Nerve Gas Alert Sparks Evacuation on Capitol Hill

WASHINGTON — Nine senators were among 200 people herded into a Capitol Hill parking garage Wednesday night after a security sensor indicated the presence of a nerve agent in their office building. Later tests proved negative. "Test results have been cleared and all test results are negative, so that's very good news," said Capitol Police Sgt. Kimberly Schneider.

The all-clear came three hours after an air-monitoring sensor indicated a suspicious substance in the attic of the Russell Senate Office Building. It initially tested positive as a nerve agent. Lawmakers, aides and other personnel were evacuated to the West Legislative Garage shortly after 6:45 p.m. EST as police conducted several other tests before concluding that it was a false alarm. "We had this warning system work," said Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), one of those in the garage. "People in the building followed the directions promptly. "There was no panic, no running, no upset or anything like that." Police said none of the people who were evacuated to the garage showed any signs, such as a runny nose, of exposure to a nerve agent. Schneider did not immediately know what triggered the alarm but said it could have been something as innocuous as a cleaning substance. "One of the alarm systems that tests air quality went off with a positive reading, and then it went off again with a positive reading, so I guess they thought it was serious enough that they had to take very aggressive action," Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.), another of the senators evacuated from the building, said while speaking on a cellphone from the garage. Gregg said everyone was eager to go home but understood the need for the delay. "I started out flying in Air Force One and ended up in the garage with 200 of my closest friends," he said. Earlier in the day, Gregg accompanied President Bush on a brief visit to New Hampshire. A spokesman for Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) said people tried to leave the area but police directed them into the underground parking garage across the street. There, police distributed water and gave regular updates.

"Everybody was in a fine mood, everybody was calm," said the spokesman, Kyle Downey. "Everybody's been up here for a few years now. What does panic get you anyway?" In addition to Sessions, Gregg and Thune, other senators known to have been in the garage were Michael B. Enzi (R-Wyo.), Gordon H. Smith (R-Ore.), Richard M. Burr (R-N.C.), Larry E. Craig (R-Idaho), Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) and Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.). Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, who was not in the garage, said the alert was prompted by a single sensor, and no suspicious chemicals were found. "Everybody is safe. This was a false alarm," Frist, a surgeon, said shortly after the all-clear. "I'm sure tomorrow there will be a lot of questions about whether we had to be quarantined, and the answer to that is yes." In February 2004, the deadly poison ricin was found in Frist's office, and while dozens of Capitol employees were quarantined briefly and decontaminated, none of them got sick. In October 2001, a month after the terrorist attacks, an anthrax-laced letter shut down Congress briefly and closed the Hart Senate Office Building for months of cleaning. Five people were killed and 17 sickened nationwide after coming into contact with letters containing anthrax.

The Rule of Law versus The Rule of Cheney

The Nation -- In the moment of executive excess, when abuses of the powers of the presidency and -- thanks to Dick Cheney's contributions to the crisis -- the vice presidency are so threatening to the Republic, it is important to remember that this is not a new fight. Cheney was the prime defender of the "right" of the executive branch to disregard Congress and the Constitution during the Iran-Contra scandal of the late 1980s, contributing a chilling dissent to the bipartisan Congressional report that accused the Reagan administration of "secrecy, deception and disdain for the law."

