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    Debt Deal is Nothing to Smile About; Credit Downgrade Imminent

    This story comes from the Yahoo! Contributor Network, where individuals publish their unique perspectives on some of the world’s most popular websites.
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    COMMENTARY | Congress and President Barack Obama were all smiles following a compromise to raise the debt ceiling but they are all missing the point. The U.S. debt can no longer be sustained and raising the ceiling with no plan to reduce it below $10 trillion will still result in a downgrade of the country's Triple-A rating.

    The debt deal, according to Yahoo! News via Time, says the deal will make $900 billion in spending cuts immediately and then raise the debt ceiling through January. The next step in the process will establish a bipartisan committee to make another $1.5 trillion in cuts.

    The watered-down bill also calls for a balanced budget amendment to the constitution. The door is still open for Democrats to raise taxes during the process, which is a defeat for Republicans. Another black mark for Republicans is spending cuts to the military budget.

    Reducing spending by $1.2 trillion is not enough to prevent the credit downgrade that everyone now knows is coming sooner than later. Standard and Poor's credit analyst David Beers appeared on Fox News with Neil Cavuto and made it clear that the debt ceiling increase was not the overriding issue to avoid a downgrade.

    This issue has to disappear after this latest contrived crisis to raise the debt ceiling. The only good thing to come out of this created crisis is an open dialogue about the out of control spending in Washington. The main issue is that the Republicans did not force the issue to get deeper and more sustained cuts.

    Standard and Poor's and Moody's are both saying they need to look at the debt deal before they decide if the deal is enough to save the United States' coveted Triple-A rating. Earlier, both credit agencies said the magic number for spending cuts and reduction was $4 trillion according to a story appearing on Fox Business News today.

    Congress and President Obama will get nothing significant done as a legislative body. It is time to once again to turn this Congress over and vote out all incumbents in November 2012. These backroom deals will not end and until then, this country is doomed to fail. The call from the voters is clear: Reduce the debt ceiling by 2012 or retire.

     

    12 comments

    • Helpless  •  9 mths ago
      Thank all crooks in Washington and the White House for our dilema. They can't resist blaming the last administration for everything. They have not improved one part of our economy. They have made it worse. They punished nobody in all these housing and loan schemes. They gave the big Insurance and banks handouts of which they made billions off of. They let Wall St. and these companies reward those crooked CEO's with hundresd of millions in bonuses that congress said would not happen. All while letting people lose their jobs,their homes and dignity because of these liars. The only part of our ecomony that has grown is unemployment,foreclosures,and our debt. Get rid of all of them,balance the budget and no more stimulus and entitlements to lazy Americans and all others that collect money for nothing.
      • God 9 mths ago
        Its pretty damn depressing whats happened to the U.S. and its economy. Makes divine intervention (The Second-Coming, pretty much) seem like the only way out
    • BearCat  •  9 mths ago
      Thanks teabaggers.
      A decrease in the nations credit rating is tantamount to a TAX on the American people.
      What a bunch of ignorant ideological idiots.

      Remember America to VOTE in 2012 and VOTE these right wing clowns out into the streets.
      • john b 9 mths ago
        Hey Einstein, it's the out of control spending by this moron in the White House that's the problem. The "teabaggers" as you call them, are one's against that. Don't blame them for the downgrade, blame the tax-and-spend dumbocraps.
      • Glenn 9 mths ago
        Let's not tax - like Bachmann wants and put 70 million people on Social Security and Veteran's pensions on the streets. That will not help the rich one bit no matter how much they think it will. Cutting spending - John B - which IS going to be done is not going to help an economy that is ready to be put on life support either... I agree with Bear Cat on this one...
      • Pete 9 mths ago
        I can see that we're crashing and burning, but I'm tired of supporting others with my sweat. I have three jobs, and I work hard. I support the tea baggers line in the sand. I'd prefer to die beside you than to allow one more person to leach of of me. This is civil war, and I'm prepared to die for my beliefs.
    • Maria Cortez McDaniels  •  9 mths ago
      Your message is a bit hidden. When you say vote out all incumbents, you mean vote out all democrat incumbents, even though your teaparty did no one any good by dragging this thing out for publicity purposes only.
      • swrbuffalo 9 mths ago
        They did right by the people that voted them in. Thats the point of voting.
    • Helpless  •  9 mths ago
      How does Obama rate amoung Presidents. Who was the worst ever? Put him one below him.
    • chrisdj614  •  9 mths ago
      and media played right along as usual. The debt ceiling was never the crisis. The crisis is the debt. Every article trumpeted the "default is imminent" line while ignoring the reality of the deep hole we stay in.
    • Luis  •  9 mths ago
      This is from this article:"It is time to once again to turn this Congress over and vote out all incumbents in November 2012. These backroom deals will not end and until then, this country is doomed to fail." As long as we let Democrats & Republicans cut delas for their own benefit, we will go down & down. We need an entity that can break this circle.......WE NEED A THIRD POLITICAL PARTY that can debilitate both, Republicans and Democrats.
    • Israel  •  9 mths ago
      The downgrade is the final nail in the coffin of this ongoing "Class War".
    • BeverlyP  •  9 mths ago
      Please dont mess with social security or any program that helps the poor now, work on the rich they can stand to loose a few dollars,remember it is we the people not we the Rich,we the congress, we the rightous , it is we the people and that means the poor
    • Biggin  •  9 mths ago
      And the band played on
    • BeverlyP  •  9 mths ago
      after this i don't know if i even want to vote for any one any more,until i see a change for the poor people and that covers a wide area today
    • Streetwalker  •  9 mths ago
      We have to stop trying to be the saviors of the planet. In case no one has noticed, the people of the middle east are capable of saving themselves, when they so choose. We spend trillions to help people, who, if the shoe was on the other foot, would crowd the streets and cheer for our demise. Our middle class is disappearing. When there is no or very little middle class, you are left with a third world country. The haves and the have nots, and nothing in between. We have spent trillions to fight a war and hunt bin Laden, while, I believe, knowing full well his whereabouts, all along. Look at where he was hiding, people!! In a high class mansion in a third world country, in a proverbial sore thumb, in a mostly empty, devoid landscape, not a mountain cave, like we've been told for years. And now that we have achieved our objective, we are still there, spending billions, weekly, for nothing in a useless endeavor to save people from thousands of years of tradition, from which they don't want saved . England, Germany, Japan, and Israel should be our only foreign concerns until we can straighten out our own problems, here, at home. It's time to stop treating the world as we would want to be treated (which obviously hasn't worked) and treat them as they deserve to be treated. We have too many pressing issues here at home, to continue to worry about everyone else's issues.
    • Madison  •  9 mths ago
      Too bad Americans aren't capable of voting these people out. They never will, so why act like it's even an option?
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