Daniel Ben-Ami in Spiked:
When Wolfowitz took over as the head of the World Bank in 2005 he too made corruption central to his approach. The differences between himself and Wolfensohn on the issue were of detail rather than substance. Where they did differ was on their political affiliations. Wolfensohn was widely seen as a liberal. Wolfowitz, in contrast, was vilified as a neo-conservative representative of the Bush administration and architect of the Iraq invasion of 2003.
No doubt it was the Bush connections that made Wolfowitz unpopular with many European governments and World Bank staff. They disliked him before the scandal over his girlfriend’s job broke. The dispute over her finances simply provided an opportunity for the critics to attack his integrity. Rather than question his political approach, they simply accused him of hypocrisy.
This attack on individual moral failures follows a pattern that has become established in Western countries in recent years.