All signs point to some secret deal. Bush announced he would veto any legislation to stop the transaction but today he says he didn’t even know about it until it was a done deal. Why would he now distance himself from something he is willing to use his - until now never used - veto power? Is Bush that out of touch, or, is this a scenario where someone else made the deal (Cheney?) and here is the proof that he just rubber stamps whatever comes across his desk from certain someones? None of this passes the smell test.
“President Bush was unaware of the pending sale of shipping operations at six major U.S. seaports to a state-owned business in the United Arab Emirates until the deal already had been approved by his administration, the White House said Wednesday.
Defending the deal anew, the administration also said that it should have briefed Congress sooner about the transaction, which has triggered a major political backlash among both Republicans and Democrats.
Bush on Tuesday brushed aside objections by leaders in the Senate and House that the $6.8 billion sale could raise risks of terrorism at American ports. In a forceful defense of his administration’s earlier approval of the deal, he pledged to veto any bill Congress might approve to block the agreement involving the sale of a British company to the Arab firm.”
UPDATE: Donald Rumsfeld says he didn’t know either, as Secretary of Defense, Rumsfeld is a member of the Committee on Foreign Investments in the United States. As such, he was one of the people who, according to the Treasury Department, unanimously approved the sale on February 13. How could do that when he didn’t even find out about the sale until last weekend?
