Portgate Roundup
Washington Times: Against
John McIntyre: Against (“[C]ommon-sense seems to tell me that we probably should not approve management of key U.S. ports to a state-owned Arab company)…
James Lileks: Against
L.A. Times: For (“Dubai Ports World, like the foreign companies that already run the majority of key U.S. ports — including 80% of the terminals in Los Angeles — does not own the points of entry. It is a contractor that coordinates logistics. And most important, it’s not in charge of security. Port operators work with U.S. security officials (port police, the Coast Guard, the Department of Homeland Security) in charge of preventing terrorism.”)…
More roundups here, here, and here…
It should be noted that much of the opposition is on political grounds, and not on the merits of the deal per se…
I favor the deal.
There are a lot of funny things about the presentation of the argument.
For those opposed, who have failed to state their reason for the opposition…
Why not make it illegal for any Arab to own property in the US?
(That is the spirit of the argument.)
Should we refuse any Arabic government from renting space in our buildings?
(After all, they could rent a floor in any building and use the location to detonate it or stage an attack.)
If the deal does go thru, should we take over the responsibility of securing the port?
(Actually we(the government) already are responsible for it.)
The whole premise that a nuke will be transported in by ship is ludicrous. What is to stop a ship from releasing a smaller vessel 10 miles out, with a nuke on board?
The idea of a nuke being delivered by cargo shipping is the stupidest ever.
A cargo ship is the slowest means of transportation out there. Increased radiation detected in a foreign port 2 days after a ship has left is going to draw a lot of attention. I trust we are looking at more foreign ports and spending more money monitoring them, than our own.
Even stranger still…dems do not want warrantless wiretaps in America…but warrantless searches of ships are now OK with them?
The confusion that has helped the manic preach is the reality of who is responsible for our ports’ Security. No private company is going to board a ship to search its cargo-they don’t have the authority to do so. This implication that the owner’s of the port are responsible for the security of the port is a complete misrepresentation of the way things are.
Does congress really want to keep our ports safe?
What about the entire coastline? The Mexican border?
Searches aren’t thorough enough? Let’s decrease the rate product enters our ports, decreasing supply and increasing the operating cost of exports, that will be passed to the consumer. Its not like we import a lot of stuff.
The greatest insurance policy ever, would be an Arab country investing in America, and not being able to liquidate the asset.
Billions of dollars for a terrorist attack? They could pull 1000 more 9/11′s for a lot cheaper.
(I do wonder though-the company making the sale is British-any chance the Brits are pushing the deal have the UK silently making the case?)
What is evident about this whole argument is that the morons of our government who believe patching and painting one side of a house, while the other three are missing, are clowns, and are now trying to run the show.
World capitalism will always be the long term solution to terrorism. Preventing an Arab country from sharing in the free market, is a recipe for destruction, preventing the day when Arabs see America as the home of their assets, and worth protecting.
Lileks, as usual, is stupendously insightful.
I don’t believe that it’s any danger to our security. I don’t believe that much of anything is any danger to our security. In the entire history of the United States, we’ve lost 3000 people to terrorist attacks. I know it’s not something one says, but terrorism doesn’t worry me in the slightest.
That said, the only point worth anything here is that this move is just plain tone deaf. The Bush administration has bet all of its dollars on its image as the Caped Crusader protecting us all from the hordes of darkness lurking just outside the window. It’s ludicrious and only the far left seems to realize that, but the point here is that only the far left seems to realize that. Everyone else thinks terrorism is a clear and present danger, and OF COURSE this port business is going to make them fly right off the deep end. You can’t spend five years telling people to “be afraid, be very afraid” and then shake your head in wonder when they’re, you know, afraid.
Ryan, sometimes I agree with you and sometimes I don’t, but I can’t share your lack of concern about terrorism. 9/11 was the pivotal event of my lifetime…and the possiblity of nuclear or biological terrorism is too horrifying to contemplate…it’s not a partisan issue…
I don’t expect to change your mind…but terrorism IS a clear and present danger, and I don’t see how that can be plausibly denied. If you and I were privy to the morning National Security briefing the President receives, our hair would probably stand on end…
I don’t deny you your fears and anxieties, but I don’t think there’s any obvious reason to subscribe to the position that terrorism is a clear and present danger. I’m not saying I think I have any rock-solid reasons for taking the position I do, only that we all act as if it’s a foregone conclusion that terrorism is the great challenge of our time. In terms of sheer body count, though, AIDS and malaria are orders of magnitude more awful than terrorism. Maybe that’s different, but I just don’t think terrorists have killed anywhere near enough people to be viewed as anything other than gnats.
