markpkessinger
markpkessinger's JournalAre we really thinking about where all this drone business leads?
Look, it's only a matter of time before other countries, some of them who are not necessarily friendly to the U.S., develop the same capability. In using drones ourselves, are we not, as a friend of mine pointed out, effectively legitimizing a non-human, completely impersonal and completely efficient method of warfare? And in so legitimizing it, are we not guaranteeing that the practice will spread?
The argument that it "saves the live of American soldiers" is a seductive one. But it occurs to me that we may be allowing ourselves to become so seduced by that argument -- much as Truman was seduced by the use of the atomic bomb, on exactly the same grounds -- that we may fail to appreciate fully what we are unleashing upon the word and upon ourselves, just as Truman failed to fully appreciate the path he was putting the world on.
Truthout/Eugene Robinson: Wrong on Drone Hits
[font color=gray][font size=2]Friday, 08 February 2013 09:40[/font][/font]
[font color=red]By Eugene Robinson, Washington Post Writers Group | Op-Ed[/font]
Washington, DC - If George W. Bush had told us that the "war on terror" gave him the right to execute an American citizen overseas with a missile fired from a drone aircraft, without due process or judicial review, I'd have gone ballistic. It makes no difference that the president making this chilling claim is Barack Obama. What's wrong is wrong.
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But one of the few bright lines we can and should recognize is that in the exceedingly rare instances when a U.S. citizen may be targeted, our government bears a special burden.
The Obama administration acknowledged as much in a secret Justice Department "white paper" obtained this week by NBC News. The document laid out a legal argument that the president, without oversight, may order a "lethal operation" against a citizen who is known to be a "senior operational leader" of al-Qaeda or an affiliated group.
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. . . I accept that Awlaki was a legitimate target. What I don't accept is that the president or a "high-level official" gets to make the call about without judicial oversight. When the government wants to violate a citizen's right to privacy with wiretaps and other forms of electronic surveillance, a judge from a special panel -- the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court -- has to give approval. Surely there should be at least as much judicial review when the government wants to violate a citizen's right not to be blown to smithereens.
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Full article at http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/14428-wrong-on-drone-hits
NYT Editorial: "To Kill an American"
[font size=5]To Kill an American[/font]
[font size=2]Published: February 5, 2013[/font]
On one level, there were not too many surprises in the newly disclosed “white paper” offering a legal reasoning behind the claim that President Obama has the power to order the killing of American citizens who are believed to be part of Al Qaeda. We knew Mr. Obama and his lawyers believed he has that power under the Constitution and federal law. We also knew that he utterly rejects the idea that Congress or the courts have any right to review such a decision in advance, or even after the fact.
Still, it was disturbing to see the twisted logic of the administration’s lawyers laid out in black and white. It had the air of a legal justification written after the fact for a policy decision that had already been made, and it brought back unwelcome memories of memos written for President George W. Bush to justify illegal wiretapping, indefinite detention, kidnapping, abuse and torture.
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According to the white paper, the Constitution and the Congressional authorization for the use of force after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, gave Mr. Obama the right to kill any American citizen that an “informed, high-level official” decides is a “senior operational leader of Al Qaeda or an associated force” and presents an “imminent threat of violent attack.”
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But it takes the position that the only “oversight” needed for such a decision resides within the executive branch, and there is no need to explain the judgment to Congress, the courts or the public — or, indeed, to even acknowledge that the killing took place.
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Read full article at: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/02/06/opinion/to-kill-an-american.html?ref=opinion
Senator Leahy's hearing on guns, lilke Reid's "support" for filibuster reform, was a SHAM...
...a fraud, a bone to throw to those who are demanding action in order to distract them while NO meaningful action is taken! If you want to see how a real hearing on the matter is conducted, have a look at some of the testimony before the Connecticut legislature's hearings this past week held in Newtown High School. The Connecticut legislature has put the Senate Judiciary Committee to shame!
I would like to know how Leahy sleeps at night after inviting that shitbag Wayne LaPierre to testify, while not including the testimony of a SINGLE parent or other witness from Newtown. Here are just a few examples of testimony which, as Lawrence O'Donnell pointed out, should have been heard by the Senate Judiciary Committee, but were not:
http://soc.li/Ew1OuWR
http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/01/31/er-doc-to-sandy-hook-families-we-tried-our-best/
Just as with filibuster reform, we are being had by our very own. Shameful!
If it's any consolation...
... earlier this week, I alerted on unjustly being called a troll, and it was permitted to stand, even though a quick look at my nearly 2600 posts should have quickly dispelled the notion.
After seeing an onslaught of gun-not postings on Facebook today . . .
. . . I posted the following status update:
This has been a major concern of mine...
... The problem is, it polls well. But, as Andrew Rosenthal pointed out in a New York Times editorial concerning the section of New York's new gun regulations that requires such reporting, "screams unintended consequences."
That provision screams unintended consequences. Dr. Paul S. Appelbaum, the director of the Division of Law, Ethics, and Psychiatry at the Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, told The Times that such a requirement “represents a major change in the presumption of confidentiality that has been inherent in mental health treatment.”
<Sigh> Why do we never seem to get it right when it comes to issues involving mental health in this country?
Don't call it "gun control", but rather "gun regulation"
This excellent piece of advice was given on Facebook (and posted to Sharpton's Politics Nation) by my friend, Louie Crew (who, as it happens, is also the founder of Integrity, the LGBT organization within the Episcopal Church). I think it's great advice since, as we all know, words matter!
Great Keynes Quote...
... which I've adopted as my new sigline:
— John Maynard Keynes, British economist (1883-1946)
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