Coast Guard: Dubai Ports Terror Risk Unknown

Coast Guard Had Concerns About Port Deal

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Citing broad gaps in U.S. intelligence, the Coast Guard cautioned the Bush administration that it was unable to determine whether a United Arab Emirates-owned company might support terrorist operations, a Senate panel said Monday.

The surprise disclosure came during a hearing on Dubai-owned DP World's plans to take over significant operations at six leading U.S. ports. The port operations are now handled by London-based Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Company.

''There are many intelligence gaps, concerning the potential for DPW or P&O assets to support terrorist operations, that precludes an overall threat assessment of the potential'' merger,'' an undated Coast Guard intelligence assessment says.

''The breadth of the intelligence gaps also infer potential unknown threats against a large number of potential vulnerabilities,'' the document says.

Senate Homeland Security committee Sen. Susan Collins said, ''This report suggests there were significant and troubling intelligence gaps,'' said Collins, R-Maine. ''That language is very troubling to me.''

Connect the Dots on Bush's Dubai Ports Deal

See If You Can Connect the Dots
The 'War on Terror' Is Really a Series of Mega Deals

from the Washington Post:

Thomas H. Kean (R), a former New Jersey governor who chaired the commission that examined the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, came out against the port deal, telling the Associated Press "it should never have happened."

"We're in a no-win situation," Kean said, referring to the United Arab Emirates. "There's no question that two of the 9/11 hijackers came from there and money was laundered through there."

[Why is President Bush so adamant that a money-laundering Arab sheikhdom that helps fund terror operations should control U.S. ports? Why are Republican leaders asking merely for a delay, rather than outright cancellation of the ports deal? It does seems strange--until you follow the money trail...and the business ties that profited Treasury Secretary John Snow (formerly CEO of CSX Lines), Bush Senior's Carlyle Group and the business links that Bush Senior has with Arab governments like Dubai.]


[On January 17, 2006, Bush announced several appointments, including one of special note]:
The President intends to nominate David C. Sanborn, of Virginia, to be Administrator of the Maritime Administration of the Department of Transportation. Mr. Sanborn currently serves as Director of Operations for Europe and Latin America at DP World.

Follow this Corporate Chronology on the CSX web site:

1990
Mar. 8: Sale of CSX Energy to Enron Corp.

2002
December 9: CSX Chairman and CEO John W. Snow appointed Secretary of the Treasury by President George W. Bush.

2003
February 27: CSX and The Carlyle Group announce conveyance of CSX Lines, LLC, from CSX to a venture formed with The Carlyle Group. The new name of the ocean-going carrier is Horizon Lines, LLC.

From MSNBC:
The U.S. government reviews these purchases through what is known as the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. The committee is chaired by Treasury Department Secretary John Snow. The Bush administration considers the U.A.E. an ally in the war on terror, but the 9/11 Commission found that some of the money for the terror attacks went through banks located in the Arab Emirates and two of the hijackers were, for what it‘s worth, from the U.A.E.

A State Department report declares, “The United Arab Emirates is believes to be a transshipment point for traffickers moving illegal drugs from the major drug producing countries, especially Afghanistan, westward. Frequent reports of seizures of illegal drugs in the UAE during the past year underscore this conclusion.”

Peter Gadiel who lost a son on 9/11 said, "It‘s simply beyond belief that the president would tolerate this kind of insanity."

Next, look at this transaction glowingly reported on the Carlyle Group web site:

May 24, 2004

The Carlyle Group Announces Sale of Horizon Lines to Castle Harlan

Washington, DC – Global private equity firm The Carlyle Group today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to sell Horizon Lines (formerly known as CSX Lines), the nation’s leading Jones Act container shipping company, to private equity firm Castle Harlan for a purchase price of $650 million.

Finally, read about the from Bloomberg UK:

January 27, 2006--DP World, Dubai's port company, yesterday agreed to pay 520 pence a share for P&O, or 3.88 billion pounds ($6.9 billion). PSA International Pte, Singapore's largest port company, must offer more than 546 pence a share to prevent DP World's offer being put to P&O investors on Feb. 13.

The purchase of P&O, which was founded in the year Queen Victoria took the throne in Britain, would turn DP World into the world's third-largest port operator and gives it control of 29 terminals at ports from New Orleans to Manila.

Read the full Bloomberg story here

Bush and bin Laden Go Way Back

from the Canadian Broacasting Company:

CONSPIRACY OR COINCIDENCE?

