Disraeli in Dubai

I am not at all surprised that Dr. Wheeler and I  see eye to eye, tooth to tooth, and reason to reason on the current burlesque the  Democrats have manufactured to distract and confuse the American people. And with a willing and complicit fifth column fourth estate (the press), it's a no brainer getting their knee jerk message out there. Those lap dogs can't lap it up fast enough.

The Republicans chasing lefty tail on this is unfortunate but they will see through this ruse of that I am sure.

The first casualty of political conquest is the truth.

The Federalist Patriot makes points here

Despite the rancor, the U.S. does not outsource the protection of our critical national-security infrastructure.

Approval of the DPW proposal underwent three months of interagency review. According to Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England, "This review definitely was not cursory and it definitely was not casual. Rather, it was in depth and comprehensive." This is the same review that management companies based in China, Denmark, Japan, Singapore and Taiwan underwent before being authorized to manage terminals in the port of Los Angeles. We might add, China now manages some terminals on both ends of the Panama Canal.

Foreign investment in the U.S., including port management, is nothing new.

Dr. Jack Wheeler's take is much more in depth than my previous post earlier this week here.
But Wheeler is a paid subscription only so I am running the whole thing. And if you don't have a subscription - get one here, NOW, worth every last penny. Jack rocks - bad dah bing, bad dah boom

DISRAELI IN DUBAI Written by Dr. Jack Wheeler

The 19^th century British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli (1804-1881) once commented on accusations that a political opponent of his was lying regarding an important issue before Parliament:  "It is worse than a lie - it is a blunder."

We can be sure that the Earl of Beaconsfield (the peerage awarded to Disraeli by Queen Victoria) would make the same observation today over the travails of George Bush and the port scandal.

There is no secret deal here.  CFIUS, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, that vets these things, ran it through 12 agencies including Defense, Treasury, State, Homeland Security, and the White House National Security Council.  Their approval was unanimous.  Had just one objected, it would have been put on a 45-day investigative hold.

Bush was blindsided on this out of sheer naiveté.  He still can't accept as real the bottomless mendacity of Democrats.  For Barbara Boxer and Chuck Schumer to foment in protest over a deal with America's closest Arab ally, when they have gone far more ballistic at any suggestion that Arabs be profiled at US airports - well, I guess it's standard liberal chutzpah.

Outdoing Bush in naiveté are Republicans in Congress being led with rings in their noses by Boxer and Schumer into an orgy of Bush-bashing.  It would be nice if they all took a deep breath, switched on their brains, and began thinking of how to take advantage of this fiasco.

Wouldn't it be great if Bill Frist stood up in the Senate Chamber and congratulated his Democrat colleagues for their concern over the safety of America's ports, and that he was sure they would now show their concern for the safety of America's airports by mandating Arab Moslem male passengers instead of grandmas and others at politically correct random?

Or if Denny Hastert stood up in the House Chamber to say he was sure his Democrat colleagues, so newly passionate about national security and concerned over our dependence on Arab oil, would now support drilling oil in Alaska's ANWR, offshore drilling in Florida and the East Coast, and eliminating government restrictions so that nuclear power plants and oil refineries can be built in three to four years.

So, should the deal with Dubai Ports World be toast?  Because the Dems have demonized the UAE in order to demonize Bush once again, this is going to be tricky.  So let's talk about this place, the United Arab Emirates.

It's a collection of seven tiny Persian Gulf sheikhdoms welded together by the Brits in 1892, changing what was called the Pirate Coast to the Trucial Coast, and creating a British Protectorate protecting them from the Ottoman Turks.  The truce between the seven - Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Fujaira, Ajman, Umm al Qaiwan, and Ras al-Kaimah - worked so well that by 1972, they were transformed into the UAE, with their respective leaders being upgraded from sheikhs to emirs.

They were all mud hut fishing villages until oil was found in Abu Dhabi and pumped out in quantity in the 1960s.  With one exception, the other emirates were happy to kick back and live off Abu Dhabi's largesse.  The exception was Dubai.  The Maktoum clan of the Babi Yas tribe that runs Dubai have always been traders.  So they made a decision in the 1970s to prosper on their own.

They did it be transforming their mud hut fishing village into the Hong Kong of the Middle East.  Their success in doing so has been beyond spectacular.

If you associate "Arabs" with "camel-herding" and "poverty," if you visit Dubai you're in for the shock of your life.  For openers, there's the world's only seven star hotel, the Burj al-Arab (see photo)

The amount of business being done in Dubai is staggering, thanks to a zero corporate tax rate, no restrictions on repatriation of capital, and 100% foreign ownership of businesses permitted.  The Dubai International Finance Center, with millions of square feet of state-of-the-art hi-tech office space, is rapidly becoming the Wall Street of the Middle East.

