America Is Preparing to Murder Its 5th Citizen by 'Remote Assassination'

[xchrom]

http://www.alternet.org/civil-liberties/america-preparing-murder-its-5th-citizen-remote-assassination-founders-are-turning

The Founding Fathers would be appalled if they knew what the Obama administration was up to right now.

On Monday, the Associated Press reported that the White House is considering using a drone strike to assassinate an American citizen accused of ties to Al-Qaida.

If the administration ends up approving the strike, the target would become the fifth American citizen killed by the government’s so-called “remote assassination program.”

News that the White House is considering killing yet another American comes less than a year after the President announced reforms to the drone program during a speech at the National Defense University.

[JustAnotherGen]

1. Do you have the link to the AP article

Did they say this man or woman's name?

ETA: article from Bill Moyer's site: http://billmoyers.com/2014/02/11/report-us-officials-debating-whether-to-kill-a-fifth-american-by-drone/

We need transparency on who this person is and if they are active planning or just another brainwashed Allah Freak in over their head. And I'm okay with any criticism against me for calling this person an Allah Freak. DU allows for criticism and derision against people of faith - I see no difference between Allah freaks and those who live on FLDS compounds in the US.

[xchrom]

2. a google search doesn't show the AP article

but it does a bunch of others == from ABC, the guardian, CNN, etc

[struggle4progress]

97. Obama administration mulls lethal strike on American in Pakistan

By Ken Dilanian
February 10, 2014, 4:45 p.m
http://www.latimes.com/world/worldnow/la-fg-wn-drone-american-20140210,0,7053797.story#axzz2t3KizgAK

[struggle4progress]

98. Source: U.S. debating targeted killing of American terror suspect overseas

By Barbara Starr, CNN Pentagon Correspondent
updated 8:43 AM EST, Tue February 11, 2014
http://www.cnn.com/2014/02/10/politics/terror-suspect-targeting-debate/

[struggle4progress]

100. White House officials weigh drone attack on American suspect

By Kimberly Dozier, Associate Press
Monday, Feb. 10, 2014 | 10:15 p.m.
http://www.lasvegassun.com/news/2014/feb/10/obama-officials-weigh-drone-attack-us-suspect/

[JustAnotherGen]

105. Thanksi

In the body of my post I linked to it earlier this morning.

[Scuba]

3. Hey, he's been accused. What else is needed before executing him?

[reusrename]

9. If they say he's guilty that good enough for me.

I just want to know what he did.

[whatchamacallit]

19. Who needs due process when we have the word of "they"? Lol.

Mind boggling...

[Comrade Grumpy]

46. Yeah, who needs actual proof of guilt?

Especially when it might be inconvenient.

[tomg]

4. This offer void where prohibited

[bowens43]

5. IMO Obama has never shown any respect for or understaning of the Constitution

don't expect him to start respecting it now.

[Scuba]

10. Yeah, he lost that credential when he declared Manning guilty.

[wildbilln864]

55. yes he did!

Bush must have explained to him how it was "just a goddamned piece of paper". And apparently he agreed.

[Fearless]

6. Habeas corpus remains dead.

Go America!

[bullwinkle428]

7. If a Republican president was about to do this, it would have 200 recs before

the mid-morning coffee break.

[ProSense]

13. Are you

"If a Republican president was about to do this, it would have 200 recs before"

...sure: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=433x787226

[sabrina 1]

16. Was Bush president in 2011? We don't have to wonder what the reaction on the Left would be

to the US Govt murdering US Citizens by Drone or by any other without even charging them with a crime. I REMEMBER the OUTRAGE the first time it was even hinted that Bush might be planning to do it.

What was the point of your link btw?

And thankfully there still is outrage on the Left and everywhere else, well at least among those who have not yet abandoned the idea that the US Constitution, not to mention International Law, the Geneva Conventions etc, ARE still operative.

When I think that we waited eight years to try to remove the Destroyers of the Constitution, full of hope that these horrific policies would finally end! I do remember being called 'politically naive' during that time, now I have to admit, that was true.

