I’ve just got to call up that on this United Arab Emirates port security matter, President Bush is right. He’s wrong on the political question, and his concept of national security is all askew on this, but he’s fundamentally much more right than his opponents, Republicans and Democrats alike.
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I’ve been on the sidelines of this debate, but two thoughts have resonated in my mind:
1) The administration has painted a black and white world, and it is no wonder that the AM radio crowd turns on the President when he tries to make a nuanced point about being fair to foreign nations or joining them in a mutually prosperous arrangement. As they say, you can’t have it both ways.
2) I’m more convinced by a recent article in The Nation (http://www.thenation.com/blogs/thebeat?bid=1&pid=62081) which argues that the issue front and center is corporate control of public resources, which are more accountable to shareholders than the public at-large.
I totally agree with you on both matters.
I’m going to offer this link about the Port Security
I’m really surprised that Waldo’s come out infavor of this port deal.
Please explain to me how putting a company, owned by a middle eastern government, in charge of our ports is a good thing??
From the above quoted article:
Now lets say you are hired by the company managing the terminal to handle security.. you’re a security guard.. and how much does that pay? and you’re working for a foreign government which owns the company? And you’re in charge of security? What’s it worth for you to stand up to your employer when those interests run counter to each other?
This should be an opportunity for the democrat to come out infavor of the U.S. worker by insisting ports be run by U.S. based non government owned companies.
I’m totally baffled at which sides people are taking with regards to this issue. It’s entirely without regard to political affiliation.
I think it’s wrong and I can’t imagine how anyone would think this is a good idea… although I will invite anyone who does to explain their position here.
Putting a company owned by a foreign government in charge of our port security is a bad decision. A very bad descision.
Waldo,
I think that you and Jimmy Carter are the only ones supporting Mr. Bush on this one. There’s only one principle that Mr. Bush is championing here and that’s MONEY.
Seems like you and Mr. Carter are the only ones who are willing to trust that Mr. Bush is on top of the situation.
This is the issue that finally shows conservatives, what moderates, independents, and progressives have always known: For Bush Money is #1 and you’re #2.
;)
TrvlnMn,
“Putting a company owned by a foreign government in charge of our port security is a bad decision. A very bad descision.”
The company that currently owns these ports is based in Britain. The White House is only allowing the exchange to occur.
Josh,
“There’s only one principle that Mr. Bush is championing here and that’s MONEY.”
In this case, I would disagree. The company that is seeking to buy these ports is located in Dubai, the capitol of the United Arab Emirates, which is easily one of the most pro-American nations in the Middle East, let alone the world. They support our “War on Terror” and in my opinion, to not allow this deal to go through would show racial discrimination against the Arabs, and indeed, even Islam itself. If we cannot do business with Dubai, I think it says we cannot do business with the Middle East at all.
~Joseph
If we’re going to eliminate all foreign licensing of ports, that’s fine by me. But so long as we let corporations of any nation own ports, there’s no reason not to let UAE own some.
A basic rule of security — as you know, Josh — is trust nobody. When I log onto my server, my usage is logged just as closely and cautiously as if any other user had, or a complete stranger. That’s why this ridiculous “trusted flyer” program was cancelled — if we conclude that we can trust some people, then the bad guys will just emulate those individuals and avoid the security checks and monitoring.
Let’s pretend that we think we can trust a UK-owned corporation to operate ports, but not a UAE-owned corporation. First we must consider our criteria for that. I’ll jump to the conclusion that it’s because we don’t trust the people of the UAE, because of their ties to September 11. Sure, the government might have been helpful to the U.S., but some of their citizens don’t seem to be with the program. So what’s to keep a UAE citizen from working for that British corporation? Uh-oh — now we’ve let our guard down, because we trust the UK, and we’ve let a terrorist bring something nasty into the U.S. OK, so now UAE citizens may work for the ports. That’s fine, but that doesn’t help us with the UAE citizens working in the outgoing port in England. So we bar any UAE citizens from working in those ports. Well, what about Brits whose family is from the UAE, and who think of themselves as Arabs first, Brits second?
