Welcome to the Port of New York -- Gateway to the United Arab Emirates

Reading today's headlines, you probably know that the "Cheney victim" has given a press conference. You'll know that there is question as to whether a man who allegedly shot and killed his wife and child will get a fair trial. You'll know that the dog that won the Westminster Kennel competition is missing. You'll know that there is a $1 million bounty on the head of a cartoonist. You'll know that you can easily find out about the people who have been shot, robbed, were injured or are sick in this country in the last 24 hours.

I went to the US pages of Yahoo News, Google News, Fox News and CNN, just to see what the big domestic headlines were. These are the news stories that should inform people on the issues that are critical to this nation. One shouldn't have to dig for them; you should be able to see these headlines with one or two clicks. I find it odd, then, that one news story has been swept under the so-called prayer rug.

So, in case you missed it, shipping terminals in NY, NJ, Baltimore, New Orleans, Miami and Philadelphia, were sold to Dubai Ports World -- a company owned by the United Arab Emirates. I don't know about you, but I don't really want or need to know more to be a bit dubious about this deal. Only Drudge has a link to it up on his page, right up top.

(As I was writing this, it looked like maybe CNN was about to do a story on it. The President was giving a speech in Miami, but I guess they got too bored with him yammering on about how we need to continue to fight terrorism...since the President didn't mention anything about the port sale in the 30 seconds they aired, why should they?)


But it gets even better, because according to Reuters, guess who's introducing legislation to block this deal? Our very own junior senator from NY! (Actually, there is a whole list of lawmakers involved in this from both sides of the aisle, as there should be -- this is not a partisan matter.)

Look, I don't care who looks into this -- this has that same uneasy feeling that the CNOOC purchase of Unocal had (which was ultimately blocked). What's next, a sale of mining companies to an Iranian company? Come on.

Update: No sooner do I hit "publish" than do CNN and CNBC both mention this story. Still, this should be top news. This should be ALL OVER the business pages, political pages, etc.