Global Financial Warriors.

I have often asserted that the Bush administration has performed superbly in the fields of economic and financial management. John B. Taylor, former Treasury Department undersecretary for international affairs agrees.

Taylor's litany of the Treasury Department's activities during his tenure includes the freezing of terrorists' assets and the halting of their money transfers around the globe; an economic reconstruction program for post-Taliban Afghanistan; the establishment of a stable dinar in Iraq after the toppling of Saddam Hussein, together with debt forgiveness for the new government in Baghdad; reforms in the policies of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank; and pressure on Chinese officials to allow their currency to be less controlled by Beijing and more responsive to free-market forces.

Not bad -- combine that with his economic management and you have one of the best records of any administration in American history. So good is Bush's record that critics are forced to fall back on the old "it would have happened anyway" line, or to say that heroic periods in the distant past were just as good. Perhaps the weakest, though most frequently voiced, criticism is the absurd assertion, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, that Bush has not been able to forge international cooperation on economic and financial matters.

For a review of Taylor's account and a critique of it see Jeff Garten's review of Global Financial Warriors in the WaPo here.