we've ordered your assassination.

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/09/25/secrecy/index.html

Pretty fucking disturbing.

Quote :

"In response to the lawsuit filed by Anwar Awlaki’s father asking a court to enjoin the President from assassinating his son, a U.S. citizen, without any due process, the administration late last night, according to The Washington Post, filed a brief asking the court to dismiss the lawsuit without hearing the merits of the claims. That’s not surprising: both the Bush and Obama administrations have repeatedly insisted that their secret conduct is legal but nonetheless urge courts not to even rule on its legality. But what’s most notable here is that one of the arguments the Obama DOJ raises to demand dismissal of this lawsuit is “state secrets”: in other words, not only does the President have the right to sentence Americans to death with no due process or charges of any kind, but his decisions as to who will be killed and why he wants them dead are “state secrets,” and thus no court may adjudicate their legality.[quote] From "The Agitator" [quote]There are no mitigating factors, here. Obama is arguing the executive has the power to execute American citizens without a trial, without even so much as an airing of the charges against them, and that it can do so in complete secrecy, with no oversight from any court, and that the families of the executed have no legal recourse. You can’t even make the weak argument that the executive at least has to claim this power in the course of protecting national security. Because it doesn’t matter. Obama is arguing that he has the right to keep everything about these executions secret—including the reasons they were orderedt—merely by uttering the magic phrase “state secrets.” In other words, that this power would only arise under a national security context is deemed irrelevant by the fact that not only is Obama claiming the president’s word on what qualifies as “national security” is final, he’s claiming the power in such a way that there’s no audience to whom he would ever need to make that connection. So yeah. Tyranny. If there’s more tyrannical power a president could possibly claim than the power to execute the citizens of his country at his sole discretion, with no oversight, no due process, and no ability for anyone to question the execution even after the fact . . . I can’t think of it. This is horrifying."

Couldn't say it better myself. Is there any doubt that our constant "War on X" mentality inevitably becomes nothing more than a war on our own citizenry?

9/27/2010 7:55:24 PM

meet the new boss. same as the old boss

9/27/2010 8:22:38 PM

9/27/2010 8:57:54 PM

DISLIKE

9/27/2010 9:02:42 PM

this is the new sound, just like the old sound: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DJuOrekvaM

9/27/2010 9:35:10 PM

He's a fugitive. If he wants access to our judicial system, he can turn himself in.

9/27/2010 9:49:56 PM

Obama/Clinton 2012!!!!

9/27/2010 10:02:32 PM

I've never quite understood how the "state secrets" bit means something couldn't go to trial. Are the courts not part of the state? I'm fairly certain we already have procedures in place for handling sensitive and non-public information in trials, why doesn't that work here? And sure, some of this stuff is "need to know" and all that, but worst case, that should mean the case is heard directly by the supreme court and certainly the highest court in the land, equal in stature to the executive branch, should have "need to know" right?

9/27/2010 10:15:08 PM

I'd like to see this come up in a town hall meeting.

9/28/2010 9:50:22 AM

Kurtis636 hates America, our freedom, our troops, and democracy!!

[Edited on September 28, 2010 at 3:58 PM. Reason : 5]

9/28/2010 3:57:47 PM

So you want me to feel sorry about the fact that our weak ass President is finally gonna kill a terrorist (and a traitor)? Sorry bud, when homeskillet took up arms against the US, he signed his own death warrant.

9/28/2010 9:07:16 PM

How do we know you haven't taken up arms and are plotting?

9/28/2010 9:09:50 PM

Slightly different take on state secrets but interesting nevertheless. For those of you not familiar with the issue, this is perhaps the mother of all government-contractor lawsuits in terms of money. They've talked about numbers as large as $20 billion in fines, legal fees, and interest which would easily break either company if things went against them.

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-09-28/boeing-general-dynamics-get-hearing-in-a-12-case.html

Quote :

