US looses AAA credit rating

[gixxerboy1]

http://money.msn.com/investment-advi...d947&GT1=33036

Great job congress. Dont want to raise taxes but now we can pay more interest on everything

[Hoggage_54]

[gixxerboy1]

that bed still available. I want to get out before China repossesses us

[gym_junki]

that bed still available. I want to get out before China repossesses us

Hate to say it but thats what's going to happen

[SlimmerMe]

Chilling.....

[Times Roman]

i have mixed emotions about this....

since WW2, politicians seem to think they have a license to wrecklessly spend my money on anything theyfeel will get them re elected. maybe and hopefully this will serve as a wake up call

i mean... let's get fukken real! this is MY fukken money they are pissing away all the time!!!!!

[SlimmerMe]

.........don't get me started......

[Shol'va]

Just consider us the beat up winner or rather loser

[Shol'va]

Well if we had extra money in the US coffers, now we wont since everything is going to cost us much more because of our leaders arrogance. Way to go Congress and Senate. what would we ever do without you all looking out for our best interests. This is why I hate politics, liers and cheaters and whores oh my!

[Nooomoto]

Maybe one day people will wake the **** up and realize we need to get at our crude resources and that oil shale.

[Twist]

I blame the freshmen and all tea party republicans plus some stupid ass democrats. One major problem with this country is that the person elected into office can't do their job and run the country the way they want to run it.

[thegodfather]

I blame the freshmen and all tea party republicans plus some stupid ass democrats. One major problem with this country is that the person elected into office can't do their job and run the country the way they want to run it.

Let me see if I understand this correctly... You blame Tea Party Republicans, who's almost sole platform is lower taxation, smaller government, and BALANCED BUDGETS, for the House of Reps and Senate raising the debt ceiling and engaging in defecit spending and unbalanced budgets? That is antithetical to the entire position of the tea party, and proves that you have no idea what their platform really is. It'd probably be a good idea to do your own research on these things, rather then listening to the talking points of liberal pundits who form opinions based on fabricated ultra left wing progressive liberal dogma.

If the Libertarian Republicans like myself had our way, we would stimualate the economy by eliminating the Federal income tax completely. This would allow people to keep the wages they EARN. Here is a FACT, an indisputable one at that. If we brought Federal spending to the levels it were at in the year 2000, we would not need the Federal income tax at all. Government probably only needs to be about 1/2 and maybe even 1/3 of the size its currently at. We have so many wasteful government bureaucracies which are drain our coffers and offer no real tangible service to the American people. There are dozens upon dozens of three letter agencies with multi-million dollar, and sometimes billion dollar budgets which we can easily cut. Additionally, Tea Partiers& Libertarian Republicans, of the Ron Paul sort, are against over seas entanglements and wars of aggression, which would save our country BILLIONS OF DOLLARS PER YEAR.

It is quite funny to me, that the Democrats campaigned on things like ending the war as quickly as possible, and it's something that is a STAPLE of the Tea Party/Libertarian Republicans, yet Obama INCREASED the number of troops in Afghanistan, and refused to give a timeline for withdrawal from the region, including Iraq. But of course, Tea Partiers & Libertarians are "racist," because they believe in smaller government and lower taxes. That is such an absurd leap in judgement, that it boggles my mind how anyone can say such things with a straight face, but the progressive liberal pundits have no problems making such unfounded leaps without a shred of tangible evidence to affirm such claims.

[ramacher]

well said godfather, don't get me wrong, I am a very conservative Republican, but Obama spent more money than Bush in all of his eight years in one year. The problem is the mindset in Congress and I honestly believe the tea party freshman want to change the way Congress is operated. Democrats campaigned in 06, and 08 on everything Americans wanted and did absolutely nothing, quite the opposite they pledged to do.

