Also I did a search on General Hayden and found rabid lefty sites that despise him. Obviously many of them hate him because of electronic eavesdropping on terrorists. IOW judging both of them by their enemies makes them look damn good.
OTOH Negroponte didn't think the huge cache of Saddam's documents was important. At least that's what we were told. Maybe he meant not as important as translating some other huge pile of info which contained more immediately pressing dangers with our limited translating ability.
He does evidentally have the backing of GWB and I have to believe that's based on some prior good things he's done. Maybe something he did in South/Latin America that you refer to. It may very well be something very important behind the scenes that we'll never know about. I hope so and I hope he's right.
What I worry about is GWB's sense of loyalty that occasionally extends to backstabbers like Ted Kennedy, Powell or Putin.
My biggest concern is the dozens of investigations that are supposed to be going on following Mary McCarthy's firing. If Negroponte and Hayden are on board for that, then I'm happy and relieved. (Not that it would change anything if I weren't.)