EXCLUSIVE: Justice Department memo reveals legal case for drone strikes on Americans

[RonPaulFanInGA]

http://openchannel.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/04/16843014-exclusive-justice-department-memo-reveals-legal-case-for-drone-strikes-on-americans

[CT4Liberty]

Wow - so if you become part of al-Qaida and had nothing to do with 9/11 and there is no intelligence that you are planning anything imminent on the US, they have authority to kill you without a trial or anything?! What authority gives them this power?!

[shane77m]

I wonder if the government will use these on themselves for giving aid to Al Qaeda?

[sailingaway]

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/MSNBC/Components/Photo/_new/130204-drones-hmed-512p.photoblog600.jpg
Tribesmen examine the rubble of a building in southeastern Yemen where American teenager Abdulrahmen al-Awlaki and six suspected al-Qaida militants were killed in a U.S. drone strike on Oct. 14, 2011. Al-Awlaki, 16, was the son of Anwar al-Awlaki, who died in a similar strike two weeks earlier.


A confidential Justice Department memo concludes that the U.S. government can order the killing of American citizens if they are believed to be “senior operational leaders” of al-Qaida or “an associated force” -- even if there is no intelligence indicating they are engaged in an active plot to attack the U.S.

The 16-page memo, a copy of which was obtained by NBC News, provides new details about the legal reasoning behind one of the Obama administration’s most secretive and controversial polices: its dramatically increased use of drone strikes against al-Qaida suspects, including those aimed at American citizens, such as the September 2011 strike in Yemen that killed alleged al-Qaida operatives Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan. Both were U.S. citizens who had never been indicted by the U.S. government nor charged with any crimes.

The secrecy surrounding such strikes is fast emerging as a central issue in this week’s hearing of White House counterterrorism adviser John Brennan, a key architect of the drone campaign, to be CIA director. Brennan was the first administration official to publicly acknowledge drone strikes in a speech last year, calling them “consistent with the inherent right of self-defense.” In a separate talk at the Northwestern University Law School in March, Attorney General Eric Holder specifically endorsed the constitutionality of targeted killings of Americans, saying they could be justified if government officials determine the target poses “an imminent threat of violent attack.”

But the confidential Justice Department “white paper” introduces a more expansive definition of self-defense or imminent attack than described by Brennan or Holder in their public speeches. It refers, for example, to what it calls a “broader concept of imminence” than actual intelligence about any ongoing plot against the U.S. homeland.

Michael Isikoff, national investigative correspondent for NBC News, talks with Rachel Maddow about a newly obtained, confidential Department of Justice white paper that hints at the details of a secret White House memo that explains the legal justifications for targeted drone strikes that kill Americans without trial in the name of national security.

“The condition that an operational leader present an ‘imminent’ threat of violent attack against the United States does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future,” the memo states

more at link including link to white paper: http://ht.ly/hqhvW

[tsai3904]

It's been posted here:

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?403485-EXCLUSIVE-Justice-Department-memo-reveals-legal-case-for-drone-strikes-on-Americans

[sailingaway]

oh :o

I'll merge....

[RandPaulReview.com]

A confidential Justice Department memo concludes that the U.S. government can order the killing of American citizens if they are believed to be “senior operational leaders” of al-Qaida or “an associated force” — even if there is no intelligence indicating they are engaged in an active plot to attack the U.S.

The 16-page memo, a copy of which was obtained by NBC News, provides new details about the legal reasoning behind one of the Obama administration’s most secretive and controversial polices: its dramatically increased use of drone strikes against al-Qaida suspects, including those aimed at American citizens, such as the September 2011 strike in Yemen that killed alleged al-Qaida operatives Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan. Both were U.S. citizens who had never been indicted by the U.S. government nor charged with any crimes.

SOURCE (http://www.randpaulreview.com/2013/02/someone-just-leaked-obamas-rules-for-assassinating-american-citizens/)

[Philhelm]

I'm assuming that "an associated force" will be stretched to "supported the presidential campaign of former Congressman Ron Paul."

[pcosmar]

What authority gives them this power?!

Hubris

[Lucille]

Ron Paul's tweet will still be bigger news than this tomorrow. If only Americans would freak about about this.

Oh and thanks for defending our freedoms, guys (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Armed_Forces).

[Occam's Banana]

I'm assuming that "an associated force" will be stretched to "supported the presidential campaign of former Congressman Ron Paul."

No, no, no. You're thinking too small. (You would really suck at this "let's kill people for no good reason" business, you know that?)

It will be stretched to "anyone we damn well please to kill - any time, anywhere. And fuck you, that's why!"

