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Sperm Walentis compares Arabs to Brokeback Mountain

In one of the funniest things I have seen today the editor of the Reading Eagle Al “Sperm” Walentis compared the outrage involving the port issue with the United Arab Emirates to the outrage some people had over the movie Brokeback Mountain. Now what the Sperm is trying to do here is portray people in Middle America as bible thumping rednecks that are just racist. Here is the quote from Sperm’s blog about the topic at hand.

Just as you might make a case that an Arab-managed port won’t weaken national security, so, too, can you argue that same-sex marriages are no danger to the republic.

But many in Middle America aren’t always focused on logic. All they care about is that Arabs attacked us on 9/11, that some of those Arabs passed through the United Arab Emirates and that groups associated with al-Qaida moved terror funding through its banking system. And they grow a little woozy when they hear the guy in charge of protecting the heartland, Michael Chertoff, equate national security with a potential chilling effect on world biz, “We have to balance the paramount urgency of security against the fact that we still want to have a robust global trading system.”

And many in Middle America don’t want to hear that same-sex unions should be equal in value under the law. All they care about is protecting the slippery slope from underage or incestuous unions and preserving the traditional institution of marriage as defined by their religious dogma, one man and one woman. And they grow a little woozy when they see two guys snuggling in “Brokeback Mountain.”

First off before I respond to Sperm’s comments I want to add that Sperm is from Shenandoah, PA. Now I have been in that part of the state several times, and is one of those towns considered middle America in my view, and I doubt that the people that reside there share the same views as their hometown hero Sperm Walentis.

Now onto the topic at hand. Sperm states that this whole thing involves hate toward any race that is not white, but Sperm can not be anymore wrong. One thing that has not been brought up in the media is that the United Arab Emirates has a connection to Osama Bin Laden, and cost us a chance to kill him in 1999. The source of this information can be found by downloading the full 9/11 Commission Report at http://www.gpoaccess.gov/911/ then go to page 137 under the subject The Desert Camp February, 1999, and you will find the topic I will be talking about.

To be brief Osama Bin Laden along with the United Arab Emirates were visiting a terrorist Desert Camp in 1999. The CIA aborted the missile attack on the Camp after discovering that members of the United Arab Emirates Royal Family were with Osama Bin Laden. Richard Clarke cornered the United Arab Emirates to urge them to distance themselves from Osama Bin Laden. About a week after that occurrence the Desert Camp is dismantled, and the chance to get Bin Laden was blown for the reason that the United Arab Emirates tipped off Osama Bin Laden.

Now once you read this you can understand why we can not have these people owning our ports at any cost. In my view we should have blown Bin Laden from the face of the earth despite Royal Family members standing by his side. They knew who Bin Laden was, and should face the consequence. Remember when growing up when you parents would tell you to stay away from the bad crowds, because you could get hurt by being involved with the bad crowd? Well that same rule should apply with our National Security as well. Just think about it that 9/11 could have been prevented by just using some common sense.

Bottom line is that if President Bush continues to embrace these people, and want to turn ownership of our ports over the enemy, or veto any attempt by Congress to prevent this from happening, then President Bush should be impeached for treason. There are just some things that you don’t sell, and our ports are one of them. The Republican Party needs to wake up, and return to their agenda of limited government, fiscal responsibility, lower taxes, securing our borders, and an American first economy. If they fail to do that then they deserve their fate this November.

This entry was posted on February 23, 2006 at 10:01 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response or trackback from your own site.

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16 Responses to “Sperm Walentis compares Arabs to Brokeback Mountain”

FP says:
February 24, 2006 at 12:36 am
arabs are caucasian, but that doesn’t mean people aren’t being racist against a company simply because it’s located in the UAE
Matt Heckman says:
February 24, 2006 at 9:25 am
Chris,

Race has nothing to do with it. It is about who these people are, and who they have been involved with. It’s like having your ex-wife for example handling your bank account after your divorce. It does not click. Black, White, Green, or Purple it does not matter, but what matters is their actions, and the 9/11 commission report confirms the actions of these people.

A logical question for you Chris. Michael Moore was very critical of Bush for his involvment with Saudis, and parties involved with 9/11, now should you hold those other parties equally accountable as you hold Bush?
FP says:
February 24, 2006 at 10:01 am
Those other parties? Me? I haven’t done anything. Please don’t use these tactics on me, I see through them. Others don’t, obviously.

Companies and countries are distinct entities. Even so, the UAE is a fairly moderate middle-eastern country. Do we want global trade, or not?
Matt Heckman says:
February 24, 2006 at 11:20 am
Ok Chris,

I want to point out that UAE is not private, but partialy run by the Saudi Government.

