Wait. Didn’t the ambassador adopt honduran children? Shouldn’t we reserve judgment before condemning this man with the record of his career?
“John.”

Posted by: slothrop | Feb 17 2005 20:56 utc | 3

Slothrop,
Did you see “I Heart Huckabees”? There is a scene in it on adopting families that you might like.

Posted by: Citizen | Feb 17 2005 21:18 utc | 5

criminal conspiracy continues like some awful broadway musical – some terrible disordered cacaphony sung by idiots & interpreted by fools – directed if that is the word by someone who steals his thoughts from himself in his darkest hours that he imagines a light
it is a joke – some awful joke – negroponte is exactly like reinhard heydrich – the same vanity, the same sentimentality, the same basic cruelty, the same plain enjoyment of the terror he reproduces under his control
i hope he dies like heydrich – poisoned by his proper vanity

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Feb 17 2005 21:25 utc | 7

“They” never die, rgiap. Just look at Goldie Hawn.

Posted by: slothrop | Feb 17 2005 21:28 utc | 9

How fitting — that last quote about “quiet diplomacy” just above the picture of the skeleton. Doesn’t get much quieter than that.

Posted by: kat | Feb 17 2005 22:25 utc | 11

rapt,i was fantasizing last night about a different kind of death squad.

Posted by: annie | Feb 17 2005 22:57 utc | 13

They will be defeated by wars that overreach and overspend. And only because that will bring the war home. They will be defeated when 911 is multiplied and no longer just a reichstag event but coordinated from many countries all of which have been given reason to hate and fear. Anything less would just mean trading one CEO for another.
Would there be a safe place to go in such a war?
I feel very stubborn about staying and trying to make my difference here with my friends and neighbors – but many people I admire at a distance have left their home countries when they disintegrated, people I imagine to be extremely tough.

Posted by: Citizen | Feb 17 2005 23:09 utc | 15

Someone might be tempted to read this appointment with an eye to the administration’s unfolding political drama. I’m tempted myself to read it that way: Rumsfeld and Cheney, I believe, have just lost their lines of authority and control of the purse-strings (within and without the Pentagon)over the intelligence bureaucracy, and have lost it to Powell’s most imposing lieutenant. I see the American Enterprise Institute being flooded rather promptly with resumes and job-applications from various underemployed Likudites, and await, with a measure of relish, the further unfoldings of the Plame affair.

Posted by: alabama | Feb 17 2005 23:32 utc | 17

That would mean Dub and his handlers are getting (have gotten) more desperate, to the point that negroponte’s job is to close up tight all the loopholes/leaks.
As for Plame, we have been eagerly waiting for a very long time. My take is that the case is being dragged out as long as possible, and that may be forever, until the operations people can come up with an exit strategy that works. Some death may be required here but that is just part of the plan.
I am not so optimistic as you are Alabama; as we should know, these guys are playing for keeps. It has been documented that corruption goes all through the judicial system including the Supremes, in case you expected that somebody would eventually do the right thing.

Posted by: rapt | Feb 17 2005 23:51 utc | 19

i would have thought the conviction of the lawyer stewart in new york would have made it clear to anyone that jurisprudence of any substance no longer exists in america. it is as althusser inferred an apparatus completely comprimised by powere. & in america it is degraded from its naked links with that power – rehnquist & scalia particularly – but so overwhelming in its culture – that they are just two of many.
the plane affair. some numbskull ‘journalist’ will pay – the real initiators & their agents novak or a miller will never face justice in any fundamental sense; ô i’d love to see novak somewhere in marian with a cell buddy calling him bubba but that will not happen – even less those within the administration – who were the creators of this little piece of work
‘revelations’ have come once a day for almost two years now about almost everything & no one has faced justice – nor will they
no one of any seriousness will ever, ever, in our coming futures ever take the american legislative process, the judical apparatus or its communication industry with anything but complete & utter contempt
all the kings horses & all the kings men….
but like the fascists before them – they do not have the balls to take power as they would want – they need & hide behind such tortured – (in every sense) – notions of ‘legality’ to practice their cruelty & to articulate their will to power – except unlike nietzsche they have no poetry in them – not an ounce – not even the hollow screams of hart crane as he dropped into deeper waters

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Feb 18 2005 0:23 utc | 21

rememberinggiap: would have thought the conviction of the lawyer stewart in new york would have made it clear to anyone that jurisprudence of any substance no longer exists in america.
Jurisprudence … Justice (aka “Just Ice”) has not existed in the US for a lot longer than most people want to hear about, rg … SF writer Stanislaw Lem said something like: There is a difference between the dream being dead, and it being dreamed wrong.

