Paul Wolfowitz

[Sid Walker]

Well, I apperciate that, Sid. America is a country with a lot of voices.

A replacement for Paul Wolfowitz "has been found" to head the World Bank.

He is Bob Zoellick.

Another Ziocon with an inglorious track record of war-mongering on behalf of the State of Israel.

Perhaps a little affirmative action is required at the World Bank, to level the playing field in favour of the 99+% of the world's population who happen to be gentiles?

Lest we forget...

January 26, 1998

The Honorable William J. Clinton

President of the United States

Washington, DC

Dear Mr. President:

We are writing you because we are convinced that current American policy toward Iraq is not succeeding, and that we may soon face a threat in the Middle East more serious than any we have known since the end of the Cold War. In your upcoming State of the Union Address, you have an opportunity to chart a clear and determined course for meeting this threat. We urge you to seize that opportunity, and to enunciate a new strategy that would secure the interests of the U.S. and our friends and allies around the world. That strategy should aim, above all, at the removal of Saddam Hussein’s regime from power. We stand ready to offer our full support in this difficult but necessary endeavor.

The policy of “containment” of Saddam Hussein has been steadily eroding over the past several months. As recent events have demonstrated, we can no longer depend on our partners in the Gulf War coalition to continue to uphold the sanctions or to punish Saddam when he blocks or evades UN inspections. Our ability to ensure that Saddam Hussein is not producing weapons of mass destruction, therefore, has substantially diminished. Even if full inspections were eventually to resume, which now seems highly unlikely, experience has shown that it is difficult if not impossible to monitor Iraq’s chemical and biological weapons production. The lengthy period during which the inspectors will have been unable to enter many Iraqi facilities has made it even less likely that they will be able to uncover all of Saddam’s secrets. As a result, in the not-too-distant future we will be unable to determine with any reasonable level of confidence whether Iraq does or does not possess such weapons.

Such uncertainty will, by itself, have a seriously destabilizing effect on the entire Middle East. It hardly needs to be added that if Saddam does acquire the capability to deliver weapons of mass destruction, as he is almost certain to do if we continue along the present course, the safety of American troops in the region, of our friends and allies like Israel and the moderate Arab states, and a significant portion of the world’s supply of oil will all be put at hazard. As you have rightly declared, Mr. President, the security of the world in the first part of the 21st century will be determined largely by how we handle this threat.

Given the magnitude of the threat, the current policy, which depends for its success upon the steadfastness of our coalition partners and upon the cooperation of Saddam Hussein, is dangerously inadequate. The only acceptable strategy is one that eliminates the possibility that Iraq will be able to use or threaten to use weapons of mass destruction. In the near term, this means a willingness to undertake military action as diplomacy is clearly failing. In the long term, it means removing Saddam Hussein and his regime from power. That now needs to become the aim of American foreign policy.

We urge you to articulate this aim, and to turn your Administration's attention to implementing a strategy for removing Saddam's regime from power. This will require a full complement of diplomatic, political and military efforts. Although we are fully aware of the dangers and difficulties in implementing this policy, we believe the dangers of failing to do so are far greater. We believe the U.S. has the authority under existing UN resolutions to take the necessary steps, including military steps, to protect our vital interests in the Gulf. In any case, American policy cannot continue to be crippled by a misguided insistence on unanimity in the UN Security Council.

We urge you to act decisively. If you act now to end the threat of weapons of mass destruction against the U.S. or its allies, you will be acting in the most fundamental national security interests of the country. If we accept a course of weakness and drift, we put our interests and our future at risk.

Sincerely,

Elliott Abrams Richard L. Armitage William J. Bennett

Jeffrey Bergner John Bolton Paula Dobriansky

Francis Fukuyama Robert Kagan Zalmay Khalilzad

William Kristol Richard Perle Peter W. Rodman

Donald Rumsfeld William Schneider, Jr. Vin Weber

Paul Wolfowitz R. James Woolsey Robert B. Zoellick

[Sid Walker]

Perhaps the Bush Administration's latest insult to the world community deserves a thread on his own?

