Is Wolfowitz threatening the World Bank?

[Superlative]

Wolfowitz:

.........."Your decision will not only affect my life, it will affect how this institution is viewed in the United States and the world."

"You still have the opportunity to avoid long-term damage by resolving this matter in a fair and equitable way that recognises that we all tried to do the right thing, however imperfectly we went about it," he said.........




http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/16/washington/16wolfowitz.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/BC36FB9A-FE49-44D6-AEE2-F745593E5E8A.htm



This seems like a Political power threat to me.

 

[Care4all]

Sure does? hmmmm, wonder what he knows?

 

[Superlative]

Sure does? hmmmm, wonder what he knows?

He knows he's powerful and he has some pretty powerful friends.

He's thinking, "I helped start the Iraq War and you guys wanna fire me for this? Ill show you World Bank."

 

[RetiredGySgt]

And of course what he said is totally wrong right? You are aware that the Europeans want to keep our money but remove us from any position to effect how and where it is spent right? THAT isn't helping their attempt to remove Wolfowitz.

Personally I support the idea of ending our contributions to this Organization, it is just like the UN, a haven for money grabbing idiots that think we are the gravy train.

 

[Care4all]

And of course what he said is totally wrong right? You are aware that the Europeans want to keep our money but remove us from any position to effect how and where it is spent right? THAT isn't helping their attempt to remove Wolfowitz.

Personally I support the idea of ending our contributions to this Organization, it is just like the UN, a haven for money grabbing idiots that think we are the gravy train.

well, if he is forced out, our president, gets to pick the replacement....it's in the ''rules''....so we will always have a say in who heads it!

 

[Truthmatters]

That is one of the possible outcomes, the WB taking that privledge away from us.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

well, if he is forced out, our president, gets to pick the replacement....it's in the ''rules''....so we will always have a say in who heads it!

For all your claims to "UP" on the news you have missed a lot here.

The Europeans want us no longer to pick anyone for any position, they did however offer to let us pick the replacement for Wolfowitz if we would force him out. Notice they didn't offer to longer pick the head of the Sister organization, which is part of the quid pro quo of the deal.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

That is one of the possible outcomes, the WB taking that privledge away from us.

The World bank has no power to take anything away from us. The European Governments might though. But the political fall out will not be to their liking.

 

[Superlative]

WASHINGTON, May 16 — After six weeks of combating efforts to oust him as president of the World Bank, Paul D. Wolfowitz began Wednesday to negotiate the terms under which he would resign, in return for the dropping or softening of the charge that he had engaged in misconduct, bank officials said.

Mr. Wolfowitz was said to be adamant that he be cleared of wrongdoing before he resigned, according to people familiar with his thinking.

The negotiations were still under way on Wednesday evening, and bank officials said they were increasingly hopeful that a solution was in sight, ending what had become a bitter ordeal at the bank, within the Bush administration and at economic ministries around the world.

The World Bank’s board of directors met in the afternoon on Wednesday to discuss the conclusion of its special committee that Mr. Wolfowitz was guilty of ethical and governance violations. Many were firm about not dismissing the findings that Mr. Wolfowitz violated the bank’s trust by arranging for a pay and promotion package for Shaha Ali Riza, his companion and a bank employee, when he became president in 2005.

At the same time, talks took place between emissaries of Mr. Wolfowitz and bank officials with backing from board members who favored easing him out without provoking a confrontation with the Bush administration. Bank officials said the negotiations were aimed at finding a way for the board to accept the findings of the bank committee, while also declaring that Mr. Wolfowitz acted in good faith and that mistakes were made by all sides.

People close to the negotiations said that the threat to oust Mr. Wolfowitz had, in the previous 24 hours, taken a bizarre U-turn, with Mr. Wolfowitz challenging the bank’s directors to vote him out, knowing that the United States would oppose that move. Previously, Mr. Wolfowitz had been doing everything in his power to prevent such a vote.

In effect, bank officials said, he was using the fear among European leaders at the bank of a possible rupture with the Bush administration at a time when the United States and Europe are struggling to cooperate on Iran sanctions, trade and other economic issues.

“The bank board is ready to vote Wolfowitz out of office, and Wolfowitz is calling their bluff,” said a bank official briefed on the negotiations. “It’s going to be difficult for the board to drop its charges against him, but they’re going to have to do it if they want to resolve this. They’re staring each other down, but the bank side is blinking furiously.”

Bank officials said they did not know the precise wording of what the bank might agree to and that Mr. Wolfowitz and his lawyer, Robert S. Bennett, would also accept.

They said it appeared that both the White House and the Treasury Department were involved in guiding Mr. Wolfowitz’s strategy, and that the interests of the United States were being represented at the bank by the American director on the board, Eli Whitney Debevoise II.

Mr. Debevoise, a Washington lawyer, arrived at his job at the bank in early April, the precise moment when the furor over Mr. Wolfowitz erupted.

The negotiations over Mr. Wolfowitz’s possible exit unfolded quickly on Wednesday, officials said. As recently as late on Tuesday night, they said that a last-minute appeal by Mr. Wolfowitz to deny the charges against him and to demand a fair process in which he could stay on the job seemed to backfire.

Especially galling to bank board members, various officials said, was Mr. Wolfowitz’s request that the 24-member bank board reject the conclusions of its seven-member subcommittee charging him with violating several codes of conduct and trying to cover up his involvement in Ms. Riza’s salary and promotion.

By the next morning, a flurry of second thoughts and back-channel conversations spread through the bank, officials said, in large part because of signals from the White House on Tuesday that if Mr. Wolfowitz were cleared of misconduct charges, the administration would be willing to consider the question of whether he could lead the bank in such a divisive atmosphere.

