Sign of the times

Just how crappy is our economy? You might not notice if you're in Pittsburgh, because we are the city of (occasional) sunshine, jobs, bright-colored bridges and hope. Even the people in the city are getting better looking than they did in the 80's and 90's. The guys all don't have mullets and the ladies all don't look like Alan Faneca, which is clutch. But if you're residing in a city like, say, Detroit, you know how bad it is.

Or if you're living in a nation that is doing better than we are, and is heavily invested in us. Then you can't be fooled as easily as we are. Or, at least, you have no qualms laughing at our Secretary of Treasury, which is something we as Americans haven't done yet; to his face, anyways.

Via Reuters,

U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner on Monday reassured the Chinese government that its huge holdings of dollar assets are safe and reaffirmed his faith in a strong U.S. currency.

"Chinese assets are very safe," Geithner said in response to a question after a speech at Peking University, where he studied Chinese as a student in the 1980s.

His answer drew loud laughter from his student audience, reflecting scepticism in China about the wisdom of a developing country accumulating a vast stockpile of foreign reserves instead of spending the money to raise living standards at home.

So let me get this straight: in a country where people used to desperately escape to make it to our golden shores of hard work and prosperity, the US economy is now a laughing stock.

Great!