Randi Rhodes: Teaconomy

Credit rating agency Standard & Poor's has downgraded the United States from its former AAA rating for the first time in history. It seems that Standard and Poor considers the creditworthiness of the USA to be substandard and poor. S&P’s explanation of the reasons for the downgrade was five pages long, but it boiled down to three letters—G O P. It’s not like credit ratings agencies are in the habit of criticizing Republicans. But they must feel compelled to say something when the Republicans stop being tools of big business and start being just tools, period. S&P’s explanation said that “The statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips…” Worse than bargaining chips, really—they’ve become gambling chips. And Republicans are willing to gamble everything. S&P also criticized the intransigence about revenue enhancement. S&P said “new revenues have dropped down on the menu of policy options.” No, actually new revenues have dropped right off that menu. There are no new revenues on the Tea Party menu. You can have one item from column A… and that’s it. There is no column B.

By the way, the original draft press release from Standard & Poor's included projections that overestimated US debt by $2 trillion. Boy, don’t you hate it when you put the decimal point in the wrong place? Or on the wrong page? Nice going, S&P. Next time you deliver a lecture to somebody about them getting their act together, try not to include any $2 trillion errors in it.

On Meet the Press, John Kerry referred to the S&P downgrade as the “Tea Party downgrade.” “Tea Party downgrade” sounds like a warning sign that the road to the future should have—“Caution: Steep Tea Party Downgrade, Next 10 Miles.” You’ve got to give the Tea Party credit—they’ve certainly had an impact. But then so did the iceberg that sank the Titanic.

Finally, at a Tea Party rally in Wisconsin, the 'baggers actually cheered the downgrading of America’s credit rating! They didn’t bust out the champagne—that was only to be touched in the event of a total default.

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A message of thanks for the Tea Party (slightly NSFW)...