"Uncertainty about the resolution of these fiscal issues could itself undermine business and household confidence," the central bank chairman said. "Fortunately, avoiding the fiscal cliff and achieving long-term fiscal sustainability are fully compatible and mutually reinforcing objectives."

Ratings service Fitch also jumped in, repeating its warning that it would cut the U.S. debt rating if Congress doesn't resolve its various budgetary problems. Fitch analyst Ed Parker said the U.S. is the only one of four AAA-rated countries that "does not have a credible fiscal consolidation plan."

Yet investment pros have talked little about the danger the fiscal cliff poses to the stock market . Most research has focused on the economic reports of the day, bond and commodity prices and, of course, the damage that a breakdown of the euro zone will bring to the global economy.

"The market is reacting to whatever the market presents itself with on any given day," said Quincy Krosby, chief market strategist at Prudential Annuities in Newark, N.J. "Bernanke cares (about the cliff), serious economists care, but they are not the ones who rule the market."

Those who do care about the predicament in Washington seem unwilling to confront a future where Congress, which remains divided on party lines, seems unwilling to agree on even the smallest measures, much less on charting the fiscal future of a slow-growth economy.

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