Deficit imperils nation’s top credit rating

By Patrice Hill,Washington Times

 If we don’t control the debt,it will ruin us

The United States is drawing closer to the kind of debt crisis plaguing some European countries,where a financial emergency forces political leaders to make draconian spending cuts and tax increases to maintain the confidence of international investors.

Moody’s,a top Wall Street credit agency,brought the U.S. closer to such a point this week by,for the first time,warning that the U.S. could lose its gold-plated AAA credit rating in coming years unless it quickly puts into place plans to curb budget deficits of more than $1 trillion that have the potential to destabilize government finances and the financial markets.

"Unless further measures are taken to reduce the budget deficit further or the economy rebounds more vigorously than expected,the federal financial picture as presented in [President Obama's Feb. 1 budget] will at some point put pressure on the AAA-government bond rating,"Moody’s said in a report Tuesday.

Mr. Obama and Senate leaders,during negotiations last month over a $1.9 trillion increase in the government’s debt limit,had hoped to put into place a process for coming up with major budget reductions by creating a bipartisan commission to recommend ways of reducing the debt that Congress could consider by the end of the year.

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