Mar 02 2006
Will Conservatives Throw It All Away Over Ports?
Conservatives who are against the UAE port are going to face a hard lesson in humility – deal with it or undermine Bush’s second term. The UAE Port deal is going through, there is nothing to stop a determined President from respecting a good ally (at least when compared to Russia, France and Germany):
US lawmakers were losing hope of being able to block the controversial takeover of operations at several US ports by a United Arab Emirates-owned firm, with the deal becoming final on Thursday. Members of Congress from both parties kept up their attacks against the impending 6.8 billion dollar sale of the British firm which manages the ports to Dubai Ports World, citing security concerns.
They conceded, however, that they are powerless to prevent the sale from going forward, and placed their hope in an 11th-hour intervention by US President George W. Bush.
“He’s the only one that can stop it,” Democratic US Senator Frank Lautenberg told AFP Wednesday.
And he is not going to stop it. Bush is demonstrating leadership and principle over political opportunism and rank fear. So all those who opposed the deal are going to be facing a test of convictions. Do they abandon Bush and risk losing on issues like the NSA surveillance? Or do they suck it up, take the loss and get back into the game?
Being one of those who wanted to hear more about Harriet Miers before we ejected her from consideration I will be honest and say I relish seeing how well people deal with this political failure. To see if they can stay in the game and keep working to progress conservative values even when they do not get all they wish.
I have heard enough to know opponents are fighting an uphill battle of speculative fantasy verses 5 years of demonstrative acts on the part of The UAE. By all objective, MEASURABLE factors, the DPW deal protects our military as they transit into and out of harms way, provides us an ally which will be checking cargo from all over the world before it ships here, and provides us an ally with intelligence potential in parts of the world we can only imagine.
Did you know that the people who manage the movement of shipping containers, the terminal operators in question, do not know what is in each container? I learned that tonight from real reporters at Fox News. So all these scenarios about infiltrating the terminals to smuggle things through is pure day dreaming. To smuggle you need to know contents in order to know what containers to slip by. Otherwise you have a needle in a haystack.
Can we beef up security on the goods entering this country? Yep – but dissing an ally who provides us the ability to see what is coming before it even gets on a foreign ship is not a path to better security.
I have been toying with the idea of calling for everyone to take a stand on The UAE Port deal. A gut check stand.
We have with The UAE the best possible ally we will ever see, for decades, in the Middle East. We have seen them step up where are NATO allies have wilted away. they fight by our side and protect our backs. If we decide the incredibly marginal risk of this Port Deal is of sufficient concern to scuttle it, after all The UAE has done, then the bar has been set very high indeed to trust Muslim Arabs in any aspect of our society.
Who will stand by their opposition to this Port Deal if the end result is this counry, America, decides to bar Muslim Arabs from all areas of potential risk in our society. Using the DPW Port deal as a benchmark, we can and should envision all sorts of protective measures.
Conservatives are prepared to round up all illegal aliens, and their families, for not having the proper paper work (aka illegal immigration). They support uprooting these people from job and home, to dump them without either across our borders. This cold and harsh mentality is more than capable of extending this thought process to Muslims and Arabs.
So I have been ready to put the test to the bloggers, talking heads and political leaders alike – would they continue to oppose the port deal if it lead to establishing a second class of people in this country? A class of people barred from positions where knowledge of security processes and protocols are known? Will the opponents to The UAE deal go on record to say they are willing to oppose the deal all the way to establishing barriers to employment and business opportunities in all areas of mass transportation (civil and commercial), all areas of police and security, all areas of the nation’s food and water supply chain?
I think it is fair to ask opponents how far they will go. Will they throw this President overboard if they do not get what they want? Will they throw our country’s shining example of fairness and opportunity for all away to assuage fears of the unknown? What limits are there for those opposing the Port Deal?
It is a simple stand. Yes, we oppose the deal even if it leads to barring Muslims and Arabs from certain parts of our society, or not. No middle ground in this poker game. Call or fold.