Is it a conspiracy or a coincidence? There is a long and tangled history between the Bush family and the elite of Saudi Arabia.

It begins in the 1970's in Houston, Texas, when George W. Bush was just starting out in his family's two businesses of politics and oil. The powerful - and very rich - Bin Laden family helped fund his first venture into oil.

The cozy friendship continued for decades. After a terrorist attack at a barracks in Saudi Arabia which killed 19 Americans, the bin Laden family received a multi-billion dollar contract to re-build. And incredibly, George Bush Sr. was in a business meeting at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Washington on the morning of September 11th with one of Osama Bin Laden's brothers.

[Perhaps this explains why Osama bin Laden "slipped away" when cornered at Tora Bora in Afghanistan and why he has not been killed or captured in Pakistan.

The close relationship between the Bush and bin Laden families may also explain why Bush facilitated the exodus of bin Laden relatives living in the U.S., allowing them to fly on private jets to Saudi Arabia in the days following 9/11 with only cursory FBI interviews.]

Dubai: Not With U.S., Against US

With Friends Like This…
Let’s talk about the UAE

By Alex Alexiev, National Review

Dubai is part of the United Arab Emirates, an authoritarian, anti-democratic polity that pursues policies that are the exact opposite of the model of democracy that we promote in Iraq and consider the basis of our strategy to transform the Middle East. It allows no political parties, dissent, or freedom of speech, unless it is anti-American or anti-Semitic; censors the Internet; and uses troglodyte sharia tenets to throw people in jail for crimes such as being homosexual. At the very least, our support for such a “stalwart friend” makes our pro-democracy stance look just a bit hypocritical; at worst it contributes to the growing hostility toward America. Virtually all recent opinion polls in the UAE have shown upward of 75 percent responding with a starkly negative opinion of America, even when compared to Osama bin Laden.

Much more serious than the nature of its government, though, is the evidence that the Emirates have for decades been one of the key financiers of radical Islamism and even outright terrorism. Indeed, if they have been a reliable friend and ally to anybody, it is to the House of Saud in its efforts to export the hateful Wahhabi creed worldwide. And it is this massive campaign over the years that has created the huge infrastructure of thousands of radical mosques, madrassas, Islamic centers, and “charities” that is the true breeding ground of hate, fanaticism, and terrorism.

— Alex Alexiev is vice president for research at the Center for Security Policy .

Read the entire National Review story.

Dubai Port Deal Fails the Smell Test

Homeland Security Initially Opposed Ports Deal

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Homeland Security Department objected at first to a United Arab Emirates company's taking over significant operations at six U.S. ports. It was the lone protest among members of the government committee that eventually approved the deal without dissent.

Billionaire Sheikh Of Dubai Wins P&O

[If the purchase price of the British port company "doesn't make sense" from a commercial standpoint, why is this sheikh smiling after ponying up all that money?]

Forbes, February 9, 2006

The winner in the tussle for P&O is now steaming ahead to victory. The venerated British shipping company Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation is set to be folded into the holdings of the Dubai government, after rival bidder PSA International bowed out of the race.



Overseen by the billionaire Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the state of Dubai will now own the world's third-largest ports operator. PSA International, the Singapore-based hauling giant, seemed a hair's breadth away from owning P&O and finally gaining some ground on its archrival Hutchinson Whampoa. Last month it had effectively scuttled the original $5.8 billion bid by Dubai's shipping company DP World with its $6.1 billion offer, and warmed the cockles of shareholders' hearts with the prospect of a bidding war.

As the P&O board switched allegiances to the Singaporeans, it seemed unclear if the sheiks would dip into their coffers once more for a counterbid. Sure enough, however, DP World came back with a knockout offer of $6.8 billion. At that, PSA has crept away, saying that to continue in the race would not be in its best interest. "PSA has decided not to increase its offer and will therefore no longer pursue the acquisition of P&O," it said in a statement, adding that going beyond Dubai's offer would not make "commercial business sense."

For the complete story of the strangely overpriced sale, scroll down to the bottom of this Forbes article.

Judicial Watch on Bush - Carlyle Group - bin Laden ties

[The conservative watchdog group may have been onto something when it wrote this in April of 2002]

MIDEAST TERROR WAR ADDS URGENCY TO CARLYLE GROUP CONTROVERSY

Former President Bush Works for International Investment Firm With Ties To Saudi Arabia

Company Had Bin Laden Family Connections

(Washington, DC) Judicial Watch, the public interest law firm that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, today pointed out that the recent spate of terror attacks on Israel has lent new urgency to the need for former President Bush to resign from the Carlyle Group, an international investment firm with close ties to the government of Saudi Arabia.

