It sounds so attractive running off the lips of

• President Obama or
• Jay Carney or
• David Plouffe or
• Nancy Pelosi or
• California’s Governor Jerry Brown.

But a few thousand dollars more from each of the folks who already pay nearly 40% of all the Federal Income Tax will not begin to shrink the deficit.

Raising the top rate from 35% to 39% and from 9.3% to 11.2%, Federal and California, respectively, is the budget red ink equivalent of tossing a pebble into Lake Tahoe – won’t make a ripple!

According to the Tax Foundation 2012 Report, the actual effective rate of federal taxation on the top 1% of earners works out to be a mere 11% after deductions and tiered taxation.  Their effective California tax is probably 5-6%

It would be surprising if the total tax revenue to the federal government is <$100B/yr.

• If the President tried to alter deductions for the 1% – where the real money is –
• Voters would realize those changes were going to trickle down to them in 2013. 
• The infamous political power broker, Huey Long, said it best
  • Don’t tax me
  • Tax the guy behind the tree.

In California, Governor Brown is more honest about the impact of increasing tax rates only on those who earn $1M or more. 

• Too little,
• too late, but
• any little bit helps  –

Shrewdly, Governor Brown is pairing his limited income tax increase with a general increase in the California sales tax — promising to funnel all the new sales tax revenue into our K to 12 education system.  

He understands his voters.   

• Every resident uses government services.  Therefore, every resident must pay at least something toward the delivery of those services.    
• Some say that sales tax falls harder on lower income earners.   But it gives everyone a stake in the success of the state.

President Obama and our Congressional leaders should take lessons from our affable Governor –

The best news is its happening because Americans and our global export partners are buying American made products

• Innovative
• Well made and
• Competitively priced.

There’s a role for our politicians in celebrating this progress.  Exactly what President Obama did when he visited the Boeing Seattle plant last week. 

The President, lauding a Boeing deal with the Indian national airline two years ago, appointed himself as “salesman in chief” – “going anywhere, any time” in support of American corporations “expanding our markets”.   

One place the “salesman in chief” has not been nearly aggressive enough in selling American made goods is in the United States and Canada and Mexico (NAFTA) –

• NBC and ABC have both done a better job of focusing on the value for American workers of “buying American” than has the President
• But that’s okay because we, the people, are way ahead of the politicians
  • No tax credit can ever replace a motivated consumer

The President, in offering tax credits now to “stimulate” manufacturing is too little, too late -

• Tax credits might have saved jobs in 2009
• A larger infrastructure renovation component in the 2009 Stimulus Act might have saved jobs in 2009 and 2010
• Proposed changes in tax treatment of raw inventory should not pit US energy interests against US manufacturing interests

Global competitiveness is that – its global.

• GM, GE, Cisco, HP etc. all build products in China for the China market –
• BMW, Mercedes, for example, build products in the US for the European market place
• When the President suggests that he will penalize American manufacturers for “sending jobs overseas”, he opens Pandora’s (Trade) Box
  • He risks retaliation
  • He inhibits domestic innovation

Monetary policy is a product of both diplomacy and prudent domestic fiscal policy.

• While China is an unfair currency manipulator
• The US Treasury has facilitated manipulation with its appetite for borrowing from China

While Stimulus Credits won’t have the desired effect, fundamental Federal Corporate Tax Reform would strengthen US manufacturing –

• Making US goods cheaper to produce
• Encouraging more foreign investment in the US
• And strengthening the US dollar.

In the private sector, management keeps sales out of operations. 

Given the genuine growth in US manufacturing this year and the impasse on fundamental tax reform –

• Mr.President, you keep selling
• And we’ll keep  beating our global competitors on the manufacturing floor

Even if its not completely level!!

Wasn’t it just two months ago when the Republican majority in Congress refused the very same deal – pointing to the long-term damage the same $100B would do to both the National Debt and the Social Security Trust Fund?

What happened?

• A 10% Congressional Approval Rating
• A weak GOP Presidential Field
• Congressional Redistricting in key battleground states
• A Presidential threat to run against a do nothing Congress
• An electorate that, too often,  really believes they are entitled –
• An electorate that, too often, believes raising someone else’s taxes won’t impact them –

In other words, its an Election Year — full of pie in the sky! 

But what happens in December, after the Election Year dust has settled? 

• Millionaires can count on their taxes going up
• Families earning $250K a year can probably count on their taxes going up
• Gamblers should not take a bet on the payroll tax cut being continued
• And the National Debt Ceiling will have increased beyond $17T

CBO estimates that US Debt to foreign investors will equal 78% of GDP by the end of the decade.

