Great find, Soccertese.
About the New Yorker article you linked to:

The New Yorker does not argue and does not need to argue that brain disease is a problem that we must fix – we have already agreed on that. Note how all of a sudden we cannot afford to NOT fight neuro diseases, and the U.S.A. has got to be Number One. Notice how it is no longer an expense; it is now an investment. Notice how it is now a game-changing industry vital to America’s supremacy.

I am not saying this cynically. This is a VGT (Very Good Thing).

When the New Yorker talks like this, you know that you got your message across: the opinion makers now see the problem of neuro diseases and they have put it on their bucket list. We will still have to teach them that there is more involved than throwing money at it, but $3 billion in research money makes me smile; and note that the author declares it should be $5 billion if you really want to beat France and Germany in the Neuro Olympics. I say: “U.S.A. is Number One: Go team, go.”

The author, Gary Marcus, says: “We absolutely can’t afford not to invest big in neuroscience. If Obama’s upcoming request is denied by Congress, many of the world’s leading neuroscientists will be tempted to leave the U.S. for better funding in Europe (as one eminent neuroscientist did recently, after twenty years at Caltech); … the European project will certainly lead to a significant number of smaller scientific advances. If the U.S. doesn’t follow suit, we will lose our lead in neuroscience, and will likely be left playing catch-up in some of the biggest game-changing industries on the horizon…”

Well there you go.

And then the author ups the ante to $5 billion. I like this guy:
He says: “Rather than putting a huge amount of money into a single project, as the Europeans have, and as the Obama Administration apparently intends, we should endow five separate projects, at a billion dollars each…”
The Medium as message: just the fact that it is being discussed in the New Yorker and they are fretting about whether to throw in $3 billion or $5 billion to out-perform Europe. You’ve got their attention.