Top 10 Reasons Why Paul Wolfowitz Would Make a Good World Bank President

By John Cavanagh / Institute for Policy Studies

1. He would follow in the great tradition of World Bank president Robert McNamara, who also helped kill tens of thousands of people in a poor country most Americans couldn’t find on a map before getting the job.
2. It helps to be a good liar when you run an institution with employees who earn over $100,000 a year to pretend to help billions of people who live on less than $1 a day.
3. With all his experience helping U.S. companies grab Iraq ’s oil profits, he's got just the right experience for doling out lucrative World Bank contracts to U.S. businesses.
4. After predecessor James Wolfensohn blew millions of dollars on "consultations" with citizen groups to give the appearance of openness, Wolfowitz's tough-guy style is just what’s needed to rid the World Bank of those irritating activists.
5. Unlike former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, another one of the four leading candidates, at least Wolfowitz hasn't failed at running a Fortune 500 company.
6. Unlike the Treasury Department’s John Taylor, another leading candidate, at least Wolfowitz doesn't want to get rid of the institution he would head.
7. While earning a University of Chicago Ph.D. , he was exposed to the tenets of market fundamentalism that have reigned at the World Bank for decades.
8. He has experience in constructing echo chambers where only the advice he wants to hear is spoken.
9. He knows some efficient private contractors who build echo chambers for only a few hundred billion dollars (cost plus, of course).
10. He can develop a pre-emptive poverty doctrine where the World Bank could invade countries that fail to make themselves safe for U.S. business, modeled on the U.S. pre-emptive war doctrine he helped craft.

 

The "World Bank." What a silly, contrived notion. This is hardly news.

 

How can you say that? Do you even know what the World Bank does, as far as helping developing nations? It's by no means similar to the UN in it's burecratic top down structure.

 

Yes I do even know what it does, and I find the notion silly and contrived. As if somehow, after centuries upon centuries of ineptitude, the only thing these countries need is a good interest rate.

Don't get me wrong, I think their mission is noble. But I also think they're pushing a rope. And it infuriates me to no end when the topic of "loan forgiveness" comes up as a means of help. It's like giving a homeless guy a sandwich. Sure, it helps for about an hour, and then he's worse off than before.

 

The scenes of death and destruction that he viewed in Indonesia and Sri Lanka played on Wolfowitz's long interest in Third World issues of poverty and peace, according to this account, and got him looking at what new career move he could make to help in this area.

"Nothing is more gratifying than being able to help people in need -- as I experienced once again when I witnessed the tsunami relief operations in Indonesia and Sri Lanka," the statement said. "It is also a critical part of making the world a better place for all of us."

Awww, what a noble fellow. . . I guess this is no way related to the driving force he was in the whole Iraq mess, and seeing as how there is no resolution in sight, him wanting to dissassociate himself from it. . .

 

I hate it when people like you take backhanded shots at our government in that matter.

Mystikalillusion = Rex?

 

Our government? Makes me want to move to another country just thinking about it.

I don't even consider Wolfowitz a human being, much less an American.

 

Nobody's forcing you to stay.

 

I love how people say this, while ignoring everything going on over there. It makes me wonder what y'all are gonna say 10 years down the road if everything continues on the path of democracy it is now on.

The World Bank is stupid, but so is the UN. The UN is still needed.

I doubt this will be popular, but I would have liked Bono for the position. Wolfowitz is awesome just for the hilarity of it all. He was one of the key people behind Iraq and he is a Jew. Perfect for the world community.

 

Don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.