Posted on 03/16/2006 11:57:00 AM PST by WatchingInAmazement
For a political junkie, the Dubai ports debacle has been a bit like the movie “Pulp Fiction”—just one freaky story inside another, unfolding at a rapid pace and leading to an unexpected ending that made no darn sense and yet was really quite satisfying emotionally. I give it two thumbs way up.
Unfortunately for the President, he played the part of “Marcellus Wallace” in “Port Fiction.” He talked tough at the start of the whole thing, but really took it hard in the end. (Bada bing!) And along the way we got to see Chuck Schumer support racial profiling, Hillary Clinton claim to be concerned about national security, Lawrence Kudlow play the (Arab) race card, Fred Barnes complain that some conservatives were too cantankerous, and Rush Limbaugh congratulate his own audience for defeating him. Now that’s a movie that should have got an Oscar!
Two of the subplots really stood out in my mind though. One was how eagerly the disciples of “free” trade took to attacking the conservative base as a bunch of xenophobic ignoramuses storming the harmless castle Globalstein with torches and pitchforks. That sort of animosity couldn’t be over just one relatively minor business deal for Dubai. I’m sensing that the Beltway Boys and the Wall Street Wonks have been entertaining some animosity against Main Street and the Heartland for some time.
Whatever their motivation, they came across as nothing less than petty and absurd. The restructuring of the world economy and the American legal landscape by the proponents of free trade over the last two decades has been nothing short of a revolution—and it was all made possible, ultimately, by the votes of the fly-over country conservatives with whom Kudlow and company have shared a big tent for so long.
And yet at the first sign of hesitation or reluctance to indulge further on mom and pop’s part, the free trade faithful turned on them with epithets and disdain. According to some pinstriped pundits, the most open nation on earth, at the most internationalist time in its history, is suddenly and dismissively labeled “xenophobic,” “isolationist,” “protectionist,” “nativist,” “racist” and “ignorant” of the fact that world is global, or some such insight. Given 99% of everything they want, some free traders turned petulantly on their enablers over the 1% they didn’t get.
This behavior is very familiar to anyone who has small children. You can take them to the park, the mall, the museum, a game, an arcade, an ice cream shop, McDonald’s and Chuck E Cheese’s, then after spending the whole day and $200 on them, you tell them it’s time to go home and they explode into tears and theatrics while flopping about on the floor calling you “a meanie,” which is like “xenophobic,” but without the overeducated pretense.
And what was the tone-deaf expectation behind conservatives of any stripe, pin or otherwise, playing the race card in an internal political debate? Perhaps, like an abused child who grows up to be a child abuser, the name callers thought that they might get the same sort of instant capitulation from their base that they are used to giving to Democrats and the media when they themselves are accused of racism—or of just having used the word “niggardly” in a college essay once.
Way to solidify the base! Why not just say that Republicans are "a pretty monolithic party. They all behave the same. They all look the same. It's pretty much a white Christian party," or "The Republicans are not very friendly to different kinds of people"? When some in the party start sounding like Howard Dean while bashing the rest of it, it could be time to take a deep breath.
The second subplot that really stood out to me, is how clueless many in the Republican Party are to the true source of public misgiving about the port deal. This does not bode well for avoiding a repeat of the debacle in the near future. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that the average voter does not normally concern himself with the minutiae of cargo management and port personnel. So why the big opinion all of a sudden over Dubai Ports World?
Well, in my opinion this is sort of like an argument in a marriage. It may have started over a specific incident, but it’s really about something else and has been building for a long time.
This minor uprising was about a general feeling that, whatever merits free trade, open borders, and corporate globalism may have financially, they are often not good for the nation in many ways that fail to be accounted for in the theoretical models of economists. Free trade fails to take account of cultural consequences, and it places no value on concepts such as national loyalty. To the value-free traders, labor is simply a commodity, and people are interchangeable parts. And they are entirely correct—economically speaking. A widget is a widget, and the cheaper you can get them made, the better.
But the problem is that all nations are more than just economic systems. They are each somebody’s home. And each has a culture, and a language, and a set of common ideals that they want protected—even more than they want another 0.3% added to next year’s GDP. Some things matter more than the economic opportunity cost we pay for having them. The American Revolution, for example, was bad for the economy while it was under way. But that was not really the point of the whole thing, was it?