And so on.
Once we trust other nations to secure our ports, we’ve already failed. So let the UAE operate ports, or let no foreign-owned businesses operate ports. (Or foreign-born citizens, or people who are fond of other nations, or people who look like kinda dark skinned but not dark skinned enough.) But to allow some nations and not others, and to predicate our security on that, provides no security, only the illusion of security. And that’s what we call Bush-style security, not real security.
Essentially the arguments which are being made against Dubai Ports World could be made against any company that is going to operate in a U.S. port. I have heard mulitple times in CNN reports that the port which this company already operates in Dubai is considered to be the safest in the world. Security is our own responsiblity, not the company’s (can we say on 5% of containers being inspected?) and I don’t have any problems letting a company that has an excellent security record operate in our ports. The question is as Waldo states it, either we allow any foreign company or no foreign companies. But even if we only allow domestic companies to operate in our ports, it does not solve the problem which Sen. Chuck Schumer so concisely stated as “How do we know that they’re not employing our enemies?”
There is no 100% assurance with P&O or with Dubai Ports World that they are not employing our enemies – neither is there such an assurance with US Air or United. 9/11 only demonstrated that terrorists will find a way to infiltrate our security to perpetrate their attacks. Dubai Ports World will be employing a vast majority of American workers in their ports, not importing workers from the UAE to work in New York or Baltimore as seems to be the insinuation. Are we then to assume that American workers will be subverted solely on the basis of their corporate employer’s Arab shareholders?
I’m sure everyone would agree that our atrocious relations with the majority of the Arab and Muslim worlds are not helping to defend us against terrorist attacks. The disaster of democracy in Iraq and the emergence of mass terrorism and civil war are only exhibit A. Is it really most expedient to our national security to offend and isolate an Arab nation which is attempting to forge alliances? Yes, two of the 9/11 hijackers were from the UAE. However, another 10 were from Saudi Arabia, our business deals with that country don’t seem to be in jeopardy.
The uproar over this deal only goes to show the extent to which Arabs and Muslims as a whole have come to be associated with terrorism in the American mind. We can’t punish an entire region of the world for the actions of a few extremists. The Oklahoma City bombers weren’t Arab Muslims…
That’s a great point. President Bush has told America over and over that “they” are out to get us, that it’s “us against them,” etc. So he can’t act particularly shocked when his black & white view of the world, now impressed upon Americans, fails to accommodate his newfound understanding of shades of gray.
Waldo, I’m glad to see you’re not tarring all critics of the port deal with anti-Arab racism. But there are specific, security-related concerns about this deal, in which the UAE royal family controls the company managing U.S. ports.
It is quite possible to make distinctions between a private corporation based in a democratically governed country that is this country’s closest ally, and a corporation owned by a small family of absolute monarchs with past warm social relationships with bin Laden.
For another thing, the deal with DPW is actually less transparent and accountable than the current deal with P&O (the British company DPW took a controlling interest in). For instance, it contains the unprecedented provision that records need not be stored on U.S. soil, where they would be available to U.S. authorities whenever needed.
Yet the deal, including this extraordinary provision, did not strike any of the members of the Committee on Foreign Investment, as problematic enough to trigger the 30-day review.
Information on port management in the news is contradictory and confusing. I’ve seen reports that P&O currently runs 21 U.S. ports. If that’s so, why is there talk only of 6 or 8 ports as part of this deal? Further info is welcome if anyone has it.
President Bush has told America over and over that “they” are out to get us, that it’s “us against them,”
I commend you for avoiding the trap that has ensared so many Bush-haters on this issue… that being, “If Bush is fer it, then I’m agin’ it!!!”
But this particular statement is pure bullshit, given your context. If anything, Bush has gone out of his way to repeatedly and emphatically state that it is not Muslims or Arabs who are the enemy, but terrorists (most of whom just happen to be Arab Muslims).
Yes — “they” are indeed out to get “us” — and Bush has said so, but he has not said that Arabs and/or Muslims are the enemy.
