Attorney General Eric Holder this week held out the possibility that the President could kill an American citizens with a drone attack on U.S. soil without any criminal charge or trial. After Holder announced President Obama’s kill list policy, many apologists for the Administration insisted that the policy was limited to targets outside of the United States and was subject to a form of due process of the President’s own making. At the time, I wrote that these arguments were nothing but spin by the Administration and its supporters since the underlying claim of authority would have no such limitations. Holder now appears to have confirmed that even they do not believe in such limitations. This follows the release of a memo showing that Holder’s description of the policy at Northwestern University Law School was narrower than the actual policy described within the Administration.
Holder was responding to a letter from Sen. Rand Paul concerning the nomination of CIA director John Brennan on the use of lethal force. Holder said “It is possible I suppose to imagine an extraordinary circumstance in which it would be necessary and appropriate under the Constitution and applicable laws of the United States for the President to authorize the military to use lethal force within the territory of the United States.”
It will be difficult for people to find someway, as in the past, to blame this policy on Republicans. The kill list policy of Obama belongs to him. As I discussed in earlier columns (here and here and here), it is astonishing how citizens, including so many liberals and civil libertarians, have remained relatively silent in the face of a classic claim of authoritarian power. The relative silence over this latest development shows just how passive the country, and particularly liberals, have become in challenging Obama on his aggregation of executive power. It also is the latest evidence showing Obama’s evisceration of the civil liberties movement in this country. There is little observable movement left after it was divided over loyalty to Obama in the first term. A president has previously said that he can kill U.S. citizens on his own authority. It was then revealed that the citizen does not actually have to be involved in an imminent terrorism attack. Now he claims the right to use that authority in the U.S. The response at every stage has been a collective and prolonged yawn from a people growing comfortable with a burgeoning security state and an imperial president.
Source: CNN
Blouise, fighting the good fight I see. I couldn’t do it, I started a reply to Sam and Porkchop and said to myself, like, ‘ arguing over the Pauls?’ OMG, just stop typing and move on for your own mental health.’ I wasn’t up to it, my stern stuff just went all squishy. 🙂
All I can muster are links to the ol’ standby Wikipedia pages which are a veritable cornucopia of positions by the elder and lesser Paul if anyone’s interested:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rand_Paul
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ron_Paul
Seriously guys, is this how you think a railroad (or a country) should be run? Just take the lack of boots-on-their-necks regulation of the banking industry and apply it to everything, have we not seen where it quickly leads?
“Bron
1, March 6, 2013 at 11:24 am
Sam Adams:
“if the Founding Fathers were loaded into a time machine and brought to today, we would have an organized Revolution within a day.”
No we wouldnt, people would think them lunatics. People have no idea what liberty is anymore.”
*******
WoW! And here I thought there was probably nothing we would ever agree upon. (Well, a few little things here and there maybe 🙂 )
It doesn’t take long, just a generation will do and what was becomes history to the people living the new freedom and democracy. What many of us old codgers see as fascism is just the way things work to a new generation. We can start calling it fascism now, finally, can’t we? And if not, please tell me what more it takes.
We have secret laws, secret legal justifications, a secret court, secret warrants, secret searches, a two tier justice system, a two tier economic system, as mentioned above the militarism of the civilian police, 100 mile wide constitution-free zones where 90% of the populace lives, ubiquitous surveillance including all electronic communication, over-prosecution of petty crimes and the highest incarceration rate in the world which serves to disenfranchise minorities at a grossly burdensome rate, stop and frisk, police enforcing school rules, persistent assaults on women’s rights and voter disenfranchisement by law… it just doesn’t look much like freedom and democracy to me.
No one signed up in this republic to feel the government’s wrath from above without due process of law. -mespo727272
And “no one signed up in this republic to feel the government’s wrath” on the ground, either, without due process of law.
Sam,
Let me remind you … back in the day you considered young Thomas to be part of the elite plantation set … vestry Anglican if you will. In today’s vernacular … a wimp.
ap,
Exactly. Americans have always had a thing about a “standing” army so how best to get around that … militarize the police.
Blouise,
“All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.”
