so the hearing of the soon-to-be-confirmed nominee for attorney general, alberto gonzales, has come and gone with no surprises. sparing and evasive with his answers, gonzales follows admirably in the tradition of rice and rumsfeld. all this leads me to wonder...what is it that supposedly sets the united states apart from the human rights violators we supposedly condemn? freedom from arbitrary arrest and detention, due process, and assurance of humane treatment while in custody, perhaps? yet here we are, on the cusp of handing over the office of attorney general to a man who publicly denounced the geneva conventions as "quaint" and "obsolete." as the the white house staff's legal specialist, gonzales not only recommended strongly that prisoners of war be denied the protection of the accords, but he also moved to redefine torture in a way that sanctioned the apalling abuses of abu ghraib and guantanamo, all the while helping bush to circumvent, rather than uphold, laws meant to protect our soldiers overseas.

does a man like this deserve to be the country's top legal enforcement officer? the correct answer is no, but as nyt editorialist bob herbert puts it, "...this is the bush administration, where incompetence and outright failure are rewarded with the nation's highest honors." in a time where the american public is unwilling to believe anything negative about those who glibly claim to be protecting us from terrorism, and where shouting "support the troops" is enough to exonerate you of any wrongdoing, i guess gonzales' promotion is only fitting.

some might argue that torture is a necessary evil, for the sake of protecting our country from further harm. mark danner has a fitting response to that. as he points out, "the war in iraq and the war on terrorism are ultimately political in character. victory depends in the end not on technology or on overwhelming force but on political persuasion. by using torture, the country relinquishes the very ideological advantage - the promotion of democracy, freedom and human rights - that the president has so persistently claimed is america's most powerful weapon in defeating islamic extremism. one does not reach democracy, or freedom, through torture." torture may get a suspect to talk, but it is ultimately self-defeating. and it will certainly not win this war.