The former president, the father of President Bush, worked for the bin Laden family business in Saudi Arabia through the Carlyle Group, meeting with them at least twice. The terrorist leader Osama bin Laden had supposedly been “disowned” by his family, which runs a multi-billion dollar business in Saudi Arabia and was a major investor in the senior Bush’s firm. Other reports have stated his Saudi family have not truly cut off Osama bin Laden.

See the original at Judicial Watch.org

UAE gave $1 million to Bush library

By WENDY BENJAMINSON, Associated Press

A sheik from the United Arab Emirates contributed at least $1 million to the Bush Library Foundation, which established the George Bush Presidential Library at Texas A&M University in College Station.

The UAE owns Dubai Port Co., which is taking operations from London-based Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Co., which operates six U.S. ports. A political uproar has ensued over the deal, which the White House approved without congressional oversight.

The donations were made in the early 1990s for the library, which houses the papers of former President George Bush, the current president's father.

Bush Cronies Sell U.S. Security

W aides' biz ties to Arab firm

BY MICHAEL McAULIFF, NY DAILY NEWS

WASHINGTON - The Dubai firm that won Bush administration backing to run six U.S. ports has at least two ties to the White House.

One is Treasury Secretary John Snow, whose agency heads the federal panel that signed off on the $6.8 billion sale of an English company to government-owned Dubai Ports World - giving it control of Manhattan's cruise ship terminal and Newark's container port.

Snow was chairman of the CSX rail firm that sold its own international port operations to DP World for $1.15 billion in 2004, the year after Snow left for President Bush's cabinet.

The other connection is David Sanborn, who runs DP World's European and Latin American operations and was tapped by Bush last month to head the U.S. Maritime Administration.

See NY Daily News for full story

Bush Lets Arabs Run U.S. Ports

'President's gone insane' – 9/11 dad

BY JIMMY VIELKIND, DAILY NEWS WRITER

Peter Gadiel just doesn't get it.

How, asks Gadiel, whose son James died in the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center, can a company owned by a terror-linked country get control of our nation's ports?

"I'm a lifelong Republican and I think the President's gone insane," said Gadiel, 58, who heads 9/11 Families for a Secure America.

Two of the 19 9/11 hijackers were citizens of Dubai, the Arab emirate whose bid to run ports in New York, New Jersey and four other cities was okayed by the White House even though investigators have found signs that money used to finance terrorism flowed through Dubai banks.

NY Daily News

Iraq Death Toll - Bush's Fuzzy Math

U.S. Soldiers Killed in Iraq: 2,276
WMDs: Zero

See icasualties.org/oif for latest Bush death toll

Wrong Mission Accomplished

Iran Was on Edge; Now It's on Top

[If you thought there is no harm having an evil dumb guy leading the country, think again]

The war in Iraq has bolstered the regime's influence in the region and made it bolder.

By Megan K. Stack and Borzou Daragahi, Los Angeles Times

BAGHDAD — The Islamic government in neighboring Iran watched with trepidation in March 2003 when U.S.-led troops stormed Iraq to overthrow Saddam Hussein's regime and start remaking the political map of the Mideast.

In retrospect, the Islamic Republic could have celebrated: The war has left America's longtime nemesis with profound influence in the new Iraq and pushed it to the apex of power in the region.

Emboldened by its new status and shielded by deep oil reserves, Tehran is pressing ahead with its nuclear program, daring the international community to impose sanctions. Iran is a Shiite Muslim nation with an ethnic Persian majority, and the blossoming of its influence has fueled the ambitions of long-repressed Shiites throughout the Arab world.

At the same time, Tehran has tightened alliances with groups such as Hamas, which recently won Palestinian elections, and with governments in Damascus and Beijing.

In the 1980s, Iran spent eight years and thousands of lives waging a war to overthrow Hussein, whose regime buffered the Sunni Muslim-dominated Arab world from Iran. But in the end, it took the U.S.-led invasion to topple Iraq's dictator and allow Iranian influence to spread through a chaotic, battle-torn country.

