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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe Rude Pundit - The Drone Murder Memo: Your Puny Laws Say Nothing That Can Stop Us
From what we know of how it happened, American citizen Anwar al-Awlaki was in a convoy, moving from one hiding place in Yemen to another, accompanied by his 16 year-old son. From what we know, al-Awlaki was quite good at spouting jihadist rhetoric and inspiring people to join the fight. He may or may not have been in on the planning of attacks. Evidence of that has never been allowed to be seen beyond the highest levels of security clearance. We do know that on September 30, 2011, his hand was not on a bomb trigger, he was not on the phone ordering an attack, and he was not wearing an explosive vest. We do know that he was killed by missiles released from American drones, as was his son, as was another American jihadi with him. We do know that he had never stood trial for his crimes. We do know that he was not killed on a battlefield, per se, unless the entire world is a battlefield.
And we know that a Justice Department memo offering the legal justification for this action exists. It was released yesterday, in a much-redacted form, in answer to lawsuits demanding a little bit of sunshine in the Obama administration's dank caves of the legal netherworld where our war on terrorists and terrorist associates is waged.
There's much that's disturbing and downright weird throughout the shoulder-brush of an afterthought the memo is. For instance, there's the use of an 1897 definition of murder from a British law book, where we're told that "Murder is when a man of sound memory, and of the age of discretion, unlawfully killeth within any county of the realm any reasonable creature in rerum natura under the king's peace." The use of the word "killeth" is the least disconcerting aspect of that sentence.
A great deal of the first part of the memo is taken up not with al-Awlaki, but with justifying the use of murderous force within the law. One of the focal points is Title 18 of the U.S. criminal code, especially Section 1119 "Foreign murder of United States nationals." The Justice Department's legal office also wrestled with the notion of the "public authority justification." That's the exception to the law that says if you're a cop, you can kill a guy who pulls a gun on you or is about to kill someone right then and there.
Now here's the awesome part of the memo, the part that essentially comes up with a way to tell the president, the CIA, the military, whoever, "If it feels good, do it." See, according to the legal minds of the Justice Department, if Congress didn't say you couldn't do it, you can do it. That's not an oversimplification. Check it out, from page 17:
"We believe the touchstone for the analysis of whether section 1119 incorporate not only justifications generally, but also the public authority justification in particular, is the legislative intent underlying this criminal statute. We conclude that the statute should be read to exclude from its prohibitory scope killings that are encompassed by traditional justifications, which include the public authority justification. There are no indications that Congress had a contrary intention...Nor is there anything in the text of legislative history of section 1119 itself to suggest that Congress intended to abrogate or otherwise affect the availability under that statute of this traditional justification for killings."
So unless Congress had said, "Oh, and by the way, don't use drone missiles to make a bloody paste out of Americans overseas," it's all good. If Congress had wanted to stop us, it would have.
That's some chilling shit, right there.
It just gets worse as it goes on to come up with any way to mollify people who might think, "Um, this is creepy." For instance, the Rude Pundit's just a poor urban blogger, not some fancy Harvard Law grad trying to make execution by fiat legal, but when the memo cites cases from the Kafkaesque detainee courts at Guantanamo Bay to support the decision, he thinks we have crossed the line from pathetic to skeevy. And then we start to get to all the redactions.
But isn't that just the way this whole thing has been run? From Bush to Obama, we have been told that we can't handle the truth or we don't deserve the truth. Obama supporters think those of us on the left should support him, that he's smart and therefore we should trust him (no, really, people actually say that).
How can we support or oppose a justification if we don't even know fully what it is? Sure, we can piecemeal attack it, like here. But if the answer to anything we want to protest is "You don't know the full story," well, it's just kind of a dickish way to treat your citizens, no matter who you are.
http://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2014/06/the-drone-murder-memo-your-puny-laws.html
Demeter
(85,373 posts)and I weep that my children are born into such shameless, fascist times.
Uncle Joe
(58,458 posts)Thanks for the thread, meegbear.
m-lekktor
(3,675 posts)the two were NOT even together. the son went over to search for and join his father but never had the chance. anybody who can google can learn this. I knew of it from reading Dirty Wars by Jeremy Scahill which covers this whole al alwlaki situation in great detail.
struggle4progress
(118,379 posts)countryjake
(8,554 posts)so, not sloppy, at all.
I think that his correction should be reflected here, also. If meegbear would kindly do that, the Rude Pundit's detractors will have less to gripe about.
The corrected paragraph:
http://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2014/06/the-drone-murder-memo-your-puny-laws.html
bullwinkle428
(20,631 posts)Maedhros
(10,007 posts)and in no conceivable way presented an imminent threat to the United States.
