Port Wine

By Dana Smith

We have seen our President resolute before. That is Bush standing firmly in one position and not moving one bit. It is this “Standing firm” that was brought to a lull when the President said there would be delay in the UAE homeland port deal. I have watched the commentators on both sides bringing up the solutions to the problem. In all this, I have found myself agreeing with some like Hillary Clinton who was “firmly against foreign ownership of our ports”. I can also see the relevance of not making a solid ally like the UAE mad. After all they are our friends, are they not?

The question for me is, why does the USA always seem to give away American land, companies, and now the ports to foreign ownership? I can still remember Ronald Reagan and his efforts to colonize the lands of America with Canada and Mexico. Other Presidents seemed to want this as well. The word we are looking for is Globalization. This is the making of America into one global society with the rest of the world. Of course that means others outside of our nation can own our lands, companies, and have a major say so in our economy. This fact of foreign ownership can be glaring as we see from a 2003 report that said the following:

Foreign companies now own approximately 81% of U.S. cement capacity, up from about 22% in 1980.#1

In another article we find the following disturbing facts:Net foreign investment in the USA jumped 51% in January to $91.5 billion, the highest level in a year and a half and the second-highest on record, the Treasury Department said. The increase in net foreign investment — purchases of U.S. stocks, bonds and other investments by foreigners minus sales — included gains in purchases by both private investors and foreign central banks.#2

Foreign investment, foreign ownership, everything foreign. Now I am not against other friends, nations, and peoples, but when are we going to stop selling America? In another example of this we find that many America companies now are and have been selling their American corporations, lands, and operations for an overseas niche to operate from. In this we find that many America workers are laid off in the process. The bottom line being the chief co-conspirator here. As this point is made briefly here:

One would expect nicer behavior from the corporate chieftains who run our economy. Over the last 15 years transnational corporations have gotten basically everything they wanted: the collapse of communism, free trade agreements, deregulation, lower taxes, the weakening of trade unions and the pushing down of wage rates. Yet while profits and the stock market soar, the standard of living for most Americans is plummeting. There is a dangerous dynamic at work. In an effort to cut costs and boost profits, AT&T announced in September 1995 that they were laying off 40,000 workers. The company's share price on Wall Street immediately jumped higher. Because the salaries of top AT&T executives are partly made up of share ownership, the executives are personally benefiting from the suffering of thousands of dislocated families.#3

In the above excerpt, the main treatise was one of Globalization and the downsizing of America. How Wall Street loved it when companies made their bottom line bigger, even at the point of the suffering of Americans being laid off.

It is this Globalization of our Ports I do not like. This is just another selling of America. Even when China became owner and purveyor of one of our ports on the west coast, I did not like it. Now we have six more ports given to another nation. The UAE, even if they are our friends, when will this selling stop? When there is nothing left to sell off? When America is totally run and managed by foreign investments, corporations, and governments?

The question then has to be asked “even if we sell off America, including our Ports, can we be safe”? Will foreign Governments and corporations consider our safety as they would in their own country? What would happen if America suffered a Nuclear bomb? Would these nations run back to their own countries and live? How can we be absolutely sure they would care for our safety as much as we care? The answer is we can’t be sure. No amount of assurance will suffice. As Council on Foreign Relations fellow Stephen Flynn is quoted as saying in an article on Port security.

Every year, some nine million cargo containers enter the United States through its ports. Soon after the September 11, 2001, attacks, calls arose to increase the scrutiny of this rapid flow of goods. These calls, says CFR fellow Stephen Flynn, have gone largely unanswered, leaving U.S. port security akin to "a house of cards."#4

If we have trouble with our own government putting the investments in our security and in the ports, how can we make foreign investors do it? We can’t. This administration has been a real worrier to many about this issue. Currently we are spending billions in other countries. This is Globalization as well. Our tax dollars are in Iraq, Afghanistan, and other nations. We should, however, spend this money to strengthen our own borders and security.

The issue today is not should the UAE take over our Ports. The issue, real and foremost is, how much foreign investments are we going to allow in the USA. Are we going to continue to sell off our lands, ports, and companies? Can we really, in the final analysis trust foreign governments to take care of our interests as we would? The answer is a plain NO. We cannot trust other governments to do this for us. After all, remember the Revolution and our departure from Great Britain?

1.http://www.economyincrisis.org/article_48.html US Cement Industry 81% Foreign Owned Companies-economy in crisis2.Foreigners pump up U.S. investments By Barbara Hagenbaugh, USA TODAY http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/2005-03-15-inflow-usat_x.htm 3.Globalization and the Downsizing of the American Dream by Kevin Danaher http://www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/econ101/americanDream.html4.UAE Port Purchase Raises Outcry http://www.cfr.org/publication/9901/foreign_purchase_of_us_port_ops_raises_outcry.html Council on Foreign Relations

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