An excellent subject for wire tapping

Posted By: Peter DavidPosted On:

I’m hoping that the Department of Homeland Security is tapping the phones of one G. W. Bush. Because it appears that he’s in cahoots with a company, individuals or country that helped siphon money to the 9/11 hijackers, and is now endeavoring to take charge of half a dozen major ports–the most security-vulnerable means of entry into the country we have. And frankly, if someone is getting calls from people who may have assisted Al Qaeda, I want to know about it and know what they’re saying.

(Considering that even the most avid Bush supporters in Congress are lining up against this, it’s interesting to see that he has truly, finally become the uniter he claimed he was.)

PAD

125 comments on “An excellent subject for wire tapping”

  1. But I thought he was supposed to destroy the Sith, not join them?

    I feel slightly guilty over the twinge of satisfaction that I feel, seeing the results of the Administration exhausting what little trust they had, even from their own party. Maybe this deal is on the up and up. Who knows? but finally, to see Congress start to demand accountability from an Administration that has demonstrated nothing but incompetence, ineptitude, and deceit from the very beginning is a sign that maybe things are starting to turn around.

    I laughed a little at the Administration’s comments that we have to be careful here, or the US will be sees as playing favorites. For one, favorites to who? By demanding trasparency in a deal with ostensibly an Arab ally, we’re showing that we’re not playing favorites. Just the opposite, we’re demanding the same rigorous test of security from our allies that we demand elsewhere. Second, it’s the old “trust me” line. If Katrina showed us anything, it’s that, finally, we realize that this administration cannot be trusted.

  2. Actually, the BRITISH company that owned the concession rights to the ports sold the concession rights to a company in the UAE. These operate outside the security corridor already patrolled by the Coast Guard. The ports themselves will be guarded — and worked — as always by American longshoremen and Coast Guard patrol boats.

  3. Actually, the BRITISH company that owned the concession rights to the ports sold the concession rights to a company in the UAE. These operate outside the security corridor already patrolled by the Coast Guard. The ports themselves will be guarded — and worked — as always by American longshoremen and Coast Guard patrol boats.
    —————————————-
    How dare you let facts get in the way of a good argument.

  4. “Actually, the BRITISH company that owned the concession rights to the ports sold the concession rights to a company in the UAE. These operate outside the security corridor already patrolled by the Coast Guard. The ports themselves will be guarded — and worked — as always by American longshoremen and Coast Guard patrol boats.”

    Actually the company is wholey owned by the UAE government. the same government that supported the Taliban and helped the 9/11 hijackers.

    “How dare you let facts get in the way of a good argument.”
    Indeed!

  5. A bit off topic (okay a lot off topic), but are we going to be seeing a Star Trek New Frontier – Missing in Action thread?

  6. The ports themselves will be guarded — and worked — as always by American longshoremen and Coast Guard patrol boats.

    Yes, that would be the same system we have in place in which less than 5% of cargo containers are actually being inspected? Yeah, I feel safe.

    The real question is one of security. Is it possible that a UAE country could hire an employee who is secretly an Al Qaida operative and will use his position to help smuggle a nuclear or biological device into the country? Hëll yeah! Is there sufficient safeguards in place to protect against that? Not according to every independent and bipartisan review of our port security.

    Of couse, Georgie is threatening to veto any measure from Congress to block this deal, proving once again that he hasn’t got a clue about anything.

    I can’t help but think about the shitstorm that happened when a similar situation came down when Clinton was considering giving a Chinese company control of some of our west coast. “Treason!” was a common cry among the punditry on Fox “News”.

    As far as I know, Chinese banks weren’t used as a conduit for funding for Al Qaida.

  7. There’s an absolutely ridiculous splitting of hairs going on, guys…

    The core of the issue is, why are we letting a nation with strong and clear links to everybody we’re supposedly fighting against have anything whatsoever to do with securing our seaports?

  8. There’s an absolutely ridiculous splitting of hairs going on, guys…

    The core of the issue is, why are we letting a nation with strong and clear links to everybody we’re supposedly fighting against have anything whatsoever to do with securing our seaports?

  9. There’s an absolutely ridiculous splitting of hairs going on, guys…

    The core of the issue is, why are we letting a nation with strong and clear links to everybody we’re supposedly fighting against have anything whatsoever to do with securing our seaports?