[Lucille]

5 Disturbing Aspects of the DOJ White Paper on the President's License to Kill
http://reason.com/blog/2013/02/04/the-fine-print-in-the-presidents-license


The Justice Department white paper on "The Lawfulness of a Lethal Operation Directed Against a U.S. Citizen Who Is a Senior Operational Leader of Al-Qa'ida or an Associated Force," noted earlier tonight by Mike Riggs, fills in the fine print of the license to kill claimed by President Obama in several ways, none of them reassuring.
[...]
More generally, the white paper fleshes out the Obama administration's argument that U.S. citizens killed by drones are getting all the process that is appropriate in the circumstances; hence the Fifth Amendment, though implicated, is not violated. And since these targeted killings are lawful acts of self-defense, the Justice Department says, they do not violate the law against killing U.S. nationals in foreign countries or the executive order banning assassination. After all, "A lawful killing in self-defense is not an assassination." Duh,

The problem is that to accept this position, you have to put complete trust in the competence, wisdom, and ethics of the president, his underlings, and their successors. You have to believe they are properly defining and inerrantly identifying people who pose an imminent (or quasi-imminent) threat to national security and eliminating that threat through the only feasible means, which involves blowing people up from a distance. If mere mortals deserved that kind of faith, we would not need a Fifth Amendment, or the rest of the Constitution.

[idiom]

Wow - so if you become part of al-Qaida and had nothing to do with 9/11 and there is no intelligence that you are planning anything imminent on the US, they have authority to kill you without a trial or anything?! What authority gives them this power?!

Its more orwellian than that. Fully translated Al Qaeda means 'the list' or the database.

So they reserve the right to kill anyone on the list without trial.

Awesome.

[Lucille]

Its more orwellian than that. Fully translated Al Qaeda means 'the list' or the database.

So they reserve the right to kill anyone on the list without trial.

Awesome.

And the definition of terrorist just keeps getting wider:

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?403352-%E2%80%9CTerrorism%E2%80%9D-and-Lexical-Warfare


These definitions of terrorism share several common features. The “politically-motivated” behavior is usually directed against a government. It generally subsumes violence, the threat of violence, and acts of intimidation; what constitutes a threat or intimidation is vague. Terrorism from groups or clandestine individuals seeks to acquire influence in order to further “political or social objectives.”

Thus, a terrorist is a person with political, social or ideological goals that are both deeply held and highly critical of the U.S. government. He may use violence; he may not. The “peaceful terrorist” attempts to influence society in ways that others sometimes find intimidating; for example, he may insist on owning a gun. The terrorist is also “clandestine”; that is, he cleaves to privacy and resists surveillance.

The “peaceful terrorist” is a libertarian standing in the good company of others who dissent; for example, those who believe “freedom of speech” has a literal meaning.

Conclusion

The transformation of the word “terrorist” has shifted focus from the raw reality of state violence onto the mere possibility of individual violence, which is defined broadly enough to include dissent. In a stunning lexical victory, the police state has become the victim. Those who peacefully exercise their natural rights have become the terrorists.

[kathy88]

Mike Church went batshit about this on his radio show this morning.

[AuH20]

I hope you are all preparing. This isn't a game.

[shane77m]

http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/according-to-a-new-dhs-report-if-you-love-individual-liberty-of-if-you-believe-in-conspiracy-theories-you-are-a-potential-terrorist


According to the new DHS report, the following are some of the beliefs and ideologies of American terrorists….

-”fiercely nationalistic (as opposed to universal and international in orientation)”

-”anti-global”

-”suspicious of centralized federal authority”

-”reverent of individual liberty”

-”believe in conspiracy theories”

-”a belief that one’s personal and/or national “way of life” is under attack”

-”a belief in the need to be prepared for an attack either by participating in paramilitary preparations and training or survivalism”

-”impose strict religious tenets or laws on society (fundamentalists)”

-”insert religion into the political sphere”

-”those who seek to politicize religion”

-”supported political movements for autonomy”

-”anti-abortion”

-”anti-Catholic”

-”anti-nuclear”

[V3n]

http://www.mediafire.com/convkey/70d9/a97mbpoj0y9rt6h5g.jpg

[Inkblots]

Wow - so if you become part of al-Qaida and had nothing to do with 9/11 and there is no intelligence that you are planning anything imminent on the US, they have authority to kill you without a trial or anything?! What authority gives them this power?!

It's even better than that: if someone in the administration CLAIMS you are part of al-Qaida OR AN ASSOCIATED FORCE (which can basically be anything, since the term is undefined), they have authority to kill you without a trial or anything.

