U.S. Credit Rating Downgraded For First Time In History: "Change You Can Believe In"?

If you put a fool in charge of the nation's purse strings, it will undoubtedly come to this.  Standard and Poors said:

Lowering the nation’s rating to one notch below AAA, the credit rating company said “political brinkmanship” in the debate over the debt had made the U.S. government’s ability to manage its finances “less stable, less effective and less predictable.” It said the bipartisan agreement reached this week to find at least $2.1 trillion in budget savings “fell short” of what was necessary to tame the nation’s debt over time and predicted that leaders would not be likely to achieve more savings in the future.

Standard and Poors also took a potshot at the Republicans, stating “The majority of Republicans in Congress continue to resist any measure that would raise revenues,"  That means the Republicans continue to resist raising taxes in a significant recession, which would be even more disastrous to any recovery.

The only way to raise tax revenues is to have a robust, growing economy.  That cannot happen until the fool in the White House is sent packing in January 2013.  That is the only feasible plan "to raise revenues" that now exists.

Read more about it here.

In a related post Psota of Free Will says the downgrade wasn't due to the evil Tea Partiers:

We didn't get downgraded because of the Tea Party. We got downgraded because of TARP, the auto bailouts, the stimulus, Obamacare, QE1 & 2, Cash for Clunkers, and a million other wastes of money. Those weren't Republican or conservative initiatives. In fact, with a few notorious exceptions, they were resisted mightily by virtually every Republican in elected office. (and those who didn't resist have found themselves out of office). Hell, the Tea Party started to protest the explosion of spending coming out of DC!

Indeed, S&P specifically complains about the failure of the debt agreement to make a serious attempt to reduce spending. That wasn't the Tea Party's fault. Obama and the Democrats in Congress were the ones who pressed to preserve spending at today's mind boggling levels. As Erik Erickson points out, S&P has indicated that only a plan with a minimum of $4 trillion in cuts would have impressed them. Well that was the Tea Party's plan, a plan that has been denounced as unserious and terroristic.

Psota is a San Francisco attorney.  I know how it feels to be the only conservative in that liberal city, but Psota isn't really alone.  Do link to his site.

Read his whole post here.