over the statewide, please have come in from all over and we're so proud and pleased. >> we wish you the best, sir, and your community remains in our thoughts and prayers. best of luck as you begin the school year. final update on our final story. senior administration official telling me obama white house aggressively challenging a decision by the s&p to down grade the government's triple-a credit rating. "cnn presents" starts right now. tonight on "cnn presents" addicted at birth. >> what's she going through?

she's just a little baby! and she can't talk and she can't tell me how she feels. >> america's painful ep depthic, the youngest generation. >> we're seeing more babies being born addicted to drugs. >> beasts of war. >> next thank you know i was staring at a porpous right in the face. >> enlisting animals to protect the country? but first, inside a polygamous sect. >> we're dealing with the exploitation of children, of young girls, for sexual purposes. >> gary tuchman takes you where most people never go, exposing polygamy's dirty secrets. the scenery is spectacular. and the polygamist family who is live here along the utah/arizona border have been able to live their lives with little

interference from the outside world for generations. stepping into their world is both jarring and surreal. how many brothers and sisters do you have? >> i have 18. >> and albert, how many brothers and sisters do you have? >> 22. >> i am the oldest of 32. >> narrator: these are not members of the salt lake city based charge known as the church of ladder day saints. they belong to a splinter group that believe in polygamy and call themselves the fundamentalist church of latter day saints, or flds. their spit wal leader, warren jeffs has been found guilty of sexually assaulting two children, and still faces trial on the count of bigomy to which he pled not guilty. the people are convinced that there's nobody on earth closer to god than warren jeffs.

they believe jeffs, even behind bars, is the mouthpiece of god. words he utters are devinely inspired. law enforcement authorities have long been worried what would happen if jeffs told his followers to do something violent and dangerous. >> i've never seen it like this before. i've been here for seven years and i've never seen things so unstable. so lawless. i consider this the most lawless town in the country. >> narrator: sam brower is a writing and been following the polygamist sect for a decade and has written a book about the flds called "prophets prey." >> do you think there's chair sons to be made like the mafia? >> yes. even the attorney general has said this is run taliban-style. and that's really all the flds

church is, in my opinion. is a organized crime family. >> narrator: attorneys for the break-away sect say that kind of assertion is nonsense. the polygamist leaders and followers who live here simply want to be left alone, to practice their religion as they see fit. but real violence, according to some neighbors, has crept into the community. this burned-out patch of grass in the town of colorado city, arizona, is ask evidence of what authorities say is very disturbing. they burned dozens of book here rather than let an opened library be built because they believe the books were collected by infidels. >> they burned things that didn't belong to them. they've broke noon the building. >> narrator: former flds member

stephanie cogrove said she worked for more than two years to collect books for the library. a library independent of the church. what do they do with the books? >> they hauled them out of the building. >> and then what did they do with them? >> we assume they were burned. we saw a massive bonfire and assumed all of this was on the pile because we saw books in the burning pile. >> narrator: this is the remnants of the charred books. it looks like a medical textbook. county investigators say the local police in colorado city are all members of the flds and have ignored the arson. those local police have not returned our calls. it's the county authorities who have worked to crackdown on the church. you're with the county. and they're the local police and normally, 99.9% of the time police all work together. you don't work with these guys, do you? >> not at all. i can't get them to talk to me

most of the time. >> that's because according to they aboy the religious leaders first and civilian second. >> in your eyes their allegiance more to the united states or to warren jeffs, their prophet? >> i think their allegiance is probably more to the church. they are required to swear allegiance to warren in one of their church meetings here not long ago. >> reporter: some say if you don't decide with warren jeffs, there can be trouble. are you afraid for your safety sometimes? >> sometimes you get worried. they've killed some of my animals. >> reporter: isaac whiler has lived here for years and until he split from warren jeffs, life was more or less tranquil, not now. >> one time there was like six dead cats in my window wells

thrown in there. you go out there and there will be a dead cat or pigeon or duck or something. >> so you feel like that's a threat to you? >> definitely intimidation, but i don't intimidate that easy. >> attorneys did not return calls for comment on either the book-burning or the alleged intimidation. >> please don't point that at me. >> during my frequent reporting trips to colorado city we were often made to feel unwelcomed. >> no cameras allowed here. >> this is private property. >> most of the people here will do what it takes to protect warren jeffs. tell me what warren jeffs means to you? >> i don't know what you mean by that. >> how important is he to you? >> everything. >> he's everything to you. >> uh-huh. >> and there's still a great deal of allegiance to the leader who's long been in jail. but that may be changing.

