Dubai Syndrome
By Siddique Malik
www.spreadfreedom.com
The DPW (Dubai Port World) debacle is a symptom
of the leadership-deficit in America.
The issue basically falls in the domain of globalization,
an epochal process to which the world public opinion
has not fully adjusted. Most of the American legislators
seemed (or they pretended to be) as devoid of
analytical acumen required to fathom this process
as the hooligans who appear at the sites of the
WTO (World Trade Organization) or the WEF (World
Economic Forum) meetings. Although, during the
recent DPW deliberations, the halls of Congress
did not witness stone throwing and smoke canister
burning, the intellectual equivalents of this
recklessness abound.
Shallowness of the legislators’ approach
towards the DPW deal was obvious from its consequence
of making the man who pulled America out of the
Kyoto agreement, emerge as an international statesman
and a friend of globalization. What a travesty?
Change is a painful and frightening process. Europe’s
unions and their spoiled members are paranoid
over globalization and the prospect of having
to earn a paycheck rather than simply collecting
it. The late Pierre Elliot Trudeau, the legendary
Canadian prime minister was a political genius
who gave his country the most precious asset a
country can have - a democratic constitution.
But over the decades, he and his Liberal Party
also instilled enough Socialistic lethargy in
Canadian workers to make them fear globalization
and abhor open competition. Globalization has
caused American unions and workers their own adjustment
pains.
When the Third World workers who are already mired
in a multi-tentacle misery, see their Western
counterparts scream murder over globalization,
they join the unfortunate chorus. Therefore, today,
whether the WTO or WEF meets in Asia, Europe,
or North America, the protesters follow the same
script of agitation. Fear has a universal language.
The result is a worldwide gross misunderstanding
of a great objective of the modern times, a quota
less world free of customs duties in which the
entire global market will be open to every country.
Try to grasp this awesome prospect.
If given the chance to unfold uninterruptedly,
this monumental concept has the potential of equally
distributing wealth from the posh suburbs of Seattle
to the mud huts of Sui, a dirt town in a Pakistani
territory that sits over one of the biggest natural
gas reserves in the world but is so undeveloped
and so backward that its people must endure 60C
heat without electricity, and often die of scorpion
bites because even basic medical facilities do
not exist. Under these circumstances, try sending
your children to school, if you can find one.
Sui is located in the Pakistani province of Balochistan
that borders with Afghanistan that not too long
ago was the home of terrorism. The stakes involved
in the failure or success of globalization should
thus be clear to everyone, certainly to the US
lawmakers who scuttled the DPW transaction in
the name of national security. Sui is just one
example of the mismanagement with which the Third
World is marred, and of which terrorism is just
a by-product.
Since the tragedy of 9/11, fear has become a convenient
methodology in America, too. Fear is socially
and politically degenerative but it is a powerful
tool that comes in handy for politicians who lack
the intellect to appeal to and/or the charisma
to excite their compatriots. Fear can get you
elected and re-elected, enable you to start a
war, and/or help you amass and abuse power. It
is lucky for you but unlucky for the country that
in such a situation, those whose duty it is to
resist autocratic tendencies share your ‘frightening’
skills.
True war presidents have wars thrust upon them,
and they lead the nation to victory with the power
of hope. No war president started a war because
he wanted to be a war president. Moreover, great
leaders don’t need to constantly brag about
their imaginary visions. Einstein didn’t
have to stand at the street corners and constantly
remind passersby that he created the theory of
relativity.
Enter the legislators of the world’s strongest
democracy
Instead of resisting and debunking the fear based
techniques, the US legislators decided to use
these to turn the table on the administration,
because they had seen the effectiveness of these
tactics. The image of America’s ports coming
under the control of Arabs carried a great fear
factor, and the lackadaisical legislators moved
in for the political kill.
Republican legislators, nervous about the upcoming
mid-term elections, jumped on the fear bandwagon.
