Boztopia.com

The news that Iraq is enjoying a record budget surplus while the US creaks under the weight of record deficits is fueling calls for Iraq to use those costs to pay for its own rebuilding efforts, a politically posthumous vindication of Iraq war architect Paul Wolfowitz’s belief that the war could be fought “on the cheap,” and Iraq could pay for the country that we (that’s us, America) wrecked with its own money. It’s all bullshit, of course–a way to justify abrogating responsibility for the damage we’ve caused.

It’s also a reminder that people like Wolfowitz, despite being proven wrong at every turn and being politically disgraced on multiple levels,are so deeply entrenched in the corridors of global power that no matter how many times they mess up, they keep showing up. It’s like a mix of Woody Allen’s “Zelig” and the Terminator–that guy who keeps showing up at important affairs and just…won’t…die.

You can even find the tentacles of Wolfowitz stretching out as far as Malaysia, where political opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim is noted for his association with him:

Now one of the Islamic world’s best-known personalities — with friends including former U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz and ex-World Bank President James Wolfensohn — Mr. Anwar leads an opposition alliance that has badly shaken the ruling National Front coalition. Among his goals: tearing down a system of race-based affirmative-action programs that have helped the ethnic Malay-dominated National Front to rule this multiracial country for 50 years. (emphasis added)

Note that particular goal, as it’s very similar to the kind of thing neocons have championed in this country for years, and which Wolfowitz continues to champion all around the world, even after his repeated failures:

Noting that he was very impressed by the economic and democratic developments Taiwan has made over the past few decades, Wolfowitz said the next challenge is to take the nation’s economic success to a higher level. “Taiwan should be made into the most business-friendly place in the world,” he said, pointing to Ireland as an example of dramatically lowered taxes, relaxed regulations and improved physical infrastructure.

Indeed, because those policies have been working out so well in our own country of late, where our bridges collapse, we get sick from bad food, and our wealth creation ability has been so completely eroded. Do these guys never learn?

Speaking of affirmative action and Anwar Ibrahim, it seems he was involved in a very different sort of preferential hiring practice for Wolfowitz and his infamous girlfriend, Shaha Riza:

Over a year later, on October 1, 2006, Anwar Ibrahim, chairman of the Foundation for the Future, wrote Robin Cleveland, a senior Wolfowitz aide at the Bank, and requested the transfer of Riza from the State Department to the Foundation for the Future. Two months later, after Cleveland instructed the Bank’s vice president of human resources to approve the transfer, the Bank okayed the switch. The Anwar letter and other Bank documents related to this transfer did not mention that Anwar is a longtime friend of Wolfowitz. One of Asia’s most prominent Muslim politicians, Anwar was a former deputy prime minister of Malaysia. He and Wolfowitz met and developed a friendship in the mid-1980s, when Wolfowitz was U.S. ambassador to Indonesia, according to Aasil Ahmad, an adviser to Anwar. In 1998, after addressing a rally protesting the government, Anwar was arrested and subsequently jailed on corruption and sodomy charges. During his years in jail, Wolfowitz was an outspoken champion of Anwar. Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, Anwar, while still imprisoned, wrote an essay condemning the attacks and calling on the Muslim worked to address “the suffering inflicted on the Muslim masses in Iraq by its dictator.”

Although I disagree with the vile smear tactics levied against Anwar by the ruling party, and generally support the Malaysian blogosphere’s fervent desire to back him in his challenge to the government, the presence of Wolfowitz in Anwar’s history is a good reminder that even in the most clear-cut struggle, there are more than enough elements of distortion to make you think twice. Whether it’s Taiwan, Malaysia, or Washington, D.C., people like Wolfowitz are continuing to insinuate themselves in the body politic and distorting the debate to promote their failed pro-war, pro-corporatist policies whenever someone gives them a podium. Like the ultimate bad penny, they just keep turning up and bringing bad luck wherever they go.