[Standby]

come join our free health care gixxer, we even have some higher taxes you might enjoy. but leave your American money there its not worth much anymore

[songdog]

I agree with you Godfather.Now if that lazy ass Zapster would run a decent acticle on this stuff.Instead of trying to build his arms up to 15 inches.I would be better informed.No all BS aside.I dont know how anyone can keep track of all the BS slung at us.Without being on meds.I know they have more than enough money.Hell we get taxed on everything.And if a group wants to find out where the money is going.All hell breaks loose.So you know theres a fox in the hen house.

[Shol'va]

well said godfather, don't get me wrong, I am a very conservative Republican, but Obama spent more money than Bush in all of his eight years in one year. The problem is the mindset in Congress and I honestly believe the tea party freshman want to change the way Congress is operated. Democrats campaigned in 06, and 08 on everything Americans wanted and did absolutely nothing, quite the opposite they pledged to do.

There is plenty of blame to go around. To me it doesn't matter whether you are a Republican or Democrat. At the end of the day we are all Americans and we all need to put our pettiness aside and work toward solving our Nations problems or go down with the ship.

[Shol'va]

I agree with you Godfather.Now if that lazy ass Zapster would run a decent acticle on this stuff.Instead of trying to build his arms up to 15 inches.I would be better informed.No all BS aside.I dont know how anyone can keep track of all the BS slung at us.Without being on meds.I know they have more than enough money.Hell we get taxed on everything.And if a group wants to find out where the money is going.All hell breaks loose.So you know theres a fox in the hen house.

Oh and don't forget all that non tax tax they shammed on us a few years ago. Remember? It is now called a user fee like when you go rent anything like videos at Blockbuster, or a rental car, or tools from a rental place, etc. Only they don't call it tax, but a user fee. Same thing different name. Slick huh? Everything is now taxed and taxed again. Look at a new vehicle for instance. Ok you buy a new vehicle and pay the taxes on it right? Then you sell it and what happens, the other guy now has to pay taxes on it again even though you had already paid all the taxes on it, and then he sells it and someone else yet again pays taxes on this same vehicle that you had already paid the original taxes on it when you bought it. Fair? I think not. And this is just one example as to how we are all way over taxed. There are several foxes in the hen house.

[Nooomoto]

Let me see if I understand this correctly... You blame Tea Party Republicans, who's almost sole platform is lower taxation, smaller government, and BALANCED BUDGETS, for the House of Reps and Senate raising the debt ceiling and engaging in defecit spending and unbalanced budgets? That is antithetical to the entire position of the tea party, and proves that you have no idea what their platform really is. It'd probably be a good idea to do your own research on these things, rather then listening to the talking points of liberal pundits who form opinions based on fabricated ultra left wing progressive liberal dogma.

If the Libertarian Republicans like myself had our way, we would stimualate the economy by eliminating the Federal income tax completely. This would allow people to keep the wages they EARN. Here is a FACT, an indisputable one at that. If we brought Federal spending to the levels it were at in the year 2000, we would not need the Federal income tax at all. Government probably only needs to be about 1/2 and maybe even 1/3 of the size its currently at. We have so many wasteful government bureaucracies which are drain our coffers and offer no real tangible service to the American people. There are dozens upon dozens of three letter agencies with multi-million dollar, and sometimes billion dollar budgets which we can easily cut. Additionally, Tea Partiers& Libertarian Republicans, of the Ron Paul sort, are against over seas entanglements and wars of aggression, which would save our country BILLIONS OF DOLLARS PER YEAR.

It is quite funny to me, that the Democrats campaigned on things like ending the war as quickly as possible, and it's something that is a STAPLE of the Tea Party/Libertarian Republicans, yet Obama INCREASED the number of troops in Afghanistan, and refused to give a timeline for withdrawal from the region, including Iraq. But of course, Tea Partiers & Libertarians are "racist," because they believe in smaller government and lower taxes. That is such an absurd leap in judgement, that it boggles my mind how anyone can say such things with a straight face, but the progressive liberal pundits have no problems making such unfounded leaps without a shred of tangible evidence to affirm such claims.