In that dissent, the man who then represented Wyoming in the House chastised Congress for "abusing its power" by seeking to limit the ability of the president and his aides to spend money as they chose in support of the Nicaraguan Contras. "Congress must recognize that effective foreign policy requires, and the Constitution mandates, the President to be the country's foreign policy leader," argued Cheney, it what remains one of history's most dramatic misreads of the Constitutional mandates with regard to the Constitutional system of checks and balances.
This messianic faith that the executive branch is above the law, which Cheney first spelled out as a member of Congress, has only hardened during his tenure as the most powerful vice president in history. Now, with the war in Iraq fully degenerated into quagmire and with the "war on terror" being used as an excuse for everything from warrantless wiretapping to extension of the Patriot Act, the Cheney doctrine infects the body politic as a cancer so widespread that is raises honest concern about the health and future of the American experiment.
It is important to recall, however, that the dangers inherent in Cheney's views were diagnosed almost two decades ago, in the aftermath of the Iran-Contra debacle.
Historian Theodore Draper, who has died at age 93, penned a brilliant assessment of the specific scandal and the broader concern, A Very Thin Line: The Iran-Contra Affairs (Hill & Wang: 1991) which used congressional testimony and private depositions to explain the controversy that erupted after it was revealed that the Reagan administration had set up an entirely illegal scheme to sell arms to Iranian fundmentalists in order to raise money that funded Contra terrorism against the Nicaraguan government and people. The title of the book refers to what Draper saw as "a very thin line (separating) the legitimate from the illegitimate exercise of power in our government."
To Draper's view, the Iran-Contra scandal was "symptomatic of a far deeper disorder in the American body politic" -- a malady characterized by the misguided view that the United States can or should disregard the system of checks and balances in order to create "a president almighty in foreign policy."
Draper warned us well about that "deeper disorder. Unfortunately, his was a warning unheeded. Now, as we struggle with its deadly ramifications, we would do well to return to Draper's text -- not merely to honor a visionary historian who saw both the past and the future, but to arm ourselves for the fight over whether this country will be governed by the rule of law or the rule of Cheney.

Bush and the Carlyle Group by Way Of Dubai

It is hard to imagine an address closer to the heart of American power. The offices of the Carlyle Group are on Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington DC, midway between the White House and the Capitol building, and within a stone's throw of the headquarters of the FBI and numerous government departments. The address reflects Carlyle's position at the very center of the Washington establishment, but amid the frenetic politicking that has occupied the higher reaches of that world in recent weeks, few have paid it much attention. Elsewhere, few have even heard of it.
This is exactly the way Carlyle likes it. For 14 years now, with almost no publicity, the company has been signing up an impressive list of former politicians - including the first President Bush and his secretary of state, James Baker; John Major; one-time World Bank treasurer Afsaneh Masheyekhi and several south-east Asian powerbrokers - and using their contacts and influence to promote the group. Among the companies Carlyle owns are those which make equipment, vehicles and munitions for the US military, and its celebrity employees have long served an ingenious dual purpose, helping encourage investments from the very wealthy while also smoothing the path for Carlyle's defense firms.
But since the start of the "war on terrorism", the firm - unofficially valued at $13.5bn - has taken on an added significance. Carlyle has become the thread which indirectly links American military policy in Afghanistan to the personal financial fortunes of its celebrity employees, not least the current president's father. And, until earlier this month, Carlyle provided another curious link to the Afghan crisis: among the firm's multi-million-dollar investors were members of the family of Osama bin Laden.
The closest the Carlyle Group has previously come to public attention was last May, when a Seoul-based employee called Peter Chung was forced to resign from his £100,000-a-year job after sending an email to friends - subsequently forwarded to thousands of others - boasting of his plans to "fuck every hot chick in Korea over the next two years". The more business-oriented activities of Carlyle's staff have been conducted much more quietly : since it was founded in 1987 by David Rubenstein, a policy assistant in Jimmy Carter's administration, and two lawyer friends, the firm has been dispatching an array of former world leaders on a series of strategic networking trips.
Last year, George Bush Sr and John Major traveled to Riyadh to talk with senior Saudi businessmen. In September 2000, Carlyle hired speakers including Colin Powell and AOL Time Warner chair Steve Case to address an extravagant party at Washington's Monarch Hotel. Months later, Major joined James Baker for a function at the Lanesborough Hotel in London, to explain the Florida election controversy to the wealthy attendees.
We can assume that Carlyle pays well. Neither Major's office nor Carlyle will confirm the details of his salary as European chairman - an appointment announced shortly before he left the House of Commons after the election - but we know, for the purposes of comparison, that he is paid £105,000 for 28 days' work a year for an unrelated non-executive directorship. Bush gives speeches for the company and is paid with stakes in the firm's investments, believed to be worth at least $80,000 per appearance. The benefits have attracted political stars from around the world: former Philippines president Fidel Ramos is an adviser, as is former Thai premier Anand Panyarachun - as well as former Bundesbank president Karl Otto Pohl, and Arthur Levitt, former chairman of the SEC, the US stock market regulator.