• Effectively that’s bankruptcy
• The difference between the US and Greece is that there is no multi-national bank capable of bailing out the second largest economy in the world
• If that happens all of the entitlement programs our leaders are so afraid to modify or modernize will stop and stop suddenly

Raising taxes on millionaires may make you and I feel better but it won’t prevent or slow the inevitable –

• If the Treasury confiscated all the wealth of the top 1% of tax payers tomorrow, it would equal $1T — only 2/3 of the 2012-2013 deficit.  2013-2014 tax revenues would decline by 40%, making the deficit $2T or more.

There are solutions that will lead to a sustainable America.  But they will be painful.   

• No more tax holidays
• Higher taxes for all
• Lower entitlements for some
• Tougher choices about programs that will be kept, cut or expanded

Any politician who tells you there’s any other solution does not deserve your confidence or your vote –

Could this be because most of the media headliners are men and they recognize an opportunity to avoid responsibility when they see one?

I achieved clarity on the issue of Reproductive Responsibility on a lovely summer evening in the mid-1970s while enjoying red wine and barbequed steaks with a group of fellow baby-boomer UC Berkeley college friends. 

The conversation had turned to the, then,  burning issue of “women’s lib”. 

Bill, an all-American soccer player and real estate mogul in the making, brought the conversation to a halt with  two short sentences.  

“The real winners are MEN. – We don’t have to be responsible any more”. –

The recent Obama Administration draft rule codifies Bill’s observation –. 

If the draft becomes permanent next year, this is how the conversation at the average American breakfast table will go –

• Female – We both agree that our 2 child family is complete.  But our passion continues. Shouldn’t you (male) get a vasectomy so that we can love without worry?
  • Male — yes, dear.  But, since we have to pay for about 20% of the cost of vasectomy – a few hundred dollars –and the government mandates tubal ligation is free, you should have the surgery!!!
• Female — but its more invasive surgery
  • Male — but its free

Or –

• Female – Those birth control pills are making my blood pressure rise.  Shouldn’t we switch to condoms for birth control?
  • Male — Of course, makes sense. But since birth control pills are free under our health insurance and condoms are not even eligible for reimbursement from our Health Savings Account, condoms would add +/-$200/yr to our family budget
• Female – but my blood pressure
  • Male – Blood pressure medication is covered by our health plan and your birth control pills are free

And so on –

In business, no matter how attractive a given strategic direction appears, stock holders expect us to examine the “what-ifs” – every action has a reaction.

Not so in our government —

Reproductive Rights, as currently defined, is a continuation of sexual inequality — the guys are getting off scot-free!!!!!

Women of the 21st century.  Don’t fall into the same trap as your Moms. 

• Demand Equal Reproductive Responsibility  — morally, physically, and financially

It’s even better news that these jobs are coming from real shifts in global competitiveness.

• These manufacturing jobs are being created by the market place – supply and demand – NOT by short-term “stimulative” government  tax credits
  • Rising foreign labor costs and transportation costs and
  • the greater productivity of the American worker have closed the cost gap with China.
• Boston Consulting has published a study that argues the American productivity advantage may actually move the cost advantage “on shore” by 2015
  • They estimate this global cost shift could create 2 to 3 million direct and indirect jobs

The President pointed to Master Lock as an example of an American company that had out-sourced most of its manufacturing to China and Mexico during the last two decades and is now reversing that trend. 

• But 21st Century Master Lock is a much more efficient and productive operation
  • It requires 1/3 the space and only half the workers it needed 15 years ago.
  • Master Lock is partnering with local trade schools and universities to train workers for the highly automated American manufacturing floor of the future.

NBC’s Rock Center News Hour reported on the return of quality furniture manufacturing to North Carolina –

• Bob Cochrane, the owner of Lincolnton Furniture, explained bringing his family’s furniture business back to North Carolina from China was partly a business decision and partly a citizenship decision, saying
  • “I finally remembered what my father taught me” – The business is “not about the furniture, its about the PEOPLE who make the furniture”

Virtually any car purchased in the United States, today, was final assembled – if not largely manufactured in the USA –

• In fact, BMW and Mercedes now build most of their global inventory in the US because of –
  • Worker productivity
  • Worker compensation and benefits
  • Absence of consumption taxes at every level of assembly

But its not all roses and lollypops in the US manufacturing sector. 