Don't forget Tea Partiers are now terrorists, too...according to our Vice President and the media whores who quickly parroted what he said. It's ok to call non-violent Americans who are involved in a political movement terrorists, but we can't call actual religious zealots who scream the name of Allah as they kill people terrorists. Obama says we need to "tone down the language"

Nothing will ever be Obama's fault...thats just how things are.

[Twist]

Let me see if I understand this correctly... You blame Tea Party Republicans, who's almost sole platform is lower taxation, smaller government, and BALANCED BUDGETS, for the House of Reps and Senate raising the debt ceiling and engaging in defecit spending and unbalanced budgets? That is antithetical to the entire position of the tea party, and proves that you have no idea what their platform really is. It'd probably be a good idea to do your own research on these things, rather then listening to the talking points of liberal pundits who form opinions based on fabricated ultra left wing progressive liberal dogma.

If the Libertarian Republicans like myself had our way, we would stimualate the economy by eliminating the Federal income tax completely. This would allow people to keep the wages they EARN. Here is a FACT, an indisputable one at that. If we brought Federal spending to the levels it were at in the year 2000, we would not need the Federal income tax at all. Government probably only needs to be about 1/2 and maybe even 1/3 of the size its currently at. We have so many wasteful government bureaucracies which are drain our coffers and offer no real tangible service to the American people. There are dozens upon dozens of three letter agencies with multi-million dollar, and sometimes billion dollar budgets which we can easily cut. Additionally, Tea Partiers& Libertarian Republicans, of the Ron Paul sort, are against over seas entanglements and wars of aggression, which would save our country BILLIONS OF DOLLARS PER YEAR.

It is quite funny to me, that the Democrats campaigned on things like ending the war as quickly as possible, and it's something that is a STAPLE of the Tea Party/Libertarian Republicans, yet Obama INCREASED the number of troops in Afghanistan, and refused to give a timeline for withdrawal from the region, including Iraq. But of course, Tea Partiers & Libertarians are "racist," because they believe in smaller government and lower taxes. That is such an absurd leap in judgement, that it boggles my mind how anyone can say such things with a straight face, but the progressive liberal pundits have no problems making such unfounded leaps without a shred of tangible evidence to affirm such claims.

So you believe that the tea partiers will stand up for what is in the best interest for the people? If so then I will respond. Warren Buffett has a lower tax rate than his secretary and you think we need less taxes?
I am republican in more ways than I am democrat but the current republican party (and especially tea partiers) are a joke and will not help out anyone but the ultra rich.

[gixxerboy1]

I think it's funny that they have been talking of this possibly happening for a month and how bad it would be. Now that it happened everyone in Gov is making comments is saying its not that big of a deal. and how these rating companies aren't accurate and taking aim at them.

[Nooomoto]

I think it's funny that they have been talking of this possibly happening for a month and how bad it would be. Now that it happened everyone in Gov making comments is saying its not that big of a deal. and how these rating companies are accurate and taking aim at them.

Good point. Instead of admitting they ****ed up they just try to make it seem like its not really a **** up.

[SlimmerMe]

Interesting it came out after the market closed for the week. And now all of Washington is on vacation for 5 weeks.

Anyone who can come up with a solution and not blame gets my vote.

[Hoggage_54]

[DSM4Life]

We suck.

[Shol'va]

We suck.

[Public Enemy]

I am not totally aware of the situation in the states but I talked to a American friend about this today.

So the debt ceiling was raised with a agreed plan to "cut spending" but from what I heard is that the plan won't stop the deficit growth. Instead, they are only cutting down on how much they are planning to spend, they are not freezing the amount and cutting down, but rather slowing down spending. I do not know how true this is, but this is what this American mate of mine told me. If this is true, then America has officially dunn goof'd.

