Mitt Romney

Interesting column in yesterday's The New York Times by Jesse Eisinger of ProPublica about the budget strategy the U.S. might be following if it were a private equity firm, that is, if it were run as if it were Bain Capital, Mitt Romney's former employer.

Eisinger's conclusion: Given the current incredibly low interest rates, the management of a private equity firm would be rushing to borrow more to finance its activities rather than to be repeatedly demanding that it deleverage and do less.

In other words, running the U.S. as a business as Romney says if elected he could/would/will do, would actually get him to do the opposite of what he and others running for president and Congress are insisting needs to be done: They would be increasing the deficit and borrowing more rather than reducing it and shrinking federal activities.

Last night's results from the Iowa caucuses provide no clues whatsoever about federal spending, taxes, deficits, or debt. None of these were major issues in the campaign.

The one exception is very personal.

I've been told by various reporters that Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann (R-MN) mentioned my name on the campaign trail as someone she would consider for Treasury secretary in her administration. Given her distant 6th place showing and the news that she may drop out of the race today, that's now not going to happen.

In case you're wondering, my Beautiful and Talented Wife (The BTW) is delighted.

I was interviewed by Sarah Eisen on Bloomberg Television this past Tuesday to give grades to the Republican presidential candidates on the budget. The full interview is here for what I hope will be your viewing pleasure. But we ran out of time before we could go through the full candidate list so here's a quick summary of my grades.

First, it's important to keep in mind that few candidates for any public office ever talk directly about the federal budget because there aren't too many voters who want to hear that their taxes will go up or that the services they get from the government will go down or be eliminated. Even when a candidate mentions specific policies, that discussion is almost always at a macro level that allows every voter to feel as if he or she will be protected.

Not only is that true in this case, but almost all of the GOP presidential candidates are currently talking about plans that would make the deficit and debt situation worse even though they're labeled as deficit reduction.