Arab ally senses Bush no longer has control in Washington

[kskiska]

The decision by the United Arab Emirates on Thursday to order state-controlled Dubai Ports World to end its control over US port facilities marks the lowest point yet in the relationship between President George W. Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress.

Mr Bush had warned repeatedly that blocking the deal would send a dangerously discriminatory message to the world. He threatened repeatedly to veto any congressional legislation.

But with his public approval ratings at record lows and his Republican party abandoning him, one of the US’s closest allies in the Arab world concluded that he was no longer in control in Washington.

The decision by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al- Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai, is likely to avert the political backlash that hit Washington last month and may prevent any further damage to diplomatic and security relations between the countries. But it underscored that Mr Bush, who still has nearly three years to go in his second term, has become perilously weak.

more…
http://news.ft.com/cms/s/aaf675ba-afb6-11da-b417-0000779e2340.html2

[LSparkle]

1. Two beautiful words: "Perilously weak"

Oh I hope he truly has become thus ... to the point where we can topple him like the Saddam statue and wipe our sandals on him!

[physioex]

3. Wonder if the Boys at the....

Carlyle group are just poopin in their pants 'bout now....

[centristo]

48. i think they're too busy counting all their money

to poop their pants...

[wordpix2]

33. looking forward to beating * effigy with my shoes!

[MADem]

2. Oh, those despots must be railing!

"A man who cannot control his country is like a man who cannot control his camels or his women!!! He is weak, I tell you, WEAK!!!"

They'll set up a shell company that subcontracts them, in some fashion==PATRIOTIC PORTS, or FREEDOM WORLD OPERATIONS, or some such shit....

[Bobbieo]

4. Bush Has Lost Control

I am a die hard Demo BUT I have always maintained it had to be his own party members who turned on him to make him lose face. Now, we can really go after him.

[woodsprite]

5. As in a "loose bowels" sorta way. Heehee.... n/t

[Dulcinea]

53. Bush does not, never had, & never will have control.

He's just the PR guy. Cheney & Rumsfeld are really running things. But even they can't override Congress on this one.

[wordpix2]

34. what they're really pissed about is their investments---if * impeached

their investments could be ruined

[delete_bush]

39. Wasn't this wing-nut reason #32

for going to war and bombing the crap out of them? That those a-rabs and eye-rackies only respect power, they can smell weakness from a distance of twenty sand dunes? Doesn't bode well for the chimp. Especially if camel is a metaphor for bicycle.

[koopie57]

6. I'm curious if Dubai pulled out to

avert political damage to * or if * paid them off to pull out? I wonder how much it cost us?

[4dsc]

7. How do you say lame duck in Arabic??

Perhaps Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al- Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai, should use the correct term for ole AWOLbush aka LAME DUCK!!

[seafan]

8. More:

snip

The White House promise to reopen a national security investigation into the deal, together with a concerted public relations effort by DP World, seemed only to deepen the anger.

More than four years after the September 11 attacks, it brought together a toxic combination of anxieties over America’s place in the world. Traditional protectionists, worried by foreign acquisitions of US assets and the outsourcing of jobs to distant and little-understood countries, lined up alongside security hawks who warned that even a close Arab ally such as the UAE was vulnerable to terrorist infiltration.

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/aaf675ba-afb6-11da-b417-0000779e2340.html2

[tabasco]

9. The Boss ain't gonna be happy !

[entanglement]

23. That's the king of Saudi Arabia, not Dubai

Different country

[tabasco]

25. Yeah, I know.

But that's Bush's boss.

Thanks for the update.

[Peace Patriot]

10. Hard for us to see maybe, that Bush is "perilously weak," but there is a

a lot of truth in it. Some 60% of Americans disapprove of Bush--about the same amount who don't trust his word--and also about the same amount who have opposed his horrendous, illegal war from the beginning, before the invasion (Feb. '03), with even greater disagreement on other Bush foreign and domestic policy (for instance, 63% oppose torture "under any circumstances"--May '04). His return to power in 2004 was based on NON-TRANSPARENT vote tabulation, by two rightwing Bushite corporations, using "TRADE SECRET," PROPRIETARY programming code--a phony election system arranged by the two biggest Bushite crooks in Congress, Tom Delay and Bob Ney.

