"...responsibility goes right to the top. That is, to us."

The great innovation of the Framers of our Constitution was to create a government that is not our master but our servant. We the people are the ultimate sovereign. The government acts for us; what it does, it does in our name and with the power we have given it. And its acts, as hornbook agency law will tell you, are attributable to us, for good or for ill. If it spreads liberty and relieves suffering, we can take pride in those acts as our own. If it tortures, we are torturers.  

Detention and Interrogation in the Post-9/11 World
Kermit Roosevelt III, University of Pennsylvania Law School http://lsr.nellco.org/upenn/wps/papers/227