Makes you feel all warm and fuzzy that under this legal doctrine, the executive can have any US citizen killed at any time, in total secrecy and entirely on its own say-so, doesn't it?

[Inkblots]

The white paper (http://www.scribd.com/doc/123883608/Lawfulness-of-a-Lethal-Operation-Directed-Against-a-U-S-Citizen-who-is-a-Senior-Operational-Leader-of-Al-Qa%E2%80%99ida-or-An-Associated-Force) is reprehensible and absurd in the arguments it makes, but have any of you caught the very last sentence of it?


It concludes only that the stated conditions would be sufficient to make lawful a lethal operation in a foreign country directed against a US citizen with the characteristics described above.

Everyone got that? Sufficient, but not necessary. The memo this white paper describes, thin as the requirements it imposes are, doesn't actually restrain the use of lethal force against US citizens in other circumstances. The above explicitly states there may be other, less stringent requirements -- right down to nothing at all -- that must necessarily be fulfilled to kill a citizen. Unbe-frickin'-lievable.

[Lucille]

And war is peace, freedom is slavery, and ignorance is strength.

The White House's Unsurprising Response to Leak of Drone Rules: "Legal, Ethical, Wise"
http://reason.com/blog/2013/02/05/the-white-houses-unsurprising-response-t

http://media.reason.com/mc/2013_02/dronetweet.png?h=82&w=466

Only Nixon could go to China, and only Obama could legalize the assassination of American citizens without due process (and so much more) because if Team Red did it, progs would be freaking out.

[Anti Federalist]

I hope you are all preparing. This isn't a game.

There is nothing more that needs to be said.

Most people could care less, but to those who do, there is no longer any question about it.

[Constitutional Paulicy]

I wonder if the government will use these on themselves for giving aid to Al Qaeda?

Now this I could get behind. ;)

[Stallheim]

http://www.mediafire.com/convkey/70d9/a97mbpoj0y9rt6h5g.jpg
What is this? a black swan? I like the image what is the significance?

[Stallheim]

And war is peace, freedom is slavery, and ignorance is strength.

The White House's Unsurprising Response to Leak of Drone Rules: "Legal, Ethical, Wise"
http://reason.com/blog/2013/02/05/the-white-houses-unsurprising-response-t

http://media.reason.com/mc/2013_02/dronetweet.png?h=82&w=466

Only Nixon could go to China, and only Obama could legalize the assassination of American citizens without due process (and so much more) because if Team Red did it, progs would be freaking out.
This is a very astute observation.

[QueenB4Liberty]

Its more orwellian than that. Fully translated Al Qaeda means 'the list' or the database.

So they reserve the right to kill anyone on the list without trial.

Awesome.

I guess it's time not to piss anyone off. You know the whole "if you see something, say something" thing. Someone could report you to the government because you flip them off and well, you're now on a kill list. That's great.

[bunklocoempire]

I hope you are all preparing. This isn't a game.

I relayed that to my own team of lawyers.

They concluded that 'clear evidence' of trampling my rights wasn't a game and that I should continue preparing as an imminent threat of a violent attack against me was certain as shown by history and human nature.

gggrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr:mad:

[Occam's Banana]

http://www.mediafire.com/convkey/70d9/a97mbpoj0y9rt6h5g.jpg


What is this? a black swan? I like the image what is the significance?

You're probably familiar with the "Bat signal" from Batman - it's a call for Batman's help.

Well, this is the "Swann signal" - it's a call for Ben Swann's help.

It amounts to saying, "Ben Swann, we need you! Please cover this story and break it down for people!"

[V3n]

What is this? a black swan? I like the image what is the significance?

I put up the Swann signal to see if we could summon Ben Swann to report on this! :)

edit: ditto the Banana! (he said it better!)

[Lucille]

http://memecrunch.com/meme/F18B/due-process/image.png

(Thanks to Cowlesy fo dat (http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?403367-What-did-I-just-watch)!)

Bad: Memo Details Obama's Weak Justification for Killing People. Worse: It's Not Even the Classified Version.
http://reason.com/blog/2013/02/06/bad-memo-details-obamas-weak-justificati


As if the memo detailing President Obama's weak framework for killing suspected terrorists (including American citizens) isn't troubling enough on its own, Adam Powell of USC's Center on Public Diplomacy points toward an even more horrifying reality: It's not even the full story.

