THE DEPARTMENT OF HOMELAND SECURITY
A birds-eye look at who’s protecting YOUR nest!
Sightings from The Catbird Seat
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March 1, 2008
Airbus parent beats Boeing for
big U.S. Air Force contract
By Leslie Wayne, International Herald Tribune
WASHINGTON: The U.S. Air Force, in a stunning decision against Boeing, awarded a $40 billion contract for aerial refueling tankers Friday to a partnership between Northrop Grumman and the European parent of Airbus, putting a critical military contract partly into the hands of a foreign company.
The contract, one of the largest at the Pentagon, has the potential to grow to $100 billion. It is also a sign of the growing influence of foreign suppliers within the Pentagon and breaks a decades-long relationship with Boeing, which built the bulk of the existing tanker fleet and fought hard to land the new contract.
"This isn't an upset," said Loren Thompson, a military analyst at the Lexington Institute, a Washington-area research group. "It's an earthquake."
Under the contract, Northrop and the parent of Airbus, European Aeronautic Defense & Space, or EADS, would build a fleet of 179 planes, based on the existing Airbus 330, to provide in-air refueling to military aircraft, from fighter jets to cargo planes. It gives a huge lift to EADS, whose commercial aviation program has suffered a number of setbacks in recent years.
While final assembly of the craft would take place at an Airbus plant near Mobile, Alabama, parts would come from suppliers across the globe.
At a news conference, air force officials said the creation of domestic jobs was not a factor in the decision. In response to questions about possible negative reaction to the deal in Congress, General Arthur Lichte, head of the air force's air mobility command, said, "This will be an American tanker, flown by American airmen with an American flag on its tail and, every day, it will be saving American lives."
Reaction from some in Congress, however, was swift.
"We are outraged that this decision taps European Airbus and its foreign workers to provide a tanker to our American military," the delegation from Washington State said in a joint statement. Boeing planes are assembled outside Seattle. "This is a blow to the American aerospace industry, American workers and America's men and women in uniform."
For its part, Boeing, which had been considered the strong favorite to retain the contract, said it was "very disappointed" in the outcome. But it did not say whether it would file a formal protest - something General Michael Moseley, chief of staff of the air force, has said he hopes the losing bidder will not do because it would only further delay the tanker replacement program.
In its statement, Boeing said, "We believe that we offered the air force the best value and lowest risk tanker for its mission." The company added that only after a debriefing by the Pentagon would the company "make a decision concerning our possible options, keeping in mind at all times the impact to the warfighter and the nation."
A Boeing victory was considered so certain that many Wall Street analysts had already factored the contract into their economic forecasts for the company and led one senator, Kay Bailey Hutchison, Republican of Texas, to prematurely send out a press release praising Boeing for its victory.
The air force decision is also a surprise ending to a protracted contracting process that went on for nearly a decade and became mired in scandal and international politics. Senator John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential candidate, had scuttled an earlier attempt by the air force to award the contract to Boeing, opening the door for the Northrop-Airbus bid.
McCain's campaign spokeswoman referred calls to his Senate office, which could not be reached for comment.
Norm Dicks, a Washington Democrat who is a member of the House Appropriations Committee Defense Subcommittee, said he was attending an anticipated victory party at Boeing's Washington headquarters when the mood suddenly darkened.
"Here we are in the middle of a recession and we give this to Airbus?" Dicks added. "That is not going to go down well."
Ronald Sugar, the chief executive of Northrop Grumman, said in a telephone interview that he expected members of Congress would have a "variety of views" depending on whether their districts would be gaining or losing jobs under the deal.
He said that 60 percent of the content of the new tanker would come from the United States and that the contract would create 2,000 jobs in Mobile and 25,000 overall in the United States.
"This is more about the capability that we will give to the kids fighting the wars and the cost to the taxpayer," he said.
Backing Sugar's view was Senator Richard Shelby, Republican of Alabama, who hailed the decision as "great news for Alabama."
The Alabama and Mississippi delegations had lobbied hard in Congress to polish the image of Airbus. In Paris, at the annual air shows, Airbus officials and these politicians proudly displayed the proposed European tanker offering and made the argument that if the United States wanted to sell its weapons to European countries, it should also open its doors to foreign suppliers....
