jeff mcallister, thank you for joining us. we have heard from china and even russia. we heard from our european countries and heads of global financial organizations saying washington essentially get your house in order. >> well, they're certainly right. this is not an edifying spectacle for anybody. this reminds me of the old churchhill quote, america can be counted on to do the right thing after it exhausted all the other measures. what is the message people take away from it? that in the end, sanity prevails, or is it that the american system is in a bad way and it is not really a world super power behaving the way it ought to? >> and so these countries were telling the u.s. essentially to try to find a way to manage its economy and its government. not from crisis to crisis but in a smooth way that won't rattle the world. those countries, perhaps less likely to be willing to take advice from the united states in the future. >> i think that is right. i mean, this is a fundamentally -- what is american power in the modern era when china is rising, and other countries