Thomas Jefferson
And … come on Sam Adams. You joined forces with the Loyal Nine Gang (later to be known as the Sons of Liberty) back in the day and had a grand old time tarring/feathering your fellow citizens, tearing down their houses, tying them up and placing them in coffins, then into a hole in the ground so that they could hear the shovelfuls of dirt falling as they were buried alive … all because they were agents for collecting fees authorized by the Stamp Act or duties authorized by the Sugar Act.
And here you are leaving footprints … at least back then you burned all your papers so that if the war was lost, no one would be able to get additional names for hanging … or droning.
Rand Paul Filibustering CIA nomination. LIVE
http://www.c-span.org/Live-Video/C-SPAN2/
This is a natural evolution of the Protect the Torturers Program. If military or para-military individuals are going to be ordered to kill fellow citizens within the homeland, one must be able to assure them that criminal charges will not be brought at any future date. -Blouise
Agreed. And it goes hand in hand with the militarization of the police.
The Militarization of Policing in America
http://www.aclu.org/militarization
(http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/03/06/aclu-police-militarization-swat_n_2813334.html posted by Dredd to another thread) )
That’s “filibuster”, not “fiilbuster”.
And at this very moment, Senator Rand Paul is engaged in a floor filibuster of the Brennan nomination over this very issue. It’s not a “hold” its a full-on traditional fiilbuster — one may like or dislike him and his father generally, but in this case, talking the talk is also walking the walk. So go Rand — probably won’t get much out of it, though.
Yes! Where do all these Obama lovers come from? He’s clever, but its been decades since Tricky Dick. Don’t you guys know that mainstream presidents can’t be trusted? Interesting how they get worse every time, no matter which party. I think it was Nixon who started the presidential edict thing; certainly ramped it up. Yes, hooray for Ron Paul. He looks radical to some because they get so used to Socialism & have this very unhealthy trust of big government, whether they are Dems or Reps.
This is a natural evolution of the Protect the Torturers Program. If military or para-military individuals are going to be ordered to kill fellow citizens within the homeland, one must be able to assure them that criminal charges will not be brought at any future date.
Now I could remind everyone of the Bonus Marches of ’33-’34 and the Army’s charge on them with fixed bayonets that resulted in death for several men, women, and children. Hoover ordered the charge which was led by MacArthur with help from Eisenhower using the United States Calvary and tanks and all taking place in Washington D C. The Bonus marches were made up of veterans from WW I and their families demanding the payment of bonuses that had been promised them for their service in that war.
It’s not as if our government doesn’t have a history of killing us.
Oops… I mean civil liberties movement
Why is it surprising, travelinglimey? Most people here only know what corporate media tells them – and corporate media is little more than right-wing propaganda. Try to get these folks to THINK and understand that the government is behind most of the events which are blamed on OSAMA or “lone nuts” etc., and they’ll respond with nothing but juvenile, ignorant insults, slander, and other signs of Tea Party cancer.
The apologists for Obama are nothing more than Hypocrites. Complete and absolute Hypocrites.
Most are too ignorant to even acknowledge the only reason they support Bush….err Obama policy is because he has ‘Democrat’ next to his name.
Just goes to show the level of dishonesty that American politics has reached. Zero integrity.
If you disagree with me and have the guts to say Obama is a good man or good president, then by all means, speak up because I would love to hear exactly how you can justify these endless assaults upon the Bill of Rights, one after another after another.
I am sorry but no amount of social policy can make up for this Presidents appalling lack of respect for the Bill of Rights. He should be removed from office.
Shocking, not….One more brick in the wall, I bet most commentators on this site voted for this Dick-tator too. When most of us were shouting Ron Paul, sanity! We got labelled radical, extreme, etc. Now who’s extreme?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/15/steve-stockman-obama_n_2478913.html A Texas right wing congressman threatens to impeach over gun control. I would certainly be wary of joining up with the gun nuts in an impeachment effort. Agree with OS. I don’t think Boehner is interested. A better use of time might be to examine why the civil liberties is dwindling and what can be done about it apart from Obama. He won’t be around in a few years.