Protectionism in the Untied States originates in Alexander Hamilton's Report on Manufactures. On page 37 of the copy in the link Hammy discusses how a combination of tariffs and subsidies (or bounties) would enable fledging American industries to grow. The idea that American should protect certain industries for various reasons has been around ever since. However, since Richard Nixon the idea has lost nearly all serious support. In fact the few pockets where it remains are in Michigan, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, states where Barack Obama decided that heavy pandering was needed in order to get some votes to win the nomination. Now that he has it, he has decided his first position was a bit extreme.
Barack Obama has stated:
"Ten years after NAFTA passed, Senator Clinton said it was good for America," Obama said. "Well, I don't think NAFTA has been good for America—and I never have.""Now, if we're honest with ourselves, we'll acknowledge that we can't stop globalization in its tracks and that some of these jobs aren't coming back," he said. "But what I refuse to accept is that we have to stand idly by while workers watch their jobs get shipped overseas."
Further, in a debate he threatened:
we should use the hammer of a potential opt-out as leverage to ensure that we actually get labor and environmental standards that are enforced
John McCain has a press release that reads:
For months, Barack Obama said that he would 'make sure that we renegotiate' NAFTA, demanded unilateral changes and threatened to unilaterally withdraw if he did not get his way. Barack Obama knew better. America has not had a protectionist president since Herbert Hoover...
The Congressional Budget Office states in a report that the GDP in America has actually increased albeit mildly because of NAFTA.
So, if it is actually making things better, then why is the Senator from Illinois against it? Nina Easton had the same question in her article in Fortune Magazine:
"Sometimes during campaigns the rhetoric gets overheated and amplified," he conceded, after I reminded him that he had called NAFTA "devastating" and "a big mistake," despite nonpartisan studies concluding that the trade zone has had a mild, positive effect on the U.S. economy.Does that mean his rhetoric was overheated and amplified? "Politicians are always guilty of that, and I don't exempt myself," he answered.
Obama says he believes in "opening up a dialogue" with trading partners Canada and Mexico "and figuring to how we can make this work for all people."
So we are all in agreement, NAFTA is good, protectionism is bad, and it only took a general election contest to get to it.