Captain Compassion <daranc@NOSPAMverizon.net> wrote:

Dubai Deal's Collapse Prompts Fears Abroad on Trade With U.S.

Yes, leftist racism HAS hurt us abroad ...

Captain Compassion <daranc@NOSPAMverizon.net> wrote:

Dubai Deal's Collapse Prompts Fears Abroad on Trade With U.S.

Yes, leftist racism HAS hurt us abroad ...

On Fri, 10 Mar 2006 10:28:10 -0800, Captain Compassion
<daranc@NOSPAMverizon.net> wrote:

Dubai Deal's Collapse Prompts Fears Abroad on Trade With U.S.
By EDUARDO PORTER
Published: March 10, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/10/business/worldbusiness/10chill.html?hp&ex=1142053200&en=f63240f56ab349b8&ei=5094&partner=homepage

I am afraid of a bigger problem. A recent poll showed half of us
REPORT a negative attitude toward Islam.

We are basically pretty darned stupid about muslims and their
religion. Most of us view muslims as little Bin Ladens I think,
unaware that muslims are mostly pretty much like other people.

To me it feels like we are in the process Germany must have gone
through as they developed anti-semitic attitudes. Soon the bigotry got
so widespread it lead to their ruin.

The attitudes toward the port deal are an example.

And that means Bin Laden is certain to win the "war"

Because the "war" is really a war for the hearts and minds of muslims.

Maybe the dishonest attack on Iraq doomed us, and maybe our brutality
in prisons and in Fallujah, which got massive coverage in other parts
of the world though we blacked it out on our media, sealed our loss.

But since we increasingly hate them, and view them in an ignorant,
bigotted way, we are going to push them away rather than pull them
toward us. And even if we had a prayer of a chance for victory,
despite our brutal, dishonest attack on Iraq, it's gone now, I fear.

The Dubai deal shows that we are disfunctional, no longer able to do
what's in our own best interests.

We have real friends in the heart of the middle east, and manage to
alienate even them.

We are done for - stick us with a fork.

Bin Laden has won, and can have his victory parade now.

Getting our troops out, and getting the pro-US billionaires out, is
just a detail which shouldn't take too long.

DP World's decision yesterday to transfer a handful of American port
terminals, rather than chilling interest in investing in the United
States, may actually have made it safer for foreigners by relieving
some of the political pressure that was building up against them.

But as part of a pattern of other antiforeign actions in Washington,
fears remain that the United States is becoming a less welcoming place
for investment from overseas.

"We need a net inflow of capital of $3 billion a day to keep the
economy afloat," said Clyde V. Prestowitz Jr., a former trade official
in the Reagan administration who is president of the Economic Strategy
Institute. "Yet all of the body language here is 'go away.' "

At least initially, those who support increased globalization were
relieved that Dubai appears to have backed away from a confrontation
with Congress.

"It is our hope that this relieves some of the political pressure,"
said Nancy McLernon, senior vice president of the Organization for
International Investment, a lobbying group in Washington representing
the United States subsidiaries of foreign multinationals.

"People were starting to question the benefits of foreign investment,"
she said. "We haven't seen this since the Japanese bought the
Rockefeller Center."

DP World's takeover was a special case: a state-owned company from the
Middle East buying a sensitive American asset. Most multinationals
that invest in the United States come from Western industrial
democracies and are unlikely to be subject to such scrutiny.

The flap over the ports acquisition alone is unlikely to make a
consequential dent in foreign investment flows into the country, most
economists agree.

"I don't think this is going to have a major effect on capital flows
into the United States," said Ben Stapleton, a partner specializing in
mergers and acquisitions at the law firm Sullivan & Cromwell in New
York. "It will just affect a deal at the margin every once in a
while."

Indeed, while protectionist sentiment in Congress is never far from
the surface, so far it has done little to damage the intricate web of
cross-border business deals that are going on just about every day.
Last summer, animosity against the effort by a state-owned Chinese oil
company to buy the American oil company Unocal helped force China to
retreat. But there has been no letup in investment flows into the
United States in its wake.

Foreign companies plowed $38.8 billion worth of direct investment into
the United States in the third quarter of last year, according to
government statistics, more than two and a half times the amount
recorded in the second quarter and roughly 9 percent more than in the
period in 2004.