Another question for you Chris. Was Michael Moore racist in targeting the Saudis? We all know the Saudi Government had involvment, but yet with all of this UAE business, from Sperm, on down then on the other hand they want to play the race card.

Think about it Chris. Race is not a factor in this.
Anonymous says:
February 24, 2006 at 3:49 pm
Matt, when are you going to run the retraction of your claim that Jim Keller was arrested for drunk driving and assaulting a police officer?
Matt Heckman says:
February 24, 2006 at 4:14 pm
“Matt, when are you going to run the retraction of your claim that Jim Keller was arrested for drunk driving and assaulting a police officer?”

I never made such a claim. You will see that a poster made the claim, and not me, and I responded with Intersting and would look into it to confirm the statement, and it turned out to be false. This is way off topic, and I felt that there is nothing more to be said about it.
Matt Heckman says:
February 24, 2006 at 4:15 pm
I am however waiting for Sperm’s retraction on framing me as a drug user, but I won’t hold my breath.
Ben Helbert says:
February 24, 2006 at 4:18 pm
I don’t see why everyone is being so critical of this. I actually do not see it as that big of a deal. Call me crazy, but I don’t think trading with the Emirates is a “bad” idea.

If we do not allow ourselves to trade with the UAE, but instead regress to isolationism as we have done in the past, we will be attacked again and again.

Let’s face it, if anyone wanted to seriously hurt us through our trades, it would have been done already. Only about 5 percent of the imports this country receives are ever checked.

Actually, depending on how you look at it, opening the ports up to the UAE could be more beneficial then not. Most people will only notice the UAE is located right alongside of other Arab countries and will call for increased security at the docks. The souped-up security may then check the other 95 perecent of imports and catch anything suspicious, thus helping the country’s national security problems.

If we can’t trade with the UAE because of what has happened in the past, who can we trade with? I think the majority of the nation’s population is simply paranoid. After all, the only we have to fear is fear itself.
Matt Heckman says:
February 24, 2006 at 4:30 pm
“If we do not allow ourselves to trade with the UAE, but instead regress to isolationism as we have done in the past, we will be attacked again and again.” Ben Helbert.

Ben,

In no way do I think we would regress to isolationism with what is going on, but it’s a matter of whoe these people are. Would you let a person with a record for Grand Theft Auto run security for a car lot filled with Vettes, or Ford GT’s or any other expensive car? Of course not.

“Let’s face it, if anyone wanted to seriously hurt us through our trades, it would have been done already. Only about 5 percent of the imports this country receives are ever checked.” Ben Helbert

Again that same kind of talk came around after the 1993 World Trade Center Bombing that they would never be crazy enough to try again, but that turned out to be wrong as well.

Bottom line is these people are willing to wait for years to strike, because they are obsessed with perfection of mass murder. They are not stupid. When they can exploit a weekness, rest assured they will go after it.
Jim Reitnour says:
February 24, 2006 at 10:26 pm
If you were to strip away the political & national security implications from this, it makes sense. However, I am not a big fan of an UAE run company running things in some of our major ports.

People in favor of this are saying that the US is still going to be incharge of security and so such, but I fear that they will not catch someone sneaking a WMD in via one of the ports. They only check about 10% of the cargo, if that.
Matt Heckman says:
February 25, 2006 at 7:48 am
Jim,

Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think the acutal number floats around 5%. It’s the exact same problem we have with our borders if you ask me.

Bottom line is this deal is like giving Ted Kennedy the keys to the Liquor Cabinet. It just is not a good idea.
Proud American says:
February 25, 2006 at 10:28 pm
Not to be critical of you guy’s, but we only “physically” check about 1% of the containers coming into this country, the amount of containers is just to vast. What we do to around 5-6% of the containers is “screen” them with radiological scanners, a form of x-ray for a metal container.

Now we are told all the containers are put through a radiation detector, but I would not put complete stock in those. A nuclear device could be lead shielded, or may come in dis-assembled to be put together at a later date.

It would be flat out stupid to turn control over to Dubai Port World. This isn’t about trade or isolationism, this is about security. Never forget that our U.S. Port Security relies on the honesty of the current port managers, who are British. Call me racist if you must, but I have more faith in a Brit than an Arab. The Brit is here to make money, we have an understanding. The Arab may be a secret fundamentalist who claims to want money, but in the end is interested in terror!

