JOHN NEGROPONTE IS MOVING ON UP TO THE BIG TIME

Nixon Nixon I keep cutting back to your face as if
it's all we've got to go on Mon General once said
in a Kennedy he saw the smiling mask of America but
in Colonel Cornpone Johnson he saw the raw face
of America itself

--Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Tyrannus Nix

Early yesterday NBC News reported that John Negroponte had agreed to become the Deputy Secretary of State, second in command under Condoleezza Rice, quitting his present office, as Director of National Intelligence.

Negroponte is being raised a notch, and I believe he could be in line to become Secretary of State. His thuggery is rising; and before we can catch our breath, we may wake up to find that he has become the diplomatic face of the United States. Meditate on that for a moment.

There are no demotions contemplated for him; from the Reagan years, romancing the death squads, as ambassador to Honduras, he went on for a stint in Mexico City. He was lifted from those second tier ambassadorships by the GW Bush administration. After 9/11 he was raised high in political visibility, and was made America's representative at the UN. Certain Hondurans of the goon class were hastily deported, so as to remove any chance that they might testify to any of the paramilitary unpleasantness, that occured during Negroponte's tenure in Honduras. But oddly enough there was no one willing to shake the rancor tree, so soon after the Towers fell, and the Senate didn't delve into all that Iran-Contra scandal. It was old news, you see.

But that was nothing. From there Negroponte went up like a skyrocket, to the Mega Embassy in Baghdad, Fortress USA in the Green Zone. It must have been like Honduras to the 10th power, riding with the bad boys again.

You would think that no more unchecked power could be granted to a small fry, career diplomat, but you would be wrong. The Bushies brought him back to Washington and hooked him up like a sixteen-tentacled octopus to sixteen intelligence agencies, where he would become America's Super-Hoover.

It's very bad when criminality arrives at too high a concentration at the top. Maybe you think I'm being too melodramatic about this. On the other hand, John "Death Squad" Negroponte, Secretary of State: just think about it.