Foreign investment in American financial markets is even stronger.
Last year, capital flows into Treasury bonds, equities in American
companies and other securities totaled more than $1 trillion, 14
percent more than in 2004. Much of it came from China and the Middle
East.

Some economists argue that it is good that foreign investment in
sensitive areas be subject to more scrutiny.

"There are some assets that are absolutely essential to U.S. security
and today's action reflects the House and Senate actually drawing a
line," said Robert E. Scott, a senior economist and trade specialist
at the liberal Economic Policy Institute.

"The question," he added, "is whether or not this is going to be a
one-time event or whether we are going to look more carefully at
foreign acquisitions, particularly in the military sector."

But some analysts warn that further political hostility against
foreign companies buying American assets could boomerang against the
United States.

"I think it is very dangerous to enter a new world in which every
purchase of an American asset by a foreign entity is scrutinized by
the government," said Kevin Hassett, director of economic policies at
the conservative American Enterprise Institute in Washington.

"It could make U.S. assets less attractive to foreign buyers because
they wonder whether there will be potential future buyers if they
decide later to sell what they have purchased."

Some observers worry that nationalist sentiment seems to be on the
rise not just in the United States but in other prosperous countries
where economic anxieties are present.

The attempt by Mittal Steel, a European company headed by an Indian
executive who lives in London, to buy Arcelor, a Luxembourg steel
company with many workers in France, is coming under intense scrutiny.

In Britain, officials have worried over the interest of Gazprom, the
Russian government-controlled oil monopoly, in the British gas company
Centrica.

"It may be well part of a global backlash against globalization," said
Michael Grenfell, a partner at the law firm Norton Rose in London.
"America could usually be relied on to champion free trade. If that
changes, things could get quite chilly."

In the United States, the political flap over the ports deal is still
not over. Ms. McLernon noted that members of Congress had submitted
some two dozen bills in the last few weeks aimed at changing the
review process for foreign investment. Many, without being specific,
could end up blocking all kinds of deals.

A bill submitted in the House by Duncan Hunter, Republican of
California, and H. James Saxton, a Republican from New Jersey, for
example, would bar foreign-controlled concerns from buying any company
that operated "critical infrastructure," which could include
everything from water and energy companies to those involved in
telecommunications.

"It's almost certain that one or another of those bills will pass,"
Mr. Prestowitz said. "The question is whether it will have sufficient
votes to override a veto by the president."

On Fri, 10 Mar 2006 10:28:10 -0800, Captain Compassion
<daranc@NOSPAMverizon.net> wrote:

Dubai Deal's Collapse Prompts Fears Abroad on Trade With U.S.
By EDUARDO PORTER
Published: March 10, 2006
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/10/business/worldbusiness/10chill.html?hp&ex=1142053200&en=f63240f56ab349b8&ei=5094&partner=homepage

I am afraid of a bigger problem. A recent poll showed half of us
REPORT a negative attitude toward Islam.

We are basically pretty darned stupid about muslims and their
religion. Most of us view muslims as little Bin Ladens I think,
unaware that muslims are mostly pretty much like other people.

To me it feels like we are in the process Germany must have gone
through as they developed anti-semitic attitudes. Soon the bigotry got
so widespread it lead to their ruin.

The attitudes toward the port deal are an example.

And that means Bin Laden is certain to win the "war"

Because the "war" is really a war for the hearts and minds of muslims.

Maybe the dishonest attack on Iraq doomed us, and maybe our brutality
in prisons and in Fallujah, which got massive coverage in other parts
of the world though we blacked it out on our media, sealed our loss.

But since we increasingly hate them, and view them in an ignorant,
bigotted way, we are going to push them away rather than pull them
toward us. And even if we had a prayer of a chance for victory,
despite our brutal, dishonest attack on Iraq, it's gone now, I fear.

The Dubai deal shows that we are disfunctional, no longer able to do
what's in our own best interests.

We have real friends in the heart of the middle east, and manage to
alienate even them.

We are done for - stick us with a fork.

Bin Laden has won, and can have his victory parade now.

Getting our troops out, and getting the pro-US billionaires out, is
just a detail which shouldn't take too long.

DP World's decision yesterday to transfer a handful of American port
terminals, rather than chilling interest in investing in the United
States, may actually have made it safer for foreigners by relieving
some of the political pressure that was building up against them.

