Update on the Dubaiya Ports Debacle

As surely as winter follows fall, the sorry truth about the security review of Dubai Ports World would eventually come out -- and would be yet another black eye for an administration that has been criminally negligent when it comes to homeland security.

The Bush administration, in defending the controversial deal under which United Arab Emirates-owned DPW would manage six major U.S. ports, had called the review thorough and by the book, and asserted that there was no security threat.

But Sen. Susan Collins, the Republican chairwoman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, told a very different story yesterday in calling the review "truly flawed."

Collins disclosed a Coast Guard report on DP World's impending purchase of P&O, the British-based operator the ports, that stated:

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

"I know the administration disagrees," Collins said, "But I can only conclude that there was a rush to judgment -- that there wasn't the kind of painstaking, thorough analysis that needed to be done despite serious questions being raised, and despite the wide variety of involvement by agencies."

And I can only conclude that business and politics once again trumped homeland security.

Oh, what a friend we have in George Bush. Christ Almighty, what a pal.

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Kevin Drum at Washington Monthly offers this insight on why Bush has not backed down:

As for why George Bush has defended the deal, one hardly has to resort to paeans to his open-minded humanity to figure this out. I don't think Bush is a bigot, but the reason he stuck to his guns on the port deal is because his first instinct is always to stick to his guns. When Bush is attacked, he attacks back, whether he knows anything about the issue at hand or not. Anyone who hasn't figured that out after five years of Bush watching really does need to go back to school, and not just for a refresher in elementary arithmetic.