I was a few days ahead of the curve (for a change) when I blogged last week about a UAE company is going to handle homeland security at American ports.  But the blogosphere and politicians are on top of it now and it seems that everyone, from the right to the left, is asking the same "What The Fuck?" question.  The United Arab Emirates has ties to terrorism, specifically 9/11, has Think Progress explains:

– The UAE was one of three countries in the world to recognize the Taliban as the legitimate government of Afghanistan.

– The UAE has been a key transfer point for illegal shipments of nuclear components to Iran, North Korea and Lybia.

– According to the FBI, money was transferred to the 9/11 hijackers through the UAE banking system.

– After 9/11, the Treasury Department reported that the UAE was not cooperating in efforts to track down Osama Bin Laden’s bank accounts.

The story only gets worse.

The company, Dubai Ports World, would also control the movement of military equipment on behalf of the U.S. Army through two other ports. From today’s edition of the British paper Lloyd’s List:

[P&O] has just renewed a contract with the United States Surface Deployment and Distribution Command to provide stevedoring [loading and unloading] of military equipment at the Texan ports of Beaumont and Corpus Christi through 2010.

According to the journal Army Logistician “Almost 40 percent of the Army cargo deployed in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom flows through these two ports.”

You get that warm fuzzy feeling of security?  Yeah, me neither.