I reject Ben’s argument, no way is tiny U.A.E. any kind of player in global trade. They are not even third tier, a very minor player. The real question here is why is it so important to the Bush Administration to reward this particular [government of U.A.E. owned] company?
Matt Heckman says:
February 26, 2006 at 1:18 am
Thanks for that insight Proud American. The number you mentioned only makes this deal even more scary then it has been. I think it would be better to put this in the hands of the military, not matter what kind of man power it took, even if it involves bringing back the draft for the objective of securing or ports, and our borders.

We have to all remember the Federal Governments #1 objective is the security, and protection of this Nation at all costs, and money should never be an issue with this.

As for your question on why the administration is so eager to push this through, I’m sure that the answer will come out in the end. I still stand firm that if President Bush vetos any attempt by Congress to block this deal, then he should be impeached for treason. Congress is acting on their constitutional duty to protect this nation from the enemy, and no doubt about it the UAE is our enenmy, as mentioned in the 9/11 Commission report, and the same argument can be made involving our borders as well both north and south.

If President Bush follows through with his veto, then he is acting no different than Jane Fonda acted toward our troops that were held at the Hanoi Hilton. These people see things that pale in comparrison to what we see in the movies, and god only knows they deserve better when they come home. We may be on the verge of a 3rd world war with this, Iran’s nuke projects, and Hamas, and Isreal. We will have to wait and see.
Anonymous says:
February 27, 2006 at 9:45 am
Matt,

Normally I think some of your topics are a bit extreme, but I with you on this one 100%. The question is not about security, but why is this administration hell bent on pushing this through?

It is nice to see everybody getting along, and hope you continue with more civil debate like this in the future.
Anonymous says:
February 28, 2006 at 2:25 am
I tried to post this on the fleagle, but aparently spermie has taken to censorship.. here of late most of my posts don’t make it… if Al doesn’t agree with you, he simply doesn’t allow the post..

—————-

The media is screaming, the bloggers are screaming, the congresscritters are screaming. What the heck are they all freaking out about? Well, from what I have seen, the media is claiming that 6 US ports will be taken over and run by a company called DP World, which is owned by the UAE government, or actually, by a holding company that is owned by the UAE.

Congresscritters are running around and yelling about outsourcing our port security. The media is screaming the same thing. Now the bloggers are doing it as well. Our security will be outsourced, our security will be compromised, the UAE hasn’t been cooperative in the war on terror, etc, etc, ad nauseum.

You’d think that we were selling them the ports and everything in them. Like it was going to be New UAE in the US, or some such garbage. What exactly does it all mean? And what is actually going on here?

First off, let’s get this straight; the Port Authorities of each city own the ports. The security is run by the Port Authority, Homeland security and the coast guard.

This will not change, in any way shape or form.

What does that mean? The same security that is in place now, will be in place when DP World manages the terminals in the ports. As a matter of fact, the security will actually be better at the 6 ports. Why? Because homeland security asked DP World to help the ports invest in better security equipment as part of the approval process.

The UAE has been investing in R&D of the technology side of port security for a while. The UAE was the first country to sign on with Homeland security so that ALL containers leaving their ports for the US are inspected before they leave for the US. So, DP World is in an excellent position to be involved in the security upgrades for the ports. But, again, they have no responsibility nor authority in the way security is run at those ports.

What does DP world do? They manage the terminals in the port, NOT the port itself. There is HUGE difference here, and it needs to be made CLEAR. Let’s first look at the company that was originally managing the day-to-day port operations, Peninsular and Oriental Steam Operations, or P&O for short. They have been managing the day-to-day operations of the 6 ports, New York, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Miami and New Orleans for the last 10 years or so.

P&O Ports is the P&O Group Company responsible for port development and investment, terminal operating and stevedoring activities. Originating with the creation of an Australia-wide stevedoring and terminal operating entity, its first international activity was the 1986 joint venture privatization and management of the Port Kelang container terminal in Malaysia. This project was one of the first privatizations of public port assets undertaken worldwide. Its great success resulted in it becoming an international model for privatization of public facilities.

P&O Ports’ success and experience in privatization was also the foundation for further international investment by P&O, resulting in it being a world leader in port development and operation today. P&O Ports is an international company managing 21 container terminals and has operations in over 85 ports in 19 countries around the world.

DP World decided that they would be interested in buying the full worldwide operations of P&O, and got into a bidding war with a number of companies last August. Last November, the Committee of Foreign investment OK’d the deal after going over the usual 30 day review period for such dealings.

They found no concerns that would be harmful to the security of the ports or the United States. Why, you may ask? Because the companies that manage the port operations, do not manage the security at the ports, and never have. DP World has also cooperated with the office of Homeland security in other international ports that they manage in order to secure and ensure the safety of containers being shipped to the United States.

