Are all products "made in China" equally bad for the environment?

Everyone is talking this week about the smog in Beijing, which got me wondering: Many of the things I buy, from my kids' toys to my washing machine, come from China. Am I responsible for the dirty air in Beijing?

The Lantern is on the scene at the Olympics, and he'll start with the good news: Compared with a year ago, the city's air does feel cleaner, and newly planted trees and shrubs line the streets. (It certainly helps a bit to shut down production in local factories and keep 1 million cars off the street.)

Beijing's air pollution has still been recorded at levels above World Health Organization standards, and as China's environmental challenges go, that's just a small part of the problem. Last year, the World Bank calculated that air pollution was responsible for at least 350,000 premature deaths in China each year—and that may be a low estimate. Over half the water in China's seven main rivers has been deemed unsafe for consumption (PDF), and its sources of clean water are at a major risk of running dry. Meanwhile, China has already overtaken the United States as the world's leading emitter of carbon dioxide, by some calculations, with its carbon footprint still growing rapidly.