After all, they are the ‘pioneers’
in this field. All these politicians (Republicans
and Democrats alike) knew the reality surrounding
the DPW deal that it in no way would have endangered
America’s national security. Yet, their
blind dependence upon opinion polls rendered them
unable to courageously stand by the reality.
General public does not have the time, energy
and resources to conduct an in-depth study of
various issues. This is why in a democratic dispensation,
the people elect and pay the legislators; to lead
and help evolve the public opinion, and to present
issues to the people in a simple and brief form,
not to confuse them and/or lie to them. The arguments
used by the legislators against the DPW deal were
noting but malicious lies. The deal did not amount
to transferring America’s sovereignty to
Dubai as some legislators argued.
Instead of reassuring the public, the legislators
concluded that aggravating its anxieties was more
beneficial for their political future, hence the
baseless hoopla. Even Senator Hillary Clinton
(D-NY) who currently has the highest approval
ratings within the Democratic Party as its possible
2008 presidential candidate could not resist the
temptation. What to expect from her fellow Democrats
who are way down on the list of approval ratings?
However, one predicts that time will tell that
Senator Clinton has made a colossal error of judgment.
One tends to believe that the speed of the rise
of the DPW issue was a ploy by the Republican
strategists to create material they would later
use to torpedo her presidential ambitions and
her prospective presidential campaign. She walked
right into the trap.
Her conduct over the DPW issue would be used to
tarnish her leadership abilities. Honesty, it
does explain why she did not have the courage
to vote against the Iraq war. True leaders confront
difficult issues with the power of their argumentative
abilities based on their courage and their commitment
to honesty and truth. They don’t surrender
to fear but confront it.
As President Roosevelt said, “You have nothing
to fear but fear, itself”. Obviously, there
is a big difference between the iconic leadership
of the man who led America during the WWII and
today’s sound-bite politicians. A democracy
without great politicians is like an orphan who
has wealth but no love.
The reason the Republican Party successfully exploited
fear in the 2002 and the 2004 elections was the
Democratic Party’s dwarf behavior. When
the 2003 Iraq war was in the offing, the would-be
2004 Democratic presidential candidate, Senator
John Kerry and his would-be running mate Senator
John Edwards were opposed to this war. Yet, they
did not have the courage to vote against it because
they thought it would make them look weak during
the upcoming presidential electioneering. Taking
a stand based on one’s convictions (no matter
how unpopular) never makes one look weak; surrendering
to fear does. By this surrender, Kerry and Edwards
practically neutralized the biggest issue on which
they could have mounted a strong challenge to
President Bush.
Senator Clinton would carry the same baggage of
intellectual cowardice in 2008, as did Kerry and
Edwards in 2004. To this baggage, she has added
an image of intellectual dishonesty, already an
area in which she and her husband have always
been made to look vulnerable by Clinton haters.
They made Kerry, a brave Vietnam veteran with
a Purple Heart look, like an absconder and a deserter.
What does Clinton think they are going to do to
her over her DPW dereliction, if she runs in 2008?
One can almost see a variation of the “I
voted for it before I voted against it”
clip that was incessantly used to destroy the
Kerry campaign in 2004.
In the end, even the declaration by the DPW that
it would divest itself of the American portion
of its business was not good enough for the legislators
gone berserk. Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY) indicated
that he would like to keep the issue open, but
he revealed a lot about his mentality and that
of his colleagues when he said that Democrats
smelled victory over the DPW issue. It was all
about partisanship, not what was best for the
country, a terrible dereliction of duty.
Contrary to the image projected by the legislators,
the DPW transaction would have benefited America.
First of all, it would have been another step
in the direction of globalization. It would have
brought America closer to the United Arab Emirates
(UAE), a country with Muslim majority. As this
deal fizzled out, globalization took a beating,
as did America’s already shaky image in
the Muslim World.
Generally, Democrats’ political senses are
so unsynchronized with reality that one may state
that Senator Schumer must have smelled something
else when he thought he smelled victory.
In a democracy, political victory (or defeat)
comes on the day, the sovereign goes to polls,
not over a routine business transaction that in
today’s global village should normally be
an apolitical affair.
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