Opinion: As Butterstick Goes, So Goes the Nation?

So this is what being in hock up to our eyeballs to China looks like? Panda-less American zoos?

Today, the National Zoo announced that it was sending the much beloved, internationally famous panda Butterstick -- official name Tai Shan -- to China.

Ann Batdorf, Smithsonian Institution / AP

Butterstick is heading back to China.

Even though Butterstick was born here in 2005, he was technically borrowed from China, as were the cub's parents, Mei Xiang and Tian Tian. And unless China grants an extension, the zoo will also have to send back those loaners next year, leaving the National Zoo without any pandas. (Zoos in Atlanta, Memphis and San Diego still have the creatures, also on loan.)

No big deal, really, except for those who like the fact that you can see pandas for free at the National Zoo, or those who think that having more pandas roaming around cages in the U.S. somehow makes us a better country.

But in the broader context -- the one where the U.S. doesn't owe the Chinese just a handful of black and white bears but about 800 billion in greenbacks -- the news lends itself to snarkiness.

DC gossip site Wonkette put it this way: "The Washington Post reports: 'Although he has felt like ours since his birth at the zoo on July 9, 2005, he has always been Chinese property.' Ha ha, you could kind of say the same thing about the entirety of the United States of America!"

On Twitter, Blake Hounshell tweeted "More bowing to Beijing? Butterstick is headed back to China. (kidding, that was always part of the deal)"

Adam Swerver tweeted that he's "Convinced Obama sold out Butterstick for emissions targets and pressure on Iran."

Mattyglesias was more succinct: "Appeasement!"

Not exactly.

But then again, there is a legitimate question in all this: What will we have to send to China when it starts demanding all its money back?