Can it be? Can someone connected with President George Bush possibly be at the center of an untidy controversy or a messy scandal? Add this one to your list of Bush associates involved in controversies and/or scandals (you may be on page two or three already on this list):
World Bank president and George W Bush ally Paul Wolfowitz is fighting to save his career after becoming embroiled in a row over pay rises and promotions given to his former colleague and romantic partner.
Mr Wolfowitz issued a full apology after admitting he had approved plans to give a bank employee Shaha Riza such substantial salary increases that she now earns more than US Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice.
The Bank’s administrative board is meeting tonight to decide the fate of Mr Wolfowitz, an arch neo-conservative, who as deputy secretary of defence was one of the prime proponents of war with Iraq.
Looking chastened and sombre, he used a press conference at the opening of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings in Washington to launch a comprehensive defence of his position.
He said: “I made a mistake, for which I am sorry.
“Let me also ask for some understanding. Not only was this a painful personal dilemma, but I also had to deal with it when I was new to this institution and I was trying to navigate in uncharted waters.
“The situation was unprecedented and exceptional.�
He needs to post his comments HERE.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.