Bush Fears for Nation's Soul

Here are some of the photos.

World Bank Watch

Peter S. Goodman writes in The Washington Post: "President Bush today plans to name Robert B. Zoellick, a career diplomat and trade negotiator, to head the World Bank, seeking to dispatch the leadership crisis that has gripped the institution under Paul D. Wolfowitz, senior administration officials said last night.

"In selecting Zoellick, 53, to serve a five-year term as bank president, the White House opted for a familiar choice, a former member of the Bush Cabinet and a figure widely respected in foreign capitals, the officials said. Zoellick is a former U.S. trade representative and deputy secretary of state who went to work last year as an executive at Goldman Sachs. . . .

"But the insider credentials that make Zoellick favored in the Bush White House, where loyalty carries enormous weight, could work against him at the bank as they did with his predecessor. . . .

"'People think Zoellick is highly intelligent and has a pragmatic mind-set,' said a senior World Bank official who spoke on condition that he not be named for fear of alienating his new boss. 'But he's still from the same people who brought you the Iraq war, the same people who brought you Paul Wolfowitz and Donald Rumsfeld. There's immediate jaundice about his country of origin. Any American appointed by this president would carry that stigma.'"

Darfur Watch

Deb Riechmann writes for the Associated Press: "It has taken President Bush nearly three years to match his impassioned rhetoric about what he decries as genocide in Darfur with tougher U.S. action against some of those blamed for the suffering.

"When Bush announced sanctions on Tuesday, advocacy groups and lawmakers wished the president had been harsher and wondered whether it was a case of too little, too late for Darfur. The violence has killed 200,000 people and forced 2.5 million more from their homes since it began in February 2003."

Michael Abramowitz and Colum Lynch write in The Washington Post: "The administration's strong rhetoric and new plan to squeeze Sudan was greeted with immediate roadblocks yesterday. At the United Nations, China and Russia displayed little interest in joining the U.S. drive to isolate Khartoum economically and coerce its leaders into cooperating with international efforts to stop the violence in Darfur.

"On the other end of the spectrum, lawmakers and advocacy groups that have campaigned for tougher action on Darfur voiced disappointment with the president's plan as being too little, too late. They questioned whether the steps are tough enough to cause the Sudanese president, Lt. Gen. Omar Hassan al-Bashir, to abandon tactics that have delayed the arrival of thousands of additional U.N. peacekeeping troops."

AIDS Watch

Michael A. Fletcher writes in The Washington Post: "President Bush will call on Congress today to provide $30 billion toward battling the global AIDS crisis over the first five years after he leaves office, according to senior administration officials, a doubling of the current U.S. commitment. . . .

"Bush will issue his request this afternoon, the officials said, during a Rose Garden ceremony in which he is scheduled to be joined by supporters and beneficiaries of the program, including a caregiver and an AIDS patient."

Torture Watch

Scott Shane and Mark Mazzetti write in the New York Times: "As the Bush administration completes secret new rules governing interrogations, a group of experts advising the intelligence agencies are arguing that the harsh techniques used since the 2001 terrorist attacks are outmoded, amateurish and unreliable. . . .