Posted on 09/07/2012 12:16:22 AM PDT by bronxville
President Barack Obama on Monday refused to acknowledge the existence of a presidential “kill list” despite multiple assertions by top-ranking officials in his administration that the list exists.
Ben Swann, a reporter for Cincinnati’s FOX 19, asked the president, “How do you as president utilize that power [of the presidential kill list] to assassinate … U.S. citizens?”
“You’re basing this on reports in the news that have never been confirmed by me, and I don’t talk about our national security decisions in that way,” the president responded.
Swann recognized that Obama himself has not confirmed the reports, but several high-ranking officials in his administration have.
More than three dozen of the president’s current and former advisers discussed the kill list in interviews for a New York Times article, including former Chief of Staff Bill Daley, former Director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair and John Brennan, the president’s top counterterrorism adviser, who personally guides Obama through the process of deciding whether or not to put a person on the kill list.
In September 2011, Obama approved a drone strike on American citizen Anwar al-Awlaki, a regional al-Qaida commander in Yemen. The next month, al-Awlaki’s 16-year-old son, also an American citizen, was killed by a drone strike authorized by Obama.
“This is an easy one,” Daley, Obama’s former chief of staff, recalled the president saying when ordering al-Awlaki’s assassination.
A secret Justice Department memo supporting the assassination decreed that American citizens’ Fifth Amendment rights to due process could be satisfied by executive branch deliberations. The memo has not been released to the public.
Daley questioned the purpose of the program, wondering, “One guy gets knocked off, and the guy’s driver, who’s No. 21, becomes 20? At what point are you just filling the bucket with numbers?”
Obama told Swann that his administration’s “goal has been to focus on al-Qaida, to focus narrowly on those who would pose an imminent threat to the United States of America and that’s why … a whole tier of al-Qaida leadership has been taken off the field. And that’s part of what has allowed us to now begin to transition out of Afghanistan.”
Yet Swann noted that the killings of Anwar al-Awlaki and his son occurred in Yemen, rather than Afghanistan.
Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/09/05/local-reporter-takes-obama-to-the-woodshed-on-constitutionality-of-kill-list/#ixzz25hkvkl2y
Waterboarding 3 known terrorists is evil. Assassinating American citizens and citizens of other nations (plus innocent collateral damage) via drones is good and rare a peep from the marxistmedia. The emptychair has free rein.
“This is an easy one.”? Oh yes, an American citizen’s constitutional right to due process wouldn’t mean much to him.
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whatever happened to “Fight Club Rule #1” ?
to assassinate U.S. citizens?” Now, this is just the type of White on Black Hate Crime we here at the Justice Department... 
are 1,000% dedicated to eradicating once and for all, forever!
Yep, you just cannot... 
make this stuff up--
Well, Bend, if this has happened back in my prime, I'd have taken care of it... 
quicker than a jackrabbit can can cross an acre of cactus!
Enemy combatant in a foreign country, not an "american citizen".
We need more local reporters who are willing to do what the national media won’t do: challenge liberal politicians.
Network correspondents have no problem resisting or pushing back against prominent conservatives....but these so-called journalists are happy to carry water for liberals.
Nice to see someone like Mr. Swann buck the trend.
I know every time I see a Miami reporter get an interview with Obamugabe, they are essentially star-struck, throwing him nothing but softballs. In other words, it is like those lame movie interviews actors give for their latest project; no real substance, just cotton candy.
to read later
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Holder just makes this crap up out of thin air. If I read this correctly, the Executive branch deliberates the 5th amendment rights and then said same executive orders the death of the individual. This would be the same as the prosecutor in a murder trial also being the judge in the same trail.
Due process my ass! Although these are despicable individuals that need killing, I fear this kind of power in the hands of the executive department. This kind of power can and will be abused. It is far more dangerous than the individuals that are being killed.
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