Mar 09 2006
Well done!
From My Way News:
WASHINGTON (AP) - In a congressional election-year repudiation of President Bush, a House panel dominated by Republicans voted overwhelmingly Wednesday to block a Dubai-owned firm from taking control of some U.S port operations. Democrats clamored for a vote in the Senate, too.
By 62-2, the House Appropriations Committee voted to bar DP World, run by the government of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates, from holding leases or contracts at U.S. ports. The landslide vote was the strongest signal yet that more than three weeks of White House efforts to stunt congressional opposition to the deal have not been successful.
Bush has promised to veto any such measure passed by Congress. But there is widespread public opposition to the deal and the GOP fears losing its advantage on the issue of national security in this fall’s elections.
The White House said the president’s position was unchanged.
“This is a national security issue,” said Rep. Jerry Lewis, the chairman of the House panel, adding that the legislation would “keep America’s ports in American hands.”
American ports should be in American hands. Lewis is 100% right. Let’s not forget that DP World actually enforces an embargo of Israeli goods in the Middle East. Frankly, any company that’s a party to such an agreement or action is not fit to do business in this country (don’t bring up the Cuban or Iraqi embargo; those aren’t embargoes set up because we don’t believe that either country has a right to exist in the first place, mmmmkay?)
Lots on the left are all offended by this sudden outpouring of what many have deemed jingoism, pointing out that there was no opposition to a UK firm operating the ports before DP World took them over. I can’t speak for anyone else, but I can speak for myself when I say I had no idea that any of our ports were controlled by foreign companies, and had I known, I wouldn’t have liked it then either. It’s not about UK, Arab (the buzzword flying around the left wing of the blogosphere and even some more soft-bellied right-wingers), or anything else that can be generated here, it’s a very simple concept that Jerry Lewis put into very simple words.
Keep American ports in American hands.
It really isn’t much more complicated than that.
Technorati Tags: Dubai Ports World, homeland security, ports, congress
March 9th, 2006 at 10:00 am
Except this may not be what it seems. I need to read the text of the measure, but it might just be for the 45 day review period that they can’t operate in the US.
For so many reasons this is a dumb idea, letting them run things.
Off to look for text.
March 9th, 2006 at 10:54 am
And just as a heads up, almost every left-leaning site I’ve read (and I do tend to frequent a lot of them) points out Dubai’s ties with terrorism, the Bush family’s ties to the UAE (through the Carlyle Group, among others), and feels just as you do: American ports should remain in American hands.
March 9th, 2006 at 10:57 am
Hmmmm… Guess we read different depths of the left, because most of the lefties I’ve been reading are just playing the racist angle…
Who knows… It’s a dumb idea and a bad move anyway.
March 9th, 2006 at 11:21 am
I used the “racism” card because so many of the opinions I read amounted to people not wanting Middle Easterners controlling port operations. They didn’t base it off the UAE’s record with terrorism, just that they were from the ME. The same people never said one thing about the UK.
However, I think your argument - no foreign control of ports - is completely valid. It’s a national security issue to have entities not under US control having some control over our ports.
What I find interesting is that this seems to be more of an issue about outsourcing or privatizing government duties and services than anything else. And yet it’s the side that usually supports privatization that is clamouring for this deal to be killed.