They Would Never Cover Anything Up

GOP senators bar probe of NSA program

By Greg Miller and Maura Reynolds, Baltimore Sun

WASHINGTON -- Senate Republicans blocked a proposed investigation of President Bush's domestic spying operation yesterday, as the chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence said he had reached an agreement with the White House to pursue legislation that would establish clearer rules surrounding the controversial National Security Agency surveillance program.

But Senate aides described the discussions with the White House as very preliminary. And angry Democrats expressed deep skepticism with the negotiations, with some describing them as a ploy to protect the Bush administration and the highly classified domestic eavesdropping operation from congressional scrutiny.

Cheney Shooting Victim Apologizes

Chutzpah with a Bullet


When the nation's number one Dick shoots someone -- implanting steel pellets in his chest and face, giving the guy a mild heart attack and sending him to intensive care for a week -- Cheney claims it was one of the worst days of his life! And he naturally expects the victim to pick out the shotgun pellets and express remorse. Which is exactly what the fat cat GOP donor did Friday.


WASHINGTON (AP) - The lawyer shot by Vice President Dick Cheney during a hunting trip was discharged from a hospital on Friday. He told reporters he was sorry for all the trouble Cheney had faced over the past week.

Harry Whittington said, “My family and I are deeply sorry for everything Vice President Cheney and his family have had to deal with.”

President Bush said he was satisfied with Cheney's explanation about the shooting accident. The accident happened on Saturday but was not publicly revealed until the next day.

Oops!

Vice President Accidently Shoots Lawyer

Vice President Dick Cheney accidently sprayed Austin lawyer Harry Whittington in the face and chest with shotgun pellets at the Armstrong Ranch while hunting quail on Saturday.

Whittington, 78, was flown by helicopter to Corpus Christi Memorial Hospital, where he was listed in stable condition today, according to Michele Trevino, a hospital spokeswoman.

White House officials did not release details of the incident. But local news accounts in Texas suggested that Mr. Cheney fired his shotgun without realizing that Mr. Whittington had approached him from behind, spraying his fellow hunter on his right side, on his cheek, neck and chest.

Impeachment Manager Blasts Bush

Bob Barr, Bane of the Right?
By Dana Milbank, Washington Post

"Are we losing our lodestar, which is the Bill of Rights?" Barr beseeched the several hundred conservatives at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference this week. "Are we in danger of putting allegiance to party ahead of allegiance to principle?"



Barr answered in the affirmative. "Do we truly remain a society that believes that . . . every president must abide by the law of this country?" he posed. "I, as a conservative, say yes. I hope you as conservatives say yes."

"This debate is very simple: It is a debate about whether or not we will remain a nation subject to and governed by the rule of law or the whim of men."

Love him or hate him, you have to give Barr high marks for consistency. "Whether it's a sitting president when I was an impeachment manager, or a Republican president who has taken liberties with adherence to the law, to me the standard is the same," he said.

Impeach Now, Avoid the Rush

Libby Says 'Superiors'

Authorized Leaks

Cheney's former aide told a jury that classified information he gave to journalists was OKd.

By Richard B. Schmitt, Los Angeles Times

WASHINGTON — Former vice presidential aide I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby has told a federal grand jury that his "superiors" authorized him to leak highly sensitive intelligence to journalists, including a New York Times reporter he allegedly tipped off to the name of an undercover CIA operative.

The revelation is contained in a Jan. 23 letter from Special Prosecutor Patrick J. Fitzgerald to lawyers for Libby, who was indicted in late October in connection with the leak of the operative's name. In the letter, Fitzgerald recounts testimony in which Vice President Dick Cheney's former chief of staff admitted circulating portions of the National Intelligence Estimate to reporters in June and July 2003.

"It is our understanding that Mr. Libby testified that he was authorized to disclose information about the [National Intelligence Estimate] to the press by his superiors," Fitzgerald wrote.

The letter did not identify those superiors. The National Journal reported on its website Thursday that Cheney, who was Libby's direct boss at the time, had authorized the disclosures.

Inaction Kills

White House Knew of Levee's

Failure on Night of Storm

By Eric Lipton, The New York Times

WASHINGTON, Feb. 9 — In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, Bush administration officials said they had been caught by surprise when they were told on Tuesday, Aug. 30, that a levee had broken, allowing floodwaters to engulf New Orleans.