[Hoggage_54]

[lovbyts]

We dont deserve AAA rating, not if we owe that much money for that long. AAA rating is for people who pay their bills, not keep borrowing. Would any lender in the world give you, me or any of us a AAA rating if we had such a high credit limit and we had to keep raising it so we could borrow more? I though most all the teaching from credit counselors and financial institutes to everyone is to NOT have a high limit of credit but to keep it paid down to a minimum. If it's good for us why is it the opposite with the government?

I hate all the BS talk. Over spending and cutting back has nothing to do with teachers, police, fire department, road crews etc, it has to do with multi million or billion project to study slug slime, frogs breeding ect. It has to do with sending troops to war that has nothing to do with us, does nothing to make us safer or giving millions/billions to countries who have natural or man made disasters when we dont have the money to send. I'm all for foriegn aid; if we have the money but when we cant take care of our-self we have to draw the line somewhere and the answer is not higher taxes but it's less BS spending. Simple economics, it's not that difficult.

[Times Roman]

First, i did not vote for Obama. I'm a Libertarian, and therefore not a knee jerk republican either.

Obama inherited this mess when he was elected. however, he is betting on a rebound economy to get us out of this mess. It looks like he is losing that bet.

I recognized the necessity of the TARP program. We needed a bailout fast, and we did it. There is a trade off here. If you want a fast bailout, it won't be pretty. if you want a pretty bailout, it won't be fast. So we got a fast bailout. good news is that a good chunk of the TARP money has been recovered.

Many politicians are now blaming Obama for a quick bailout that wasn't pretty. We knew that going in, and now they are just playing games.

What bothers me about the man, is a failure to recognize the economy for what it was at the time, and pushing his political agenda to the potential detrement of our ailing economy. I'm talking universal health care for one. Extremely expensive for sure. In retrospect, watching him push UHC when he did really makes me feel like the man is not in touch with what is going on.

Another issue that bothers me is this relentless "war on terrorism" as some like to call it. I call it nation building. Extremely expensive. Very difficult to accomplish. Very difficult to determine when "mission accomplished". Therefore very difficult to know when to leave. Instead of staying the course, he should have been pulling the troups back with a quick exit strategy. We spend $2billion a month in Afghanistan alone. I'm not saying we could be saving this money, but we are missing out on opportunity costs. As a country, we have been ignoring investment in our infrastrure for the last 15 years. During this same period, China has been doing nothing but investing in it's infrastructure. Please think about this for a moment.

The underlying reason for our downgraded credit rating, is an inability to control spending. Tax revenues are down, spending is up. Deficits are exploding. This is a leadership problem, Obama is the leader, and in this regard, he is responsible. As would any president be.

I think it is time we realize that we, as a country, cannot be everything to everybody. We cannot be the policemen to the world. We cannot go in and build nations for other countries and bear the brunt of the cost. We cannot provide expensive health care for everyone. We cannot guarantee a social safety net for everyone (welfare), AND we cannot continue to believe it is better to not develop our own natural resources (oil/energy) and instead import from other countries.

We cannot continue to export jobs. We cannot continue to run trade deficits with our trading partners.

And the government cannot continue to spend more than the tax revenues bring in.

[Twist]

I'm not 100% with Obama (especially lately) but he is being prevented to do what he wants/needs to do. Universal Healthcare, try to defund/fight tooth and nail; close loopholes and raise taxes, non-starter; raise debt ceiling etc etc etc. Give me a break. We don't really know how Obama would run the country because he hasn't been given a chance.

Limited but active government would be great. Too bad neither side is advocating that and there is zero common ground between the two sides. Either Obama and democrats should leave office and let the Republicans ru(i)n the country or the republicans should leave and let Obama run it (or throw all the ****ers out and get someone in the middle). Both at the same time doesn't work.

[gixxerboy1]

fanny mae and freddy mac just lowered today

[Nooomoto]

Eagerly awaiting Obama's speech where he tells us its not his fault.

