DOWNLOADS: (216)

PLAYS: (2399)

Embed

After watching Ali Velshi fill in on some of CNN's coverage over the holidays on this "fiscal cliff" debacle, I would definitely be happy to see him take Erin Burnett's place on CNN in the evening. He corrected wingnut Rep. Tim Huelskamp on the air this Tuesday and the following evening after the House finally voted to pass the Senate's bill, he didn't let Rep. Tom Cole get away with trying to blame S&P's downgrade of our credit rating on the budget deficit.

After Cole again explained that he was happy with the Republicans passing this deal because they got a lot of what they liked and that they planned on leveraging the debt ceiling to get some of the spending cuts they want, Cole said this:

COLE: We didn't have a downgrade because of the debt ceiling debate. We had it because we weren't dealing with our deficit. This is...

VELSHI: That's not entirely true. (CROSSTALK) No, no, It's not entirely true.

COLE: It actually is. (CROSSTALK)

VELSHI: Congressman, I really enjoy talking to you. I think you're one of the best around. It's just not entirely true.

COLE: Look, you can't have trillion dollar deficits for four consecutive years and have it going forward...

VELSHI: Give me five minutes and I'll pull out S&P's report. I mean, I'm not the guy to have this fight with. I don't know as much about Congress as you do, but I do know about this.

Velshi went on to give him a hard time about the Republicans not being able to get their act together in the House and he's exactly right, that report did not blame the deficit. It blamed the politicians not being able to work together.

When Cole attempted to put most of the blame for the Simpson-Bowles commission going nowhere onto President Obama, Velshi reminded him that their vice presidential candidate, Paul Ryan voted against the plan as well. Velshi didn't give Democrats a pass for their part in any of this brinksmanship we've seen going on, but he made sure to let the viewers know we're dealing with a really dysfunctional House right now.

It was nice to at least see the Representative not be allowed to get away with just completely revising history. I'd have been happier after watching this if he wasn't allowed to pretend that it's going to be acceptable behavior for them to continue their hostage taking during this upcoming debt ceiling debate. I've still got my issues with Velshi, mainly due to the fact that's he's on board for austerity measures and cuts to our social safety nets and like so many of them, seems obsessed with the deficit instead of getting Americans back to work. But compared to Burnett, who he's been filling in for, he's a breath of fresh air. It would really be nice to see more of these anchors do what he did here again, which is call out a politician on the spot when they lie on the air.

For a little reminder, here's what that S&P report said about the downgrade:

Continue reading »

DOWNLOADS: (747)

PLAYS: (217)

Embed

Fox's Neil Cavuto claimed he really didn't want to take up for Standard and Poor's and defend their record, but it didn't stop him from accusing the Congress from conducting a "witch hunt" in their defense now that investigations are being called for after they downgraded the United States' credit rating.

Apparently Cavuto and some of his cohorts on Fox have been carrying water for S&P for the last week or so.

From Media Matters -- Fox News Objects To S&P Downgrade Inquiry By Screaming "Witch Hunt":

Fox News personalities have expressed outrage that Congress is reportedly considering investigating Standard & Poor's (S&P) controversial decision to downgrade its U.S. credit rating. But S&P has significant credibility issues, and executives at rating agencies - including S&P - have routinely testified before Congress, including about their role in the Enron scandal and the financial crisis.

As Congress Prepares To Investigate S&P's "Downgrade" Of The U.S. Credit Rating ...

AP: Senate Moving To Investigate S&P's Downgrade Decision.

On August 8, the Associated Press reported that the Senate Banking Committee "is gathering information on Standard & Poor's decision to issue the first-ever downgrade of the government's credit rating." [Associated Press, 8/8/11] ...

Fox News Shouts Intimidation And "Witch Hunt" ...

Fox's Cavuto On Possible Investigation Of S&P: "You Can't Threaten Everyone."

From host Neil Cavuto's discussion of a possible Senate investigation of S&P with Larry Sabato on Your World: Read on...

While telling every one else not to panic in reaction to drops in the stock market after the S&P downgrade, Stephen Colbert packed his "hobo satchel" full of gold, weapons and a chicken as he prepared to make his escape from the United States.

After noting that the only other two countries with a rating of AA+ are Belgium and New Zealand, Colbert concluded:

The credit downgrade reduces Americans to waffle-eating Kiwis who put mayonnaise on their French fries and have a serious Hobbit infestation.

DOWNLOADS: (1012)

PLAYS: (5995)

Embed

Well, we had one bright spot on the Sunday morning talks shows this weekend -- the fact that Rachel Maddow was a panel member on Meet the Press. The downside, she got stuck debating Republican hack, Alex Castellanos who just regurgitated one Republican lie-filled talking point after another during the entire segment.

