Your government can kill you if...

A Justice Department memorandum apparently prepared for Congress lays out for the first time the criteria that the national security establishment uses to decide whether to kill an American who is a senior al Qaeda leader or the the leader of one of its operational arms. Honors go to NBC's Mike Isikoff for the score. The memo has no classification markings on it, which tells me that it is a distillation from a larger, probably classified document prepared by the Office of Legal Counsel at the Department of Justice. Generally, the executive branch keeps secrets in one of two of ways. They classify something formally, or they claim that something not classified is tantamount to internal work product or private legal advice intended for the president and his advisers only.

This allows the administration to keep its internal legal memos away from other branches of government, which it claims the right to do. The Bush Administration revealed operational details of secret programs to Congress but refused to provide the legal reasoning. The Obama administration has, at least in the past two years, begun to brief members of Congress proactively on both sets of details. This is one reason why Congress, for the most part, isn't complaining about "secret laws." (There are some exceptions.)

Anyway, here is what the lawyers to the president's lawyer say about the legality of killing Americans who are constituted as al Qaeda or al Qaeda-linked threats. (The memo makes it clear that its language does not apply to other instances where American citizens might be killed by their government.)

1. "An informed, high-level official" must determine that the person represents "an imminent threat" of "violent attack against the United States."(continued)

“we don’t use our military against our own civillians.”

You are living in a fantasy world. Since time immemorial and since the adoption of the U.S. Constitution, the military in the form of the militia, the state military forces, and the Federal military forces have been authorized to combat and suppress insurrections, riots, other civil disturbances, and acts of piracy and brigandage, subject to some restrictions by the later Posse Comitatus laws. Under a declaration of martial law, in particular, U.S. Citizens are certainly subject to military actions.

In 1974, I was ordered to undergo additional training and duties for specializzed riot control duties. One of the duties we were trained to perform was a smiper mission to shoot Weathermaen terrorists plotting to assasinate a black leader at the forefront of an urban race riot. The Weathermen terrorists schemed to create a false flag incident much like they did at kent State to blame the government for the ensuing chos an shootings. Our mission was to stop the assasination by shooting the Weatherman before he could pull the trigger on the black protest leader.

It is unfortunate when you adopt the Marxist anti-military propaganda without trying to learn about and understand the actual scope of military law, before the Liberals tried to re-write istory and thee law.

By what logic do you argue the U.S. Government cannot wage war upon and kill U.S. Citizens engaging in belligerant actions against tthe U.S. Government and/or its foreign allies?

Since the definition of imminent threat was changed to continued 'plotting'.

It is all about the due process required PRIOR to removing an inalienable right (namely LIFE) of US citizens that are not directly engaged in an illegal activity though they may be plotting one. This equates to summary executions of US Citizens by the Executive.

Using the new definition, Obama could execute Tea Party or NRA members who actively plot to overthrow Obama UNLESS some good men stopped him BECAUSE the laws clearly in this cause are not stopping him.

In summary, to answer your question with a question regarding limited government and the rule of law -by what logic do you argue the U.S. Government can arbitrarily kill U.S. Citizens that may have committed a crime but have never been found guilty of such AND at the time they are killed are not an immediate threat warranting self defense -let alone the fact that ONLY the drone is in danger during the supposed 'war effort"? US citizens placed on a kill list and targeted without due process is not an America I want to live in. Regarding US Citizens I could MAYBE buy into using drones to execute death sentences resulting from some form of due process or even using drones in self defensive measures on a battle field as a means of saving lives on that battlefield; HOWEVER, neither of those scenarios is what is being discussed.

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By what logic do you argue the U.S. Government cannot wage war upon and kill U.S. Citizens engaging in belligerant actions against tthe U.S. Government and/or its foreign allies?
Since the definition of imminent threat was changed to continued ‘plotting’.

You are falsely claiming the U.S. Citizens under discussion were “ not directly engaged in an illegal activity” despite the fact they had associated themselves with an organization engaged in warfare in direct violation of the laws of war and the laws of nations, who in past years and millenia authorized the immediate enslavement or execution upon sight or capture by any person, military or civilian. Pirates, brigands, and persons engaging in combat without a commission of the sovereign power were subject to the penalty of death without due process by anyone and anywhere. Nowadays, the legal profession has severely reigned in such practices sometimes and in some places, yet the law and principle still exists, especially in combat situations. Arguing due process becomes ludicrous in most combat situations, as the right of a law enforcement officer or a citizen to commit lawful homicide without due process under exigent circumstances of imminent threat which you allude to. Combat and certain types of intelligence activities involving the risks of personal combat and combat intelligence are likewise circumstances where due process is not reasonable or required by law and where the writ of habeus corpus does not and should not exist as a right because of the inappropriate consequences.

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Using the new definition, Obama could execute Tea Party or NRA members who actively plot to overthrow Obama UNLESS some good men stopped him BECAUSE the laws clearly in this cause are not stopping him.
[Unquote]

The Obama Administration does not have the lawful right to so target the members of the TEA Party under such legislation, but that does not mean he would not abuse the interpretation of the law to do so or has already done so in some covert actions. The Obama Administration and prior Presidents have always had the Constitutional power to suspend habeus corpus with the consent of Congress, and they have actually done so on a number of occasions. What should be dome about this power to suspend the writ of habeus corpus and/or suspension of due process is another question pending since the Constitution was adopted. Before answring the question, however, a peerson has to be careful not to invalidate the inalienable rights of citizens nor unnecessarily deny the military to effectively perform its mission to protect and defend those Constitutional rights and freedoms against foreign and domestic enemies who would destroy them while abusing the Constitutional protections.

