Torture: can the u.s. justify it?   stance: no:
The points against torture are numerous, but the most important one is IT DOESN'T WORK. All of these "ticking time bomb" scenarios are fantasy right out of "24". That just does not happen in the real world. Another point against it: aren't we supposed to be the good guys? How in the world do we expect to keep our supposed moral superiority when we debase ourselves by stooping to the level of our enemies? If someone wants to argue we need to get down to our enemies level to really be effective in the war on terror, shouldn't we have rounded up all the German-Americans in WWII and burned them in ovens? Shouldn't we have gotten down to the German level to be really effective? I don't think the U.S. can seriously dictate to other countries when it doesn't follow the dictates of its own Constitution.