Missing the Point

One topic seemed to dominate the discourse in the blogworld and the mainstream media yesterday, that of American port management being handled by a company now owned by the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Six US ports had been managed by a British company, but that business was sold to the UAE company. Apparently the sale was duly reported several months ago in the financial media, but it finally hit the American consciousness over the past few days, and the predictable howls of outrage raced across the political spectrum. Port security, known to be deficient in the post-9/11 world, would now be compromised further because a country with various kinds of ties to terrorist organizations was now involved.

In all probablility, our ports will be no less secure under the UAE firm, but the political storm continues. A Washington Post editorial attempts to call bullshit on the whole story, but for the most part fails to see the real dynamic in play.

YOU KNOW THERE'S something suspicious going on when multiple members of Congress -- House, Senate, Democrat, Republican, future presidential candidates of all stripes -- spontaneously unite around an issue that none of them had known existed a week earlier. That appears to be what happened last weekend after politicians awoke to the fairly stale news that the London-based P&O navigation company, which has long managed the ports of New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia, had been taken over by Dubai Ports World, a company based in the United Arab Emirates. Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) called the deal "tone-deaf politically at this point in our history." Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) called for the White House to put a hold on the purchase. Minority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) seconded him, implying that Arab owners posed a major security threat -- as did everyone from Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) to Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) to Rep. Peter T. King (R-N.Y.) to Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R).

At stake -- in theory -- is the question of whether we should "outsource major port security to a foreign-based company," in the words of Mr. Graham. But those words, like that of almost all of the others, sound, well, tone-deaf to us. For one, the deal cannot "outsource major port security," because management companies that run ports do not control security. The U.S. Coast Guard controls the physical security of our ports. The U.S. Customs Service controls container security. That doesn't change, no matter who runs the business operations. Nor is it clear why Mr. Graham or anybody else should be worried about "foreign-based" companies managing U.S. ports, since P&O is a British company. And Britain, as events of the last year have illustrated, is no less likely to harbor radical Islamic terrorists than Dubai.

None of the U.S. politicians huffing and puffing seem to be aware that this deal was long in the making, that it had been reported on extensively in the financial press, and that it went through normal security clearance procedures, including approval from a foreign investment committee that contains officials from the departments of Treasury, Commerce, State and Homeland Security, among other agencies. Even more disturbing is the apparent difficulty of members of Congress in distinguishing among Arab countries. We'd like to remind them, as they've apparently forgotten, that the United Arab Emirates is a U.S. ally that has cooperated extensively with U.S. security operations in the war on terrorism, that supplied troops to the U.S.-led coalition during the 1991 Persian Gulf War, and that sends humanitarian aid to Iraq. U.S. troops move freely in and out of Dubai on their way to Iraq now. [Emphasis added]

What the Washington Post missed contains at least three parts. The first is that Americans suddenly woke up to the fact that the federal government has been just as active in outsourcing as the most global of corporations. Why any part of port management should be handled by anything other than the federal government directly is mystifying.

The second part of this dynamic is that Congress was caught by surprise, which itself can hardly be surprising. This regime has from the start had little use for congressional oversight. It tells Congress what the regime wants it to know, usually after the fact, and Congress has willingly allowed this practice. Why should this issue be any different, even if it is an election year? And this ties in nicely with the third part.

This regime has spent every day since even before 9/11 demonizing the Arab world, raising and lowering the color coded terror alert, manipulating the country to war against those "who hate us for our freedom", and generally trash talking against "Islamofascists" at the drop of a hat. By playing the race card so blatantly, it should not come as any surprise that the American public would be outraged that an Arab country, any Arab country would somehow be involved in running major entry points to America. Congress, and I mean both sides of the aisle, have also permitted this to go on. The regime should have seen this coming, but apparently it did not, believing that its imperial rightness would cover all contingencies.

The only thing I find surprising in all of this is how badly the White House is handling the news. Several cabinet members, most notably Defense Secretary Rumsfield, claims not to have known anything about the deal until this past weekend, and he claims he still hasn't fully reviewed the situation. Similar hedges were offered by several other officials. The response of the Emperor was typical for him: "There's nothing wrong with the deal and I'll veto any legislation that tries to undo it."

Karl Rove must have taken the long holiday weekend off.