just ahead, a man who was once one of warren jeffs' most loyal followers now tells a very different story. >> he in his own wards admitted to what he is. he said he's a wicked man and he confessed to doing some very terrible things. vrrooom...vrrroooomm vroom vrrooom vrrroooomm vrrroooomm vrroom vrrrooomm vrrroooooooommmmmm mmmm mm. [ female announcer ] granola thins. something deliciously different from nature valley. thin squares of crispy granola layered with creamy peanut butter or rich dark chocolate flavor. lightly toasted for a delicate crunch.

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even though he's just been found guilty by a texas injure of sexually assault two children, there seems little doubt that warren jeffs is in charge of his break-away sect. while he was in trial awaiting jail he did one thing above all else. he was on the phone. in this past month, how much money has he spent, would you estimate, on phone cards to make phone calls. >> >> roughly, $4,000. >> and in another jail a few dozen miles away. >> in excess of 10,000, i would say. >> is that unusual. have you ever had an inmate spend that much money on phone cards? >> no. >> authorities say he has been given cash by his loyal followers to pay for the calls and they say they monitor what's

said. mostly lengthy sermons and detailed instructions to his followers a few miles away at his isolated yearning for zion ranch, as well as to his followers in the polygamist towns of colorado city with utah and arizona. insiders say he's been excommunicating those that disagree with him. what it hadn't done is stop a growing feud between those that believe in him and those that now he's a child molester. >> i like for you to think if you were standing here today -- >> three years ago willie jessop was one of his most trusted lieutena lieutenants. he showed me around the compound in west texas that was raided to show us that there was nothing bad inherently taking place. >> so where are they? >> right there. >> can i see them? today, jessop says warren jeffs

has betrayed his church. >> he said he's a very wicked man and he confessed to doing some very bad things include moglessing his daughter, his sister. i think his own words described himself. >> jessop is talking about diaries submitted as evidence that he says were left by warren jeffs after his arrest in las vegas five years ago. he's talking about these. pictures showing jeffs embracing and kissing young girls, no more than 12 or 13 years old, jessop says. >> his conduct will never be sanctions by me. i don't think there's anyone at my church that will ever sanction what he's done. it's just a matter of time until they come to terms and figure out how to cope with what he's done. >> according to authorities, of both texas and canada, jeffs orchestrate had with canadian police called "the child trafficking ring." as i understanding as many as 30 young girls, ages 12 or 13, from

a polygamist compound in british colombia across the u.s. border to flds enclaves in utah, arizona and texas. this is a very serious allegations here. >> essentially in layman's terms we're dealing with the exploitation of children and young girls for sexual purposes and the procurement of sex with girls under the ages of 18. >> and here is the canadian compound. now it has split into factions. one faction loyal to jeffs. the other loyal to this man, winston blackmoore. he's a long time polygamist. >> i've heard the stories. just different people have come like you've come and told me about them. i feel very disappointed if they were actually true. >> a woman who did not want her face shown told us that it is true. she says she has first-hand

knowledge. three of her nieces were among those sent away to be married to older men in the u.s. >> it angers me that 12 and 13 year olds would be taken away and given to an older man. and that he'd consummate their marriage vows. that angers me. i mean, they're just children. you know? it's not right. >> many girls investigators say, ended up here at this flds compound in pest texas where we tried to get some answers. >> it's gary tuchman with cnn and we're doing a story about warren jeffs. cars went in and out but no one

