On Saturday, President Barack Obama celebrated his 51st birthday. On Sunday, Obama faced a more somber anniversary — it was the first anniversary of America’s credit downgrade.
“One year ago, the President’s failure to rein in reckless government spending led to a downgrade in the creditworthiness of our nation,” Mitt Romney said in a statement. “President Obama’s spending binge now has him on pace to add more than $1 trillion to the debt for the fourth straight year.”
Romney said the “the middle class that will pay most dearly for this out-of-control spending” and “the contrast between President Obama and me on this critical issue could not be more clear.”
A year ago, Standard and Poor’s (S&P) downgraded America’s triple-A credit rating to AA+, a score the The Wall Street Journal noted ranked below countries such as Liechtenstein, and on par with Belgium and New Zealand. S&P also put the credit rating on a “negative outlook,” which meant the agency felt America had “little chance of regaining the top rating in the near term.”
National Journal referred to the downgrade as an “ignominious legacy for Obama.”
What was worse was that the Obama administration seemed blindsided by the downgrade. Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner told a House panel on in 2012 the bond rating is safe and that “there’s not a chance” it would get downgraded. In April of 2011, just months before the downgrade, Geithner said, there was “no risk” America’s credit would be downgraded.
And the Obama administration still has not learned its lessons and continues to recklessly spend money even after the the country’s credit had been downgraded. In fact, CBS News noted the national debt increased by $4 trillion on Obama’s watch, and this is “the most rapid increase in the debt under any U.S. president.” Under, Obama, the country is facing its fourth consecutive year of trillion-dollar budget deficits, making America’s long-term credit rating even more uncertain.
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