"What..is your name?"

head shakes

"What..is your favorite target?"

head shakes

"Okay, Khalid. We're just gonna tip you back and..."

*glug glug glug*

gurgling sounds

"You ready to talk, yet?"

"Oh. MY. God. Am I ever! Whew! What was the question? My favorite target? Freedom, of course! And people like you, who love freedom too darn much. I mean we've been setting our sights on freedom from day one. Me an' Osama and a couple of his lieutenants were sitting around just a few months ago, wondering what we could bomb next. It was really nice, y'know, kicking back with a couple of O'Douls and Boca Burgers, talking about destruction and stuff. Someone wanted mayo, and there was this big discussion about whether you were allowed to actually...

"Just to clarify, could you..."

"...actually use mayo on a Boca Burger, and we finally voted, and decided wee could, but only in the Pastun region. and we had these little buns with sesame seeds and stuff. It was great! But then some more lieutenants arrived...wait, I don't know if they were lieutenants...Might have been Corporals or something...Who can tell, these days, with all the protocol changes. I can never remember if I'm supposed to tie my turban clockwise or counterclockwise, know what I mean? And I'm always getting turned around trying to figure out where Mecca is. You heathans have it easy, far as that goes. But we finally sorted all that out, and got down to..."

"Speaking of we, tell us who else..."

"...down to deciding if we were going to split up while some of us went down to the Mosque for a little insight, and some went to fix up some belts for the newest interns. Osama said to me on the side that he didn't think everyone should be making belts, 'cause not everyone was so good at it, and of course I agreed with him, 'cause what are you gonna do? Cross him. I. Don't. Think. So. So after snack we..."

"Keep waterboarding, Sarge. Do it until he shuts up"

Fast forward 150 waterboarding sessions...

"What..is your name?"

head shakes

...Until, and unless, he gets in, and stays in, line.

A credible, anything-but-anonymous source, who was subjected to all the rigorous keen-edged questioning that our elected officials could muster in regards to pubic hair and coke cans.

It's no wonder that:

A: Sources stay anonymous, and

B: The public has no idea how to discriminate between what is credible and what is not.

P.S.: Lynx - Rosen only bites kittens when he has sex with them. Stop spreading scurrilous lies.

They're for being against it before they even know what it is.

"Why would we want to impose incredibly strict regulations on nearly every company, which would substantially raise the cost of nearly everything, during an economic downturn?

Because these self-same companies have polluted our air and our water and fucked up the earth long enough, and clearly can't be relied upon to keep up with the times. I mean, do doctors still insist on using leeches? No. Better medicines have come along. So change is coming to the energy industry now, when it will be more painful that it would have if we had started this process years ago. Better late than never.

Lead, follow, or get out of the way. If the existing companies won't change, newer, greener, more sustainable ones will take their place, and employ those people, and will a little good old American ingenuity, maybe we can once again be a leader in the world on this front.

We see the problem.

We do not torture.

We enhance our interrogations.

We have a memo that says it is okay.

Other people saw this memo.

They are the ones who torture.

The US system of justice, a system you on the right are clearly unfamiliar with

Or brown ones?

And the great irony of this (or cause) is that he is the last president (Since who? Kennedy, maybe?) who was actually in the military.

Thanks for the catch. He also ran tha CIA, I think, which is kinda sorta military. Hard to draw the line, these days.

We lock people up for rape (Unless you're a priest). For murder (Unless you're the president). For torture (ditto). For stealing (Unless you are a banker). For smoking pot. For lying, sometimes.

You can never tell what danger lies just around the corner. Smut. Vagrants. Unsightly lawns. Drivers in their cars kill 40,000 people a year. Parents everywhere live in fear! House arrest for everyone! Convert your home to a prison for just $99.99! Buy now, and receive free shackles!

Perception is nine-tenths of the law.

The Nth Detention would be a great name for a band, by the way. If the band was a bunch of hippy muslim math geeks, maybe.