In his letter to the editor, Mark Wilson ("Who cares what the CIA does to terrorists?" Dec. 21) asks whether he is living in the "Twilight Zone" because he sees nothing wrong with torturing people to get so-called information from them. Perhaps he is. He fails to grasp that the people in question were only accused, not proved guilty of any wrongdoing. His calling them terrorists in the absence of proof is foolish libel and his declaration that he does not care what is done to people whose only demonstrated characteristic is being different from him is moral idiocy.
Our Constitution, whatever its defects, is the basis of our legal system and our national security. It makes clear that nobody is to be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. Torture is not lawful for any purpose under our own law or under international law by which we agreed to be bound. Moreover, the responses gained by torture have been known for decades to be unreliable information; wasting time on them may actually reduce the government's ability to protect the country.
All citizens have a responsibility to uphold the Constitution. This entails knowing what is in it and engaging in rational thought about current events. These are not onerous burdens, just our job. The more we fail to do it, the greater the danger to the republic.
Katharine W. Rylaarsdam