It's been obvious all along that most Americans despise his war and everything he stands for--and that the great progressive majority in this country has been hoodwinked into believing that they are the minority, by the five CEO's who control all news and opinion (and clean up in tidy war profiteering and monopolies of our public airwaves).

A regime built on lie after lie, on secrecy, on spying, on spin, on false and phony imagery and dictated "talking points"--a house of cards--guilty of mass death and thievery, and treason.

The super-rich and the nutso 'christians' who promote or buy his crap are--and always were--a minority of maybe 30%, with a confused, muddle-brained 10% sometimes joining them. That's IT. I don't think Bush has ever had any more support than that--40%, at best--and all the rest is war profiteering corporate news monopoly manipulation.

The Bush junta is scary as shit, but I don't think it can stand. There are too many of us. Our country is too big, too open-minded, too multi-cultured and the trend of history, both here and worldwide, and over the millenia, is democratic and progressive.

It may be difficult to recover from this looting by our Corporate Rulers--and from the frontal assault on our Constitution, and on everything we value. And the damage goes well beyond our shores--to the hatred and contempt in which our country is now held by one and all, and involves neglect and destruction of many kinds. But I think the lesson is in determining what "strength" and "weakness" really are.

"Strength" is not the ability to strut around the world like a jack-booted little emperor. It is not shoving bad government and theft by the rich down the throats of the poor. It is not bullying, and spying, and blackmailing, and lying your way to power. Real strength is flexible, compassionate and seeks the good of all. Real strength is being able to GIVE UP brute strength, and to prefer a cooperative, peaceful world, where everyone may prosper.

And listening to the people whom you serve is not "weakness"! "Weakness" is being deaf to others, being stupidly set upon your own egocentric course, in your tiny egocentric world. "Weakness" is not even being able to recognize what service to the good of all is. It is being without core values of any kind--having nothing that moves you except a crude kind of acquisitiveness, seeking power over others and material wealth, so that, in the end, you are alone and without the resources of real friendship and community.

Bush and the people around him--and behind him--I don't think have a clue what real strength is about. They may not be done with looting us and bullying us and everyone else in the world; and god knows what mischief they are still capable of; but I have for a long time seen them as empty people, who can't fathom what the rest of us mean by peace and justice, nor do they have any of the creativity, inspiration, vision, competence, and sense of duty that moves most of us. They are liars and fakes, whose main motive is looting. They thus have no basis for ruling over us.

I guess what I'm trying to say here is that Bush being "perilously weak" means that we, the people and the true sovereigns on this land, are strong. It would be a peril to almost no one if Bush were to "fall"--be impeached, be tried, be forced to resign in disgrace. The writer's term "perilously weak" is not used with much understanding of democracy. It is a term that would apply in a situation of jackals or sharks turning on each other. Weak? Perilously weak? So what if he can't shove the UAE ports deal down our throats?* That means--hopefully--that we still have a democracy, and I consider that to be real strength.

-----

*(The UAE deal may not be over yet. It was possibly a bait and switch to contrive Cheney's retirement package through Halliburton control of US ports. But it's still true that Bush blustered about a veto, etc., and was unable to shove it down our throats in the manner designed.)

[Wise Doubter]

32. VERY well said !!!

I wish I could write so clearly

[Amonester]

41. You wrote it all in a few paragraphs. Thinking alike here, and:

"It would be a peril to almost no one if Bush were to "fall"--be impeached, be tried, be forced to resign in disgrace."

And sent to The Hague. (Where true Justice prevails.)

:applause:

[lagavulin]

45. But that's missing the point entirely.

It doesn't matter whether "Bush" is weak or not. It doesn't matter whether his public opinion polls fall to 2%...he's essentially disposable, and the NeoCons are still in power. No--We the People are NOT in control. I'm sorry if that sounds cynical or defeatest, but real strength only comes with cutting through the illusions and facing the truth.