came out to talk. warren jeffs' attorney declined to comment. the people that live on the ranch in one of the most isolated parts of texas are not only loyal to warren jeffs they're the most loyal of the loyal. you're only invited to live here if the prophet himself approves. and despite his long stay in jails in utah, arizona and texas, jail time amounted to more than five years so far, that's what warren jeffs is to people that believe in him. a leader to be follow and obeyed, despite his conviction this week on two charges of sexual assault. he's also stand trial on a bigomy charge. officials of the mainstream mormon church reject jeffs and his practices. but within the flds there seem to be more people supporting jeffs than those trying to unseed him. how long that will guest is anyone's guess. warren jeffs was his own attorney during his texas trial

where prosecutors played audiotapes of sexual encounters with underage girls. even so, he's still controlling the destiny of his polygamist followers. listen to this young believe the arizona. >> tell me what warren jeffs means to you. >> i don't know what you mean by that. >> how important is he to you? >> everything? >> he's everything to you? uh-huh. >> and are you married yet. >> i'm not. >> do you want to be married some day? >> of course. >> do you want to have sister wives, too? >> of course, i do. >> how many sister wives do you think would be perfect, as many as i get. next on "cnn presents," the new face of america's epidemic. innocence. >> if you're pregnant and you know it's harming the baby why don't you quit using the pills? >> it's just not that easy. you feel like you're going to die. and later -- caught by the u.s. navy's underwater recruits.

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from the outside, they look more like nightclubs than doctors' offices. and they're not too happy to see our cameras. we're here in a parking lot in one of these pain clinics. >> get out of here.

>> broward county, florida, is filled with pain clinics. doctors making millions doling out precipitation opium like candy. >> ox sicodone? >> ox sicodone, 30 milligrams. rocksies, blues. >> i can get hundreds of hundreds of pills in one day going from one doctor to the next and then they take them on the street and they sell them. >> authorities are struggling to shut down these pill mills, but not fast enough. >> more and more people keep dieing from prescription drug overdoses. >> these doctors are slaughtering our children every single day. we're desperate. look at us. we're begging you. >> as one generation succumbs to prescription opiods. [ baby crying ] >> a new generation of addicts being born. >> we saw the number of crack

babies that died and this is just another version of that. we all need to be concerned. >> good morning ladies, i'm jessica. i feel good today. casey goes for her follow-up appointment at the doctors so hopefully they'll say she's doing better and i hope everybody has a blessed day. this is casey's bed. like i said, she's a little princess to -- >> and that's where she was born? >> that's about a week after she was born. this is her nebulizer. it's kind of loud. this is why we're going to the doctors, this nasty cough. >> for most of her pregnancy, jessica flooded her body and therefore, casey's with the prescription painkiller, oxycodone. they have emerged as the

nation's fastest-growing drug problem. jessica fears the drug use is responsible for casey's frequent respiratory infections. >> with my other two kids they were never sick this young. so it's kind of new to me. god comforts us in a way a loving parent comforts a frightened child. >> two years ago, jessica's husband died. a friend gave jessica a couple of oxycodone pills to numb the pain. >> when i started i was taking like one to two and within a six-month period i was taking 30. 30 30 milligrams. >> she was getting her pills from florida's numerous pill mills and then she got pregnant. >> if you are pregnant and you know that it's harming the baby and you know it could possibly cause birth defects why don't you just quit using the pills?

>> it's just not that easy. you feel like you're going to die. >> this recovery center used to be filled with pregnant women who had abused crack cocaine. now it's pills. when did the first patient come in addicted to pills? >> in 2000, this is all cocaine, the blue line, versus primary drug of choice, prescription. and the crossover was sometime in 2009. >> pregnant women addicted to crack are encouraged to quit. but with opiods, babies get just as addicted as the mother. if she quits cold turkey, the baby could die in utero from withdrawal. >> when you went through withdrawal did you feel like casey was, too? >> absolutely. >> how was that? >> she would like curl up, like in a -- because it was in the later part of the pregnancy. she would crawl up in a ball and my stomach would get like rock