[ProSense]

18. He was in 2003. n/t

[sabrina 1]

21. Your link was to one of your own OPs from 2011. Which didn't match at all, the

point you claimed to be making.

[PowerToThePeople]

8. Thanks Obama. n/t

[hack89]

11. He could always turn himself in for a trial. nt

[sabrina 1]

17. Who is he?? Do you know?

[hack89]

23. No - but the US government does.

and he certainly knows who he is - I can't imagine there are that many Americans that are working with Al-Qaida.

I think the US should release his name and give him a week to turn himself in.

[sabrina 1]

47. How do you know any of this? I don't know that such a person even exists. The Government has

said a lot of things that have turned out not to be true. A matter of life and death generally, at least in democracies, requires more than 'I trust the Government, if they say so, it has to be true'.

Millions of people said that when Bush/Cheney told them Iraq was going to blow us off the face of the earth. I didn't believe it. I don't believe this either. I don't believe ANYTHING without evidence.

'The government should release his name'. How do you know it isn't a woman? Or a figment of someone's imagination in order to justify all those tax payer dollars we are spending to 'make us safe'. Which btw, was supposed to take only 'a month, maybe a few months at most'. The Government told us that also.

But it's 12 years later. There were no WMDs. And until I see absolute proof, having learned over the past number of years, that the Government, most recent example, Clapper eg, often lies, I believe NOTHING.

AND if this person exists, if they have proof of a crime worthy of death, then why don't they try him in court so we all get to see the evidence?

A US Citizen is still innocent until proven guilty under our laws.

Or have we dispensed entirely with the Rule of Law which is what makes a nation CIVILIZED, not some tin pot dictatorship which is where this kind of does happen.

[hack89]

49. I am saying that, if true, he should be afforded the opportunity to surrender

you are trying too hard to be outraged.

[sabrina 1]

70. No one has to TRY to be outraged about just what you stated. You outlined the

problem, no one KNOWS if it's true or not. Yet there are a few who are willing to support this OUTRAGEOUS, and it is OUTRAGEOUS, policy of extra-judicial assassination of ANYONE, citizen or not. And just a few years ago it was something we did not condone as a civilized nation.

As a matter of fact we condemned those nations who did do it.

It is not legal. It is a Right Wing Bush policy that even he was trying to hide knowing how outrageous it was.

The world, and thankfully many decent, civilized people here in this country are working hard to END it. It never should have begun.

I AM outraged with zero need to pretend to be. Why would you even think that anyone would have to pretend to be outraged over such an evil policy? That is what I don't understand.

[hack89]

71. ok. nt

[wildbilln864]

58. Hell he probably doesn't even know who Al CIAduh is. n/t

[L0oniX]

39. Complaint!

You have way too many hearts!

[NCTraveler]

56. Where is the arrest warrant?

The Grand Jury results? Accusation of a specific crime?

[hack89]

57. Sure - we can do all that first.

but if he refuses to turn himself in after that, he is fair game.

[NCTraveler]

59. Still don't think he is fair game.

None of what I said proves guilt. It only proves that the government has gone down the hole of not respecting due process. Charging a US citizen with a crime should not automatically mean a death sentence. If they want to issue a warrant and attempt to go get him, I am fine with that. If they decide a warrant is enough to kill him from the skies, they are constitutionally and morally wrong. If he is enough of a problem to subvert the constitution, then he is important enough to send a team in to attempt to extract him.

[hack89]

61. In principle, if he is actively waging war against America

then he is fair game.

I know that for many here there is no way to prove that.

I trust the president to do the best he can in a hard situation.

[NCTraveler]

63. I do respect your opinion and am not all that far off.

I will never be able to trust the White House that much. American Citizens have rights that should never be broken. I will not give up the right to due process for this scum bags death. Not a chance. Going through the channels to revoke his citizenship would do it for me. It really is about that citizen part for me, even if he has taken up arms against us. I appreciate your thoughtful response.