But Congressional investigators have now learned that an eyewitness account of the flooding from a federal emergency official reached the Homeland Security Department's headquarters starting at 9:27 p.m. the day before, and the White House itself at midnight.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency official, Marty Bahamonde, first heard of a major levee breach Monday morning. By late Monday afternoon, Mr. Bahamonde had hitched a ride on a Coast Guard helicopter over the breach at the 17th Street Canal to confirm the extensive flooding. He then telephoned his report to FEMA headquarters in Washington, which notified the Homeland Security Department.

"FYI from FEMA," said an e-mail message from the agency's public affairs staff describing the helicopter flight, sent Monday night at 9:27 to the chief of staff of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and recently unearthed by investigators. Conditions, the message said, "are far more serious than media reports are currently reflecting. Finding extensive flooding and more stranded people than they had thought — also a number of fires."

Bush Twisted Facts Into Lies

Associated Press Photo

Ex-CIA Official Faults Use of Data on Iraq
Intelligence 'Misused' to Justify War, He Says

By Walter Pincus, Washington Post Staff Writer

The former CIA official who coordinated U.S. intelligence on the Middle East until last year has accused the Bush administration of "cherry-picking" intelligence on Iraq to justify a decision it had already reached to go to war, and of ignoring warnings that the country could easily fall into violence and chaos after an invasion to overthrow Saddam Hussein.

Paul R. Pillar, who was the national intelligence officer for the Near East and South Asia from 2000 to 2005, acknowledges the U.S. intelligence agencies' mistakes in concluding that Hussein's government possessed weapons of mass destruction. But he said those misjudgments did not drive the administration's decision to invade.

"Official intelligence on Iraqi weapons programs was flawed, but even with its flaws, it was not what led to the war," Pillar wrote in the upcoming issue of the journal Foreign Affairs. Instead, he asserted, the administration "went to war without requesting -- and evidently without being influenced by -- any strategic-level intelligence assessments on any aspect of Iraq."

"It has become clear that official intelligence was not relied on in making even the most significant national security decisions, that intelligence was misused publicly to justify decisions already made, that damaging ill will developed between [Bush] policymakers and intelligence officers, and that the intelligence community's own work was politicized," Pillar wrote.

The Cost of Failure

How Much Does It Cost
Not to Find Osama or Any WMDs?

WASHINGTON (AP) - The Bush administration will ask Congress for $120 billion more for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and $18 billion more for hurricane relief this year.

The White House acknowledges the upcoming requests would cause total spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan since Sept. 11, 2001, to soar well past the $400 billion mark.

About $70 billion of the new war money will be requested for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan this year, bringing total spending on the two campaigns to $120 billion for the current budget year. The other $50 billion in new war money will be set aside in the 2007 budget for the first few months of the fiscal year that begins Oct. 1. More money will likely be needed in 2007.

We Have Corruption Liftoff!

NASA's Inspector General Probed

Failure to Investigate Safety Violations Is Among the Charges

By Guy Gugliotta, Washington Post Staff Writer

An FBI-led watchdog agency has opened an investigation into multiple complaints accusing NASA Inspector General Robert W. Cobb of failing to investigate safety violations and retaliating against whistle-blowers. Most of the complaints were filed by current and former employees of his own office.

Written complaints and supporting documents from at least 16 people have been given to investigators. They allege that Cobb, appointed by President Bush in 2002, suppressed investigations of wrongdoing within NASA, and abused and penalized his own investigators when they persisted in raising concerns.

In documents obtained by The Washington Post and in interviews, NASA employees and former employees said Cobb's actions had contributed to a lack of attention to safety problems at NASA.

The petitioners also said Cobb had disregarded the inspector general's mandate to root out "waste, fraud and abuse" and caused dozens of longtime NASA employees to leave the IG's 200-person office and seek investigative work elsewhere.

Sentence First, Verdict Afterwards

Bush Told Blair "We're Going to War"

Richard Norton-Taylor, The Guardian

Tony Blair told President George Bush that he was "solidly" behind US plans to invade Iraq before he sought advice about the invasion's legality and despite the absence of a second UN resolution, according to a new account of the build-up to the war published today.

A memo of a two-hour meeting between the two leaders at the White House on January 31 2003 - nearly two months before the invasion - reveals that Mr Bush made it clear the US intended to invade whether or not there was a second resolution and even if UN inspectors found no evidence of a banned Iraqi weapons programme.

"The diplomatic strategy had to be arranged around the military planning", the president told Mr Blair. The prime minister is said to have raised no objection.

[2248 U.S. soldiers killed in Iraq; WMDs: 0]

http://icasualties.org/oif/