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.
This is simply indefensible. Why not just let them run the Airports too while we are at it?
EXON-FLORIO PROVISION Introduction. The United States has traditionally welcomed Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and provided foreign investors fair, equitable and nondiscriminatory treatment with few limited exceptions designed to protect national security. The Exon-Florio provision is implemented within the context of this open investment policy. The intent of Exon-Florio is not to discourage FDI generally, but to provide a mechanism to review and, if the President finds necessary, to restrict FDI that threatens the national security.
The Exon-Florio provision is implemented by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States ("CFIUS"), an inter-agency committee chaired by the Secretary of Treasury. CFIUS seeks to serve U.S. investment policy through thorough reviews that protect national security while maintaining the credibility of our open investment policy and preserving the confidence of foreign investors here and of U.S. investors abroad that they will not be subject to retaliatory discrimination.
What organizations are on this committee? Oh, nobody important. Just Homeland Security, DoD, the Attorney General, OMB, chaired by Treasury, and others...
Sing it from the mountain tops!!!
LLS
It looks like government agencies handle some ports as in Houston. I'd rather have them doing it with public employees than turn it over to countries with known terrorist ties.
Does it really matter WHO owns the ports? There was no security when they were run by Americans...
Well, fortunately that's not the case here. So I presume you're now at peace? (let me guess...)
Amen to that. And if we here at FR fall for it hook, line and sinker, is there any need to wonder how much it impacts the population at large?
I heard the port operators in Miami aren't happy about this.
I think we've seen a great deal of knee jerking on this story. People seem to have this vision of arabs running around taking over security of the ports and longshoremen meekly looking the other way as missiles are offloaded from containers. The UAE isn't going to "own" the ports and take over security. They're simply inheriting pre-existing contracts from a British company.
As far as I understand it, this deal has already gone through close examination as far as the usual protocols which are pretty thorough.
However, in light of the firestorm, I believe the deal will obviously undergo even closer examination.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1582888/posts?page=23#23
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The MSM has actually hitched onto this late in the game. Savage and others were screaming about the deal weeks ago.
And why do you think that is? Because the Dems told the media to go with it (via their press release/attack order), and because the Cheney story died like so many others before it.
A voice of reason in a sea of what Rush calls the people caught in the "Tsunami".
Well, the right wing has largely allied itself with Hillary Clinton in recent days over this, so the MSM is salivating at the opportunities herr.
"Amen to that. And if we here at FR fall for it hook, line and sinker, is there any need to wonder how much it impacts the population at large?"
Over a DNC press release. LOL. Well, according to the spin, Arabs terrorists are taking over security at our ports.
I'm not exactly sure what people think is going to happen. Mass firings of American employees to be replaced with suicide belt-donned Palestinian volunteers?
Seriously. I chalenge anyone to tell me what exactly will change, operations and security-wise, at these ports. What exactly will be different as a result of this corporate buy-out. My money is on "Nada".
This reminds me of the "Japan" is buying up all of the USA" hysteria we saw years ago.
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