[Maedhros]

64. The definition of "waging war" has become as nebulous and useless as that of "terrorism".

This person is accused of conspiring to commit a crime. He is not "actively waging war."

In America, we don't just kill people who are accused of a crime because it's inconvenient to follow due process.

[hack89]

69. ok. nt

[Pholus]

77. If trust has to enter into this extreme sanction of a US citizen....

then you have just admitted the system is broken.

If this is a US citizen and WE THE PEOPLE are agreeing to eliminate him, then sufficient evidence to make the case should be made public.

We have a moral obligation to refuse to "trust" in situations such as these because the next President may not be so trustworthy and precedent is hard to break.

[markpkessinger]

88. "He could turn himself in for trial . . ."

. . . at the hands of the very people who have expressed their willingness to assassinate him with no trial at all. Yeah, that's an option.

[JoeyT]

112. And the people who operate torture dungeons where even those we admit are innocent

are kept in perpetuity, because after we've tortured them for a while, we figure they probably hate us now even if they didn't before. Of course those have allegedly been closed, because we don't torture, even if it means having to stretch the definition of torture to the very breaking point to put what we do outside it.

"We're going to murder you without a trial unless you surrender yourself to a life imprisonment of torture without trial" doesn't sound legal to me, but I'm not a Constitutional Scholar or anything.

[frwrfpos]

92. Bush and Cheney can always turn themselves in for a trial too for war crimes

I'll give a shit about this guy when those two war criminals turn themselves in

[okaawhatever]

12. the term American citizen is dubious. It has long been established that if you leave the US and take

up arms against us you have renounced your citizenship. With these few cases, I'm confident that the State Dept. and President have enough evidence to prove this individual has taken up arms against our country. I don't think for a second President Obama would pull the trigger without having ample evidence that these six individuals are our enemies and want to harm this country. Not for a second.

[whatchamacallit]

15. Glad your faith-based reasoning keeps your mind at ease

wtf?

[sabrina 1]

20. Who is this person you are confidently condemning to death? A 16 year old teenage American maybe?

Oh wait, we got an admission from the WH that droning the teenager was a 'mistake'. I suppose that's enough to keep our confidence that our government, well at least when there is a 'd' attached, we were very angry about droning American citizens when the team had an 'r' attached, would never kill anyone without being absolutely certain they deserve killing. Although our killing record doesn't seem to match that 'theory'. Ask over a million innocent people from Iraq, well you could if they weren't dead.

Anyhow, considering your confidence that our government would do any wrong, (will you feel that way if a Republican gets back into the WH btw?) I assume you must know something the rest of us don't know, such as who this condemned person is, what he is supposed to have done etc. I don't have a clue, therefore I do not have your confidence.

[Vattel]

22. Incorrect. You must take up arms against USA with the INTENTION of relinquishing US nationality.

Timothy McVeigh, for example, did not lose his citizenship simply by taking up arms against the USA.

Relevant US law:

(a) A person who is a national of the United States whether by birth or naturalization, shall lose his nationality by voluntarily performing any of the following acts with the intention of relinquishing United States nationality—
(1) obtaining naturalization in a foreign state upon his own application or upon an application filed by a duly authorized agent, after having attained the age of eighteen years; or

(2) taking an oath or making an affirmation or other formal declaration of allegiance to a foreign state or a political subdivision thereof, after having attained the age of eighteen years; or

(3) entering, or serving in, the armed forces of a foreign state if
(A) such armed forces are engaged in hostilities against the United States, or . . .

