Sorry, Mr.FixIt. I have to disagree with many of your statements.
Hate me if you will. But these people hate you more, and have for hundreds of years. They declared war on us hundreds of years ago, and we still haven't woken up to realize it and face it. They will kill themselves to kill you, your families, your children. So what is a little torture? We're not killing them or their families, right? Their women, their children, and their men are trained to strap bombs to themselves and blow themselves up, in our airplanes, in our football stadiums, in our high school graduations--whatever event that might have a solid impact on the fear of our nation (Is this not torture?). Why? Because they hate us. Period.
You paint with a broad brush here. The vast majority of "these people" are simple, peace-loving, hard working human beings who deplore much of the atrocities which are being committed in their names. It's only a handful of Muslim extremists who are trying to terrorize the rest of the world simply because their beliefs are in the minority. And let's not forget, it's us (Christians) who started this mess by launching the Crusades.
Now, imagine that you didn't get that hose out because other people might think it's too cruel. Could you live with your action...or lack thereof?
So, we should torture anyone we even think might be a threat, based only upon their religion, or the color of their skin, or perhaps the color of their hair, or eyes? Or maybe anyone who doesn't speak English? That's absurd! Do you really think that kidnapping some poor farmer from his fields, transporting him thousands of miles from his home, then torturing him for hours and hours is going to get you information? The guy doesn't know anything! He's just a farmer! But you would go right on torturing him until you've either killed him or turned him into a vegetable, just because you THINK he might know something? That's nuts!
Imagine that you are in an airplane (Flight 93 Maybe?) and you know that you are headed for the side of a building. Imagine that you had the choice of water boarding the fucker with the plan in mind and you chose not to because you had a little moral dilema with the whole issue. Imagine that you could have prevented the whole situation for all of the American families involved, but you chose to do the "right thing" and now you have to live with your weak-assed, humanity lovin', PC (politically correct) decision for the rest of your life. I say, "Let's Roll!"
This is a completely different story. Here you are not looking for shadows under the bed, you have a tangible threat right in front of you. Yet you would rather torture some guy while his cronies fly the plane into the building? Fuck that! "Let's Roll" indeed! Charge the cockpit, try to regain control of the plane, just as those heroes on Flight 93 did. With luck, you capture and/or kill the terrorists and regain the plane. At worst, as really happened, the terrorists fly the plane into the ground, preventing even worse loss of life. But torturing a guy to get the plan while the plane is diving on the building isn't going to accomplish anything.
Imagine that Timothy McVeigh had been water boarded during interrogation prior to the incidents at OKC. (The attack that claimed 168 lives and left over 800 injured). How might that have changed history?
Forgive me if I'm wrong, but was McVeigh suspected of being a home-grown terrorist prior to his actions? I don't believe so. So you're saying we should have tortured him anyway, just in case? That would justify our government being able to pick anyone up off the streets, including your wife, or your daughter, and allow them to torture them just in case they were planning a terrorist attack. Which brings us to:
Imagine that you knew that your next door neighbor intended to mutilate, rape, and destroy your family simply because of his extremist religious beliefs, and you had no defense against it. Would you water board (regardless of the congressional definition of torture) the mother-fucker to prevent it from happening, or would that be taking it easy on the poor defenseless son-of-a bitch?
What proof do you have that he's planning on doing this? Has he threatened you? Or them? Has he been recruiting people to help him attack your home? Has he done anything other than spout what you consider to be "extremist religious beliefs"? If so, then you have a right to defend your family. So kill the bastard! Or turn him over to the police. What's the point in torturing him if you already know what he's going to do? Or perhaps you only suspect he's planning this? Then the obvious course of action is to torture his wife and his children to learn what he's planning. They may not know anything, but what the hell! You're protecting your family!
Bear in mind that we do not send video tapes of torture to the families of the poor slobs after the water boarding, like our families have the privilege to watch the torture and beheadings of our loved ones on CNN (Chicken Noodle News), or youtube (where you can watch the beheading of Saddam).
You're damn right we're better than them! And you're damn right we're the good guys.
How does emulating our enemies make us better than them? You say that we don't show tapes of the torture and murder of our victims, yet you advocate doing just that! That doesn't make you one of the "good guys", that makes you one of them!
I say, whatever it takes to protect my family, my freedom, and my life is acceptable by me, and I support the honorable efforts of the soldiers that are risking their lives to ensure our American freedoms. Fuck the PC movement!
I, too support the honorable efforts of the soldiers. I especially support those honorable men and women who are leaking information about the atrocities committed at Guantanamo Bay, in my name, by a government which is getting out of control. I can love my country without loving the people who are leading it. I have always honored those soldiers who have sacrificed so much in the defense of freedom. Even during the Viet Nam era, when it was "fashionable" to harangue and insult soldiers returning from war, I supported them and praised them for the work they did.
I do not support, will never support, those political and business leaders who allow such atrocities to happen, who send those young men and women out to fight a war to insure their profits, who permit and encourage illegal and immoral acts in the name of National Security.
And as for religious extremists, I am far more concerned with the actions of the Christian Right Wing fanatics right here in the US than I am with some poor Muslim store clerk in Baghdad.