Dubai Healthcare City is a $3 billion project, making the emirate a world class center for medical treatment, research, and education that includes branches of the Mayo Clinic and the Harvard Medical School.

With a $5 billion dollar project called Dubailand, it plans on being the Disneyland of the Middle East, with 15 million additional tourists as year.

There are millions of tourists and businessmen coming every year to Dubai already.  The lubricant of tourism, of course, is booze, rivers of which flow through Dubai's hotels, bars, and discos.  Remember this is a Moslem country.

And wherever there are hordes of tourists with money, there are hordes of hookers.  Prostitution is as illegal as it is in Las Vegas.  Every bar in every 4 and 5 star hotel in Dubai offers a selection of ladies from Russia, England, China, Pakistan, the Philippines, Ethiopia, and elsewhere.  The Cyclone Disco is legendary for being a "United Nations of prostitution," with over 500 international ladies of the evening available on an average night.

You would think that this debauch of money, booze, and sex would outrage the Islamists.  Yet Dubai has never been hit with a terrorist attack.  Right across the sandy border, Saudi Arabia has been hit by suicidal Moslem crazies numerous times.  But Dubai - America's best friend in Arab-land, the Moslem Fleshpot - never.

That's because Dubai, besides being the Middle East's Hong Kong, Wall Street, Disneyland, and Las Vegas, is also the Middle East's Switzerland, where everyone's money no matter how drug, mafia, or terrorist-tainted, is handled with equal discretion.

That's the trade-off.  As it's the place where terrorists can do business, the terrorists leave it alone.

But what if Al Qaeda or an Al Qaeda wannabe decides to blackmail the Dubai government, owners of Dubai Ports World?  One suicide bomber wiping out the lobby of the Burj al-Arab could cost Dubai billions in tourist and investment revenue.  To prevent this, all DPW has to do is insert a few Al Qaeda boys to work in American ports.

Terrorist Blackmail is the security issue that needs to be discussed.

The Bushistas have made a bewildering blunder in not briefing Congress and preempting Democratic demagoguery.  A lot of conservatives knee-jerk reacted with a "not just no but hell no!" unthinking rejection like Sue Myrick (R-NC).  This is going to change as conservatives calm down and actually start to reflect on the matter, instead of venting and demagoguing like liberals do.

Take a look at the White House's reasoning in its Fact Sheet on the CFIUS Process and the DP World Transaction.  The case is well made.  If the White House can effectively assuage the terrorist blackmail concern, then you'll see a shift in support for the president.

It has already begun - Jack Kelly's column, Is It Smart To Attack All Moslems?,  this week is example. 

Look at it this way - to be on the side of Barbara Boxer, Chuck Schumer, and Hillary Clinton and against George Bush on an issue is prima facie not pro-American. 

Maybe - just maybe - the port scandal will turn out not to be a Bushie blunder at all.  You wonder what Disraeli would say about that.

Thanks Jack........... (click below for Kelly's column)

IS IT SMART TO ATTACK ALL MOSLEMS?  

Written by Jack Kelly

Friday, 24 February 2006

What do the arrests of three suspected Moslem terrorists in Ohio have to do with the purchase by an Arab company of the firm that manages facilities at six U.S. seaports?

Nothing...and everything.

The Justice Department indicted Tuesday Mohammad Zaki Amawi, 26, of Toledo; Marwan Othman al-Hindi, 42, of Toledo, and Wassim Mazloum, 24, of Cleveland, on charges of plotting to kill U.S. military personnel.

A fourth person is mentioned in the indictment.  He is "the trainer," a U.S. military combat veteran and "respected member of the Moslem community" in Toledo from whom the plotters sought weapons training and bomb making advice.

The "trainer" reported the terrorists to the FBI, and agreed to work undercover to build the case against them.

So what does this have to do with the purchase by Dubai Ports World of the British firm that manages commercial operations at ports in New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Miami and New Orleans?

Bush administration approval of the sale has united Democrats and Republicans in fury.  Conservative pundits are apoplectic.

"The Dubai ports fracas will become a flap, quickly swell into a firestorm, then become a debacle before settling into the history books as a 'historic miscalculation' -- providing the Republicans only lose the Congress," predicted James Lileks of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.

On the left, Jack Cafferty, CNN's resident bozo, opined the ports deal could be grounds for impeachment.

Distilled to its essence, the argument against the sale is that Dubai Ports World is an Arab firm, and it was Arabs who attacked us on 9/11 (including Marwan al Shehhi, a citizen of the United Arab Emirates, who flew United Flight 175 into the World Trade Center).

The argument is comparable to the one President Roosevelt used to send Japanese Americans from the West Coast to concentration camps.