Replacing these tankers has been the air force's top priority since 1996, when the government first proposed obtaining new planes. The first 179 tankers will be acquired at a pace of about 15 a year. But it is expected that, over time, nearly 400 new refueling planes will be needed, which could bring the program's total cost to $100 billion.
For more than a decade the air force's effort to modernize the fleet has been thwarted by global politics, Washington scandals and an aggressive attack by McCain, a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
In the end, a procurement scandal led to the departure of Philip Condit, the chief executive of Boeing, the resignation of James Roche as air force secretary and the imprisonment of two Boeing executives, one of whom had worked on the program as a Pentagon acquisition official.
The air force, short on cash and wanting to acquire the planes as fast as possible, proposed an arrangement to Congress in late 2001 under which the Pentagon would lease the Boeing 767s in a sole-source contract that would keep Boeing's aging 767 production line alive.
But just as the air force was about to sign that deal, it came under sharp attack from McCain, a former navy pilot. He denounced the deal as a sweetheart arrangement between Boeing and the air force that had been arranged with insufficient scrutiny and oversight, and that would shortchange the taxpayer.
Soon afterward, it was reported that the air force's No. 2 weapons buyer, Darleen Druyun, had been promised jobs for herself, her daughter and son-in-law in return for steering the tanker contract and billions of dollars of other air force business to Boeing. Soon after joining the company in a $250,000-a-year post, Druyun and Michael Sears, Boeing's former chief financial officer, pleaded guilty and received prison terms.
The weight of the scandal caused the deal to collapse in 2004 and opened the door to competition.
Each side spent millions to sharpen its proposal, hire lobbyists and former generals to argue their case and wage extensive advertising efforts in Washington and at military gatherings.
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/03/01/business/eads.php
March 6, 2008
Move to restrict EADS’
foreign ownership
The Financial Times, Limited
By Gerrit Wiesmann in Frankfurt and Peggy Hollinger in Paris
France and Germany are finalising changes to EADS’ corporate by-laws to prevent foreign investors building significant stakes in – or even taking over – Europe’s flagship aerospace and defence company.
The move comes at a sensitive time for the Franco-German group, which late last week secured a breathtaking entry into the US defence market with a $35bn contract for its Airbus tanker-aircraft.
Some US politicians have said giving the contract to a foreign company could have dire security implications – a frenzy that could mount if EADS’ Russian or Middle Eastern shareholders were to increase their holdings.
Dubai International Capital, a sovereign wealth fund, bought 3.1 per cent last summer and VEB, a state-controlled Russian bank, took a 5 per cent stake in December.
But the French government, French media group Lagardère, and German carmaker Daimler, which together control 45 per cent of EADS, are planning to restrict any investor deemed predatory from owning more than 15 per cent.
That level – a working number that might change – is integral to two models the Franco-German core shareholders are working on to see whether EADS can be given additional protection against a foreign takeover.
This follows last summer’s agreement between Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, and Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, to consider issuing “golden shares” to Paris and Berlin to take pressure off the core trio to uphold their stakes.
New takeover defences could herald adjustments to the shareholders’ pact, which enshrines German and French stakes at 22.5 per cent a piece. Lagardère has been seen as a probable seller of its 7.5 per cent stake....
www.ft.com/cms/s/0/5fc7f6a2-ebbb-11dc-9493-0000779fd2ac.html
March 11, 2008
McCain advisers lobbied for
European plane maker
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Top current advisers to Sen. John McCain's presidential campaign last year lobbied for a European plane maker that beat Boeing to a $35 billion Air Force tanker contract, taking sides in a bidding fight that McCain has tried to referee for more than five years.
Two of the advisers gave up their lobbying work when they joined McCain's campaign. A third, former Texas Rep. Tom Loeffler, lobbied for the European Aeronautic Defence and Space Co. while serving as McCain's national finance chairman.
