Wolfie Soprano
Paul Wolfowitz pleaded his case before the executive board of the World Bank on Tuesday.
The Bush administration continued to try to keep him in office. Why? Why try so hard? It is clear that Wolfowitz does not have the confidence of his staff, and could not possibly hope to be an effective leader at this point. Indeed, you have to wonder why Bush put Wolfowitz into a job for which he had no credentials whatsoever.
So here is maybe a clue.
Richard Adams writes in The Guardian:
‘Under fire for the lavish package given to Shaha Riza, a World Bank employee and Mr Wolfowitz’s girlfriend when he became president, an official investigation into the controversy has found that Mr Wolfowitz broke bank rules and violated his own contract – setting off a struggle between US and European governments over Mr Wolfowitz’s future.Sounding more like a cast member of the Sopranos than an international leader . . .
According to Mr Coll’s notes: “At the end of the conversation Mr Wolfowitz became increasingly agitated and said that he was ‘tired of people … attacking him’ and ‘you should get your friends to stop it’. Mr Wolfowitz said, ‘If they f*ck me or Shaha, I have enough on them to f*ck them too’,” naming several senior bank staff he felt were vulnerable. ‘
Wolfowitz seems to make his way in the world by threatening and blackmailing the people around him. Just makes you wonder.
And also, you wonder what his sources of damning information are.