The New 'I' Word: Insanity
This Dubai Ports deal is so bizarre that even Republicans are choking on it. For some reason this deal was snuck through without competitive bidding, without Congress' knowledge, and supposedly without George Bush's knowledge either. Yeah, right.
You can assume one of two things from this insanity, and you have to chose one - you can't just not think about it. People not thinking are what got us into this five year nightmare.
1. There is SO much money to be made by the Bush family and their cronys that the risks are worth inflicting upon us. Remember, that much money buys private planes out of any situation, like 6 major U.S. cities bombed simultaneously. Or...
2. There is no terrorist threat.
So which is it? Here we have a President who accuses the Democrats of being weak on security and living in a pre-9/11 world, who then turns around and opens up our already unprotected ports to the government who refused to let us track Al Qaeda's accounts after 9/11. He actually said yesterday, "people don't need to worry about security". This entire deal flies in the face of every terrorist threat he's ever delivered to us.
But the best part is the special exception that was granted the UAE - they won't be required to keep copies of their business records in the U.S. like other foreign companies that own American businesses in this country. In other words, no representative of this country will ever know anything about the financing or associations operating inside OUR OWN PORTS. We'll just have to hope that everything is ok and that Bush's judgment has suddenly taken a turn for the better. Riiiight.
I have a feeling that even the Republicans have had enough. They're finally beginning to realize that Bush is a power-mad Dictator who doesn't care about the future, all he cares about is how much fame, money, and power he can acquire before the game is over. I think that if the Democrats decided to go full steam ahead with impeachment hearings, the Republicans might just quietly step out of the way.
posted by Argent at 2:04 PM
4 Comments:
That there's a ton of money to be made isn't just theory, it's fact. The UAE is literally a fat cash cow, they're building a 800 metre skyscaper, they're literally lifting islands in the shape of palm trees from the gulf, and when you have enough money to do things like that, you can be sure that they probably bought their way through any bidding, don't have to keep records, etc.
The deal itself is pretty ridiculous. I'm all for globalization and compeition and all that, but there has to be some accountability in Dubai. You just can't give them free reign over the ports because they bribed you with billions.
Now, I'm going to make a BIG assumption, and assume that Dubai unrealistically follows the 'rules', and doesn't try to screw us over. It's still a big risk to allow them to operate in this manner so close to our vital ports. Who's to say that some sailors/terrorists disappear in these ports? I live in Philadelphia, all that separates the port from the rest of the city is a 8 foot chain link fence, like you'd see in any school yard. It's insane.
Bush is increasingly pissing me off, because he keeps making increasingly stupid comments. Before I read this article, I saw another in the Inqurier about Bush claiming "I didn't know about this, blah blah blah". Ok, moron, so you'd just pass any bill that passes your desk? If I proposed a bill that made me king of the state of Arizona, you'd pass that?
And the bullshit with the terrorist threats is hilarious, because, as you have presented it, Bush is seemingly doing the same "flopping" he accused Kerry of not less than two years ago. It's comical to anyone with a memory span longer than a year.
The sad thing is, people probably still support him simply because he's Republican, and they feel obligated to vote 'along party linees'. They probably still think that, even after all this, he's a 'devout born-again Christian'. The polls are changing, which is kinda good, but it's two years too late.
I see the same problem among my peers in engineering. They forget that the average American has no idea what the hell we're talking about sometimes, and as a result, we get stupid concerns like "will this particle accelerator end the universe!?!?" or "Is Lactic acid like some kind of super acid!?!" We need to get people more informed, so we avoid mistakes like this. I can say "That particle accelerator only produces 10^6 mega joules of energy, far too little to make a difference in entrophy of the universe" but what the hell does that mean? If I said "It produces less energy than a common solar flare" then you'd probably be more reassured, because it's in terms one can understand, instead of a ton of jargon. I'll bet anything that people in Nevada or Iowa are reading about these ports and thinking "so.. what?" These are the people who need to be informed why this is criminally stupid, instead of just writing them off as a republican vote.
The ironies here are just too much. Bush is totally gung ho about this port deal, and it turns out he didn't even know about the deal until after it was already signed.
These soft-on-terror Democrats are suddenly more concerned about national security than Bush.
The government wants to monitor the phone calls and library records of millions of US citizens, for national security purposes. Meanwhile, our ports will be guarded by an Arabic firm which won't be monitored or held accountable in any way.
It's getting curiouser and curiouser.
Horvat - didn't even see that you had posted! And it's true, Dubai is one of the most decadent places in the Mid East, putting ancient Greco-Roman orgies to shame. And we have no idea who they hire or how they hire... it's truly stupid.
And no, the Christian right will never turn their back on him - it's against their religion to challenge a fellow Christian on morals and ethics, which we see reflected in Congress. Their whole Christian platform is supported on a shaky foundation of damning everyone else for their indiscretions; if they turned that criticism on those who claim to be holier than they, they would be forced to acknowledge their own empty beliefs.
Tom - I need to find a nice long list of Bush's paranoid, hysterical terrorist threats to support my argument. That'll fix him.
ANd yet they impeached Clinton for lying about a little extra-marital action...
I'll take a happy president over a terror threat any day.
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