That Jane Harman is one heck of a poker player, I have to admit.

Thank you Amos. Of course you are correct. 'Twas Donuel posting at that time. My apologies. And yes, I did read the Reuters piece.

Little Hawk, as per your first response, you draw your line at the possible use of atomic weapons? So you would feel compelled to use "harsh interrogation methods" when the threat reached a certain quantity in terms of human lives and property? Can you give me a number? Or perhaps a certain quality? The "best and the brightest" perhaps? What's the threshold? The Brooklyn Bridge? The Library Building in downtown Los Angeles? Actually, I agree with you. There are situations and conditions where the threat is so enormous that extreme measures might be the only option. Stop the threat first and then sort out the lesser questions of ethics later. There are times one must do what is best for the whole regardless of the personal cost. It's too bad we are such imperfect beings that we cannot always know what the threshold is or if the present information is true.

As for your last entry, you make a good point. The US has superior military might in terms of conventional warfare. We are probably able to meet and best any other nation on the planet as things stand today. Maybe any two nations! But on the other hand look at the devastation just a small handful of dedicated enemies was able to wreak on the "most powerful nation"! Military expenditures is not the complete picture. A house is thousands of times larger than the tiny termite. Wave after wave will eventually erode the rock mountain and finally reduce it to sand (sorry about my mixed metaphors there).

There are really no easy answers to these questions unless you DO adopt a deontological point of view and then you run the risk of coming to some absurd conclusions such as Emmanuel Kant did in his Critique of Pure Reason. Absolutes are tricky things.

The reason I raised my own concerns and questions about what to do, is that this nation and others HAVE been attacked effectively by low tech means and small numbers. It exposes a vulnerability that has always been there. No other enemy has sought to exploit it. And, no one is exempt from such action! If it can happen here it can happen anywhere and it can be perpetrated by anyone who has the determination to do so. Another example would be Timothy McVeigh.

I'm not going to rush to judgement. Until ALL the evidence is in, I can't knot the rope. There is a certain element in this forum that is rabid to hang Misters Bush and Cheney and their lackeys and that is wrong. It smacks of extreme partisanship and reminds me of the Brown Shirts and other such.