(7) committing any act of treason against, or attempting by force to overthrow, or bearing arms against, the United States, violating or conspiring to violate any of the provisions of section 2383 of title 18, or willfully performing any act in violation of section 2385 of title 18, or violating section 2384 of title 18 by engaging in a conspiracy to overthrow, put down, or to destroy by force the Government of the United States, or to levy war against them, if and when he is convicted thereof by a court martial or by a court of competent jurisdiction.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/8/1481

[okaawhatever]

28. Hasn't it been ruled that leaving the country and participating in actions against the US is

considered "relinquishing" your citizenship? I remember reading about it last year, and the legal debate is that someone who leaves the country and takes up with, say the Taliban or Al Qaeda, has through their actions relinquished their citizenship. It's ridiculous to expect that a terrorist type is going to publicly announce that they are relinquishing their citizenship. Some times actions speak louder than words.

[Vattel]

30. John Walker Lind was arrested for fighting with Taliban but

his citizenship was not regarded as having been relinquished. There may be a recent case bearing on this that I am not familiar with. If you find one, let me know. I would be interested.

[TheMathieu]

27. +1000

[L0oniX]

40. "want to harm this country" is subjective.

[Maedhros]

66. Obama's approval of "signature strikes" directly counters your claim

that Obama would not kill people without ample evidence.

Drone strikes kill people all the time because remote surveillance suggests they are acting like they might be involved with something related to possible "terrorism."

[markpkessinger]

85. Actually, the word 'citizen' is beside the point in this context . . .

. . . The Fifth Amendment does not apply to citizens only, but to all "persons" under U.S. jurisdiction. The text reads:

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

(Emphasis added.)

It may well be that this person has "taken up arms against the U.S., and that in so doing he has renounced his citizenship, but those are questions to be determined by due process of law, not by presidential fiat.

And your faith that President Obama would never exercise this (extra-constitutional) authority improperly (which statement itself is rather oxymoronic, but I'll leave that lie for the moment) is all well and good, but would you be as comfortable with, say, a future Dick Cheney-like President possessing that power? The problem that arises when Presidents claim some new authority for themselves is that such authority is virtually never ceded or relinquished by their successors.

[jsr]

14. Brought to you by the Drones For Peace program

[L0oniX]

37. +1

[Enthusiast]

79. +2

[DesMoinesDem]

24. Bad headline. America isn't going to murder anyone with a drone; Obama is.

[Romulox]

25. Hey! Where's that DUer who goes on Fox News to tell us why drone killing is A-OK????

(from a "liberal" perspective, of course!)

[L0oniX]

36. Is that the same one that goes to freeperville so they can tell us what freeps are saying?

[Maedhros]

67. I think his user name is something like SuperBlueProgressiveUltraDemocrat

or something.

[laundry_queen]

95. lol, yep. nt

[Demo_Chris]

65. EDIT: He Who Shall Not Be Named

Last edited Thu Feb 13, 2014, 09:41 PM - Edit history (1)

[riderinthestorm]

99. Shh. Can't call out DUers specifically leser your post gets hidden...

[Demo_Chris]

102. Gotcha! I shall fix it. nt

[TheMathieu]

26. People like this assassinate themselves the moment they become our enemy.

My sympathy is with their victims and potential victims.

[whatchamacallit]

29. I know this is hard for some to grasp

but the issue isn't what a terrorist deserves, it's the veracity of such a designation.

[ladjf]

33. Without a trial, how do we know this person is the "enemy"? nt

[okaawhatever]

41. Should we ask them real nice to come back from that Taliban training camp to stand trial? nt

[ladjf]

42. My question was, "how do we know that the person was guilty without a trial"?

Your response was not an answer. However, it implied that since he wasn't available for trial, we have the right to execute him
in absentia based on a questionable information gathering process. Chances are, the man is guilty as charged. But, that's not my point.
We would be replacing our historic system of trial by jury with one that depends on the accuracy and integrity of some sort of internal
information gathering, that as we all know, is not always on the "up and up".