Jurine, You Been Served

BushLaden Network

Bush has ties to the Dubai Group

Bush's Terrorism Words Bite Him

WASHINGTON, Feb 22 (Reuters) - For almost five years U.S. President George W. Bush has warned Americans to fear terrorism, but now those words may come back to bite him.
The president, who has cast himself as America's protector against terrorism and Islamic militancy, has been thrown on the defensive by a bipartisan revolt over his administration's approval of a state-owned company from the United Arab Emirates assuming operation of six major U.S. seaports.
Bush and his aides have argued that the United Arab Emirates is an anti-terrorist ally and that the company would have no security role. But even Bush allies, like South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsay Graham, have called the deal "politically tone deaf."
With Republican and Democratic lawmakers drafting legislation to block the port deal, Bush vowed on Tuesday to use his veto for the first time should any such law reach his desk, drawing the lines for a high-stakes political battle.
"Politically, for the president, it is a huge mistake for him to be defending this decision. The president will be overturned," said U.S. Rep. Tom DeLay, the former number two Republican in the House of Representatives.
Bush has long been successful in persuading Americans they were under constant threat and he was the best man to protect them, although polls reveal paradoxes in attitudes.
Last month, some 75 percent of Americans said in a Zogby survey that they expected the country to suffer a major terrorist attack within the next two years, but a CNN/Gallup/USA Today poll found that 64 percent of Americans had confidence in Bush's ability to prevent an attack.
Fears have not subsided, pollster John Zogby said, although the United States has not suffered a major attack since Sept. 11, 2001. Bush two weeks ago revealed a plot foiled in 2002 to fly an airplane into the West Coast's tallest building and said the terrorist threat had not abated.
"That's what makes this story so ironic. I guess you can't have it both ways," Zogby said.
Cal Jillson, a political scientist at Southern Methodist University, said, "Bush is a victim of his own rhetoric. This deal flies in the face of the Bush administration's general posture, which has been that there is much to fear out there and they have been vigilant in protecting the country."
DEMOCRATS HIT BACK
Other factors may also be driving opposition to the proposed takeover by Dubai Ports World of operations at the six ports.
Among them may be general anti-Arab sentiment and political calculations in a congressional election year. For years, Bush has portrayed Democrats as weak on security. Now, they have taken the chance to hit back.
Meanwhile Republicans are less beholden to a second-term president with weak approval ratings.
"So far Bush has always managed to get Republicans back in line when he needed to, but his influence is waning and it will only get worse for this administration," Jillson said.
Some in Congress have complained they were blindsided by the deal, which was approved by a panel whose deliberations are closed to the public.
Anger has also bubbled up among grassroots conservatives at the heart of Bush's political base who are expressing themselves on talk radio and the Internet.
Political analyst Michael Ledeen of the American Enterprise Institute compared the furor to a conservative revolt last year that thwarted Bush's nomination of White House legal counsel Harriet Miers to the Supreme Court. "It's the foreign policy equivalent of the Miers nomination. It's stupid," Ledeen said.

