Dubai and Economic Nationalism
Posted by Moonage on 12 Mar 2006 | Tagged as: International Politics
In wake of DPW withdrawing from the ports deal amid a basically unanimous political backlash against the deal, a lot of people are once again speculating Bush got himself in more political hot water because he made a strong-armed decision that no one else supports. I personally have supported this deal based on my lack of knowledge that I HOPE some legislators have that I don’t, and, because if we are going to fight an international war on terror, we need to reward those that help us in that fight. This would have sent a huge signal to the Middle East that helping us DOES have rewards.
And you know what, looks like I’m not alone in that thinking:
I mean, so far, that’s not even close. And what’s more important to me, that’s not even remotely close to the message we’ve been getting from ALL major media. Including Fox as well.
Now, Ann Coulter I think it has noted that they think a little different in Dubai. That they respect a strong decision and power. That, because they were told "no" sternly, they’ll respect the US just the same. And, because of that, nixing this deal would not have the ramifications people like me feel it will.
Let’s hope she’s right. However, having the President say "yes", and his senate say "no", and the media say "no", but the people say "yes", just doesn’t strike me as the display of power Ann Coulter is suggesting has occurred.
And, yeah, Bush didn’t communicate why this deal was good to the people before the firestorm erupted. However, he was probably thinking like I am that this was no big deal in the first place. And, I personally still feel this way. Hopefully the debate put more focus on port security. If it did, then maybe something good will come from it. However, what I think people will realize if that focus does occur is that this whole flap over DPW was a misguided Islamophobic knee-jerk reaction coordinated by Democrats and media and the Republicans fell for it hook line and sinker, probably because they have the same issues.
Folks, isolationism gave us WWI AND WWII. And "economic nationalism" is just another word for isolationism. If we are going to drag the Middle East out of the dark ages, we’re going to have to engage them, sometimes on their terms. Just buying their oil ain’t going to cut it much longer because Asia will be buying more if they’re not already. If we want an open dialogue, we’re going to have to put our actions where our mouths are. Telling Dubai we expect them to help us in the war on terror and then telling them we don’t trust them enough to do business with them ain’t the action our mouths are selling. And, contrary to Ann, I don’t think the message we sent was the message she thinks they got.
- Technorati port security, DPW, Ann Coulter, economic nationalism, isolationism
3 Comments »
on 12 Mar 2006 at 10:38 am 1.StormWarning
said …
One question that should be asked is how come the House Appropriations Committee voted so overwhelmingly to “blow the deal?”
The House Appropriations Committee (66 members in all) voted 62-2 to adopt this amendment: http://appropriations.house.gov/_files/PortAmendLang.pdf
Of those Members on the Committee, only Democrat Rep. Jim Moran of Virginia and Republican Jim Kolbe of Arizona cast “no” votes…loads of “good Republicans” with plenty of seniority who voted for it.
With full House scheduled to vote on the DPW deal, I wonder why DPW pulled out so quickly (did they pull out prematurely?).
So is this posturing by the House Appropriations Committee? Posturing by DPW? Or was it a very unlikely ploy (because of its apparent diplomatic and economic costs) by the Adminstration to get KBR (”Kinfolk, Brothers and Relatives”) to secure the management contract. If that’s what it was, I think it was a very risky and potentially costly game of “political chicken.”
on 12 Mar 2006 at 11:31 am 2.Moonage
said …
The overwhelming vote is the reason I keep quantifying my comments here with the assumption they know something us ordinary folk don’t.
I truly don’t believe the KBR assumptions at all. The reason Bush gets crucified by just about everyone is he doesn’t play games very well. If he wanted to do business with DPW, that’s what he wanted. Now, I wouldn’t rule out Congressional members thinking KBR. But, what little I don know for sure is the deal didn’t just pop up out of the blue. It’s been in the works for probably a year or so. And, it’s not been kept a secret. No one mentioned it outside of a hand full of people UNTIL after the fact. The whole thing just doesn’t taste right to me because of that. If people had that strong feelings AFTER the fact, why didn’t they have those same concerns BEFORE the fact? And, why weren’t they all that concerned when DPW bought into CSX railroads in 2005?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/21/AR2006022101944.html
They already have a huge stake in the ports because of that deal. No one seemed too concerned at that point. Now, granted, these are the foreign train markets. But, you can’t assume they don’t have some influence over CSX at this point because of that. Of course, people will just to prove their point. Bottom line, DPW has a huge business interest in the US at this point that no one has ever questioned. What was so dramatically different about this deal? Don’t give me the security argument because we all know that one was bogus from the get go. Unless, of course, someone wants to convince me that we were safer with a privately owned company from the country that sent us the Shoe Bomber and George Galloway AFTER 9/11. To me, something smells bad, but it ain’t Bush and it ain’t DPW.
on 14 Mar 2006 at 12:49 pm 3.Boys Wear Pants, Men Wear Trousers said …
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