  10. Brian: According to Amazon, MIA doesn’t come out for another week. Did you already get a copy?

  11. Brian: According to Amazon, MIA doesn’t come out for another week. Did you already get a copy?

  12. Brian: According to Amazon, MIA doesn’t come out for another week. Did you already get a copy?

  13. Of couse, Georgie is threatening to veto any measure from Congress to block this deal, proving once again that he hasn’t got a clue about anything.

    If this article on Yahoo is accurate, than truer words were never spoken, Den:

    This article on the main page of Yahoo says Bush was unaware of the pending sale until AFTER it had already been approved by his Administration.

    Yeah, he’s completely smegging clueless alright.

  15. Great, Dumbya didn’t even know about this transaction before it was approved and now he’s vowing to veto any measure to thwart it.

  16. Ðámņìŧ. Craig beat me in posting the same article.

    Here’s a hypothetical:

    In 2008, a nuclear device is smuggled into the country through one of our ports and detonated in a major US city. The CIA and FBI completely missed it because Bush was ordering them to focus on spying on Quakers in Florida.

    You’re Karl Rove. How do you craft a response in the media that puts all the blame on Clinton getting a bløw jøb?

  17. We need to step back just a second.

    With his poll numbers in the trash, shotgun Cheney on the loose and the American public wondering about the wiretaps we suddenly get something the Rebulicans can use to distance themselves from the administration just before the midterm elections. Smells like Rove to me.

  18. It probably wouldn’t annoy me half as much if I didn’t live within 15 or so miles of said ports. The British I trust, By the way, just a little more than a country that has leaders who want to wipe a nation off the map – and the people in it and other countries who are of the same beliefs….

  20. Well that’s hardly shocking. For the past five years, any company with a connection to the administration has been sitting pretty.

    And as far as this being some kind of Rovian misdirection plot, I don’t think even he’s clever enough to engineer the sale of a British company to an UAE company just to give the GOP a boost.

  21. Well Jimmy Carter just came out FOR the deal. That settles it for me. Even though a stopped clock is correct at least twice a day, one will seldom go wrong in doing the exact opposite of what Carter thinks is a sound foreign policy.

    Personally, I think this was a terrible idea, not because of any real security fears but because of simple politics. I’m not as outraged as some that Bush was unaware of the sale because I never actually thought that Presidents were supposed to monitor such things but I don’t see the sense in trying to stop what seems to me to be a done deal–this sale will not be allowed to stand.

    And now the Arabs have yet another thing to scream about. Right on the heels of Al Gore telling them that the USA is discriminating against them they now have proof that no Arab country will be allowed to conduct business here that is allowed to pretty much everyone else.

    I’m not aware of the facts that otehrs have mentioned regarding the UAE support of terrorism. According to Reuters it’s described as “a staunch ally” and “U.S. warships regularly dock at Dubai’s Jebel Ali Port, which is also managed by DP World, and the emirate became the first Middle Eastern port city in 2004 to sign a U.S. pact aimed at deterring the use of shipping containers for terrorism.”

    “The UAE provides logistical support for some U.S. military operations in the region, including Afghanistan. The Gulf Arab state, an OPEC oil producer, is negotiating a free trade agreement with the United States.”

    The article (http://today.reuters.com/news/newsarticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyid=2006-02-22T145021Z_01_L22174752_RTRUKOC_0_US-SECURITY-PORTS-ARABS.xml&rpc=22) also states that Analysts said opposition to the deal stemmed from bias, since the Dubai firm would not oversee security.

    But I don’t know. Given recent events I just don’t want these people in any concievable position of power here. That’s not entirely fair, I realize.

    So…if the UAE is truly an ally then it is asinine to punish them as if they are a foe and it will hurt us in the long run. If they can’t be trusted abd have demonstrated that they can’t be trusted (and I don’t consider the fact that some of the 9/11 killers were from the UAE sufficiant evidence of that) then the deal should be broken immediately. So which is it? Becaus ethe wrong choice will hurt us.

    I’d like to think that the answer to that question can be made fairly, without any regard to how it will affect Bush but it seems that for partisans on both sides that’s the first and sometimes only consideration they have.

  22. I’m not as outraged as some that Bush was unaware of the sale because I never actually thought that Presidents were supposed to monitor such things

    I’m not so much outraged. Outraged would imply that I’m surprised that he’s a clueless twit who doesn’t know what his supposed underlings are doing. He already cemented that image in my mind when the words “Brownie, you’re doing a heckuva job” came out of his mouth.

    But don’t you think it’s odd that he’s threatening to use his first ever veto to defend a deal he supposedly didn’t know anything about?

