>Enemy combatants according to whom? That's the whole point, or at least a good part of it. These detainees are only suspects unless and until charges are proved against them. Like you, I have no doubt some, probably many, of them are guilty and would do us harm if given the opportunity. But it hasn't been proven. All we have is the government's word for that. We should certainly know by now that not everything the government has told us since 9/11 has been true. That's not trying to turn this into a partisan dispute, it's just a statement of fact.

You seem to think the judges have superior understanding of this process to the military officers. I don't think we should have to be certain (beyond a doubt, and to a moral certainty) on the information for these terrorists. I believe my government is doing the right thing here, and they are not abusing these people unnecessarily. Waterboarding terrorists is a good thing IMHO. It has yielded a lot of information. Then again, I don't know what is known about these prisoners, and neither does anyone who isn't involved in the cases.

It's funny you inject 9/11 into this, I just read an article about Tim Russert, by Adam Scheffler, where they were discussing whether or not we would go to war with Iraq. Russert said, if Sadaam didn't let us in to remove the WMD, we would probably go to war. Yep, people tend to forget that everyone thought there were WMD in Iraq, and I still think there was, we just haven't found them (probably because they were moved.)

I'm afraid liberals will be the end of the US. You are more concerned about feelings than outcomes. You don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, and sometimes that cannot be avoided. The constant erosion of our country's sovereignty with an eye toward a one world government is also very disturbing to me, and it is just another tenet of liberalism.