THIS PAST JULY, at an event at the Ronald Reagan Building on Pennsylvania Avenue that amounts to a kind of prom for trade policy wonks, the Washington International Trade Association (WITA) presented its annual Lifetime Achievement Award to outgoing Republican congressman Jim Kolbe of Arizona. That was no surprise. Kolbe is a zealous free trader who led the fight for the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the trade pact with Canada and Mexico, in 1993; and the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), for Central American countries and the Dominican Republic, in 2005.

But WITA also honored Kolbe’s Democratic colleague Charles Rangel, the rhetorical maestro from Harlem, with its Distinguished Service Award. That tribute “raised a few eyebrows,” says one Republican who attended the dinner. Yet according to this Republican–a former senior U.S. trade official with decades of experience–Rangel deserved the recognition. “I consider him to be a pretty pragmatic, practical guy.”