Posted on 02/26/2006 7:21:39 PM PST by Cornpone
President George W. Bush has declared that he would veto any congressional attempt to derail a contract allowing a Middle Eastern company to run six major U.S. seaports. His administration has approved the $6.8 billion deal between the London-based P&O (Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company) and Dubai Ports World—which is owned by the United Arab Emirates—to operate ports in Baltimore, Miami, Newark, New Orleans, New York and Philadelphia.
The opposition to the deal has been instant, vociferous, and unprecedentedly bipartisan. The resistance to the proposed transaction within his own party is likely to exceed the rebellion last fall over his nomination of Harriet Miers. Informed Washingtonians predict that Bush will be forced into yet another embarrassing retreat; the issue, it appears, is not “if” but “when,” and at what political cost to himself.
So far the critics have focused on the reliability of the UAE as an American “ally,” the extent to which Dubai Ports World could be used as a means of terrorist penetration of a highly vulnerable segment of the nation’s infrastructure, and the lack of transparency and procedural safeguards preceding the deal. Seven specific arguments have been advanced:
1. While nominally the paragon of Arab striving for modernity, Dubai and the rest of the Emirates are inhabited by people not only similar to their Muslim brethren elsewhere, but disproportionately inclined to Islamic terrorism. There are barely a million UAE citizens, but they included two of the 19 terrorists who carried out the 9/11 attacks—including Marwan al Shehhi, who—according to the FBI—flew United Airlines flight 175 into the second World Trade Center tower.
2. Several of the 9-11 hijackers and planners traveled through the UAE or stayed there while preparing the attack, and its banking system was used to move funds used in the operation. This has prompted critics to call the Emirates “an operational and financial base for the hijackers” who carried out the 9-11 attacks.
3. Only three countries in the world recognized the Taliban regime in Afghanistan: Saudi Arabia, Pakistan—and the UAE. Entrusting the running of America’s ports to a company owned by one of those three governments is inherently unsafe.
4. According to a bipartisan congressional letter of protest sent to the Administration last week, the UAE has been a key transfer point for illegal shipments of nuclear components to Iran and North Korea. If such shipments, many of them bulky, passed undetected, the UAE government is guilty either of gross negligence or of complicity.
5. The management structure, hiring policies, and external supervision of the company itself are flawed. “There are conditions, which shows they had concerns, but it’s all procedural and relies entirely on good faith,” according to Rep. Pete King, a Republican from New York and the House homeland security chief, but “there’s nothing those conditions . . . nothing that assures us they’re not hiring someone with bin Laden.”
6. The plan was not subjected to any proper evaluation by the Department of Homeland Security. Its administrators obediently rubber-stamped it, but its senior security analysts were surreptitious bypassed. They “were never told [about it] and they don’t like it now.”
7. The Dubai firm has unnaturally close ties to the White House. Treasury Secretary John Snow, whose department heads the federal panel that approved the deal, was chairman of the CSX rail firm that sold its own international port operations to Dubai Ports World for $1.15 billion in 2004—one year after Snow left for President Bush’s cabinet. David Sanborn, currently in charge of Dubai Ports World’s European and Latin American operations, “was tapped by Bush last month to head the U.S. Maritime Administration.”
To all that, the President responded with an ill-tempered challenge: “I want those who are questioning it to step up and explain why all of a sudden a Middle Eastern company is held to a different standard than a [British] company,” he told reporters. The idiocy of such thinking, rather than any specific security threat, is the real reason why this deal must be called off. It reflects his enduring ideological commitment to the fiction that there are good Muslims, who are our friends and allies and whose countries are every bit as “normal” as Great Britain, Canada, or Japan; and then there are some bad apples who have “hijacked a great religion.”
Bush’s logic in defending the right of a Middle Eastern company to enjoy the same access to America’s strategic infrastructure as a British company is the same logic that has granted millions of Muslims equal access to this country’s green cards and passports, thus creating the main terrorist threat that America faces today. It is the logic of globalization and anti-discriminationism. It is not merely flawed, it is evil, and it presents a mortal danger to our civilization.
