That’s the ticket.

“Yesterday’s decisions by one rating agency do not provide more clarity. They rather add another speculative element to the situation,” Barroso told reporters, adding that the agencies were not immune to “mistakes and exaggerations.””It seems strange that there is not a single rating agency coming from Europe.

It shows there may be some bias in the markets when it comes to the evaluation of the specific issues of Europe,” he said, stating publicly a view that many senior EU officials have pushed privately for some time.

I almost, and I mean almost, feel bad for the ratings guys. They blew it on housing and are now trying to make it up by being tough on bad government debt and they’re still getting hammered. A no win situation. I guess they didn’t spend enough lobbying money on buying up enough European MP’s so they don’t get criticized. They certainly spent enough on buying American pols.