When responding to whether his buddy Mitt Romney should have shown some leadership and weighed in on the debt-ceiling debacle before it was over with or not, Castellanos tried blaming the downgrade by S&P on government spending and too much debt. But Maddow corrected him about just who exactly they blame if you actually read their report -- Republicans playing chicken with the debt ceiling and their rigid refusal to ever allow taxes to be raised.

MADDOW: To the extent that we are taking the S&P downgrade as a serious thing, that we believe that S&P has the credibility to have done this, and this actually does levy a blow against the U.S. economic credibility. I mean, honestly, we should talk about the fact that during the financial crisis, S&P was handing out AAA ratings to any pile of junk tall enough to reach the doorbell and ask. So they do not have the most credibility on this. But if we are going to take them seriously, let's take them on their word about why they did this. They said they did this because of brinksmanship over the debt ceiling. They did not say they did this because there's too much government spending.

GREGORY: All right. Let's, let...

MADDOW: They said they did this because of Republicans holding the debt...

CASTELLANOS: Because of the debt.

MADDOW: No. The debt ceiling. Brinksmanship...

CASTELLANOS: Yeah, but the debt ceiling is the ceiling...

MADDOW: ...is their word.

Naturally Castellanos did his best to interrupt her so she couldn't make her point. Austan Goolsbee got a chance to follow up and agree with Maddow on the fact that Republicans were the ones out there actually insane enough to be pretending that default might be acceptable.

Steve Benen made some similar points in his post from today A pox on one house:

But for all the complaining I do about this, it’s only fair to note when someone gets this right. National Journal’s Edmund Andrews, for example, had a good piece yesterday that specifically rejected the notion that the downgrade is “a pox-on-both-your-houses curse at the intransigence of both Republicans and Democrats.” [...]

And who instigated this brinksmanship, refused to compromise, and delayed a resolution until literally the last day?

Putting aside, at least for now, whether S&P has the credibility to make such sweeping condemnations, it’s worth emphasizing the extent to which the agency pointed the finger at congressional Republicans. It not only directly attributed blame to the GOP hostage strategy of the past few months, it lamented the very idea of allowing “the statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default” to “become political bargaining chips in the debate over fiscal policy,” before complaining that “the majority of Republicans in Congress continue to resist any measure that would raise revenues.”

Andrews added, “[I]t’s hard to read the S&P analysis as anything other than a blast at Republicans.”

Full transcript below the fold.

Continue reading »

DOWNLOADS: (807)

PLAYS: (1894)

Embed

John Kerry left little doubt where Democrats plan on laying the blame for Standard and Poor's deciding to downgrade our credit rating -- squarely on the laps of those "tea party" Republicans in the House who were actually saying default would be acceptable.

From TPM -- Kerry Slams ‘Tea Party Downgrade’:

Senator John Kerry (D-MA), appearing on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday, blamed Republicans and in particular Tea Party intransigence for the unprecedented S&P downgrade of U.S. credit from AAA to AA+.

"I believe this is without question the Tea Party downgrade," he said. "This is the Tea Party downgrade because a minority of people in the House of Representatives countered the will of even many of Republicans in the United States Senate who were prepared to do a bigger deal."

Kerry intimated that the "grand bargain" that President Obama initially negotiated with House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH), a package of larger spending cuts and revenue increases, was scuttled by a smaller group of Republicans who were not willing to negotiate at any cost.

"There were some people in the Republican party - and Mitch McConnell even admitted this - who wanted to default, Kerry said. "He said there were people in his party who were willing to shoot the hostage. In the end they found that the hostage was worth ransoming." Read on...

It looks like the Democrats got on the same page with their talking points for the day since David Axelrod said the exact same thing on Face the Nation today.

DOWNLOADS: (1021)

PLAYS: (741)

Embed

You've just got to love what passes for "straight news" over at the Fox/Republican cable channel. During one of their "breaking news" segments after the news that Standard and Poor's decided to downgrade the AAA credit rating of the Unites States, who did they bring in to do some "objective" analysis? The American Spectator and Wall Street Journal's resident hack, John Fund.

And what was Fund's reaction to the downgrade? More austerity measures naturally.

And what did Fund completely ignore? This tidbit from the report issued by Standard and Poor's on their decision for making the downgrade.

(h/t Jamie)

Compared with previous projections, our revised base case scenario now assumes that the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, due to expire by the end of 2012, remain in place. We have changed our assumption on this because the majority of Republicans in Congress continue to resist any measure that would raise revenues, a position we believe Congress reinforced by passing the act.

