So there you go - S&P has painted a big target on the back of Medicare and Social Security (euphemistically referred to here as “other entitlementsâ€). If the U.S. guts Social Security and Medicare, S&P may let us keep our current AA+ rating. Fail to thrown grandpa and grandma under the bus, and the credit rating may go down yet again, to AA.
How seriously should we regard S&P’s warnings about the long-term fiscal instability of U.S. public finances? The Wall Street Journal - the jewel in the Murdoch crown - gives us the answer: The unprecedented move came after several hours of high-stakes drama. It began in the morning, when word leaked that a downgrade was imminent and stocks tumbled sharply. Around 1:30 p.m., S&P officials notified the Treasury Department they planned to downgrade U.S. debt, and presented the government with their findings. But Treasury officials noticed a $2 trillion error in S&P’s math that delayed an announcement for several hours. S&P officials decided to move ahead anyway, and after 8 p.m. they made their downgrade official. What, after all, is a minor $2 trillion calculation error compared with the imperative to fuck over the working class?
It may turn out that S&P is a paper tiger
=====================
"There is not in this country as in most others, a central point at which the more important companies are either domiciled, or at which all are required to present annual statements of their affairs, for the reason that they *derive their existence and powers* from the legislatures of the several States." [Henry Poor, 1860, in "The New Masters of Capital" by Timothy Sinclair, page 23]
Talk about your Hegelian inversions.
Further:
"Despite its bean counter image, bond rating is something that stirs great passions, perhaps because it reminds us of the feelings of rejection getting a bad grade in school produced. At a deeper level, some may have an inklong that it is precisely in the seemingly technical, the supposedly objective infrastructural phenomena such as rating that the big questions of today and tomorrow are increasingly being decided." [ibid, page 179]
The oxycontin addled kakistocracy slumbers on...............