• Companies can build significantly more products, more profitably with fewer workers.
• Manufacturing jobs, today and tomorrow, need more highly trained and skilled and continuously re-skilled workers than are in the work force, now —
  • That’s an immediate (can you say September, 2012) and continuing challenge  community colleges and local industry must partner to meet – for all workers 18 to 60.

The return of some manufacturing jobs to the US is an encouraging sign, but its still just a few glowing embers that need to be coaxed into a robust flame –

The government must avoid stumbling over the embers and extinguishing them before the blaze really gets burning –.  

During an election year its important to avoid the four temptations of incumbency —

• over-stimulating,
• over taxing,
• over borrowing or
• over regulating 

And focus, instead, on the five challenges of global competitiveness

• trade policy
• tax policy
• education policy
• energy policy and
• infrastructure modernization

The current controversy about Catholic institutions and contraception is just the 2012 version of a 30 year old campaign fundamental –

• If telling the truth about the –
  • economy
  • education
  • energy and
  • entitlements
• Will cost you votes –
• Trot out women’s reproductive rights
• It works every time.
• Just ask California Senator Barbara Boxer – a text book example – of how a candidate with less than 50% approval gets elected and re-elected –
• Are women really this gullible as a group?

Its true the dispute between the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Catholic Church treads on Constitutional limits and respect for individual conscience.

But the REAL issue is the carve out of “Women’s Reproductive Health” from the larger societal need for UNIVERSAL PREVENTIVE CARE for all men, women and children in the country and how and who should pay –

• Men suffer from the same cancers that are most often associated with women – such as breast cancer – but get no free screenings.
• Why should co-pays be required for male prostate hormone therapy or women’s menopause symptoms but not for birth control bills ????
  • Condoms are not even eligible for reimbursement under Health Savings Accounts!
• Why should birth controls pills be exempted from co-payments for the same patients who must pay a co-pay for other life saving medicines –
  • blood pressure
  • diabetes
  • antibiotics
  • antihistamines?

If the issue was about health and not politics –

• HHS would propose a menu of mandates that are more reflective of the varied needs and beliefs of individual Americans. 
• Wasn’t that the promise of health care exchanges in the Affordable Health Care Act (Obama Care)?

Want more proof?  The White House and HHS have acknowledged that they spent six months arguing about the issues of Women’s Reproductive Health policy.  This policy was deliberate.

Could this be a stalking horse for establishing broad HHS discretion to determine how much and what health care specific Americans receive?  And who will pay? 

Is this debate intended as a template for implementing future Independent Payment Advisory Board decisions?

The good news, first –

• 243,000 new private sector jobs were created
• Government employment remained flat – instead of falling
• Job Growth was across most major sectors of the economy
• Real wages actually ticked about 1%
• And the government calculated the unemployment rate to be 8.3% – the lowest since 2007

Now for the bad news – which is, of course, more complicated –

• The unemployment rate excludes 1.1M so-called “discouraged workers”
• The unemployment rate assumes all 16 – 24 year olds not working are students
• The unemployment rate assumes all 50 plus jobless workers are “semi” or completely “retired” –
  • Before this recession, these were considered a worker’s “peak earning years” –
• The unemployment rate counts all jobs equally
  • It does not distinguish
    • between full-time and part-time
    • between the quality of the job lost and the job found
  • It does not account for the long-term loss of financial security that results from prolonged un or underemployment.
• In truth, the total rate of un/under employment remains stubbornly over 15% and too many in the middle class are still precariously close to falling into poverty –

Congress and the President must quickly build on this positive momentum –

• The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) must dig into the numbers in advance of the 2012 Budget debate.
  • How much of the improvement is driven by market economics and
  • How much of the improvement is driven by government stimulus?
    • What stimulus worked –
      • payroll tax holiday or
      • targeted hiring tax credits
      • or unemployment insurance extensions or
      • retraining grants etc…?
  • Would economic recovery be strengthened more by a fully funded 5 Year Interstate Infrastructure Plan and a 5 Year Energy Independence Plan?
  • Would economic recovery be strengthened more by fundamental Tax Reform – ala Bowles Simpson – than by short-term tweaks to the existing code?

Its now less important in the 2012 Budget to count the number of jobs than it is to secure the future of THE PEOPLE WHO DO THE JOBS!!!!

While we’ve been without a budget, the country has added +/- $4T to the National Debt.

• Congress dickers, dithers, and debates with no apparent accountability,
• The bureaucracy is left rudderless, darting from one political hot button to the next and spending on auto pilot –

The budget in government, as it is in the private sector, is the operational task plan that supports this year’s Strategic Plan

• NOTHING Congress does in any given year is more important than passing a Budget. 

