I have wanted to chime in on this sale of London-based P&O to Dubai Ports World, based in and operated by the United Arab Emirates. However, my main problem is why are we so outraged over this now? Yes, I realize we would be giving control of many key U.S. ports to a country with alleged ties to terrorism. That could be a disaster.
However, I am curious to find out why we weren’t up in arms that a foreign company was responsible for securing our ports in the first place. Let me repeat…P&O, the company being bought by DP World, is based in London…England…in the United Kingdom! To me, it is insane that we have a foreign country looking over U.S. ports. Shouldn’t this fact have been a bigger issue BEFORE DP World even got involved?
Forgive me if I missed it, but I think there should have been a mainstream media story years ago about what would happen if the ports operated by a company based in a nation that is an ally were to be sold to a nation that quite possibly funded the 9/11 hijackers?
Anyway, that’s not the point of this post. My point is a slip of the tongue by Pres. George W. Bush. In this AP story, Bush says this about the ports being sold to DP World:
“The more people learn about the transaction that has been scrutinized and approved by MY government,” Bush said, “the more they’ll be comforted that our ports will be secure.”
My government? The last time I checked, the United States of America is still supposed to be a democracy. In a democracy, it is supposed to be “our government.”
Obviously, Bush meant to say “my administration.” But what came out was what Bush really feels. He thinks he is beyond reproach…that because he is president, he can’t be questioned or challenged. This is HIS government. It’s not ours anymore.
I don’t know…maybe I’m being too cynical, but between the Bush administration and some of these U.S. “Olympians” who think the point of the Games is to do a whole bunch of commercials before they start instead of actually representing–proudly and wholeheartedly–their country during them (yeah, I’m looking at you, Bode “Can Barely Finish a Race But Have a Ton of Cash from Nike” Miller), I’m just down on this country right now.
I mean, I’m not looking for everybody on Team USA to win a medal, but don’t sound stupid and don’t act like you don’t care when you are wearing the uniform with those three letters on it. Just do your best.
But instead we get a skater (Johnny Weir) who failed because he felt “black inside,” a snowboarder (Lindsey Jacobellis) who is sent to the Olympics to represent the United States but thinks she is there to have fun (and do a “showboat” move that costs Team USA a gold medal), and the infamous Mr. Miller, a fraud on skis I have started to call the James Frey of his sport.
Yeah…can you tell I have wanted to write somthing on my displeasure with the attitudes of many of the athletes on Team USA, too. Hadn’t gotten around to it until now, though.
But Kansas City Star columnist Joe Posnanski, a very good writer I have just recently discovered who is covering the Torino Winter Games, had this take on Mr. Miller:
“I was super aggressive,” he said. Bode really likes using that word “super” as an adjective, doesn’t he? You know, I’m going to say that if he really had been SUPER aggressive, he might have, you know, inspected the course beforehand like other skiers did. Bode did not. He rarely does. Instead, Bode tumbled out of his trailer with barely an hour to go before the race, like some college kid rushing to his 8 a.m. class.
If that’s super aggressive, I can only imagine what plain old normal aggressive might have been. Sleeping through the first half of his race?
I encourage you to read Poz’s work on the KC Star site, especially the recent Olympic columns. Good stuff.
OK…let’s see. Criticized the sale of the U.S. ports. Check. Mocked Bush. Check. Called out the overhyped U.S. Olympians. Check. Plugged my new favorite sports columnist, Joe Posnanski. Check.
My work is done for today.
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