Bush Ties to Bin Laden

Last week I had the opportunity to visit the United Nations Headquarters in New York for the first time since my parents took me there for my 12th birthday in 1966. In 1966, the UN Building was an amazing place. Popularized in fiction by the television show “The Man from U.N.C.L.E.” and the movie “North by Northwest,” the UN Building is quintessential 1950s modern architecture--its delegates’ lounge with a huge window facing the East River more resembles the airport waiting lounges inside the old Idlewild (now JFK Airport) or Washington National Airport terminals. In 1966, it was amazing to see delegates from the four corners of the world wearing various traditional clothing and engaging one another in both jocular and serious conversations. One had the sense that the UN was doing what the leaders of the Allies in World War II wanted it to do--preserve the peace and prevent another war.
But something is now very wrong at the UN Building. The carpets in the building are threadbare and stained. The drapes adorning the large plate glass windows are faded. And just days before the U.S. presidential election, the demeanor of the UN staff was apprehensive and jittery.
George W. Bush accomplished what so many recent dictators tried to accomplish -- the honorable idea of a post-World War II community of nations to create an international body to preserve the peace through negotiation and reason was laid to waste. The UN is no longer a gleaming glass and marble symbol of hope on the East River. Because of the rise to power in Washington of a cabal of unilateralist right-wingers adhering to a crypto-Nazi and fascist ideology developed by an unholy alliance of apocalyptic Christian fundamentalists, Leo Straussian neo-conservatives, a smattering of former Trotskyites, and Vladimir Jabotinskyite Zionists, the UN is now a dismal and gray place where the world’s dominant power -- the United States -- has all but ignored the international body at the expense of international law and diplomacy.
George W. Bush’s Texas Republican Party demands in its platform for the United States to withdraw from the UN and expel it from the U.S. territory. This was the demand of the farthest extremes of the right wing in the 1950s and 1960s and it just shows how far out of the political mainstream Bush and his political cronies have gone. Texas Republican Governor Rick Perry even refused to sign a recent pro forma proclamation honoring the UN on its anniversary.
Walking down the corridors of eerily quiet, empty, and drab UN was right out of a scene from the nuclear war apocalypse movie “On the Beach.” The General Assembly, Security Council, and Economic and Social Council rooms were completely empty -- their effectiveness curtailed by the Bush war regime. Vital decisions affecting war and genocidal status quo civil war stalemates are now made by a dangerous cabal inside the White House, Pentagon, and Number 10 Downing Street.
The nightmarish image inside the UN is equally matched by the armed-to-the-teeth storm troopers who now surround the White House, the U.S. Congress, and the Supreme Court. The Bush regime, headed by a megalomaniac who decides to spring his long-awaited “October Surprise” by producing a videotape made by an old and valued Bush family Saudi business partner just four days before the presidential election is just further proof that Bush and his regime are traitors to the United States of America and anathema to everything it stands for.
After three years of investigating the events of 911 on three continents, I can now report that the Saudi led terrorist attack, supported by wealthy members of governments and the top business communities of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, and which was known in advance by an off-the-shelf Israeli intelligence operation supported by Israeli-Russian criminal gangs who helped to further inflame passions by posing as celebrating Arabs in and around New York City after the twin attacks on the World Trade Center, was also known by key members of the Bush administration, including Vice President Dick Cheney, his chief of staff Scooter Libby (a one time lawyer shill for international crime boss Marc Rich), and the cabal of neo-conservatives serving in the Pentagon under Donald Rumsfeld. In fact, the leader of a group of Israeli “movers” of Eastern European descent, who had advance knowledge of the 911 attacks from their base of operation in Weehawken, New Jersey, was implicated by the FBI as being in league with the Al Qaeda hijackers in an official FBI 911 suspect list.
The pre-911 “shadowing” activities of Israeli “movers” and “art students” in close proximity to the Arab hijackers in Hollywood, Florida; Irving, Texas; and Jersey City, New Jersey now appears to have been an “off-the-shelf” intelligence operation tied closely to the activities of the Offices of Special Plans within the Pentagon and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s office. Shortly after the 911 attacks, former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed the opinion that the attacks were good for Israel. The inseparable ties between Cheney’s office, Netanyahu’s and Sharon’s private intelligence operatives, Rumsfeld’s neo conservative shop in the Pentagon, and the hijackers and their financiers are as clear as day. Moreover, these ties are known by a number of CIA, FBI, Justice Department, and other federal agents who have been stymied in their attempts to bring ALL the perpetrators of 911, Arabs and Israelis alike, to justice. In addition, it is time to bring charges against the Israeli operatives who were based in New Jersey and who were responsible for the anthrax mailings that contained letters that suggested Arabs were the perpetrators. They and their liaisons at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute for Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick, Maryland should be the focus of a new FBI investigation unencumbered by the interference of Attorney General John Ashcroft, an individual who was on the take of Kansas City and St. Louis organized crime syndicates when he was Attorney General and Governor of Missouri.
To cover their tracks, the Israelis managed, working through high tech database, networking, and communications companies in which they have a controlling interest, to destroy critical evidence concerning their role in not only failing to warn the United States of what was being planned for September 11, 2001 but in stoking the flames of anti-Arab tensions by posing as Arabs and appearing to threaten the Holland and Lincoln Tunnels and the George Washington and Brooklyn Bridges. Critical police and other computerized records throughout north Jersey and Trenton have been scrubbed by entities tied to the Israelis and possibly to the former New Jersey Homeland Security chief Golan Cipel, an Israeli citizen and alleged agent who is now being investigated by the FBI. Cipel, who reportedly “honey trapped” Democratic Governor Jim McGreevey in a series of homosexual trysts, may have used his influence to cover up pre- and post-911 activities of the Israeli agents in New Jersey, particularly in Jersey City, Weehawken, Union City, Edgewater, Secaucus, Fort Lee, and at Liberty State Park.
Like Sears and Roebuck, Binney and Smith, Horn and Hardart, and Barnes and Noble, the Bush and Bin Laden families are a long standing business team that has been involved in various dubious joint ventures in the Middle East and around the world since the 1950s. And contrary to Saudi propaganda, the Bin Laden family never disinherited or otherwise excommunicated Osama from their midst. Such an act requires an elaborate ceremony in which the family gathers in the desert and at sunset and publicly banishes the subject family member in the presence of an imam who documents the ritual in the same manner as a priest documents a baptism or christening. According to the highest levels of Israeli intelligence, such a document does not exist because no such required ceremony ever occurred.