Alito flew through with barely a grumble, the Patriot Act was re-up'ed without a stutter, the illegal surveillance program is getting solid approval for law, the debt limit has been pushed up yet again to allow even more of our money to funnel into Ike's "military-industrial complex", Halliburton's Kellogg Brown & Root was given contracts for building massive detention centers here in the U.S., electronic voting has now widely been accepted as a "compromised" system but it will not be scrapped and past elections will not be questioned, the war will escalate into Iran, "our troops" will not be coming home (and if they did they'd just be re-hired as "private security forces" since there's no jobs for them here anyway).... You fill in the rest of the blanks yourself.

It's pointless to argue or to cheer political sides and opinions anymore, because "politics" is no longer even relevant. Bush, Cheney, Condi, Hillary Clinton, Kerry...like the cover of People Magazine, the faces will change but the vacuous contents will remain the same.

[Peace Patriot]

51. I agree with most of what you say, lagavulin--and welcome to DU!

But I don't think it's over. I think the revolution has just begun. And the South Americans are showing us the way--with hard work over a long period of time on TRANSPARENT elections, by grass roots activists, civic groups, the OAS, EU election monitors and the Carter Center. Brazil, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile, Venezuela, Bolivia. Next Peru, and Mexico. Huge, profound, unstoppable leftist/socialist movement, covering virtually the entire map of South America already.

Transparent elections = good, leftist government, of, by and for the people.

Non-transparent elections = the Bush junta.

Just think of what the South Americans have had to overcome to achieve this--decades of assassinations, death squads, dictators, torture, and centuries of economic exploitation, all supported and fomented by the U.S. gov't and our Corporate Rulers.

It may be a hard slog--through every state/local jurisdiction--but it CAN be done. It is doable. It is a specific, concrete rallying point and goal. TRANSPARENT elections!

In Chile, they just elected their first woman president, socialist Michele Batchelet--who was tortured by the US-backed dictator Pinochet, and lost her family to that junta. In Bolivia, they just elected their first indigenous Indian president, socialist Evo Morales--born of coca leaf growers in the mountains, who campaigned with a wreath of coca leaves around his neck! (--symbol of resistance to the murderous US "war on drugs"; sacred plant to the indigenous, essential to survival in the cold, high altitudes of the Andes). That election was preceded by the Bolivians throwing the Bechtel Corporation out of their country in a popular uprising (Bechtel had privatized the water in one Bolivian city and had jacked up the price of water to the poor).

It CAN be done. And it must be done. And it is up to us. We have an historic duty to get this fascist junta off of everybody else's backs, as well as our own, and to restore democracy in the United States, no matter how long it takes, no matter how difficult it is. Each of us, as individuals, doing our part--and together as a conscious community of patriots and lovers of peace and justice. We are brain-washed to want easy, quick solutions, and to despair and feel demoralized and disempowered when individual battles are lost. We need to think long-term--and to see and study the OVERWHELMING examples available, in the recent past, and happening RIGHT NOW, as in South America, of the undefeatable progressive trend of history. We, as individuals, are products of that trend. Our country has been the world's leader of that trend--with the mechanisms of democracy, voting and free speech, permitting us to correct course when our country goes astray (as we did, for instance, in the '70s and '80s, regarding CIA assassinations/death squads in So./Central America, the Iran-Contra war on Nicaragua, and the Vietnam war itself), and to implement progressive values (Voting Rights Act, Civil Rights Act, end of segregation, Roe vs Wade, and other advances).

We must not allow ourselves to become depressed at temporary defeats, no matter how bad they seem, and no matter how darkly one can paint the overall circumstances of our country.

Indeed, no matter how bad it gets, we must never stop fighting for our democracy and for peace and justice. Be depressed and demoralized, if you must. Everybody needs some down-time. It's definitely understandable. But simply listing all the horrendous negative evidence of a country that is in very great trouble may be accurate, but it isn't enough. What are the mechanisms of change? How can they be recovered? What is in people' hearts? What is there to build upon, locally and nationwide? Where do you start? What should we use our time and energy, and remaining liberty, to support? How to strategize in this situation? These are the things we need to be thinking of--not how hopeless it all is.