EADS is the parent company of Airbus, which teamed up with U.S.-based Northrop Grumman Corp. to win the lucrative aerial refueling contract on February 29. Boeing Co. Chairman and CEO Jim McNerney said in a statement Monday that the Chicago-based aerospace company "found serious flaws in the process that we believe warrant appeal."
McCain, the Republican presidential nominee in waiting, has been a key figure in the Pentagon's years-long attempt to complete a deal on the tanker. McCain helped block an earlier tanker contract with Boeing and prodded the Pentagon in 2006 to develop bidding procedures that did not exclude Airbus.
EADS retained Ogilvy Government Relations and The Loeffler Group to lobby for the tanker deal last year, months after McCain sent two letters urging the Defense Department to make sure the bidding proposals guaranteed competition.
"They never lobbied him related to the issues, and the letters went out before they were contracted" by EADS, McCain campaign spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker said Monday.
According to lobbying records filed with the Senate, Loeffler Group lobbyists on the project included Loeffler and Susan Nelson, who left the firm and is now the campaign's finance director. Ogilvy lobbyist John Green, who was assigned the EADS work, recently took a leave of absence to volunteer for McCain as the campaign's congressional liaison.
"The aesthetics are not good, especially since he is an advocate of reform and transparency," said Richard Aboulafia, an analyst with the aerospace consulting firm Teal Group. "Boeing advocates are going to use this as ammunition."
McCain, a longtime critic of influence peddling and special interest politics, has come under increased scrutiny as a presidential candidate, particularly because he has surrounded himself with advisers who are veteran Washington lobbyists. He has defended his inner circle and has emphatically denied reports last month in The New York Times and The Washington Post that suggested he helped the client of a lobbyist friend nine years ago.
He has also cast himself as a neutral watchdog in the Air Force tanker contract, one of the largest in decades.
"All I asked for in this situation was a fair competition," he told reporters Monday at Lambert Field in St. Louis, home of a Boeing fighter jet plant.
On Friday, he defended his aggressive oversight: "I never weighed in for or against anybody that competed for the contract. All I asked for was a fair process. And the facts are that I never showed any bias in any way against anybody -- except for the taxpayer."
Last week, Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the EADS-Northrop Gruman plane was "clearly a better performer" than the one proposed by Boeing.
It is unclear what EADS hired the lobbyists to do. Loeffler and Airbus officials did not immediately respond to phone and e-mail messages left late Monday.
A Boeing spokesman declined to comment Monday on the links between McCain and lobbying efforts on behalf of EADS.
But Boeing supporters already have begun to accuse McCain of damaging Boeing's chances by inserting himself into the tanker deal.
One of them, Rep. Norm Dicks, D-Washington, said the field was "tilted to Airbus" because the Pentagon did not weigh European subsidies for Airbus in its deliberations -- a decision he blamed on McCain. Everett, Wash., is where Boeing would perform much of the tanker work, and Dicks is a senior member of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee.
In December 2006, just weeks before the Air Force was set to release its formal request for proposals, McCain wrote a letter to the incoming defense secretary, Robert Gates, warning that he was "troubled" by the Air Force's draft request for bids.
The United States had filed a complaint with the World Trade Organization alleging that Airbus unfairly benefits from European subsidies. Airbus in turn argued that Boeing also receives government support, mostly as tax breaks.
Under the Air Force proposal, bidders would have been required to explain how financial penalties or other sanctions stemming from the subsidy dispute might affect their ability to execute the contract. The request was widely viewed as hurting the EADS-Northrop Grumman bid.
The proposed bid request "may risk eliminating competition before bids are submitted," McCain wrote in a December 1, 2006, letter to Gates. The Air Force changed the criteria four days later.
Dicks said the removal of the subsidy language was a "game-changer" that favored EADS over Boeing.
"The only reason that they could even bid a low price is because they received a subsidy," Dicks said last week. "And Senator McCain jumped into this and said that (the Air Force) could not look at the subsidy issue -- which I think is a big mistake, especially when the U.S. trade representative is bringing a case in the (World Trade Organization) on this very issue."
EADS' interest in the tanker deal is evident in the political contributions of its employees. From 2004 to 2006, donations by its employees jumped from $42,500 to $141,931, according to an analysis by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. So far this election cycle, company employees have donated $120,350. Of that, McCain's presidential campaign has received $14,000, the most of any other member of Congress this election cycle.
