Somewhere I'd read an essay on the ten steps towards a Dictatorship & as torture beings one of the steps in point, it was noted that every Dictorship that used torture on their enemies eventually somewhere going down the lined ended up using torture on their own citizens.

I'd fully agree with Don's assessment. Where Don says

"its because the "way of life" of some of the richest Americans is on their backs, and has been for generations."

I'd change "on their backs" to
"under their thumbs"

I've always felt that we (the US) conveniently deal with terrorism in a way a doctor would treat the symptoms of a disease, using a knee jerk reaction rather than investigating the cause of the disease/problem & dealing with the root source.
I would want to ask why someone would feel so desprate as to resort to mass murder not just "Bush it under the rug" buy saying their culture hates us. No one hates with out some sort of cause. What's the cause? It's just to easy to fire back & invade unless that the purpose to begin with.

Barry