February 22, 2006
Ports in a Storm
By Mark
Davis
National unity has
been hard to find since just after 9/11, but it's back. President
Bush, long maligned for dividing America, has truly brought together
young and old, red states and blue states, men and women.
This rare moment of
unity is the visceral reaction to an idea so stunningly unwise
that political opponents are stumbling over one another to reach
the same cameras and microphones to say the same thing –
stop the ports takeover now.The controversy stems from the sale
of a British firm that runs port operations in New York, New Jersey,
Philadelphia, Baltimore, New Orleans and Miami. London-based Peninsular
and Oriental Steam Navigation has been sold to Dubai Ports World
of the United Arab Emirates, a nation that happened to supply
two of the 9/11 hijackers.
That does not make
the government of the UAE an avowed ally of Osama bin Laden, but
it doesn't make it a welcome addition to our already bleak port
security landscape either.
Two billion tons of
cargo move through U.S. ports every year, with less than 10 percent
receiving any kind of meaningful security inspection. Against
that backdrop, it is impossible to imagine how smart people could
sit around a table and see no danger in this acquisition.
Oh, to have been a
fly on the wall as people from the Department of Defense, the
FBI and the Coast Guard heard of the sale that would put daily
port operations in the hands of sheiks, many of whom at the very
least share the fairly common Arab worldview that Israel should
not exist and its allies – like America – are, shall
we say, problematic.
There are those who
have said this is not an issue of an Arab nation running American
port operations, that instead it should be a question of whether
any foreign nation should have such control.
Fair point, but needlessly
broad. I don't think we've had too much reason for sleepless nights
while those ports were under British control. My first choice
is for American companies to do virtually everything in America,
but in this global economy, I'm prepared to have port operations
run by firms from just about any nation that meets some basic
conditions: no smattering of celebrations on 9/11, no network
of schools teaching the need to eradicate Israel and other infidels
and no sizable al-Qaeda population.
Am I asking too much?
Apparently so, in view of what the White House is asking of us.
We are asked not merely
to tolerate but to embrace NSA wiretaps because they are a vital
part of the extreme caution necessary in the post-9/11 world.
We are asked not merely
to tolerate but to embrace detentions at Guantánamo and
at secret prisons elsewhere because these are different circumstances
born of the extreme caution necessary in the post-9/11 world.
I remain proudly on
board for both of those arguments, but any administration asking
for such trust has an obligation to be consistent. A cavalier
wink at the notion of an Islamic nation assuming operational control
of U.S. ports is a nearly schizophrenic departure from everything
else Mr. Bush has told us about the war on terror.
We have been told
it will involve tough decisions. We have been told we cannot worry
about world opinion when we know what is right. And we have been
told that we will not generalize or demonize in our attitudes
toward Muslims, but we will face hard choices as we differentiate
between the peaceful portions of the Islamic world and those who
wish to kill us.
Where did that logic
go? It is what got Mr. Bush re-elected, and to see it fly out
the window is distressing to anyone who has been energized by
his tirelessness and courage in setting the nation on a proper
war footing.
I don't expect perfection.
I can tolerate some foot-dragging in a vice presidential hunting
accident story; I can even stomach the bungles of FEMA. Lessons
are presumably learned in both cases.
This I cannot take.
We cannot withstand a lesson that might come in the form of dead
Americans due to our inattention to the ill wisdom of this ports
deal.
The president must
change his mind, and I pray that he will.
Mark
Davis is a columnist for the Dallas
Morning News.
The Mark Davis
Show is heard weekdays nationwide on the ABC Radio Network.
His e-mail address is mdavis@wbap.com.
