SYNDICATED COLUMN: Obama's Real Death Panels
President Maintains "Right" to Kill American Citizens
Shortly after 9/11, George W. Bush secretly signed two executive orders. Both violated basic constitutional protections as well as U.S. obligations under international treaties, yet both carried the force of law.
They still do.
The first order grants the president (and other officials, including the secretary of defense, the secretary of homeland security and presumably certain postal clerks) the right to declare anyone—including an American citizen—an "unlawful enemy combatant." A person so declared has no redress, no way to appeal, no ability to challenge that designation. Once a person has been named an enemy combatant, according to the Bush Administration—and now to the Obama Administration—he has no rights. He can be held without charges forever, tortured, you name it—well, actually, the president or the secretary of defense names it.
In the second covert executive order, Bush authorized the CIA to target and assassinate said "enemy combatants"—again, including American citizens.
These two documents first came into play on November 3, 2002, when a CIA-operated Predator drone plane violating Yemeni airspace fired a Hellfire missile at a car containing Qaed Salim Sinan al-Harethi, supposedly Al Qaeda's #1 man in Yemen at the time.
U.S. officials didn't know that an American citizen, Kamal Derwish, was riding along. (You know what they say about hitchhiking.) "The Bush administration said the killing of an American in this fashion was legal…this is legal because the president and his lawyers say so—it's not much more complicated than that," CBS News reported at the time. "I can assure you that no constitutional questions are raised here," said Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, after the CIA assassinations. "He's well within the balance of accepted practice and the letter of his constitutional authority."
It's right there in the Constitution between the right to tax and the repeal of Prohibition.
Anyway, Congress tried to clarify matters in the Military Commissions Act of 2006, part of which—the section that eliminated the writ of habeas corpus—got struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court last year. But the rest of the MCA remains in force, including a passage that defines an enemy combatant as anyone who provides "material support" to the "enemy." And who is the enemy? The enemy is anyone the president says it/he/she/they is.
Again, there is no distinction between foreigners and U.S. citizens.
Jose Padilla, the so-called would-be "dirty bomber" held in a Navy brig since 2002, was tried and convicted of such "material support" charges in 2007. (The government couldn't prosecute Padilla for their original dirty bomb charges because they had tortured him so severely that he had been reduced to mental mush.)
Now that times have supposedly changed, it's time to ask: why hasn't President Obama abrogated Bush's controversial executive orders? If Obama truly seeks a break with the lawlessness of the prior administration, what better way to enact it?
Simply put, no one man—not even a nice, articulate, charismatic one—ought to claim the right to suspend a person's constitutional rights. Not in America. Certainly no one man—not even a young, handsome, likeable one—should be able to have anyone he wants whacked. Even in dictatorships, the right of life and death is reserved for judges and juries operating under a system purportedly designed to support impartiality and a search for the truth.
But that's not the case here in the United States. In 2002 Scott Silliman, director of the Center on Law, Ethics and National Security at Duke University asked: "Could you put a Hellfire missile into a car in Washington, D.C., under [the Bush] theory? The answer is yes, you could."
Nothing much has changed since then. Obama has eliminated the use of the phrase "enemy combatant," but The New York Times reported that the change is merely meant to "symbolically separate the new administration from Bush detention policies." The words may have changed, but Obama attorney general Eric Holder's definition of who can and cannot be held, said the Times, is "not significantly different from the one used by the Bush administration."
These days, Obama has ramped up the assassination of political opponents of the U.S. and the U.S.-aligned authoritarian regime in Pakistan, deploying more Predator drone plane attacks than Bush. But that's just for now. Obama could still personally order a government agency to murder you.
Which is weird. But not nearly as weird as the fact that you probably don't care enough to do something about it.
(Ted Rall is the author of "To Afghanistan and Back," the first book about the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan. Among its chapters is one titled "How We Lost the Afghan War.")
COPYRIGHT 2009 TED RALL
Shortly after 9/11, George W. Bush secretly signed two executive orders. Both violated basic constitutional protections as well as U.S. obligations under international treaties, yet both carried the force of law.
They still do.
The first order grants the president (and other officials, including the secretary of defense, the secretary of homeland security and presumably certain postal clerks) the right to declare anyone—including an American citizen—an "unlawful enemy combatant." A person so declared has no redress, no way to appeal, no ability to challenge that designation. Once a person has been named an enemy combatant, according to the Bush Administration—and now to the Obama Administration—he has no rights. He can be held without charges forever, tortured, you name it—well, actually, the president or the secretary of defense names it.
