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This post by Jill Schlesinger originally appeared on CBS' MoneyWatch.com.

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Full disclosure: I'm genetically programmed to be a bear. My father, who traded for three decades on the floor of the American Stock Exchange, passed this gene on to me, along with the ability to put a soccer ball in the back of a net.


My natural inclination to distrust markets has served me well - it's prevented me from jumping on bull market bandwagons and becoming ensnared in a bear trap. But I've also missed some golden opportunities. But that's the deal - you can't have it both ways and for over two decades, I've found that losing less on the downside is better for me than making it big on the upside.

But I started to sense that the tide was turning during the spring. In fact, right after I wrote about soaring stock prices, I had a sober conversation with inner-bear. The discussion led to this video.

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Caption: Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, who is "worried" about U.S. debt


If your boss slashes your pay, if you have no savings because you spent more than you earned for many years, and if your creditors are threatening to cut off your credit cards and home equity loan, what happens?

The answer, of course, is that you're in serious trouble. And this could be the situation for the U.S. government -- which is facing lower income tax receipts and ballooning deficits -- if China loses its appetite for extending more and more loans by buying U.S. Treasury securities.

China is the single largest foreign holder of U.S. Treasurys. The money it lends to the Feds finances our significant budget deficits. (Americans have been paying about $450 billion a year in interest on the national credit card; without that debt to pay off, personal income taxes could be almost 40 percent lower.)

But in Beijing on Friday, Premier Wen Jiabao told reporters that he was worried about the U.S. becoming something of a, well, deadbeat. "We have made a huge amount of loans to the United States. Of course we are concerned about the safety of our assets. To be honest, I'm a little bit worried," Wen said. "I would like to call on the United States to honor its words, stay a credible nation and ensure the safety of Chinese assets."

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