Could it be a bill littered with bacon, earmarks like this country has never seen before? No…Bush has pledged to veto any kind of legislation that would prevent control over the management and security of US ports to the United Arab Emarites. Makes sense…after all, the House speaker and Senate Majority Leader have said publicly that they oppose the deal. Better to stand up for who really matters and make these chumps understand that when the King makes a deal, it stays made!
History, facts…it should be obvious to everyone at this point that Bush has no time for either. This is about money, and those dock workers have been nothing but trouble ever since our President’s leadership bloated the trade deficit. They want health insurance and retirement benefits, so our blue-collar President decides to put an end to it. Unions need to wake up and take notice, because this is only the begining.
Pretty soon the 10th Ammendment will be overturned, and officer Ali Al-Alla-Ja-Jalala will be checking your driving credentials during a routine traffic stop. Clearly, if we get rid of the unions and outsourse everything, not only will our security be intact, but those tax cuts for the upper 1% will be that much more effective.
Ah…the sweet smell of leadership…it’s almost ridiculous enough to find it’s way into a Michael Moore movie! In fact, that could be what Bush is counting on! Since conservatives just shout ‘nuh-uh’ at whatever that guy puts out, perhaps the stack of Republicans scratching their heads over this deal just need Moore to talk about it before the think-tanks are humming with a line of crap they can all repeat to justify all of this.
Bush’s first veto…makes you wonder who his ‘daddy’ REALLY is! My guess it’s whoever bankrolled his series of failures in the oil industry.
Short term financial gain seems to rule all the administrations actions. This probably is not the black and white issue that it is turing into, but in the long term it seems like a very bad idea to put a company controlled by the UAE in charge of port security.
It is sort of like the auctioning of US lands to build rural schools, everything in America is for sale. The US is acting like a third world country with a dictator desperate to make as much profit as he can before he loses power.
Bush just doesn’t have a concept of what’s important and what’s not. Managerial control over our ports isn’t something you treat like the production of widgets.
There are several municipal functions that should only be performed by Americans. Border patrol, police, firefighters, air traffic control, CIA, FBI, NSA, etc…
I just don’t think he understands that import/export falls under that category. To him it’s about the rising costs of doing business due to the increase in imports. Each dock worker is union and that costs money.
Outsourcing the management is an end-around those headaches. Basically an attempt to lessen the costs of our trade defecit with a gimick rather than an actual policy.
It could be a European company required to operate according to US labor laws…our interests are similar. An African/Arab/Asian/Australian company…that’s not a good idea. Not only for the sake of our security, but for the sake of the dockworkers, truckers and the thousands of others who bust their ass to make our economy work.
When you disrupt shipments, or allow the process to be subverted by potentially criminal elements…
Look…the ports are already dirty. Crime is already difficult to deal with. We can’t just wash our hands of the entire process because it’s a headache. That’s not the American way.
Chris have you ever thought of this-our borders are porous and what have you said about that situation? Our ports are just as vulnerable and have been for a long time. Americans have been guarding them! And for whatever reasons (political or otherwise) security is lax !! So don’t just blame your favorite whipping boy GWB – put some of that righteous anger on the Congress too !
Paul – I’m not all that concerned about human beings entering the country through the borders. What can we do about it? Spend a few billions on tighter security, when the majority are crossing to seek a better life, not kill as many Americans as they can.
Canisters “disappear”…the tracking system works from the ship to wherever the canister is placed within the port, and that system can be circumvented when a canister of illegal merchandise needs to go out undetected…it’s how drugs, sex slaves (actual human beings are transferred from across the world into this and other countries in the same canisters you see on the back of rigs every day on the highway), arms, etc…this is how it happens.
The longshoreman getting a kickback makes it so the audit trail is cold from the time the ship enters the port…police can try all they want to put the pieces together, but if the tracking system had a ‘glitch’, or for some reason a canister ‘fell through the cracks’…you can see where I’m going with this.
Now how much skag, coke, pot or meth can a border jumper make it across with on their own (knowing that border security will check all vehicles prior to entry)? How much explosives can a border jumper make it across with?
Nothing compared to how much of either can come in on a shipping canister.
That’s the difference between the borders and the ports. I don’t look at it as a total doomsday scenario, as the ability of criminals to infiltrate the system is already a problem…and one that’s extremely difficult to manage even with a wire up. You bust some union workers and think it’s all over and done with…but money talks, and once they’re gone, the bribes will go to someone else.
Heroin enters the country in mass quantites…poppies grown in Afghanistan, Turkey and other surrounding areas…refined in Europe, loaded onto a shipping container and unloaded in a US port…that’s how the drug makes it in.
With that in mind, we should be strengthing security, not handing over a portion of the job to a country with ties to Osama Bin Laden!
Illegal immigrants…I don’t care much about that…America is a great country, and if I were a poverty stricken Latin American, I’d be doing everything I could to get into the country also. I don’t judge them, because if the situation was reversed, I’d do the same thing. I know that.