Fund naturally thinks we should be taking it out on the hides of everyday working Americans to do something about our budget deficit. Ignoring completely that the Republicans have been the ones being absolutely rigid in their position that there will be no tax increases since they're all afraid their Uncle Grover will primary them.

I think we just got a preview here of what we're going to see from Fox 24/7 over the next week as they try to explain what happened with this downgrade. No questioning of whether we should even trust the ratings agency that got it all so wrong before the meltdown of the financial industries and more demands that we go after Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid or these vultures will never be satisfied.

UPDATE: And right on cue, one of our newly elected TeaBircher Republicans in the Senate, Mike Lee was chiming some of the same talking points in another "breaking news" segment following the one with Fund. Not only was he calling for austerity measures, but he was also still touting their ridiculous balanced budget amendment as well. And of course the problem in Lee's mind with protecting his rich campaign donors is that Washington is spending too much (code for they're doing things to help out working people and not corporate welfare or funding our military industrial complex) and they're borrowing too much. And of course with him also ignoring that the wealthiest 1% are being taxed at the lowest rates in ages and that we have a revenue problem they refuse to fix. I'm just wondering how much worse things have to get in the United States before the majority of the public starts to get wise to these liars because they actually start paying attention to what's going on and how ridiculous these talking points from the GOP are that do not match up to reality in any way, shape or form.

DOWNLOADS: (840)

PLAYS: (690)

Embed

DOWNLOADS: (837)

PLAYS: (3109)

Embed

As John already posted in the breaking news story, S&P has went ahead and downgraded the United States credit rating from AAA to AA+. Rachel talked to Rep. Barney Frank who is the former Chair of the House Financial Services Committee and the Washington Post's Ezra Klein about tonight's news, but first she went through some of the details that went on this evening.

Rachel Maddow read some of this part of S&P's decision to go ahead with the downgrade:

In its statement, S&P said that it had changed its view "of the difficulties of bridging the gulf between the political parties" over a credible deficit reduction plan.

S&P said it was now "pessimistic about the capacity of Congress and the administration to be able to leverage their agreement this week into a broader fiscal consolidation plan that stabilizes the government's debt dynamics anytime soon."

DOWNLOADS: (536)

PLAYS: (2223)

Embed

Barney Frank blasted Standard & Poor's for their poor record during the meltdown of the financial service industries and felt that they were trying to over compensate now for past mistakes. He also criticized them for being too lienent with their ratings on private enteprise, while being too harsh with their ratings of government from the federal level right on down to the states and local governments.

When asked if the recent debacle by our politicians in Washington over raising the debt ceiling was responsible for this happening, Frank pushed back and said if anything, this proved that ultimately the full faith and credit of the United States was not something that could be allowed to be defaulted on.

Ezra Klein wasn't quite as charitable about Congressman Frank's assessment on whether our politicians were at all responsible for this happening and here's more from his column from just before this decision was made -- Five thoughts on the potential S&P downgrade:

Continue reading »

DOWNLOADS: (939)

PLAYS: (1562)

Embed

Well, it looks like someone's been reading Crooks and Liars again, like Keith's staff. That said I'm glad to see at least one person in the media is talking about the games the Republicans are playing rather than chasing after the pornography story. As Karoli pointed out:

On a weekend where negotiations are moving ahead to get to a vote on financial regulation Monday, Issa's latest effort to manufacture scandal is just a cynical ploy to manipulate public opinion. It's a little like the "death panel" controversy, or the "Goldman Sachs gave more money to Obama than anyone else" controversy. The goal is to turn public opinion away from efforts to rein in what is completely out of control, water it down more than it is already, and pay off the Republican paymasters of Wall Street.

Keith and Ezra Klein discussed the hearings Carl Levin is holding taking a look at the ratings firms -- Former credit-rating firm executives say they were told to cut corners:

Former officials at the nation's major credit-rating companies told a Senate panel Friday that a pressure-cooker culture fostered by top executives encouraged them to cut corners so their firms could handle an exploding volume of deals and keep raking in profits during the bubble years.

The testimony backs the findings of a probe by the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations. The probe concluded that these firms used outdated models, gave high ratings to flimsy investment vehicles and waited too long to downgrade those investments in part because they were unduly influenced by their Wall Street clients and their own quest to make more money.

Investors relied on the ratings companies to impartially gauge the risk of complex deals tied to home mortgages. But the firms failed to do that, and the ensuing downgrade of hundreds of mortgage-backed securities in mid-2007, "shocked financial markets," and "the financial crisis was on," said Sen. Carl M. Levin (D-Mich.), head of the Senate panel.

Financial regulatory overhaul legislation before Congress aims to increase oversight of the ratings industry to prevent such a collapse in the future. Read on...