Bush goes shrimping

This is an odd action for somebody who is supposedly a free trader.

The Bush administration on Tuesday proposed tariffs on shrimp imports from China and Vietnam, finding that companies there were dumping frozen and canned warm-water shrimp products into the United States at artificially low prices.

I'm a fair trader, not a free trader. I don't think it's fair if other countries dump their goods onto some other market. And as long as the Bush administration isn't giving a free handout to his corporate buddies, I would have to support tariffs to protect other countries dumping on our markets. It's only fair, and I have to be consistant with my views. On that token, I wish the US would be consistant with its views on trade. First we're for free trade, then we want to slap down tariffs. Well, which is it? Free trade or no free trade? You can't have it both ways, especially when the US is also guilty of dumping our goods on other countries. Granted the report I link to details dumping from the Clinton era, I don't think the policies of the Bush administration have changed. No matter who's in office, the US seems to think that it can do whatever it wants as far as trade is concerned.