For two of the last three years, Democrats controlled both Houses of the Congress.  So, objectively, BOTH parties are to blame.  

• Avoiding a budget made it possible for both parties to avoid making hard choices and painful decisions.

WE THE PEOPLE, need to give Congress an ultimatum –

• No Budget
• No Pay
• And, perhaps, No Re-election

No Budget – No Pay is already law in California – passed by voter initiative. 

Legislation has been introduced in both the House (HR. 3643) and the Senate (S. 1981).  It simply proposes that every member of Congress lose a day’s pay for every day the, then, current year Fiscal Year Budget is late. 

If you agree, 

• the bi-partisan, grass-roots organization, No Labels, has developed letters that you can auto sign and send to your Senators and Representative. 
• Or call, e-mail, tweet, or friend your Senators and Representative and urge them to co-sponsor, debate and pass this legislation immediately.

Frankly, this is such a fundamental statement of principle that every member should be embarrassed that it requires legislation to make it so.

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=s112-1981

He is realistic –

• Unemployment among those without a high school diploma is >30%
• Unemployment among those with at least a Bachelor’s degree is <6%.

Americans need to acquire and maintain the skills they need to participate in the 21st century American economy –.

• That does not mean, though, that every child graduating from high school necessarily needs to head for a World Class University.
• There are lots of opportunities between a GED and a Ph.D.
• And ignores the fact that most Americans will have multiple careers during their working life.

The President urged Congress to send him legislation to sign that –

• Maintains the Student Loan interest rate at 3.4.  This is only fair when the Federal Reserve anticipates holding its interest rates at or near 0 for the next two years.
• Extends unemployment insurance beyond 99 weeks
• Provides tax credits for hiring the unemployed and
• Provides additional tax credits for retraining unemployed workers

Unemployment insurance, retraining programs and college financial aid have separate origins but in 21st century America, they form an eco-system of “life-long learning”

• state-specific, self-sustaining
• executed by a partnership between an industry and educational communities
• administered locally through community colleges

Congress can encourage the growth and institutionalization of this eco-system by funding it with block grants —

• giving states’ needed flexibility
• matching skills, training, and local job openings
• encouraging seed-beds for new businesses.
• encouraging new business investment in local community colleges 

Congress, pass the legislation so the President can sign it today and the states can start to transition from unemployment to employment programs tomorrow.

Just when we thought that it could not get worse than the mud-wrestling GOP Republican Primary in Florida –

• The President led his State of the Union Message acknowledging his largest accomplishment was “get”ting “Bin Laden”
  • Eliminating Bin Laden was a big deal – all thanks to SEAL Team 6 — but –
• After 4 years, the President still does not have a cohesive PLAN for American Restoration –
  • Raising taxes on the wealthy may feel good but won’t make a dent in the rising deficit
  • Manufacturing is improving in the US more because of changing global market conditions than positive steps by the Obama Administration or Congress
  • Declining unemployment numbers are welcome but they come as a percentage of total work force a million jobs smaller than it was in 2009
    • Its good news that Dollar General is hiring 5000.  But its not good news that those are $10,/hr jobs
  • If it takes a law to keep kids in school to age 18, we’ve lost the battle for an improved education system
  • And, it takes two to tango.    (Republican) House appropriations bills are bottled up in the Democratic Senate.   And vice versa.
    • Where’s the leadership?
    • Where’s the statesmanship over politics?

Not a strong case for re-election until compared to the remaining GOP field –

• Mitt Romney hasn’t offered a clear business analysis of the country’s current situation or a measurable Turn Around Plan” – even while touting his extensive managerial career — both in the private and public sector.
  • Is that because there is such a big difference between managing and LEADING – technocrat and courageous torch-bearer?
  • And then there is the matter of the drip. drop – of his taxes.
• Newt Gingrich shouldn’t and (probably) couldn’t even get elected Mayor of the Moon Colony he proposes
• Rick Santorum won the last GOP Debate on points 

Is it any wonder that the ABC News / Washington Post Poll found that 2/3 of voters would consider voting for a third party or independent candidate and fully 48% hope that there will be a third choice on the November ballot?

It was a campaign speech. 

• It laid out a lot of tantalizing proposals for more programs and benefits
• It laid out a challenge to Congress

While the State of the Union is still fresh in their minds, Congress should pick up the challenge the President laid down and quickly pass legislation in areas where there is broad bi-partisan agreement.

