One of the arguments in favor of the Dubai Deal is that free trade is what we’re all about and who are we to deny trade to somebody simply because of their ethno-religious extraction?
That’s actually one of the arguments that have some merit, in my opinion, as opposed to the knee-jerk “racist”, “bigot” and assorted other playground insults coming from some on the pro-Dubai side. I’m a big fan of free trade and yes, the more the merrier. Free trade will make all of us rich and nations are generally reluctant to attack and attempt to destroy their major trade partners as well. Capitalism is a Good Thing™ and anybody railing against tariffs, boycotts and embargos will, generally speaking, have my attention (there are exceptions, obviously, such as Saddam Hussein and now the Mad Mullahs of Tehran).
But if a nation tries to call foul and unfair on anybody regarding trade deals and discriminatory behavior, it helps a great deal if they themselves live according to the standards that they insist to be treated in accordance with, and Dubai fails the smell test on that one, big time (link thanks to LC Sig94):
The parent company of a Dubai-based firm at the center of a political storm in the US over the purchase of American ports participates in the Arab boycott against Israel, The Jerusalem Post has learned.
…
“Yes, of course the boycott is still in place and is still enforced,” Muhammad Rashid a-Din, a staff member of the Dubai Customs Department’s Office for the Boycott of Israel, told the Post in a telephone interview.
“If a product contained even some components that were made in Israel, and you wanted to import it to Dubai, it would be a problem,” he said.
A-Din noted that while the head office for the anti-Israel boycott sits in Damascus, he and his fellow staff members are paid employees of the Dubai Customs Department, which is a division of the PCZC, the same Dubai government-owned entity that runs Dubai Ports World.
Moreover, the Post found that the website for Dubai’s Jebel Ali Free Zone Area, which is also part of the PCZC, advises importers that they will need to comply with the terms of the boycott.
And that’s it, as far as His Rottieness is concerned. Discussion over. If Dubai wants to even debate the merits of their deal, they’ll have to start by lifting their anti-Semitic embargo. Until then, no other arguments are worth a damn.
Go pound sand. You seem to have an awful lot of it.
If you want to be treated fairly, you’d damn well better start with treating other people the way you wish to be treated.
Besides, unlike Dubai, Israel is a valuable ally of ours as opposed to a “Johnny-come-lately” and “let’s bet on the strong horse” collaborator of convenience.
Thatisall.
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Alright…let me be the first (heehee) to say that this may be what pushes me off the fence…
February 28th, 2006 at 11:06 amWell said. Let them renounce the embargo before we discuss anything further with them.
February 28th, 2006 at 11:07 amI brought the point up on another post on this subject….wondering if, when the s–t hits the fan what the UAE will be first, allies or muslims. Their anti-semitism/racism has clarified that for me.
February 28th, 2006 at 11:33 amMisha, you just made my day. Flawless. They wanna play on the field? Fine. First they have to agree to play by the rules. And Jaybear just hit it right on the head. For a country that’s as supposedly ‘progressive’ and ‘westernized’ as is being touted in the media, they sure do have some interesting policies, no? I don’t have much doubt either as to what side they’ll go with if it hits the fan.
February 28th, 2006 at 11:46 amWe better get to shutting out Emirates Air - especially their air freight operation.
To be completely consistent, we should immediately suspend all imports of oil and any other products from any Arab nation supporting this boycott.
And just so it doesn’t appear that were standing behind our principles to disguise our racism, lets immediately suspend all trade with China. Certainly we can’t have free trade with a country that doesn’t allow freedom.
February 28th, 2006 at 12:11 pmIndeed. Nothing would please me more than to see us shut off trade with that Communist shithole. I don’t much like paying for the rope that’s going to hang me.
As to oil, we need it for now but we should definitely look for alternate sources/suppliers to rid ourselves of our dependency in the long run.
We don’t NEED Dubai to run our ports, nor do we NEED their airlines, however. They’re not the only show on Broadway. That’s the difference.
February 28th, 2006 at 12:20 pmDubai Ports Firm Involved In Israel Boycott…
The White House damage control squad will be working fulltime on this one, reported by the Jersualem Post:
The parent ……
February 28th, 2006 at 12:23 pmMisha,
I’m confused - I clicked on your link and went to a JP story entitled “Arab boycott largely reduced to ‘lip service’” that contained none of your quoted material and basically said that except for Lebanon, Syria & Iran, the boycott is in word only.
