Last week several groups, including the United Steelworkers, petitioned the federal government to whack the latest trade mole – illegally traded auto parts from China.

With President Obama announcing creation of a new trade enforcement unit in his State of the Union Address, the feds probably will investigate. But even if they whack down the auto parts mole, experience has shown a new mole will pop up.

In 2010, over 350 members of the House agreed to a bill designed to punish China for their currency manipulation. In 2011, 68 members of the Senate agreed to a similar bill. But in a year-end report to Congress, the Treasury Department voiced their disagreement, refusing to label China a currency manipulator, instead opting for softer language around their failing to “reform” currency operations.

Yesterday, the Senate voted for cloture on a motion to proceed on a bill to discourage China’s currency manipulation, with a bipartisan 79-19 vote. But the White House would rather pursue its “free” trade bills with Columbia, Korea and Panama.

The Senate will vote on a motion to proceed on a bill addressing currency manipulators, targeted mainly at China. Supporters believe the bill would save money, create millions of jobs over time, and has bipartisan support.

Let’s review the bill together! The legislation is an amalgam of two different efforts. A bill co-sponsored by Sherrod Brown (D-OH) and Olympia Snowe (R-ME) would give unions and industries greater ability to file claims against illegal Chinese trade practices on a case-by-case basis, and would allow the Commerce Department to factor in currency manipulation into any tariffs the US puts up as a result. This would increase duties against Chinese products, which are being effectively subsidized by currency manipulation. The Congressional Budget Office estimated last year that such a measure would collect $125 million in new tariff revenues, but the main impact would be to put political pressure on China to revalue its currency.

In recent years, as the mendacity and greed of the wealthiest, most powerful elements of our society have become ever more thinly veiled — and ever more unchecked — it’s become more common for people to express offhand, “We’re heading for another Gilded Age“… another era, like the late 19th century, when vast riches were concentrated in the hands of a lucky few who flaunted it brazenly.

So far, that hasn’t become literally true (yet) in the United States, but elsewhere, a tipping point might have been reached.

There’s the issue of trade. Now this starts unexceptionally. Romney supports the existing trade agreements with South Korea, Panama and Colombia (on this point, the President agrees). And he wants to finish off the Trans-Pacific Partnership, which Obama also supports. He also wants to pursue a “Reagan Economic Zone,” which I assume is important because it has the word “Reagan” in it. But then he starts in on China.

The United States spies on China as it does on many nations of geostrategic significance – but thus far at least, the Chinese book publishing arena hasn’t yet produced anything as sizzling about its own world of spies and spymasters as David Wise has in his page-turner, Tiger Trap: America’ Secret Spy War with China.

John LeCarre – writing fiction – mastered the art of taking shadows of real world sophisticated spycraft and turning them into some of the best novels of the last generation. What David Wise has done is zero in on and reveal the stories of America’s real George Smiley’s – only problem is that most of them have none of the competence or the layers of complexly organized subterfuge that LeCarre’s principal character had.

It is China’s own actions that lead to the U.S. borrowing that it is complaining about.

As soon as I read the news that the new Chinese stealth fighter might have been reverse-engineered from an F-117 Nighthawk shot down during the NATO bombing of Serbia, I wondered the same thing implied (though not explicitly stated) in this Fox News piece: did we bomb the Chinese embassy because they were actively collecting parts and information on the plane?