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t Walter Williams was talking about last week. Paraphrased, it went something like this: Bankruptcies are good as they mean that resources will be naturally reallocated elsewhere, where they will be put to better use than before. So instead of bailing out players in the markets, let other players come in and try their hand at doing a better, more efficient job.

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Right. Right. Right. It's called "Economic Darwinism". If you want to get a look at "protected" industries-- an their effect on a nation's economy-- just take a look at Japan, or, even worse, India.

And why all this handwringing over "dumping"? If other nations are desperate (or stupid) enough to sell us steel at below cost who are we not to take advantage of it? That's like someone offering to sell you a (US)dollar for 90c. What are you going to say? "No thanks, I'd rather go to the bank an pay $1.05 for it".

This is a poor analogy and a even more myopic view of economics and industry. Today these nations dump, because they are not profit driven, but employment driven.. in the process our profit driven industries are driven out of business, because they cannot compete. Now in 5 or 10 years when the economies of Japan or Korea eventually come out of depression and profits once again drive their industries, and their prices naturally rise, there is no domestic producer left to compete. You just exported Billions of dollars of wealth, destroyed untold numbers of jobs by destroying an entire domestic industry, and lord forbid a conflict break out, you now depend on foreign sources for a fundamental building block for industry, that can be cut off at any time...

Blanket "free trade" policies are some of the dumbest policies ever employed. It is a pity that this group has coopted the entire conservative side of the isle. If putting economics strictly before sovereignty is conservatism, then it is a sad sad day in america.