Goodbye, Dubai
Goodbye, Dubai
We hardly knew thee
(And that's fine with me)
We hardly knew thee
(And that's fine with me)
posted by Scribbler de Stebbing | 3/12/2006 05:26:00 PM
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The reaction to the ports deal from the so called paleo-to hell with them-cons is an intellectual travesity. It reminds me of Guy Lusignan's march of folly from Jeruselam to Hattin. Guy was a paleocon as well. He said to hell with them and in the end lost everything.
Paleocons are not fit to lead...they never have been.
I never understood why there was a small faction hell-bent on seeing this transaction go through. What was so impressive about this deal? Sure, I saw some minor arguments for technological and some other sharing benefits, but nothing of a convincing nature.
It is our government's prerogative to oversee such transactions that could potentially have security implications. Even the White House has back-pedaled on this one.
And no, I'm not thrilled about China managing some of our ports either.
Someone explain to me how we would be in more danger having a foreign port terminal operator? The Paleocons and Democrats said it would make us less secure because the muslims could do nefarious things because they would be privy to our port security plans.... WHAT THINGS? What would they do? Take over a Port? Stop the flow of Hummas? The one you hear all the time is that they could smuggle in a Nuke? Yet, the best place to detonate a nuke is in the harbor, not in the port. Why would anyone risk moving it in through the port.
The risk is so low that it becomes nutty to use the risk as an excuse.
In reality, nixing this deal makes us less safe. DPW is one of the largest port operators in the world. The better our relationship is with them, the better for our security in getting information about what is going on at foreign ports. They real risk is the foreign ports... thats where the bomb would be loaded.
In my opinion it is the Paleocons that are the true warmongers. They say lets disengage... and if we are attacked we can nuke them all.... (so what if we lose a few cities).
"TO HELL WITH THE MUSLIMS." - Guy Lusignan - 12th Century Paleocon
I don't KNOW that DWP would constitute a risk. In fact, I might say there's an 80% chance there would be no compromised security. But I need that number to be closer to 100.
I'll go even further to say that Dubai is likely a fine, upstanding company, pure as the wind-driven snow, and I'll put 98% on my comfort level with that.
But the door is opened when they hire employees, and those employees have friends who know somebody else in that part of the world.
Yeah, maybe I'm paranoid. But just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they aren't out to get ya.
And maybe I'm rascist. I think DWP ownership would cause problems with our ability to profile, such as it is. But just because I may or may not be rascist, doesn't mean that the guys who blew up the World Trade Center didn't come from the Middle East.
This was played wrong by the White House, plain and simple. At least they've owned up to that much.
S'aurus, I wouldn't necessarily put Neocon/Paleocon stickers on the 2 sides of this issue. This is one that's made for strange bedfellows.
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Scribbler, I don't think your a racist. I think you have given up reason in exchange for a gut reaction on this issue. You made up the 80% number. You ask that someone prove the deal would provide close to 100% security, knowing full well that such proof is an imposibility. After all, the same arguments can be made about any American company running a port. In fact, history shows that we have more to fear from our own treasonous citizens then we do foreign companies.
My point is that the arguments such as....
"the door is opened when they hire employees, and those employees have friends who know somebody else in that part of the world...."
is pure nuttiness.
The truth is you can't really come up with an argument other than improbable what-ifs that have no basis in fact. No one has come up with realistic security arguments. The only real argument is an economic one... that we should encourage American owned ports to create more jobs here or a xenophobic argument.. that foreigners should go away. But these are not security arguments.
Instead the critics say "it just doesn't feel right..." or "we should error on the side of security in this instance...."
Come on...
I have been accused of nuttiness before, or was that naughtiness, but never by a fellow JASer. Not that there's anything wrong with that . . .
There are enough questions about this transaction, and the stakes are too high to ignore them.
Yeah, I made up the 80%. I could go 75% or 85% but not high enough for comfort. I'm not saying it needs to be 100%, but certainly closer to that number than we are.
The United Arab Emirates was hometown to three of the 9/11 terrists (Saudi Arabia the majority of the remainder) and owner Dubai Ports World. That, in a very small nutshell, is the difference between 80% and 100%, to me.
I recognize that in accusing you of nuttiness, I am taking a big risk on a accusing a large percentage of conservatives of the same. However, I stand by my accusation. I think the reaction to this ports issue is nutty.
Your claim that UAE is damaged goods because three of the 9/11 attackers were from there is far out. Every society has its criminals. So what. Why the collective responsibility for UAE? In response the Arabs world could argue that they should not do business with us...because some of our soldiers committed personal crimes. You know... collective responsibility. I say this with seriousness because I believe that many paleocons would like such a response from the Arab world. It is part of the "to hell with them" philosophy (never mind the consequences).
The one argument that I think is a good one is that DPW is owned by members of the royal family in Dubai, which means that DPW is partially "state" owned. We should not be doing business with state owned companies out of principle. But we do. AirBus is partially state owned. So are many Chinese companies. Many more companies have state subsidized financing. The list goes on....Therefore, that is not a good argument for the DPW ports deal.
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