Protectionist tendancies

I've been getting a lot of conflicting messages from the world at large recently. On the one hand, everyone has been saying how bad protectionism is, except maybe for Paul Krugman, who argues (just to be intellectually honest, he claims) that there is an economic case for it, although even he doesn't recommend that route, given the current political economy. Everyone was up in arms when the American stimulus bill included a "Buy American" policy, forcing the Senate to water down their stance to state that those provisions should be "applied in a manner consistent with United States obligations under international agreements."

It seems like everyone agrees that in theory, no one should engage in beggar thy neighbour policies or engage in a race to the bottom. In practice, however, it's a different story. Sarkozy was caught out when he criticized French automakers for outsourcing production to the Czech Republic. Europe is now taxing American biodisel, and right here in Malaysia, we have the PM and MCA, among others, urging us to Buy Malaysian. Seems like it's alright to protest protectionism when others are threatening to implement it, and when it affects you and your exports directly, but it's ok to protect your own lot. The ironic thing is, Asean countries recently reaffirmed their commitment to anti-protectionism at the last Summit.

All these conflicting messages are giving me a headache. All I can say is, treat others like you would like to be treated yourself. It's the golden rule for a reason.

On another related note, Malaysian companies were told to retrench foreign workers first in an effort to protect Malaysian jobs. But what of Malaysians working overseas? Won't the same policies implemented overseas affect us? That kind of major job reshuffling isn't going to help anyone. It's not exactly protectionism, but the same principles apply, don't you think?