The economy is now staring eyeball-to-eyeball with an activist U.S. government. It will legislate, reform, supervise, bully, give out money like cotton candy and get concessions in return.

The Russian ruble fell yesterday (Monday) to levels not seen since the 1998 banking crisis, as the nation’s central bank devalued the currency for the sixth time in seven days. The devaluation is seen as a sign of further deterioration in the Russian economy and comes despite government efforts to orchestrate an orderly retreat.

We all know the U.S. government is in debt up to its eyeballs. Moody’s is already threatening to downgrade the country’s debt rating due to unfunded liabilities for Medicare and Social Security.

China’s foreign currency reserves soared to a world-leading $1.68 trillion at the end of March, and that has the government scrambling for ways to keep the torrents of incoming money from stoking an inflation rate that’s already at its highest in more than a decade.

Should Chinese money be bailing out U.S. companies? That’s one of the topics of the widely respected news show “60 Minutes” airing tonight (Sunday). Unfortunately, I’ll be out celebrating my sister-in-law’s 47th birthday tonight, so I’m going to miss it.