I haven't posted since last November, I see, but now I have something in my craw. There has been a lot of public discussion recently about torture, the use of torture, what constitutes torture, and whether torture is justified if it yields life-preserving information. Regarding the last question, as to whether torture is OK if it works, I have a counter-question or two: Is blackmail OK if it works? Is piracy OK if it works? Is armed robbery OK if it works? Because, at least in the short term, all of these things work. If they didn't work, they wouldn't continue to happen. But none of these things has a place, a sanctioned/condoned place, in civil society. And to my mind, civil society is what we are fighting for. How ironic that we would so readily sacrifice our most cherished ideals! If we have to sink to the level of our enemy to prevail in this conflict, then we have already lost.