MORE ON WHITE HOUSE PORT CONTROVERSY

In response to my recent post on the White House decision to green light the takeover of a British firm that provides port administration services to five major US ports by state-owned company from the United Arab Emirates, which has been accused of helping the 9/11 terrorists and transferring nuclear technology to Iran, my old friend Matt writes in Real Art comments:

I'll take the opposing view on this one, as I actually agree with the administration on this one (wow, that felt weird to write): 1. the UAE is small potatoes next to Saudi Arabi when it comes to owning things in the US and supporting terrorism. To talk about the UAE and continue to ignore Saudi Arabia makes congress look uninformed and only interested in token resistance to the admin. 2. blocking an arab company or country from participating equally in our free market system will look incredibly racist and anti-moslem outside of our borders

So, i think congress looks panic-stricken, directionless and anti-arab doing this and hence I (gulp) agree with Bush.

Thoughts?

Okay, I'll take these in reverse order.

My own problem with this deal is not that it's an Arab company, but a state-owned company, literally an organ of government, from a nation that may very well be aiding terrorists, despite it's being recognized by the White House as an official ally in the "war on terror." I'll grant the possibility that this may create the appearance of anti-Arab discrimination, but, at this point, the only public voice I've heard criticizing opposition to the deal in those terms is the President's. That doesn't mean Arabs aren't angry about it, just that I haven't heard of it yet. Furthermore, I'm not even advocating blocking the deal just yet: for now, I want to know why the White House thinks this is going to be safe; "We've checked it out" doesn't really cut it, given the serious accusations against the UAE. Once we've heard some answers, then a real debate can begin.

My personal bet is that there aren't any answers--from what I'm hearing, this thing was approved by a board of cronies, a real FEMA style operation, that doesn't really have any qualifications to determine the security ramifications of the deal. But more on that below.

As for the point about Saudi Arabia, all I can do is say, "yeah," and just kind of stare at the ground. Really, the point here is that Congress really is uninformed, as is most of the US public about the situation there. Most of the Islamic world's resentment toward the United States comes from its support of Israel no matter how low it goes in dealing with the Palestinians, but a great deal of resentment also stems from American support of despotic rulers in the Middle East. The Saudi royal family is utterly corrupt, stealing the wealth of the nation, while repressing its citizens. Most Americans don't even realize that Bin Laden's own brand of Islamic extremism, Wahhabism, was born in Saudi Arabia; because all other forms of dissent have been crushed in the desert nation, Wahhabist mosques, strongly supported by the royal family, became by default the only place where radical rhetoric is tolerated. Thus, the mosques became the birthing ground for anti-Saudi and anti-American politics on the Arabian peninsula. In other words, US support of the Saudi family indirectly contributed to the rise of the man who masterminded 9/11--that's why the vast majority of hijackers were Saudi citizens.

Nonetheless, exposing the schizophrenic nature of American foreign policy in the region still doesn't explain why it's okay to allow a nation that may have aided those hijackers to take control of several important gateways into the US. Nor does the observation that Congress is "panic-stricken, directionless and anti-arab," a true enough statement by itself.

So I guess that my overall problem with this whole thing is that there are a lot of unanswered questions that, until today, Bush didn't seem interested in answering. I'm very curious as to how he's going to defend the deal. Because...

A lot of new info has come out about this in the last couple of days since Matt made his comment. A lot. So much, in fact, that I'm taking the lazy route and doing what the bigtime bloggers call a "blog round up." Here goes.

From the Daily Kos:

Ignorant, yet defiant

Of course, the big question is who reviewed and approved the deal, since we now find that a decision with major national security ramifications was made without input from either the president (supposedly) or the Secretary of Defense. Or perhaps the better question is whether the administration has decided to hang Chertoff off to dry. The dude is on his way out anyway, might as well tar him with this disaster as well. Because as far as we can tell, we have no proof the committee that McClellan assured us yesterday had unanimously approved the deal has even met.

Furthermore, while the administration was required under law to conduct a 45-day investigation into the deal, none took place. Of course, "laws" are those pesky words on paper that King George and his infallible administration are allowed to ignore and discard at their own perogative.

Yet this is a case with national security ramifications so obvious that even Republicans can't sit on the sidelines. I mean, we're talking about a nation that impeded our ability to take out Osama Bin Laden because half its royal family was chillin' with the terrorist mastemind himself. We attacked Iraq because one of the 9/11 terrorists allegedly met with an Iraqi security official in Prague, yet we give control of our ports to a nation whose leadership is on a first-name basis with Osama himself and got together for tea and crumpets.

Click here for more, including source links.

Again from the Daily Kos:

Secretary Snow Wasn't Aware of Deal--
Despite Law Requiring He Chairs CFIUS

So far, we know that the Secretary of Defense, who is supposed to sit on the committee, didn't. We know that the Secretary of the Treasury, who is supposed to chair the meeting, didn't. Did ANY cabinet-level official do their duty as required by law? Or was the Dubai deal approved by a dozen Yoo-like marionettes of this administration? A list of who exactly participated in the meeting needs to be disclosed. Immediately.

More here.

And from Eschaton, this little bit of CBS News transcription:

Joke

BORGER: Here's one explanation. The president and his senior staff couldn't brief Congress because they didn't know. That's because the panel that makes these calls, the Committee on Foreign Investments, is not run by the high-level Cabinet members listed on its Web site. Those guys usually rubber-stamp decisions made by staffers. Richard Perle is a Bush ally who sat on the panel during the Reagan years.

Mr. RICHARD PERLE (Former Assistant Secretary of Defense): The committee almost never met. And when it deliberated, which it did from time to time, it was usually at a pretty low bureaucratic level.

BORGER: So, is it a joke?

Mr. PERLE: I think it's a bit of a joke if we were serious about scrutinizing foreign ownership and foreign control, particularly since 9/11.

Click here to see it in context (I just copied and pasted the entire bit, actually).

Eschaton also gives a nice little overview of three separate stories which also put the security situation about this port deal in doubt.

So, obviously, I've got a lot of questions. Unfortunately, the White House's track record on answering questions is generally pretty bad. I guess we'll see what happens.

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$