As a top-ranking official at the U.S. Department of Transportation, Jeff Shane ought to be publicly ducking the Dubai ports controversy. Instead, the attorney and DOT undersecretary for public policy said he is tickled by the political firestorm that has spread in recent weeks.

"I'm like the guy chewing on Chicken McNuggets," he said Wednesday in remarks at The Citadel. "I'm lovin' it."

Shane, an appointee of President Bush, wasn't being disloyal to the White House, which has been roundly criticized for approving the sale of six U.S. port terminal operations to a United Arab Emirates company without notifying Congress. His point was that the fracas has fixed public attention on the nation's underfunded and increasingly congested transportation network.

Before the Dubai Ports World flap, Shane said, the "vast majority" of Americans had "no clue" about how ports work and the critical role they play in the movement of goods in and out of the country. "They don't see them. Stuff just shows up on the shelves," he said. "And it's a good thing it does, because we love having it."

Now, lawmakers and the public alike are getting a quick lesson about where the waterfront fits into the global supply chain, thanks to the debate over whether

Dubai Ports World should be allowed to take over the U.S. business of a British company, Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Co.

"That's why I'm so pleased we have controversy in Dubai World," Shane said at a luncheon sponsored by the Charleston-based Free Enterprise Foundation. "People are discussing it."

The controversy has helped give the public a better understanding of global trade, he said. For instance, Shane was delighted to see that The Washington Post recently published a detailed illustration of how a typical container port operates.

"This is to die for," he said. "I couldn't have possibly come up with anything like that."

Shane hopes all the attention will prompt lawmakers to address what he described as an alarming problem within his agency: Funding for critical transportation projects is being "completely overwhelmed" by federal entitlement programs.

"In a good year we're keeping ourselves flat," he said of DOT.

Shane said complaints about transportation bottlenecks are piling up in his office, but not from just the usual suspects, such as airlines, shipping lines and trucking companies.

"Something new is happening . The users of transportation are coming in," he said.

Dell, Nike and Liz Claiborne are among the companies worried about congestion at the nation's ports, roads and airports hurting their bottom line, Shane said.

"What I'm saying . is transportation is embedded in the fabric of the U.S. economy in ways we've never seen before," he said.

Shane said one possible solution is for the United States to step up the privatization of its transportation network, as other countries have done. "The private sector has a much bigger role to play than ever before," Shane said.

As the Dubai controversy illustrates, privatization can also have its drawbacks. For the record, Shane echoed the White House response to the deal, saying "it doesn't have any impact that we can see on security."

"If you're buying a terminal operator . for $6.8 billion, a terrorist incident is probably the last thing you want to happen on one of your ports," he said.

Reach John McDermott at 937-5572 or jmcdermott@postandcourier.com.