Posted on 03/03/2006 7:59:36 AM PST by ex-Texan
Was Duncan Hunter on the Armed Services Committee when Dubai was approved as our most visited port of call for our Navy? The USS Reagan has just entered the Gulf.
Whoever prompted DP World to to put in the bid which the shareholders of P and O approved is a genius.
You make my point...different folks but same kind of terror (now more than 3 decades old)--1972 Olympics, Lebanon, Lybia, Pan Am bombing, intifata, Somalia, USS Cole, Taliban, 9-11, Iraq--all resembling even the slightest hint of radical gutter Mohammad-the-Pig-worshipping Islam must be stomped into the desert sand until only the filthy rags of a turban is left, even if it means popping the "big potato" over Mecca and Medina just as it was done over Hirsohima and Nagasaki!
How much money have you send to GOP candidates in the past?
If the number is zero, we've lost nothing to your swagger.
The only principled stand is to support the rightward most candidate who is viable. Anything else is an unprincipled indulgence in condemnation of your own family and your neighbors to life under liberal Democrats.
Indeed, they may well have been jeopardized. In a "major way." A risk was run. A balancing act if you will. While they could hit our Navy hard, as did Al-Queda in Yemen, they also know that our troops are right there to go after them. Furthermore, the Sultanate is not going to be happy if any nukes went off in their own harbors. That doesn't mean that it can always control the powder-keg population it sits over.
It is reasonable to surmise that everyone, including those with the larger misgivings such as Duncan Hunter, may have stayed mum on the risks being run. Exposing our troops and sailors to those risk... And it was done likely with the very best of intentions. It was done in order to "win" the War on Terror vis-a-vis Iraq and Iran.
And similar dangerous 'alliances' have been risked before. Just as we have heard so much the last week from the spin-control done by Prager, Medved and Hewitt. The famous "we allied with STALIN!" example of WW-II.
Yes we did.
But
(1)The alliance was made without the American public ever being fully informed what was known about Stalin's monstrousness. (FDR seems not to have wanted to know either, likely with help from the Soviet Moles).
Indeed, the public was knowingly MISINFORMED via the New York Times. Covering for Stalin.
And similarly, there seems to be a serious effort on the part of the DWP proponents and Dubai regime to sweep under the rug the very real security issues and concerns that need to be addressed not just in private or "under the table"...but in public for our system of government to work. The Executive Branch does need to build support for its radical position, not just peremptorily 'execute' and then seek to justify it post hoc. Clearly, there has been process damage done by the proponents, who have attempted to evade the substantive intent of the vetting process...and deploy a different standard than we would expect for other and closer 'allies.'
(2) Furthermore, the example is inapt, because we didn't let Stalin take over our own port-side terminal operations as a gesture of solidarity. Stalin was notably impatient with the whole "Second Front" delay of the Allies...and needed coaxing and reassurances. Yet we still never gave him any such concessions. Yet here we are presently doing just that with DPW, with suspicious signs that the politics of the WOT are overwhelming the judgments of those evaluating the critical nagging details of the approval process.
There also 3 interesting "atmospheric issues" that may also bear on the Administration's adamance on the deal. As discussed elsewhere,
(1) the Commerce Dept. has been attempting to induce the UAE into a "free trade pact" and
(2)the fact that the UAE is running out of oil...and needs some alternative lines of business for an income stream for their futures. This would explain (albeit it still may not warrant our accepting) their energetic acquisition efforts, and
(3) We have given their air force a hell of a lot of the newest-generation F-16s.
All of these are fraught with the hazards of not just diplomatic embarrassment, but alienation, destabilization, and security 'blow-back'.
The administration is truly frightened beyond pant-wetting stage if the Congress pulls the plug, and the Emirates perceived that they have been "snubbed."
It should not have been allowed to come to this brink of crisis. It should have been headed off at the pass...rather than letting politics trump process.
BTTT.
"This platform included balanced fair trade, a strong national defense, strong national sovereignty, responsible currency management, and a generally pro USA and pro Western Civilization stance."
Harrumph! Harrumph!
""Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government." ---George Washington, 1793"
Another Harrumph!
Speaking of swagger....
Arrogance doesn't win elections, shill. You'll find that out soon enough if things continue on their current course.
-Dan
You are right. The neocons and glommy middle, wimp-type republicans are just as deadly as a shrill, hairy liberal.
Wimps on the right: Wake up and grow some antibodies against these arabs.
Xenophobic. You can call the arabs that when they are taking a serrated blade to your cervical spine on al-Jezeera. But talk fast before the gurgling starts, so they can understand you.
It's been a while Flux. Weren't you on the old McClintock threads? Good times.
There was about 60 days spent on investigating this. Now there will be another 45.
He'll probably pull it out this year, though.
-Dan
>>---How much money have you send to GOP candidates in the past? If the number is zero, we've lost nothing to your swagger.----
Speaking of swagger....
Arrogance doesn't win elections, shill. You'll find that out soon enough if things continue on their current course.
>>
True. Arrogance doesn't win elections. Money does. Perhaps I missed it. How much did you say you'd contributed to GOP candidates in the past?
No real requirement for a GOP voter to contribute, but a poster who advocates defeat of the rightward-most viable candidate in races really does have some obligation to establish bonafides.
I don't recall that set of threads. I'm sure I would remember.
Oh, TOM McClintock. Yup. Though in hindsight, maybe cheering on Schwarzenegger wasn't such a great idea. :)
I try to remember that everything in life.... is funny. And that someday it won't matter, and the absurdity of this argument and of the entire human condition will be seen in proper context. So I divest myself of all hard feelings that may lurk beneath my hot temper.
-Dan
Eventually everyone runs for re election. Congressman Duncan is an honorable soldier and the dad of a marine.
You got a problem with him?
Haley Barbour of MS doesn't have a problem with the deal and they will be managing some terminals there. Haley understands how the ports work, Duncan is grandstanding.
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