???
- MuscleDaddy
February 28th, 2006 at 12:33 pmThat’s odd, MuscleDaddy, because I just checked the link, just to make sure, and it still points to the correct article.
February 28th, 2006 at 12:48 pmMuscle Daddy’s talking about the link within the Post’s article, which links to another of their articles. It appears in your blockquote, Misha.
February 28th, 2006 at 12:53 pmOh that one. Yep, I included that one because it was in the original article. I try to be as true to the original as possible when quoting.
The link to the article I’m quoting, MuscleDaddy, is the one immediately before the blockquote.
February 28th, 2006 at 1:02 pmI wish the Democrats would adhere to that tenet.
February 28th, 2006 at 1:18 pmDubai Ports World Participates in Arab Boycott of Israel…
Dubai Ports World, the company involved in the UAE port deal, participates in the Arab boycott against Israel.
“Yes, of course the boycott is still in place and is still enforced,” Muhammad Rashid a-Din, a staff member of the Dubai Customs Departm…
February 28th, 2006 at 1:21 pmWell on the face of it, the Dubai ports deal is mostly O.K.
Note what American Spectator writer, (www.spectator.org/dsp_article.asp?art_id=9465″) Brandon Crocker has to say: “The concern that with Dubai Ports World taking over ownership of the former British P&O, hordes of potentially shady Arabs will be running things at our ports is, to put it bluntly, ludicrous. These same ports are not currently overrun by Brits”
Rich Lowery of NRO notes: “Nattering on about how important it is to listen to the U.N. and France has been a loser. Nor has the party’s incoherence on the Iraq war — in favor of it when it seems politically expedient, sort of against it when it doesn’t — gotten it anywhere. But the successful posturing on the Dubai deal points the way toward a thematically consistent foreign policy that could be popular, even if it is tinged with isolationism and nativism…
All this aside, the red flag for the Bush administration should have been what the Jerusalem Post noted: Arab boycott against Israel which Dubai is still part of…
February 28th, 2006 at 1:32 pmI hate to say it, but I see this as another example of the utter corruption of U.S. trade policy in general. A conscious decision was made years ago to ceed any industry or activity to another nation if they could perform that function more efficiently. The asians make televisions more cheaply, then let them drive our domestic comanies out of business. Steel, automobiles, it doesn’t matter. Other countries do not have to meet the wage expectations of our workers, and our leaders have no interest in maintaining the American standard of living by using tariffs to equalize the costs of foreign made comdities and services. The result is that US companies are diriven out of various markets, and no longer have the expertise to do the work efficiently now anyway. This is the same thing, only on a larger scale. Until legislative service are officially outsourced in large quanities, the delusionists on Capitol Hill will not express any interest in reversing the trend.
February 28th, 2006 at 2:42 pmMisha,
Figured it out - I clicked on the link IN the story (Arab boycott against Israel), and THAT took me to the “Boycott is Lip Service” story.
Odd - so the JP runs a story that contains a link to another JP story, that largely contradicts the first story.
Okay, I need coffee.
- MuscleDaddy
February 28th, 2006 at 2:43 pmI would consider it.
That’s pretty much an asinine comment. I would love to cut off Arab oil imports but leftists/econazis/socialists/democrats/dumbfucks have obstructed in every way to keep the US from drilling in Anwr, building more refineries, building nuclear power plants [France is building approx 13], Ted “I let a woman drown in my drunken stupor” Kennedy blocked a wind “farm” from being built near his compound in Hampton [typical hypocritical libturd], and so on….. So you can blame by in large liberal dumbfucks for our over-dependence of Arab oil. Ironically we are funding the same Oil Sheiks who fund terrorism and build madras’s/mosques worldwide, including in the US, that preach death to America/Israel and the West.
To be concerned about an Arab country that had/has ties with terrorists is racist? You’re a good little liberal goosestepper.
