• The UAE was one of three countries in the world to recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan.


• According to George Tenet, the former Director of the CIA, members of the UAE royal family visited Osama Bin Laden in February 1999 (before 9/11), and their presence deterred an American attack on Bin Laden's compound.


• Two of the 9/11 hijackers were citizens of the UAE.


• According to the FBI, money was transferred to the 9/11 hijackers through the UAE banking system.


• After 9/11, the Treasury Department reported that the UAE was not cooperating in efforts to track down Osama Bin Laden's bank accounts.


• The UAE has been a key transfer point for illegal shipments of nuclear components to Iran, North Korea and Libya.


• According to the CIA, the UAE is a drug transshipment point for traffickers given its proximity to Southwest Asian drug producing countries.

Why would anyone what them to be running part of the national infrastructure?

Because that seems like a very "knee-jerk" reaction to the American left itself...  If we are going to allow that there might be some nuance in Bush's decisionmaking, I hope we can allow the same for the "American left."

I still don't see why "race" has to be a factor in opposing the selling of our ports to a firm in country that used to support the Taliban, which we are supposedly in need of protection from.  We are talking about the privatizing of security and questioning political alliances.

If the hijackers had been British, do you think we'd have be fine with the British running our ports?  9I was shocked to learn any foreign entity was running them, btw!) After Katrina, do we trust the Administration to run entrust our security to the most qualified people or to those whom they owe favors?  There are a lot of factors.  Race is only one of them.

Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities. -Voltaire