Drug, arms and human traffickers are a different story. For a quick buck, I wouldn’t transport heroin for someone…but I certainly would hop a fence and try my best to find a good life in America if I had to!!!
Here’s another person opposed to the UAE port deal: Chairman of the Ways and Means Committee Bill Thomas. he is the biggest lap dog around. If he opposes something, it’s gotta be bad.
I can’t believe that GWB is actually going through with this with a straight face. He has a horrible approval rating, and prominent members of his own party are against him. The guy has no clue.
At the heart of this issue is that some things should not be privatized. Port security seems to be one of those things.
Chris does that means that you advocate anyone coming into the country who wants to enter it-illegally or legally? No laws eh? Interesting.
Advocate…no, but I understand their motivation and sympathize with them. Are they criminals? Is the illegal alien working a landscaping job somewhere a criminal? Our laws consider them criminals perhaps, but put that person alongside someone convicted of robbery, assault or arson and perspective is gained.
Illegal aliens are the convenient ‘boogymen’ right now, yet the fact is, you can pump double the border security budget into the equation and they’re still going to make it in here. A Mexican’s motivation for making it in will always surpass that of the security personell tasked with hunting them down.
Immigration is a part of life, and people will always leave wherever they are if a brighter future is within their reach.
Canisters are physical things that come into the country in the light of day and can be checked. Canisters aren’t human beings desiring a better life, they’re inanimate objects, sometimes containing dangerous things inside of them.
How much time has the author spent on the border? Or, if not there, has he engaged in security at a port? Perhaps, but if so, he is mistaken as to the severity of the border issue, though in my opinion the more dangerous border is north, at least owing to the results of those cross border excursions.
As to canisters when was the last time a canister conceived a plot? Whilst it is wise to secure our ports, and not under the plan approved by the administration, it is equally judicious to control the borders. Not all of those walking across want a better life. I know-I speak to them. Further, one human being can spread destruction over a wide swath of territory or does the author have still further utopian views to set out as fact?
Excellent blog BTW, as it does cause one to think even if it reminds me of so many right wing blogs that spew hatred, rather than opinion.
Washington, the Canadian border is enormous. When pot smugglers need to get their product into the country, do they adapt according to what the border patrol changes up since the last time they went on a run? Perhaps deciding to take their goods across one of the great lakes? How do you prevent every single instance of this?
My contention when it’s come to the uprisal of dissent over the borders is that it’s opportunistic, and typically those shouting the loudest speak not a word about the cost of doing what they want done. I’ve heard people advocate fences, more employees, roundups and deportation…yet would any of these things make it so illegal aliens aren’t doing the dingy jobs most Americans have no interest in? I don’t think so.
My idealism on this matter is about motivation, and the motivated individual seeking a better life will outsmart the money every time. Throw more money at the problem and it won’t get solved, the people will just adapt and they’ll still make it into the country.
Canisters on the other hand provide a criminal organization the ability to move whatever they want in secrecy. From an operations standpoint, with the ports, you have every single piece within reach at one time, making it easier to spot-check…whereas the borders constitute an age-old problem that we here in America like to pretend is exclusive to us.
Europe had this problem for centuries, and their borders are open. Does that mean they don’t know what they’re doing? My guess is they tried everything in the book and realized at some point that it’s a catch-22
LOL…
Where did I mention pot? We are talking about border security as it relates to terrorism and the Northern border has seen the entrance of terrorists that perpetrate attacks.
As to containers having within them all sorts of bad things it is widely understood that anything that can be used to disrupt life, via a terrorist, can be found once said moron enters a country. The ability to put those things together requires a mind, which is far more dangerous than a shipment any day.
Europes borders are open primarily due to two wars in the twentieth century, partioning that followed the second, and the understanding that in order to compete economically open borders were essential. However there are provisions in place to shut those borders quickly-and owing to the size of the individual countries in Europe it is not an exercise in futility. Quit looking to Europe for ideals-if you go there very often you know doubt know that they are very worried about immigration and are taking steps to check it – they call them emergency provisions. among other things.
Hilarious.
I agree with your motivation – more money does nothing not because money is evil but because no matter how high one wants humanity to ascend they shall never reach that high-you can’t perfect people. Democrats fail, by and large, because they still hold on to the idea of a utopian society created by government. Not going to happen.
I disagree with your interpretation of the danger that comes with lax port security. Once one of those canisters is loaded onto a rig, it can be driven to the terrorist, who, until that truck arrives, is as dangerous as I am.
Alright, not THAT dangerous…but once they get the chemical weapon out of the back of that truck…they’re getting close!
My idea when it comes to border security is that to make it foolproof…if that’s your goal, then failure is the only outcome to look forward to. The same can probably be said in terms of port security, but I’m more concerned about the canister full of skag or rocket propelled grenades (on a manifest that reads ‘edible underwear, banana flavored’) than I am the evil thoughts of whoever enters the country.
