What you need to know about torture, according to the president: (Thanks, Andrew.)

O'REILLY: But if the public doesn't know what torture is or is not, as defined by the Bush administration, how can the public make a decision on whether your policy is right or wrong?

BUSH: Well, one thing is that you can rest assured we're not going to talk about the techniques we use in a public forum. No matter how hard you try because I don't want the enemy to be able to adjust their tactics if we capture them on the battlefield.

But what the American people need to know is we've got a program in place that is able to get intelligence from these people. And we've used it to stop attacks.

The intelligence community believes strongly that the information we got from the detainee questioning program yielded information that made America safer, that we stopped attacks.

And yet, I feel as if I need to know more. But thanks for thinking of me, George. In all seriousness, for all the talk of Bush as jes-folks, it's rather astonishing how freely he substitutes his prerogatives for what we "need to know." No one finds that... imperious? Arrogant?

And big-up to O'Reilly -- I've actually been on the guy's show once -- for pressing the issue. I mean it.