After all, we may have to witness his antics for years to come.

I should acknowledge a kinder, gentler Zoellick.

USinfo.state.gov shows us that he cuddles pandas.

Last year, Zoellick skipped off to Goldman Sachs after a "successful" stint at the State Department.

Zoellick to quit 'in the coming weeks'

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Deputy Secretary of State Robert Zoellick, the department's No. 2 official, will leave his job "in the coming weeks," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told reporters Monday.

"Today, American diplomacy is on track; it is stronger than ever and that is due, in no small part, to Bob Zoellick," she told reporters.

"I've accomplished what I've set out to do, and it's time for me to step down," said Zoellick, who entered public office in 2001 as the U.S. trade representative.

He said he plans to join the investment banking firm Goldman Sachs. (Posted 9:58 a.m.)

What did he set out to do? The mind boggles.

Perverse that Goldman Sachs was so keen to snap up this great talent. Zoellick has also dabbled in helping to demolish multinational corporations. According to Robert Parry, "Robert Zoellick...worked for Enron... as a paid member of Enron's advisory board."

Many on the Republican right have long harboured a desire to wind up 'internationalist' institutions such as the UN and the World Bank.

Perhaps that's why they don't care when The Decider chooses The Terminator II to head the world's premier banking institution?

Edited May 31, 2007 by Sid Walker

[John Simkin]

It is outrageous how the president of the US gets to appoint the head of the World Bank. What a gutless pack of world political leaders we have.

[Len Colby]

Sid - Got any evidence he's Jewish other than claims that he is from sites like David Duke's or Jew Watch?

[Sid Walker]

Sid - Got any evidence he's Jewish other than claims that he is from sites like David Duke's or Jew Watch?

Len,

Thanks. You could be correct. It may be no more than a widespread assumption that Zoellick is 'Jewish'.

May I ask you a question. Is Zoellick NOT Jewish?

If Bob Zoellick is not Jewish, he certainly has a lot of people confused.

Not the first time that's happened in history, I'll grant you.

Sometimes confusion can even affect the individual concerned. I understand that happened in the case of Madeleine Albright, who 'discovered' her Jewish ancestry only after her appointment as US Secretary of State and once her efforts to co-ordinate an international push against Iraq got underway.

One may reasonably ask what the word means, in any case. Does Zoellick attend synagogue? I have no idea. Is he part of a genetically distinct group? I doubt it. Does he promote the interests of the State of Israel? it would appear so. Did his mother and/or father consider themselves Jewish? That's probably the unresolved issue here. Do you, Len, know for sure, either way?

Regarding his PNAC allegiance, one could take the point of view that lobbying to invade Iraq was not 'pro-Israel' at all, but 'pro-democracy' - and that signatories to the Project for the New American Century were not pro-Israel stooges but honest pro-democracy intellectuals on a compassionate mission to improve the world.

In that case, they were - on anyone's definition - miserably and disastrously wrong.

So there we have it.

Either the next head of the World Bank is a pro-Israel stooge, or his judgment on major contemporary events is woeful and he's an unrepentant fool.

Take your pick.

On either analysis, having been a significant influence behind the utter destruction of one previously quite prosperous nation, Zoellick has been promoted to experiment on the entire world. An odd way to reqard failure.

John's point, of course, is in some ways of greater concern.

For the WB Presidency to be the gift of a US President is quite blatant injustice. Is this an world organization - or what?

A serious critique of the World Bank would take many threads. It's another international institution dating from the end of World War Two, set up in haste and never subsequently reformed by a functional, co-operating world polity. It has backed numerous lousy projects and doubtless some benign projects - but overall is a pale shadow of what the world might expect from its premier banking institution. As I understand the story, when the IMF and World Bank were established, there was a hard fought contest between some of the world's greatest progressive economic minds, led by Keynes, and the world's most entrenched financial forces. The latter won.

Edited June 1, 2007 by Sid Walker