Recession in US

So the whole world is crying about recession in US. or known as housing recession in the United States. Do you know what recession is? According to wikipedia -

"A recession is a contraction phase of the business cycle. The U.S. based National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) defines a recession more broadly as "a significant decline in economic activity spread across the economy, lasting more than a few months, normally visible in real GDP, real income, employment, industrial production, and wholesale-retail sales." A sustained recession may become a depression.

American newspapers often quote the rule of thumb that a recession occurs when real gross domestic product (GDP) growth is negative for two or more consecutive quarters. This measure fails to register several official (NBER defined) US recessions"

The whole world is going down in the grip f this recession. Banks are failing, companies are reporting losses, import expot are decreasing, stock markets are crashing.. So is it the enf of US being the king of the world? Will Indi and China use this opportunity to come on the top of this world?