• Outlaw insider trading by members of Congress
• Simplify the permanent residency application process for foreign students earning advanced science and math degrees in the United States
• Pass the portion of the Dream Act that applies to military service
• Extend the payroll tax holiday for the full 2012 year*
• The President is right, there is no point in crying over spilt milk
• Hold Congress accountable by passing No Budget – No Pay Legislation
• The Senate’s refusal to pass a National Budget for 1000 days and counting is as unprecedented as it is inexcusable.

In addition to the obvious merits of these actions, there are important lessons that can be learned from the exercise of successfully writing, debating and passing legislation –

• In the private sector, we’ve learned through long and (sometimes bitter) experience that change is more easily accomplished and sustained when it is done in smaller, quicker increments –
• Passing legislation to control the internal behavior of Congress would create a few basic building blocks of trust to use to begin the debate over difficult issues of debt, deficit and entitlement.
• In the private sector we’ve, also,  learned that “comprehensive”, means
• too big
• too difficult to operate
• obsolete before its implemented. 
• If some parts of “Comprehensive Immigration Reform” can be debated and passed this year, Congress will
• Demonstrate seriousness to both the business community and the immigrant community
• Demonstrate measurable results that, if positive, will build trust for further reform –
• Even – as the President noted in his speech – those reforms may take years to complete.

The President offered Congress a choice last night, a choice not missed by the voters. 

• Either do nothing and become a bi-partisan Presidential campaign cliché
• Or take these bi-partisan actions and earn your right to be part of the 2012 Debate.

• It is a summary of your accomplishments in the First Term
  • Promises made and kept
  • Promises made but still unfulfilled
  • Management of the unexpected
• It is an opportunity to lay out the argument for a second term
  • Mistakes acknowledged
  • Lessons learned

The problems you confronted in 2009 were daunting.  Those problems are still daunting and the American people are

• Angry
• Scared and
• Disappointed in you as a Leader.

Leadership is hard and fraught with risk but it is what the Country requires of you tonight.

President Obama, you’ve laid out several  Visions for America –

Vision is a goal.  Reaching the goal requires a PLAN –

• Clear
• Concise
• Integrated
• Possible and
• MEASURABLE.

Its a tall order, Mr. President.  

Tell us how you will LEAD all Americans.

• Strong embrace of manufacturing in America
  • But an equally strong exhortation to Americans about consuming products that are Made In America
• Comprehensive Tax Reform
  • To keep American-made goods globally competitive
  • To increase the fairness of US tax code
    • But that does not stoop to old clichés about haves and have-nots.
• A realistic and modest plan for K – 12 Core Curriculum Education that leaves the majority of funding and implementation decisions in the hands of local officials
• An Infrastructure Planthat is comprehensive –
  • broadband
  • highways
  • railroads
  • airport construction
  • Modeled on President Eisenhower’s approach –
    • Inter-state Projects
    • Time-boxed
  • That can put 20,000 people to work by the end of 2012.
• An Energy Planthat is tied to the infrastructure plan
  • EVOLVING from our current dependence on fossil fuel to clean energy over two decades
    • with clear, annual measureable goals.
• A Plan to Modernize Government, while you are still in office, on a scale much larger than the elimination of < 200 jobs a year at the Department of Commerce.
• A Plan to Secure America and maintained America’s worldwide leadership – both militarily and humanly

All grounded by real Deficit Reduction through a full throated embrace of Bowles-Simpson – even though it will anger some in your base.

Mr. President, this is your moment. 

• To lead
• To persuade
• Not to point fingers

My greatest disappointment over the last 4 years has been your tendency to forget too often that you are President of all the American people, not a Democratic politician.

Tonight is your Mount Rushmore MOMENT, Mr. President, make the most of it!!!

http://reimagineamerica.org/2011/some-advice-on-the-eve-of-the-2011-state-of-the-union/

(Silicon Valley) Internet content aggregation and distribution is a major business in California

Yet, as a war of words over legislation intended to stop online (international) content piracy rages (SOPA); Diane Feinstein, California’s senior senator, has been unable to even organize a conference call between Hollywood and Silicon Valley –

When did two of California’s biggest industries decide to put more faith in K Street lobbyists than their own Congressional representatives and senators?

Decades ago when it became clear that members of the California delegation, from both parties, decided that they owed more allegiance to the powerful in their own political party than they did to the voters they represented.   

They caucus as Democrats –

They caucus as Republicans

But they DON’T Caucus as Californians —

Our Representatives and Senators are so focused on Washington party politics – reflexively battling each other “across the aisle” — that they have no credibility when they claim to represent the broad California economic interest. 