So the fact that Osama bin Laden is still a cherished member of the same family that has engaged in joint business activities for two generations with George H. W. Bush, George W. Bush, Marvin Bush, Neil Bush, Jeb Bush, and Bush family consigliore James Baker and Bush’s multibillion dollar slush fund activity, The Carlyle Group, gives his recent videotaped commentary on the U.S. presidential election more weight. Osama Bin Laden always comes to the rescue of George W. Bush when the chips are down. In August 2001, Bush was sinking in the polls amid continuing charges that his presidency was an illegal contrivance engineered by his brother in Florida, Florida’s Secretary of State Katherine Harris, and five partisan members of the U.S. Supreme Court. Then, like a true and trusted business partner, Bin Laden delivered the 911 attacks while Bush was being read book excerpts about a pet goat in a Florida elementary school. Like two friendly business chums cracking jokes on the golf course, Bin Laden chided Bush about the pet goat story in his recent videotape.
Bin Laden, whose family was aided by the Bush’s during the 1970s and 1980s in acquiring airports, aircraft, secret bank accounts, front companies, and real estate throughout Texas for the purpose of weapons smuggling and money laundering, came through for Bush by launching the very kind of “Pearl Harbor-level” attack called for by Bush’s ideological allies serving with the Israeli-Russian Mafia-funded Project for the New American Century (PNAC). Bin Laden financial help to Bush’s various failed oil ventures, including Arbusto, Spectrum 7 and Harken totaled $1 million over the years. Dick Cheney, whose wife Lynne receives Israeli-Russian Mafia funds to support her $125,000 chair at the American Enterprise Institute, immediately used the 911 attacks to consolidate the Bush regime’s hold on power, generate windfall war profits for his old company Halliburton and take the nation’s attention of the biggest corporate collapse in the history of the United States -- the Enron implosion.
Bush’s friends and partners in the United Arab Emirates arranged for $109,500 to be transferred to the joint Sun Trust Bank account in Florida used by hijackers Mohammed Atta and Marwan al Shehhi. Florida Governor Jeb Bush has extensive personal financial ties to Sun Trust. The wire transfer originated in Dubai and was transferred through Citibank in New York. Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill privately complained to the Emirates during a March 2002 visit to Dubai about the use of Dubai by the Al Qaeda terrorists prior to and after the 911 attacks. For example, hijacker Ziad Jarrah transited Dubai in January 2001 on his return to Florida after spending time at Al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Hijackers Wail and and Waleed al Shehri, who were brothers, arranged to use special phone cards in the United States that could only be used to call Dubai.
O’Neill crossed swords with the Bush-Bin Laden partnership when he renewed the aggressive approach to UAE and Saudi involvement with terrorist money laundering begun by Clinton’s National Security Adviser Sandy Berger. The Bush regime scrapped Berger’s policies after it took office but O’Neill decided to take a hard line against the Saudis and Emiratis after 911. In December 2002, O’Neill was fired. It was not because of his skepticism over Bush’s planned war against Iraq (we did not know about that until well after he was sacked), but it was O’Neill’s decision to shut down the financial activities of Al Qaeda and its allies that earned him the wrath of the Bush-Bin Laden partnership and what led to his ultimate firing. Obviously, his distaste for the Iraqi invasion also did not endear O’Neill to the Israeli-Russian influenced neo-conservatives and PNACers.
And Bush has done much for Osama. After 911, Bush sufficiently delayed an attack on Afghanistan enabling Bin Laden and his family and closest cohorts to evade the eventual attack. After the U.S. invaded, it allowed Bin Laden to escape Tora Bora by using former Bin Laden-allied local warlords to supposedly try to capture him. Bush, in essence, allowed Bin Laden and his party to escape. After Bush geared up to attack Iraq’s Saddam Hussein, Bush publicly stated that he did not care about Osama any longer. Until October 2004 when polls showed Kerry surging ahead. Bingo! -- Osama cuts a videotape on his view of the presidential election. Walter Cronkite and I share the belief that this video was engineered by Karl Rove. Beyond that fact, the video was yet another example of the teamwork between the Bush and Bin Laden partners when one or the other partner is threatened in some manner.
Immediately, PNAC adherent former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani, who has made handsome profits in the security business as a result of 911, began making statements that Bin Laden was parroting allegations contained in Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 911." It was that film that introduced many Americans for the first time to the business relationship between the Bushes and Bin Ladens. Osama's video was used by Bush's people to discredit Moore, and thus, the John Kerry campaign.
When I arrived at the UN Building in the late afternoon of October 29, a group of staffers were having a small Halloween party but were also transfixed on a television airing the video of Bin Laden. Eerily, I had just left a meeting in midtown Manhattan with a colleague who told me that Bin Laden was receiving kidney treatment in Qatar, which hosts a major U.S. military base where Saddam Hussein was once imprisoned. Then, bam!--Bin Laden is on TV broadcasting from what was deemed by a number of TV technicians to be a professional studio. Then the tape ends up in the hands of Al Jazeera, which is also based in Qatar. Walter Cronkite smelled a Karl Rove rat with that tape and so do I. It is a continuation of past Bush-Bin Laden teamwork in matters of making tons of money and bringing about global mayhem -- all for the bottom line.
In July 2001, just weeks prior to 911, the French media reported that Osama Bin Laden was in hospital at the American Hospital in -- you guessed it -- Dubai, where he was receiving kidney treatment. The French media also reported that a rather dodgy local American named Larry Mitchell, who was attached to the U.S. Consulate General and said to be the CIA station chief, visited Bin Laden at the hospital. More evidence of the Bush-Bin Laden team in action.
On November 2, we must put and end to the most damaging and menacing administration in the history of our republic. The sinister Bush family and their bastard operatives are the most dangerous collection of demagogues and hate mongers to have achieved power since the days of Adolf Hitler and the Nazis. It’s time for them to go. Let a Kerry administration begin the process of indicting the Bush-Bin Laden cartel criminals for their treacherous acts against our nation. Let there be no mercy, pardons, or clemency for these truly evil people.
Wayne Madsen is a Washington, DC-based journalist, author, and commentator. He is the author of the forthcoming (but suppressed) book "Jaded Tasks: Big Oil, Black Ops, & Brass Plates." He served in the National Security Agency (NSA) during the Reagan administration and has written extensively on intelligence and national security issues.