The reason and logic on this thread stuns me!!
I almost always expect only Bush apologists on this
site anymore!
He used to go by the name of Serge Trifkovic but since its become so popular to advertise your own culture he now uses his native spelling. I suspect he comes from one of the former Yugoslavian republics. The one's I've been to don't have any vowels or very few. Try finding your way back when Trieste becomes Trst on the road signs on the other side of the border. It takes a while. Anyway, he's written at least one good book on Islam and many articles. I suspect he speaks from experience as do I with the culture in certain parts of the world. I have some of his stuff listed I think in my profile.
Someone up above posted a link to an article about the Saudis already controling ops at 9 U.S. ports. No stink about that, though, because it can't be used to bash Bush.
And there the reality of the opposition is exposed. It's not about security, it's about bashing Bush and the left using the issue to separate GW from his base. And that's ALL it's about.
As is oil and apparently the concept of freedom...in whatever form it’s portrayed in these days. Look, I don't want to argue with you or anyone else. I just try to inform. I could say a lot more but I'm getting the sense, not necessarily from you, that it just doesn't matter anymore. I've lived a good life. Every generation defines their own and in most cases finds some sense of meaning. I just think I've lived my life at the end of the golden age of humanity based on what I see unfolding. My life will end soon. Everyone here is free to entertain their fantasies of the future. I just happen to think they are fantasies and most don't see what's coming. It will be their challenge. I've had mine. Live well and live proud that you are an American whether in fact or in spirit.
The last book of the Holy Bible has warned us that Globlism will certainly be what will be our demise.
Untill I see new evidence that it won't .
I totally agree with you.
And your point is? Perhaps the same Jihadist logic that says its our fault we got bombed on 911 because we have an open society? What are you trying to say?
What does one expect? Everyone is starting to line up for the 2006 and 2008 elections.
I absolutely, totally give up. You're absolutely right. We should have absolutely nothing to be concerned about from a government that funds terrorists groups or terrorist front groups in the middle east and the United States.
granted the terms are mixed, but the point is one of hypocrisy. We don't want China to own our oil companies; we don't want the French to tell us how to deal with terrorists; we don't want the UN to mess in our affairs; we want to protect our homeland. But then the administration, although we control the security, gives the control of the ports (management) to Dubai, who has allowed terrorists to pass through its borders, and funded terrorist organizations. The Bush administration is essentially proving Michael Moore's point. I am sure other more reputable allies in the war on terror would be available.
LOL, oh my...
Bleep wrote:
"granted the terms are mixed, but the point is one of hypocrisy. We don't want China to own our oil companies; we don't want the French to tell us how to deal with terrorists; we don't want the UN to mess in our affairs; we want to protect our homeland. But then the administration, although we control the security, gives the control of the ports (management) to Dubai, who has allowed terrorists to pass through its borders, and funded terrorist organizations. The Bush administration is essentially proving Michael Moore's point. I am sure other more reputable allies in the war on terror would be available."
When did the Bush admistration suggest that "a twinkie an hour" was a good idea?
Petronski wrote: "When did the Bush admistration suggest that "a twinkie an hour" was a good idea?"
ROFL!
"...give us this day our hourly Twinkie and forgive us from sin..."
That's just not right.
In a perfect world? Sure.
In this world? The President has to work with who and what he's got.
Dubai is the expert in this type of port coordination. They have worked with our military for some time. I guess they're good enough for our brave heroes but not good enough for us? Wow, that's some message to the troops!
I guess we expect the President to just sit there and sulk and only deal with all the perfect democracies in the Middle East. Sorry to break it to you, but the President doesn't have that choice; he has to play the hand he's dealt, and make the best of it. That's what he's doing--engaging on the level he can. The alternative is to not deal with anyone in the region, and then people will be bitching that he's not making any inroads into the Middle East.
I just thank God the adults are in charge.
Post 2: ...I just thank God the adults are in charge.
Try a little WD-40...it will stop that corrosion too...
They are a trojan horse, smiley and harmless on the outside, death and hatred on the inside IMO.
America doesn't need Muslims or Arabs running our ports.
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