OK, so what have we got so far?

First, they will not be doing any security for the ports that they will be managing. None. All security is in the hands of the local Port Authority, Homeland Security, and the Coast Guard.

The Port Authority, who owns the ports (and is usually a government agency, and elected by the citizens of that city) contract out the daily terminal operations of the port, to companies that do that type of management. P&O was an excellent company to have done that, and now DP World has purchased ALL of P&O’s worldwide assets and management divisions, which happens to include the 6 US ports named above.

Second, DP World is indeed owned by the UAE. The UAE has been one of our greatest allies in the Middle East, and around the world, on our continuing war on terror. Of all the Middle Eastern countries they are the smallest security risk and the most trustworthy as evidenced by their cooperation with our continued war on terrorism and signing onto our Homeland Security arrangements at their own ports.

Third, this buyout was approved by the Foreign investment Committee after much research and of course discussions with the company itself. The media has hyped it to a point where it has taken on a life of it’s own, and people are freaking out over pretty much nothing.

What’s the actual bottom line here?

DP World will be in charge of the day-to-day operations of the terminals in the 6 ports of those cities, just as P&O was. The American longshoreman will still load and unload all the ships. The American managers will still be in charge of the day-to-day operations, and security will be handled by the same people that have always handled it. (The Port Authority of each city, Homeland Security, and the Coast Guard.)

What will be different? The payee on the paychecks to those American Longshoreman and those American managers will say DP World instead of P&O.

The profits from those operations will be going to the UAE, instead of the UK.

The ports will be getting some much needed modernization of their security equipment.

That’s it, that’s the bottom line…

So what’s the fuss? What has caused this entire furor over a change in management?

Well, let’s take a peek at a couple of things shall we?

Let’s start with a timeline.

August 2005: DP World gets into a bidding war for the purchase of P&O. A final buyout price of about 6.8 billion dollars is agreed upon as of January 26th 2006.

November 2005: The committee on foreign investment gives the nod to the buyout and for DP world to take over the daily operations at the 6 US ports.

January 2006: Dave Sanborn is nominated to serve as the maritime administrator. He has been an executive of DP world since 2005.

February 15th 2006: Continental Stevedoring and Terminals Inc., a partner with P&O in the US, filed a suit to block the purchase. Miami’s mayor also sent a letter of protest to President Bush.

And today, all the media outlets are having conniption fits and the bloggers are screaming “off with Bush’s head” over this one. OK, so what does this little timeline tell us? This was a done deal 3 months ago, back in November. Media reaction—YAWNER, nonstory.

January, Dave Sanborn is nominated. Media reaction—YAWNER, nonstory. Today? Conniption fit city. What happened? Hmm, Continental filed a suit to block the sale and Miami’s mayor wrote a letter of protest to the president. Hmm, sounds particularly suspicious to me, and another case of the media playing fast and loose with the facts in order to create a fracas and discredit the Bush administration.

And everyone has fallen for it hook, line and sinker. This thing has been done for over 3 months, the nomination was done last month, and now the media is just reporting it, only after a letter of protest from a mayor and a company filed suit?

BTW, 99% of the shareholders agreed to the sale of P&O to DP World. Another case of the crying liberals trying to get a judge to overturn something after the people voted for it. Sorry, I digress.

Tomorrow, they will be saying that Dave Sanborn getting the Maritime administrator position was some sort of payback to DP World for cooperating with Homeland Security. Just watch, it’s going to happen. Here is Dave Sanborns Resume’, just in case you were wondering how he might qualify for this position.

Mr. Sanborn, a graduate of The United States Merchant Maritime Academy, joined DP World in 2005. He previously held senior roles with shipping lines CMA-CGM (Americas), APL Ltd and Sea-Land and has been based, besides the US, in Brazil, Europe, Hong Kong and Dubai during his career. He has also served in the US Naval Reserve.

Looks pretty darned qualified to me. The media has given this story the legs it needs by playing fast and loose with the facts. They will do the same here. Just watch them. The media has manipulated this thing from the get go, and everyone is falling right in step to their tune. I find it sad, disturbing and very frustrating.

Bin Laden can’t wait to tell everyone how the US hates and distrusts Arabs and that the US is indeed the enemy. The overreaction and lies about this sale and the management of these ports will tell the world exactly that.

The media has played everyone for fools by not telling the WHOLE story or, for that matter, the real story.

For some reason the media has decided that a mayoral letter of protest and a suit to block the sale in US courts is enough to run with the story. (But, they haven’t said a thing about that part, have they?)

