Look, pally, I explicitly said "as far as I can tell’ in my OP. I don’t know that there isn’t any concern about this stuff overseas, I’m asking why I can’t seem to find any and if there actually is any. And, I’d like to explore the different reactions we’re seeing to this deal in the US vs Germany/France/UK/etc. I’ve made no sweeping claims in my OP, I’ve drawn no conclusions. I’m trying to learn hear, not preach.
Have you heard of this thing called “Google”? 
Here’s an Isreali site:
Australian
I realize these aren’t exactly what you are talking about, but there are so many damn hits on this (**7,810,000 ** by my search), how do you know? And, of course, some sites would be in Walloon, French, or other languages. And, the USA dominates World news, of course, and especially it dominates Google hits.
Thus, I think your OP is incorrect. Sorry, you are presupposing a fact which is not in evidence.
But when you have read all 7 million sites, plus those in foriegn languages, do come back. With or without pie.
Related item: 2002 Letter shows Al-Qaeda infiltrated UAE government
Not asking for a negative to be proven, are we? And in case you hadn’t noticed, there’s agreement in this thread from various Europeans that the fuss about DPW has been an American-only affair.
So, are the British up in arms over this. Or the French of the Germans or the Australians? That’s what this thread is about, if you remember.
Don’t worry about Hentor. He thinks he’s getting back at me for something I did to him in another thread. Frankly, I’m not going to play that game with him. And he shouldn’t have played it with me if he really thought that was what I was doing (which I wasn’t).
No. Why would you think that? A simple poll would tell you what the level of concern or apathy was.
It is very much simpler than John Mace’s demand in another thread that I do a comprehensive cataloging and statistical analysis of all news sources to determine if they are failing to do their job and if that has changed over time. Oddly, he was just fine with my promise to hold him to his empirical standard at the time. Little did I think it would take less than a day for him to be hoist on his own petard.
As for his innocent claim to simply be seeking answers in this thread, I would point out that the title and the OP present the apathy of the rest of the world to the issue as fact, and seek answers as to why this is, not whether it exists. The OP in fact provides no consideration as to the possibility that this apathy might be fiction.
I was perfectly able to understand that much of what gets posted here is in the form of opinion. John Mace felt compelled to raise a snit about objectivity and empiricism versus opinion regarding my offerings in another thread. He either complies with that standard or is a hypocrite. Simple enough.
Not to mention the Forum. If he had wanted an answer, he could have just asked the question in-of all the strange places - General Questions. Clearly, to me, he didn’t want an Answer, he wanted a Debate. However, as I said, his basic supposition in his OP is unproven, and doubtful. I cheerfully admit that the US concerns are getting a LOT more news coverage, Worldwide. So do US Elections, but that doesn’t mean the Belgians don’t have their very own elections.
Yeah, you’re right. I’m secretly trying to implant subversive ideas into people’s heads by pretending to only be interested in learning about this. Clearly if I wanted honest answers, I would’ve first openned a GQ thread to solicit straigh GQ-type answers. Maybe something like this: DP World ports deal: Any other countries concerned?
Yes, just like that!
My biggest problem with this whole thing is that the U.S. is damn lousy at picking friends. We picked Pinochet, Batista, Marcos, The Shaw, and Saddam Hussein. Our track record just isn’t that good. It’s possible the UAE has the most stable government in the region. The problem is that just isn’t saying that much. It seems to me that if the UAE were to topple, it won’t be people that like us that take over the government. The new, and most likely hostile, government would have instant total access to maps and information about a very large set of arteries to our economy.
I realise that we are supposed to be in charge of the security of the ports, and whoever owns it are supposed to follow all our rules. There sure just seems to be a whole lot of supposed tos that we are stuck relying on to have any comfort about this situation.
I have one other little problem with the ability of this administration to plan for anything harder than a best case senario.
Did you have anything to add to this debate, which is about how other countries are reacting to DPW taking over terminal operations in their countries?
Hentor’s clearly never going to be happy, because he’s got some personal axe to grind, but I’m telling you as fact that the issue is being reported as one specific to the USA, and that there is no controversy about DWP taking over British ports. Yesterday, the business section of the biggest-selling broadsheet newspaper had a splash article about it, barely mentioning non-US ports. (Note, also, it’s in the business section - it’s simply not become a ‘big news’ topic.)
Just out of curiosity, do you know how big this thing is in the US? Congress is considering passing a law specifically to kill this deal. Everyone is just going nuts over this.
…as far as this New Zealander is concerned, the apathy is absolutely not fiction. My brother is as anti-Bush Administration as you probably could get in our nation, and he doesn’t know what the fuss is about. Management Contracts change place every day over here: and when they do, they normally end up on the business pages, not the front page. I’ve argued in this thread, , that many of the lessons from 9/11 have not been heeded. Despite my feelings about the Bush Admin and their conduct on the War Against Terror, I personally see no problem with the Ports deal.
John, this one has been asked and answered.
The goverment and media of the USA has spent the last four plus years working the citizenry into a panic that ‘Terrists are gonna git you’.
Because of that, those publically opposed to the deal can score points, either against the Administration or, in some cases, financial points for a contributor.
Forces in the USA have been seeding the ground with terrorist paranoia for quite some time - and now you’re surprised that a minor inconvenience has backfired against them?
-Joe
So, what you’re saying is that no one really has a good reason to oppose this deal. Is that it? Do you oppose this deal?
Besides Bush’s playing the 9/11 card at every turn (which the rest of the world hasn’t had to put up with - lucky them), I think tschild brought up a practical consideration for our needing to think of this in different terms from our European allies (“Old” and “New” alike ;)), at least:
[QUOTE=tschild]
[li]security and immigration considerations tend to concentrate less on the border than they seem to in the US (e.g. the U.S. practice where immigration control is strict at the border and almost nonexistent within the country looks a bit strange to me). [/li][/QUOTE]
If a country’s internal policing/security is stronger, then less stringent attention to the borders is warranted. But in the U.S., once you get past the border, your encounters with any sort of police or security personnel are going to be minimal to nonexistent unless you do something to attract attention. So border security is paramount.
Unlike many of our representatives (as well as SDMB posters) I don’t pretend to understand the deal well enough to make a judgement.
However, it’s plain enough to see that the arrows thrown by the goose are being thrown back by the gander. Too frickin’ bad. If Dubya is going to use paranoia to justify…well, just about anything, really, I’m not going to have a lot of sympathy when his Oil Overlords get incovenienced by the paranoia they spent so much time nurturing.
-Joe