On Sun, 15 Apr 2007, the FT was quoted as saying
> A senior European official told the Financial Times that unless the White
> House withdrew its support, European countries were not sufficiently
> united to succeed in an immediate attempt to force Mr Wolfowitz?s
> removal.
FWIW (and generally the FT is better informed in these spheres) the NYT report today is interestingly on the other side,
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/04/16/washington/16bank.html
portraying determined European resistance that is growing (and was inflamed by the Wolfie press conference that Woj cited), as well as determined resistance from Paulsen in Treasury. Which if true would jibe with both Woj's and Doug's views: the ruling capitalist class thinks this is bad; treasury represents them and is pushing hard; but if past practice is any indication, treasury won't win.
What I don't understand is why the dominant forces (as opposed to the staff, which viscerally hate him) wouldn't simply see this as victory and leave it.
Wolfie's whole agenda, which was pure Bushit, was to politicize the Bank's operations -- which is anathema to the Bank's mission, which is to put economic considerations above all and transform all economies into the kind that are profitable for us. He's been fought tooth and nail by the governing board on this, and he's lost time and time again. FBOW, it's used up the Bank's energies and hamstrung it. But because the aegis of this mission was "good governance" and "stamping out corruption" it is now completely dead in the water. There is no way Wolfie will ever have credibility on that subject again. He's a laughing stock. So on the substance, the internal opposition against him has now basically won an irrevocable vicotry. Actually getting rid of him would not only be gravy, it might actually endanger their victory.
Ideally, supporters of the bank would want a dynamic, qualified, charismatic president right now because the bank's post-Bretton Woods mission -- greasing the wheels for the IMF's structural adjustment programs -- has been in crisis for almost a decade, along with the IMF's. But they're not going to get any such leader from the Bushits. So there's no strategic point in removing him -- unless they actually want to go so far as to overthrow the 60 year old system that gives the US the chair.
Michael