[lbo-talk] Misusing "Racism", was Re: Bush down to 33%; public loves posturingxenophobiccongress

jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net
Fri Mar 17 12:53:16 PST 2006



> ----- Original Message -----
> From: <jthorn65 at sbcglobal.net>
> -So why didn't the Dems try to block the deal when Dubai World Ports bought
> the port operations and
> -shipping terminals of CSX corp last year?
> -Perhaps because they couldn't score points against Bush in doing so?
>
> It seems silly to argue that it's proof that they are racist because they
> didn't attack Dubai last year.
>
> I'm not even sure what your point is, since if there was no government
> action in approval of Dubai's purchase, there's no policy issue to debate.
>
> Nathan Newman

The point is that if the Dems were worried about security as you claim they would have been just as worried about last years CSX deal as this years P&O deal. They were not so we need to look at what other reason besides security would have prompted this years response.

I'm not arguing that the Dems are racist. What is the point in that? I'm arguing that the Dems were pandering to racists in the US with their attacks on the Dubai World Ports deal. This might be OK (the lesser of two evils as it were) if there were clear gains to be made in doing so. There do not appear to be any. The only gain is gotcha points against Bush. This means nothing unless it is turned into concrete results which looks highly unlikely.

I'm not arguing for the Dems to be saints, only that if they are going to pander to racist thought in the US they should have a very clear and concrete gain to be made for doing so. Otherwise they look as foolish as they do in this instance. Pandering to racist ideas is a double edged sword and it is far easier for the Dems to cut themselves with it than hurt the Repubs.

I'm pretty sure you understand all this but either chose to believe it is not important or to pretend that the issue was really about security rather than xenophobia.

John Thornton



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