The risks of the U.S. losing its prized triple-A rating over the medium term have increased as the country faces a political impasse and nears its debt ceiling, Standard and Poor's said on Tuesday.

IMF economist Paul Mills took a negative line on the politics surrounding the U.S. debt situation, speaking at the a Euromoney bond conference in London yesterday.

"I don't think the debate has yet even begun to understand how big a fiscal retrenchment is going to be needed," Mills said.

I thank reader Scott Pluschau for this Reuters story posted over at news.yahoo.com...and the link is here.

Bill Gross ponders the fact that a college education isn't worth much these days..."American citizens and its universities have experienced an ivy-laden ivory tower for the past half century. Students, however, can no longer assume that a four year degree will be the golden ticket to a good job in a global economy that cares little for their social networking skills and more about what their labor is worth on the global marketplace."

I thank reader U.D. for this story posted over at pimco.com...and the link is here.

J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. agreed to pay $153.6 million to settle civil charges that it misled investors in a complex mortgage-bond portfolio—failing to tell them that a hedge fund helped craft the deal and stood to profit if it failed.

The settlement indicates the Securities and Exchange Commission has settled on a playbook for forcing Wall Street firms to pay penalties for transactions that helped fuel the financial crisis.

This is barely a slap on the wrist when JPMorgan et al made tens of billions of dollars profit on these things. And the major banks still have to deal with the government investigation into these matters...and Goldman Sachs is at the top of the list.

The story is courtesy of Washington state reader S.A...but it's posted in The Wall Street Journal...and you need a subscription to see it...but the link is here if you do.

Prime Minister George Papandreou of Greece won a crucial vote of confidence early Wednesday, with all 155 lawmakers of the Socialist Party expressing their support for his beleaguered government, above the absolute majority of 151 votes required by Greece’s 300-seat Parliament.

Mr. Papandreou will face an even bigger challenge when Parliament votes next week on a slate of measures that includes tax hikes, wage cuts and state privatization. The steps were required by the European Union, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund before the release of the next segment of financial aid, which Greece needs to meet expenses through the summer.

This Roy Stephens offering was posted late last night over at The New York Times...and the link is here.

When it comes to the euro crisis, Europe means business. That, at least, is the message sent by the decision to withhold a vital aid tranche until Greece passes a far-reaching austerity package next week. But the move could backfire.

Prime Minister Giorgios Papandreou is doing all he can to keep his government together and prevent his country from going bankrupt. But the obstacles -- a full year after the European Union and the International Monetary Fund put together a €110 billion aid package for the country -- are myriad. And high.

The next hurdle is scheduled for Tuesday night at midnight, Athens time. Papandreou, himself an enthusiastic runner, faces a confidence vote in the Greek parliament. With his party holding 155 of 300 seats, his margin for error is thin. The conservative opposition has vowed to vote against him.

This is another Roy Stephens offering...and it's a posting over at the German website spiegel.de. It's worth the read...and the link is here.

Syrian President Bashar Assad, following in the footsteps of other beleaguered Arab autocrats, promised reforms and threatened protesters in a televised speech. But German commentators join the growing number of observers who feel Assad's regime may be running out of time.

The center-left Süddeutsche Zeitung writes:

"It is, despite all the violence, a display of overwhelming impotence: Syrian soldiers kill livestock, shoot children, burn down houses. Military helicopters circle over villages as whole provinces flee to neighboring countries. And the people, in an almost suicidal fashion, still arm themselves, go out onto the streets and demand the overthrow of the regime."

"Now Syrian President Bashar Assad has once again tried to be the good guy; he has promised reforms, more political parties, freedom of opinion. A better, more peaceful, more prosperous and free Syria can be created, his reforms promise, if "plotters", "vandals" and "extremists" are resisted; if Syria decides in favor of its president and against the chaos. It is not impossible that sections of the Syrian population thoroughly endorse Assad's speech."

This is Roy's third and final offering in today's column. This one is also posted over at spiegel.de...and the link is here.

Here's a GATA release...and I'm just going to steal Chris Powell's preamble and post the link.

Al Korelin of the Korelin Economics Report interviewed GATA Chairman Bill Murphy, GATA board member Ed Steer, and your secretary/treasurer during Cambridge House's World Resource Investment Conference in Vancouver two weeks ago. The interview covers GATA's development, objectives, and successes. It's 16 minutes long and video of it can be found at youtube.com...and the link is here.