Bush Unaware of Ports Deal Before Approval

WASHINGTON Feb 22, 2006 (AP)— President Bush was unaware of the pending sale of shipping operations at six major U.S. seaports to a state-owned business in the United Arab Emirates until the deal already had been approved by his administration, the White House said Wednesday.
Defending the deal anew, the administration also said that it should have briefed Congress sooner about the transaction, which has triggered a major political backlash among both Republicans and Democrats.
Bush on Tuesday brushed aside objections by leaders in the Senate and House that the $6.8 billion sale could raise risks of terrorism at American ports. In a forceful defense of his administration's earlier approval of the deal, he pledged to veto any bill Congress might approve to block the agreement involving the sale of a British company to the Arab firm.
Dubai Port's top American executive, chief operating officer Edward H. Bilkey, said the company will do whatever the administration asks to enhance shipping security and ensure the sale goes through. Bilkey said Wednesday he will work in Washington to persuade skeptical lawmakers they should endorse the deal. At least two Senate oversight hearings already are scheduled.
"We're disappointed," Bilkey told The Associated Press in an interview. "We're going to do our best to persuade them that they jumped the gun. "The UAE is a very solid friend, as President Bush has said."
Bush faces a rebellion from leaders of his own party, as well as from Democrats, about the deal that would put Dubai Ports in charge of major shipping operations in New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia.
While Bush has adamantly defended the deal, the White House acknowledged that he did not know about it until recently.
"He became aware of it over the last several days," McClellan said. Asked if Bush did not know about it until it was a done deal, McClellan said, "That's correct." He said the matter did not rise to the presidential level, but went through a congressionally-mandated review process and was determined not to pose a national security threat.


