Some of Reagan's actual policies on free trade (but then why let facts get in the way of a good story?):
http://www.mises.org/freemarket_detail.asp?control=489&sortorder=articledate
The administration has thus far:
* Forced Japan to accept restraints on auto exports;
* Tightened considerably the quotas on imported sugar;
* Negotiated to increase the restrictiveness of the Multifiber Arrangement governing trade in textiles and apparel;
* Required 18 countries, including Brazil, Spain, South
* Korea, Japan, Mexico, South Africa, Finland, Australia, and the European Community, to accept "voluntary restraint agreements" that reduce their steel imports to the United States;
* Imposed a 45% duty on Japanese motorcycles for the benefit of Harley Davidson, which admitted that superior
* Japanese management was the cause of its problems;
* Raised tariffs on Canadian lumber and cedar shingles;
* Forced the Japanese into an agreement to control the price of computer memory chips;
* Removed third-world countries on several occasions from the duty-free import program for developing nations;
* Pressed Japan to force its automakers to buy more American-made parts;
* Demanded that Taiwan, West Germany, Japan, and Switzerland restrain their exports of machine tools;
* Accused the Japanese of dumping roller bearings on grounds that the price did not rise to cover a fall in the value of the yen;
* Accused the Japanese of dumping forklift trucks and color picture tubes;
* Extended quotas on imported clothes pins;
* Failed to ask Congress to end the ban on the export of Alaskan oil and timber cut from federal lands;
* Redefined dumping so domestic firms can more easily charge foreign competitors with unfair trade practices;
* Beefed-up the Export-Import Bank, an institution dedicated to distorting the American economy at the expense of the American people in order to artificially promote exports of eight large corporations.
Love your tagline : "California, Mexico's HMO.". ;>P
Like most post-war presidents, Reagan championed free trade while selectively deviating from it. Critics of trade note correctly that Reagan negotiated "voluntary" import quotas for steel and Japanese cars and imposed Section 201 tariffs on imported motorcycles to protect Harley-Davidson. All true. But those were the exceptions and not the rule. They were tactical retreats designed to defuse rising protectionists pressures in Congress.
Fair point, no doubt. Sometimes, even those who know better, feel the need to throw some bones to the wolves chasing the sleigh, to deflect them from doing real damage.