One simple - too simple? - graph to explain US economy's performance

The graph comes from Thomson Datastream via Derek Thompson of TheAtlantic.com - and it shows that the US economy's performance over the last five years was better than that of comparable developed countries: a shallower recession with a faster recovery. Thompson attributes this performance to the facts that:

(a) control our own currency and (b) used aggressive monetary policy to save the banks and lower interest rates while running high deficits.

Do you agree? What's your interpretation of the graph?