Free Republic

A majority of voters reject the depiction of Tea Party activists as “terrorists,” a new Rasmussen poll shows … but not a terribly large majority, given the ridiculously demagogic attack it represents. Fifty-five percent say that the Tea Party didn’t act like “economic terrorists” during the negotiations over the debt ceiling and deficit spending, while 29% — more than one in four voters — see equivalency between the Tea Party’s use of representative government and, say, al-Qaeda: Democrats and their media friends have charged the Tea Party with being economic terrorists during the congressional budget debates, but most voters don’t...

Credit rating agency Standard and Poor's on Monday downgraded the debt of mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The downgrades to AA+ are part of the continued fallout from the agency's decision to drop U.S. sovereign debt to AA+, an unprecedented move that rattled investors and sparked concern over the long-term impact of the action It was widely expected that S&P's downgrade of U.S. debt would roll downhill to other entities that are closely linked to the federal government.