California voters have already decided, through the initiative process, this is not acceptable.

The California delegation would be wise to recognize the risk and the challenge.  

The California delegation should have a weekly caucus.  

California is, after all,  the 8th biggest economy in the world – .  There ought to be enough to find to talk about – one would think?

• Caucus members would become more comfortable with each other
• They would develop a common understanding of the issues that impact the state -
  • facts
  • factors
  • opportunities and limits
• Working on the issues that face the people they represent might help the members to develop
  • Respect for one another
  • A measure of trust – in the absence of real affection – that can translate into effective legislative action to address the vexing problems of California and the nation at large –

After all, we all know – so goes California, so goes the nation —

Perhaps even the titans of both Hollywood and Silicon Valley would, once more, take the Senator’s call??

• A heroic example of capitalism at its best or
• A villainous example of greed at worst

It depends on your view and understanding of venture capital – and the economics of risk and reward.

To begin, let’s stipulate that no entrepreneur or CEO seeks external investors unless they are viewed as too risky for a bank loan.

• The higher the risk of failure, the higher the cost of capital because there is a large risk that investors will lose their own money –
• Its the opposite of “too big to fail”

This blog is NOT an endorsement of Mitt Romney or Bain Capital, but rather a reaction to what I view as the destructive pattern in current American politics –

• Character assassination reinforced through
• Negative 30 second commercials that become truth through repetition rather than substance

While my direct and indirect experience with Bain Capital is not exhaustive, it is illustrative.

• Gartner Group afforded me the 10 most exciting, challenging, financially rewarding years of my technology industry career.   It began as a Bain leveraged buyout
• Bright Horizons was a Bain financed start-up of a new model for child care that create a third path for professional women between career and stay-at-home mom.
• Staples, and the competitors it spurred, have reduced costs on everything “my small business needs”
• GTE Bike, the original mountain bike, made Bain a minority owner hoping new capital could turn GTE’s brand value into profits. 
  • Bain turned to CSC Consulting for operational expertise.  I drew the assessment assignment that led
  • Bain to engage in a multi-year, multi-million dollar “remediation strategy” but GTE management resisted 
    • Eventually forcing Bain to sell the GTE brand to Schwinn Bicycles

The challenge to Mr. Romney is to attack the destructive pattern – to turn from politics to governing. 

He has to explain how his Bain experience informs a detailed Romney National Recovery Plan –

• Can be understood by the voters
• Can start to be implemented in first year in office
• Some initial results can be measured before the mid-terms

Mr. Romney’s challenge is to demonstrate that he understands what is common to his business and political experience boils down to the courage to risk to lead!!

Like the Boston Globe,  Reimagine America urges New Hampshire voters to support, former Utah Governor and Ambassador to China,  Jon Huntsman. 

• Jon Huntsman has the strongest program for job creation, regulatory reform, and deficit reduction
• His serial successes as an Ambassador and Trade Representative in areas of Asia that are critical to long-term US interests separates him from all other candidates
• And most importantly, as governor of Utah,  Huntsman has a track record that actually mirrors his rhetoric.

As a technology industry executive, I’ve learned that choosing people to work or collaborate with involves three distinct processes –

• First Impression
• Intense Interviewing
• Referencing

Of the three, references are the most important because past performance is the best predictor of future performance.  

Governor Huntsman –

• Improved education while rejecting No Child Left Behind dollars
• Flattened taxes
• Expanded health care without mandates
• Led the nation in creating high wage, technology focused jobs
• And demonstrated his commitment to bi-partisanship by accepting President Obama’s appointment as Ambassador to China.
  • Arguably the most important US foreign policy position after Secretary of State?
  • Clearly cognizant of the fact that accepting the position would make a presumed future race for the White House more difficult.

Governor Huntsman won re-election with an enviable 77.7% of the vote.   Compared to that –

• Governor Romney, who elected not to run for re-election – calling 2006 a “difficult year for Republican governors”
• Rick Santorum was beaten in his 2006 Senate re-election bid by 18 points
• Newt Gingrich was fired as Speaker by his fellow Republican House members

As the Boston Globe points out,  a vote for Jon Huntsman is good for the country: 

• Jon Huntsman presents a clear challenge to President Obama on policy not personality.
• And, even if Mitt Romney goes on to be the eventual nominee of the GOP: extending the contest of ideas and experiences between these two former governors, will make Mr. Romney a better general election candidate.