[okaawhatever]

44. I wouldn't say we are "replacing" our historic system of trial by jury with one that depends on the

accuracy and integrity of some.....I would say we're coming up with an alternative process when trial by jury isn't an available option. We aren't choosing this over trial by jury, it's that the defendant hasn't given us a choice. While I agree that information isn't always on the "up and up" I do think with the Obama administration he's probably made sure he's covered his butt with facts and data to support this. He's the one who will be on trial at the Hague if he can't back this up.
Yes, I'm concerned with Bush and Cheney having the same ability, but I don't kid myself. If Cheney did it, we wouldn't know about it. I don't think for a second he'd leave the paper trail that Obama has. He'd probably take some cash from a black account and contact someone he knows in a foreign government to send their people out after the individual.
There are certainly issues any way you look at it, Congress tried to pass a bill in 2012 that dealt with these situations. It was sponsored by Leiberman but the neo-cons spread the rumor that Obama would use it to come take people's guns and put them in FEMA camps and strip their citizenship. (No kidding, that's where a lot of it started) so we're left with Obama possibly having to prove one day that aThatn individual had renounced their citizenship through their actions by taking up arms for a foreign organization that was a threat to the US.

Not an ideal situation, but based on the info I've seen on two or three of the other US citizens they deaded, I'd say there was a clear and present threat to security and quite a bit of information as to their political goals. That's just my two cents.

[ladjf]

50. Thanks for the thorough explanation of your views on the subject.

[reusrename]

101. The problem is not knowing what specific behavior is a crime.

We have no clue what this guy did to get on the list.

Sure, you say he has it in for us all and we should just murder him cause we're peeing our pants in fear.

I get it. Some people wish to turn the land of the free, home of the brave into land of the ruled, home of the scared. But there are a whole lot of patriots who don't want to go down that road willingly.

We want everyone to be able to confront their accusers. We want to know in clear and transparent terms that there is justice for all. We are not afraid to confront our enemies.

I flat-out guarantee you that whatever this guy did to piss them off enough to land himself on the kill list, it has nothing to do with protecting the public. They are protecting themselves. Most likely from people who know where the skeletons are buried or from someone who might amass political power that that is at odds with their strategery. That's the reason for the secrecy. Real criminals get public trials.

[NYC Liberal]

43. Do you think every soldier on a battlefield has to be arrested and

tried? No. Otherwise waging war would be impossible, and the Constitution certainly allows for waging war.

These people are engaged in warfare, not smoking joints in their living room.

[ladjf]

52. Other than obvious deserters during the heat of battle, yes, I think all American soldiers should

be arrested, charged and tried. After WWII, we granted the Nazi officers trials. Further, the man in question is only a citizen, possibly
a traitor to the U.S. But, I believe an execution without trial is illegal and politically very detrimental to the U.S.

[NYC Liberal]

74. Not after the fact. Not after a surrender.

I mean in the middle of a battle. The Nuremberg trials happened AFTER the war, after Germany had surrendered.

Do you consider the German soldiers killed during the Normandy Landing to have been "executed without trial"?

[ladjf]

81. Of course not. They were casualties of war. nt

[NYC Liberal]

82. As is this. He is on the battlefield waging war.

[markpkessinger]

94. Rules for soldiers in combat are different . . .

. . . but I thoroughly dispute the legitimacy both of (1) labeling U.S. efforts to root out terrorists (whose actions historically had been treated as crimes), as a "war" at all, much less a "global" one, and (2) equating terrorists to enemy soldiers in combat. The entire "Global War on Terror" has been nothing but an attempt by this country to thwart the constraints both of its own Constitution and international law.

[ladjf]

114. Yes. Good post. nt

[n2doc]

31. IOKIODI

It's ok if Obama does it. He's a Good Man(tm). I'm sure he has America's best interest's at heart. Even if that means killing a citizen without trial. We are at War(tm), so this is just like bombing the Nazi's. Only more precise!

Just imagine the outrage around here if Romney or McCain were doing this.

[L0oniX]

34. Nazis got a trial.

[n2doc]

35. Only the ones that survived the war n/t

[ladjf]

53. A number of the Nazis who survived the war were later captured

and given a trial. nt

[Nye Bevan]

62. Many DUers seem to trust Obama with the unilateral power to decide to execute someone,

without a trial, judge, or jury being involved. But the problem is, how can they grant Obama this power without granting it to a future Republican president? What would Ted Cruz do with the ability to declare US citizens to be enemy combatants and execute them?

