I am loving this Churchill quote from a Seeking Alpha post:

Americans will always do the right thing, after they have exhausted all the alternatives

Here's hoping he had more insight into American habits than, say, this guy.

But seriously, while not nearly as fabulous as its kicker quote, the rest of the post is a decent read in its own right. Granted, the take-away is nothing new, if you subscribe to today's conventional wisdom of cautious optimism. That, of course, would be that things are not going to be hunky dory for a good long while, but we'll all probably figure this out without having to resort to a hunter-gatherer model of existence. Point taken. But here's some interesting stuff worth noting: take a look at the GDP graph near the bottom. The U.S. still accounts for nearly a quarter of global GDP, more than Japan, China, and Germany combined (numbers 2, 3, and 4, respectively, on the economic big dog list). To be sure, that tells us more about the status quo than the future, and anyone who hasn't been living under a rock this year knows those are two very different things. But look how Mr. Scott ties those numbers in with info on decoupling just below. The supposed up-and-comers are still too dependent on America's spring-break-style consumption habits to drastically change that breakdown.

I hate to cheerlead. Complacency is the last thing Americans need right now, especially since the overall point of the post is that the green shoots talk is premature at best. But for frayed American nerves, the numbers should have a calming effect. Amid the past year's constant chatter about rising Asian tigers and disgraced blue-eyed bankers, they're useful reminders that the rising rest still has a heck of a climb ahead of it. Team America may yet prove good old Winston right.

Welcome to Shangkong: A year or two ago, New York and London battled each other to be crowned seat of global finance. But, writing in the Financial Times, Yale professor (and regular Newsweek International contributor) Jeffrey Garten argues that, "once the global recovery begins, New York and London might be vying less with one another than with a new competitor in the form of a partnership between Hong Kong and Shanghai – call it 'Shangkong' – a highly consequential shift of financial gravity to the east."

We Prefer Netflix, Anyway: You've heard of zombie banks, so how about a zombie video company? Blockbuster Inc. is being kept alive by a generous credit line from JP Morgan, even though the company has only made money once since 1997.

Speaking of Zombies: James Surowiecki at the New Yorker casts doubt on the whole zombie bank idea. Invoking Japan's "lost decade" is an easy but inaccurate way to frighten people about the direness of our current predicament, he says.

Communists Can't Outspend Capitalists: A lengthy but highly informative status report on the Chinese economy, courtesy of Bloomberg (the company, not the mayor).