Anyone want to tell me why that is?

Onwards…

What story finally just died? Cheney, shooting some poor Republican lawyer, while on a hunting trip. Now the 78 year old lawyer is out of the hospital and all is forgiven. Whoops, the story had legs, and then had them cut out from under them.

Now, along comes this story. The media, trying it again.

The timing looks really strange to me. If any of you understand how the media manipulates the American people, it should look mighty strange to you as well. This whole story is a nonstory. It is nothing but a lot of caterwauling and BS from the usual suspects and the usual media outlets. President Bush is doing the right thing.

This is an executive branch responsibility. The deal is done. The arrangements have been made. Congress sticking it’s fingers into this pie will do nothing more then play into the prejudices that Bin Laden is trying so hard to convince other Arabs that we have.

This deal should be allowed to go through. It will NOT endanger our national security in any way shape or form. It will help with our war on terror. Besides the fact, DP World does an excellent job of running port terminals, as their assets and continued contracts on the worldwide market should prove to you.

Sources:
http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110007999
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/terrorism/jan-june06/ports_2-21.html
http://www.nationalreview.com/ijaz/ijaz200602221412.asp
http://www.dpiterminals.com/fullnews.asp?NewsID=39
http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/02/22/D8FUHG4G0.html
http://www.heraldsun.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5478,18245410%5E1702,00.html
Matt Heckman says:
February 28, 2006 at 12:57 pm
Anonymous,

Thank You for that long detailed statement. I want to let you know that I read every word, and though I don’t agree with you on some of it allow me to explain.

First We all know what Sperm is. We agree to the fact that Sperm could care less about the ports deal. Sperm’s bitter hatred as seen on his blog as of late, and attempting to frame me as a drug user proves just that.

Now your concern about how the media is playing this out. I can agree with you to a point about how they have it in for the administration, and I can agree with you that if this were Hillary Clinton in the White House this deal would have been done completly silent in the wee hours of the night just like the Pennsylvania’s elected officals giving themselves a pay raise.

Now to focus on the Port Deal in General I don’t agree that this should go through. I have heard for the past couple of days how this won’t hurt our security here, and there, but it is also beyond that. Allow me to respond to your statements.

“Second, DP World is indeed owned by the UAE. The UAE has been one of our greatest allies in the Middle East, and around the world, on our continuing war on terror. Of all the Middle Eastern countries they are the smallest security risk and the most trustworthy as evidenced by their cooperation with our continued war on terrorism and signing onto our Homeland Security arrangements at their own ports.”

With all due respect this is far from the truth. As I mentioned in the opening of this post the UAE, and Osama Bin Laden are close, and the UAE cost us a chance of taking out Bin Laden in 1999 as evidenced in the 9/11 commission report. The UAE tipped off our enemy, and for that they are far from our “Friends”. I invite you and everybody to check out the 9/11 commission report page 137. I also have a link on the opening statement of this topic for anybody to see, and once you read it you will have no doubt in your mind that these people are not our Friends.

“The profits from those operations will be going to the UAE, instead of the UK.”

Profits that will continue to fund anti-american terrorist acts aginst our country, and our allies. One question to you is would you pay a hitman to have yourself killed for no reason? That is exactly what this is all about.

“BTW, 99% of the shareholders agreed to the sale of P&O to DP World. Another case of the crying liberals trying to get a judge to overturn something after the people voted for it. Sorry, I digress.”

Those shareholders are not a government of, by and for the people. As a matter of fact most of those shareholders are not even Americans. George Washington, along with our founding fathers mentioned several times not to allow outside parties to influance the security of our nation. Congress are the elected representatives by the people, and they have an oath to protect this country. Wall Street does not.

“Bin Laden can’t wait to tell everyone how the US hates and distrusts Arabs and that the US is indeed the enemy. The overreaction and lies about this sale and the management of these ports will tell the world exactly that.”

If somebody asks your kids to do drugs because they are cool, and if they don’t do drugs, then they won’t be cool, so they take drugs to fit in, and in the end destroy their life. My question to you is why should be go with this port deal when the facts state that we will suffer the same fate as the boy that did drugs? In this case it would not destroy one boys life, but it would destroy a Union that has been around for over 200 years.

Bottom line is we are the United States of America, and as we fought for our Independence, we should not be concerned what other people think about us. Our country would never be so great if we were more concerned what other people think of us. Stand firm, and proud, and by any costs this deal needs to be rejected.

Sperm Walentis compares Arabs to Brokeback Mountain

16 Responses to “Sperm Walentis compares Arabs to Brokeback Mountain”

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