Posted by: Kate_Storm | Feb 18 2005 0:43 utc | 23

That would mean Dub and his handlers are getting (have gotten) more desperate, to the point that negroponte’s job is to close up tight all the loopholes/leaks.
hmmm — Viktor, le Nettoyeur, eh?
the fact that this man even walks around at liberty is imho an festering insult to the entire Southern Hemisphere.
I’m thinking of the degree of glamour and glory that got attached to the “Nazi hunters” after the war… the commando groups — some of them Israeli-trained and -funded iirc — who tracked down, kidnapped, assassinated former Nazis in their various hiding places. Why is it that criminals like Negroponte walk free without fear of similiar reprisals? it doesn’t seem to testify much to the “barbarism” that we’re always accusing all those Little Brown People of… if they so notably refrain from inflicting vigilante vengeance on our own commissars and occupational governors.
also I agree “The Official Story” is a fine film.

Posted by: DeAnander | Feb 18 2005 0:59 utc | 25

So, does xUS -> Honduras/Guatemala/Nicaragua redux? Is anyone clear on what this sewer rat’s job description is? Will he control domestic spying?
For anyone thinking of perhaps heading North, I hope you saw my earlier link that unfortunately ended up on dying open thread. Meetings have been held planning to further integrate still democratic Canada w/ xUS – common currency, common foreign & security policy (Canada’s no doubt!!).
Full Story from 2/14 Toronto Star:
Border talks called disturbing

Posted by: jj | Feb 18 2005 4:39 utc | 27

The Heydrich/Negroponte comparison is apt. Both completely in thrall of power, slavishly obedient to it and never seek ultimate responsibility for themselves. Cruelty comes naturally, be they Arabs, Nicaraguans or Czech villagers. Inverterate planners of solutions, final or temporary. Differences are in aesthetics and scale. The secret and dirty work is no longer conducted in black uniforms, but in grey suits; and the scope of the enterprise is worldwide as opposed to Europe and all points east.

Posted by: theodor | Feb 18 2005 5:19 utc | 29

Is it just me or is Fienstein more like a rethug most of the time?
Feinstein is odious and without principles, except a school marmish obsession with gun-control. (except when she gets to carry a concealed weapon, of course).

Posted by: thesumofallparts | Feb 18 2005 8:34 utc | 31

A thought on Negroponte. These days in Iraq – forming of coalitions and a new government – are extremly critical for the US plans.
Why did Negroponte leave that post now? Could the new job not have waited another few weeks? Is he running for shelter before anybody can pin a negative Iraq development on him?
There is something fishy with this. Any ideas?

Posted by: b | Feb 18 2005 11:54 utc | 33

Is he running for shelter before anybody can pin a negative Iraq development on him?
Seems to me Bernie Kerik skedaddled out of Iraq pretty quick too, back when he was supposed to be overseeing the all-important task of training the iraqi police force. Maybe both Kerik and Negroponte figured they’d get their millions, stuff the cash into their dufflebags and get out before they got their asses shot off.
Or maybe Negroponte just relished the idea of setting up a secret police force and death squads in America. How often does an opportunity like that come up in your lifetime?

Posted by: semper fubar | Feb 18 2005 18:02 utc | 35

why search for conspiracy or reasons my friends – this administration is so far out there they make h p lovecraft & e a poe seem like they were social realists
this administration is about the most demented in words & in deeds. they don’t have the kind of medicine you need for this kind of dementia
it is a congress full of sweating shirts like the one wore by mccarthy at the army hearings
there is not one ounce of decency amongst them – they are a herd of swine as the learned dr thomson might put it
i neither search ofr strategies nor reasons – they will cannibalise all that is corrupt, venal & crazy in american history & they will revitalise it – they will show that a people, like the german working class under herr hitler – will work against their proper iterest for the sake of a ‘security’ sold by the very persons who are scaring them shitless
if negroponte is like heydrich – then cheny is certainly the rôhm figurine – vulgar, brutish & without any normal sense of honour or of decency. bridge so muck like kaltenbrunner that i have to go back to the history books to see if reincarnation is a material possibility
no – i do not search any sense here – this is what charlie manson & his friends called an orgy – & it will keep on going until the party ends & that does not seem for some time yet & in that time they will have put a fork into anything that moves – people, countries, ideas
charlie stole a song for it too – helter skelter & i can not think of a more appropriate jingle for this administration. in fact they make old charley seem like a personable midwife in comparison
i do not know what goes on in the late hours at the white house but whatever it is – william friedkin should go there for his hardons for horror because that much is at least certain. there would be such horror – that normal reality respecting people like ourselves would fall very quickly under the force of their obvious innate understanding of mysticism. all they need now is for the angelic brian wilson to set up his clinic in the oval room & cut us a new disc making clear for us cretins the wonderful & magisterial interior lives of our leaders
no – if i want sense i’ll go to hank williams or some hillbilly song by cisco houston

Posted by: remembereringgiap | Feb 18 2005 23:27 utc | 37