Michelle is having an uncharacteristically tough time with being challenged on this issue. Well, criticism is a two-way street. Those of us who are not wringing our hands in fear are simply pointing to actions verses speculation. I actually wonder if Michelle is up for rounding up all Muslim and Arabs like we did in World War II? Is this how far she will go out of fear of an attack? I am afraid to hear her answer, to be honest. We are not all bigots now. Some have gone where only desperate democrats are willing to go. We shall see what happens.
Nice post. 🙂
.
YOU SAID: Being one of those who wanted to hear more about Harriet Miers before we ejected her from consideration I will be honest and say I relish seeing how well people deal with this political failure. To see if they can stay in the game and keep working to progress conservative values even when they do not get all they wish.
.
I remember on the day that Miers finally called it quits, there were conservative posters announcing immediately that all of us on the right were suddenly united, just hours after denouncing Miers as Caligula’s horse, and those of us who supported Miers as Kool-aid-drinking Bushbots. I remember telling a few people off. I believe I used the word “scumbag” a few times. To this day, I have no desire to read or listen to Miers’ nastiest detractors, namely Ann Coulter, George Will, Laura Ingraham, and Michelle Malkin. They came across like spoiled rich kids in high school, jilted because the captain of the football team decided he’d rather spend time with the shy girl in glasses who works in the library than he would with them.
.
I wasn’t even all that attached to Miers. I supported Miers because I supported Bush, and I have seen no clear reason to drop my support of him.
.
YOU SAID: I have been toying with the idea of calling for everyone to take a stand on The UAE Port deal. A gut check stand.
.
In the absence of clear evidence that allowing Dubai Ports World into our ports will provide any new opportunities for terrorists, and in the face of clear evidence that the U.A.E. has been a U.S. ally, I SUPPORT THE DUBAI PORTS WORLD DEAL.
.
(I also have to say I’m getting a little weary of the holdouts who made up their minds early, dug in their heels, and are now trying to reignite the initial firestorm of outrage by writing and posting articles about how terrorist money flows through U.A.E. banks, how the U.A.E. is not a democracy, how the U.A.E. supposedly recognizes the Taliban as a legitimate government but does not recognize Israel, etc., etc., etc., none of which really have anything to do with what the U.A.E. could do to us via Dubai if this deal goes through, IF they had a mind to do anything to us.)
.
YOU SAID: Michelle is having an uncharacteristically tough time with being challenged on this issue. Well, criticism is a two-way street. Those of us who are not wringing our hands in fear are simply pointing to actions verses speculation. I actually wonder if Michelle is up for rounding up all Muslim and Arabs like we did in World War II? Is this how far she will go out of fear of an attack?
.
Well, she did write a book justifying the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II, so I guess the answer would be YES (though I have not heard that she has actually said so).
.
I really can’t read Malkin anymore. And it isn’t just residual disgust over Miers — she’s just shrill. She just strikes me as one of those who is only too ready to jump overboard if the ship isn’t taking EXACTLY the course she thinks it should be taking.
Sadly, as I have described in my blog, Michelle’s complaints of the”race card” being played ring hollow. As my piece on the ports deal for Strategypage pointed out, she went after the UAE with no real fact-checking.
It was a country that was Arab and largely Moslem. She returned a guilty verdict with out checking the facts (they were located in a variety of Google searches in one evening), and now, rather than admit she was wrong, she is going to play the “race-baiting” card to try to avoid that admission.
We are at war, but the professionals who have been running that war all say the UAE has been a stalwart ally. Again, where does Michelle Malkin get the notion that she knows more about the UAE’s cooperation in the war on terror than Tommy Franks, Peter Pace, and Don Rusmfeld? Will she answer that question? Or does that constitute race-baiting in her mind?
This commentary (http://prairiepundit.blogspot.com/2006/03/shumer-port-duplicity.html) by a Democrat writing in the Washington Times shows what a sham several of Shumers’ arguments are.