Wolfowitz is resigning effective 30 June.
The White House ‘reluctantly’ accepts the resignation.
Almost every aspect of the GOP is imploding, and I wish I could say I was even slightly upset about that.
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grumpy realist
Now let’s just get the Gonzo critter out, bring back Habeas Corpus, bring back rights dating back to the Magna Carta for our “accused as terrorists”,bring back checks-and-balances, strip away all those “executive rights” that Bush et al attempted to garnish the office of Presidency with, and educate ourselves so this never happens again.
ThymeZone
Just when I thought that story couldn’t get any more putrid, we have the Comey testimony.
OMFG, I read it over and still can’t believe it.
Dreggas
Cynicism and healthy dose of “but wait it’ll get worse…”
makes it easy to believe. All you have to do is think of the worst of all possible scenarios and these jackasses will outdo it.
Tom Hilton
Gotta love the institutional statement: “a number of mistakes were made by a number of individuals.” The only way they could make it weaker would be to say “stuff happened”.
Chris Johnson
I just emailed John a news item for the first time in my life: youtube link to the Comey testimony.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hxHjWYA50Ds&eurl=
DAMN…
I’m just imagining FBI Director Mueller ordering the security detail not to allow the acting attorney general to be REMOVED FROM THE ROOM under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES. Unquote… If you have any familiarity with how this things work, that speaks volumes. The director of the FBI saw fit to give direct orders to the security guys to make sure Comey wasn’t physically dragged from the room??? That scene could hardly have been more dramatic if the security guys had had to pull guns on Gonzales… with orders like that, it could have happened, and it tells you something that he saw fit to GIVE orders as dramatic as that…
Zombie Santa Claus
Set the White House flag at half mast.
Zombie Santa Claus
Fucking piece of shit computer! Sorry for the double post.
Set all the flags at half mast, not just the White House one. All the flags at the UN, too. This is a dark day for civilization.
BarneyG2000
I don’t remember if Wolfie was confirmed by the Senate, but do you remember when Repubs and conservative talking-heads argued that Bush has a right to appoint whomever he wants (Nuke option)?
Considering how many Bush appointments have had to resign (Gonzo soon) I wonder if the Repub leadership still fells the same way?
AkaDad
Wolfoquitz?
Zombie Santa Claus
Doubly so. If it weren’t for Democrat investigations, none of these hardworking patriotic Americans would’ve had to resign at all. If anything, impeachment powers should be taken away from Congress and put in the hands of the President, where they belong. Who, better than he, knows whether or not a member of the Executive deserves impeachment?
Jay C
Great: so Paul Wolfotwits gets another six weeks to stink up the World Bank ?(Jeez, would they even let him back in the building?): AND gets his golden parachute inflated by another $400K or so (I think he only had to hang in til 6/1).
Oh well, good riddance in any case: and it least it’s not (I hope not) OUR tax bucks heping out this cretin’s “retirement”.
jake
Yes, his “focus” certainly helped cause a lot of the former and helped fuck up the latter in Iraq.
Faretheewell, you war mongering son of a bitch!
P&POD
Bob In Pacifica
Okay, so what’s the real reason the Euros showed Wolfie the door?
Rome Again
::two points::
God, I love you guys, who else would think up shit like this?
Rome Again
Well John, I’m certainly glad to not see you crying over this stuff, because last night I heard it said “Social Conservatives are the heart of the GOP” and I thought to myself “John Cole might not like that”. They apparently could care less about voters like you, so, fuck ’em!
cleek
don’t they know that setting hard deadlines only emboldens the enemies of the World Bank ? bureaudefeatocrats !
Tsulagi
Poor Wolfie. You prove yourself in helping fuckup a war beyond anyone’s wildest imagination, but no one fully recognizes that genius. You’re pushed out of the Pentagon giving you the World Bank, but then the evildoer Eurotrash take you out not for your abysmal performance in that job too, but just for having your girlfriend bought with government dollars. He’s a victim.
RSA
Administrative leave beginning immediately, according to NPR.
MNPundit
So what are some good names for whatever party replaces the Republican Party? The Conservative Party? The National Patriot Party?
Let’s face it, parties have lived and died throughout history and it’s time for this one to die. There’s only room for one perpetual party in this country and it ain’t the GOP.