-------

Some resources:

www.votersunite.org (MythBreakers - easy primer on electronic voting--one of the myths is that HAVA requires electronic voting; it does not.)
www.verfiedvoting.org (great activist site)
www.UScountvotes.org (monitoring of '06 and '08 elections)
www.solarbus.org/election/index.shtml (fab compendium of all election info)
www.freepress.org (devoted to election reform)
www.TruthIsAll.net (analysis of the 2004 election)
Sign the petition (Russ Holt, HR 550, great bill-has 169 sponsors). http://www.rushholt.com/petition.html
www.debrabowen.com (Calif Senator running for Sec of State to reform election system)
www.votepa.us (well-organized local group of citizen activists in Pennsylvania, where important legal issues are at stake, including state's rights over election systems)

Also of interest:

Bob Koehler (-- four recent election reform initiatives in Ohio, predicted to win by 60/40 votes, flipped over, on election day, into 60/40 LOSSES!--the biggest flipover we've seen yet; the election theft machines and their masters are now dictating election policy!)
www.tmsfeatures.com/tmsfeatures/subcategory.jsp?file=20051124ctnbk-a.txt&catid=1824&code=ctnbk

Amaryllis (Diebold, ES&S, Sequoia lavish lobbying of election officials - Beverly Hilton, Aug. '05)
www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x380340

-------

Throw Diebold and ES&S election theft machines into 'Boston Harbor' NOW!

:think: :patriot: :woohoo: :patriot: :think:

[MissWaverly]

47. agree and the fixed 2004 election

is confirmed by the indictment of 3 election workers in Ohio for hocus pocus during the recount, the reaction of their employers, we are going to keep them, we're switching to
computers and they are our best employees. This reaction signals to me that their bosses
knew about the manipulation and ordered it and are willing to let them face the music for
it. Nobody is indicted for six counts over nothing.

[VegasWolf]

11. Great! Let's pull down the statue of Bush with tanks! nt

[humbled_opinion]

12. Weak And Vulnerable

Polls at all time low for the loser his own party against him. Time to act on impeachment proceedings....

[goforit]

13. They think they can buy anyone any time any place....ARROGANCE!!!

[skooooo]

14. Arab "ally" would be right!

[fshrink]

15. Figure of speech really. He never was in control.

He was chosen because he couldn't control anything, including a bike, and because he could, by his mere demeanor, muster the pride of the weak. He's so dumb that he can say nearly anything, and its contrary one hour later, and get away with it. The neo-fascist machine working behind does the rest.

[Peace Patriot]

17. Good point, fshrink! He was never anything but weak, propped up by

massive, ill-gotten wealth, propped up by his handlers, bailed out of every failure, a ready tool for greedy powerful men, an obviously dimwitted, vacant bully type of a man, who has no talent, and doesn't understand how anything works, or what moves most of the other people on this earth.

It's sort of what I was getting at. If you build a fraudulent election theft machine, and your "policy" is a lot of fraudulent, lying "talking points," and your main purpose is massive theft, and then covering up your theft and other even worse crimes, and you put this little tinpot bully out in front, with strings showing, what you have is a whole lot of nothing.

Cheney may end up with power over all the arms/drugs/oil/child slavery traffic through US ports--for a while--as the Bush house of cards collapses behind him. But it will gain him only hatred--from his own party members (and maybe already has)--who will not rest until he is ousted from whatever throne he plans to sit on. I don't see anything of substance to hold anybody to him, or Rumsfeld, or Bush. They've built exactly nothing.

I'm reminded of all the gold dust that the desert wind picks up and disperses at the end of "Treasure of Sierra Madre."

[fshrink]

18. Exactly right.

[wordpix2]

35. but military industrial Congressional complex that props him are strong

although that, too, is falling apart now in some ways, such as repuke Congressmen leaving BushCo's DPW deal, and military whispering in Murtha's ear.

[saigon68]

49. HE CAN'T CONTROL HIS BOWEL

That's why he needs a diaper.

[salin]

16. Interesting...

saves bush's face;
allows gopers in congress to look like they won;

Would almost suggest that this is 'planned' - ala there are other good (more hidden) deals to protect - that will be left without scrutiny if this issue goes away (ala something for roveco to twist arms over to accomplish this end.)

However it does, as the article suggests, leaves bush looking rather powerless in the international community. Not sure whether or not that matters to the egomaniac (he just needs to be a "winner" among the american public).