No, he hasn’t said it, but he’s very, very strongly implied it, time and time again. Since September 11, he’s presented the problem of terrorism as a very simple one, a black and white issue of good against evil. “We’re gonna smoke ’em out.” “Dead or alive.” “It’s us against them.” “Either yer with us, er yer agains us.” The White House and their surrogates have painted the whole of the Muslim world as “Islamofascists,” the “them” in “it’s us against them.”
Americans’ inability to keep up with which nations that we hate (Syria and Iran), which ones that we love (Iraq, currently, and Israel), and which ones that we can’t seem to decide on (Palestine, Saudi Arabia) can be understood. And Americans’ inclusion of the UAE as “them” can likewise by understood. They, after all, just more “Islamofascists.”
I feel there’s a difference between a foriegn company and a foriegn company run by its government with unelected officials.
To answer the question I asked in my post, yes, it is 21 ports, not 6. Here’s a map.
At no point in this process has the administration showed the slightest sense of accountability to anyone outside the regime. And, yes, it’s a regime.
Waldo, you need to address that not all the arguments against this deal have to do with UAE vs. British company, or foreign company vs US control, but with the fact that the DPW deal is actually less transparent than the existing P&O agreement. Also that there are security aspects to the agreements (in other words, it is not true that the U.S. has all the security responsibilities in the deal so everything is okay).
The ‘superior to both sides’ stance can be refreshing, but in this case, by responding only to the political arguments being made rather than the facts that are dribbling out, you’re committing the same sin as the pols.
I’m quite sympathetic to arguments that a state-owned company should not be in charge of port security for the US. However, contra what most of you are arguing, that’s just not the case here.
The UAE-owned company is not buying the ports, and they will not be charged with “port security”. Port Security will still be the domain of the US Coast Guard and US Customs. The UAE company will be operating terminals. Docks. That’s it.
Now, perhaps there’s some vital national security secret in an unloading dock, but I’m not aware of it. They’d know the unloading schedule…but that’s currently about as confidential as the bus schedule. What’s left? The boats that unload at US docks are already predominantly foreign owned, anyway.
What, exactly, will a foreign company — even one owned by a Muslim dictatorship — be able to do by owning a US loading dock? What’s more, since their a** will be on the line if something happens through their terminal, what’s the incentive to let it? If anything, they have an incentive to be doubly scrupulous about things.
I agree with Nell on this one. Why cant we have some transparency on this? Why was this rushed and why where the principles–supposedly– in the dark?
I think if we find out, this will all have more to do with Dubai’s duty free ports, “open” economy, and importance as a customer for our exports.
On the politics: fostering racism has been a very, very, very affective tool for this administration. Most importantly it helped them make the crude connection between Al Quada and Iraq. It also helped him win re-election: that wolves add with the shadowy dark skin men about to eat your babies, was a particular favorite of mine.
The only time Bush went, “out of his way” to state that Muslims are not the enemy, was when he thought Muslims where listening.
The innuendo towards the domestic audience has been in a much different key.
But guilt of sinister intentions with innuendo is hard to prove. So more revealingly is if he where to truly go “out of his way”, he would have taking to task individuals and allies in his base who have been propagating such noise.
As you wrote, the facts are just dribbling out. No sooner does one bit of information come out that indicates that Bush is wrong about something than some other information comes out indicating that the critics are wrong. On these minor matters I’m reserving a decision. But on the matter on the whole — the question of whether a business owned by the UAE ought to have the right to manage the operations of some ports — I believe that President Bush is right.
Transparency, rushing through things, etc., these are all important, but my interest is really in the central question, and not whether this specific business transaction has been handled properly.
Should we be asking the question is it ok for any company owned by a non-democratic country to be doing business inside the USA?
I know we buy and sell lots of stuff from agents like that, but is there a line that is crossed?
I don’t know, I am asking? And how undemocratic is Dubai anyway? And are there any non-democratic state-owned companies operating inside the US, right now?
Thomas Kean, a former Republican governor of New Jersey who led the bipartisan probe of the Sept. 11 attacks, said the deal was a big mistake because of past connections between the 2001 hijackers and the UAE.
