735 Washington Post gets it wrong he says

Kenneth Anderson comments, "The Washington Post, in its Sunday, January 16, 2005 editorial opposing the confirmation of Alberto Gonzales as attorney general, gets it wrong on the Geneva Conventions. My guess is that the editorial writers have never actually read the relevant article of the conventions, but instead have simply relied on press releases from various rights groups that tell the WaPo what it wants to hear. . ." After quoting the incorrect editorial, he continues:

"The Bush Administration was - and is - NOT in violation of Article 5 of the Third Geneva Convention. Read it. It does NOT say that a "competent tribunal" shall determine whether any doubt has arisen with respect to the POW status of a detainee. It says, rather, that "should any doubt arise" as to whether a detainee is entitled to POW status, then the person shall be treated as a POW until a competent tribunal shall determine his or her status. The question of who is entitled to determine whether any doubt has arisen is left open - it does not say that this matter must be determined by a competent tribunal. It leaves open the possibility that the President or the Secretary of Defense may determine, even for an entire group of detainees, that no doubt arises and hence no tribunal is required."

The content of Anderson's blog is Law of War and Just War Theory.

On January 7 Anderson noted: "I particularly reject Mark Danner's quite slippery op-ed piece in the NYT of yesterday, Thursday, January 6, titled "We are all torturers now." Cute, but sorry: we're not. What Danner does, quite inexcusably, is mingle the undeniable abuses of Abu Ghraib with the fact that the White House counsel sought, in the context of the interrogation of a known senior Al Qaeda chief, the outer limits of what could permissibly done in the way of questioning. I don't know, quite frankly, why one has a lawyer if not to ask what the outer limits of legal behavior are."

Noted at Pejmanesque.

Are all Bush's Hispanic nominees having a problem with confirmation or just the top rung? Apparently, Dr. Rice is a foot shuffling mammy to Bush haters and Hispanics are just illegal wetbacks not smart enough to check with lawyers.