Alberto Gonzales Officially Opposes Torture...of Himself

Slate has as good an article as anyone else, although you can go to the actual transcript from this Times link. And Bob Herbert has a much more serious take on the Gonzales matter than myself (see post below):

The administration that thumbed its nose at the Geneva Conventions seems equally dismissive of such grand American values as honor, justice, integrity, due process and the truth. So there was Alberto Gonzales, counselor to the president and enabler in chief of the pro-torture lobby, interviewing on Capitol Hill yesterday for the post of attorney general, which just happens to be the highest law enforcement office in the land.

Mr. Gonzales shouldn't be allowed anywhere near that office. His judgments regarding the detention and treatment of prisoners rounded up in Iraq and the so-called war on terror have been both unsound and shameful. Some of the practices that evolved from his judgments were appalling, gruesome, medieval.

But this is the Bush administration, where incompetence and outright failure are rewarded with the nation's highest honors. (Remember the Presidential Medal of Freedom awarded last month to George Tenet et al.?) So not only is Mr. Gonzales's name being stenciled onto the attorney general's door, but a plush judicial seat is being readied for his anticipated elevation to the Supreme Court.

For the record, I watched about as much of the hearing as I could stand, which is to say not a whole lot. I saw Abu G. evade a very simple question from Senator Patrick Leahy (Can the president essentially authorize torture by providing immunity to those who engage in it?)--later I saw a little bit of Russ Feingold's questioning period. John Cornyn did his best to make it seem like Gonzales was the one being tortured, what with having to actually go through the confirmation process.

But Paul Krugman really hits the nail on the head today. After saying he wants to write a novel--a bad novel, ("there won't be any nuance," he asserts, before reminding us just how crass and hypocritical the Bush Gang is), Krugman concludes

The principal objection to making Mr. Gonzales attorney general is that doing so will tell the world that America thinks it's acceptable to torture people. But his confirmation will also be a statement about ethics.

As White House counsel, Mr. Gonzales was charged with vetting Mr. Kerik. He must have realized what kind of man he was dealing with - yet he declared Mr. Kerik fit to oversee homeland security.

Did Mr. Gonzales defer to the wishes of a president who wanted Mr. Kerik anyway, or did he decide that his boss wouldn't want to know? (The Nelson Report, a respected newsletter, reports that Mr. Bush has made it clear to his subordinates that he doesn't want to hear bad news about Iraq.)

Either way, when the Senate confirms Mr. Gonzales, it will mean that Iokiyar remains in effect, that the basic rules of ethics don't apply to people aligned with the ruling party. And reality will continue to be worse than any fiction I could write.

Iokiyar=It's OK if you're a Republican.