McCain prides himself in the role he played blocking an earlier version of the tanker deal that gave the contract to Boeing. As chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee and of an Armed Services subcommittee, McCain led an investigation that eventually helped kill that contract in 2004. A former Air Force official and a top Boeing executive both served time in prison, and the scandal led to the departure of Boeing's chief executive and several top Air Force officials.
"I intervened in a process that was clearly corrupt," McCain said Friday. "That's why people went to jail."
While McCain has praised Boeing for fixing its practices, his campaign said the experience prompted him to demand "a full, fair and open competition." His letters -- one to Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England in September 2006 and the other to Gates -- were sent with that spirit in mind, Hazelbaker said Monday.
Once the rules were in place, Hazelbaker said, bidders submitted proposals, the Air Force reviewed them and the contract was awarded.
"That is a process that McCain, appropriately, had absolutely no role in," she said.
www.kycbs.net/McCain-Airbus-Lobby.mht
Date Posted: 04/16/07 Mon
Author: Eric Shine
Subject: TO ALL CONCERNED CITIZENS...
To all Concerned Citizens,
You may or may not have heard of my current, if not long term plight and fight for my life.
It may be hard to understand - or get around the legal and underlying whistle blower matters - but the most important point is that I am in deep trouble and need help badly.
My name is Lt. Eric N. Shine - USNR - MMRRI a graduate of the United States Merchant Marine Academy - a sister Academy to West Point and Annapolis.
I have been held and detained "under the gun" so to speak and have been taking on "friendly fire" under false flag proceedings carried out against me over the past 4 years or longer by HOMELAND SECURITY so as to step upon my underlying complaints. This in and of itself is an enormous program of waste, fraud, abuse and gross mismanagment in and of itself, barring all other surrounding matters and concerns.
I have been charged, and am, and have been being "prosecuted" aggressively by the "United States" for the past 4 years for "being depressed." There is much, much more to all of this - but I will not get into it now as there is a more urgent matter at hand.
It is difficult to convey to you just what has transpired or what I have been put through - all I can say that it is and has been and continues to be extremely tortuous for me to put it lightly. This is the general intention of these proceedings - torture.
This is part of a program called LEGAL WARFARE or LAWFARE that is being targeted at Federal Officers and personnel and even now Citizens to use a new Pentagon Program to change the law and Constitution on its face by using "Defense" dollars to protect and defend and attack any and all grievants, complainants, whistle blowers and others who speak the truth about what is going on right now. This goes well beyond the DoD Programs of paying journalists like Armstrong Willams and others to publish propoganda.
Beyond all that I am forced to represent myself beginning tomorrow once again within these proceedings brought against me by Homeland Security even though the United States wishes to prove that I am "medically/ mentally incompetent" and do so from under extreme duress and tortuous violations of due process and protections.
The USCG Commandant has recently vacated the previous Order filed against me that was done absent any and all hearings or evidence in early 2004 - only to try and point and focus the matters somehow back on the death of my father in 2001 even now.
I need help badly in the form of LEGAL AID and a LEGAL AID DEFENSE FUND and other such provisions as this is gravely serious and do not know how much more of these unlawful and cruel and unusual proceedings that I can withstand - especially on my own.
The very nature of these proceedings sounds odd if not clearly abnormal - because they are being used to try and place me in an early grave from overt and intentional oppression and deprivation of due process and other such legal rights and remedies. Homeland Security has seized medical records, falsified them and entered them in these proceedings and continuously blocked me from any and all proper due process hearings in this regard.
I am trapped in a false flag proceeding that I cannot get myself out of - nor can I somehow lift myself up from - by my own bootstraps. I cannot and will not survive much more of this unless I get immediate help and assistance from people like you.
I need help, minimally, in getting and staying visible.
Please do what you can to try and rally a substantial number of the people to help one of those who has gone to extreme lengths to help defend you, the Nation and most importantly the Declaration of Independence, Constitution, Bill of Rights and rule of law.
