So what good are the hearings? Are they simply political theater, as the GOP claims?

Not "simply." To paraphrase a Salon article on a related subject from some time ago[1], a Congressional hearing (or at least a good one) is a political process with theatrical overtones. It allows legislators to conduct inquiries, of course, and if Congress is working the way it should sometimes the outcome of such an inquiry is enough by itself to influence policy.

But there's also a way in which Congressional hearings are trial balloons — the people conducting them are testing the waters to see how the public reacts. The Senate showed every sign of being willing to confirm Mukasey if his hearing was followed by the usual deafening silence of disinterest from all but the most dogged public-interest lobbying groups.

Instead, it would appear, you all are starting to have an impact. Keep it up and who knows where it might lead.

As for the GOP's claims, nothing would be funnier if we weren't in such dire straits as a nation. One of the things that distinguishes contemporary Republican governance is its inversion of the usual principle — government for them has been all theater, with only the most fleeting overtone of real politics.

1. "The I-word", http://dir.salon.com/story/opinion/feature/2005/06/09/impeachment/

I thought of Congress as a target. But that's absurd. I do believe that they have been sending polticized intelligence briefers to the Hill and to the Beltway media with scare talk about immediate dangers of attack, but that's not the same thing.

Not us. We're still posting away--I'm using my own name. I'm not worried. (Although I admit to being a little worried about Glenn, out of the country and attacking Petraeus when he went silent for about 20 hours.)

The Inquisition and the NKoreans and the Stalinist show trials and Winston Smith's fictional torture (or for that matter, Harlan Ellison's Harlequin) were primarily to obtain the confessions they wanted. The NK is the purest form of this; the NKoreans weren't torturing American sailors to terrorize other American sailors.

But in these other cases, torture was also a means of stifling dissent--of threatening the entire population with torture if they dared to speak out. They knew, when they saw the televised confessions, that the speaker was not acting freely.

But that's not true in this case either. There are no show trials--there are no trials at all. Now the idea may be to intimidate and terrorize future conspirators, by disappearing people and torturing some of them. But how do you terrorize suicide bombers? And the people they're catching are generally marginal at best.

I really think they are doing it because they can. No more than that. They can do it, and they enjoy making it happen.

Mukasey needs to be reminded that this is what he is signing on to. If someone could make that clear to him, maybe he would withdraw himself from consideration.

The hearings also, as someone noted way upthread, preserve the trappings of the constitution. This is actually a good thing. That the president has to get rubberstamps along the way for his actions maintains the possibility that that those rubber stamps may be withheld.

BTW, that's why if the Kagro X position is adopted, in effect, by rejecting Mukasey, the president will simply dispense with the approval process. He will simply make interim appointments.

The only remedy for that approach is impeachment and conviction.

One interpretation I've seen is that Addington's heavy hand can be seen in all the rediculous fudging and definitional contortions that Mukasey has been going through. This makes sense to me.

Since it is Mukasey's stated and written opinion that the Executive is very very powerful, constitutionally, in a "time of war", it is perhaps unsurprising that he is taking direction so completely from WH staff. So while he may have been quite independent as a judge, he is now simply exhibiting the behavior of a potential employee who is pre-conditioned to comply with all the wishes of his new boss.

Senator Feinstein,

I have not seen eye to eye with you on many things recently, principally your views on FISA and such issues. But you and I should agree that torture is illegal, that it is evil, and that any member of the U.S. government who sanctions it or orders it should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

I am writing to ask that you vote No on the nomination of Judge Mukasey for Attorney General. If this man cannot condemn torture unequivocally, and cannot understand that something like waterboarding is not a "useful tool" but an abominable technique befitting of Torquemada, then he is not a choice for top law enforcement officer of the United States.

As an aside, in the heated public debate over this nomination, the Bush Administration has dropped all pretense that the technique and others like it were the work of low level personnel exceeding their orders, or of a frat-boy mentality. They have effectively confirmed to the general public that they in fact have condoned, sanctioned, and ordered the use of such techniques. I urge you to read Jane Mayer's article in the New Yorker, "The Black Sites" for a description of techniques that leave waterboarding far behind.

The systematization of torture is defined by international humanitarian law as a crime against humanity. The practice of torture is a war crime, it is a capital crime in the United States, and conspiracy or facilitation of it is punishable by life imprisonment. It is not a small thing, and it is a very, very black stain on our country. I urge you and all other congressional representatives from both houses to examine the information that has surfaced during the debate on Judge Mukasey's nomination, and to move with all due haste towards prosecution and/or impeachment and prosecution, of all parties to this deplorable practice.

Your constituent,

While much of debate concerning torture revolves around its effect on the victims, significantly less has been said about its effect on the perpetrators. We're actually creating a protected class of sadist, to perform unpleasant tasks for us. What does that portend for our future?