Question about UAE Port Deal? Answered! Feedback?

[jsamuel]

I was sent this:

Explain to me why this is a problem. Even if an Arab company leases a port from the U.S. Everything coming in is still searched by Americans. No foreign nationals will be doing the radiation scanning, X-ray check, customs, coast guard patrol, federal inspections etc... It would be just as easy to get something in when not running the port. This just seems like stupid politics that will further alienate Arab countries from the U.S. Interesting that this comes up just when mid-term elections begin.

Please explain

My response:

I understand what you are saying. The first thing I posted online about this story is that we need to make sure that we do NOT make this a race or religion issue. The reasons to oppose this have nothing to do with the United “Arab” Emirates, rather with the UAE, the country itself. As 9/11 was happening, I was very worried about the anit-islamic sentiment in the country and I think that we need to do everything we can to stop xenophobia from taking hold in the country. Unfortunately, the way Bush and the Republicans in congress have been running their political campaigns and wars, the Republican base has grown (or been validated) more racist against people of Islamic origins. Isolationism was a large sentiment before WWII and it ended up giving way due to Pearl Harbor, but since the War in Iraq has been shown to be a complete blunder, Isolationism has been making resurgence in the US, especially among Democrats, Libertarians, and moderate Republicans. This is good and bad because Isolationism can keep us from invading countries that we have no business in, but can lead to xenophobia. So, an important BALANCE must be struck.



There are two major points to be stressed to make me conclude that this is a bad deal:

While Britain controlled these ports before, I really don’t care for that much either. The ports of a sovereign nation should be controlled by that nation. Just as a nation’s oil reserves, utilities, or coast guard should be operated by that country. It is common sense.
Even if you disagree with point 1, the country that you would allow to control the ports (or the company based in that country) would have to be trustworthy. Why? Because (even though they don’t control the security) they are going to know EVERYTHING about port security in each of those cities. With they have the ability to completely circumvent the system? Probably not, but that country will know every weak spot there is in our security and will have people working with these weak spots daily.


This deal is effectively putting targets on the backs of these cities. The deal creates weak spots in the most populated cities on the east coast. It’s just a plain bad idea.



All that without considering how trustworthy the UAE is… Here is some info on the UAE:

UAE royal family met with Bin Laden, saved him from CIA hit
http://www.9-11commission.gov/archive/hearing8/9-11Commission_Hearing_2004-03-24.htm

MR. FIELDING: Yeah. Well, I would appreciate that on behalf of the Commission if you could do that because it seemed that this -- when the intelligence was so good, and that by the time the camp was dismantled days and days had passed.

So I would appreciate --

MR. TENET: There's also a question, I believe, as to whether bin Ladin was inside or outside the camp --

MR. FIELDING: Of course.

MR. TENET: -- it was a complicating issue in this whole thing -- and whether he was there or not. So there's a second complicating factor here.

The third complicating factor here is, you might have wiped out half the royal family in the UAE in the process, which I'm sure entered into everybody's calculation in all this.

But in any event, I would like -- I will try and reconstruct the data as best I can, in terms of what I had in my possession at the time.

The UAE won’t recognize Israel. (While Bush is making a deal with the UAE, he won’t touch Hamas because they won’t recognize Israel.)

The UAE was one of three countries that recognized the Taliban as legitimate rulers of Afganistan.

Some of the 9/11 hijackers came from UAE and were fincanced through UAE banks and the UAE government would not cooperate with the investigation after 9/11.

In general the UAE has 10X more problems with terrorists than Iraq had before we invaded them.



Bush is doing more of that “trust me” stuff. Chertoff (Dept of Homeland Security Chief) said that they have good reason but it is classified. (rolling eyes)



That’s my view right now. Plus, the Sec. of the Treasury (who approved of the deal) was appointed by Bush after working with this company. The Carlyle Group (group of investors including: Bush, Blair, and other major RWer’s) is also heavily invested in this company. The people in the Bush Administration will make lots of money with this deal.



The issue is just one of hundreds that I don’t like, but the reason why this one is making such a ruckus is because Democrats, Republicans, and Libertarians hate it (80-90%). Rarely do we see numbers so profoundly against Bush for something he is willing to veto over. Plus Bush’s devout followers are so enraged over him allowing this to happen that they are openly bashing him on their “only good news for Bush” forum. It could be where Bush’s approval numbers finally get well below 40% permanently, not because of Democrats, but because of fed up Republicans.



Now we also see that:

1) P&O (Peninsular Oriental Navigation Co) is for sale. Its a British company that has been in business for nearly 170yrs.



2) P&O has a subsidiary company that handles its "Port/Terminal" Management for several US ports.



3) There were only two bidders on the table for the deal - A company from Dabui, UAE called Ports World and a company from Singapore called PSA. One has ties to "bad people" in the middle east and the other to "bad people" in China and the far east.

That is a good argument for the deal, but not really a solution to the problem, rather is brings the real problem up. The real problem is that our ports are being operated by companies (privatization) rather than by the government. Nader warned us against privatization as many Democrats do as well. I am very much against privatization of anything that should be run by the US government. That includes Social Security.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Feinstein: Ports 'ought to be governmentally operated'
Feb. 22, 2006

http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/business/national/13929392.htm

SAN DIEGO - U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein said Tuesday it was fortunate that California's major ports are run differently than the six big ports on the East and Gulf coasts embroiled in controversy over whether their shipping operations should be taken over by a state-owned business in the United Arab Emirates.

"My reaction is that it is a mistake to let ports be privately owned, period," the California Democrat said during a news conference in San Diego.

Feinstein was asked her view on the sale of London-based Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co. to Dubai Ports World. Approved by the Bush administration and expected to be completed soon, it would put Dubai Ports in charge of shipping operations in New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia

Feinstein said she was familiar with port operations because of her nine years as mayor of San Francisco.

[madmom]

1. Of equal importance is the fact that the British Co. was privately

owned the UAE company is owned by the state, with all their resources (which is plenty) behind them.What would happen if they decided they didn't like one of our import/export partners, they could basically shut down these ports.Where would that leave us?

[Katherine Brengle]

2. "everything" is not searched--this is part of the problem. "everything"

is not scanned for radiation. See The Progress Report from the Center for American Progress today--they break this down very well.

[KT2000]

3. What I have heard

is about 5% is searched. Sen Patty Murray D-WA has been trying to make this an issue for years without much success.

[Katherine Brengle]

5. Exactly--and only about 6% gets scanned for radiation. n/t

[KharmaTrain]

4. Corporation Vs. Monarchy

The British company is a publicly traded coroporation. While it's based in Britain...it's owners or stockholders come from all over the world. Good chance a large number of American funds are invested in this company making many "regular Americans" owners of these facilities. A publicly traded corporation...while being far from a democracy...is still accountable to its stockholders and has to operate responsibly or either lose investors, lose business or face legal/criminal problems. As much as slime merchants as Enron was, at least there's some accountability taking place.

A monarchy is like a privately held company. There is no transparency...no disclosure. We have little concept of the parent company's assets or other holdings. We don't even get a full accounting of whose on the board of directors. With no accountability, it can and will operate on self interest and whim and always serve the master long before it even considers the serfs.

The company that wants to control the ports is part of a large network of coporations shuffled between the various Arabian Peninsula monarchies (UAE, Kuwaiit, Saudi Arabi, Qataar) and big American oil and military interests. All have risen and benefited from their snake dances with one another and this is just kicking it onto a new level.