Morality-- what's that?

Morality is what great nations make up as they go along. It is imposed on weaker nations and individuals, never the other way around.

Moral categories like good and evil don't apply to great nations. A great nation doesn't have to adhere to any moral code except that which advances its national security.

A great nation never says it's sorry, either. Apologies are for lesser governments with nothing to lose.

That's why Maher Arar, a Canadian of Syrian descent, will wait in vain for an apology from the United States for handing him over to the Syrians for interrogation in 2002.

While a character in a Kafka novel can expect the dignity of a show trial before a guilty verdict is rendered, the United States reserves the right to jettison elementary expectations of fairness whenever we feel threatened.

Acting on a tip from the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, U.S. federal agents arrested the 37-year-old during a layover in New York after vacationing in Tunisia with his family.

A responsible government only has to ask itself one question given the preponderance of innuendo and bad intelligence: Who would vacation in Tunisia except a terrorists?

Presumed guilty of everything, but nothing specific, Mr. Arar spent a mere 11 days in American custody. He was shackled and deprived of sleep, but worse things have been known to happen to pledges during fraternity hazings.

After we turned him over to the Syrians, Mr. Arar realized how good he had it in a windowless American cell.

As for his "alleged" torture at the hands of the Syrians, we're not responsible for that. In the early days of the war on terror, the Syrians indicated that they wanted to help us. How were we supposed to know that they would treat one of their own with such brutality on our behalf?

After 10 months of detention and aggressive interrogation, Mr. Arar was finally returned to Canada a little worse for wear. The Syrians managed to get a confession out of him, but many are inclined to disbelieve it because it was supposedly coerced.

But a lie isn't the only thing that can be coerced. How are we to know that Mr. Arar's admission that he was a terrorist wasn't the truth uttered under duress?

Even more disturbing is the Canadian government's willingness to entertain Mr. Arar's baseless claim that he's completely innocent.

Associate Chief Justice of Ontario Dennis O'Connor spent two years undermining the war on terror by shining a light into the darkest corners of Canadian intelligence. As it turns out, the United States is guilty of acting on bad intel that was passed on to us.

Who cares, though? A little bad intelligence between allies and neighbors is to be expected from time to time. No harm, no foul. Why investigate a matter we've already agreed upon, anyway? Why can't Mr. Arar simply get over how badly he says he was treated?

Worse yet, why apologize simply because the facts don't line up as neatly as they once did? Why pay a terrorist suspect $8.9 million for his pain and suffering in compensation for an honest mistake?

A great nation would never tolerate its leader writing a letter as abject as the one Prime Minister Stephen Harper -- a so-called conservative -- wrote to the terrorist and released on Friday:

With this letter, the Canadians have joined their cousins the French in the ranks of the world's greatest surrender monkeys.

Think about it. An apology of this type, if taken seriously, can undermine that nation's will to power for centuries.

That's why you'll never catch the United States apologizing for anything. It's a slippery slope. As Nietzsche taught us, apologies lead to a sentimental abyss where virtue is its own punishment.

The great philosopher also taught us that the bite of conscience, like the bite of a dog into a stone, is sheer stupidity. A great nation must exhibit enough intestinal fortitude to ignore the call to conscience, even when its own people cry out for a gesture of simple, human justice.

A great nation is capable of only one response under the circumstances: