Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Iraqi bonds on par with California

From Daniel Foster at the Corner:
This is probably bad news for California, but it is certainly good news for Iraq:

Traditional Wall Street investors have taken note. Iraq is now considered a safer bet than Argentina, Venezuela, Pakistan, and Dubai — and is nearly on par with the State of California, according to Bloomberg statistics on credit default swaps, which are considered a raw indicator of default risk.

“Compared to California, I’d rather bet on Iraq,’’ Daher said. “Iraq is a country where there are still bombs going off and people getting murdered, but they are less indebted than the United States. California is likely to have more demands on its resources, and there is no miracle where California is going to have more revenue coming out of the sky. Iraq has prospects for tremendously higher revenues, if they can manage to get their act halfway together, which they seem to be doing.’’
Perhaps Sacramento needs to start contemplating a Surge strategy.
Maybe adding 6.3 million uninsured to the government health care rolls or extending citizenship to 5.6 million non-citizens through immigration reform will fix Caliornia's debt problems.  I've got a better idea.  Californians should elect as governor, a business leader who knows how to grow a business and balance a budget.

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