It is feasible to imagine that bush/roveco twisted arms for this result to save a domestic disaster (bush does the threatened veto that was reiterated last night, and is overridden by Congress), without fully recognizing potential reprecussions of the leaders of the world viewing bush as impotent - ala his "word" means nothing as congress could do anything with or without bush. The problem isn't at this moment, it is what unfolds when Bolton acts like a bully, it is what happens when bush tries to work with Russia or China, it is what happens when Blair decides it is finally safe to act independently of bush... the scenarios are too innumerous to write. And at each one bush will begin to look (further) deminished domestically. Point being - to try to score domestically (by avoiding a BIG defeat) he may have been set up for future BIGGER defeats - in the eyes of the public.

Very interesting development.

I predict that while the short-term fallout for bush has been diminished by putting off a showdown with the House GOP - that there will be near-term future ramifications that will be even worse for bush in the long run - in terms of public opinion of bush.

Interesting indeed.

[symbolman]

19. Watch for a NO BID contract for Halliburton

this is a smoke and mirrors move to allow the Right Wingers to "seperate" from Bush and save their own asses, as they have to deal with actual PEOPLE getting in their faces back home, and the truth is that those every day people HATE this son of a bitch, POS.

Only the insane would want to emulate their ideals, or want to grow up in comic bookland,,

If the Arabs were actually pissed off they'd just pull those BILLIONS of dollars from our country that they have used to OWN parts of washington LITERALLY..

The Bush/Arab clan go back a LOOOONG way, no one will convince me that they are on the OUTS.. no fucking way, there's something nice and stinky and nefarious going on here back in the hashish den..

I love the way the media darlings love to keep making the point that these guys are OUR PALS, fighting the war against Terrorism, when in fact they FUND IT, they have anti American SCHOOLS, they arm suicide bombers, THEY KNOCKED DOWN THE WORLD TRADE CENTER, probably as part of a deal with the Bush/Baker folks in the first place.

What are 3,000 lousy american lives when there are TRILLIONS to be stolen? They didn't give a shit back when they were selling fine american STEEL to the Nazis so they could make themseles some good tough tanks and KILL OUR SOLDIERS THEN, EITHER, while they pocketed the proceeds until Congress Forced Prescott Bush to shut down his bank under the War Profitteering Act..

BTW, What the hell ever happened to the WAR PROFITTEERING ACT? Did it Slide off the Books somehow? If they can use obscure laws from 1871 to screw with anyone they need to then why can't WE DEMAND that Halliburton, Bechtel, etc be held LIABLE under the WP Act NOW, TODAY, THIS MINUTE?

Someone tell Conyers to RE-ANIMATE the Act and lay it on them..

If the ARABS or the CHINESE were to pull their money out of this country there would be a depression that would make the last one look like the Roaring Twenties on Steroids.

We are BROKE, but Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld/Bush Senior, etc are NOT..

And *I* want ALL that money BACK, BACK into the Treasury where it belongs, to be used to SAVE americans from starving, going without ANYTHING, then we move on the world and cure starvation, etc there as well..

This is three card Monty, don't buy it - they were ALL willing to sell our ports to the ENEMY and that needs to be repeated on the HOUR.

[VegasWolf]

20. I heard that Faux News was getting the contract as a big Thank You! nt

[Just Me]

21. Oh, yeah. And, Halliburton would sub-contract to,...DUBAI.

Nope. This whole "dead deal" meme is bullshit.

Dubai's gonna get their "deal" one way or another,...BushCO PROMISED it, Dubai relied upon that promise, Carlyle Group is vested in it and PNAC depends upon it.

If this issue drops like a rock, I'll know for damn sure that all those raising a ruckous were full of shit. We'll see. We'll see who follows through.

[raccoon]

44. I like the way you think.

I think your premise is right, this is just a smoke and mirrors trick.

"If the ARABS or the CHINESE were to pull their money out of this country there would be a depression that would make the last one look like the Roaring Twenties on Steroids."

Amen/Ramen to that.

[Peace Patriot]

52. I'm with you, Symbolman! My first goal as a political activist is:

TRANSPARENT elections.

My second is: Getting our money back--all of it.

I really don't care about jail for these criminals. (Community service could be interesting, though.) I want our money back!