CaseyL
The Few, the Proud, the Not Totally Insane. (Motto: No Bushes Ever Again, We Swear.)
Joe1347
Gonzo’s turn is coming up. I wonder who’s next? Rove?
cleek
The Void
jake
Start placing your bets.
He’s not on this list of possibles but I’m tempted to pick GoneZo. He might soon need a consolation prize to keep him quiet.
grumpy realist
Article in the FT this morning–yah, there’s enough pressure within the WB to not let Wolfie back into the building, period.
Bush might try to do a “FU” revenge replacement (although I think the Europeans would probably say “ok, we’re taking our balls and going home–see if we ever let the US appoint the head of the WB ever again”), but the otherwise rumoured replacements all seem quite respectable. Talk of Paul Volker as interim president, which would be incredibly intelligent, so of course Bushie won’t do it.
No matter what happy-talk they put on Wolfie’s leaving, the US has lost face and power over this. And I couldn’t care less. The clowns running this Administration and the Republican party are going to have to discover the hard way that competency matters and you just can’t go around bellowing “my way or the highway!” without Blowback.
RSA
Well, the fiscal conservatives should expect to acquire the nickname “the Grand New Party”, with the perfectly appropriate acronym GNP. Social conservatives might go for a revival of the Know Nothing party but would probably prefer something grander, like the Party of God.
Redhand
I’m happy this pompous, ethically challenged scumbag was given the boot. Now, if we can only get rid of Gonzo, who is even more corrupt and morally unfit than Wolfie.
jake
I’ve seen “God’s Only Party” on bumperstickers. Or they could go with SOP: Social Order Party.
RSA
There’s a nice acronym, because we know what their standard operating procedure is like.
ImJohnGalt
Plus, they’re so used to giving a sop to their base, it just seems appropriate to their methods.
Wilfred
From the NYT story:
Like his plan to invade Iraq, maybe? That’s D for doomed, btw.
Punchy
Just think. The Dems were only a few thousand “lost” votes in either Virginia, Montana, or Missouri from NEVER knowing about Gonzo’s games, never investigating Rice’s run-up to the Niger claims, never being able to subpeona any documents for any of this stuff…Wow.
By the way, whomever said Bush will replace WolFullOfItz with a FU replacement, congrats. Names floating include Blair, and Frist. Bill Fucking Frist. Chew on that.
RSA
Don’t forget the Liberty University also has a business school. That would be a nice gesture, wouldn’t it? A one-fingered gesture, that is.
Zombie Santa Claus
Personally, I’m hoping for either John Bolton or Miguel Estrada. I’d settle for Admiral Poindexter or Eliott Abrams, though.
Detlef
You might have to send them all.
After the World Bank insurgents – with the help of the “chocolate-making countries” – defeated Wolfowitz and his three aides, you now need a surge of neo-cons to suppress the rebellion. Without a time-table of course. It´s the only way to ensure the survival of liberty, democracy and “Free Markets” at the World Bank.
fecapult
How about Party Under God, or PUG?
Then there’d be 2 PUGs I could look upon with equal revulsion.
Zombie Santa Claus
Socialism is in its last throes. We’ll soon get rid of those dead-enders, and bring freedom and prosperity to the World Bank and the IMF.
Punchy
Nobody fucks with Ponch. Send Ponch to the WB. Have him ride in on the motorcycle, just for effect.
Jimmmmm
Of course, thanks to Bush’s College of Cronies, the blow-back’s gonna be more potshots at America for being corrupt, brutal, weak, and ineffectual:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070518/wl_nm/worldbank_wolfowitz_africa_dc
Anybody left to make the argument that Bush and the GOP are going to make the US stronger and more secure?
Dreggas
This is what pisses me off the most. Used to be that you could be proud to be an American because your country stood for what was good and right in the world and even when it made mistakes it tried to correct them (for the most part).
grumpy realist
Hmmm. You’ve just reminded me to get some Chalmers Johnson out of the library….
Rome Again
But, it’s not America that is corrupt, it’s the GOP and the asswipes in the current administration. Don’t lay this at the feet of ordinary Americans and the country they live in. The country itself didn’t do it, just a certain cabal contained within this country and their supporters only.
caustics
Who could have imagined that the “serious party” would appoint the biggest collection of dumbshits, whack-a-doodles, pissants and ne’er-do-wells ever to disgrace an administration.
