Saturday Night Live Parody Lives On With Chris Matthews and Hardball

Remember the SNL skit during the lead up to the Gulf War which had the press asking questions during a Pentagon briefing such as “ When exactly will we attack, from which direction and what forces will be used” and “What secret code do we use and how does it work?”.

Matthews, yesterday, questioning Rob Scavone, the executive vice president, general counsel at P&O Ports, North America, which presently runs the ports the Dubai Ports World is seeking to operate..........

MATTHEWS: What I'm trying to get at if something were dangerous to come into the country, a container of nerve gas for example, who would the terrorists have to bribe or deal with to get past? If you wanted to put a container of nerve gas aboard one of these containers, who would you have to get past to get that done or have a good chance of that getting through?

The complete transcript will show that Scavone never provided the answer to Matthews' stupid question.

Here's the crux of the who controls our ports:

MATTHEWS: Great to have you here. You're an expert.
Rob Scavone is the executive vice president, general counsel at P&O Ports, North America, which presently runs the ports the Dubai Ports World is seeking to operate. Mr. Scavone, will remain in his job when Dubai Ports World acquires P&O Ports, North America. He's here to discuss port security only.
Help me out here. This is a question we keep asking on the show. When a container moves from another port to one of the American ports, one of the six American ports, who is responsible for making sure nothing dangerous is carried in those containers?
ROB SCAVONE, P&O PORTS EXECUTIVE: That would first be the shipper who owns the cargo, followed by the vessel operator, the container carrier, then the customs or governmental authorities in the port where the vessel is loaded, some of whom allow U.S. customs authorities to screen and inspect cargo there. And finally, by customs and border protection in the U.S. Coast Guard when the vessel arrives in the United States.
The information on the contents of the container, the manifest information that the vessel operator has, is sent electronically to customs officials in the United States before the vessel is loaded, but that information, people may be surprised to learn, is not given to us. Customs knows what's in the boxes. The vessel operator knows what's in the boxes, but we are not advised what's in the boxes.
MATTHEWS: What I'm trying to get at if something were dangerous to come into the country, a container of nerve gas for example, who would the terrorists have to bribe or deal with to get past? If you wanted to put a container of nerve gas aboard one of these containers, who would you have to get past to get that done or have a good chance of that getting through?
SCAVONE: You've highlighted the main issue that we do try to address and our government tries to address, which is the point of origin of the container, and that is where our security efforts have primarily been focused.
MATTHEWS: But whatever the answer is to that question, it doesn't relate to what happens once the container reaches the ground in the United States and certainly has nothing to do with who owns that particular terminal operator.
MATTHEWS: Well, the terminal operator, in other words, in this case, Dubai Ports World, and you as one of their assets, your company, P&O, would you check what was in the container, or does it simply go to the address who it's addressed to and they get to open it?
SCAVONE: No, we follow the instructions of customs. They tell us what containers they want to inspect, among those that they haven't inspected before the vessel was loaded. We give the containers physically to them. That, by the way, is done by our longshoremen. Nobody moves, touches or even counts a box unless he's a longshoreman.
Customs takes it, they do whatever they want to do with it, whether it's non-intrusive inspection with x-rays or radiation detection or whether it's physically opening the box and restuffing it. Then they give it back to us. Nothing leaves any one of our terminals until Customs and Border Protection allows us to release it to the cargo owner.
MATTHEWS: OK, let me put it this way. If something dangerous comes into the United States and explodes on Broadway or somewhere else, and we find it came in, in one of the containers, who would we got to find out how it happened?
SCAVONE: You would start with customs, because they would have all the information about vessel loading and contents and whatnot, and then you would trace back through the vessel carrier to the point of origin and their customers. Highly unlikely the terminal operator in the United States would have anything to add to that equation.
MATTHEWS: So he wouldn't—your company would not feel a duty to start sniffing around these containers and opening them up because why? Why wouldn't you do that?
SCAVONE: It's not our property. The containers are sealed before they are dispatched from the foreign country, and one of the whole principles of containerization is that that seal remains on until it's received by the cargo owner in the United States.

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