What a study in contrasts it was when leader-in-waiting Vice-President Xi Jinping went travelling this month. In Washington he was awarded all the paraphernalia of respect, with red carpet, a gun salute, fanfare, glittering banquets, a meeting in the Oval Office with President Barack Obama, plus separate sessions with Vice-President Joe Biden and the secretaries of state, treasury, defence, agriculture and commerce.
But there was also a nervous edge. As Britain's Daily Telegraph newspaper headlined it, Xi was 'wined, dined ... and warned'. All the fanfare and respect in the world could not match the warmth that welcomed Xi on his next stop in Ireland, a hundred thousand welcomes, as the Irish traditionally say.
Power-mongers in Washington should take a leaf from the Irish playbook if they wish to win friends and influence people in Beijing. This is not merely a political point, but economic advice - as one of America's most distinguished think tanks recently acknowledged.
David Marchick, the managing director and global head of external affairs at the Carlyle Group, pointed out in a policy memorandum for the US Council on Foreign Relations that the visit of Xi to the US offered a great opportunity to establish a new economic framework that could help to rebalance the global economy.
'Creating a positive framework will help mitigate the inevitable stresses on the US-China relationship as leaders in both political parties sharpen their anti-China rhetoric during the 2012 US election,' Marchick wrote.
His presentation, part of the 'Renewing America' series by the think tank, particularly advocates fostering greater Chinese investment in the US.