If we are to win the war against the Islamofascists, we need to be able to distinguish our friends from our enemies.

In this war, there are good Moslems and bad Moslems.  The Toledo conspirators are examples of the latter.  The "trainer," and the 1,715 Moslems currently serving in the U.S. Army are examples of the former.

We wouldn't lump "the trainer" in with the terrorists he risked his life to catch, and we shouldn't lump the UAE in with Iran or Syria, or even with Egypt or Saudi Arabia.

Among Arab nations, we have no better friends than the United Arab Emirates.  The government (which owns Dubai Ports World) sponsors a U.S. Air Force base, services U.S. Navy warships, and is assisting in our efforts to shut down terrorist funding.  (Dubai is the banking, and consequently the money laundering, center of the Gulf.) 

Unlike Saudi Arabia, the UAE is a modern, tolerant country.  The British Financial Times describes it as "the Singapore of the Gulf." The UAE is what we wish every Arab country were like.  But we will not make more friends in the Arab world if we treat the friends we have as if they were enemies.

There are, of course, Islamists in the UAE.  But not, so far as we know, in the management of Dubai Ports World, whose security record has been exemplary. 

There are, as we have seen, Islamists in Toledo, too.  And there are lots of Islamists in London, which is where Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Company, the British firm Dubai Ports World bought, is headquartered.  Not even Jack Cafferty has yet suggested we stop doing business with Ohio and Britain.

Dubai Ports World bought P&O; it isn't replacing it.  Management of the ports will continue as before.  The employees who load and unload ships -- nearly all of whom are Americans -- will remain the same.  The managers simply will report to a different board of directors.

And P&O has nothing to do with port security, which remains in the hands of the Coast Guard and other federal agencies.  U.S. intelligence agencies and the U.S. military reviewed the deal, and say they have no problem with it.

Opposition to the ports deal has been fueled by ignorance and prejudice.  Blocking it will do no more to defeat the terrorists than Roosevelt's concentration camps did to defeat the Japanese. 

It is stupid as well as shameful to turn the war we must fight against Islamic extremism into an attack on Moslems generally.

Comments

[bernie golomb]

On Feb22 I noted that DP World running our ports is not a security issue .. but I didn't want them involved strictly on grounds that, as much as they are practically our allies out there, they still fund and support jihadist terrorism.

[Mark]

Thanks for providing that Pamela. I couldn't get the link for the Jack Kelley column to work though.

[lowandslow]

The UAE port situation is a serious subject that requires thorough consideration but...

500 hookers in one club? WOW!

[Francis W. Porretto]

The deal isn't traitorous, and of course it's discomfiting to be "on the same side" as Schumer, Clinton, et alii, but it still strikes me as unwise.

Middle Eastern Muslim states contain...are you securely seated?...Middle Eastern Muslims. There is no subgroup of humanity that presents a "more enriched sample" of terrorists, persons who hate the United States, persons who can be intimidated or pressured by the United States, and persons who might be persuaded by some means to aid in doing harm to the United States.

I used to sell military aircraft into that part of the world. I know.

The course of prudence is to terminate all intercourse of any kind with all Islamic states, until Islam has collapsed or reformed in a satisfactory way. That might take many decades, but the alternative is to continue to court unacceptable risks to America, Americans, and their legitimate interests worldwide.

[Rev. Thomas S. Painter (R)]

"Atlas Shrugged", I think that was one of the best named piece of trash books the devil ever tempted me to read. Your blog is better. ...a bit of a loose cannon, but sometimes that works out for the best. God bless. :-)

[Ripper]

1) Is Dubai Muslim? - yes
2) Is Dubai Arab? - yes
3) Does Dubai engage in state sponsored anti Semitism? - yes
4) Did Dubai recognize the Taliban? - yes
5) Did 2 of the 9/11 hijackers come from Dubai? - yes
6) Is Bill O'Reilly the bloviator on the take from the Arabs? - who knows?
7) What is Neil Bush's relationship with Dubai?
Nix this dumb deal! There are no Muslim friends.

[Ripper]

If being on the side of HIllary Clinton and Chuck Schumer (my two Senators) is discomfitting, how about being on the side of Robert Novak, Pat Buchanan, Congressman Darrell Issa (R. of California), the Arab-Anmerican Anti-Discrmination Committee, and Dhimmi Carter?

[bonzoid]

Jack said:
If being on the side of HIllary Clinton and Chuck Schumer (my two Senators) is discomfitting, how about being on the side of Robert Novak, Pat Buchanan, Congressman Darrell Issa (R. of California), the Arab-Anmerican Anti-Discrmination Committee, and Dhimmi Carter?
----
There's always Condi 44, or Clinton-Gore '08.
Carter could run again.

