Wolfowitz a bad choice.

Byline: The Register-Guard

Gee, wasn't it just a few weeks ago that the Los Angeles Times endorsed rock star Bono as the next president of the World Bank?

On Wednesday, President Bush nominated Paul Wolfowitz, the deputy secretary of defense and ideological godfather of the Iraq war, to lead the World Bank.

Talk about reality checks. While an intriguing case could be made for the passionately humanitarian Bono, it's hard to think of a more inappropriate choice than Wolfowitz for this critically important job.

As if the selection of Wolfowitz weren't startling enough, it came on the heels of Bush's naming John Bolton, a scathing critic of the United Nations, to be the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. Bush's selection of Wolfowitz, a neoconservative distrustful of multilateralism, to head a uniquely multilateral institution that promotes development and fights poverty around the world sends a disturbing message.

The nomination comes at a time when the Bush administration insists that it's trying to heal the rift with Europe over the war in Iraq. If recent trips by Bush and Condoleezza Rice succeeded in filling reservoirs of goodwill in Europe, the appointments of Bolton and Wolfowitz have drained them to bedrock.

An argument could be made that Bolton has a relevant diplomatic background and a thorough familiarity with the U.N. The same cannot be said of Wolfowitz, a former Yale professor of political science and ambassador to Indonesia.

Wolfowitz's record does not inspire confidence. He predicted the U.S. invasion of Iraq would pay for itself out of Iraq's oil reserves (he was off by only a couple of hundred billion dollars) and that joyful Iraqis would greet U.S. troops with flowers. He rejected the warning of former Army Chief of Staff Gen. Erick Shinseki, who said the U.S. military needed "several hundred thousand" soldiers to get the job done in Iraq.

Wolfowitz's record as an ultra-loyalist in an administration that prizes loyalty above all else raises the question of whether he would be able to exercise the independence that the World Bank job requires. The nominee's pivotal involvement with U.S. policy in the Middle East also raises concerns that he might shift the World Bank's current focus from sub-Saharan Africa to the Islamic world in line with U.S. efforts to promote democracy and economic reform in the region.

Bush's choice is particularly puzzling given the list of prominent, qualified individuals whose names have been mentioned for the job. They include James Wolfensohn, an Australian-born investment banker who is finishing his second five-year term and could have served a third. Others included former U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell, former Brazilian President Henrique Cardoso and former Mexican President Ernesto Zedillo.

It will be interesting to see if European leaders reject Wolfowitz's nomination, as President Clinton once rejected the European nominee to head the International Monetary Fund. Traditionally the United States, which controls a majority of shares in the bank, selects the president of the World Bank, while Europeans pick the chief of the IMF.

As World Bank president, Wolfowitz would oversee development in the world's most impoverished regions and influence the quality of life, even life and death itself, of many who live in Africa, Asia and Latin America. These people deserve a World Bank leader who cares more about poverty reduction and economic development than advancing American hegemony.