solid and she wouldn't move. you could feel it. you could feel that she was in torment. it's really sad, you know. to know that your basis is in pain while you're in pain and you feel horrible because you did it. you did it. you put yourself there. >> jessica was weaned off the pills before casey was born. those that aren't give birth to babies who begin to suffer with their first breath. so you have to detox the babies? >> they go through their withdrawal symptoms yes. they start out by having feeding intolerances, diarrhea. they are crampy and miserable and irritatable. sometimes they can have seizures. >> according to state health records, during the first half of 2010 alone, 635 florida babies were born addicted. you're saying the number of

babies you've seen addicted to prescription drugs doubled last year? >> yes. there are some situations where we have three or four babies at a time. it just makes everybody a little reflective and a little sad about the whole situation. >> even more troubling? researchers still don't know what the long-term effects of opiod use will be on infants. and neither does jessica. >> i know that i'm going through stuff the, getting off of the pills. so what's she going through? she's just a little baby? and she can't talk and she can't tell me how she feels. i want to make sure that she doesn't want for anything. that she doesn't have to hurt any more than i already put her through. she didn't deserve that. she's a princess.

coming up -- >> we're going to see her drug dealer. he has tear drops tattooed on his eyes. we si first-hand how the pill trade works. boy, i'm glad we got aflac huh. aflac! oh, i've just got major medical... major medical. ...but it helps pay the doctors. pays the doctors, boyyy! [ quack ] oh yeah? what about your family? ♪ we added aflac, so we get cash! it's like our safety net... ♪ to help with the mortgage or whatever we need! so my family doesn't feel the pain too. ha! [ male announcer ] help protect your family at aflac.com. [ pigeons ] heyyy! hooo!!! helps defends against occasional constipation, diarrhea, gas and bloating. with three strains of good bacteria to help balance your colon. you had me at "probiotic." [ female announcer ] phillips' colon health.

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i'm susan hendricks "cnn presents" will return in a minute. first, breaking news.

standard & poor's has downgraded america's debt rate from the debt crisis. more on this fast-moving story tonight on "360." now back to "cnn presents." first, allen has much more on this breaking story. allen? >> that's right, susan. the debt is now at aa-plus. the triple-a rating has been taken away by standard & poors. this warning has been out there since july 14th. that's when they first warned they may take this action and indeed, now it has done so and it's saying within the next two years it could lower the rating by, yet, another notch to double-a, but for now double-a plus for the united states of america and the s&p said the deal done this week between congress and the administration simply isn't credible enough. isn't enough in terms of lower the debt burden relative to the size of the economy. s&p also says it's not enough

that the country avoided default. not enough that it was able to raise the debt ceiling. and the basically, s&p is also saying that they are, quote, highly pessimistic about the capability of congress and the administration to be able to leverage their agreement this week into a broader fiscal consolidation plan that stabilizes the government's debt dynamics. so a real lack of vote of confidence here in the u.s. government. >> and alan, you said not enough over and over. how do you think the market also react to this breaking news? >> some of this has to be already baked into the cake. we've had just an awful week in the stock market. sure, this could push the stock market down a little more. could make investors a little bit shaky about buying u.s. government treasuries. but the fact is, it still is debt that's supported by the full faith and credit of the united states. and even in the chaos that occurred this week, investors were rushing into u.s. treasury

securities as a safe haven. so on the bond market, it may not be devastating for u.s. treasuries. it could hit the u.s. stock market a little bit, certainly. >> allan, thanks for the latest on this breaking news. more on this fast-moving story tonight on kwz 360." now back to "cnn presents". we came to broward county a year ago to do an investigation on pill mills. now we're back a year later and they're still rows and rows of pain clinics. we're seeing more babies being born addicted to drugs. >> more people died last year from prescription drug overdoses than car accidents. >> our children are dying. and it's all young people. it's all the young people. >> what age were you when you started using coke? >> i was 18. that's me and my dad and my

brother. and that's me and my mom before drugs. i used to be so prissy and preppy in all my pictures. i caredbility my hair and may make up. i don't give a [ bleep ] anymore. >> the addiction to oxycodone is killing her. there's five of the oxycodons and a bar and a half of xanax. >> she allowed us to film this because she wants us to show with what a rut these pills have made of her life. >> i love my family, but this is the only thing that i care about. it doesn't feel like i'm -- my vain isn't pumping up. it burns until you take the tie out.

