Anybody run across this?

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

Im not trying to fight... I was just curious.

Forget I said it.

[Skar]

Skar how can you blame just the Democrats for torpedoing the port deal when the majority of the republican party did the exact same thing?

I'm not blaming only the democrats for torpedoing the ports deal.  Perhaps I was less than clear (heaven knows that's been a problem of mine in the past) but what I was pointing out was that the democrats reversed their position on national security over the issue because (as far as I could tell) it was a chance to politically hurt the republicans.  They have been claiming that the Republicans simply hate all arabs, lied to get into the war because they hate all arabs, and are racist in their attitudes towards arabs.  Now, suddenly they have an opportunity to jab a Republican president over a percieved national security issue and they reverse themselves.  Suddenly the ports deal was bad for no better reason than "arabs would be controlling our ports."  As I said, the democrats had nothing credible to say, they just screamed ARAB and made hay.  I didn't blame the democrats for torpedoing the ports deal, I blamed them for engaging in mindless fearmongering, which very thing they have been accusing the Republicans of for years now.  It doesn't even matter whether they were right to accuse the Republicans of that, that discussion has been had more than once too many times on this forum.  I was merely pointing out that their behavior was internally inconsistent.

You should expect the party not in power to do everything to press a percived advantage, If the tables were reversed, like under Clinton the Republicans would have been howling for blood and an impeachment preceeding. What stunned me was how willing the republicans were to cut and run from the president over it.

On the contrary I expect any party to at least behave in a consistent manner, rather than reversing themselves in order to ride on every passing zephyr of political advantage.  One is now left to wonder whether the democratic party thinks we should treat arabs as real people (which is the stand they take to oppose the war and accuse the Republicans of NOT doing) or whether we should treat them as an untrustworthy racial whole (which is the stand they took over the ports deal).  The Democrats are/were being false in at least one of those mutually exclusive stands.  That leads one to wonder if they are ever true since they play the crowd so casually.

I don't think the Republicans who broke with the Pres. had any more credible reason for objecting to the ports deal than the democrats, they certainly didn't present a more compelling case.  But they at least weren't reversing themselves on the national security issue.

[Skar]

Incidentally, you're in the Coast Guard yes? (forgive me if I have that totally wrong...)  If you have any insights into how ports operate and whether the Dubai Ports deal would or would not have given terrorists easier access I'd like to hear your thoughts.  I have nearly no knowledge on the matter and would appreciate some insight.

And, incidentally, I'm honestly not trying to start a fight.  If my remarks seem needlessly inflammatory know that I'm not doing it on purpose.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

The Coast Guard assessment presented to congress concluded that "there are many intelligence gaps, concerning the potential for DPW or P&O assets to support terrorist operations, that precludes an overall threat assessment of the potential DWP and P&O ports merger. The breadth of the intelligence gaps also infer potential unknown threats against a large number of potential vulnerabilities."


While its true that the port owner has little control or influence over most port operations, they have just enough to be truely dangerous especially when you take into account that we are only able to inspect  35% of containers that come into our ports. Its probably true that ownership by DWP would make no difference, they do have an excellect record, from a nationalistic point of veiw Im of the opinion that foreigners who want to own our infrastructure can get stuffed and bugger off. They can trade with us, not own us. I feel like every foreign operated port in the US ought to be run by us. I would also like to point out that 35% of containers inspected is a terrifying number. That means that in a batch of 100 containers all carrying a nuke, only 35 might get caught. Im not comfortable with that figure.  Im also not comfortable with the just trust us excuse from the white house. Trade and security are important enough to warrant an investigation even if the buyers seem to be or even are our allies.

That bits just my opinion though.
I'll tell you more about port ops in 3 months when Im inspecting cargos in Norfolk.

[Skar]

Its probably true that ownership by DPW would make no difference, they do have an excellect record.

That makes good sense.  The ports are already so wide open that ownership by one foreign ally over another is a moot point. So I have to echo E here, how embarrassing that the ports deal got killed "because they're arabs."

Makes one wonder why a container bomb hasn't already been detonated here.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

Not that embarassing. For a few reasons. No ones really gone out of their way in this country or around the world making the face of the arab world look sane. Just look at the riots about cartoons. You and I can intellectualize that most Arabs are people, with feelings, and reverence toward life, with ambitions and dreams, but I tend to think of us as the intellecual elite of the coutry too. We use computers, we vote, we keep up on current affairs, we read etc...
The average joe, going to work from 9-5 doesnt know a lot about arabs. Heck half of them think Iranians are Arabs, they dont know the words Arab, and Islam arent synonymous. If they can find Iraq on a map its only because we fought 2 wars with them. Most folks know nothing of Dubai, or the UAE.

Heres an article worth reading from the Washington times (yes I read conservative papers too) http://www.washingtontimes.com/national/20060308-122910-3253r.htm

This is from the post from a few years ago
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A22303-2002Feb16?language=printer
and shudder fox news.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,185725,00.html

the Pakistani nuclear connection in itself is troublesome, and UAE is on the list of 20 nations involved in the Nuclear black market.

and yeah, we're scared of Arabs. People have been scaring us about arabs for 2 decades now. It finally took. Who knew?

[Skar]

Not that embarassing. For a few reasons.

But you have to admit the opponents of the ports deal could at least have said something along the lines of "The UAE intelligence service is riddled with AlQaeda operatives."  or  "DPW has absolutely no controls in place capable of ensuring that their middle to upper management (those who could easily ensure that a particular container was part of the 65%) are NOT AlQaeda operatives."  It's not embarrassing that the ports deal failed but that it failed on such a weak argument when so many better ones were available.  I hope to read those articles tomorrow.  Buenos Noches.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

many of them were made, they just got soundbited into racist little 30 second clips from both sides.

[Skar]

Thank you to the media.