PetroChina passes Exxon as China revs up its economy

Henry Kissinger must be wondering whether he did the right thing when he opened up U.S. relations with China back in the 1970s. Now the two countries are in some ways the same -- or at least they're so dependent on each other economically that the failure of one means they both go down. In a sense, the two countries have a form of economic mutually assured destruction.

Or at least that seemed true until the recent economic collapse. The U.S. remains exceptionally dependent on China to buy debt -- China leads the world with $1.2 trillion in Treasuries or U.S. government agency debt -- and China used to depend on the U.S. to buy its cheap goods. But now China's economic stimulus plan seems to be working by boosting Chinese consumer demand, while the U.S. stimulus plan has not done the same.