“It shouldn’t have happened, it never should have happened,” Kean said in a telephone interview with The Associated Press.
The quicker the Bush administration can get out of the deal, the better, he said. “There’s no question that two of the 9/11 hijackers came from there and money was laundered through there,” Kean said.
Kean acknowledged the UAE is now being helpful by allowing the United States to dock ships in its country’s waters, and helping the U.S. with intelligence.
“From our point of view, we don’t want foreigners controlling our ports,” Kean said. “From their point of view, this is a legitimate company that had a legitimate bid and won, and here are all these congressmen saying all these things about not wanting this company. It looks to them like it’s anti-Arab.”
“I think this deal is going to be killed,” Kean said. “The question is how much damage is this going to do to us before it’s killed.”
Waldo, your well-reasoned conclusion on this point is almost negated by your nonsensical comment no. 11.
Don’t even nip at the Kool-Aid.
I found this post disappointingly vague, and the followup comments didn’t help much. I still have no clear idea on what point you think Bush is “right.”
Furthermore, I feel that by describing them as “UK-owned” and “UAE-owned,” you have elided the difference between a public company and a state-owned one, which plays into the allegation that the only difference is prejudice.
What I see in this case is the Bush Administration not following legal requirements (in the security review, in this case) but insisting that they have done enough, claiming secrecy and refusing to provide information to Congress to substantiate that contention, and changing their story as to who was involved and when they were informed. We have numerous past cases where they have behaved similarly, and in every one of them the truth turns out to be that they made up their minds beforehand and shaped the process to fit their preconceptions.
I think it’s a sad commentary on the state of our nation that the only reason this deal produced significant opposition, rather than just a Democratic unofficial hearning in a basement room, is that it triggered the racism and xenophobia the national GOP has been stoking for five years, but the fact that a lot of people are opposing it for the wrong reasons doesn’t make it right.
If your point is simply that if the companies are reasonably equivalent and a competent review was done, there is no reason why, if we are willing to let a British-owned company manage our ports, we should not let an Arab-owned one do the same, then I would agree. But since I don’t see any of those conditions being true, such an argument is entirely in the abstract, and has no connection with the statement “Bush is right.”
It’s intentionally vague — it’s confessional, not factual. I think the man is right, and I’m calling it up.
A “fair and balanced” position, Mr. Jaquith.
To those who assert that the security review was “rushed,” it wasn’t. I know a lot of people in the agencies who vetted this. They know what they’re doing. The security issues had been kicked around internally since October. Within the industry (with which I have a fair amount of contact) there has been a great deal of talk about this. The determination by these professionals at Defense, Homeland Security, Treasury, Customs and Coast Guard that the arrangement would not unduly cede control to foreign interests or threaten security concerns is likely a higher-value determination than Chuck Schumer’s race to the the TV cameras.
I’m not sure whether I should be annoyed at this fellow’s insulting assumptions, or amused at the way he divides motivations into partisan camps.
Maybe there’s a degree of xenophia about some of the opposition to this, but you argued yourself that a State-owned company is different. Why, then, assume that people — only Republicans, or people touched by Republican Xenophobia! — are xenophobic about outsiders, rather than worried about the same security concerns you have?
Moreover, nobody seems to have addressed the facts I mentioned above — this is not a “port ownership” or “port security” issue. Port security is still a function of US Coast Guard and Customs.
I’m not assuming anything about any individuals’ motivations, except as expressed, and I didn’t say anyone here was motivated by it. If you don’t believe that there is plenty of xenophobia and racism in the views expressed about this on the conservative side, I suggest you wander over to freerepublic or listen to Michael Savage’s callers, just for starters.
How exactly is it xenophobia to believe an entity wholly owned by a foreign government is more of a security risk than a privately owned company?
As for the administration line you’re accepting that there is no security concern because the Coast Guard and Customs are in charge of security, it was addressed in a comment prior to yours, and I couldn’t put it better than it was expressed there.
I give up. I don’t object to the concept of your post, and I understand that it was not your intention to justify the opinion, but I still have no idea what it is you think he’s right about. That’s my only complaint.