Kidnap first - get proof later - or not

WaPo has an interesting read this morning on the anatomy of extraordinary rendition gone wrong. Khaled Masri, a German citizen was "disappeared" for five months by the CIA while being held in various secret prisons around the world. When they finally determined they had the wrong guy, which required the "extraordinary" step of ascertaining he had a legitimate passport, he was unceremoniously dumped into Gitmo from where he was later released without charges.

The US was forced to admit this mistake because Masri refused to be silenced upon his release. The question is how many more Masris are there wrongly languishing in secret torture chambers? Since the CIA operates in this arena with virtually no oversight and is authorized to do so by presidential edict, we'll probably never know.

Is this the freedom the terrorists allegedly despise us for having?