I hit my limit when I had to throw out my son's Thomas the Tank Engine toys last April. Luckily, I didn't have to throw out poisoned toothpaste, bury a poisoned pet, or attend the funeral of someone who died ingesting a counterfeit medication.

I also feel lucky compared with attendees I spoke with at the Managing Automation Progressive Manufacturing Summit who shared war stories about bottles that shatter when stacked, components that come coated with grease that has to be cleaned out before being used, mislabeled supplies that require costly restocking, and other ills that seem endemic to the global reliance on Chinese manufacturing.

But blaming China really isn't my point. The recent bad news from China is a symptom of a greater ill sweeping American manufacturing: a lack of regulation, from the supplier all the way to the buyer. This is threatening not only our children and our profitability, but also the thin lifeline that keeps U.S. manufacturers alive in a cut-throat global economy.

This lack of regulation is somehow made to look like a good thing by the National Association of Manufacturers, which claims to represent U.S. manufacturing. Yet, NAM is more beholden to a long-established — and highly flawed — political agenda that has little, if anything, to do with making America a safer place for manufacturing. It's no wonder that more progressive voices, such as the Alliance for American Manufacturing, the Coalition for a Stronger FDA, and the FDA Alliance, are emerging to advocate a more centrist — and sensible — public policy on regulation and other issues.

Pat Cleary, NAM's recently departed head of communications, speaking at the 2006 Progressive Manufacturing Summit, made NAM's position on energy clear: If we could gut our environmental laws and drill for oil in Alaska, inexpensive oil would solve a host of problems for manufacturers. This ignores the realities of energy pricing — which is based on global, not local, market prices — and the fact that higher energy prices can be positive for manufacturing, particularly companies in the oil industry and those targeting green industries and alternatives to oil and gas.

Some would argue that advocating more regulation is useless, that U.S. regulators can't make a difference in China. But we have no choice. A laissez-faire regulatory environment inside our borders can, at a minimum, be policed by whistle-blowers, the press, and watchdog agencies, though the minimum is clearly not enough. But China has no such openness. The Chinese government regularly stonewalls — or worse — anyone who tries to expose the unregulated activities of its criminally negligent manufacturers. It is up to us to police what arrives on our shores, as well as what becomes of those goods once they enter our supply chains.

Meanwhile, I still cringe when my 18-month-old son puts any of his Thomas toys in his mouth for a good chew. I can only hope that the initial recall covered every possible lead-poisoned toy. RC2 Corp., which builds Thomas products using a Chinese supply chain, should cringe, too. Between the lax American regulatory regime promoted by the likes of NAM and the lax regulatory regime defended by the Chinese government, all RC2 and I can do is pray that my son and millions of other children across the globe aren't ingesting lead. There has to be a better, safer way.