And this guy had it rough too.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah. Well, I guess it’s really depressing and it’s kind of scary, like you’re saying, where there seems to be sort of a trajectory of it getting worse and worse. And I think the only thing I will say is that even with all of this, like you said, we have really incredible scientists doing really incredible work still and I just hope-
Paul Goldberg: Not scare more of them and more of them and they’re coming in and they’re not thwarted by these jerks who want to thwart their work and want work on behalf of cancer.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah. Oh well.
Paul Goldberg: Well, you know what? Before you close this up, I thought I would get in one last word. Haa.
Jacquelyn Cobb: I thought that was the word. I was like, “Oh, okay.”
Paul Goldberg: No, that wasn’t the word. I kind of like the idea of what NCI is finally getting around to doing, which is the kind of webcasts on the things that NCI has done with the money. Yeah, it’s a good idea, it’s-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Have they started that? I don’t know if I’ve seen that.
Paul Goldberg: They started it. I’ll show it to you.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, I would love-
Paul Goldberg: Tony [inaudible 00:28:29], has shown it in places and it’s-
Jacquelyn Cobb: That’s awesome.
Paul Goldberg: … it’s nice to do. It’s a little short, I think it’s something… But it’s there and I think what we should do, is just maybe kind of build around it and build a bigger, more detailed programming around it at The Cancer letter.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah.
Paul Goldberg: Through the history project.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.
Paul Goldberg: Let’s just do it.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah. Heck yeah. Because we could just talk to people and ask like, “Yeah, we have this basics of what happened from NCI,” and then we can help them.
Paul Goldberg: [inaudible 00:29:08]. Yeah.
Jacquelyn Cobb: And that’s cool.
Paul Goldberg: And also look at the stories as they were told.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: As they unfolded.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah. [inaudible 00:29:17].
Paul Goldberg: Like Who was opposed to what? I mean, why RAS? There were a lot of other compelling targets, why RAS?
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: That battle was fought.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Paul Goldberg: I saw it being fought.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah, yeah. I’m so excited, you have me, I just literally want to hang up and go on-
Paul Goldberg: Don’t hang up.
Jacquelyn Cobb: No.
Paul Goldberg: Well, I’ll see you in a few hours-
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yes.
Paul Goldberg: At the National Press Club, where we will or will not get awards. This has been a particularly good year for awards for us.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Yeah. Yes, yeah, our team has been incredible. Claire won the, what was it? The first place in the Society of Healthcare Journalists Trade Journalism Award, I believe.
Paul Goldberg: That’s a big deal.
Jacquelyn Cobb: That’s incredible. So yeah, very exciting, very fun celebratory night for us as well, after a very celebratory few weeks following the RASolute trial.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah.
Jacquelyn Cobb: [inaudible 00:30:21].
Paul Goldberg: This is a really good time to be a journalist.
Jacquelyn Cobb: It’s a weird time and it’s a good time.
Paul Goldberg: Yes, it is.
Jacquelyn Cobb: It is. That’s true.
Paul Goldberg: Yeah. All right. Well, this is turning into a Jewish goodbye, nobody leaving. And I will see you in a couple of hours.
Jacquelyn Cobb: I’ll see you in two hours, Paul.
Paul Goldberg: In two hours. All right.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Talk to you later.
Paul Goldberg: All right. Bye.
Jacquelyn Cobb: Bye. And hopefully I see you next week.
Thank you for joining us on The Cancer Letter Podcast, where we explore the stories shaping the future of oncology. For more in depth reporting and analysis, visit us at cancerletter.com. With over 200 site license subscriptions, you may already have access through your workplace. If you found this episode valuable, don’t forget to subscribe, rate, and share. Together, we’ll keep the conversation going.
Paul Goldberg: Until next time, stay informed, stay engaged, and thank you for listening.