In the second covert executive order, Bush authorized the CIA to target and assassinate said "enemy combatants"—again, including American citizens.
These two documents first came into play on November 3, 2002, when a CIA-operated Predator drone plane violating Yemeni airspace fired a Hellfire missile at a car containing Qaed Salim Sinan al-Harethi, supposedly Al Qaeda's #1 man in Yemen at the time.
U.S. officials didn't know that an American citizen, Kamal Derwish, was riding along. (You know what they say about hitchhiking.) "The Bush administration said the killing of an American in this fashion was legal…this is legal because the president and his lawyers say so—it's not much more complicated than that," CBS News reported at the time. "I can assure you that no constitutional questions are raised here," said Bush's national security adviser, Condoleezza Rice, after the CIA assassinations. "He's well within the balance of accepted practice and the letter of his constitutional authority."
It's right there in the Constitution between the right to tax and the repeal of Prohibition.
Anyway, Congress tried to clarify matters in the Military Commissions Act of 2006, part of which—the section that eliminated the writ of habeas corpus—got struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court last year. But the rest of the MCA remains in force, including a passage that defines an enemy combatant as anyone who provides "material support" to the "enemy." And who is the enemy? The enemy is anyone the president says it/he/she/they is.
Again, there is no distinction between foreigners and U.S. citizens.
Jose Padilla, the so-called would-be "dirty bomber" held in a Navy brig since 2002, was tried and convicted of such "material support" charges in 2007. (The government couldn't prosecute Padilla for their original dirty bomb charges because they had tortured him so severely that he had been reduced to mental mush.)
Now that times have supposedly changed, it's time to ask: why hasn't President Obama abrogated Bush's controversial executive orders? If Obama truly seeks a break with the lawlessness of the prior administration, what better way to enact it?
Simply put, no one man—not even a nice, articulate, charismatic one—ought to claim the right to suspend a person's constitutional rights. Not in America. Certainly no one man—not even a young, handsome, likeable one—should be able to have anyone he wants whacked. Even in dictatorships, the right of life and death is reserved for judges and juries operating under a system purportedly designed to support impartiality and a search for the truth.
But that's not the case here in the United States. In 2002 Scott Silliman, director of the Center on Law, Ethics and National Security at Duke University asked: "Could you put a Hellfire missile into a car in Washington, D.C., under [the Bush] theory? The answer is yes, you could."
Nothing much has changed since then. Obama has eliminated the use of the phrase "enemy combatant," but The New York Times reported that the change is merely meant to "symbolically separate the new administration from Bush detention policies." The words may have changed, but Obama attorney general Eric Holder's definition of who can and cannot be held, said the Times, is "not significantly different from the one used by the Bush administration."
These days, Obama has ramped up the assassination of political opponents of the U.S. and the U.S.-aligned authoritarian regime in Pakistan, deploying more Predator drone plane attacks than Bush. But that's just for now. Obama could still personally order a government agency to murder you.
Which is weird. But not nearly as weird as the fact that you probably don't care enough to do something about it.
(Ted Rall is the author of "To Afghanistan and Back," the first book about the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan. Among its chapters is one titled "How We Lost the Afghan War.")
COPYRIGHT 2009 TED RALL
posted by Ted Rall at
3:22 PM
11 Comments:
It's right there, between the right to abort a baby and using taxpayer money to takeover banks and car companies.
Couldn't agree more. Wouldn't bet much on change. should of bet more earlier.
The system is so wide that to change it would be certainly suic. It would take a mass protest that we have never seen here. People watching love ones starve.
Virtue need not be proven by suic, but cooperation is another thing. Treason.
Oh well
It's not that easy being green. An entire industry exists to muddy issues and attack messengers rather than grow the fuck up and approach the life and welfare of our county in a responsible and mature fashion.
Interesting that every single Republican politican and pundit who opposes health care reform speaks laak he jes shot at a rabbit and discovered black gold, eeeee haaaaawww! It's the Beverly Hillbillies! Hwee don' wan' no gov'mint runnin' are hay-elth cay-err say-is-tum. Support th' troops 'n' Gaad Blay-ess 'Merica!
