:::::::::I disagree. It's only personal pov to speak on behalf of an abstract "sensible person" because I don't think anybody with an ounce of sense would see an intelligent connection between a torturer and the use of a general racial slur against the race of the torturer. Some US troops have pled guilty to torturing prisoners in Iraq but I don't think a sensible person would say that makes it more acceptable for the tortured person to be calling the torturers "honkeys" or something like that; I know many veterans of WW2 and I have never heard them use the term "krauts" in public and I certainly don't think Eisenhower ever did it in public. 
 This defense of McCain's right to use the slur is quite bizarre, I think.