[gixxerboy1]

Eagerly awaiting Obama's speech where he tells us its not his fault.

imo it's not his fault, well not his alone by any means

[Bryan2]

This is only the beginning guys,

Over the next 5 years you will begin to see all kinds of changes within the worlds governments.

E.U the U.S, China, Japan, are all just starting to fail and many are calling for a new reserve currency, one made up of a 'bucket' of many currencies.

The United nations will be the one to usher in the new global reserve currency. Probably the SDR that they have been trying to push for a small while now. All it takes is for things to reach a breaking point.

All you have to do is read the news to see we have already begun the start of the transistion

[Public Enemy]

His (Obama) speech began... and I have to ask, is this guy the biggest BS'er in the history of U.S. presidency?? I mean lying is one thing.. but this guy does it so professionally. I think he mastered the art of lying.

[gixxerboy1]

This is only the beginning guys,

Over the next 5 years you will begin to see all kinds of changes within the worlds governments.

E.U the U.S, China, Japan, are all just starting to fail and many are calling for a new reserve currency, one made up of a 'bucket' of many currencies.

The United nations will be the one to usher in the new global reserve currency. Probably the SDR that they have been trying to push for a small while now. All it takes is for things to reach a breaking point.

All you have to do is read the news to see we have already begun the start of the transistion

Do you see a downside to a global currency?
What is the reason to have everything separate in todays world?

[Nooomoto]

Do you see a downside to a global currency?
What is the reason to have everything separate in todays world?

Well for one we would lose the ability to have a national monetary policy. A nation would be unable to use the interest rate to boost a depressed economy. Also, countries with high rates of inflation will be unable to adjust interest rates to contain the inflation. Something else to consider, a large part of the world is Muslim, and Muslim governments do not believe in interest rates.

Furthermore, you're out of your mind if you believe that all of the nations of the world would be able to agree on a single system of currency. It can lead to a loss of political sovereignty. It would most likely to be unacceptable for the majority of the nations to consider monetary interests greater than political interests.

[gixxerboy1]

i wasnt for or against it. I was looking for opinions from both sides. You make very valid points

[Twist]

The US or other countries wouldn't adopt a global currency. The reserves would be held in a global currency much like US dollars are held as reserve currency now. That doesn't mean countries don't get to use their own currency. THis would suck for the US but it makes sense and would happen anyway just now its sooner rather than later.

How can someone say this is Obama's fault? I don't understand this. We just cut spending by eliminating the jobs of the middle class by laying off people from the biggest corporation in the world (the US). We won't raise taxes on the rich even though they are not suffering at all and they got tons of tax breaks. We won't close the loopholes for huge corporations even thought they are making record profits and not hiring anyone or bringing any of that money to the US. None of this is president Obama. Our country is getting raped by congress and blaming it on the black guy and most are too dumb to see it! I can't even believe this.

[Nooomoto]

The US or other countries wouldn't adopt a global currency. The reserves would be held in a global currency much like US dollars are held as reserve currency now. That doesn't mean countries don't get to use their own currency. THis would suck for the US but it makes sense and would happen anyway just now its sooner rather than later.

How can someone say this is Obama's fault? I don't understand this. We just cut spending by eliminating the jobs of the middle class by laying off people from the biggest corporation in the world (the US). We won't raise taxes on the rich even though they are not suffering at all and they got tons of tax breaks. We won't close the loopholes for huge corporations even thought they are making record profits and not hiring anyone or bringing any of that money to the US. None of this is president Obama. Our country is getting raped by congress and blaming it on the black guy and most are too dumb to see it! I can't even believe this.

How much would you have to collect in taxes to keep up with Obama's spending? You could double the taxes on the wealthy and it still wouldn't even come close. He had plenty of time with democrats in full control of the house and senate and all they did was spend, spend, spend. Now all they do is blame, blame, blame.

These are Obama's policies and he is the one signing the checks. He is at the helm of a sinking ship.