Paul Wolfowitz is running the World Bank, and running corruption out

Speeches are one thing, action quite another. The Wolfensohn bank developed state-of-the-art corruption indexes, which are now used by the U.S. government to identify which countries deserve extra foreign assistance; it created a department to investigate malfeasance in bank projects. But the anti-corruption unit was understaffed and ineffectual, and the bank did not build on Wolfensohn's cancer talk by cutting off corrupt borrowers consistently. Excuses were found. Lending frequently continued.

In a series of tough decisions, some of which have been widely reported and some of which have not, Wolfowitz has challenged this culture.

The bank has held up $800 million in lending to Indian health projects. This is a vast sum, and India is one of the bank's most formidable clients: It borrows a lot, has a good economic record and tells development organizations to get lost if they behave condescendingly. But Indian politicians were said to have their hands on the health funds, so Wolfowitz blocked the loans anyway..

Some may be surprised at this, after all, the media did their best to do a Cheney on Wolfowitz, but he is simply being consistent with a hard-headed idealism that says that virtues that promote the public interest--like fighting corruption or tyrants, are the road to salvation for the perennial backwaters of this world.