[stepnw1f]

22. He's Been Out of Control from the Start (nt)

[rodeodance]

24. "Bush no longer has control in Washington" beautiful to see!!

[magellan]

26. There's something sinister to all this

I don't buy it. Things are still morphing behind the scenes on this...BushCo building its next new reality to cover what's really going on.

Wonder what we'll discover after it all shakes out.

[Just Me]

27. We'll discover the profiteers topped out using "perception management",...

,...techniques. NEWS RELEASE: Dubai is handing over contract to an American "entity".

BushCO creates an American "entity" which is easily accomplished by a couple people: create a corporation.

BushCO creates another "front" company to hide the NEW entity.

Dubai contract via BushCO's company which finances the NEW entity.

See how those magical arrangements work.

Meanwhile, Dubai STILL basically gets the contract, escapes compliance with U.S. law, and all the profiteers are happily enjoying the treasures funneled to them.

Hocus pocus!!!

[magellan]

28. Thanks, JM, you saved me the aspirin :-) (nt)

[wordpix2]

36. it will take years to shake it all out, meanwhile we have to keep beating

this filthy rug to get out what we can.

[PATRICK]

29. He's coming to my neck of the woods

Upstate NY? To talk about social security? This isn't exactly Bush territory but I guess this part of a campaign either to keep Bush distracted or to regain political traction in Congress- a Congress that is utterly incapable of really stopping him(but it can freeze his plans and lose their seats). The ugly guy here is Kuhn, who is not too keen on running against a great Dem candidate. It does seem odd for Bush to figure that in, but he has been stumping in Ohio too.

No one knows really where or what will take place next Tuesday, but I'm betting the scripts are all written. We have a Homeland Security white elephant courtesy of a failed Xerox plant. We have Diebold locally, a bunch of righties that might be marshalled and some good schools Bush hasn't ruined yet. As a
shrine of the early women's movement it might continue some of his false charm offensive to offset the disaster among that part of the electorate.

This is a lot of sidereal stumping considering what is really happening in DC. The wheels are really off the train. I am guessing they are telling the Reps. We can make you win or break you. But if they don't even run??? The devil is wandering around the nation making strategic deals with various Reps who can't really oppose the WH, aren't independent of the machine, and need to be rallied to the full agenda.

And it keeps Junior out of DC which seems the main goal over all. Because there he LOOKS like he is totally out of it.

[wordpix2]

37. everyone says upstate NY is Hillary country since she stumped there alot

[davepc]

40. buffalo area and rochester to some extent

http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2004/pages/results/states/NY/P/00/


Rural New Yorkers still vote mostly red.

[PATRICK]

42. Could be co-option

She spoke out in one of her rare on target attacks on the ports deal, but a photo op schmooze like this one- if she attends- would put her dumbly back into the fold. No one here needs any lessons how inadequate she is on the national stage though she does her local jobs well. I think a lot of voters who put her in over the GOP sleaze are not enthusiastic about her as a potential president.

If she doesn't attend it would be a GOP love fest and I guess our Dem mayor would be roped into it to. This is what we get for not adopting an antiwar resolution. That would have at least spared us this assault. Our mildly liberal newspaper could find out something about the itinerary but it won't print it.

I may start my own thread on the local hosting of the dark side(ugh). I am just worried they will shut down the sole highway into town so that I can't get anywhere.

A lot of tick tick tapping on the phones lines these past months. I mean a lot.

[Drum]

30. The Manchurian Quack

[lovuian]

31. Bush isn't dictator yet... Yep big wake up call and Congress is

getting skittish too...

[Disturbed]

38. Impeach Cheney....NOW!!!!

Impeach the Sock Puppet right afterward.

[wryter2000]

43. But, but, but

He's a popular wartime president. :sarcasm:

[many a good man]

46. March 9, 2006: Bush-Cheney dictatorship officially ended

Our long national nightmare is almost over. Now if we can find a cure for the hangover that begins in November.

[BadGimp]

50. re: Bush no longer has control in Washington

Bush has NEVER been incontrol. I doubt they even let him pick his ties in the morning.

Can you say Sockpuppet?

[genieroze]

54. Ouch! Hey * thats gotta hurt.

It almost says * has no ballz.