Correcting Erskine Bowles

Morgan Stanley director Erskine Bowles got a couple of big things wrong in a "Room for Debate" comment in the NYT. First he refers to, "our commission’s plan." His commission did not produce a plan. To produce a plan it would have needed 14 votes. The plan that he and his co-chair, Alan Simpson, developed only got the support of 11 members of the commission.

He also refers to the crisis that will result from not taking steps to reduce the deficit as "the most predictable economic crisis in h...