If Bush didn't know about the "Port Deal" approved by his Administration, why is Bush vowing to Veto on something he knows nothing about? This smacks of incompetence. Bush always hide behind he didn't know when he gets daily briefings of important nws of the hour and dayand he does warrantless wiretappings.

Failure of Bush

With failing Social Security, With failing Border security, with failing Homeland Security, and now failing Port security; no wonder we all are feeling insecure.

Joran on Good Morning America

Feb. 22, 2006 — In an exclusive interview with ABC News' Chris Cuomo for "Primetime," Joran Van der Sloot, the Dutch teen seen with American Natalee Holloway the night she disappeared from Aruba in May, said he planned to have sex with her when they left a bar together.
"We were planning on going to my house, because she said she wanted to go to my house," he said. "My intention was to take her to the house to have sex with her."
But the couple did not end up sleeping together, he said. "I asked her if she wanted to have sex, and she was fine with it," he said. "I didn't have a condom with me though in my wallet, and I won't have sex with a girl without a condom."
The full interview airs Thursday at 10 p.m. ET on "Primetime."


Holloway, who was visiting Aruba on a school trip, met van der Sloot at a casino the night she disappeared. How they met and what went on between them has been the focus of endless speculation by officials and Holloway's friends and family.
Holloway sat at a blackjack table with van der Sloot in a casino the night she disappeared, according to a videotape obtained exclusively by ABC News from a confidential source. The tape shows grainy images of the two — along with a group of Holloway's friends — at the Excelsior Casino on what may have been the last night of her life.
"I sat down there and within five minutes, there was a group of girls from the Mountain Brook school that came up to me and sat down next to me and they wanted to play as well," van der Sloot told Cuomo. "They'd already been drinking that day and had drinks with them. We played blackjack for a while, and I told them whether or not to hit."
A Night on the Beach
Later that night, Holloway was seen leaving Carlos 'n Charlies with vabn der Sloot, who said she did not seem drunk, though she had been drinking.
"She didn't seem drunk," he said. "She seemed like she drank a lot, but there's a difference between someone being absolutely drunk and someone … actually having had a couple drinks."

read more here http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/story?id=1648218&page=1

Watch The Republicans

Bush has been dreadfully wrong on so many things but he wasn't wrong alone or on his own. The Republican controlled Congress allowed this President to spiral out of control by not stopping him in his tracks. Now the Republicans are going to oppose him on the ports to score points for reelection. Think of the ramifications if these Republicans are reelected. Think what else they will allow Bush to do and Cheney to hide.

Think People.

Republicans played on our fears of terrorism and Bush needed to do warrantless wiretapping to catch the terrorists while our borders remained unsecured. Republicans DRUMMED in our brains they were tough on terrorism. Are they?

Think People

Bush Says He Found Out About The Port Deal Late

I am sick and tire of Bush saying he "just" found about about something critical. For heaven's sake, he is doing warrantless wiretapping. He found out about 9/11, LATE. He found out about Katrina, LATE. He found out about Cheney shooting a man in the face, LATE.

We have Bush as a president but we are finding out how dumb and ignorant he is, LATE.

Bush Threatens Veto Against Bid To Stop Port Deal

President Bush yesterday strongly defended an Arab company's attempt to take over the operation of seaports in Baltimore and five other cities, threatening a veto if Congress tries to kill a deal his administration has blessed.
Facing a sharp bipartisan backlash, Bush took the unusual step of summoning reporters to the front of Air Force One to condemn efforts to block a firm from the United Arab Emirates from purchasing the rights to manage ports that include those in New York and New Orleans.

