What was supposed to happen? Guaranteed price supports for steel, so that the rest of the economy gets to subsidize them? A ban on importing steel (which is exactly the same thing)? Direct government subsidies, so that steel plants can continue to operate at a loss?
One industry produces steel. Dozens of industries use steel. Keeping the price of steel artificially high benefits the steelworkers' union, at the expense of the whole rest of the country.
Who let American Steel die? It wasn't Congress, and it wasn't foreign governments. It was the steel industry itself, by assuming that the good times would last forever, and the steelworkers' unions, by demanding the same power no matter what happened.
It isn't a hopeless prospect to manufacture steel in America. Dozens of "minimills" have sprung up in the shadow of the dead steel giants, because they use modern technology and non-union labor. But it is a hopeless prospect to run U.S. Steel or Bethlehem Steel under the assumption that it's going to be 1955 forever.
You'd best Google NuCor and read the last few statements they've made...they are NOT doing well at all.
Come up with another excuse for the steel problem besides unions (that's irrelevant) and 1955.
Hint: X42 is a traitor for allowing PNTR/MFN for Red China in the first place, and GWB has his head stuck firmly where the sun doesn't shine on the issue of FAIR trade.