i need more pills. i don't feel anything. i'm not satisfied. you can just leave the door opened. is that hard for you to see her like this right now? >> i hate it. i hate it. >> her mother, joy, is a nurse. but this is one patient she's not been able to help. >> she's dropped cigarettes in between her chest and burned holes in her, you know -- i mean, it's amazing that our house hadn't burned down, to be honest with you. >> your daughter is around her all the time. how come you can't keep her from doing the pills? >> she's trying. i've tried everything. i say a prayer every time i leave for work. when i get home the first thing i do is i check on her to make sure she's still breathing.

it's not a fun way to live. >> joy joins other south florida parents in protest against the pill mills that feed addiction. >> so the majority of people that are out here, have they lost family members to pills? >> all of them have. >> this is my precious son. his name is jay. he died at age 36 on his birthday. >> blaine died december 5th, 2009. >> your home at night and the phone rings and you're afraid to answer it because you don't know whether it's the sheriff, the morgue or the hospital. >> bree's driving us to go pick up more pills. >> how much money is this? >> i think it's $175. >> and this will get you one hit? >> she spends thousands of dollars a week just to get high. we're going to see her drug dealer. he has tear drops tattooed on his eyes and gold teeth.

you're not scared of this guy? >> no. he's a sweetheart. >> ignore me. if you see me on the street ignore me. my producer steve is getting out of the car because it might look too suspicious with him sitting in the back seat. >> let me get 12 until later. >> the dealer admits he gets his stash after visiting multiple pill-mill doctors. >> so what did he give you? >> 11 of them. >> what are they? >> oxycodone. >> to put this into perspective, the recommended starting dose for oxycodone is 10 milligramses in 12 hours. bree just bought 30 times that. and that's just enough to get her through one afternoon. today, a multiagency task force busts 22 pill mills, arresting doctors for trafficking in illegal prescriptions.

>> it's not uncommon seeing doctors making upwards of $1 million a year. >> but that's nothing compared to what some of the clinic owners make. dea agents seized more than two dozen luxury cars from the garage of one pill mill entrepreneur. >> this individual was making $150,000 a day. >> viper, porsche, a nice blue bentley. i don't know what this is. why does it take so long to bust the clinics? why can't you just go in and knock them down one by one. >> they do it under the cover of their medical license and you have to prove the doctor knew they were overprescribing. >> these people are addicted. these people are suffering and these pill mill clinic owners and some of these doctors are just preying on that suffering. for the cash. for the profit.

>> these are the faces of that suffering. >> i remember when i first started doing these occasionally. everybody, all my friends, none of us were drug addicts. now, the whole town is. >> one mother who has already lost her child -- >> yes, princess. >> another mother, who is hoping her past hasn't ruined her child's future. >> i don't want to ever forget how bad i felt. i don't want to ever forget what it could have done to her. it's not ever okay to do a pill again. ever. up next, animals trained to take on terrorists. >> get ready for a episode of man versus dolphin. >> kaj larsen tries to beat a dolphin at its own game.

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good evening. i'm anderson cooper we're interrupting our program to bring you the latest news. credit rating agency standard & poor's has decided to downgrade america's credit rating. america's triple-a credit rating. the fallout from the debt crisis. allan chernoff is in new york. how unexpected is this? >> this is not shocking at all. it is shocking from a public relation's standpoint but s&p actually had warned of this on july 14th when they said there was a better than 50% chance they were going to do this. and they've pulled the trigger. it wasn't easy for them but they've done it. what they're saying is that the deal struck this week to avoid default, to raise the debt ceiling and cut spending simply isn't sufficient.

it's not enough to stabilize the debt situation of the united states as they term it, as s&p terms it. the medium-term debt dynamics of the u.s. they want to see more spending and they say they're making a judgment on the politics that occurred in washington this past week. the disarray, the fighting, the fact that it took until the very last minute, almost, for them to come to a deal and they're saying we don't believe that the congress and the administration will be able to leverage their agreement into a broader, fiscal consolidation policy so they're giving a thumb's down to what's occurred in washington over the past week. down one notch to double-a plus. >> it's because news but it could have been worse in terms of levels of downgrade. this is, as you say, one notch? >> it's one notch but they're saying within two years, they may go down another notch.

