The Downgrade's Real Casualties

Suzy Khimm at the Washington Post astutely identifies them: city governments. Which in turn means, still more local austerity to come: S&P’s is poised to  downgrade thousands of municipal bonds that are directly tied to the federal government, with an announcement expected later …

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Written by David Frum on Wednesday August 10, 2011

The S&P Bond Rally

In a column for the National Post , I explain why the current price of government bonds repudiates the S&P downgrade of American debt: If I were Standard & Poor's, I'd be damn embarrassed. On Friday, the famous bond-rating services took the momentous step of downgrading the sovereign …

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Written by David Frum on Tuesday August 9, 2011

S&P Was Right to Downgrade

The dispute between the Treasury Department and Standard and Poor’s over America’s sovereign bond rating is a tempest in a teapot.  Worse, it overshadows the reality about America's debt: Congress cannot handle it politically and Americans will have difficultly handling it personally. The …

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Written by Steve Bell on Monday August 8, 2011

The Cost of the Crisis

The forcing of a debt-ceiling crisis seems likely to have permanent consequences, even if it is settled before Default Day, reports Bloomberg News : Conviction that lawmakers will fail sent rates on bills due next month to the highest level since March 31, data compiled by Bloomberg show. …

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Written by David Frum on Thursday July 28, 2011

Ratings Agencies Want to See Bush Tax Cuts Lapse

The suggestion that the US needs to cut $4 trillion in projected debt over the next ten years in order to avoid a downgrade in its debt rating, posed here in an S&P report , has gained significant traction among many on the right. Erick Erickson, when he's not denying "absolution" to the …

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Written by Fred Bauer on Tuesday July 26, 2011