Why do politicians who know better portray certain CIA interrogation techniques used to extract life-saving information from enemy detainees as torture?

A cottage industry has developed among disgruntled politicians to suggest America is as barbaric as Islamic extremists. I'm not referring to Rosie O'Donnell, who is not a politician and who limited her criticisms to Christian fundamentalists, as if she has an earthly clue of which or whom she speaks.

I'm talking about former President Clinton, Sens. McCain, Graham and Warner, and many Democrats who are feeding into this third-world hate frenzy against the United States. Is it truly their intention to play into the hands of America-despising tyrants like Venezuela's Hugo Chavez and Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad?

On National Public Radio, Clinton said it would be unnecessary and wrong to give broad approval to torture. Well, yes, Mr. Clinton, but since no one in the Bush administration or Congress is considering that, why do you insist on framing the debate in those terms?

Clinton, who is widely reputed to have a large, discriminating mind, knows that President Bush's effort to obtain congressional clarification of the interrogation practices permitted under language contained in Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions is not giving broad approval to torture.

Indeed, Mr. Bush believes these interrogation practices are already authorized by the Conventions but wants Congress expressly to concur with his opinion. Bush has warned that in the absence of such clarification, the program might have to be terminated because interrogators dedicated to saving American lives are at risk of liability.

Given the semantic games Clinton and other war critics play, who could reasonably argue that clarification isn't needed, especially given the regrettable Supreme Court decision that the Geneva Conventions apply to our terrorist enemies? But opponents of the measure, like Sens. McCain and Graham, insist that it would be a dangerous precedent to tinker with the language, which supposedly hasn't been modified in decades.

If we dare to take such action, just imagine what our present or future enemies might do to our prisoners of war! They would be free to reinterpret the language to mistreat our prisoners, who they would otherwise doubtlessly pamper. Continued...