I'm still not hearing what the alternative is to this deal. Does the USA have jurisdiction over DPI buying P&O? Sure we can bar them from doing business here, but then what?
Why is the 'then what' so amorphous? Seems to me an easy solution--the UAE may buy the Brit corp but must sell the port contract to an American company. If none will bite at the original terms, the government will have to sweeten the deal to ensure these ports are secure. Americans are willing to spend for national security in Iraq, they will be willing to spend it on the home front, too.
Sure, subsidy is not normally conservative. But American national security is the one thing I thought wasn't subject to penny-pinching. There is no on-the-books profit for running national defense anyway. Just as there was uproar upon finding we were contracting for TSA staff from outside the U.S., and we should have stopped that entirely, we shouldn't be doing this for American ports, even if it costs extra.