Bill Clinton helped Dubai on ports deal

Oh the horror from the left.

Bill Clinton, former US president, advised top officials from Dubai two weeks ago on how to address growing US concerns over the acquisition of five US container terminals by DP World.

It came even as his wife, Senator Hillary Clinton, was leading efforts to derail the deal.

Mr Clinton, who this week called the United Arab Emirates a “good ally to America”, advised Dubai’s leaders to propose a 45-day delay to allow for an intensive investigation of the acquisition, according to his spokesman.


Ports backlash makes Arab investors wary

On Sunday, DP World agreed with the White House to undertake the lengthy review, a move which has assuaged some of the opposition from the US Congress.

However, Mrs Clinton remains a leading voice against the deal, and this week proposed legislation to block it, arguing that the US could not afford to “surrender our port operations to foreign governments”.


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Mr Clinton’s spokesman said: “President Clinton is the former president of the US and as such receives many calls from world leaders and leading figures every week. About two weeks ago, the Dubai leaders called him and he suggested that they submit to the full and regular scrutiny process and that they should put maximum safeguards and security into any port proposal.”

He added that Mr Clinton supported his wife’s position on the deal and that “ideally” state-owned companies would not own US port operations.

Mr Clinton’s contact with Dubai on the issue underscores the relationship he has developed with the United Arab Emirates since leaving office. In 2002, he was paid $300,000 (€252,000) to address a summit in Dubai.

The backlash against Dubai’s takeover has seen some lawmakers in Washington highlight the UAE’s alleged role in helping to finance September 11.

 

There you go!!!! I was wondering when Clinton's name will be brought up in this matter

 

man,... would you look at that..

and here I was thinking Clinton wasn't the president anymore.....

 

Bill Clinton ought to register as a foreign agent for Dubai.

 

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Saw on Sky Angel tthat Conservative Cal Thomas is on the same side of argument as MRS Hillary Clinton, me too ;
1[one] of the few times i agree with that combative Hillary ''Jezebel '' Clinton .

 

I just wanted to see the reaction from dodo and z10 who are calling the deal a total Bush disaster when their hero William Jefferson Clinton helped get the deal pushed through.

silence.

 

More on Clinton and Dubai

Where is the outrage????????

WASHINGTON -- While Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton was ripping President Bush's handling of American ports management, Bill Clinton was pushing for one of his favorite White House aides to be hired to defend the deal. The former president proposed to the United Arab Emirates (UAE) his onetime press secretary, Joe Lockhart, as Washington spokesman for the UAE-owned company, Dubai Ports World.

The Lockhart deal was never consummated. But the spectacle of the two Clintons going in opposite directions on the UAE port-management question exposed a Democratic fault line. Widespread public reaction against outsourcing control of the ports was seen by Sen. Clinton and other prominent Democrats as a chance to outflank the Republicans on homeland security in this year's elections. Behind the scenes, however, Democrats aligned with the Clinton family were lobbying for the UAE.

The lineup over the DP World raises questions about how Bill Clinton's free and easy political manner will impact his wife's prospective presidential campaign for 2008. Highly disciplined Hillary Clinton plays politics by the numbers, following a carefully plotted strategy. Her husband's freewheeling, intuitive style was typified when he tried to secure a well-paid assignment for his friend and valued aide, Joe Lockhart, who now heads a Washington-based media firm.


According to well-placed UAE sources, the former president made the suggestion at the very highest level of the oil-rich state. The relationship between him and the UAE is far from casual. The sheikdom has contributed to the Clinton Presidential Library, and brought Clinton to Dubai in 2002 and 2005 for highly paid speeches (reportedly at $300,000 apiece). He was there in 2003 to announce a scholarship program for American students traveling to Dubai.

Certainly, the emirs would pay the closest attention to any request from the former president. Lockhart did confer with DP World officials, but they failed to reach agreement. The UAE sources said that Lockhart's asking price was much too high.

Lockhart did not flatly deny to me that Clinton had made a pitch for him, but instead said he did not know whether the former president was involved. Lockhart said he was recommended by another Clintonite: Carol Browner, the former Environmental Protection Agency chief and now a principal in the Albright Group lobbying firm. Headed by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, the company is representing DP World. Lockhart told me "money was not the problem" as he turned down the offer.

UAE sources, contending that Lockhart priced himself out of the market, asserted there was no question but that Clinton had intervened on his behalf and added it was not possible that Lockhart had not known about his former chief's intervention. When I sought comment from Clinton, his press spokesman, Jay Carson, said: "I don't know for sure, but I don't know him to generate employment even for someone he likes and admires as much as Joe Lockhart."

While Lockhart may have been a bridge too far for DP World, the UAE has reached out to high-priced Washington lobbyists on both sides of the aisle (including Republicans Bob Dole and Vin Weber). Leading the way in putting together the port deal was Jonathan Winer, a leading Democratic lobbyist who spent 10 years as Sen. John Kerry's aide. Winer's associate at the Alston & Bird law firm supporting DP World is Kathryn Marks, who was policy director for then Sen. John Edwards. Former Democratic Rep. Tom Downey, chairman of his own lobbying firm, is also on the Dubai team.

In contrast to Democratic operatives working behind closed doors are Democratic lawmakers attacking the ports deal in the open. Speaking to the Jewish Community Relations Council at Manhattan's 92nd Street YMCA on Sunday, Sen. Clinton went beyond questions of homeland security. She called the Dubai deal "emblematic of a larger problem" of ceding "some of our fiscal sovereignty."

Does that put the Clintons on a collision course? Not exactly. Having failed privately to hook up Lockhart with DP World, the former president publicly turned on his old friends from the UAE last Friday in a speech at Auckland, New Zealand. DP World, he said, "is from UAE, where some of the money from 9/11 was laundered." If Democrats in general are divided publicly and privately on this issue, so is Bill Clinton as an individual.

 

That's because Clinton is not my (and I am pretty sure Z10's) hero, he's a private citizen, that's because we're not interested in his (or Carter's or anyone else's) opinion, that's because we tend to use our own heads and brains which we do have to evaluate controversies as opposed to brain-dead dittoheads blindly following a fearless and resolute leader. The concept of using your head, making your own conclusions and not relying on talking points of your prefered political party is something you'll hardly ever understand.

Besides who knows maybe Clinton is helping "to get the deal pushed through" exactly because it's a total disaster for Bush, imagine the stink the dems will make about it in November 2006 and 2008.

And again you're distorting Clinton's position, he adviced the Dubai leaders to go ahead with "the full and regular scrutiny process" which is exactly what both dems and repugs want and

 

Mega dittos dddooo.



Seriously, can the right wingers ever just let the buck stop at Bush's door, without a focus on Clinton as some defense of what Bush does?

I detest Bush, and believe what he is doing and has done is horrific for America.

Clinton's presidency has nothing to do with it, nor does his ex-presidency.

Hillary actually has some power as a senator, Clinton has none beyond politicking and perhaps influencing some voter's opinions. So what Hilllary does or doesn't do is news, what Bill does now isn't very important in my opinion....unless he is running for some political elected office.