POLITICS: World Bank Should Go With Wolfowitz – Activists

Paul Wolfowitz's fall from grace is symptomatic of the double standards and hypocrisy of the World Bank and strains the marriage between neo-liberal policies and militarism that he embodied, say activists and analysts.

POLITICS: Wolfowitz Fueled Tensions That Led to His Demise

Disgraced World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz, who announced his resignation Thursday, may insist that his staff and the Bank's directors ganged up on him because of his role in the Iraq war, but analysts and a Bank source say the ouster was mostly self-inflicted.

POLITICS-US/IRAN: Another Step Toward Realism

Realists in the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush appear to have won another victory over the dwindling ranks of neo-conservatives and others hawks with this weekend's announcement that Washington will soon engage in bilateral talks with Iran.

POLITICS-US: Neo-Cons Driving Iran Divestment Campaign

Neo-conservative hawks who championed the invasion of Iraq are leading a new campaign to persuade state and local governments, as well as other institutional investors, to "divest" their holdings in foreign companies and U.S. overseas subsidiaries doing business in Iran.

POPULATION: NGOs Warn of World Bank “Fundamentalists”

When the United States tried to water down a longstanding policy on reproductive health and family planning at the World Bank last month, there was a storm of protests from population experts and activist groups worldwide.

POLITICS-US: Slowly, Slowly, the Ship of State Turns Realist

With just over 18 months left in office, the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush appears once again to be moving in a more "realist" direction in its dealings with the rest of the world, including the Middle East.

POLITICS-U.S.: Wolfowitz Defenders Double Their Standards

Some of the same neoconservative institutions that are defending World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz against charges that he unethically promoted the career and compensation of his romantic partner were among the most aggressive in attacking former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan for alleged nepotism on behalf of his son.

POLITICS: Wolfowitz’s Allies Regroup but Leave Questions Unanswered

Paul Wolfowitz, the embattled World Bank president, is receiving new support from conservative politicians and right-wing publications that previously backed his notorious role as an architect of the war in Iraq, but missing from the regrouping attempts are answers to two important questions.

POLITICS: Top Wolfowitz Postings Went to Iraq War Backers

Of the top five outside international appointments made by embattled World Bank president Paul Wolfowitz during his nearly two-year tenure, three were senior political appointees of right-wing governments that provided strong backing for U.S. policy in Iraq.

POLITICS-US: Cheney Daughter Rages Against Syria

Just a week after Vice President Dick Cheney accused Congress' senior Democrat and Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi of "bad behaviour" for visiting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, his daughter and former senior State Department official, Elizabeth Cheney, called Thursday for a global diplomatic embargo against Damascus.

POLITICS-US: Heroes or Cowards? Neocons Weigh In on Sailors

Name, rank, serial number and sign on the dotted line. No sooner had Britain's 15 "kidnapped" sailors and marines returned from their harrowing "hostage" experience at the hands of Iran than some were lining up to sell their stories to the British press.

POLITICS: Elliott Abrams and Deja Vu All Over Again

It has an all too familiar ring to it.

CULTURE-US: Battling Evil with Abs of Steel

If the new Hollywood blockbuster "300" weren't so homoerotic, Osama Bin Laden would probably make the film mandatory viewing for all members of al Qaeda.

POLITICS-US: Bush’s Book List Gets More Islamophobic

Accounts of a Feb. 28 "literary luncheon" at the White House suggest that President George W. Bush's reading tastes - until now a remarkably good predictor of his policy views - are moving ever rightward, even apocalyptic, despite his administration's recent suggestions that it is more disposed to engage Washington's foes, even in the Middle East.

POLITICS-US: End of Cowboy Diplomacy, Part II?

It was just nine months ago when Newsweek spoke for the conventional wisdom at that moment when it pronounced "The End of Cowboy Diplomacy".

POLITICS: Rice Picks Neo-Con Champion of Iraq War as Counselor

In a move that has surprised many foreign policy analysts here, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has appointed a prominent neo-conservative hawk and leading champion of the Iraq war to the post of State Department Counselor.

US/MIDEAST: Rice Faces Formidable White House Foe

If, as she insists, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is determined to make concrete progress toward achieving George W. Bush's vision of a two-state solution, one in which Israel would be required to make major territorial concessions, it appears that she faces a major foe in the White House.

POLITICS-US: The Neo-Con Dog That Isn’t Barking

For several weeks now, Washington has been abuzz with rumours that U.S. President George W. Bush is preparing to attack nuclear and other sites in Iran this spring - rumours deemed sufficiently credible that lawmakers from both parties are hastily preparing legislation precisely to prevent such an eventuality.

POLITICS-US: How Neocon Shiite Strategy Led to Sectarian War

The supreme irony of President George W. Bush's campaign to blame Iran for the sectarian civil war in Iraq, as well as attacks on U.S. forces, is that the Shiite militias who started to drive the Sunnis out of the Baghdad area in 2004 and thus precipitated the present sectarian crisis did so with the support of both Iran and the neoconservative U.S. war planners.

POLITICS-US: Democracy Languishes, but Neo-Con Strategy Lives

The Project for the New American Century (PNAC) may have effectively closed up shop two years ago and its key neo-conservative allies in the administration, such as Scooter Libby and Douglas Feith, may be long gone, but the group's five-year-old Middle East strategy remains very much alive.

POLITICS-US: Hardliner’s Hardliner Led Bush’s Iraq Review

When President George W. Bush's unveils his long-awaited new strategy on Iraq Wednesday night, he will be relying heavily on the counsel of one J.D. Crouch II, perhaps the most hard line - if most obscure - of his hawkish advisers.