A financial reporter couple of weeks ago refered to the ratings agency as 'chumps'. Well S&P reaffirmed that name last Friday by cutting the US rating from AAA to AA+. Another commentator on Bloomberg TV put is succinctly: "Why woud you believe these chumps anyway? They were the same chumps that maintained the ratings on Lehman Brothers even up to when they went bankrupt, as well as giving AAA to all the CDOs before the house of cards fell inwards..."
And for years the US govt debt was in the shits with unsustainable trillions in deficit, as well as a shutdown of government in 1996 during the Clinton Administration they maintain AAA o US debt. This guy, head of sovereign ratings in S&P really has absolutely no credibility...