In case you didn't get the bigger picture of Zoellick's remarks, he was comparing domestic socialists and anti-globalization protesters to Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda.
He doesn't care one whit whether throwing out a Starbucks window is productive for us or not; he wasn't aiming to help instruct lefties what they could do to be more productive to influence power.
In fact, he also slammed the idea of a "Socialist International" [sic] - basically a peaceable assembly of delegates. That's not good either, to him, and also merited a roundabout comparison to al Qaeda. I guess there's a "kernel of truth," as you say, in the remark about smashing out a window, in that maybe it's counter-productive to what lefties want -- but that's not Zoellick's concern. He was just going after ANYTHING attributable to present-day anarchists, socialists (the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand was also mentioned - hah), whatever, as being tantamount to similar what the 9/11 hijackers wanted. In other words, "Those anti-globo crazies out there, well, they basically are on the same page as Islamic terrorists." But Zoellick's specifically mentions ideological afiliations like socialism, anarchism, and the International, which is rarer to see these days.
I'm sure he'll make a hell of a World Bank president!
-B.
Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:
[WS:] That does not even qualify as grade B - it is a D or C minus at best. He is basically reiterating the most trite and hackneyed US propaganda lines with zero creativity of his own. BTW, I do not think he is off the target by much about stone throwing at windows. It is totally counterproductive it delegitimizes otherwise valid concerns. So does the knee-jerk opposition to globalization and its institutions.