The Bush administration recently approved the sale of a London-based company that currently manages the ports to state-run Dubai Ports World. The deal has raised alarms on Capitol Hill and with the Republican governors of Maryland and New York. Critics note that the United Arab Emirates has been a home base for terrorists.
The federal government has approval rights over business transactions with national security implications. In this case, Dubai Ports World would handle shipping arrivals, departures, unloading at the docks and many security-related functions. The federal government would oversee those security operations.
"I want those who are questioning it to step up and explain why all of a sudden a Middle Eastern company is held to a different standard than a [British] company," Bush told reporters.
He said the transaction was thoroughly scrutinized by administration officials, who concluded that it poses no threat to national security. He praised the United Arab Emirates as a close ally against terrorism and warned of sending the wrong message to the world by condemning a business just because it is Arab-owned.
But many Republicans and Democrats who represent the seaport regions remain deeply skeptical of a UAE-owned company playing such a central role at some of the most sensitive entry points in the country. They noted that some of the hijackers involved in the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks used the United Arab Emirates as an operational and financial hub.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) and Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) called on Bush to delay the takeover and reevaluate the security risk. Frist threatened to introduce legislation to delay the takeover if Bush does not act quickly.
Rep. Mark Foley (R-Fla.) called Bush politically tone-deaf. "Of all the bills to veto, if he lays down this gauntlet, he'll probably have 350 members of the House ready to accept that challenge," Foley said.
Bush welcomed the fight. "They ought to look at the facts and understand the consequences of what they're going to do," Bush said. "But if they pass a law, I'll deal with it, with a veto."
In a 20-minute airborne news conference en route to the White House from Colorado, Bush also dared opponents to try to make a political issue of the new Medicare prescription drug benefit -- Democrats call it a bureaucratic fiasco -- and said the newly elected Hamas leadership of the Palestinian Authority can expect no U.S. financial support until it formally recognizes Israel's right to exist. Hamas is formally known as the Islamic Resistance Movement.
But Bush's purpose in calling reporters to his front cabin was clearly to assuage the growing concerns raised by his Republican allies over the port issue.
In recent days, Hastert and other GOP leaders had sent word to the White House that conservative lawmakers and voters are furious over the notion that a country with terrorism links -- even if indirect ones -- would be managing U.S. seaports. On C-SPAN, Fox News and conservative talk radio, Republicans from across the country are criticizing Bush with an intensity rarely seen by this White House.
Maryland Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R) went to Dundalk yesterday to discuss the deal with leaders of the labor union that represents port workers and to issue a warning. "Job one is public safety," Ehrlich said, calling it "paramount during a time of war, a terror war, a nontraditional war."
Ehrlich stopped short of saying he would seek to have Maryland, which controls the Baltimore port, break its contracts to scuttle the deal. He said more review of the deal is needed.
On Capitol Hill, Republicans and Democrats rushed throughout the day to endorse a plan to impose a 45-day review of the purchase. "If the president insists on using his first veto on this bill, Congress should give him the opportunity to do so," said Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), who, along with Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), has promised legislation to ban firms owned by foreign governments from controlling operations at U.S. ports.
Republicans who had previously spoken out against the port deal appeared just as undeterred. "I'm not changing my mind," said Rep. Vito Fossella (N.Y.), who said a legislative showdown now appears inevitable. "The momentum is there. The genie is out of the bottle."
GOP leaders are also fuming that they had not been consulted on an issue with such obvious political implications. "It's strange that the administration didn't consult Congress," a Republican leadership aide said. "They might not have had to, but it was going to be a big deal on Capitol Hill. To not know that is mystifying."
Minutes after the president's veto threat came to the GOP leadership's attention, Hastert sent a letter to Bush calling for "an immediate moratorium" on the deal and a more thorough administration review.
"Finally, this proposal may require additional Congressional action in order to ensure that we are fully protecting Americans at home," Hastert wrote.
Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John W. Warner (R-Va.) said last night that he will convene his panel today for a public briefing to be led by Deputy Treasury Secretary Robert M. Kimmitt and five other administration officials involved in the security review of the deal. Warner was briefed yesterday by Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and Marine Corps Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. The senator said he was satisfied that proper procedures were followed on the deal.
But he said he would withhold judgment on the deal's national security implications until after today's briefing. The United Arab Emirates provides docking rights for more U.S. Navy ships than any other nation in the region, Warner noted. He added: "If they say they have not been treated fairly in this, we run the risk of them pulling back some of that support at a critical time of the war."
The deal has already passed muster with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, a secretive 12-member board that includes Cabinet members and White House officials. The panel operates behind closed doors, with little or no consultation with Congress.

Joran, Darth Vader's Brother

You been served Joran. Read them and weep.