[Enthusiast]

80. Many DUers are wrong.

[Maedhros]

75. You hit on the key point that the drone murder apologists keep missing:

Last edited Thu Feb 13, 2014, 05:09 PM - Edit history (2)

In an actual war, with an actual battlefield, there are two armed groups in conflict with one another. These groups are engaged in a firefight in an attempt to capture contested ground or to destroy each others' forces. This firefight may be occurring in an urban locale, and there may be civilians on or near the battlefield. In such a situation the fog of war may indeed result in unwanted civilian casualties. For example, an air strike may be called in on a church steeple housing an enemy artillery observer and inadvertently kill the civilians hiding in the church basement. This kind of thing happens all the time in actual, real wars.

But our drone campaigns are not taking place under conditions of actual, real war. Drone strikes are not made in the midst of firefights, against defensive strongpoints or on troop formations assembled for the attack. The strikes are falling on weddings and funerals, on marketplaces and farms and schools, on people going about their normal lives. Drone murder apologists want to use the "fog of war" excuse to explain away civilian casualties as "necessary" without conditions being present to justify such an explanation.

Exactly what activities are this accused U.S. citizen involved in that has earned him the death penalty? Drone murder apologists claim, without any evidence, that this accused citizen is "actively waging war" against the United States. How? The United States is not at war with anyone. There are certainly individuals and organizations plotting crimes against the United States, but our legal process does not allow for preemptive killing of suspected criminals unless they present an imminent threat to the well being of others. No such imminent threat has been demonstrated.

[woo me with science]

104. Thank you.

These murders by the government OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, and the outrageous, shameless rhetoric attempting to justify them, are beyond vile and horrifying; they are surreal in their depravity. Every time I get close to convincing myself that the corporate interests taking over this country cannot possibly be as dangerous to the very foundations of our democratic system as they seem, another round of apologism for the utter SHREDDING of our Constitution and replacement of our democratic system with secret, unchecked power to the level of MURDER brings me back to my senses.

We are fighting nothing less than the replacement of a representative democracy with fascism.

[Cali_Democrat]

93. Look at the replies in this thread

It appears as though a majority of DUers are against this.

Unless you've got all those people on ignore and can't see what they're saying.

[L0oniX]

32. Drones are like a box of chocolates...

[ladjf]

38. This "murder by drone" has got to stop immediately. It disregards the Constitution in a flagrant

manner and it opens the U.S. up to unimaginable scenarios of murder by drones.

[JaneyVee]

45. Yeah, our Founding Fathers would never assassinate its own citizens!

[sabrina 1]

48. I think they wrote something into the laws they put in place about 'due process'. John Adams eg

was of the opinion that NO ONE, citizen or otherwise, was not entitled to a fair trial. He defended British Soldiers because he believed that human beings, when accused of serious crimes, must have a chance to defend themselves in court.

I always thought due process was a great idea. I guess we are dispensing with it. But we are not alone, there have been plenty of places where the accused are just killed without any fuss or bother. Why should be different?

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

51. That's soooo 18th century. We have to "look ahead". Like we did with CIA torturers.

We didn't give them trials either...just declared them innocent.

[Agnosticsherbet]

54. In WWII, there were a number of American Citizens of German descent who returned to Germany and

fought against the US. Their citizenship never protected them on the battlefield.

This issue is not new, and Obama is not the first American President to served when Americans were fighting for the other side and being killed by Americans. The Civil War is the most egregious of these periods.

My issue is with the definition of the battlefield. The war on terror should be ended. Such people who aid in terrorist attack or conspiracies should be dealt with as criminals.

[Nye Bevan]

60. Talk about mixed feelings when you hear a drone nearby.

It might be an Amazon Prime delivery of those extra-long USB cables that you ordered. Or possibly you have been declared an enemy combatant and are just about to be summarily executed.

