That may sound bad to some of you but I don't care, what we have is right now, and the future. I am sure history will look upon this period as a blemish on our republic.
Again I don't care, I am sure the Union will weather it. If you look upon the infractions by the Lincoln Administration on civil rights or even FDR's you might wonder how the hell we survived, but we did. Was Lincolns' war on civil rights ( and specifically habeus corpus )justified to keep the Union together? Maybe?
Did FDR's internment camps benefit Naional Security? (in this case probably not) but he is still looked upon (especially by the left) as one of this Nations greatest Presidents.
I do think there are times when a volation of rights is justified. Just like the example of not waiting for a warrant to search for the "ticking bomb".
I believe they had this Padilla guy and did not want anyone to know untill they could nab some of his buddies in Pak. That explains the timing.
In the mean time through interogation they are probably so convinced of his guilt, and seeing how the Moussoui circus is going, thought it was time to tackle this one a little differently.