27 Comments

1. Grumpy Old Man:

Somebody’s got a giant Tin Ear.

Feb 21, 2006 - 5:55 am 2. reliapundit - the astute blogger:

I HAVE A SIMPLE SOLUTION: Let’s get P&O – the current British owner – or Ports World (the impending Dubai owner) – to sell the port operations to MAERSK – a DANISH shipping company. They’re one of the LARGEST shipping container companies in the world, and already manage dozens and dozens of major ports; in fact, Maersk’s APM TERMINALS division is the THIRD LARGEST port operator in the world.

I think most Americans trust the Danes – and would LOVE to see the Danes get this business, especially NOW! DOWN WITH DUBAI! UP WITH DENMARK!

IOW: Let’s not just “BUY DANISH!”; let’s SELL SOMETHING TO THEM, TOO!

WE CAN “PROTECT OUR PORTS” AND HELP AN ALLY IN NEED AT THE SAME TIME!

http://astuteblogger.blogspot.com/2006/02/simple-solution-for-dubaius-port.html

Feb 21, 2006 - 7:54 am 3. David Thomson:

I must disagree with Roger Simon on this particular matter. There is no legitimate reason, as far as I can tell, to deny this Saudi company the privilege of managing our ports. It will have absolutely nothing to with security. Are we to treat all Arabs as possible enemies? Also, why couldnít a terrorist organization take advantage of any foreign based company? Why be so trusting of either the British or the Danes? The hell with the public relations angle? Is this the right thing to do? That is the far more important question.

Feb 21, 2006 - 8:11 am 4. David Thomson:

I visited National Reviewís site shortly after posting my earlier comments. They have started a discussion regarding this controversy. Alas, only one of the debaters seems to agree with me:

ìWhat happens when one foreign-owned company sells a U.S. port service to another foreign-owned company. Not much. Virtually all the company employees at the ports are U.S. citizens. The Dubai firm is a holding company that will likely play no role in managing the U.S. facilities. Likewise, the company is owned by the government, a government that is an ally of the United States and recognizes that al Qaeda is as much a threat to them as it is to us. They are spending billions to buy these facilities because they think itís a crackerjack investment that will keep making money for them long after the oil runs out. The odds that they have any interest in seeing their facilities become a gateway for terrorist into the United States are less than zero.î

—James Jay Carafano

http://www.nationalreview.com/symposium/symposium200602211008.asp

We probably should not forbid the Saudi company to operate our ports. But if this is our ultimate decision—then no foreign firm can be granted permission.

Feb 21, 2006 - 8:32 am 5. dclydew:

The hell with the public relations angle?

And this seems to be one reason why Mr. Bush has a ~40% approval rating. When one is a representitive of the Public, it appears that the need to have a good command of how public relations work. This administration seems to have fumbled this again and agian, making simple errors look huge and innocent acts look suspect.

Feb 21, 2006 - 8:32 am 6. David Thomson:

“And this seems to be one reason why Mr. Bush has a ~40% approval rating.”

Yes, often doing the right thing brings down the poll numbers. Is President Bush suppose to focus merely on gaining public approval. I hate to think what you would have thought of Winston Churchill during the pre-World War II era in the British isles.

Feb 21, 2006 - 8:54 am 7. dclydew:

David,

Of course he should merely focus on gaining public approval. He should however, understand the impact that public approval has on his ability to do anything. It also should register in his head that public approval will probably be necessary for his allies to get reelected.

If one is thinking about selling Port management to a company based out of Saudi Arabia, then it would be wise to have lots of detailed reports on its validity and the reasons for it ready to fire off to the public, instead of letting some PR happy Senator drop it like a bomb and leave the public feeling confused. A president should never base his decisions on Poll numbers, but he should understand the impact of decisions and (one would hope) plan an effective way to communicate the wisdom of his actions to the public. This administration seems to have real trouble with this concept.

Feb 21, 2006 - 10:48 am 8. dclydew:

Err, should read “he should not merely focus on gaining public approval”…

sorry

Feb 21, 2006 - 10:48 am 9. Hermie:

I believe that this will actually help efforts in the GWOT.

Remember, the Left has either poo-pooed or laughed at the idea of a GWOT. To them, it isn’t a war requiring military action, but a legal matter requiring Justice Department and ACLU lawyers.

The objections coming from Schumer, Clinton and other left-wing Democrats are based on a belief that all arabs are potential terrorists. This flies in the face of the ‘non-discrimination’ mantras that have accompanied the supposed ‘illegal detentions’ that Gore and the moonbats have screamed about. The Dems are in effect, engaging in ‘racial profiling’.

You must either acknowledge that there is a effort by Islamic terrorists to destroy the U.S., and there is a potential risk here which needs further consideration; or you must follow the ‘innocent until proven guilty’ belief of GWOT opponents in the U.S., and allow the UAE company to assume control of the ports.

Feb 21, 2006 - 10:58 am 10. flenser:

dclydew

If one is thinking about selling Port management to a company based out of Saudi Arabia,..

