Let's just hope we never see one of our soldiers captured by a terrorist outfit and waterboarded, with the justification offered being some cobbled-together logic inspired by the recent revelations that our Justice Dept. gives it the OK, and top White House officials also approve.

Did a terrorist outfit always have the opportunity to do this? Sure, but before learning that we apparently do employ torture and find it to be legally acceptable "under certain circumstances," we stood on firmer ground of no-tolerance for such acts with one huge reason being we don't do it ourselves. That precedent just went out the window. Instead, we've decided to cross over and join the legions of primitives and thugs.

Not to mention the evidence showing these tactics simply don't work (just Google "torture does not work"), and instead we've open our soldiers up to harm via reciprocity.

Just more backwards, idiotic reasoning from this reigning cabal. As with their idea to outsource many federal jobs (you know, like a good deal of our military presence in Iraq), forcing current government employees to justify their existence else be shown the door. The problem is this program hasn't gone quite as expected (surprise!):

It turned on a simple idea: Force federal employees to compete for their jobs against private contractors and costs will decrease, even if the work ultimately stays in-house.

But as Bush's presidency winds down, the program's critics say it has had disappointing results and shaken morale among the federal government's 1.8 million civil servants.

Private contractors have grown increasingly reluctant to participate in the competitions, which federal employees have won 83 percent of the time.

The program fell short of the president's goals in scope and in cost savings. Between 2003 and 2006, agencies completed competitions for fewer than 50,000 jobs, a fraction of what Bush envisioned.

Moreover, the Government Accountability Office found that the administration has overstated the savings from some competitions by undercounting the costs of running them. Collectively, they cost $225 million, or about $4,800 per job, according to White House figures.

"The competitive sourcing initiative did little to improve management, produced a ton of worthless paper, demoralized thousands of workers and cost a bundle, all to prove that federal employees are pretty good after all," said Paul C. Light, a professor of government at New York University's Wagner Graduate School of Public Service.

Just more incompetence from these fools. Meanwhile, recall what Clinton/Gore did to shrink government and make it more effective. Ah yes, the good old days....