The emotion surrounding the ports deal, and illegal immigration, and outsourcing, and homeland security and a dozen other aspects of breakneck international economic integration is no longer simply a quiet misgiving. It is rapidly being formed into a single coherent message from average citizens to those in power—both on the right and on the left- that see it as their job to make sure the “inevitable” rise of a single world economic entity actually happens. People are saying, “Stop!
They’re saying “OK, we’ve tried it your way and it never seems to end. No amount of globalization, tolerance, equalization, outsourcing, internationalism, interventionism, human smuggling, and security risk is ever enough. There is always a push for more—even before the last round has proven itself wise or foolish. Treaty piles upon treaty, migration upon migration, integration upon integration. Now people want a break and a reassessment. They’re not sure they are against it all. They’re just no longer sure they’re still for it.
It is not Xenophobia. It is Xenonausea. People are sick of having the whole world shoved down their throats at once and being told it tastes like ice cream. They are sick of every street corner and parking lot being filled with criminal aliens waiting to work off the books and outside the laws that are applied so enthusiastically to actual Americans. They are sick of pressing “1” for English. They are sick of being at war with foreign terrorists and simultaneously being economically and demographically bound more tightly to the nations producing these terrorists. They are sick of being told that the world is global or flat or smaller or at their doorstep or all coming for dinner on Tuesday.
They are sick of hearing that America is just an economic opportunity zone and not a distinct nation, a culture—their home. They are sick of being told that human beings are interchangeable parts, that the nation-state is passé, that there are some jobs that Americans just won’t do, that there are some contracts that Americans just won’t bid, and that any cost that cannot be measured in money cannot be very important. They are sick of having the world purposely knit together in a tighter tangle everyday and then being told we are so entangled that America must now run the whole world and solve all its problems. And they are sick of being called ignorant and racist and xenophobic just for having the temerity to raise questions when abstract trade theory conflicts with their common sense.
And they want a break. They want some breathing room and some limits; and they don’t want to hear elitist children cry themselves hoarse after all they’ve been given already.
If absolute globalization really is inevitable, it doesn’t need such a vociferous lobby. It will happen at its own organic pace. Trying to force it prematurely will just cause a backlash here and abroad—as it already has from Van Nuys to Venezuela to Vladivostok.
And if it is not inevitable, then it needs to be justified beyond the boardroom and the lecture hall. It may not be something that everyone wants to pay the costs of, whatever benefits it may bring to our bank accounts and stock exchanges.
Soon, Congress will consider a new illegal immigration bill. Failure to acknowledge the new mood in the country could break the Republican Party.
Mr. Johnson, a writer and medical researcher in Cambridge, MA., is a regular contributor to Human Events. His column generally appears on Mondays. Archives and additional material can be found at www.macjohnson.com.
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Ironic, eh?
I'm *asking* for facts. Facts that tie the individuals running this company and the UAE to terrorist activities.
So far, not one single fact to that regard has been presented. I've been told we can't wait for such facts.
OK. Ya'll think UAE would endanger our ports. I want evidence to that regard, which ya'll have not provided. You want to keep repeating the same unfounded accusations, internet rumors and emotional pleas, be my guest.
Just don't be surprised if it doesn't sway those of us waiting for facts.
As far as the UAE being an ally....Oh yeah...Allies who are busy writing blood-curdling sinister Nabati.
With allies like this...who needs enemies?
Oh -- that must be why my entire point is based on needing facts, then.
Do you honestly not understand what I'm looking for when I say, "Facts"? It's pretty simple, most folks understand what "evidence of wrong-doing" means.
I think you do too, but are just insulting me for the fun of it! If so, then *please* use funnier insults.
No it isn't.
It is you who don't know what facts are. Or relevance for that matter.
E.g. maybe we need to highlight and increase the font size for you:
NABATI
Perhaps you also already forgot about the knee-jerk sentiments of their populace for the infidels...the UAE was in the thick of the massive and violent protests against the supposedly anti-muslim Danish cartoons.
And not just their populace...the government too.
I submit that there *is* evidence to show that since 9/11 UAE is a trusted ally. They are friendly to our military, captured and turned over terrorists, etc.
So I want evidence to show that the UAE, or DPW, has since then done anything to endanger ports anywhere in the world.
Your side has failed to provide that evidence. A few of the more intellingent folks on your side have understood why I want this evidence, but they feel that the risks in this world outweigh the need for evidence.
