Obama's Budget Director a Bain Guy, Married a Bain Gal 4:27 PM, Jul 16, 2012 • By DANIEL HALPER

President Obama's rhetoric would suggest that he's against Bain (both
Bain Capital, the investment firm, and Bain Consulting, the consulting
firm, as he makes little distinction between the two Bains where Mitt
Romney worked in the past). But Obama's own hiring practice suggests
something a little different: His own budget director is a Bain guy who
married a Bain gal.

Jeff Zients is the head of the Obama administration's Office
of Management and Budget. "Like Mitt Romney, the man who would unseat
his boss, Mr. Zients (rhymes with science) got his professional start
at Bain Consulting," the Wall Street Journal reports.

Zients has only praise, it would seem, for Bain:

After graduating in 1988, Mr. Zients started as a
consultant at Bain & Co. in Boston, where he "fell in love with
Bain's culture, teamwork…and analytical rigor," according to a Bain
alumni newsletter. (He didn't work with Mr. Romney, who already had
left to start Bain Capital.)

At Bain, Mr. Zients reported to Mary Menell, four years his senior,
who became his wife, with whom he now has four children. They were
married in Mrs. Zients's homeland of South Africa, with Nelson Mandela,
her parents' friend, in attendance.

Mr. Zients left Bain to return to Washington and become an
entrepreneur. He helped run Advisory Board Co., a research firm, and its
spinoff, Corporate Executive Board, which together grew to more than
1,000 employees, and launched an initial public offering for each. In
2002, Fortune magazine named Mr. Zients in its list of the 40 richest
Americans under 40. His net worth is conservatively estimated at around
$200 million.