U.S. Is on Verge of Losing Financial Reputation

What's a good reputation worth?

To you, at work, maybe your job; if you're suddenly Tiger Woods, maybe your marriage. And if you're the U.S. government, maybe your financial future.

Because, don't look now, but Uncle Sam is on the verge of losing his financial reputation: The stuff that made him — and by extension us — unique, special; money in the bank, if you will.

For as long as anyone can remember, this country's always enjoyed a triple-A credit rating. That's the highest you can get, sort of like a FICO credit score over 800: good as gold.

Folks with high credit scores score something else: the best loans, the best mortgages, the best deals. Countries with triple-A credit scores score too: the most investment, the most foreign interest, the most security.

Countries and companies feel confident lending to those with high financial scores because they're usually confident the money they lend will be returned, so they keep lending. Until maybe they're not so confident, because a ratings agency says the folks to whom they're lending aren't so risk-free.

An agency like Moody's warning Tuesday that the U.S. needs to get its fiscal house in order.

Or what?

Risk losing its coveted triple-A credit rating, that's what!

You know what's got Moody's moody? Our debt; now nearly 84 percent of our GDP and likely close to 98 percent by next year.

We've never owed so much; basically because we've never spent so much on stimulus and rescues and bailouts and takeovers. And I'm not even including the additional stimulus they're still planning and the health care reform they're still intent on doing.

Bottom line, friends: We're deadbeats; which is to say, we either beat this or we're dead. A triple-A threat because, I hate to break it to you, we're now all officially triple-A losers.

Rate it and weep.

— Watch Neil Cavuto weekdays at 4 p.m. ET on "Your World with Cavuto" and send your comments to cavuto@foxnews.com