if they don't see enough spending cuts, if they don't see enough fiscal consolidation in washington. so they're giving a warning that we may not be done with this. so it's really quite a step. >> is their biggest concern long-term debt? >> yeah. they're worried about this debt overhang for the united states, absolutely, as a percentage of gdp, of gross domestic product. they're saying -- look, the economy is fairly uncertain. what if the economy shrinks and our debtload increases and puts the united states in an even more tenuous situation? >> what sort of impact will people at home, consumers feel, from this. >> well, it certainly is possible that some interest rates could rise from this. really, the more likely impact is that we could have more pressure on the stock market come monday morning. we've already had a horrific week. but this certainly is a blow to

the united states without question. in terms of the treasury market, right, that's where it should really hit. that, after all, is how the united states borrows money. we issue bonds, notes, short-term bills to investors. they give the united states their money and the united states says -- we'll pay you back with interest. so will people run away from those? well, unlikely. the full fate and credit of the united states still means quite a bit and, indeed, some other major nations have seen their credit rating cut and it didn't have all that much impact on those countries, including japan. >> in a moment i want to talk to you about what it may mean for states and fannie mae and freddie mac. whether they may face downgrades as well. i want to bring in john king. you've been talking to your sources in washington. was this a surprise for the obama white house? did they have much advanced

notice of this? >> around anderson this is what i'm told, at 1:30, s&p sent word they were planning to make this decision. i'm told treasury analysts quickly caught what they caught a glaring mistake and they say, and this is the administration's view, s&p overestimated future deficits by $2 trillion because they made a miscalculations -- from a congressional budget office report. the administration says s&p then acknowledged the mistake, went back and redid its analysis and still came back and said it was going ahead with the downgrade. i just talked to a senior administration official who was very frustrated, anderson and he said -- remember this is embarrassing to the administration so you can understand the frustration -- he said, these guys nation congress look good. this is a damn the facts approach that the administration believes it countered with steady numbers and then the administration official shrugged and said, nothing we can do about it. we'll see what the markets do on

monday. >> and politically, john, obviously for the obama white house, right or wrong, this is not good news at all? >> it's embarrassing, to be the president of the united states. to have your credit rating downgraded. obviously the administration will say, moody's didn't do this and fitch didn't do it, the other two agencies. but here's the bigger risk. it's embarrassing for the president. today we just saw again, a relatively anemic. people were cheering it because recent economic news has been so bad. but a relatively anemic unemployment report. the rate ticked down a little bit. the last thing the president needs is any further uncertainty. bad news in the u.s. economy and guess what? this credit raiding could and emphasis on "could" if the government's borrowing is higher credit card rates could get higher. this could impact consumers even though they don't have anything to do with it, it could impact consumers and if it slows consumer spending just a little,

that slows the recovery a little and that hurts the president, not only as the president of the united states, it hurts him significantly as a candidate for re-election in which the slow economy and his promises to make things better are going to be the defining issue in the campaign. >> allan chernoff, how likely is it that moody's might then re-assess things? >> i don't think they're necessarily going to move because s&p has moved. moody's came out this week after the deal was done between congress and the president. and they said we're not touching it just yet. doesn't mean they may not move at some point in the future, but they may not move immediately just because s&p has. >> how quickly is it possible that they might re-assess this and if things improved, upgrade the credit rating? >> s&p you're referring to? >> yeah, s&p. >> that's not likely at all. this is really quite a damning report. i don't think we can anticipate that at all. s&p is criticizing the political

brinkmanship here. they're saying we seek, quote, americans governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective and less predictable than what we previously believed. and then they go on to say, medicare was barely touched in this deal and they say in the report that they believe cutting medicare is key to long-term fiscal sustainability. or at least, minor policy changes are not enough and we need to see changes to entitlement. we need to see that to have long-term fiscal stability. >> is it possible, allan that government things like freddie mac and fannie mae could be affected? >> i don't think we'll see an immediate impact. they have the implicit backing of the united states and right now the u.s. does own those entities and there's so much money already invested in them.

i don't think this necessarily leads to any impact on freddi or fanny. >> our coverage will continue and we'll be right back. [ male announcer ] members of the american postal workers union handle more than 165 billion letters and packages a year. that's about 34 million pounds of mail every day. ever wonder what this costs you as a taxpayer? millions? tens of millions? hundreds of millions? not a single cent. the united states postal service doesn't run on your tax dollars. it's funded solely by stamps and postage.

