Why PROTECTIONISM works. Case in point: China.

[pampango]

13. Across-the-board tariff increases were a "republican thing" for 100 years unti Reagan.

Punitive tariffs in cases where a country is not living up to its commitments on trade should be and is official Obama (though not Bush) policy.

Of course, the US has more punitive tariffs imposed on it than any other country including China. So lets not pretend that we live up to our word in every trade commitment we have ever made.

"The U.S. uses more than 300 anti- dumping and countervailing duty orders to shield American-made goods, from honey to bedroom furniture, against global competition it deems unfair and damaging to U.S. companies. About half the orders target iron and steel products.

China accounts for a third of all U.S. actions on imports, the most of any country, including about 100 anti-dumping and more than two dozen countervailing duty orders, according to the U.S. trade commission.

The Obama administration filed a trade complaint against China at the World Trade Organization in December 2010 over its support for wind-energy manufacturers through aid tied to the use of locally produced content. China agreed to end hundreds of millions of dollars in such subsidies, the U.S. trade office said in June."

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-12-29/u-s-wind-tower-companies-seek-duties-against-china-vietnam-1-.html

And from wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tariffs_in_United_States_history

"Woodrow Wilson (D) made a drastic lowering of tariff rates a major priority for his presidency.

When the Republicans (Harding followed by Coolidge and Hoover) regained power after the war they restored the usual high rates...with tariffs increases in 1921, 1922 and 1930.

Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Dealers made promises about lowering tariffs on a reciprocal country-by-country basis (which they did).

After the war the U.S. promoted the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) (initiated by FDR and signed by Truman) established in 1947, to minimize tariffs and other restrictions, and to liberalize trade

So, yeah, I did say that high tariffs "was a Republican thing". And low tariffs were a "Democratic thing" as evidenced by the policies of Wilson, FDR and Truman. Tariffs also rose under Eisenhower then fell under Kennedy and LBJ.

Would you argue that it wasn't "a Republican thing" until Reagan came along? (And tariffs actually rose during his 8 years - despite his rhetoric - so he wasn't that different from his republican predecessors in that sense.)

And, of course, high tariffs are still the preference for most right wing parties in Europe who apparently never got the Reagan message that conservatives were supposed to flip-flop over to being in favor of low tariffs on trade.