Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan and chairman of the Armed Services Committee, emerged from a briefing with Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates to declare that in his judgment the administration's review "was right on track".
But sainthood does not imply infallibility in either judgment or administration; since the second century there have been those who, whatever their faults, have been distinguished for their personal sanctity, and in those early days the primary constituent in determining who they were was usually popular acclaim.
In the landmark 1976 U.S. Supreme Court case Estelle v. Gamble, the Court ruled that prisoners are entitled to access to care for diagnosis and treatment, a professional medical judgment, and administration of the treatment prescribed by the physician.
The problem, according to Carter, was the means used to reach that judgment: the Bush administration appears to have been guided by Dick Cheney's dictum that even a 1 percent chance of attack is grounds for a military response.
What history has inadequately afforded Mr. Koch, who served as mayor from 1978 through 1989, is a judgment on his administration's handling of AIDS divorced from questions and assumptions about his sexual leanings.
Development experts generally praised the broad ideas of Mr. Bush's speech, saying that it reflected a new and significant political judgment within the administration of the need to do more in developing countries.
David Smith, a spokesman for the Human Rights Campaign, which deals with issues of concern to gays and lesbians, said that he would reserve judgment on the administration's AIDS efforts, but that what had happened today was "breathtaking in its political clumsiness".
We hope they, and any others who are skeptical or undecided, will withhold final judgment until the administration completes a review that aims to answer their doubts with updated data.
Dan Becker, director of the Safe Climate Campaign, who has been involved in fuel economy issues for three decades, was far harsher in his judgment of the administration's decision and the auto industry's lobbying campaign against the letter-grade system.
Just two days before the commission investigating the Sept. 11 attacks renders its judgment on his administration's handling of the terror plot and its aftermath, President Bush told supporters here that the lessons he learned from that day led him to the decision to depose Saddam Hussein.
representing Catholic hospitals nationwide, did not offer a quick judgment on the administration's latest proposal, saying they were still reviewing it.
