Did the FED announce something today?

The rating agencies' ranking of the United States is even more disconnected from reality. To believe that the US sets the benchmark for sovereign debt credit ratings is preposterous... a recent update written by United States Government Accountability Office (GAO)  noted the US's budget deficit equivalent to 9.9% of GDP in 2009 - the largest 10 since 1945 - and stated that without significant policy changes the US government would soon face an "unsustainable growth in debt".

 It goes on to state, however, that using reasonable assumptions, "roughly 93 cents of every dollar of federal revenue will be spent on the major entitlement programs and net interest costs by 2020."  In less than ten years, using reasonable assumptions, there will essentially be no money left to run the US government - 93% of all tax revenues the US government collects will go to pay social security, Medicare, Medicaid and the interest costs on their national debt. This implies no money left over for defense, homeland security, welfare, unemployment benefits, education or anything else we associate with the normal business of government. And the US government is rated AAA!?

The historian Niall Ferguson recently wrote that, "US government debt is a safe haven the way Pearl Harbor was a safe haven in 1941."