Haynes "Deserved the Boot"

South Carolina's The Herald praised Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) yesterday for opposing the nomination of William Haynes, II to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. The Senate recently sent back the nomination to President Bush, but the president might return it to the Senate in September.

Noting that "opposition from a single Republican was enough to block the nomination from going to the full Senate," The Herald explained that:

Haynes, one of the architects of the Bush administration's detainee policies, deserved the boot. ... These polices embraced using dogs to menace prisoners, leaving prisoners in stress positions for hours at a time, withholding food and water, and stripping prisoners and placing them in uncomfortably cold cells. In short, Haynes, as chief counsel to the Defense Department, endorsed torture.

The Herald commented that "Graham's decision reflected the thinking of senior military officers and his own conscience," and concluded with this excellent summation of the situation: "If the White House and its conservative supporters want a full Senate vote for their judicial candidates, they need to choose more qualified people." For more Justice Digest posts on Haynes, see here, here and here. AFJ's Full Report on Haynes is here.