Posted on 02/21/2006 11:08:07 AM PST by Reaganwuzthebest
CORAL GABLES, Fla. -- Gov. Jeb Bush said he has faith in his brother's administration over its decision to allow an Arab-owned company to operate major U.S. ports, including in Miami.
Dubai Ports World, a state-owned business in the United Arab Emirates, is expected to take over a British company that has been running six U.S. ports.
Several South Florida Congress members and politicians believe the deal should be closely examined.
U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen said she has no specific concerns about the company, although the fact that UAE was where a number of the Sept. 11 hijackers were being harbored warrants further examination.
However, a former security director said there is little cause for concern.
"Being regulated by the federal government and by the state government puts a very high threshold of security standard for any operator at the Port of Miami," Nelson Oramas said.
Florida's governor, who attended a breakfast meeting at the Biltmore Hotel on Tuesday promoting the Central American Free Trade Agreement, said he thinks criticism by some Congress members is unwarranted because his brother, President George W. Bush, could press for more details by the time the sale is supposed to go through on March 2.
Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has said that the company went through a "very extensive" review process.
Nevertheless, the Republican governors of New York and Maryland said they might try to cancel lease arrangements at ports in their states.
Democratic Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Sen. Robert Menendez are planning to introduce legislation that would prevent the sale of port operations to foreign governments.
Of course it does since the asset was transferred to the new company.
Unless you want the Government to write a law saying no Muslim can do business on US property?
When it comes to sensitive installations like our ports and which involves national security I have no problem with the government intervening in these matters and in fact I expect them to, it's their job.
They have and do.
But you still haven't answered the question. Should no Muslim do business or be employed at ports, airports, water facilities, borders, or whatever other facility someone may consider to be sensitive?
"Question: who runs/ owns all the other US ports?"
Good question. I don't think any are run by US companies.
This may sound a bit arbitrary but no, I don't want Muslims with their often repeated hatred for us not to mention inability to control the terrorists within their countries running anything even remotely related to national security in this one. If they want to buy some Pizza Hut franchise I suppose that's different but ports no way.
LOL!! You've got a point.....
Boy...sometimes it just feels like both parties are in cahoots, don't it?
The US Coast Guard will not be replaced by arabs.
The dockworkers will not be replaced by arabs driving camels.
For now, the British were kind enough to let them keep their jobs. There's no guarantee future owners will do the same.
Really doesn't bother me.
http://www.ezinearticles.com/?Foreign-Ownership-of-U.S.-Airlines-and-Ports-Deemed-Troubling&id=145524
They are governed by regulations at the state and federal level. Do you really think buying the company makes them King 'o the Port?
One should verify before trusting. When someone cries "trust me" while doing something that defies logic -- it's usually a smoke screen to hide something very bad. This might save my family member from going to Iraq to fight terrorism as it appears the need will be here.
What concerns most people is terrorist infiltration, it's an undeniable possibility when you have a company owned by a government that has known ties to these groups. It's just amazing that Bush allowed the deal to go through in the first place without considering the political risks involved.
There's a lot of money involved in this deal and we need to find out exactly who's profiting from it.
I'm far more concerned with the political risks of telling every arab country that we consider them defacto terrorists.
"It's looking more and more like political posturing coming from them. I'm waiting for the Republicans in the House to do something, yesterday it was reported they planned on it."
This is a setup. Bush doesn't want this. He wants ANWR opened. That is why he is running around the country pushing his energy initiative. How can we sell ports to the Arabs yet we are held hostage by the same Arabs for our oil. Isn't that hypocritical? So Bush turns Saudi oil into the straw man. Meanwhile, the Saudis who want us to continue buying their oil drop the price.
No lose for Bush.
We'll see in the next couple of days what happens but my gut feeling tells me this whole fiasco will be coming to an end.
Well, there's far more areas than ports involved in national security issues, so you would be barring Muslims from lots and lots of jobs not just at the ports.
And, as much as I hate terrorists, that would be the first time in US history that a law would be passed disallowing people from jobs based only on religion.
Whatever, to protect national security it has to be done that way. This isn't about legal immigrant Muslims in the country but only those representing foreign interests. In that sense I'd rather all countries were kept from running our sea and airports.
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