You may not understand the matters at hand, but I do - with my training and experience and have attempted to confront what is going on within the Court systems only to have those involved in war profiteering and privateering use the system to come after me.
Please take this request seriously and be moved to act quickly.
Thanking you in advance for any and all considerations in this and all other regards.
I'd not ask this if there were anyway I could confront or withstand all of this on my own. The "United States" is trying to use overwhelming force to oppress and further injure me.
Peace!
Thank You
Lt. Eric N. Shine
USNR - MMRRI - Kings Point - 1991
714-362-7491
For more, GO TO > > > The Torch of Eric Shine
February 26, 2006
Homeland Security Protested
Ports Deal
By TED BRIDIS, Associated Press, Yahoo! News
The Homeland Security Department objected at first to a United Arab Emirates company's taking over significant operations at six U.S. ports. It was the lone protest among members of the government committee that eventually approved the deal without dissent.
The department's early objections were settled later in the government's review of the $6.8 billion deal after Dubai-owned DP World agreed to a series of security restrictions.
Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist and other congressional leaders, the company and Bush administration officials were working on a compromise intended to derail plans by Republicans and Democrats for legislation next week that would force a new investigation of security issues relating to the deal....
"My comfort level is good, but I have 99 other United States senators who need the opportunity to ask their questions," Frist told the Lexington Herald-Leader before speaking at a Republican dinner Saturday evening in Lexington, Ky.
"We're behind the president 100 percent," he added. "We believe the decision in all likelihood is absolutely the right one."
Under one proposal being discussed, DP World would seek new approval of the deal from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, given the company's surprise decision Thursday to indefinitely postpone its takeover of U.S. port operations. Other proposals included a new, intensive 45-day review of the deal by the government — something the White House had refused to consider as recently as Friday.
Rep. Peter King, chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, said discussions among congressional leaders centered on that issue. "It's my understanding that they are trying to build support for a deal involving a new 45-day investigation," he said.
Frist, R-Tenn., said that while legislation may not be necessary now, having "30 to 45 days" to step back and evaluate the deal still could be necessary.
"If there's some question about the diagnosis, then maybe we need to get a second opinion," said Frist, a former heart surgeon.
King, R-N.Y., said he would need to see all the details of a compromise before deciding if it met all of his concerns, or met the demands of the legislation he planned to offer.
Despite persistent criticism from Republicans and Democrats, the president has defended his administration's approval of the ports deal and threatened to veto any measures in Congress that would block it. The company's voluntary delay in taking over most operations at the six U.S. ports did little to quell a political furor or appease skeptical members of Congress that the deal does not pose any increased risks to the U.S. from terrorism. Republican House and Senate leaders are to meet Tuesday to discuss how to proceed....
A DP World executive said the company would agree to tougher security restrictions to win congressional support only if the same restrictions applied to all U.S. port operators. The company earlier had struck a more conciliatory stance, saying it would do whatever Bush asked to salvage the agreement.
"Security is everybody's business," senior vice president Michael Moore told The Associated Press. "We're going to have a very open mind to legitimate concerns. But anything we can do, any way to improve security, should apply to everybody equally."
The administration approved the ports deal on Jan. 17 after DP World agreed during secret negotiations to cooperate with law enforcement investigations in the future and make other concessions.
Some lawmakers have challenged the adequacy of a classified intelligence assessment crucial to assuring the administration that the deal was proper. The report was assembled during four weeks in November by analysts working for the director of national intelligence.
The report concluded that U.S. spy agencies were "unable to locate any derogatory information on the company," according to a person familiar with the document. This person spoke only on condition of anonymity because the report was classified.
Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., and others have complained that the intelligence report focused only on information the agencies collected about DP World and did not examine reported links between UAE government officials and al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden before the Sept. 11 attacks.
The uproar over DP World has exposed how the government routinely approves deals involving national security without the input of senior administration officials or Congress.
President Bush, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and even Treasury Secretary John Snow, who oversees the government committee that approved the deal, all say they did not know about the purchase until after it was finalized. The work was done mostly by assistant secretaries.
Snow now says he may consider changes in the approval process so lawmakers are better alerted after such deals get the go-ahead.