I hear the little neo-kiddies whine about minority treatment in congress. I say all they need to do is come clean with a few piddling scandals – then they can eat at the grown-up table again.
Detlef
Zombie Santa Claus,
You´re totally right!
But let´s not forget that there might be a few “freedom and prosperity” loving souls still alive in the World Bank. After all, Wolfowitz still might get his bonus payment of $300,000 to 400,000.
I grant you that this isn´t much of a “golden parachute” but it seems to indicate that the spark of freedom and capitalism – and rejection of socialism – is still there. After the surge we might want to identify these freedom-loving people.
Tax Analyst
Well, maybe it’s a bit of a stretch, but how about a Religious Party that advocates a strict Theocracy – they could pull all the nut-cases who want to replace the Constitution with the Bible, but just disagree mainly on peripheral issues that, while important, can be settled out after they make sure we all pray everyday, you know, like “Exactly how many angels ARE dancing on the head of that pin – and can we find out if we torture some of them”…they would go by “America’s Newly Unified Savior’s”, or “ANUS”…
Zombie Santa Claus
True, there might be some neo-cons trapped in there. Only reason I can think of not to preemptively nuke the place from orbit.
poppinfresh
I can’t believe nobody has mentioned the name I feel most likely to come up on the list of qualified replacements:
Harriet Meyers.
You heard it here first, folks.
Detlef
Rome again,
That was a perfectly well understood excuse up to 2004 outside the USA given what happened in 2000.
Unfortunately later in 2004, the USA population re-elected that guy as President and provided him again with a Republican Congress majority not interested in oversight.
Remember that British tabloid “Daily Mirror” headline in late 2004?
“How can 59,054,087 people be so DUMB?”
“The country” did re-elect Bush in late 2004. Amid “Freedom fries”, “Old Europe”, “axis of chocolate making countries” and thoughts that Kerry might be speaking French as a second language. Which was somehow “bad” and un-American. And cheered on by lot´s of American media.
Coupled with foreign media reports describing a different picture than the US government.
Ask yourself this.
If you were a continental European, getting European media reports and getting insulted by Rumsfeld, Cheney and the neo-cons, how would you react?
You´d probably get suspicious of American media (CNN International) and every American media available on the web. The “NYT” case with Judith Miller probably won´t help.
Simply put, going it alone and destroying trust is much easier than retaining trust. Once you destroyed trust, it´s a lot harder to win it back.
Detlef
Now, now…
While I applaud your patriotic stance – from a safe distance in Europe :) – the World Bank headquarters is situated in Washington D.C. . Just like the “IMF”. Somehow these international institutions founded their headquarters close to the US government 60 years ago. No doubt they were trying to escape the justified anger of true American patriots later on.
Still, the Bush White House might be too close to ground zero in your scenario. Not to mention that you might loose some Republican Congress politicians in your scenario. That would be really unpatriotic.
Rome Again
Detlef, this is no longer 2004, and there are a lot of people who voted for Bush in 2000 and 2004 that, if given the opportunity to do it again, wouldn’t.
What part of sinking approval rating have you not figured out? In what way are you concerned that the Republicans will pull through in another election when there are indications all around that the entire party is seriously imploding.
I think you need to check your clock, and turn it ahead a few years.
Tax Analyst
What? No mention of Michael Brown…he did a helluva job, ya’ know…maybe the Decider has Decided to save Brownie up for fryin’ those bigger fishes…probably gonna be an opening for a new AG fairly soon – Brown’s extensive experience in…what was it? — Horse Shows or something like that – really gives him the type of background that Dubyah’s gonna be looking for there, because whoever it is, they are gonna have to be familiar with horseshit and how to shovel it.
May 18th, 2007 at 10:17 am
Detlef
Rome again, as I said I´m not an American citizen.
I´m an European, a German. And I´m not saying that the Republicans would win another election? Sorry if my comment might be misunderstood.
We were simply disappointed when you Americans re-elected Bush. That made us a bit wary…
However let me ask you a question?
Suppose that the Iraq situation wouldn´t be as bad as it is today, don´t you suppose the approval ratings for Bush would be higher than today?
Simply put, is it possible that American voters might be less interested in principle (UN security council, approval of European allies) but more interested in results in that war?
In short, if Iraq had worked out, wouldn´t the Bush administration be gloating and searching for the next target. Syria or Iran? Cheered on by the American media?