If we lived in Israel, I would obviously have a much different impression of how much terrorism matters to me and my country. As it is, I don’t. And I think it’s even odder that the people who are supposed to believe that terrorism is the worst thing going are the ones who seem to be completely flabbergasted by the fact that everyone else is taking them at their word.
But remember, Ryan, that you and I aren’t the President; there could be no worse possible neglect of duty than to allow a nuclear or chemical or biological attack to occur because you didn’t do everything you reasonably could to stop it.
I am fully aware of the fact that much of the opposition to this deal is opportunistic and (as Michelle Malkin points out, hypocritical as well), but so what? Even if it is driven by political posturing, it doesn’t change the fact that it sounds like a really bad idea. And Bush’s initial response — threatening a veto — tells me he doesn’t give a rip about any concerns ordinary citizens might have towards this deal.
“In terms of sheer body count, though, AIDS and malaria are orders of magnitude more awful than terrorism.”
I wasn’t aware that we had a malaria epidemic here – man, where’s the MSM when you really need them?
dmac – I meant on a worldwide scale, but that’s a legitimate point. In fact, I sincerely doubt that terrorism, malaria, or even AIDS rank anywhere near serious priorities for us in terms of body count. We have way bigger fish to fry than any of those. But if we’re concerned about the global scale of death, terrorism is nothing compared to AIDS and malaria. Either way, I don’t think terrorism is a big deal.
Mark – I agree that the President has an obligation to do everything he reasonably can to prevent terrorist attacks. What I don’t think is that a whole lot of what we’re doing falls under that “reasonable” headline, while it seems eminently sensible to me to put “don’t sell ports to sketchy Arab governments” in there as fast as we can. I could go either way on the wiretapping, although I think the threat to civil liberties is far too high to justify allowing it to continue the way it’s been going. Some of the other stuff, even DHS, I’m not sure on. Maybe if DHS were run at all competently. But it isn’t.
By “sell ports” I mean, etc.
Well, we’re all friends here, and we can agree to disagree, but there’s one further thought I had – it’s the preventable aspect. AIDS, worldwide, is largely preventable, in the sense that we can vastly, vastly reduce the death toll through better distribution of medicine to third world and developing countries – but then you get down to that hardcore group of AIDS victims that we can do nothing about – you can’t completely prevent it, but you can – I guess the word is, mitigate its effects.
That’s the way I feel about the War on Terror – God knows, you can’t defeat ‘terror’ – but you can mitigate the risks (even if the possibility of dying in a terrorist attack is, in the scale of things, pretty remote to begin with)…and I have no doubt our more aggressive post 9-11 stance HAS mitigated the risk, in many ways…
I know that’s a little far away from the original topic of the UAE port sell, btw…
Sean, I think once again the main problem was a lack of sales acumen…Bush’s advisors, despite their stellar reputations, seem to be really off this second term…I think it’s the job of Rove and Karen Hughes and the Cabinet, to some extent, to keep the Administration away from PR blunders of this sort – and they just ain’t getting the job done….
“I have no doubt our more aggressive post 9-11 stance HAS mitigated the risk, in many ways.”
I have to disagree with you here. As far as I can tell, there has been no serious effort to protect our ports, chemical plants, airplane luggage and cargo, nuclear facilities, electrical grid, mass transit, or water supply. This is perhaps the largest failure of the Bush administration: despite years of talking tough on terrorism, and with billions of appropriated dollars, they seem to have done amazingly little to protect us against terrorists.
But surely, peter, those are areas we could do better (even much, much better) in – you can’t be saying that you think none of our efforts have caused the slightest change in terrorist plans, can you?
I think that’s a rather bold assertion, if so…
“I think once again the main problem was a lack of sales acumen…”
I don’t think so on that one. The deal was struck in November. That it is now is topic A, was a matter of timing. The admin couldn’t have come out and say-”some people may not like it, but we are willing to do business with Arabs.”
The threat to the ports is extremely narrow, barring a nuclear device, I don’t see any other potential threat. If a nuke has a)been built, b) given to a terrorist, c)makes its way to one of our harbors then d-z don’t really matter. The cost effectiveness of addressing a-c, is a hundred fold greater than port protection.
