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Paul Wolfowitz Resigns
May 18, 2007




The Washington Post is running an article entitled, "For Washington
Insider, Job was an Uneasy Fit."

The article states, "Yesterday, two years (after he assumed its
presidency), (Paul) Wolfowitz resigned from the World Bank,
effective June 30. He has become a virtual pariah, forced out by the
bank's executive board for ethics violations and reviled by much of the
staff as an arrogant intellectual who cared more about his ideas and
image than about the institution or its customers."

According to the article Wolfowitz developed a reputation as, "a
foreign policy iconoclast, a mild-mannered intellectual with a steely
ideological core, and an inept manager," during his thirty four year
Washington career.

Read the Article!!

Discussion-Starters for Younger Children

  • What do your students think it means to be smart?
  • Ask students to write down five characteristics about
    smart people. Help them recognize that anybody can
    work hard to become smart.

  • What does it mean to be nice to other people? Do your students
    think it's important to give charity? Why/why not?
  • Consider selecting a project that supports international
    social welfare and making a contribution as a class.
    (Even a few pennies from most students would help.)

  • Have your students ever been picked to be on a sports team, or
    for another group activity? How did it feel/would it have felt to
    have been picked first? Why would it have felt this way? How
    did it feel/would it have felt to be picked last? Why would it
    have felt this way? Is it OK for the person picking to only pick
    their friends first? Why/why not?
  • Ask your students if they think there is a difference
    between being nice and having skills in a specific area.
    Students could draw a picture of somebody using
    special skills.

  • Do your students think it's important to have a boss? Why/why
    not? What does a boss do? Should students be able to make
    some decisions for themselves? What kinds of decisions?
    Explain!!
  • Consider asking students to develop skits in which they
    demonstrate the kinds of decisions that they can make
    on their own.


Discussion-Starters for Older Students

  • Vocabulary terms to discuss: Humility; Pariah; Iconoclast; and,
    Vitriol.

  • Should economically advanced nations have a responsibility to
    help less advanced nations develop their social and economic
    infrastructures? Why/why not? (What is a social
    infrastructure? What is an economic infrastructure?)
  • Consider asking students to write persuasive essays in
    response to these questions. They might reference a
    core democratic value in the essay.

  • Should the President of a public organization intervene to help
    somebody with whom he has a close relationship attain a higher
    salary? Why/why not? (What is a public organization? What
    does the word ethical mean?) Would it be all right for
    somebody who owns a private company to pay somebody
    whom he/she likes more money than somebody else for doing
    the same job? Why/why not?
  • These questions, particularly the second scenario, might
    prompt an interesting class discussion.

  • Should American citizens care about what is happening at the
    World Bank? Why/why not?
  • Consider asking students to develop editorials, or
    podcasts, in which they respond to this question. They
    could work in small groups.
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