There are plenty of people here legally with heads full of evil thoughts…
I have no delusions over there being a ‘utopian society’ somewhere in the future…I think we have it right now, or as I see it:
“People are just about as happy as they choose to be” – Abraham Lincoln
It’s all about a person’s state of mind. That’s off topic though…as for your pigeon-holing of Democrats…being one myself, I’d point out that universal health care, wages that rise with inflation and more money spent on after school programs, college loans, etc…that’s the agenda I’m hoping to see put into action when and if they take power next.
No offense, but I can turn on one of about five conservative talk stations available on the dial here on a given day and year Democrats incorrectly classified as everything from ‘terrorist sypathizers’ to ‘anti-religion’ to ‘communist’ to ‘hairy armpit feminazis’…
Reality exists within these issues, not huge arbitrary brackets…how we delve into the security issue is what it’s all about in my opinion. The give and take in the debate. Once we categorize millions under one phrase, we’re exiting reality for something entirely different.
No offense, but I can turn on one of about five conservative talk stations available on the dial here on a given day and year Democrats incorrectly classified as everything from ‘terrorist sypathizers’ to ‘anti-religion’ to ‘communist’ to ‘hairy armpit feminazis’…
Can we now add Racial Profilers? The Brits can run the operations at some of our ports but not the Arabs? Where is the light skin/dark skin comparison I’ve seen elsewhere, like in the Katrina post? Or is it no muslims can run our operations?
Democrats stepped into a huge pile and now they are tracking it all over their homes.
Democrats fail for several reasons:
1. The subject matter, as indicated by Mr. Dean himself, has not changed for the Dems though times have.
2. Anyone that feels that government institutions can force a better life on all insure that the good life will not be had by any. Government fails because it ir run by people-who fail. Man is not perfectable so it likewise follows that government, when used to engineer society outside the normal rate of change, will fail because it is less than perfect.
People love to harp about Mr. Bush being conservative. That is a joke. He has presided over government expansion that rivals FDR. And yet, because people are by the very nature capable of evil, we still have imperfect government.
I’m just happy Democrats don’t have the ability to rationalize within our reality. They create these bizarre mental pictures of their own reality, act on those pictures and then can’t understand why they lose all the time.
Take Kerry for example, only to a liberal would think that a marry-for-money, anti-American, war hero fraud, millionaire that is completely out of touch with the common man would be a great presidential candidate. Don’t even get me started on Al Gore, America realized that Bill Clinton’s “We need change” campaign was a huge mistake.
What ever you have to say about George Bush, Democrats have nothing to offer in exchange. They think Joe Lieberman is a secret GOP operative. I am fine with the Democrats living in a dream world and confusing it with the real world.
RightThinker:
Pray tell me how great George Bush is? Provide, for my edification, all of the astounding virtues which he is in possesion of for I, myself, cannot seem to find them.
Whilst I do agree that he was the better of the two automons that he faced let’s not confuse, for posterity’s sake, the difference between choosing the better of two evils and greatness.
Of course you did not say great so I should halt there – but make no mistake-as a conservative you cannot like the way he has mismanaged government, or at least I can’t imagine that you do? Am I wrong?
Bush is anything BUT conservative! Small government…nope, fiscal discipline/personal responsibility…nope, keep our nose out of other people’s business…nope, protect personal freedoms/keep government out of our business…nope.
For the 5th time since he’s been elected, the national debt cap will have to be raised, and this guy is pushing for more tax cuts for the upper class.
Katrina proved he’s incapable of dealing with adversity or acting like a general when his country needs one. Iraq proved that he’s incapable of controlling his subordinates when they’re not listening to people who know what they’re talking about (General Shinsecki, his father, Colon Powell just to name a couple)…on this same point, his Vice President (his subordinate) is so out of control, he managed to commit a political blunder while OFF THE CLOCK…
Whatever his supporters hold up as successes are without exception, abstract examples that can neither be proven out on paper nor accepted without a certain amount of faith.
Being thankfull that the Democrats weren’t in charge these past 6 years…that’s hardly something to hang your hat on! If there was anything tangible to refer to along the line of accomplishments, such a thing wouldn’t even need to be said.
RT-Racial Profilers?!?!
This is ridiculous…where did you get this, Limbaugh? Seriously Right, there are just as many Republicans who oppose the port deal, and it has nothing to do with the color of their skin.
UAE is a third world dictatorship with the lowest human rights rating available.
You and Bush are grasping at straws here…which is ironic since during Katrina when blacks were the ones foresaken, the mantra was ‘race has nothing to do with it’…so basically, Arabs rank higher than American blacks.
Or is the race card here merely a case of having nothing else to turn to?
Chris:
Your hatred of GWB destroys your ability to be critical.
The man performed well after 9/11 – much better than any President we have had in the last 16 years.
You are playing the race card here and it is sickening. Like Jesse Jackson, for whom I am sure you have repsect, who so often spouts anti-jewish propaganda the notion of race mattering is now dead because it has been used to explain away every perceived wrong of the past 50 years. Thus, when true racism arises it is met with silence because people play the race card far too often.