[MarcH]

1. Dr. Rachel Ehrenfeld, the renowned researcher of terrorist financing (http://www.public-integrity.org/about/team.php) lays out the goods (with co-author Alyssa Lappen) on the UAE royal family’s longtime support for HAMAS (http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/ReadArticle.asp?ID=21413).

2. I wonder if describing UAE/Dubai as a benign Disneyland with hookers is a sufficient picture of the place. Hugh Fitzgerald at Jihad Watch (http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/010346.php) describes a UAE entertainment that I don’t remember from Disneyland:

“ People living in New York and Baltimore will be made distinctly uneasy knowing that their ports are controlled by a company whose owners are Muslims from the United Arab Emirates, a collection of statelets -- Abu Dhabi and Dubai being the best known -- which are full of people who loathe us as Infidels. Some of them are distinctly unpleasant. All kinds of ruling families and the others who rule the economic and political roost in the constituent statelets of the U.A.E., for example, seemed to find nothing morally wrong, were in deed indifferent to, those thousands and thousands of tiny children, often under the age of 4, snatched from their Pakistani or Indian or Somali or Bangladeshi homes, brought to the U.A.E., trained under horrible conditions to be tied on the backs of camels, and during either the training, or in the actual races, were so often maimed or killed on the spot. (When the outside world began to notice, and to protest, and only then, did the U.A.E. begin to substitute robots for those tiny sacrificial slave-jockets). After all, who cared -- they were from Pakistan and Bangladesh and Somalia; they weren't Arabs, they were expendable, and camel races are such fun, after all. That is the level of moral development in the United Arab Emirates.”

3. I’m sorry to see that the anti-Jihadi community of pundits, bloggers and readers seems to be a loggerheads on this issue. For myself, I’m against this deal but willing to be persuaded by a convincing argument. In any case, I think the bigger, underlying story is that the recent disputes within the anti-Jihadi community over UAE port deal and cartoon highlights our confusion over the nature of this conflict and the identity and nature of our enemies.

[MarcH]

"Look at it this way - to be on the side of Barbara Boxer, Chuck Schumer, and Hillary Clinton and against George Bush on an issue is prima facie not pro-American."

I'm surprised that Wheeler can make this argument with a straight face given that, on this issue, he is on the same side as James Earl Carter, Jr., the former President, Nobel Prize winner, and peanut farmer.

[Dennis Miller]

Please consider the concerns in the following link. There is more to this issue than mistrusting the motives of Dhimmicrats!

http://canadafreepress.com/2006/jonsson022506.htm

[MarcH]

Thanks Dennis Miller. That article was food for thought. The author seems to be well versed in the field of Islamic finance.

[searcher]

TO MarcH, thanks for the link to the frontpage article "Welcoming Terror to U.S. Ports"....the connection to Hamas and the support of the UAE for suicide bombers should be enough to nix this deal. But it won't.

We are being asked to open our country (and ports) to our ideological enemy/opponent: Fundamentalist Islam; that is the enemy we face. The UAE is part of that world, and Islamic expansionism is their goal.

Hamas has sworn to destroy Israel, and in the same breath denounces Israel for racism and apartheidism for building a security wall. The screaming of racism in the port deal is straight out of the jihad playbook--it's a strategy. To hear it coming from our President is shocking.

Here is a site regarding the child-slavery in UAE. When I first found it, there was video from a secret camera documentary by HBO. The video has disappeared since last week.
http://www.ansarburney.com/index.html

[MarcH]

Searcher,

Thanks for the reference to that site. I will bookmark it and use it for future reference as it is important to understand the nature of these folks.

Regarding the UAE ports deal, there are a lot of good people on both sides of the argument, but I think it is not a good idea. We may sometimes have to cultivate unsavory allies, but there is no way we should give them a window to our sensitive infrastructure.

There are just so many disturbing things about this deal. For example, it includes an special exemption for DPW allowing them to keep corporate documents in the UAE instead of in the US, as is required for other similar arrangements (http://www.caycompass.com/cgi-bin/CFPnews.cgi?ID=1011290). This could be a big problem for a US law enforcement officer (LEO) trying to investigate DPW, its customers, employees or owners.

A US LEO can access US located documents through subpoena or search warrent. Both are routine investigative measures. To access UAE based documents, a US LEO must go through a long and clumsy process of making a request through the US Department of State to UAE authorities. Even then, the LEO must trust that the UAE/Dubai and businesses will be forthcoming.

Readers of Atlas Shrugs can decide for themselves how much they would trust the sheiks of the UAE/Dubai/DPW. Any reader who has a question as to whether to trust UAE/Dubai/DPW can always ask the brutalized child jockeys described in the above comments.

I have great respect for President Bush, but I hope he'll run a "Harriet Miers" play on this one.