All around the blogosphere, from left to right, and from Hillary Clinton to Gov. Ehrlich, there has been a knee-jerk reaction of outrage to the news that American ports, currently under control of a British company, would move to a company owned by the United Arab Emerites (UAE). This story is making strange bedfellows out of Chuck Schumer and Michelle Malkin, and George W. Bush and Jimmy Carter (link).

This fall completely in line with the politics of economic nationalism. Economic nationalism, to provide a quick definition, is the desire to use the forces of nationalism to explicity futher the economy of one's own country at the cost of hurting another country's (or countries') economy. In the 19th and 20th century forms, this was done via the mercantilist desires of colonialism. While some may approach a defense against economic nationalism from an individualist perspective, I see it as a free trade issue.

I don't see Dubai World Ports as a major security threat for two reasons. Frist, the UAE is desperately trying to grow its economy, and creating the suspicion of terror is not the way to do that. Two, the United States remains in control of security. Here is what is really going on here, from The Strata-Shpere:

The one bugging me right now is the outcries about a UAE company acquiring control of a British company that runs some of our ports. Has anyone heard that this is a British company, using American employees, which is selling a controlling interest to a UAE company?

I hadn’t. By the outcry I thought UAE Muslims were taking complete control of the ports (which, by the way, are also run by the US Coast Guard) and would be smuggling nuclear bombs through them any day now. That is the fear being alluded to that is driving us to create the ‘them’ and ‘us’. The UAE is one of the most western Middle East countries and they have a lot of commercial ties to the West because they have been investing their oil monies to modernize the region.

and:

And because of fear we are about to do Al Qaeda’s bidding and nip this opportunity in the bud. Because an ‘Arab’ country of ‘Muslims’ is continuing to work its way into the Western economic picture - we are up in arms.

The UAE and the British have been working together for decades. The fact the UAE is getting permission from the British to integrate these two companies provides me plenty of confidence this is not some Al Qaeda front. We are playing to our worst reflexes. Unless someone has hard, irrefutable evidence of Al Qaeda running this company, and they are able to order the US and British employees to violate our inspection processes to get dangerous materials past our borders, I suggest people calm down and think this out.

We WANT a modern, peaceful Middle East as an economic partner. We cannot live in fear of every Arab or Muslim or we will fulfill Al Qaeda’s dream and WE will be the ones that divide the world into ‘haves’ and ‘have nots’. We do not target groups and punish them for sharing blood or religion with our enemies. We identify individuals and prosecute them (or kill them) if they are working with our enemies.

Mad Tea Party also has a post on why this isn't a big deal, and touches on why an American company can't take over for DPA. Because that company does not exist.

From the outcry, this may actually get reversed, and that may not be so good for us. Time will tell.

UPDATE (6:12PM 2/21/2006):
Bush is now threatening to veto legislation that prevents this deal. First, I can't believe this is the issue that brings out the pen. After that $282 billion highway bill, I thought he lost it.
Second, there must be a reason for this. The UAE must have something we want, and I believe it is connected to the War on Terror. This may be a bad political move by the President in terms of popular support, but there may be some deeper policy at work here. .

Posted by Ryan S. on Tuesday, February 21, 2006 at 12:01 PM | Permalink |