Mind you, I´m not saying that the American population at large would be comfortable with a unilateral course. I´m simply saying that your re-elected Bush administration didn´t give a d*mn for European objections. Justified or not.
The USA did lose trust in Europe after 2003. Losing trust is easy but gaining trust (again) takes time. Especially given the European feeling that you Americans are only turning against Iraq because it went wrong, not because the Iraq war itself was wrong.
Tax Analyst
Oh, man…I completely missed this connection in my last post..see – here: Brownie/FEMA – FEMA/Disaster management – Disaster Management/displaced people, particularly those lacking financial means to recover (We’ll call them “*Poor Folks”). OK, got that, right? Now we attach Brownie’s masterful handling there – he sure dealt with those poor folks, didn’t he?
OK, now here’s how it connects to the World Bank: WB/charged with aiding development of impoverished countries – Aiding development/Critical function – economic recovery/ disaster relief – Disaster Relief/*Poor Folks, lacking means to recover or even a pot to piss into in many cases.
It all ties in so beautifully. Think of it thousands of New Orleans/Katrina recoveries taking place simultaneously all over the globe.
…if only Brownie hadn’t burned his bridges by making those self-serving remarks trying to avoid accountabillity after he got dumped…I don’t know where in the world he could have picked up that nasty habit from.
It’s so sad that things have come to the point where any of what I just said has any resonance at all, because my point, really, is that Bush has paid absolutely no attention to the effects of his appointments and so continues to make the same type of appointments at every juncture…and with each inappropriate move he puts in motion a further, deeper and potentially more lasting erosion of our nation’s credibility and standing and makes it that much more difficult to promote and defend our VERY REAL & SERIOUS national interests. But Dubyah never cared about any of that…as long as they could spin it so the American public would swallow it they couldn’t have cared less about a fucking thing…unleashing a bloody conflict in a key Middle-eastern State…we’ll get rid of Hussein, be in and out in a couple months or so, and nobody will give a fuck about what happens to the rest of ’em. “No Child Left Behind”…We’ll make a bunch of uplifting speeches about how important it is to invest in our future generations…and then hand a huge, unfunded mandate to the States…nobody will remember the funding thing and then we can blame the states for failing to effectively implement this very important mandate…shame on those bad, bad, uncaring states – maybe they need more Religion.
Enough..sorry to burn so much space – I think you get the picture, it’s probably overdrawn.
Gotta go…
conumbdrum
Submitted from Swing Shift Cinderella, Tex Avery’s cartoon masterpiece…
I think that’s the point at which the wolf gets clobbered with a frying pan…
grumpy realist
The problem with the neocons and everyone else of the “well, there’s no law against it so we’ll do what we want” persuasion is that once you’ve shown yourself unwilling to abide by unwritten “etiquette”, there’s nothing to stop the other groups from turning around and doing the exact thing to you.
For instance, it’s quite possible that the Europeans, if pissed off enough, would do a quiet round of other WB countries, get all of them to decide on a candidate, and then just tell Bush “we’ve chosen Mr. X to run the World Bank. We’ve decided we’re not going to let the US pick the head any more. After all, there’s no law that says we have to.”
Plus there ARE other channels that the other countries could use to get money to the Third World–they could also simply say “screw this, we’re picking up our ball and going home.”
This is why I think saner heads will prevail, and head off Bush from yet another game of chicken politics, which seems to be the only way he knows to manage: be as bullheaded as possible, never compromise, and push until the other guy backs down. The problem with this strategy is that there is no defense against someone who decides to walk away from the “negotiations”, period. And why would anyone want to even enter negotiations with Bush if they know the only thing is “my way or the highway”? Better to refuse to enter the arena at all.
Result: lose of American power. I know the neocons (and a lot of other sillies) believe that the US can indeed totally “go it alone” and doesn’t have to care about what the rest of the world thinks of the US. They are very very wrong about our lack of vulnerability. (Heck, if China wants, it can trash our economy at any point by refusing to buy any more government bonds)
jake
Mmm. I still think she’ll be tapped for the next AG if The Deciderator can ever leggo his Gonezo. He’ll likely view the fact she knows jack shit about the Constitution as a bonus. Either that or he’s handing over his War Czarin’ cap so he can declare himself Head Sherriff and strap on the star and spurs.