Yesterday, Dubai Ports World announced that it would sell operation of US ports to a “US entity,” thus bringing the ballyhoo over this controversial sale to a close.  The hype surrounding this issue was mostly manufactured.  Security, the only concern, is not outsourced and would not have been.

Politicians created the furor for their own political advantage.  Democrats, successfully (and incorrectly) painted as weak on defense by their opponents for years, seized on the opportunity to accuse the Bush administration of being soft on security by selling port operations to a nation with ties to the 11 September 2001 attacks on the US.  Republicans, needing to find issues to break with an unpopular President on, and seeking to shore up their racist base with a show of contempt for Arabs, joined in opposing the deal.  Even the Whitehouse probably saw advantage in all the hype, as it took the fickle media’s focus away from the fact that the Vice President had imbibed at least one drink, handled a loaded firearm, shot a man in the face, and then sent investigators away without submitting to a blood alcohol test.

The division within the Republican party on this issue should cause orgasmic levels of excitement for Democratic strategists. Richard Vigurie told Reagan that he could split the Democrats right down the middle on the abortion issue, and he was right. Only Bill Clinton has won a Presidential election as a Democrat since the Republicans effectively boxed Democrats in on the issue.  So-called “free trade” now presents Democrats with the opportunity to do the same.  It has now been shown to divide Republicans.  On the one side, we have the pseudo-intellectual Republicans, the libertarian-leaning ones who worship at the alter of the “free market” and Tom Friedman.  On the other side, we have xenophobic bigots who blame all their problems on foreigners.  If Pelosi, Dean, and Reid are smart, they’ll make trade a national issue for the upcoming elections.  If they take a firm protectionist position under the rubric of security, as they did here, they force Republicans to dig their heels in on the trade issue.  When that happens, Democrats will shore up their own base with organized labor, as well as getting xenophobicRepublicans to either switch to voting Democrat or stay home.