For all the fervor of the Tea Party and the anxiety of the middle class, Americans still adhere to a comforting story of the U.S. as the world’s sole superpower. If anything good comes out of this current morass, it will be that we’re one step closer to unraveling that outdated myth.

The financial crisis of 2008 disabused the rest of the world of the notion that the United States—whatever its limitations—was far and away superior at maneuvering the wheels of finance and capitalism. For a while, the denizens of the European Union enjoyed tut-tutting the Americans about their love affairs with derivatives and mortgages, until the EU itself plunged into chaos in 2010. The U.S. was exposed as the man behind the curtain, dispensing advice born of financial alchemy, but in the end just as susceptible to speculators and systemic failings.

That the “emerging” world came out of the 2008 crisis in much better financial shape was especially damning for Washington-centrism. The countries that learned hard financial lessons in past regional crises, such as Latin America in the 1970s or East Asian nations in the 1990s, held up remarkably well in the aftermath of the financial crisis, especially compared to the United States and Europe. Aware that they were weathering the storms, they became more vocal in their criticism and skepticism of the Americans.

As the United States adopted an easy-money, low-rate policy in an attempt to shore up its ailing economic system, many in the developing world cried foul and accused the U.S. of engaging in a currency war. In 2010, when President Obama appeared in Seoul at the G20 summit, he was met not with the deference normally accorded the leader of the world’s largest economy but rather with lectures and even a hint of scorn. China’s deputy foreign minister admonished America to “realize its responsibility and obligation as a major currency issuing country, and take responsible macroeconomic policies.” Germany’s Angela Merkel was more diplomatic but still unequivocally rebuffed America’s calls for less austerity.

Then, in 2011, came a similar game of debt ceiling chicken. The world once again watched as the American political class encased itself in a hermetically-sealed bubble of folly and arrogance while it disregarded the deleterious effects on both its own prestige and the global financial system. One bout of inanity that tilts toward insanity can perhaps be written off as a bad moment. Two in the space of two years begins to look like a pattern.

This diminution is widely perceived as negative, but for now it is actually an extraordinary boon for the United States. It provides a much-needed opening to turn full attention to pressing domestic issues, such as the future of job creation and the nature of economic growth in the decades ahead. (Granted, this crisis is not exactly leading to solutions on domestic issues, but perhaps that will emerge in its wake.) The U.S. has too many unresolved issues, and the world has too many emerging centers of dynamism, for America to do otherwise.