Missing the point, as usual

I'm on record as criticizing the mainstream opposition to the Dubai ports deal. I've heard some legitimate criticism of the deal but most of it, I've found it nauseating. Particularly that many supposed liberals were so intent on bashing President Bush come heck or high water and of out-demagoging the president on security that they adopted the rhetoric of the nativists and xenophobes against this deal, which was killed. That said...

Friday, President Bush fumed angrily at the rejection.

"I'm concerned about a broader message this issue could send to our friends and allies around the world, particularly in the Middle East," he said. Adding, "In order to win the war on terror we have got to strengthen our friendships and relationships with moderate Arab countries in the Middle East."

He's right, but it's a little late for him to come around to this line of thinking. The war against Iraq has so alienated huge swaths of the Middle East. The idea that a ports management deal between the US government and a sultanate is going to magically rehabilitate his and America's tattered credibility in the region is beyond prepostrous.

"I despised America so much because of their imperialist Crusade in Iraq. But now that they let the sultan of Dubai's company run their ports, I don't hate them nearly as much any more."

It's ludricrous to imagine this conversation happening anywhere.

It's like raping someone and then thinking that doing business with your victim's third cousin twice removed will suddenly absolve you.

If the president really wants to strengthen our friendships and relations with moderate Arab countries in the Middle East, he can apologize for the unprovoked, illegal invasion of Iraq as well as for the instability, chaos, violence and civil war in that country that the aggression has provoked. He can apologize for transforming Iraq from a tyranny of autocracy to a tyranny of chaos.

That would do far more than some technocratic contract to repair the relationships his reckless actions have so thoroughly damaged.