    I’m also not concerned because two of the hijackers came from the UAE. I am more concerned that funding for 9/11 had been funnelled through UAE banks.

    And if it sounds discriminatory to say that we should think twice before allowing an firm owned by an Arab government to have such unlimited access to our ports, so be it. Between 9/11 and the cartoon flap, I’m not in a trusting mood with regards to any government, ally or not, from that region.

  23. But don’t you think it’s odd that he’s threatening to use his first ever veto to defend a deal he supposedly didn’t know anything about?

    Well, considering that he threatened to use his first veto to defend the right of the adminstration to use torture . . . no, not really.

  24. Well I’m gonna pull a flip flop ala Kerry and say I’m against it. I read somewhere that Jimmy Carter supports this, and that alone can’t be good.

  25. Here’s a hypothetical:

    In 2008, a nuclear device is smuggled into the country through one of our ports and detonated in a major US city. The CIA and FBI completely missed it because Bush was ordering them to focus on spying on Quakers in Florida.

    You’re Karl Rove. How do you craft a response in the media that puts all the blame on Clinton getting a bløw jøb?

    From: “Turd Blossom”
    To: All Affiliates
    Re: Approved Talking Points – Tampa “Nuclear Event”

    FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
    The “scandal fatigue” created by Clinton’s many peccadillos and overreaches so wore down the American citizen that eventually, even the most egregious abuse was met with a profound response of “who cares?” Thus, the nuclear vaporization of Tampa was not the fault of President Bush: It is the fault of Clinton for creating this pervasive tolerance for scandal that allowed our government’s most jaw-dropping lapses of judgement to occur in the last eight years — lapses that, if not for a Clinton-induced apathy, would have been greeted with a cry of rage and a demand of accountability instead of a yawn and a shrug.

  27. Here’s a twist to add into the debate.

    Dubai World Ports would not only grab major ports by buying P&O. Dubai Ports World would also control the movement of military equipment on behalf of the U.S. Army through two other ports.

    From the British paper Lloyd’s List:

    “(P&O) has just renewed a contract with the United States Surface Deployment and Distribution Command to provide stevedoring (loading and unloading) of military equipment at the Texan ports of Beaumont and Corpus Christi through 2010.”

    That, to me at least, does add quite a bit more weight to this being a very bad idea.

  28. In 2008, a nuclear device is smuggled into the country through one of our ports and detonated in a major US city. The CIA and FBI completely missed it because Bush was ordering them to focus on spying on Quakers in Florida.

    You’re Karl Rove. How do you craft a response in the media that puts all the blame on Clinton getting a bløw jøb?

    Blah blah blah ShorthandDateOfAttack blah blah Major City blah blah 9/11 9/11 9/11 blah blah blah Saddam blah blah blah Clinton bløwjøb blah.

    Howzat?

  29. Right on the heels of Al Gore telling them that the USA is discriminating against them they now have proof that no Arab country will be allowed to conduct business here that is allowed to pretty much everyone else.

    Oh, it’s ok to do business here… if you’re a friend of the Bush family.

    See: Saudis in the days after 9/11.

    Btw, anybody want to add their own captions to this picture, be my guest.

    Sometimes, pictures are worth far more than a thousand words. Especially when Bush is involved. 😀

  31. If we’re so worried about appearing racist, here’s the solution: put control of the ports under Federal jurisdiction. What the heck does the Department of Homeland Security do that could be more about securing the homeland than providing security for our points of entry. I totally understand that this administration is filled with MBAs, and that one of the keys is labels that sound like one thing, but totally do another thing.

    Every time I think there’s nothing this administration can do that will surprise me, they surprise me. Not only are they going to hand over partial port security to the UAE, they’re saying that to NOT do so would open up the US to world criticism of playing favorites. Ignore for the moment that P&O has ties to the Administration…playing favorites if ever I’ve seen it…but essentially, the Administration is more worried about our image as FAIR and BALANCED over our image of expansionist and warlike. I totally expect this administration to play favorites….it’s one of the perks of winning the election. But to make such an assinine statement that we’re worried about our corporate image more than our military one is just ludicrous. How many countries have been invaded because they played corporate favorites? A good deal less than I’d imagine were because they took an expansionist, militaristic stance.

  32. Will: Yes, I already got a copy, and have read it already as well. It’s interesting that Amazon says it’s not out yet since that’s where I bought mine from.

