Protectionism is on a roll in the United States and, predictably, Australia's closet protectionists are finding their voice.
Christopher Pyne is the Federal Minister for Industry and therefore the Turnbull government's ex officio protectionist and patron saint of rent seekers.
Every government has to have one - and who better fitted for the role in the Turnbull government than Pyne? 
He represents South Australia, a state built on protectionism - from the highly protected car and white goods industries to steel, warships and now proof that governments don't pick winners but losers pick governments: the submarines.
All of this economic waste is presided over by Pyne and a state Labor government that is itself generously subsidised by taxpayers in the other states.
According to Pyne, there is no reason why Australia should be the "main shining knight" on free trade in the world, but it does need to play within the rules of the World Trade Organisation and our free-trade agreements in the political scramble to keep the steel industry going.
He is now promising to protect the steel industry against "unfair" dumping, which in fact is just the price discounting that Austrade has long promoted to Australian exporters as a sensible extension of the competitive practices routinely employed in Australia.
Pyne, of course, must run to keep up with Bill Shorten, who appears to have devoured the Trump and Clinton songbooks and is promising a six-point plan to protect Australian manufacturing jobs within the first 100 days of his prime ministership.
Fortunately for Pyne, Shorten and the South Australians, there are sufficient loopholes in the World Trade Organisation, and our so-called free-trade agreements are unlikely to be a serious impediment to their protectionist objectives.
The next US president will lead the protectionist charge. There won't be anything as confronting as a 1930s-style tariff wall. But there will be pressure on countries to "voluntarily" limit their exports, and the more extensive recourse to temporary trade barriers such as the Obama administration's 2009 use of the US Trade Act safeguard provisions to put hefty import duties on Chinese tyres after complaints from US unions. And, of course, there will be more anti-dumping actions.
The Americans can just about boast the world's worst practice when it comes to the misuse of anti-dumping action. According to Australia's Productivity Commission, nearly 4 per cent of US imports were covered by anti-dumping measures in 2011, and average duty levels are estimated to exceed 40 per cent.
But Australia has been a good pupil. The commission has shown how the anti-dumping assistance has become increasingly captured by the steel industry and used to erect a wall of protection against the competitive pressures of the global market. "Arrium recently advised its shareholders that 65 per cent of its sales base was subject to anti-dumping investigations and that it was examining whether further applications were appropriate," it says.
Steel products accounted for 86 per cent of new investigations during 2014-15 and now make up more than 60 per cent of all measures in force. The average dumping and countervailing duty currently in place in Australia is 17 per cent, more than three times greater than the general tariff rate of 5 per cent.
Anti-dumping or countervailing measures typically remain in place for five years. But, like their American counterparts, Australian politicians know how to turn a system of temporary relief into a longer-term wall of protection. Some notable examples include the anti-dumping action against imports of ammonium nitrate from Russia and Estonia (15 years), against brandy from France (applied with some breaks from 1995 to 2012) and polyvinyl chloride homopolymer resin from the US and Japan (23 years).
Unlike some other countries, Australia has no inconvenient requirement for the authorities to consider whether anti-dumping action is in the national interest.
That's no simple oversight. Anti-dumping duties increase the costs, and undermine the competitiveness, of all Australian industries that consume steel. While protecting jobs in steel, they undermine jobs across the economy.
But that is the last thing the steel industry and its political friends want drawn to the public's attention.
Perhaps the national interest will get more consideration in Canberra after the federal election. If so, the best way to deal with the new protectionist mood in the US is not to copy it.
Instead it is to unilaterally open the Australian economy to as much trade as is politically possible. If we can't dissuade the Americans from protecting their weak industries, we can at least make sure that Australia's scarce resources are being used as productively as possible given the distortions being imposed the US and the other major economies.
Of course there will be arguments about how long the distortions will last, and whether we should adjust or wait. But in nearly every case that should be a commercial decision -a matter between by the Arriums and their banks.P