Now that I can agree with. It’s liberal miscreants who will be hurt by in large by “free” trade with China. You’ll price yourselves out of the marketplace, with help from the unions, and you won’t be able to compete against slave wages. And since liberals are by in large employees it will be YOU who gets fucked. The very same corporations you libturds are employed by and demonize constantly [fuckin’ ingrates] won’t be able to compete in the “free” market and you will be FIRED or laid-off. Welcome to free trade with communists/third world countries.
February 28th, 2006 at 2:58 pmFriendly fire incident on aisle #17
Apollyon, I think that to call LC Stephen a “liberal” would be mildly inaccurate, to say the very least (and that’s quite an understatement).
February 28th, 2006 at 3:04 pmSteve’s on your side, Apollyon. There’s a small but growing number of folks on both ends of the political spectrum who are not as worried about this as they originally were, or have not been swayed by any of the more pervasive political cons of the deal.
February 28th, 2006 at 3:07 pmI said before it was the relationship with Israel that bothered me the most about this. Is there a boycott or is this just more shit clouding the water? I guess it depends which article you choose to give more credence to.
February 28th, 2006 at 3:46 pmIt would appear their are more reasons to be concerned regarding the security then I thought. With this administrations actions in the WOT (most of them, anyway)you’d thing this would have been vetted properly. That may not be the case as we are finding out. Bush owes us some answers and I still want to see some asses hanging from the yardarm for the way this whole deal went down.
There may very well be a ’small but growing number’ of persons who are not particularly concerned about this issue, but that lack of concern does not give them a free pass to post idiotic and unproductive commentary without challenge, thank you very much.
I am tired of listening to this utterly childish line of reasoning that “You can’t take a position to deny this deal without also taking a position to deny all other trade etc. etc.”. It’s a blatantly retarded argument on its face. In fact, it’s a slightly tweaked version of the arguments used by the groups that want to ban gun ownership. You know, the old “Some people get killed with guns so we should ban all guns” bit. It’s pathetic.
February 28th, 2006 at 3:50 pmBack your position up with legitimate concerns and reasoning, or shut the hell up. The adults are trying to have a conversation here.
Mostly the boycott is lip service, Max. The boycott is over 50 years old and only Syria and Iran really bothers anymore. Even the Saudis and the PA don’t follow the boycott.
February 28th, 2006 at 3:55 pmIt just keeps getting stranger and stranger.
February 28th, 2006 at 4:27 pmGlobes [Online]: Israel’s Business Arena
From the original Jerusalem Post article:
And from the linked secondary article:
I’m certainly not in the import/export business, nor do I claim any expertise in that field. But it certainly sounds like a boycott to me. And MuscleDaddy, if you read the article that says the boycott is pretty much ignored, you’ll see that importers are forced to ship to another country.
And from that secondary article again:
This means that extra shipping/handling costs are associated with buying that product, which the consumer is forced to pay in the form of higher prices. So Dubai and other arab boycott countries are forcing others to pay an anti-Semitic tax for products made in Israel.
Now how those costs are distributed, or if they make their way into U.S. consumers wallets is not clear. But if those products then are shipped from the arab country receiving them to the US, then all of us are forced to pay that hellish tax.
I say no. No to the arab “Hate Jooooos” tax and no to any arab country that still supports the boycott and wishes to do business with the United States. If they drop all pretense to that nonsense then fine, let them in, otherwise, stick your oil, hommus and chickpeas where the sun don’t shine and you don’t wipe…
February 28th, 2006 at 4:31 pmStephen Macklin, sorry about the friendly fire. [feel free to put the “kick me” sign on my back]
February 28th, 2006 at 4:39 pmThe Dubai Ports World deal might be killed for political reason, but you CANNOT and SHOULD NOT hold the private business entities from a country responsible for the sins of a small minority of the Cleresy. It’s just not right.
February 28th, 2006 at 5:54 pmThank you, Sire…I was unaware of that small detail..
February 28th, 2006 at 8:06 pmMy feelings…no Israel, no deal, no compromise. Simple and direct.
I did my part. I wrote my congressman (Democrat) so I expect little on that part. But I wrote to John Kyl and John McCain as well. I dont expect much from McCain, he strikes me as a modern Chamberlin…but John Kyl has some balls. Hopefully he will respond.
February 28th, 2006 at 10:19 pm