  33. Somebody call the folks at the Fox network ,I think we got the plot for the next season of 24.
    Yeesh!!!!
    “Jack Bauer has 24 hours to find a nuclear weapon that was smuggled in the country cause some dûmbášš let a UAE company control the ports that were already not secured properly”
    Sad part is at least on TV we know things turn out okay in the end.

  34. And if it sounds discriminatory to say that we should think twice before allowing an firm owned by an Arab government to have such unlimited access to our ports, so be it. Between 9/11 and the cartoon flap, I’m not in a trusting mood with regards to any government, ally or not, from that region.

    And I feel the same way. S does Michelle Malkin and Ann Coulture and a bunch of Daily kossacks and others who very seldom are seen in the same side of anything. So it sounds like a bad idea…

    BUT– if the UAE is, as reported, a major ally in shutting down Al Queada funds and if, as reported, we regualrly berth our Carriers in the UAE, is it not possible that the negative fallout from killing this deal will outweigh the benefit? Especially if, as at least one coast guard guy has claimed, this will actually produce very very little change:

    http://www.thedonovan.com/archives/005374.html

    I know what you are saying and agree, but did you notice how readily you repeated the headlines and used terms that indicate the “running of a port” vice the running of a single port facility?

    Besides considering the number of acres the P&O operates in New Orleans here is perhaps a better comparison. Between the Head of Passes and Baton Rouge’s upper bridge (the head of most ocean going navigation) the two banks of the river measure over 440 miles in length and are dense with vessel handling facilities.

    The P&O manages approximately 2,000 linear feet on the East bank. Of the approximately 300 Coast Guard uniformed personnel , 40 member harbor police, 90 member parish sheriff’s department, and several hundred security guards that serve the area the P&O will probably be responsible for staffing 3 physical positions with armed guards.

    Of course the P&O already provides these armed American citizens, they have been running the container facility for years. What has changed is the P&Os controlling interest stockholder? If this deal goes through the same guys who are on guard tonight will be there the night after the deal is signed. But some weeks later they may have more lights, communications gear, and cameras since the “new’ P&O” has been purchased by a company willing to put money into the Coast Guard approved security plan.

    The old P&O stockholders balked at the security costs of doing business in post 9/11 America. Meanwhile I am still on duty along with the rest of the Coast Guard, if someone else is “in charge of port security” we haven’t been told and know of no relief coming.

    Note – the ports are already being run by foreigners. Of a nation that a Prime Minister famously observed, “…had no permanent friends, only permanent interests.”

    Certainly the change in ownership of a strategic asset merits scrutiny and discussion. But it helps if you understand the problem before you pronounce on the problem. And by that I refer to the politicians and Big Pundits. We little people, we’re supposed to raise our voices in question.

    But as I noted before, and still hold: This isn’t a huge catastrophe. Unless you think the Department of Homeland Defense and the Coast Guard aren’t up to their jobs.

    Which is a completely different issue that you allow *this* issue to cloud.

    Similarly, an Arab American, who claims that the current leadership of UAE is a model for the rest of the Arab world chimes in: It seems patently hypocritical that America wants democracy in the Middle East, champions capitalism and global integration, pushes for reform, transparency, and anti-corruption practices in business, and then turns around and tells those who are practicing what America preaches, Sorry, we think you folks are a bunch of terrorists, so we don’t want you on our shores and don’t trust you running our ports.

    There is no question, though, that this has been handled in a politically clumsy way.

  35. What doesn’t help matters is that, according to the NY Daily News, an Israeli company desiring to complete a much smaller deal involving purchasing an American security software company has been subject to tons more scrutiny than the Arab company which has sailed through the approvals process.

    PAD

  36. “There is no question, though, that this has been handled in a politically clumsy way.”

    That’s maybe the craziest thing. If the Administration had some common sense and accurate foresight, they might have understood that this action had the potential to be a shitstorm. And taken the steps to make sure the Congress and the public were informed of the reasons why the Administration thinks there’s no big to the story.

    Instead, they set themselves up to be the targets of yet another conspiracy theory…giving the security of US ports over to an Arab controlled entity, with no advance warning, and very little time for public action to get involved. What should be a fairly routine transfer of authority has now become a political mess.

    What happened to the well-oiled political machine that’s pulled the wool over the public’s eyes for the past 6 years?

  37. BUT– if the UAE is, as reported, a major ally in shutting down Al Queada funds and if, as reported, we regualrly berth our Carriers in the UAE, is it not possible that the negative fallout from killing this deal will outweigh the benefit?

