Further, as manufacturing moves toward a more information-intensive, automated, and flexible future, it is returning to the US. With new materials, new techniques and demands for mass-customization, manufacturing will increasingly rely on knowledge, design capabilities, innovation and research.

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The irony, which seems to have been lost on Washington, is that an artificially low cost of capital (created by lenders who lost sight of risk management) got us into this mess in the first place, and now we're considering returning to easy money to get us out of it.

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It was far removed from the big news stories we kept returning to - the future of the Eurozone, the US presidential election and the alarming state of the global economy - but it packed an enormous emotional punch.

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