President George W. Bush has appointed three more officials with unsavory baggage from previous government roles. Let's hope they have learned something from their past misdeeds.

One of the nominees -- Michael Chertoff -- is expected to be confirmed shortly as secretary of the Homeland Security Department, replacing Tom Ridge. Chertoff headed the Justice Department's criminal division in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks.

White House legal counsel Alberto R. Gonzales -- the replacement for John Ashcroft as attorney general -- did not get the usual pass accorded Cabinet appointees. The Senate vote on his confirmation was 60 in favor and 36 against, meaning that he was easily confirmed but that a sizeable chunk of the Senate didn't like his nomination.

Gonzales had to answer for Justice Department and White House legal memos defining what constitutes torture of terrorist suspects. Those documents have been blamed for creating the legal environment that led some U.S. military personnel to torture detainees in Iraq and elsewhere.

The third man is Elliott Abrams, who was convicted of withholding information from Congress in the Iran-Contra scandal during the Reagan era.

Abrams, who has been appointed deputy national security adviser, does not have to be confirmed by the Senate, and probably never will be nominated for any post that requires confirmation because of his past troubles with the law.

He was serving in the State Department in 1986 when he falsely testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that he did not know that White House national security staffer Oliver North was directing illegal arms sales to Iran and diverting the profits to the Nicaraguan Contra rebels.

Former President George H.W. Bush later pardoned Abrams.