Stewart Baker, a senior Homeland Security official, said he was the sole representative on the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States who objected to the ports deal. Baker said he later changed his vote after DP World agreed to the security conditions. Other officials confirmed Baker's account.
"We were not prepared to sign off on the deal without the successful negotiation of the assurances," Baker told the AP.
Officials from the White House, CIA, departments of State, Treasury, Justices, and others looked for guidance from Homeland Security because it is responsible for seaports. "We had the most obvious stake in the process," Baker said.
Baker acknowledged that a government audit of security practices at the U.S. ports in the takeover has not been completed as part of the deal. "We had the authority to do an audit earlier," Baker said.
The audit will help evaluate DP World's security programs to stop smuggling and detect illegal shipments of nuclear materials at its seaport operations in New York, New Jersey, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia.
The administration privately disclosed the status of the security audit to senators during meetings about improving reviews of future business deals involving foreign buyers. Officials did not suggest the audit's earlier completion would have affected the deal's approval.
New Jersey's Democratic governor, who is suing to block the deal, said in his party's weekly radio address on Saturday that the administration failed to properly investigate the UAE's record on terrorism.
"We were told that the president didn't know about the sale until after it was approved. For many Americans, regardless of party, this lack of disciplined review is unacceptable," Jon Corzine said....
Bush's national security adviser, Stephen Hadley, said there was no going back on the deal.
February 20, 2006
P&O confident of Dubai takeover
P&O has said it is confident its takeover by
Dubai Ports World will go ahead despite
mounting opposition in the US.
BBC News
Several US senators have warned they will oppose the $6.8bn (£3.9bn) deal over "national security concerns".
P&O controls six major ports in the US, including New York and Miami.
Meanwhile, a company based in the port of Miami has begun court action to prevent the takeover by DP World, which is backed by the Dubai government.
President Bush's administration has given its backing to the deal, which was agreed by the two firms last week, and has resisted calls from Congress to reconsider its stance.
Security worries
But lawmakers from both the Democratic and Republican parties have questioned the takeover, and at least one Senate oversight hearing is planned for later this month.
Over the weekend, opponents of the deal voiced their concerns about whether security would be compromised by allowing a firm backed by a member of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to takeover major US port operations.
The chairman of the House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee, Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, has called for an immediate freeze on the deal and demanded a "full and thorough investigation" of the sale.
He also dubbed the government's support of the deal "politically tone deaf".
Senator Chuck Schumer said: "The question that needs to be answered is whether or not they (Dubai) can be trusted to operate our ports in this post 9-11 world."
Assurances in place
But the US Government dismissed the concerns, saying it had given the deal a thorough review and had implemented the "appropriate" conditions and safeguards where necessary.
"We make sure there are assurances in place, in general, sufficient to satisfy us that the deal is appropriate from a national security standpoint," Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff told ABC television.
However, he declined to give further details saying the information was classified.
DP World also shrugged off the claims saying security was "at the forefront" of its business.
Meanwhile P&O has insisted it has cleared all the correct regulatory channels after a partner in Miami filed a lawsuit to block the deal.
Eller & Company subsidiary Continental Stevedoring & Terminals launched the action late on Friday, saying that the sale was prohibited under its current agreement with P&O.
It argued that under the terms of sale it became an "involuntary partner" with Dubai and it may seek damages of $10m.
The takeover of P&O will make DP World one of the three largest container ports businesses in the world when it is finalised on 2 March.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/business/4731560.stm
January 24, 2006
DP WORLD EXECUTIVE NOMINATED FOR PRESITIGOUS US GOVT POSITION
Dubai - Global ports operator DP World today welcomed news that one of its senior executives, Dave Sanborn, has been nominated by US President George W. Bush to serve as Maritime Administrator - a key transportation appointment reporting directly to Norman Mineta the Secretary of Transportation and Cabinet Member.
The White House has issued a statement from Washington DC announcing the nomination. The confirmation process will begin in February.
