Vorlon Whispers

And how many jihadists were created when Bush stood in front of that "Mission Accomplished" sign? How many soldiers died because Bush said "bring it on"?

What Durbin said was the report on the treatment of these detainees sounds more like a report on Nazi prison camps than on anything that would be coming out of American camps. That did not disrespect the troops one bit. Are you saying that the reports we keep hearing about the mistreatment of detainees IS acceptable American tactics? I would think that allowing these illegal and immoral actions to happen would create more jihadists than actually stoping the mistreatment. It we stopped mistreating Arabs, it would stand to reason that we would have more friends in the Middle East.

And not everyone who was mistreated were terrorists, many complaits came from former detainees who were released after they were found to be innocent (after years of false imprisonment), so don't think that I'm defending terrorist. I'm defending the fair treatment of human beings. Let's try erring on the side of life, like the prez says.

And you think Durbin should have spoken to Bush first? Oh, Please. What has Bush or Cheney done to make anyone think that they would listen to their opposition for one second?

Eye for an Eye? I believe Jesus later updated that to "turn the other cheek," did He not?

Impugn the motives of the Bush administration all you want. The fact remains the Senator made no attempt to contact them. If he had truly wanted to change things, he would have traveled to Guantanamo Bay and confronted the personnel there with his report. Baring satisfaction there, he should have followed the chain of command up the ladder.

If he failed after a thorough attempt to resolve the situation to his satisfaction, then he could make a public utterance on it.

But the senator did not follow this course because I believe he just wanted to make a dramatic attack on the Bush administration the U.S. war effort and the military.

As for the other cheek, I was not the one being attacked. Our brave men and women in uniform were attacked and maligned. I was coming to their defense.

If I recall Jesus was not ALWAYS pacifistic . . .

In the temple he found those who were selling oxen and sheep and pigeons, and the money-changers sitting there. And making a whip of cords, he drove them all out of the temple, with the sheep and oxen. And he poured out the coins of the money-changers and overturned their tables.

No, you weren't the one being attacked (and I don't think our troops were either), but it doesn't change the fact that you condemned the Senator for how he acted and then you felt that you were justified in acting the same way. So instead of giving a biblical example, maybe I should have just quoted my mother, "two wrongs don't make a right."

You are correct, the senator himself did not start at the bottom and go all the way up the chain of command. But it's not like the Democratic Party hasn't tried to do what you suggest, and guess what, they got nowhere. The "top" kept passing the buck back down the chain. Pass it off as "a few bad apples" while never sincerly condemning torture. Instead, the best they have is, "we're not as bad as the Nazis were," as if just being better than Nazis is something to be proud of. We should be shooting higher than that.

There is nothing in Durbin's past that suggest that he showboats. I believe that his words were said out of the frusration of seeing America's legacy of fairness to those accused being completely destroyed.

Then we have agreement of sorts. Durbin was wrong.