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the breaking news tonight, credit rating agency, standard & poors has downgraded the prestein credit rating of the united states. now it's a double-a. we have john king and allan

chernoff and the president and coo of the comeback america initiative. david walker, in terms of hoping america comes back this is certainly bad news. what was your reaction? >> well i'm not totally surprised, anderson. the fact is in april, s&p had a downgrade on the outlook for the u.s. credit rating and they made it very clear they were looking for at least a $4 trillion reduction in the projected deficit over the next ten years. and while congress properly raised the debt ceiling limit to avoid a technical default, the deal they came up with is 2 toin 1 to $2.4 trillion and that's just not enough. and so i'm not surprised. but i don't necessarily expect moody's and fitch to follow this immediately. they may wait to see what this super committee does. >> do you think this changes anything? do you think consumers are going to feel the impact of this in the short term? >> well, the real question is,

obviously, it has a psychological impact. this is the first time in the history of the united states we've not been a triple-a credit rating but the more practical thing is what it will do to interest rates. and we won't know that until a few days because ultimately we need to keep in mind, for every 1% increase in interest rates, which is 100 basis points, that's about $150 billion a year additional interest for which we get nothing. so it's only time that will tell how we'll be affected and interest rates that affect the u.s. government can ultimately ripple throughout the economy which is not good news given our weak economic condition already. >> so the message you think for this for people on capitol hill, for politics left and right, republican and democrat? >> the message is, they need to start doing their job and earning their pay. the fact is, it's been absolutely embarrassing how much time has been spent on raising

this debt ceiling limit and then they punted on all the big four issues. medicare, medicaid, social security and tax reform. it's time to start making tough choices. and we're all going to pay a price if they don't. >> john king is joining us. john, in terms of the impact on capitol hill, right now capitol hill has adjourned. these folks are away for five weeks. any chance of this motivating them coming back? or some sort of breaking of log jams? breaking of this bottleneck? >> you won't see them come back from their recess. not due back until afellay bore day but david walker made an important point when he talked about the super committee. the bill that was just passed, the super committee is charged with coming up with at least $1.5 billion more. most people thought that's all they would do because of the contentious politics. we saw how difficult it was just

to get this deal. the possible political impact of this s&p decision -- and this is what the administration said in the pushback -- the administration was asking s&p, wait. don't do this now. wait and see how the super committee deal works out. they may trim medicare and other entitlements. they may trim more spending. let's make this decision in november or december, not now in august. the committee is charged with at least $1.5 trillion. this is awe pretty strong argument to make that the floor, not the ceiling. will they have the political will to go for $2 trillion more or $2.5 trillion more or $3 trillion more to get where s&p wanted to be in the $4 trillion range? that requires a lot of political will months before we turn the calendar into a big year. not just presidential but congressional. we need to get back to aaa and we better do a good job. >> and with a presidential election coming up it's impossible not to talk about this as a political issue.

wolf, you imagine politicians are thinking of how they'll ta talk about this on the campaign trail come this presidential election. how do you think this plays out? >> i expect the presidential candidates will all start blaming the president of the united states. they'll say, look, this happened on his watch. he's the commander-in-chief. he's the president and he's to blame for allowing the united states, for the first time ever to be see its aaa rate going down to aa. they'll have another argument, the democrats and president, look what the tea party activists have done by forcing the u.s. into this situation by avoiding the issue of tax reform, let's say, or tax revenue or increases for the wealthiest mention, eliminating the loopholes for the biggest corporations. subsidies and stuff like that so the argument we've been hearing, they are simply going to be