Mr Sanborn currently holds the position of Director of Operations for Europe and Latin America for the Dubai-based company
Mohammed Sharaf, CEO, DP World said:
“While we are sorry to lose such an experienced and capable executive, it is exactly those qualities that will make Dave an effective administrator for MarAd. We are proud of Dave’s selection and pleased that the Bush Administration found such a capable executive. We wish him all the best in his new role.”
Ted Bilkey, Chief Operating Officer, DP World said:
“Dave’s decades of experience in markets around the world, together with his passion for the industry and commitment to its development, will allow him to make a positive contribution to the work of the Maritime Administration. We wish him well for the future.”
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.
Mr Sanborn is due to take up his new role based in Washington DC later in 2006.
www.dpiterminals.com/fullnews.asp?NewsID=39
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For more poop on Dubya and Dubai, GO TO > > >
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dubai#History
http://corpwatch.org/article.php?id=13322
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For more poop on Norman Mineta, GO TO > > > Hail To The Chief; The Eagle Awakes; The Eagle Hooded; Tarnished Wings: Graft and Greed at Lockheed Martin; The Torch of Eric Shine; Who’s Guarding the Hen House?; Year of the Dragon; Woo vs. Harmon: Witness Norman Mineta
~ ~ ~
For more poop on the takeover of the world, GO TO > > > APCOA: Vultures in the Parking Lot; BCCI: The Bank of Crooks & Criminals; Dirty Gold in Goldman Sachs; The Carlyle Group: Birds That Drink From Cesspools; Investigating Investcorp; Nests In The Pentagon; The Eagle Hooded: The 9-11 Coverup; The Kissinger of Death; The Nature Conservancy; Thorns in The Rose Garden; Vampires in the City
From The International Relations Center:
MICHAEL CHERTOFF
Michael Chertoff, a rabbi’s son from northern New Jersey, is widely respected for his razor-sharp mind and fearsome courtroom demeanor. While at Harvard Law School, he was a classmate of Scott Turow, whose semi-fictional memoir about law school, One L, was based in part on his memories of Chertoff’s brutal yet incisive manner of legal argument.
A political partisan, Chertoff became special counsel to the Whitewater Commission established in 1994 by the Republican-led Congress to investigate the involvement of Bill and Hillary Clinton in real estate deals in Arkansas and other business deals. Now widely regarded as a political witch hunt spearheaded by Sen. Alfonse D’Amato (R-NY) and Independent Counselor Kenneth Starr, the Whitewater Commission spent $40 million on the investigation, which ultimately failed to find that the Clintons had done anything illegal.
Chertoff is a longtime member and activist in the Federalist Society. This national association of right-wing lawyers and judicial reform activists is dedicated to realigning the country’s legal system to reflect a more conservative interpretation of the Constitution.
The Federalist Society, which since its founding in 1982 has been closely linked to the neoconservative political camp, aims to rid the system of liberal judges and stamp out what it sees are its overly egalitarian and secular impulses. Many association members believe that the Constitution and the country’s laws should primarily serve to ensure order and social orthodoxy rather than democracy and human rights.
As U.S. Attorney General in New Jersey, appointed by President George H.W. Bush in 1990, Chertoff gained a reputation as a political attack dog for the Republican Party. Leveraging his strong political base in New Jersey, Chertoff served as financial vice chair for Bush’s 2000 campaign in the Garden State. (2)
Chertoff was Bush’s second nominee to head Homeland Security, following the failed nomination of former New York City Police Chief Bernie Kerik, who admitted that he neglected to pay taxes for the “illegal immigrant” nanny he employed.
Chertoff himself has a less-than-stellar record on immigration issues. During his short stint as federal appeals court judge in the Third Court District, Chertoff demonstrated a generally dismissive attitude toward asylum claims—ruling against immigrants in 14 of 18 immigration cases. In one case, he denied asylum to a Bangladeshi man who was imprisoned, severely beaten in jail, and forced to denounce his dissident political party. Despite his requiring 19 days of medical care after his release, Chertoff denied asylum on the grounds that the treatment didn’t constitute torture. Chertoff also overruled a lower-court immigration judge’s decision to question the credibility of the asylum petition of a Chinese man who was seeking refuge because his wife was involuntarily sterilized.
As the architect of the