Whatever influences and pressures President Obama is dealing with, he could use a bit of understanding and faith that he is doing the best he can, considering, too, the monstrous support the ever-incompetent and criminal, George W. Bush, got when he squatted in the White House.
Anyone who thinks "Doctor Strangelove" was made up in the mind of a creative writer is sadly mistaken. Strangelove was RIPPED from the files of military and civilian advisors before and during the Cold War. President Obama is just about now saying to Michele right before they try to get some sleep, "What the fuck was I thinking? This fucking job is INSANE! No wonder Bush stuck around for eight years! He fit right in!"
America is sliding down a snowy, icy, greased slope with a Class-5 tail wind to DOOM. Once we learned how much support George W. Bush had from the subculture of wasted and criminal talent, it was plain that we were going to repeat Nero fiddling while Rome burns. It's all over except for the introduction of Zombies. The gun nuts will be horribly surprised when they find out head shots with shotguns have absolutely no effect on Zombies.
Now, if Curtis LeMay climbs out of his grave as a Zombie and gets elected President, America will have half a chance of ridding the earth of all the trouble-makers.
Yeah, it just isn't easy being green.
"But not nearly as weird as the fact that you probably don't care enough to do something about it."
Fuck you Ted. What are YOU going to do about it? You think penning a fucking op-ed is your contribution while everyone else puts their ass on the front line?
Again, fuck you Ted. Fucking phony.
It's fascinating when you talk to conservatives (I should say, "neo-cons") about this. (I've had extensive discussions with my relatives, and read several blog discussions whose addresses I don't have handy.) They have an interesting point of view (at least, it's internally consistent). They say that the power to order assassinations is the rightful, logical duty of any head of State of a superpower. From Rome through Napoleon through Nazi Germany all the way to the present day. The has a lot of responsibility weighing on him, and the safety of Our Boys Over There are on the line, so he's gotta make the tough decisions, so obviously George Bush deserved those powers. But any Democrat will inevitably abuse that power, due to the Democrats' inherently corrupt nature, so therefore that's the reason why we must all work hard to make sure no Democrats are ever, ever elected to power. An interesting take on "realpolitik"... and then these neo-cons wonder why people call them 'fascists'.
Democrats, of course, make a similar argument: only Democrats have the wisdom and prudence to handle the responsibility of these executive (literally) powers. So that's why we must work hard to make sure Republicans are never, ever elected to power. And the reason Democratic politicians don't reject and abolish such powers is... well... he's only been in office for nine months, and politics is the art of the possible you know, and we can't get elected if we don't appear to be tough on crime and terrorism and all that, and I'll get back to you with better reasons later...
People won't start to care until someone they care about is assassinated in an American city. That's the kind of shock it'll take for us to get off our asses and do something.
And even then, when has objecting to government policy without some sort of violent acts gotten anywhere?
In order to fight these executive orders and remove the concepts, we'd have to effectively become enemy combatants. Then again, that could happen anyway.
All hail the US, and its dual success in instilling both fear and apathy in the populace.
Very good article. But Bush only signed into official law what was the de facto foreign policy modus operandi of the administrations previous to Bush. I suppose the difference is now even American citizens can be held at undisclosed sites, Bagram, Guantanamo CUBA and other 'bases'.
"But not nearly as weird as the fact that you probably don't care enough to do something about it."
Right. What exactly can you do about it anyway?
Article says:"But not nearly as weird as the fact that you probably don't care enough to do something about it."
Anon says:Right. What exactly can you do about it anyway?
Whoa the fact that no one even bothered to ponder what they could "do about it" rather than trading insults is interesting.
Everyone knows the process of "doing things". Quit acting like the government is some force beyond your comprehension and management.
What happens if the carwash scratches your car or payroll deducts too much from your check? You find a way to "handle it". When your government en masse acts like lunatics hands are thrown up.
If you don't know "what to do" then FIND OUT.
I know how I like to handle these issues. How do YOU want to handle these issues?
You shut things down until people pay attention. If that temporarily complicates your life-a question: Do you want the pain now or later?
You shut things down until people pay attention. If that temporarily complicates your life-a question: Do you want the pain now or later?
It's how they do it in France.
You shut things down until people pay attention. If that temporarily complicates your life-a question: Do you want the pain now or later?
Great idea! I'll do it at a Democrat town hall meeting and call it a tea party. Oh wait that was done and you statist girls pee'd (or wee wee'd as our five minute resume president says) in your pink panties.
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