(bolding mine)
I would take exception to your characterization of this as something only afflicts the current administration.
The truth is that for a long time now we’ve had a government that will sometimes ignore the constitution, regardless of who or what party is in charge of it.
And yet, it’s still our government. We can still voice our displeasure, and work to change how it handles it’s bidness.
But it does afflict this administration. Which is one in a ever growing list of disappointments Obama has saddled me with. While I am heartened that, at the very, very, very least, they agree US citizens abroad do have due process rights (a baby step in the right direction from Bush), I am also incredibly disheartened at this administration’s willingness to continue Bush’s expansion of power despite condemning them in the past.
Since about 1783.
Sure would be nice if the only check on that executive power wasn’t electing a new President.
I think its ok if its in another country where we have little to no reason to believe we’d be able to exercise our legal powers.
Its great that the US can’t kill citizens in the US or in US controlled areas. You can get local police to do what the Feds want, you can be sure of laws covering both the prosecution and defendant, and you can be sure that a jail in Florida or one in a US base in Germany is just as good as one in California. In other countries, especially outlaw countries, you are at the whim of that state and the choices are either to kill the guy or let him go. Letting him go isn’t an option, so killing him becomes necessary
Yea. Or the Supreme Court. Or the Congress.
It’s just so bizarre to me that anyone can think for a second that these killings were wrong. They were members of Al Qaeda…what more authorization do you need?! Who gives a shit what nationality they are. They’re engaged in war against the United States, fer crissake! You kill people that are waging war on you. What’s the issue, here?
How do we know whether they did anything? There’s a reason we have due process and courts where we force the government to prove its charges. We don’t allow the government to decide for itself that it can start killing people. What’s to stop the government from deciding that you are a member of Al Qaeda and to put you in your grave without giving you a chance to defend yourself?
Yes we do. Police can decide for themselves whether or not to kill someone. Self-defense. What happened in the OP case, very controversial, but it’s in that same basic vein.
And he did get due process. Due process doesn’t always = review by a judicial court.
It’s nothing like it. Self defense, first of all, doesn’t just apply to the government, and second, is based upon an imminent threat of bodily harm.
Calling assassination the same as self defense is supremely dishonest intellectually.
What process? Did he get to challenge his accusers? Did the government have to prove its claims before a disinterested finder of fact? A bunch of interested people making decisions in private isn’t process of any kind.
So it does apply to the government. And the police don’t owe anyone due process except their own on the spot judgment.
Not the same as OP, but not every American that doesnt get a day in court lacks due process.
Absolutely untrue, in the sense that police shootings are subject to review, often by civilian-led review boards. Government sponsored murder, like the kind in the OP and the kind that killed Awlaki’s 16 year old son and the son’s 17 year old cousin, are apparently not subject to any review process whatsoever. There appears to be no check and no balance to the unilateral, secret decision-making that led to these and any other similar killings.
I’m talking before the Govt kills. Not after.
I totally agree, Acsenray.
CoolHandCox, can you describe the due process that Awlaki’s 16 year old son received before he was murdered?
Not tonight.
Was he the intended target?
When will you be able to?
Do you have information that he was not the intended target? So far all the information, including that coming from government sources, indicates that he was.
When the Jameson and Guiness exit my body.
I don’t remember much. That information would have made a big difference, though.
Quick search. Found one article that said no one knows who the intended target is. Here’s a more credible source (newspaper, not necessarily who’s being quoted).
Al Jazeera reported Ibrahim al-Banna was indeed killed in that attack.
Since I’ve seen nothing credible indicating the young al-Awlaki was the intended target of the attack, nor that they knew he was there, he’s considered collateral damage of the intended Ibrahim al-Banna attack.
The due process that goes into this type of attack must be compliant with the laws of war (e.g. principles of military necessity, distinction, proportionality, ect.). The military likely saw a senior al qaeda leader and al qaeda fighters and attacked and killed them. This kid was a very unfortunate casualty of that attack.
If there’s other information out there that’s different, please show me because that would change a lot of the above. Or rather, going by Holder’s criteria for attacking US citizens abroad, the young al-Awlaki could not be a legit target by our own standards.
It’s not controversial at all, this thread notwithstanding.
Yes, of course he did. He had years to turn himself in and face trial. He did not. The government essentially said “Come out with your hands up,” and he replied “You’ll never take me alive!” What was the government supposed to do? Go “Right, then. Nevermind. Carry on.”?
He was a member of fuckin al Qaeda! This is a fact without dispute! To say otherwise shows a creationist-level of ignorance.
Chessic, I’m pretty sure this is one of those cases where everyone agrees that this guy in particular could justifiably be targeted, but where people are worried about the process by which the government acted, because they worry that the rules used in this case are too open to abuse.
The argument isn’t “this guy shouldn’t have been targeted,” but rather, “The legal process behind the targeting of this guy needed to be different.” Same outcome for this guy, but potentially different outcomes for others the rules may end up applying to later.
Don’t be muddying up the issue with stuff like “process” or “rules”. He was bad, he deserved to die, we killed him. What’s the problem?
This is like saying “Sure, I was weaving all over the road after drinking a whole bottle of vodka, but I got home okay. What’s the problem?” Just because you can argue it turned out okay in one specific instance does not mean it is acceptable behaviour.
Awlaki’s son isn’t the only 16 year old they’ve killed. Another is Tariq Khan, a 16 year old whose car was targetted just three days after he met with human rights activists about that same campaign of drone attacks. If this isn’t the deliberate murder of a witness willing to come forwards about the CIA’s crimes (using the same murder weapon, no less!), it is so close as to be indistinguishable.