In a world of hypotheticals, the danger we face of having a nuke go off in a port city will say a lot what about what we failed to prevent. It means there is a will and a means to do it…and they will keep coming.
I’d rather have the help of the UAE when that time comes, but if this port deal doesn’t happen, we might find one of our most significant partners in the GWOT, refusing to station our troops, and hiding their financial records.
This is a a black and white decision…either UAE is our ally, or they are our enemies.
There’s no question that we need to do much more in terms of protecting our ports and our borders – wish Bush will get off the politically correct line here and realize that the borders are porous and mostly unguarded (see the recent Canadian border incident in which the security personnel on their side basically ran away when we warned them in advance of hot pursuit of criminals). In other words, it’s not just Mexico, obviously.
But the recent arrests in Ohio and California lend credence to the reality that many attacks have been thrwarted because of the steeped – up security measures since 9/11. Too easy to claim the boogeyman of possible attacks that may or may not exist that we may or may not be preventing at the moment.
Here’s a question – did anyone really think that there wasn’t going to be an immediate sequential attack in this country after 9/11? Since the Richard Reid incident (which was offshore), it hasn’t happened – and that is the ultimate measure of performance at this time.
They may have changed terrorist plans, but I find it hard to believe that they have impeded the ability of people to commit terror. As an example, the New York Times ran an article some time ago about a rail line which goes through downtown Washington. CSX regularly transports chemicals on this rail line, and there are a number of pedestrian overpasses which a terrorist could easily drop an explosive from. Lobbying from CSX (John Snow’s former company) stopped the administration from re-routing the CSX lines around Washington.
Another Times article had pictures of chemical plants in heavily populated areas which had minimal protection. The article I posted elsewhere shows how funding for port security was roughly one quarter of what was deemed necessary, despite increasing shipping volumes every year. The Central Park Reservoir is protected by a chain link fence about ten feet high. I recognize that you can’t protect everything at once, and there are many points of vulnerability. However, I don’t see anything you can point to showing how any part of our infrastructure has been improved, with the possible exception of airport check-in.
I also recognize that terrorism can never be entirely prevented.
Hannah Arendt wrote “give me one hundred people who aren’t afraid to die, and I can change the course of history.” Two guys with shotguns terrorized the Washington, DC, area two summers ago. Ten suicide bombers who detonate themselves simultaneously at NFL games or shopping malls would have a devastating effect, and there isn’t much we can do to stop it. However, there are things we can do to prevent an attack which would kill thousands or more, and I don’t see any evidence that they are being done.
we are still data mining…it’s no longer called Able Danger, and fewer people know the specifics, and the subgroups are much larger to diffuse the coordination of the info. The Defense Department is compelled to follow the most effective means of protecting this country.
That our efforts to stop terrorists are not made public knowledge would seem an element of logic.
Judging by the rxn to the NSA wiretapping program, it is probably a good thing that the public doesn’t know more. I’m certainly glad we aren’t explaining our clandestine efforts to the terrorists.
How bizarre that perception of security is more important than the reality of the security.
You gotta love the NYT – always looking out for the rest of us plebians. Saw another article in the Sunday edition explaining yet another way for someone to launch an attack on US citizens. Of course, it’s always prefaced under their rubric of “we’re just pointing this out as our civic duty so the government can take care of this so people don’t get hurt,” blah, blah, blah. They’ve crossed so far over the line of objectivity with these stories that it’s worthless to get worked up over them anymore – it’s their raison d’terre these days.
Would they be putting out stories like these if Kerry was President? Not a bloody chance, and everyone outside of the Upper East Side knows it.
mtl, excellent points regarding the cooperation of the UAE…
Ryan-
re: AIDS and malaria — that’s why Bill and Melinda Gates (and Bono) were such a great pick for Time.
Hey Clint, no sucking up to our host here (just kidding!).
Hey, you act like I’m a Bono fan or something!
I agree that they were especially wise choices, and I think it’s telling that Time didn’t go with a GWOT pick. We can have all the talk we want about bias in the media and such, but I think disease, poverty, and tyranny are the real problems. By linking terrorism to tyranny, we’ve actually made some progress on that one, although the situations in Iraq and Israel make me wonder exactly how valuable that association has been. The Bush administration, if nothing else, is deeply schizophrenic about its objectives. This port thing looks awfully symptomatic of that.