Former state Auditor Pat Anderson has a new job: She's now the president of the Minnesota Free Market Institute, which lists as its mission: "to promote the virtues of free markets and individual liberty over centralized bureaucratic government solutions to today’s problems."

She replaces David Strom, who founded the institute in 2007. Before that, he was president of the Taxpayers League of Minnesota. Strom will stay on as a senior fellow of the institute, so you can bet it won't be endorsing any Obama tax initiatives. Strom also has a Saturday morning talk show on AM 1280, "The Patriot."

Anderson, once known by her former married name of Pat Awada, was state auditor from 2003 to 2007 and then became commissioner of the Minnesota Department of Employee Relations and managed its merger with the Minnesota Department of Finance. She likes to say that she's perhaps the first commissioner in Minnesota history to intentionally work herself out of a job in order to promote greater efficiency in government.