The point which you and others are missing is that the President is not selling anything to anyone. The various ports in question, which are state run entities for the most part, opted to outsource the running of the ports to foreign companies.

It’s odd to hear all those who complained about King George and the Imperial Presidency now practically demanding that Bush nationalize the countries ports.

There was a SC decision in the news recently pertaining to a certain president who attempted to take control of the nations steel production. You may want to look it up. It was called the Truong case.

Feb 21, 2006 - 11:04 am 11. dclydew:

flenser,

Again, I think you’re missing the point. In this day and age, what IS real doesn’t seem to mater as much as what appears real to people. Even if Bush was simply a passive watcher to the sale (as seems extremely likely) some smart PR person should have had material ready to support the administration and defend the situation.

Feb 21, 2006 - 11:19 am 12. Terrye:

dclydew:

And how is he supposed to do that? If the Brits want to sell their company what is George Bush supposed to do about it? I heard this morning that no American company even made a bid. Short of nationalizing the ports there is really nothing we can do. Bush can nix the deal I suppose, but if he does…who is going to run the ports? Are we going to force the Brits to do it? It seems to me that once the decision was made years ago to allow such deals to be made there was a possibility something like this could happen.

Gore goes to SA and complains that the US is picking on Arabs, we are unkind to them, we treat them badly etc and so far as I know Schumer had no problem with that. No bad PR for the Democrats there. Now all of a sudden all Arabs are the enemy and Bush is supposed to jump in here and nix a deal without having a real alternative.

Maybe we should have the individual states take control of these ports and then they can make the call, but the truth is while we can talk about bad PR all we want there is no way to make people feel comfortable with something like this.

But it should be remembered that we have bases all over the Arab world and a lot of those governments could make their own lives easier by telling us to pack up and leave.

Feb 21, 2006 - 12:52 pm 13. dw:

there seems to be a lot of misinformation out there on this. Roger wonders “who came to make the decision to award such a contract to a UAE company…?” They didn’t. The ports were already operated by a British company which was purchased by Dubai Ports. Other commenters keep referring to a Saudi company – Dubai is part of United Arab Emirates (totally different country).

I’ll agree that this creates a political problem for the administration but I don’t pesonally see any problem. All our oil service companies are set up in the UAE, 20,000+ American live in UAE and our military and intelligence cooperates with UAE. You can hardly say “you’re a company from an Arab nation,” we’re cancelling your purchase of a British company. I think people are getting worked up over nothing.

Having spent a lot of time in Dubai, economically, they are free market capitalists and operate an extremely efficient port themselves. Dubai is mostly about money. As others have pointed out, it is still run by Brits and Americans and Americans (Coast Guard, U.S. Customs etc) are still responsible for security.

my guess is that the political storm will probably result in these assets of P&O being spun off by Dubai Ports with some incentive given by U.S. gov’t to UAE.

Feb 21, 2006 - 1:05 pm 14. dclydew:

Terrye,

Well, for one thing, I personally think that if the Administration understood communication with the Public, they wouldn’t have Chertoff and friends trying to downplay the issue. Just as when things went wrong with NOLA, you can’t just tell everyone it’s ok and think that they will believe you.

I’m not trying to support democrats or be against Bush, I’m simply stating that once again, the Administration has allowed itself additional, unnecessary grief because it appears incompetent in communication with its citizenry.

As for Al Gore, what the hell does that twit have to do with anything? Did Bush put him in charge of Foreign Relations with the UAE?

Feb 21, 2006 - 1:08 pm 15. Terrye:

dclydew:

Are they trying to down play the issue or are they pointing out that this is the case of one company buying another company? And the company doing the buying does this kind of thing all over the world and has no obvious ties with terrorism that would make it easy to step in and tell the Brits what to do?

We let these people fly planes into this country everyday. The pilots are from places like {gasp} the UAE. They do not need to hijack planes, they own and operate their own.

I would prefer that Americans owned and ran the ports, but let us imagine the reaction if say Halliburton had made a bid. But they did not. I think that the government will kill the deal and it make hard feelings with people we might need on our side some day.

If the American people want George Bush to step in to stop deals like this, then nationalize the ports. Otherwise there is no way of knowing who might be involved.

Feb 21, 2006 - 1:35 pm 16. Terrye:

I forgot to mention… what Al gore has to do with this is his assertion that the Bush administration has refused to [for example] give visas to Arabs and that this administration has also refused to deal with Arabs fairly by treating them all like the enemy. Schumer was not outraged. That is my point.

Feb 21, 2006 - 1:39 pm 17. dclydew:

Terrye,

Well, I’m still not sure what that has to do with my post… which had nothing to do with Schumer. If something whcih may be percieved as bad is happening or going to happen, it is usually wise to preempt it with communication which will ease concerns. Chuck Schumer is a politican, he’s not gonna rant against one of his own, but he’ll jump on the Administration in a heartbeat. I think the guys at FOX stated it well:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,185471,00.html

Feb 21, 2006 - 2:04 pm 18. ClericalGal:

It looks like Bush is standing firm on this:

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/02/21/D8FTOB0G0.html

The conservative blogs are already complaining about Bush using the veto pen for this and not for pork barrel spending. Frankly, I have mixed feelings about this. I know the UAE will not be in charge of port security. However, it is sad that no American company can run our ports.

