Arab ally senses Bush no longer has control in Washington

The decision by the United Arab Emirates on Thursday to order state-controlled Dubai Ports World to end its control over US port facilities marks the lowest point yet in the relationship between President George W. Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress.

Mr Bush had warned repeatedly that blocking the deal would send a dangerously discriminatory message to the world. He threatened repeatedly to veto any congressional legislation.

But with his public approval ratings at record lows and his Republican party abandoning him, one of the US’s closest allies in the Arab world concluded that he was no longer in control in Washington.

The decision by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al- Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai, is likely to avert the political backlash that hit Washington last month and may prevent any further damage to diplomatic and security relations between the countries. But it underscored that Mr Bush, who still has nearly three years to go in his second term, has become perilously weak.

Dennis Hastert, the Republican speaker of the House and one of Mr Bush’s most loyal backers in Congress, emerged from a White House meeting on Thursday morning and signalled that he could not hold back the opposition to the deal. “We want to protect the American people and we will continue to do that,” he said.

“There’s a Republican initiative right now that says, ‘Get us the hell out of here’,” said Frank Lautenberg, a Republican senator from the port state of New Jersey.

The acquisition of five US port terminals by an Arab company became an unlikely target for an outpouring of American anger and fear. While administration officials and port security experts insisted there were no security concerns raised by the transfer of port facilities from a British company to a Dubai company, members of Congress said they were flooded with calls and letters from ordinary Americans angered by the deal.

The White House promise to reopen a national security investigation into the deal, together with a concerted public relations effort by DP World, seemed only to deepen the anger.

More than four years after the September 11 attacks, it brought together a toxic combination of anxieties over America’s place in the world. Traditional protectionists, worried by foreign acquisitions of US assets and the outsourcing of jobs to distant and little-understood countries, lined up alongside security hawks who warned that even a close Arab ally such as the UAE was vulnerable to terrorist infiltration.

This has nothing to do with the president. The Executive branch performed a duty required of it by a congressional legislative act. That duty was to evaluate a business transaction involving a foreign company to see if there were any adverse security consequences, and if so to attempt to mitigate them.

The Executive branch performed it's function precisely as the law required, and found that there was no security risk (a finding that stands today, but is under a 45-day review which congress decided to short-circuit).

Bush didn't offer the ports to UAE to pay them for their loyal service. He didn't put this P&O/DP World merger together as part of a grand strategy. He in fact had NOTHING to do with it. P&O stockholders decided to sell their company, and DP World was the highest of TWO bidders, the other being another foreign-owned firm, asian/chinese.

Bush didn't CHOOSE to approve the deal. The law required that the deal be approved, because NONE of 17 separate agencies could find a single adverse security consequence that was not quickly mitigated by the company. Not surprising since DP World is already intimately involved in real security, has relationships with our country, and already operates terminals around the world with no problems.

Bush's only reaction was when Congress, without the facts, made false accusations about the deal, accused the administration of not doing its job, and threatened to pass a law to punish UAE for being UAE. Bush jumped to the defense of a loyal, trusted, and necessary ally in the war on terror.

He was not acting as King, he was acting as COMMANDER IN CHIEF in a time of war, defending our country's strategic military/industrial alliances against the misleading and partisan attacks of democrats seeking to harm our country to take back control.

But then the american people, completely misled by the media and the democrats, came out against the deal, and the republicans who should know better jumped the shark and accused UAE of being a terrorist organization.

We are very fortunate first that the President put our country first and stood strongly for our allies against the mindless onslaught, and second that UAE is actually such a good ally for us that they were willing to bend over backwards to mollify the critics of the deal, just to keep our friendship intact.

France never would have done this for us. Nor Germany, or Russia. I'm not sure Israel would have jumped through the hoops like this.

We can only pray that the relationship with Dubai has not been irreparably harmed by the outrageous false attacks on the UAE by people who mostly wanted to send a message about border security.

And I disagree with your conclusion. The american people did NOT win today. Our country is no safer, the ports are no more secure, the future is no brighter. AT BEST DP World will manage to find a company that somehow can step up and run terminals as well as DP World does it (which is why DP World is where it is today). We can only pray that the new owners have deep pockets and a willingness to spend money for security, because the DP World agreements to spend millions and to open access to information are obviously null and void now.

No, we weakened our country today. Our allies (who all agreed to the DP World deal, who all see there is NO RISK to them having DP WOrld run their ports, see us throwing a temper tantrum, and conclude (since they KNOW there is no security issue) that we are just being protectionist, something they have long accused us of. They will react accordingly, which will harm us in the long run.

DP World will now have to spend time and effort finding a company to buy out the US companies that run these terminals. In the meantime they are kind of on autopilot I guess. Who know how the terrorists can take advantage of this. We've done a fine job of evaluating DP World for terrorist ties, how will we do with a brand-new holding company springing up in our country overnight? Hopefully this won't be how it is done, but how do we know. The future which was so clear before is not a muddled mess.

And the next time the media can gin up some contrived issue, we'll be right back here again, with sane people arguing that congress has a responsibility to act responsibly, and the masses screaming that "the will of the people must be done".

It's like a lynch mob, only sanctioned by gutless politicians.

OK - call me an idealist, but Presidnt Bush's Strategery has dumbfounded his critics many times in the past. So let me play out a thought process here.

The President is the focus of the animus of the left.

The Republicans are concerned about a loss of power in Congress.

The President's poll numbers are down due to the war on terror. The President can't run again and, therefore, has no need of popularity.

So the President creates a tempest in a teapot. This tempest allows the Republicans in Congress to distance themselves from the President which strengthens them against their Democrat rivals. The Ports get a different owner. The UAE has enough oil money that they don't care, and the Republicans keep control of Congress.

Sound like a plan?

Shalom.

In terms of the duration of low polls I agree with you that is has been longer than any period of low approval in his first term. Although I would like to add that these polls have so much biased as you know and I think if we just chose the "likely voters" the President approval numbers will be around 47% to 48%, not stellar but not as bad as these "adults" polls with have much more democrats or independent leaning democrats polled than Republicans or independents leaning Republicans. Anyway I also believe that "He who lives by the polls will die by the polls" if you want proof ask the 1% of democrats with brains about it.

My important point is we should not react with such a fear and remain optimistic. Fear will not lead us anywhere. It is the democrats who should be afraid because of their so many problems and weaknesses, but most of them are too stupid to realize how weak they are and thus they are not afraid but rather get more crazy and more hateful one day after another. This will always work in our favor.

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