China and America, as the two current hegemons, are inevitably cast on adversarial sides. That's the neat story. Plenty still remain enamoured with the sound-bitey Thucydides Trap, a notion built on such shoddy selection bias that it reeks of Bronze Age thinking. But peel away the rhetoric and the bluster, and Chinese and Americans are very similar peoples: Both are enterprising and pragmatic, respect hard work, and chase prosperity. They are also so thoroughly capitalistic that in either country, every rule is quickly examined for its arbitrage. (I know this from decades on both sides, with as many American friends as Chinese) Both modern nations were forged in revolt against empire, and both began with a genuine streak of idealism. And on both sides, the quality of people varies enormously. The smartest and the dumbest people I know are American. In the crowded field of China punditry, some Americans who have lived there for decades understand our own story better than many of us do. Yet, as ever, the loudest pundits tend to be the least informed. certainly no meritocratic filter on the megaphone. If we refrain from the easy temptation to bicker for a moment, we can stay on the cosier end of the frenemyship. And perhaps China can even help mediate the American-Canadian relationship!