I remember doing this video interview with Al...but can't remember a thing about what was said...and I haven't had time to watch it. But Bill and Chris did most of the talking, which was fine by me. For all you newbie gold and silver bugs out there...you can find out what GATA is all about...and what we're up to at the moment.

Here's a piece that showed up at the Casey Research website the other day...and it's very much worth your time.

Fiat currencies the world over are being manipulated by central banks, which is distorting asset and commodity prices. Successful investing requires that investors have a good idea of what things cost and what they are really worth – and using the world's oldest and most stable form of money, gold, to compare prices is one way to get that insight.

This wonderful article is a must read...and I thank Washington state reader S.A. for bringing it to our attention. The link is here.

Here's a short R.R. blog posted over at King World News that Eric sent me yesterday. The headline pretty much says it all...and the link is here.

Here's an interesting story that showed up in the Monday edition of the New York Post.

There's gold in them thar sidewalk cracks!

A Queens man has discovered enough hidden treasure -- bits of diamonds, rubies, platinum and gold -- on the gritty sidewalks of Midtown's Diamond District to make a living.

"The streets of 47th Street are literally paved with gold," a giddy Raffi Stepanian, 43, of Whitestone told The Post last week when a reporter discovered him on all fours -- armed with tweezers and a butter knife -- digging through cracks in the sidewalk in a driving rainstorm.

You can't make this stuff up...and I thank reader Craig Eubanks for sharing it with us. The link is here.

Reader Charley Orr sent me this story that was posted over at the coinweek.com website yesterday.

U.S. Postal Service inspectors are investigating the fraudulent use of stolen American Express credit cards to purchase apparently tens of thousands of dollars of gold coins.

“The orders are placed by phone, often for $10,000 to $20,000 worth of Liberty Double Eagles or other, large-sized gold coins. The callers have a foreign accent and sometimes have problems pronouncing the name on the credit card. They’ll phone dealers and will correspond by email, but no one ever answers the phones when dealers try to call them back,” said Michael Fuljenz, President of Universal Coin & Bullion in Beaumont, Texas who has been working with postal inspectors on several cases.

It's a very short...but very interesting read...and the link is here.

This is not a website that I've ever spent much/any time at...but GATA's secretary treasurer Chris Powell says that the piece about Liberty Dollar founder Bernard von NotHaus "seems a fair summary of the briefs" being presented to the courts as part of the appeal process.

Chris has already done the hard work for us...and the link to the GATA release is here.

Here's a zerohedge.com piece that was sent to me by various readers since it appeared on their website on Saturday. The first thing I did was ask silver analyst Ted Butler what it meant in the grand scheme of things...and this was his reply..."This is not a big deal, as this type of trading should never have been allowed in the first place."

The Over the Counter [OTC] market is described here....and I know that the 'brain trust' at Casey Research is working on this right now...and they'll have more to say about it in the days and weeks ahead.

But you can still buy all the physical gold and silver that you want, as the OTC market has nothing whatsoever to do with buying the metal itself. Once you read the above Wikipedia description, that should put your mind at ease.

This only applies to the United States...but having said that, I know that about two thirds of my readers live there, so watch this space...and sign of for free to Casey's Daily Dispatch...for more breaking news on this.

The link to the zerohedge.com story is here...and there's another zerohedge.com piece on a similar vein linked here. Both are must reads.

Here's a short blog posted over at King World News...and the link is here.

Lastly today is this most excellent story out of yesterday's edition of the Financial Times in London...and many thanks goes out to reader Tariq Khan for digging this one up.

Greek citizens are emptying savings accounts and buying gold as they brace themselves for the possibility of a sovereign default and a run on the banks.

Sales of gold coins have soared as savers seek a safer and fungible source of value.

"When the global financial crisis started, our sales of coins to investors overtook bullion for the first time," said Harry Krinakis, at Sepheriades, a Greek precious metals trader. "Now the sales ratio has reached five to one."

The story is subscriber protected, but I sent it off to Chris Powell...and he promptly posted it in the public domain embedded in a GATA release. The link to this absolute must read article is here.