But as part of a pattern of other antiforeign actions in Washington,
fears remain that the United States is becoming a less welcoming place
for investment from overseas.

"We need a net inflow of capital of $3 billion a day to keep the
economy afloat," said Clyde V. Prestowitz Jr., a former trade official
in the Reagan administration who is president of the Economic Strategy
Institute. "Yet all of the body language here is 'go away.' "

At least initially, those who support increased globalization were
relieved that Dubai appears to have backed away from a confrontation
with Congress.

"It is our hope that this relieves some of the political pressure,"
said Nancy McLernon, senior vice president of the Organization for
International Investment, a lobbying group in Washington representing
the United States subsidiaries of foreign multinationals.

"People were starting to question the benefits of foreign investment,"
she said. "We haven't seen this since the Japanese bought the
Rockefeller Center."

DP World's takeover was a special case: a state-owned company from the
Middle East buying a sensitive American asset. Most multinationals
that invest in the United States come from Western industrial
democracies and are unlikely to be subject to such scrutiny.

The flap over the ports acquisition alone is unlikely to make a
consequential dent in foreign investment flows into the country, most
economists agree.

"I don't think this is going to have a major effect on capital flows
into the United States," said Ben Stapleton, a partner specializing in
mergers and acquisitions at the law firm Sullivan & Cromwell in New
York. "It will just affect a deal at the margin every once in a
while."

Indeed, while protectionist sentiment in Congress is never far from
the surface, so far it has done little to damage the intricate web of
cross-border business deals that are going on just about every day.
Last summer, animosity against the effort by a state-owned Chinese oil
company to buy the American oil company Unocal helped force China to
retreat. But there has been no letup in investment flows into the
United States in its wake.

Foreign companies plowed $38.8 billion worth of direct investment into
the United States in the third quarter of last year, according to
government statistics, more than two and a half times the amount
recorded in the second quarter and roughly 9 percent more than in the
period in 2004.

Foreign investment in American financial markets is even stronger.
Last year, capital flows into Treasury bonds, equities in American
companies and other securities totaled more than $1 trillion, 14
percent more than in 2004. Much of it came from China and the Middle
East.

Some economists argue that it is good that foreign investment in
sensitive areas be subject to more scrutiny.

"There are some assets that are absolutely essential to U.S. security
and today's action reflects the House and Senate actually drawing a
line," said Robert E. Scott, a senior economist and trade specialist
at the liberal Economic Policy Institute.

"The question," he added, "is whether or not this is going to be a
one-time event or whether we are going to look more carefully at
foreign acquisitions, particularly in the military sector."

But some analysts warn that further political hostility against
foreign companies buying American assets could boomerang against the
United States.

"I think it is very dangerous to enter a new world in which every
purchase of an American asset by a foreign entity is scrutinized by
the government," said Kevin Hassett, director of economic policies at
the conservative American Enterprise Institute in Washington.

"It could make U.S. assets less attractive to foreign buyers because
they wonder whether there will be potential future buyers if they
decide later to sell what they have purchased."

Some observers worry that nationalist sentiment seems to be on the
rise not just in the United States but in other prosperous countries
where economic anxieties are present.

The attempt by Mittal Steel, a European company headed by an Indian
executive who lives in London, to buy Arcelor, a Luxembourg steel
company with many workers in France, is coming under intense scrutiny.

In Britain, officials have worried over the interest of Gazprom, the
Russian government-controlled oil monopoly, in the British gas company
Centrica.

"It may be well part of a global backlash against globalization," said
Michael Grenfell, a partner at the law firm Norton Rose in London.
"America could usually be relied on to champion free trade. If that
changes, things could get quite chilly."

In the United States, the political flap over the ports deal is still
not over. Ms. McLernon noted that members of Congress had submitted
some two dozen bills in the last few weeks aimed at changing the
review process for foreign investment. Many, without being specific,
could end up blocking all kinds of deals.

A bill submitted in the House by Duncan Hunter, Republican of
California, and H. James Saxton, a Republican from New Jersey, for
example, would bar foreign-controlled concerns from buying any company
that operated "critical infrastructure," which could include
everything from water and energy companies to those involved in
telecommunications.

"It's almost certain that one or another of those bills will pass,"
Mr. Prestowitz said. "The question is whether it will have sufficient
votes to override a veto by the president."