Anyone watching the Washington budget debate over the past decade must have wondered why there didn't seem to be any grown-ups in the room - someone who could cut through what Honeywell's Dave Cote calls the "hysteria, histrionics and hyperbole" and force the bickering children to agree on a reasonable compromise.

That's what the voters want, what the economy demands and what country must now have to regain its confidence and its global influence.

Some grown-ups who have been noticeably absent from this conversation have been the heads of the country's major corporations, who talk a good game about deficit reduction but haven't invested the time, money and political capital necessary to jolt the political system from its dysfunctional equilibrium.

That's about to change. Last week, the first battalion of CEOs showed up in Washington, reporting for duty.

It all started last year when corporate executives looked on in horror as the ideological tong war in Washington nearly led the country to default on its debt. As the crisis was developing, they assumed it was just the kind of posturing that characterizes any high-stakes negotiation. 

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