If he was an imminent threat, then it is the U.S. Government's responsibility to prove it and not ours to disprove.
At most, he appears to have been guilty of calling for jihad - which is protected speech under Brandenburg v. Ohio.
If Democrats will accept a President who claims the power to execute American citizens without due process, without oversight or accountability, according to secret laws interpreted by secret courts, then exactly what will they NOT accept?
Blind partisanship is killing America.
delrem
(9,688 posts)If Democrats will accept.....
Change that to "if people will accept..." (regardless of their comfort-food-like affiliation with tweedledum or tweedledee) and you've got it exactly.
Maedhros
(10,007 posts)woo me with science
(32,139 posts)nadinbrzezinski
(154,021 posts)gratuitous
(82,849 posts)But I keep running into those goddam four words: "Due process of law."* I have tried very hard to break myself of this unnatural attachment to quaint language from an old document that probably doesn't mean what I think it means. After all, the kool kidz are saying that if someone in authority (either by force of law or force of will) designates someone as very, very bad, then it's perfectly all right for the government to snuff that person anytime, anywhere. I'd like to think that way, but I keep stumbling over those four words.
I have also tried very hard to trim my ideals to fit the fashion, but whenever I do, those four words come back to me. It's almost as if the measure with which our country measures justice might one day be measured against us. I don't know where this notion comes from, probably some even older, quainter document that means even less. My apprehension is so great, you'd think the mourning bells were tolling for me.
It's all very puzzling to me why I can't just rejoice over the swift, efficient wiping out of our country's enemies. Maybe I'm not a good American anymore.
*If you're familiar with punitive damages jurisprudence in the civil law, you know that bandit companies insist over and over again on their due process rights after they've killed or maimed their customers, did it for profit, and knew full well that people were going to die because of their deliberate behavior. Our government takes the due process rights of large corporations very, very seriously when it looks like they might get dinged financially for their murderous practices.
zeemike
(18,998 posts)But they are people with lots of money...and that money gives them due process.
Our justice system has two tiers and ordinary people are in one not the other.
rickyhall
(4,889 posts)riderinthestorm
(23,272 posts)DeSwiss
(27,137 posts)WHEN CRABS ROAR
(3,813 posts)and stomping on our civil rights, my country seems like the enemy at times.
WillyT
(72,631 posts)I posted this about said memo:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10025143710
It didn't seem to get much interest, but the Rudie knows how to say things straight out.
DRoseDARs
(6,810 posts)"Skeevy."
For those of you with your sarcasm detectors set to "Herp derp" that was sarcasm.
Response to meegbear (Original post)
Corruption Inc This message was self-deleted by its author.
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)This is the behavior of totalitarianism.
When will we acknowledge that these are not mere political differences in a democratic system? This is the subversion, perversion, and destruction of our Constitutional system. These people are fascists and totalitarians.
Response to woo me with science (Reply #18)
woo me with science This message was self-deleted by its author.
whatchamacallit
(15,558 posts)GOTV!
woo me with science
(32,139 posts)countryjake
(8,554 posts)One criticism, Papa needs to edit the first sentence of this piece; al-Awlaki was not murdered together with his young son, Abdulrahman.
From the linked article in that very same sentence, how it happened:
The missile strike on Sept. 30, 2011, that killed Mr. Awlaki a terrorist leader whose death lawyers in the Obama administration believed to be justifiable also killed Mr. Khan, though officials had judged he was not a significant enough threat to warrant being specifically targeted. The next month, another drone strike mistakenly killed Mr. Awlakis 16-year-old son, Abdulrahman, who had set off into the Yemeni desert in search of his father. Within just two weeks, the American government had killed three of its own citizens in Yemen. Only one had been killed on purpose.
Note: the Rude Pundit's mistake concerning Anwar al-Awlaki's son and his subsequent drone-strike murder in the month following al-Awlaki's death has now been corrected on his blog.
Savannahmann
(3,891 posts)When you start finding exceptions to the rules, you inevitably water the rules down so much that they mean nothing. Illegal search and seizure, unless, unless, or unless. Today's cell phone ruling is a push back, but for how long? Freedom of speech, unless, unless, unless.
We can always find a reason to do the wrong thing, instead of looking at the rules and deciding that the wrong thing shouldn't be done, because it's wrong. Simple as that.
erglerbergler
(27 posts)Throwing your cards in with someone like Awlaki is idiotic. Thankfully the Democratic Party is not quite as loony as a number of folks at DU (and tiny minority of all Democrats)
Maedhros
(10,007 posts)It separates me from you, and if it puts me in a "tiny minority" it's worth it.