By Steve Clemons

Chris Nelson, in his Nelson Report, reveals the flavor of a recent alleged meeting of Bush friends and supporters with the President.

Out of the blue in the Washington Post today, former US Ambassador to the UN and Atlanta Mayor Andrew Young decries America’s “excessive Puritanism” and makes a plea to give the beleaguered World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz just one more chance.

Behind the scenes of the gladiatorial battle that will take place between Paul Wolfowitz and the World Bank Board today are efforts by his lawyer, Robert Bennett, and the Bank staff to negotiate terms of Wolfowitz’s departure.

World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz, staffed by legal counsel Robert Bennett at his side, will have an opportunity to respond to allegations of nepotism and inappropriate conduct at a meeting today. The stakes are high for Wolfowitz and the Bank. If one wins, the other loses.

Paul Wolfowitz, Remarks to the Business for Social Responsibility Conference Washington DC, November 4, 2005 But punishing corruptors isn’t the only solution. In fact, it probably isn’t the best solution. The best solution is in fact improved transparency, improved accountability, so that corruptors know ahead of time that they can’t hide.

I’m in the colonial era town Chestertown, MD this morning — for a short while — blogging at the town central coffee shop, Play it Again Sam.

(Obama to Hillary: So you really, really think TV Marti is worth $200 million?!) Sarah Stephens nudged Barack Obama the other day in a TWN guest blog post on the 13 scant words he offered on Latin America in his recent foreign policy manifesto (that the Washington Post applauded this morning.

The World Bank does matter. If the world is ever going to turn the “developing nation challenge” around, the Bank has been and will continue to be a vital part of that process. But the place is coming unglued over the Wolfowitz-Riza scandal and the staff have become profoundly distracted by lapses by their leader….

Here are three views of the first Democratic Presidential Debate held in South Carolina — one by someone who watched it carefully on television, one who was on the floor of the debate and a guest of one of the contenders, and one from someone who did not watch the debate live but watched the…

I am. Click here to get to MSNBC’s site on the set-up and a live stream feed. So far, everyone looks a little stiff. No zingers yet. I do like that all the candidates are giving short responses to questions — even Joe Biden.