Because the political climate in the US seems to be against them securing the deal despite plans to raise their bid to more than 20 billion dollars. This is Important for several reasons.
- Slows down Bush's selling of America to foreign governments (we aleady owe china nearly a cool trillion dollars)
- Foreign governments should be banned from using state funds to buy independently owned and publicly traded companies. (I see the benefits, but we aren't a socialist country. IMO NASA should not be subsidized by our national dollars, nor oil companies, nor corporate farms, nor any privately held company.)
- What would that deal have said to other countries? Get your money over here ASAP and buy IBM, Apple, etc.
- If China wants to buy a company that is already set up for their style of management buy WALMART---near slave labor supplied, they buy all their crap from China anyway, they don't believe in human rights...hey its a perfect fit.
- Bush and family have already made enough off shady deals with foreign govts, that Bush Sr. has ties to UNOCAL and China is a little suspect.
- UNOCAL has supplied this Bush admin with several top government officials. UNOCAL is a prime mover and shaker of the war in Afghanistan that just happened to secure some necessary lands for the Caspian Oil Pipeline, of which China would love to own a stake in since they could probably siphon off some much needed fuel without having to pay for it, while charging us 60+ a barrel.
I am no fan of UNOCAL but China sucks. Until China gets some human rights laws on the books and enforces them we shouldn't even be dealing with the fuckers.
And yeah, I'm sure that China would greet the US with open arms if the US wanted to purchase say, the Hong Kong stock market.