Previously the administration had rebuffed all suggestions that he could not lead the bank, as both President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney declared their confidence in his abilities.............

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/17/washington/17wolfowitz.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin


Does he not understand that things dont work the same way outside the White House?

Its a show of power now, and Wolfowitz is calling in his friends.

 

[Care4all]

For all your claims to "UP" on the news you have missed a lot here.

The Europeans want us no longer to pick anyone for any position, they did however offer to let us pick the replacement for Wolfowitz if we would force him out. Notice they didn't offer to longer pick the head of the Sister organization, which is part of the quid pro quo of the deal.

man oh man, this administration has screwed us as a country, just all around in foreign power and affairs...

they are just incredibly jinxed, unlucky, or imcompetent with their picks of leadership....end result, being the same, the loss of respect and controlling power in the foreign arena....

hopefully, we can get some of that back some day....it makes us more secure imo!

care

 

[Superlative]

It doesnt matter, none of it does, there have been worse things happen in the past.

As long as the US is the lone military superpower, and they have control of things other countries need, they can continue to do as we please.

On all fronts.

And if the Dems get control, they will be on cleanup duty for a long time.

 

[RetiredGySgt]

man oh man, this administration has screwed us as a country, just all around in foreign power and affairs...

they are just incredibly jinxed, unlucky, or imcompetent with their picks of leadership....end result, being the same, the loss of respect and controlling power in the foreign arena....

hopefully, we can get some of that back some day....it makes us more secure imo!

care

Your claim of being "up" on the news fails you yet again... I suggest you actually learn what your talking about.

 

[boedicca]

Hmmmmm...this would all be very insightful if it weren't a load of misinformation.

Wolfowitz worked through the bureaucracy at the World Bank in order to ensure that his girlfriend was moved out of a position under his control. This Fracas is just Euro-Backstabbing at its "finest".

According to the Ad Hoc Group Report, at paragraph 44, Mr. Coll in his recent interview stated as follows:

"According to Mr. Coll, he told Mr. Wolfowitz and Ms. Cleveland that the terms proposed by Ms. Riza, regarding her promotion increase, her annual increase and guaranteed promotion to Levels I and J were ‘outside the Staff Rules' and that moving forward with them was a reputational risk to the Bank. In Mr. Coll's view, there is ‘no doubt that the President knew or had been made aware of by me that this was outside the rules."

Memos and notes prepared by Mr. Coll at the time show that his views were quite opposite-Mr. Coll affirmed that there were no personnel policies that clearly applied to this situation:

For example, in handwritten edits he wrote on a draft of the Riza agreement, Mr. Coll wrote:

"There is no precedent to his kind of situation and no policy that would clearly apply to resolve it." (Handwritten annotations of X. Coll on draft agreement dated 08/26/05 (emphasis added). The final agreement with Ms. Riza, which was signed by Mr. Coll, similarly states: "There is no precedent of this kind and no personnel policy that clearly applies to resolve it." (September 1, 2005 Letter Agreement signed by X. Coll and S. Riza) (Emphasis added).


* He wrote, in a memo to himself dated August 22, 2005, that he told Mr. Wolfowitz "we were in a very difficult situation - with no precedents at the Bank - and that it had enormous potential to damage the bank's reputation.In balance, I thought the situation required more flexibility than in other past cases and that there was great risk to the Bank if we could not come to a workable agreement in a few days." (August 22, 2005 email from X. Coll to himself)
* He added: "I felt comfortable that I had raised points of concern with the President and that he had taken these seriously and given due consideration."(Id.)
* Mr. Coll also wrote at the time that the decision, with which Mr. Wolfowitz concurred, to make any promotions contingent on evaluation and peer review "was a workable solution that was more within bounds of acceptable policy.This addition brought the process for potential promotions more in line with current practice at the Bank.I felt that, on balance this was a reasonable way to move forward and find a solution given the very complex and difficult set of circumstances." (Id.)...

http://www.americanthinker.com/2007/05/the_attempted_putsch_at_the_wo.html

 

[Superlative]

..........It offered him a “second chance” to redeem his reputation and realize his ambitions, says a friend who has known him for decades.

Months later, another friend ran into the new bank president and asked how he was enjoying the job. Mr. Wolfowitz unleashed a torrent of bitter complaints about the bank’s bureaucracy, saying it was the worst he had ever seen — worse than at the Pentagon.

Now, as friends and critics sort through the wreckage of Mr. Wolfowitz’s bank career, they wonder if it was doomed from the outset. Supporters say he arrived at the bank, a citadel of liberalism, from a four-year stint at the Pentagon, where he was an early champion of going to war with Iraq and left bearing its stigma. He was determined to shake up the status quo by rooting out what he saw as corruption and waste, and demanding measurable results from the bank’s many aid programs.

“The bank leadership didn’t like Paul challenging their assumptions,” said Robert B. Holland III, a Texas businessman who represented the Bush administration on the bank board until last year. “They have all been there a long time, and they are used to promoting each other’s interests and scratching each other’s back.”

But others say Mr. Wolfowitz repeated the mistakes he had made at the Pentagon: adopting a single-minded position on certain matters, refusing to entertain alternative views, marginalizing dissenters.

“Wolfowitz unsettled people from the outset,” said Manish Bapna, executive director of the Bank Information Center, an independent watchdog group. “His style was seen as an ad hoc subjective approach to punishing enemies and rewarding friends..............”


..........Despite the administration’s aversion to multilateral institutions, many at the World Bank had initially hoped that Mr. Wolfowitz — a neoconservative intellectual, former academic dean and ambassador to Indonesia — could help forge a new consensus with liberals on ways to aid poor countries more effectively.

But his low-key intellectual approach to subjects belied a determination to get his way, bank officials say............"


http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/18/washington/18worldbank.html?hp