Rendition, Torture and Warantless Wiretapping (Oh My)

“The Real Price of Freedom,” The Economist, September 22nd 2007:

[L]etting secret policemen spy on citizens, detain them without trial and use torture to extract information makes it easier to foil terrorist plots. To eschew such tools is to fight terrorism with one hand tied behind your back. But that [...] is precisely how democracies ought to fight terrorism. [...] Dozens of plots may have been foiled and thousands of lives saved as a result of some of the unsavoury practices now being employed in the name of fighting terrorism. Dropping such practices in order to preserve freedom may cost many lives. So be it.

Or, as incorrectly attributed to Benjamin Franklin: “Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”

The choice is usually framed as one between the rights of one (to be tortured) and the lives of many (whom the one threatens). But the real choice is whether we are to accord rights to anyone, anywhere. “Injustice anywhere,” said Dr. King, “is a threat to justice everywhere.”