[Qutoe]
In summary, to answer your question with a question regarding limited government and the rule of law -by what logic do you argue the U.S. Government can arbitrarily kill U.S. Citizens that may have committed a crime but have never been found guilty of such AND at the time they are killed are not an immediate threat warranting self defense -let alone the fact that ONLY the drone is in danger during the supposed ‘war effort”? US citizens placed on a kill list and targeted without due process is not an America I want to live in. Regarding US Citizens I could MAYBE buy into using drones to execute death sentences resulting from some form of due process or even using drones in self defensive measures on a battle field as a means of saving lives on that battlefield; HOWEVER, neither of those scenarios is what is being discussed.
[Unquote]

You are wrong in saying “neither of those scenarios is what is being discussed.” On the contrary, such attacks are being discussed, and they cannot be arbitrary by definition, since they are targeted as you have observed. Neither are the attacks entirely without due process. The attacks are subject to due process determinations of compliance with the Constitution’s enumerated Power for Congress to define the rules and laws for piracy and the Law of Nations for example. The legal compliance for due process under those laws and the Uniform Code for Military Justice are quite different from domestic civilian legal codes, and for good reasons not to be trifled with without very good cause to do so. It may very well be a need for improvements in due process to military law, the Laws of War, and the Law of Nations to prevent dictatorial abuses; yet the current laws do in fact provide some due process despite any impressions you find to the contrary. Consequently, your argument serves as a non-existant strawman argument and not the actual circumstances which exist.

Odd you mention the Weather underground.

I’m looking at a copy of the translation of an al Qaida doc recovered in Afgan. It came straight from UBL himself.

Take the info in this doc and guess what. The terrorist attacks are following the Weather underground playbook and have been since 1993’s 1st WTC bombing.

Whole lot of false flags since 1993. The latest one was the attack in Libya.

Nice little attempt to make it appear as if Mitt Romney and the repubs were collaborating with the terrorist to paint Zippo as Peanuts Carter.

BTW, Hillary’s ‘spontaneous” lie has it’s roots in the lie the dems tried to create after the 1st WTC bombing.

Dem operatives tried a somewhat similar lie once again in January of 2006. Got UBL himself to help them with that lie.

On the contrary, military history compels me to conclude you are using an illogical strawman argument, because it erroneously asserts the introduction of a new and effective weapons system would necessarily be considered normal warfare and free of legal and moral challenges in the hands of most any government.

During the American Revolution, for example, the British were generally opposed to the use of rifles as military weapons. The rifles of the day were typically unable to mount a bayonet, which the infantry required as a weapon to repel cavalry and engage in close combat with infantry. Furthermore, the infantry could load and fire a muzzleloading infantry musket much faster than a muzzleloading rifle., which gave the muskets a greater weight in firepower that won battles while in line of battle formations. Consequently, the slower loading rifle without a bayonet was seen as too defective for use like a standard infantry musket with a bayonet, and its only remaining value on the European style battlefield was for use in sniper work to kill officers. At this point of time the selective killing of officers was seen by the British Army and some other armies as something more akin to dishonoarble assasination and murder on the battlefield than some form of honorable and manly duel in battle. Some officers in the British Army went so far as to propose treating Americans captured with a rifle as some kind of war criminals. The British Army used rifles and snipers, but it was s source of controversy for some time before, during, and after the Revolutionary War. One historical fact did force the British Army to consider its position on the matter. At the Battle of Bunker Hill (Breed’s Hill), the American army used the Indian fighting tactics they were accustomed to using in the colonial wars and used their rifles to snipe and kill the British officers leading the attack up the hill. Out of all the losses of officers incurred during the Revolutionary War, something on the order of one-fourth of those officer losses occurred in the assault on that hill in just one day. Some of the surviving British officers described the American use of the rifle that day as murder because of its selective killing of gentlemen officers supposedly needed to control the rabble of the lower ranks.

The controversy over the role of sniping on the battlefield has continued to some degree to this very day. It’s morality and honorability remains in greater and lesser controversy because it gives the attacker greater opportunities for immunity while greatly increasing the vulnerability of the targets. These are the same factors which brought the introduction of other new eapons into moral question and legal challenges. This was true of artillery and its fragmentation shells striking infantry from a distance, submarines such as the Turtle and CSS Hunley striking from hidden underwater approaches, aircraft dropping bombs and strafing from the sky with impunity, shotguns used in trench warfare, and hollow point bullets fragmenting into wounds. The armed drone is just the latest weapons system combining many of these same features which have sparked unending controversy over its ability to effectively and selectively make a target greatly more vulnerable and the attacker greatly more immune to counterattack. The arme drone can snipe a target almost like a rifle, attack from a hidden position in the sky like a submarine underwater, attack from the sky and retreat to the sky like a warplane, use fragmentation projectiles causing grievous wounds like fragmentation artillery rounds striking from a distance, and gives the attacker an unmatched degree of immunity against counterattack. Given the endless precedents for controversy over each new type of weapon, it must be asked how can it be remotely considered normal or logical for such a weapon to be free of the kind of controversies which lawyers inevitably exploit and cause legal opinions and memoranda to fly about like shrapnel from an artillery shell burst?

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