"Boeing, General Dynamics Get Hearing in A-12 Case Sept. 28 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Supreme Court, accepting a case that will affect government secrecy claims, agreed to review a ruling that could force Boeing Co. and General Dynamics Corp to pay $3 billion in a dispute over a canceled Navy aircraft contract. The justices today said they will intervene in a 19-year- old legal dispute over the Pentagon’s 1991 termination of the A- 12 Avenger stealth fighter aircraft program. A federal appeals court said the government was justified in canceling the contract because the companies weren’t living up to their obligations. A victory for the companies could wipe out the government’s demand for the return of $1.35 billion in payments, plus the interest that has accrued over two decades. More broadly, the case could affect the government’s use of the so-called state secrets privilege, which Boeing and General Dynamics say unfairly prevented them from mounting a defense in their case. “By invoking the state-secrets privilege, the government has not simply taken some evidence out of this case,” General Dynamics argued in its appeal. “Rather, it has entirely prevented the contractors from raising a critical defense.” The A-12 was one of the largest defense procurement fiascos in U.S. history. The plane, designed to penetrate heavily defended locations, never made it into production in spite of years of development. Navy Planes In 1988, General Dynamics and McDonnell Douglas signed a contract to build eight of the planes for the Navy at a total target price of $4.4 billion. Three years later, the Navy and then-Defense Secretary Dick Cheney declared the company in default and canceled the contract. The two sides have traded blame. The government says the companies weren’t able to produce the aircraft as designed on schedule. In the weeks leading up to the termination, the companies “adhered to the position that they could not build the A-12 aircraft for the agreed-upon price, under the agreed-upon schedule and to the agreed-upon specifications,” Acting U.S. Solicitor General Neal Katyal told the Supreme Court. The state secrets issue stems from the companies’ contention that the delay was caused by the government’s refusal to share essential stealth technology. Military Secrets The government argued that the companies couldn’t press that argument because litigating the issue would require the disclosure of military secrets and jeopardize national security. Two lower courts agreed. The companies don’t directly challenge the assertion of the state secrets privilege. They instead say the government’s invocation of the privilege should have precluded it from claiming default. The Obama administration has drawn fire from human rights advocates for using the state secrets privilege in other contexts, including lawsuits by suspected terrorists who say they were subjected to torture. Two business trade groups, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, joined Boeing and General Dynamics in urging Supreme Court review. Boeing, a Chicago-based aerospace company, inherited the litigation through its 1997 purchase of McDonnell Douglas Corp. The companies at one point stood to recover $1.2 billion, plus interest. A trial judge awarded that sum in 1998 after ruling that the government improperly terminated the contract. An appeals court panel overturned that ruling. The two companies would split any liability in the case. Boeing, which set aside $350 million in 1990, said in a July regulatory filing that the company ultimately could take $1.7 billion in pre-tax charges. General Dynamics, which is based in Falls Church, Virginia, said its after-tax charge could be $805 million, or $2.07 per share. The cases are General Dynamics v. United States, 09-1298, and Boeing v. United States, 09-1302."

9/29/2010 10:34:10 AM

i agree - it's pretty fucking disturbing to think the courts might protect someone who has been nothing but a good citizen by hiding in yemen, inspiring terrorists to murder innocents, writing riveting literary works like 44 Ways to Support Jihad, and issuing fatawas over cartoons

let me guess - you probably think McVeigh didn't deserve the death penalty either

[Edited on September 29, 2010 at 10:12 PM. Reason : .]

9/29/2010 10:11:55 PM

Oh, so an American citizen was tried in the court of public opinion and thats good enough, right?

You deserve neither liberty or safety.

9/29/2010 10:28:06 PM

At least Nixon had the decency to hide his assassination attempts.

Quote :

"In 1972, Anderson was the target of an assassination plot in the White House. Two Nixon administration conspirators admitted under oath they plotted to poison Anderson on orders from a senior White House aide.[10] White House "plumbers" G. Gordon Liddy and E. Howard Hunt met with a CIA operative to discuss the possibilities, including drugging Anderson with LSD, poisoning his aspirin bottle, or staging a fatal mugging.[11] The plot was aborted when the plotters were arrested for the Watergate break-in. Nixon had long been angry with Anderson, blaming Anderson's election eve story about a secret loan from Howard Hughes to Nixon's brother[12] for Nixon's loss of the 1960 presidential election. Anderson remained a target of FBI investigation after his death; in February 2006, the FBI contacted Anderson's family to obtain his files and search for classified documents.[13] The FBI agents claimed to be looking for documents pertaining to American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) as part of an espionage investigation."

9/30/2010 7:56:00 PM

Quote :

"let me guess - you probably think McVeigh didn't deserve the death penalty either"

McVeigh was arrested and convicted in a court of law. Look, the guy is an asshole no doubt about it, but to the best of my knowledge he has neither renounced his citizenship, nor actively engaged our troops in combat. If he gets shot in a battle or blown up by a missile strike on a hideout, too bad, I'm not going to weep tears over his loss, but equally if we have the ability we by law must arrest him and make him stand trial.

Regardless of what the man has done, he is still a US citizen and our constitution provides him equal protection under the law as it would any common thief or murderer.

9/30/2010 10:01:03 PM

^what he said.

10/1/2010 7:47:18 AM