    Maybe it will or maybe it won’t. But where’s the harm in taking a second look and seeing that areas that are in badly need of security upgrading receive it.

    Of course the P&O already provides these armed American citizens, they have been running the container facility for years. What has changed is the P&Os controlling interest stockholder? If this deal goes through the same guys who are on guard tonight will be there the night after the deal is signed. But some weeks later they may have more lights, communications gear, and cameras since the “new’ P&O” has been purchased by a company willing to put money into the Coast Guard approved security plan.

    If that’s what will really happen, then maybe that will be an improvement. Or maybe the company will be infiltrated by an Al Qaida operative who will quietly reassign the guards and allow a few mystery containers to slip through.

    Unless you think the Department of Homeland Defense and the Coast Guard aren’t up to their jobs.

    Well, Yeah.

    “Sorry, we think you folks are a bunch of terrorists, so we don’t want you on our shores and don’t trust you running our ports.”

    Yes. And your point is?

    Call us when political cartoons no longer cause your people to burn embassies.

    I’d still like to know, if this isn’t such a big deal, why was it treason for Clinton for allowing a Chinese owned company to do the a href=”http://ojc.org/adi/ccfall.htm”>same.

  40. What happened to the well-oiled political machine that’s pulled the wool over the public’s eyes for the past 6 years?

    Well oiled machine? Are you kidding? The fact that Bush has had so many victories is DESPITE the efforts of the communications people. Peruse any conservative blog over the last 6 years and one often sees the complaint “Now why isn’t the White House making this argument?”

  41. There were two parts to it:

    One involved a Hong Based company Hutchinson Whampoa taking over operations of the ports at either end of the Panama canal. This was accompanied by horror tales of the Red Chinese Military denying our ships access to the canal.

    The other involved a Chinese company, COSCO, which signed a deal to run some of our west coast ports and came close to leasing the former Long Beach Naval Shipyard. The Long Beach deal was killed do to political outcry.

    Both companies were accused of being fronts for the Chinese army and would result in nests of Chinese spies infiltrating our ports.

    Now, I’ll be the first to acknowledge that China is a brutal dictatorship, but as far as I know, they aren’t obsessed with killing all Americans.

  42. Here’s a link on the Long Beach Story.

    I don’t know if COSCO is truly an arm of the People’s Liberation Army, but I don’t think that the PLA didn’t help finance Al Qaida and 9/11 the way that banks in UAE did.

  43. Okay, I need to proof read better or at least try not to post when my boss is around. 🙁

    That should have been “I don’t think the PLA did help finance Al Qaida”.

  44. I’d still like to know, if this isn’t such a big deal, why was it treason for Clinton for allowing a Chinese owned company to do the same.

    I don’t see too many saying it isn’t a big deal and the ones who are aren’t, near as I can tell, the ones who called the China deal treason (Who were the ones who called it treason anyway?)

    At any rate, whatever the wisdom of the sales to China, the point here is whether or not allowing foreigners to own ports with the explicit exception of Arabs will end up playing right into the hands of the Al Qaida forces. At the very least we should expect the UAE to make some public retaliation–I’d expect their people to demand it, not entirely without reason.

    Will that hurt us? Does it matter? At this point the politics have overtaken just about any mere facts that might come out.

    The Administration should have painted this as a victory in the war on terror, with a compliant UAE overcoming its dubious past and reaping reward, a lesson to our less helpful “allies” in the region (assuming that’s the case). How they missed seeing the perfect storm of conservative resistance to Arab control of US assets and liberal resistance to anything that comes out of the administration is beyond me.

    Another take:
    http://tks.nationalreview.com/archives/090568.asp

    Which concludes with the reasonable statement “I guess the issue comes down to whether one concludes that the UAE is “demonstrably unreliable” as Michelle (Malkin) puts it, or whether they are “very, very solid partners” as the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs says. I can see how smart folks can disagree.”

    Definitely an issue that has made for some strange bedfellows.

  45. Meanwhile, a far bigger story is being missed–the bombing of one of the Shiite’s holiest sites in Iraq.

    One might pause to marvel at how Muslims went nuts over a few supposedly blasphemous cartoons when it is from within their own ranks that those who are able to destroy mosques emerge. But that’s for another time. Al Qaida may have finally hit on a way to get the anarchy they have sought.

  47. The heck with the UAE…let’s give the contract to HitlerBurton, DicKKK Cheney’s Toy Company.

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