The WSJ’s Daniel Henninger takes our political "leaders" to the woodshed. A taste:
Our political elites, rather than recognize they are playing with a new kind of fire, instead have become pyromaniacs, lighting the fires. New Orleans even now can’t get out from under the initial crazy statements the pols were hurling over Katrina. Our politicians seem to have arrived at the conclusion that they somehow no longer bear responsibility for what they say, or that there is no consequence to what they say. But they do and there is. Yosemite Sam was a cartoon. The ability of government to function in a dangerous world is not.
Read the whole thing.
White House and Congress Trade Away American Security
The United Arab Emirates ports management deal finally exposes our economic and trade policies for what they are: a government’s pursuit of money (for a select few) over the interests of most Americans.
The ports management deal is not an isolated mistake. Far worse has happened, but perhaps nothing as nakedly blatant. For example, how does it benefit Americans when:
Drug companies are allowed to write a new Medicare prescription drug benefit that keeps prices artificially high for seniors by forbidding government-negotiated prices based on volume?
The American-funded Import/Export Bank subsidizes Chinese nuclear power development? Is it possible we are not sending enough money to Communist China?
Congress has repeatedly neglected our national and economic security:
The majority of our oil comes from abroad, much of that from countries with unstable, unfriendly populations
The majority of our computer equipment is manufactured overseas
The majority of our food in imported from foreign countries
Over two-thirds of the products sold in major retailers is imported from countries like Communist China and Mexico
Our soaring budget deficit leaves deeply indebted to foreign countries like Communist China, to whom we owe $1 trillion
Illegal immigration is accepted—and legal immigration is abused—to secure cheap labor (exposing us to unknown security risks)
Congress sees the results of these unhealthy dependencies (declining American wages, record trade and budget deficits, national security vulnerabilities) and just pours fuel on the fire. It passed CAFTA after NAFTA. It refused to crack down on widespread illegal Chinese trade practices by threatening to withdraw from the World Trade Organization (WTO).
Most in Congress have demonstrated that they will not change course; they are simply too indebted to big-money campaign donors and lobbyists. We must replace them.
Antagonism towards the DPW deal need not segue into an endorsement of the economic policies of Pat Buchanan. Reagan violated Capitalistic purism by bailing out Chrysler, and he also didn’t allow profit and trade to be privileged over Western security, when he opposed the trans-siberian pipeline deal that the Soviets wanted Westerners to finance, and provide the technology for.
I am firmly against this deal, and I’m not persuaded by the "details" that the Administration has provided that have been disclosed to redress my concerns.
Well colour me flabbergasted. Something we can actually agree on.
Even I can see that from a security point of view, it’s not a hard case to make that this ports deal was a bad idea. Politically, it’s a catastrophe.
The only conclusion to reach is business/cash/income trumps national security, just like it trumps everything else.
Wake up and smell the coffee people.
Ronald Reagan’s belief in "fair trade" also saved Harley Davidson and forced Honda and others to build plants in this country. "Free trade" is a load of nonsense. I’m afraid that Pat Buchanan is wrong about a great deal, but economic nationalism isn’t one of them. On economics, we shouldn’t be liberals or conservatives but Americans, first and foremost.
Sure thing Dain. As always its America ueberalles.
I agree (even though I’m not an american) that this ports deal was a bad idea. However, not because it endangers the US, but because it endangers people.
Any fool can see that putting a middle eastern company in such a position of power weakens national security, and increase the risk of something really dreadful happening.
That said, the risk of such an attack, although still tiny, is now hundreds of times more likely than it was before the US decided to kill 50,000 muslims.
So lets get our concern a bit more general, for people, everywhere, and not just (shudder) "american lives".
QAEDA CLAIM: WE ’INFILTRATED’ UAE GOV’T
By NILES LATHEM
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February 25, 2006 -- WASHINGTON — Al Qaeda warned the government of the United Arab Emirates more than three years ago that it "infiltrated" key government agencies, according to a disturbing document released by the U.S. military.
The warning was contained in a June 2002 message to UAE rulers, in which the terror network demanded the release of an unknown number of "mujahedeen detainees," who it said had been arrested during a government crackdown in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.
The explosive document is certain to become ammunition for critics of the controversial UAE port...