Standard & Poor's lowers New Jersey state credit outlook

But enough about me, what do you think about me? More bad news for New Jersey, and for Gov. Chris Christie:

The latest dose of bad news was delivered by Standard & Poor's, which Tuesday lowered its credit outlook for New Jersey from stable to negative.

While Standard & Poor's did not change the state's AA- rating ' one of the worst among the states ' it warned the more drastic step of a lower rating loomed if Christie's nearly 8 percent growth in revenue failed to materialize. [...]

"We revised the outlook to reflect our view of the risk of revenue assumptions we view as optimistic, continued reliance on one-time measures to offset revenue shortfalls, and longer-term growing expenditure pressures," John Sugden, a credit analyst for Standard & Poor's, said.

The optimistic revenue assumptions part is a direct reference to Christie's implausible budget assumptions, especially as it relates to his insistence that only further tax cuts can possibly cause the magical money unicorn to once again poop cash and rainbows across his great state. For Republicans, this was proof enough of Christie's seriousness to make him one of the keynote speakers at their recent convention.

Which, as it turns out, seems to be a trend. After all, one of the people most responsible for the national credit downgrade was Paul Ryan and his merry band of fellow fiscal anarchists'and for his own valiant attempts in the field of completely implausible budget numbers, he was rewarded with the vice presidential slot on the Republican ticket.

In the current Republican Party, gross fiscal incompetence has become a big selling point. And if your incompetence results in actual, real-world economic damage, you'll be considered as leadership material.