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This contract should have been stopped at an earlier stage, but at this point doing so would cause too much damage to our relations with moderate Arab states. There are no very good options. The best exit strategy is this: (1) Allow the contract to go through; (2) give it heightened scrutiny by assigning a team of U.S. government agents to work inside the company at least for the first few years to make sure security is tight and information closely held; (3) have the team report every six months to both the executive and a select congressional committee.

Charles has got this right. Too many people on the conservative side knee-jerked their way into a "no A-rabs are gonna run our ports" position without knowing many facts. Now, after being so vocal about it, they've painted themselves into a corner and won't admit they were wrong in the first place.

I expect that kind of nonsense from an idiot like Sean Hannity who only has a handful of talking points to rely on in the first place but people with smarts should know better. The fact tht Dems like Hillary, Schumer and Boxer were against this from the get-go should have sent up a red flag immediately.

This is no different than when the Democrats held up the airport inspectors legislation because they wanted those jobs to be unionized. This situation is all about the Longshoreman's Union and nothing about port security. As for conservatives against this, Rush Limbaugh put it best: "The 9/11 hijackers didn't need to spend billions of dollars to attack us."

This has raised the obvious question of whether we want our ports, through which a nuclear bomb could come, handled by a country two of whose nationals flew into the South Tower on Sept. 11 and which has a history of laundering money and nuclear secrets from bad guys to worse guys.

What does he mean by "handle" ports? Ports in America are "handled" by Americans. DPW doesn't intend to "handle" our ports. The British Company did not "handle" our ports.

Kraut can't "handle" the truth.

Let me inform some of my very ignorant fellow Free Republicers. If a ship ever got into a US port with a nuclear weapon, it is too late. Any ship should have been scrutinized when it was being loaded, before it leaves port.

A ship may be held up for weeks; only to find that the low radiation detected was only a type of clay used in pottery. No port authority in the world will let a ship leave its port without a complete certification of its manifest.

as for the Rats' reaction--

Here's the real money quote from the Dick Morris column that was posted earlier today at http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1593000/posts regarding the Clintons' relationship with the UAE:

Bill is, after all, a regular in Dubai. The crown prince — that is, the government — contributed to his presidential library and pays him $300,000 per speech. Recently, Yucaipa, an American company that has Bill Clinton as a “senior adviser” and pays him a percentage of its profits, formed a partnership with the Dubai Investment Group to form DIGL Inc., a company dedicated to managing the sheik’s personal investments.

If BJ is deeply involved in a "company dedicated to managing the sheik’s personal investments," he and the Witch will be receiving millions of dollars of income in the following years from that very company. In other words, if she's elected President, the President of the United States will be on the Dubai payroll due to BJ's involvement in managing the sheik's personal investments. Her denunciation of the ports deal is nothing but cover for this raging, continuing conflict of interest. If the Pubbies can't take advantage of this, they can't take advantage of anything.

8 posted on 03/09/2006 5:51:31 AM PST by libstripper