Then there are the *other* folks on your side, who seem to have no idea what evidence means and don't have any understanding of why a rational person *might* want evidence before declaring an ally as untrustworthy. In fact, they seem to ridicule anyone who is silly enough to want to make policy decisions based on evidence! And you respond with bigger fonts, and cartoons, and pictures, and -- lots of things that just aren't persuasive to someone looking for facts and evidence.
:-)
Pretty darned simple, it seems. I want evidence you don't have. So, until someone on your side is able to listen to what I'm asking for and provide it, there's nothing much more to be gained from repetitive posting here.
Only because you keep moving the goal posts.
Or should we say changing the size of the evidence...or the metaphorical football in this case.
There is evidence post-9/11...which in many ways is as significant as the evidence extant pre-9/11.
In my first post in this thread, Post 93 stated exactly the same request I just restated.
I repeat, yet again: Do you have evidence that DPW has ever, or will ever, endanger the security of any port?
I've been consistent. And so far, not one fact has been posted by anyone that would show that DPW (or the UAE) have ever endangered the security at a port. Your side seems consistent in believing that such evidence is not needed. I simply disagree.
So until someone on your side answers my simple, direct question -- there is nothing else to be said. Our discussion has come to a fruitless end. :-)
He's been shown the UAE consistently votes against the USA in the UN.
He's been shown over and over that the UAE got all hot and bothered by the Muslim cartoons.
He's been shown over and over the links between AlQaida and the UAE.
He's been shown that the UAE represses human rights and engages in humn trafficking and trafficking arms.
And on and on. Facts don't matter.
They still refuse to cooperate on disclosing the financial information of Al-Queda's head...Bin Laden...
This is an ally of fairly dubious reliability. US News and World Report's David Kaplan identified the problem in a December 2005 article:
U.A.E. rulers have taken terrorism seriously since 9/11, but Washington has a half-dozen extradition requests that they refuse to honor. The list includes people accused of rape, murder, and arms trafficking, and the last fugitive of the BCCI banking scandal. The country has put money laundering controls on the books but has made few cases. Interior Minister Sheik Saif bin Zayed Al Nahyan told U.S. News the U.A.E. has made great strides in cracking down, but he insists that the real problems lie elsewhere. "We are a neutral country, like Switzerland," he says. "Give us the evidence, and we will do something about it. Don't blame others." Not everyone agrees. "All roads lead to Dubai," says former treasury agent John Cassara, author of Hide and Seek, a forthcoming book on terrorism finance. Cassara tried explaining U.S. concerns about Dubai to a local businessman but got only a puzzled look: "Mr. John, money laundering? But that's what we do." "But Dubai also serves as the region's criminal crossroads, a hub for smuggling, money laundering, and underground banking. There are Russian and Indian mobsters, Iranian arms traffickers, and Arab jihadists. Funds for the 9/11 hijackers and African embassy bombers were transferred through the city. It was the heart of Pakistani scientist A. Q. Khan's black market in nuclear technology and other proliferation cases. Half of all applications to buy U.S. military equipment from Dubai are from bogus front companies, officials say. "Iran," adds one U.S. official, "is building a bomb through Dubai." Last year, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents thwarted the shipment of 3,000 U.S. military night-vision goggles by an Iranian pair based in Dubai. Moving goods undetected is not hard. Dhows--rickety wooden boats that have plowed the Arabian Sea for centuries--move along the city center, uninspected, down the aptly named Smuggler's Creek.
"Give us evidence and we'll do something about it." Fairly classic evidence of untrustworthiness. This is more than mere lassitude. It's more akin to 'If you catch us, why then we'll be only too happy to cooperate.' And then shift their complicity to others... E.g., so much for the guilt-trip they try to lay on the author, "don't blame others."
They refuse to take responsibility! Which is a compelling sign that they can't be trusted on their own. These are the guys who you wouldn't 'release on their own recognizance' no matter how big the bail posted..
And this is from their official who sets the policies for the underlings and we are supposed to rely on this?! And it's all post 9/11.
No wonder the more-honest officials in the U.S. Coast Guard, the "underlings" dutifully flagged a major problem. And didn't back down. And they clearly weren't "bigoted" as so swiftly disparaged by the faux traders who only want to believe in "assurances". Who have already repeated their charges in this very thread.