The Dems are demogoging this issue for all its worth to show they are not soft on terrorism. They could care less. All they care about is sticking it to Bush.

Feb 21, 2006 - 2:08 pm 19. Terrye:

Well some of the conservative blogs tend to get a little ahead of themselves. I consider myself a conservative but a lot of that socalled pork barrel spending is quite popular with the folks back home, like it or not.

So, I guess we should just say that while we appreciate the fact that certain countries in the ME allow us to put naval and air and army bases on their territory we as Americans do not like or trust Arabs and will never allow an Arab country to come anywhere near our ports. Because they are all potential terrorists. I mean come on, let’s be honest..that is what we are saying.

I just wish they had never started letting foreign companies do this work in the first place.

Feb 21, 2006 - 2:33 pm 20. dclydew:

All they care about is sticking it to Bush.

True words. Though I have to agree that I’d like to see that veto pen used more often for pork…

Feb 21, 2006 - 2:33 pm 21. Rick Ballard:

P & O Ports website

One might try and distinguish between a “port authority” and a “freight handling facility” prior to making a ton of assertions.

I don’t think that his will be found to have compromised Homeland Security or Customs or Immigration activities in any manner.

Feb 21, 2006 - 3:00 pm 22. Lem:

This politically charged “storm” reminds me of Ronald Reagan’s visit to the Kolmeshohe Cemetery at Bitburg; some SS are buried there. At that time everyone believed Ronald Reagan was out of his mind.

From the NYT

“We who were enemies are now friends,” Mr. Reagan told about 5,000 American military personnel, their families and local German residents at the Bitburg Air Base, less than one mile from the cemetery.
“We who were bitter adversaries are now the strongest of allies,” Mr. Reagan said. “In the place of fear we have sown trust, and out of the ruins of war has blossomed an enduring peace.”

One day this war on terror will be over. The price we are prepared to pay should not come at the expense of WHO we are. If (admittedly, its a big if) all the security concerns have been exhaustively vetted, stopping the contract will only fuel our enemies campaign of misinformation against us.

We are not at war against the UAE, Muslims nor Islam. We are at war with those who would have us dead because we are not like them.

Feb 21, 2006 - 8:02 pm 23. Orson2:

Gotta agree with with the perspectives of James and David on top, dissenting from Roger’s view. However, I understand where he and many others are coming from: intuitively, passing ownership to an Arab government firm simply sounds obviously wrong!

But bear with me: who should we fear first – a firm with a serious economic interest in our port operation’s success? or the unidentified Islamist terrorists still working on the docks?

Politics is always about perception, but clearly Bush wants to go to the mat over this sale because it rewards our ally, the UAE. As a growing entrpot of world trade, they need us more than we need them. But can the flatpfooted, ham-fisted Bushies close the sale?

Roger’s very astute to argue this problem. Its like Harriet Myers for Bush, even when the the candidate is better qualified than O’Conner.

Feb 21, 2006 - 9:09 pm 24. ray_g:

The UAE have been friends and allies for some time. IIRC their forces fought beside us in GW-1
They are the kind of moderate Middle East state that we want to encourage. So some Democrats (and some Republicans too, shame on them) want to make a big deal over this because they are “Arabs”. Who’s racial profiling now?

Feb 22, 2006 - 12:33 pm 25. Anomolous:

One thing I haven’t seen is people commenting on is the fact that at one time, the UAE royals and OBL seemed pretty cozy…

http://in.rediff.com/news/2004/mar/25osama.htm
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/11/12/60minutes/main655407.shtml

Feb 22, 2006 - 2:20 pm 26. dclydew:

So, I’m of mixed opinion on the whole deal, but I am curious as to peoples thoughts on the fact that the President found out, apparently, through the news media instead of from his own staff.

If I were examining a deal (which may be perfectly legitimate and safe) to allow an arab nation to control several US ports, it would likely dawn on me that some of the Presidents enemies and a number of reactionary politicans would probably jump on this and make a big deal about it.

I think I would at least discuss it with the President, provide him a report or something. I don’t mean this as a jab at our C-i-C, its not his fault if his people didn’t keep him informed. However, I am curious to see what others think.

Feb 23, 2006 - 7:23 am 27. Percy Dovetonsils:

I’m still on the fence on this, but what’s tipping my opinion is that the contemptible Margaret Carlson just did one of her trademark articles (on Bloomberg News) slamming the President over this. I’ve found that Carlson is a reliable guidepost, in that she is repeatedly and resoundingly wrong over the long term. Thus, I’m far more willing to give Bush’s perspective much closer consideration.

“The Dems are demagoging this issue for all its worth to show they are not soft on terrorism. They could care less. All they care about is sticking it to Bush.”

Perhaps this was all a plot by our Dark Lord, Karl Rove, Peace (and Power) Be Unto Him, to let the Dems and the media run and make fools of themselves – yet again.

Feb 23, 2006 - 8:33 am

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