[Demo_Chris]

68. Or your kid. Obama has no problem vaporozing children. He's good at it.

[solarhydrocan]

72. Handy guide for targeted citizens

[xchrom]

78. +1

[Octafish]

90. Should be an OP.

Thank you, solarhydrocan! Bolling is TOPS!

[laundry_queen]

96. Good one. nt

[msanthrope]

73. I'm always shocked to read American's exceptionalism on this issue. As if different laws should

apply to citizens and non-citizens....a little too close to Joe Arpaio for me.

[markpkessinger]

86. Actually, the Fifth Amendment applies to all persons under U.S. jurisdiction . . .

. . . not just to citizens only.

[msanthrope]

113. And so does the AUMF of 9/18/2001. You've also made a fatal mistake about the 5th....

due process for a non-custodial combatant does not encompass an Article III court.

[ZombieHorde]

76. Um...

The Founding Fathers would be appalled if they knew what the Obama administration was up to right now.

They would be appalled by President Obama's skin color and women voting, so I am not so sure they're the best compass for modern ethics.

[kwassa]

83. I don't have a big problem with drone strikes ...

for an American citizen to get targeted at all means that they are very far out on their personal war against America.

This is actually one area I tend to trust the government in, and I don't trust the government very much.

The fact is, drone strikes is a strategy that has been very successful at reaching the heads of terrorist organizations while reducing the potential deaths to American servicemen, always the sign of a successful military strategy. It has been, by and large, the only successful strategy against most of these terrorist organizations.

[Nye Bevan]

84. Ever hear about someone being on the "no-fly list" because their name is similar to a terrorist?

Are you not concerned that someone might be summarily executed by mistake?

[EX500rider]

89. No one by mistake gets tracked by UAV's...

......leaving Al-Qaeda training camps and planting IED's.

The fact that mistakes can be made is also no reason for inaction against the enemies of the USA. War is not nice and neat and innocents die in every conflict. Sad but true. If killing terrorists bomb makers and bomb planters saves thousands of lives then yes it
the thing to do even if the wrong person is in the area of the strike sometimes.

[kwassa]

110. Exactly. Agree 100%.

[woo me with science]

91. Good fucking god.

We are now expected to have NO comprehension whatsoever of our own Constitutional protections or of the moral and legal depravity of a President OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA's claiming the right to MURDER the country's own citizens without due process.

This is either vile, patronizing propaganda or the most pathetic lack of historical awareness and comprehension of the dread power of secret government and unchecked power that I have ever seen on a purportedly liberal discussion board.

In your place, I would be vomiting with shame.

[kwassa]

107. so, how do you really feel? Don't hold back. Express yourself.

I think you are reluctant to reveal your true feelings.

[Bonobo]

109. Agreed except for the "citizen" part.

My wife is not a US citizen and never will be.

Doesn't make her right to not be killed by drone strike on a whim any less real.

Fuck anyone who thinks this right not to be killed without a declaration of war by the Congress is only for US citizens.

[woo me with science]

111. Thank you.

I agree with you 100 percent. Thank you for correcting me.

[JustAnotherGen]

106. Me either as long as

They know beyond a shadow of a doubt that the person is ready to pull a figurative trigger. I don't know enough about this suspect to say its the right thing to do.

[Octafish]

87. Gee. Does anyone else seem to remember there had to be a trial first?

Oh well. If President Jebthro said he had it coming, then he had it coming.

[Nye Bevan]

108. If the President does it, it can't be illegal (nt)

[Mojo Electro]

103. It's getting scary out there...

The government can just whack people now, like Tony Soprano.

And it's even covered in the news, and it's accepted. It's not even done in secret anymore. "Yeah we killed four people... might have to do a fifth.. go ahead and have a debate about it if you want to, like it matters"

Between this, and things like the Kelly Thomas case, the word is that "we will kill you if we want to... and there ain't shit you can do about it... If we don't do it ourselves, we'll have somebody do it"

When did all this become okay?