The Coast Guard Investigators were well-informed. And thorough. But concluded that they could not do the job of vetting DPW. They could not properly investigate this state-owned entity...because it was simply impossible to do so. They then got overruled by higher-ups with pieces of paper. No substance, just form.
Personally, I do feel that security issues might still be manageable, but only by using our own security personnel constantly looking over their shoulders there...as we do now with their air cargo... but for the sheer,scale of that oversight having to be stationed in Dubai... why bother? They don't want to spend enough here to do what needs to be done on our end. Why complicate things still more?
Manifestly there is fuzzy-headed thinking on the globalist's side here. They really have blinders over their eyes with respect to national security...mistakenly thinking that they can compartmentalize something which is innately not so limited. They don't think as you need to...outside the box. And they ignore all the warning signs that their little abstract demarcations will not be of any use against an asymmetric enemy.
A Congressional District should be no more than 100,000 constituents, not the 1/2 million to a million they are now. Congress themselves arbitrarily set their own number at 435.
Reform and redistrict Congress, repeal the 17th Amendment and get back to gridlock the way the Founders designed it.
Not one of those things you just posted is evidence to show that DPW would endanger our port security, of course. They vote against us? Ok, so? They have muslims, who riot? Yes, and what does that have to do with ports? UAE has a govt we don't agree with? Again, no mention of 'port security' anywhere there.
Do you guys seriously not even understand what kind of evidence I'm looking for? I've been very clear, and am asking such a simple question.
An intelligent person in your should would say, as some have, "I understand why you might prefer clear evidence, but in this case we feel the risks are too high " . . . then explain yourself.
But to not even *know* what clear evidence is, and to not even *understand* why anyone would ever want evidence? And to post cartoons, and the like, as if that were persuasive?
You're saying a lot more about yourselves than you mean to.
You continue to show your intellectual ignorance of evidence. You also fail to properly ascertain what the clearance process requires. The entity needs to prove its reliability and 'innocence.' Thus, a couple examples where the COUNTRY SELLS us docking and basing rights (how extremely generous of them), doesn't constitute a ringing affirmation of such trustworthiness.
As Mark Twain once opinied: "The Thirteenth stroke of a clock is not only false of itself, but it casts exceedingly grave doubts upon the veracity of the preceding twelve!"
So too with all the multifarious misdeeds and linkages of the Emirates. They are manifestly in the thick of things. And playing a double game.
Furthermore, you continue to fail to grasp that this is not a "company."
You continue to blow off what the Coast Guard officers said.
Your narrow construct that you claim you want is not what is necessary. And is in fact INAPPROPRIATE in the circumstances.
Average Indians (our Globalist traders) have said that we were clearly right.
And the average American seems to have a higher instinctive grasp of the 'out of the box' elements of national hazards here than you do. But of course all you can do is claim to be bored by their concerns...or disparage them with ad hominem accusations of some stripe.
And to post cartoons, and the like, as if that were persuasive?
Oh, I see you already forgot in this very thread that you were the one demanding humor!
"pinstriped pundits" = RINOS = Country Clubbers = the Rockefeller wing = those who hated Goldwater and Reagan. SOSDD....
The longer you're in a comma, the less chance you have of coming out of it. But, there is still hope for America, or I'd at least like to believe that there is for the sake of my children. She's opened her eyes a few times lately. Raised her eyebrows at illegal immigration, Harriet Miers, and this port fiasco.
For obvious reasons, I do not agree with you.
The fact that they've allowed us to doc our warships in their harbors, and that they've played host to our troops, and that they've partnered with us in finding terrorists, and that they've turned terrorists over to us - - - is clearly evidence of co-operation and trustworthyness.
And the fact that their govt owns the company is *not* evidence of terrorist activity that would endanger our ports.
We have nothing left to discuss. For some reason, you and a select few seem to have no idea what I'm looking for, so asking you for it is hopeless. I'm asking for apples, you keep offering me banannas -- and seem to not even know what an apple *is*.
You seem to have a significant comprehension problem.
Maybe that has something to do with your position on this then, I don't know.
"and often have a full house of Chinese and Taiwanese made electronics, toys, appliances, clothing, "
My fridge, washer, dryer, dishwasher are all US made. Could you tell me where to get US made dvd players, personal computer parts, etc, at ANY price?
"I have been sensing a growing backlash against free trade for several years. It is building."
Definitely warranted due to our horrible economy! /sarcasm
Yep.
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