The International Herald Tribune reports that the World Trade Organization (WTO) has ruled that the US tariffs imposed by the Bush (II) administration are protectionist and therefore not compliant with the WTO agreements on tariffs and treaties.

This isn't surprising, since the tariffs are protectionist, and were shocking to most of the world (including free trade advocates in the US) when they were originally enacted over a year ago.

The WTO has provided the full text of the report (about 900 pages in length) on their web site.

The administration is appealing (although on what grounds I know not), and the EU is threatening to impose $2.2B in tariffs immediately upon the loss of said appeal unless the existing tariffs in the US are dropped.

If we were lucky, the administration would come to its senses and drop the tariffs, but that's unlikely to happen.