Tea Party Downgrade

The rightwing's intractability and lack of increased revenue are specifically mentioned in S&P's report on why they downgraded the US from an AAA to an AA+ nation:

"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.
The political brinksmanship of recent months highlights what we see as
America's governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective,
and less predictable than what we previously believed. The statutory debt
ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips in
the debate over fiscal policy.
It appears that for now, new revenues have dropped down on the menu of policy options."
  
In addition, the far rightwing Teabag Wearers who claim to be such Constitutional sticklers, blatantly rooted for default and not raising the debt ceiling. This would have specifically been unconstitutional since the Constitution says the debt of the US govt "shall not be questioned."

So the bottom line is the Regressives in Congress -- controlled by their own minority of far rightwing Newbies With Teabags Stapled to Their Hats -- refused to compromise at all, they got what they wanted, they acted unconstitutionally and our collective credit rating was lowered thanks to them.

And then there's the other thought that says, who cares?  Standard & Poors were the idiots who gave Lehman Brothers triple-A ratings until they collapsed as well.