Obama is still keeping his "threat matrix" or whatever you want to call his decisionmaking process for offing people a secret from Congress. The memo released by NBC News is what Obama grudgingly sent to nosy senators last year. It's an unclassified document and its lack of details made the Senate pissed off enough to demand actual details.
[...]
So Obama is not simply refusing to tell the general public how his team decides who gets killed and why. He's refusing to tell the U.S. Senate. All in the name of what, national security? This is deeply revolting spectacle, one that is acid to any and all principles not simply of the open government that Obama supposedly cherishes but to America's standing in the brotherhood of nations.

What is it that Marx said about history? That it repeats itself, "first as tragedy, and then as farce." For those who remember Bush administration justifications of "enhanced interrogation" methods and all the squirrely philosophizing by the likes of John Yoo and Alberto Gonzales to justify an anything-goes approach to the War on Terror, the second coming of an unrestrained executive branch doesn't present itself as farce. It's simply a doubling down on tragedy.

In assessing "Obama's dicey license to kill," Reuters' Jack Shafer argues that the unclassified memo could have been leaked either by people who want to sink John Brennan's nomination for CIA director or by friends seeking to give "drone-architect Brennan a little breathing room by blunting the demands for the classified documents." Whoever leaked it, the Senate will be doing a disservice not simply to the United States but to the world if it refuses to confront Brennan - and Obama - over their assertions that, as Shafer puts it, that "U.S. citizens can be whacked based on hunches, suspicions, belief and patchy fragments of intelligence by unnamed, high-level officials."

In a supposed age of hyper-partisan polarization, here's hoping that senators of both parties can put aside differences to put a stop to a government that is destroying its legitimacy through evasion and secrecy.

[Lucille]

Obama's Criteria for Killing People Are Optional
http://reason.com/blog/2013/02/06/here-are-the-circumstances-in-which-obam


On Monday I noted several alarming aspects of the process by which President Obama marks people for death, as outlined in a Justice Department white paper leaked this week. All of them boil down to this: To be comfortable with the Obama administration's program of "targeted killings," you have to be confident that the president and his underlings, without the benefit of judicial review, are conscientiously and inerrantly identifying people who deserve to die and who pose truly imminent terrorist threats that can only be addressed by dropping bombs on them. This morning Jesse Walker noted an additional problem: Even if the targets are appropriate, they are not the only ones killed by American missiles. In addition to the Yemeni cleric he mentions, who had taken a brave stance against Al Qaeda, the same New York Times story cites a 2009 attack in which "American cruise missiles carrying cluster munitions killed dozens of civilians, including many women and children." Counts by the Bureau of Investigative Journalism at City University in London indicate that drone strikes in Pakistan had killed somewhere between 474 and 881 civilians, including 176 children, as of last September.
[...]
A 2012 study by researchers at the Stanford and NYU law schools estimated that 2 percent of targets killed by drones in Pakistan could be described as "high-level." To be fair, the DOJ white paper makes it clear that the conditions it discusses—the target is 1) a senior, operational leader who 2) poses an imminent threat (which in practice is the same as the first condition) and 3) cannot be captured—are sufficient to justify the summary execution of an American citizen, which does not mean they are necessary, especially when it comes to foreign nationals. Attorney General Eric Holder likewise kept the president's options open in a March 2012 speech (emphasis added):


Let me be clear: An operation using lethal force in a foreign country, targeted against a U.S. citizen who is a senior operational leader of al Qaeda or associated forces, and who is actively engaged in planning to kill Americans, would be lawful at least in the following circumstances: First, the U.S. government has determined, after a thorough and careful review, that the individual poses an imminent threat of violent attack against the United States; second, capture is not feasible; and third, the operation would be conducted in a manner consistent with applicable law of war principles.

I am happy to let Holder be clear, but he seems intent on obfuscating a crucial point: While the president claims the authority to order someone's death when these conditions are met, he also claims that authority when these conditions are not met. The white paper itself broadens the meaning of "imminent threat" so that it is not really a distinct criterion, dropping even the requirement (which was never really a requirement) that a target be "actively engaged in planning to kill Americans." Both that document and a close reading of Holder's speech make it clear that the president's license to kill is broader than all the talk of careful review and qualifying criteria might lead one to believe.

National Review Writers: Even Republican Presidents Should Not Summarily Execute Suspected Terrorists
http://reason.com/blog/2013/02/06/national-review-writers-say-even-republi


At least two National Review writers have criticized President Obama's policy of summarily sentencing suspected terrorists to death by drone. Yesterday Charles C.W. Cooke tweeted: "In case my position isn't obvious: I am appalled by any president possessing the unilateral power to kill American citizens extrajudicially." This morning Jim Geraghty, after quoting Mother Jones writer Adam Serwer's criticism of Obama's license to kill, likewise conceded that such a policy would be cause for concern even if Mitt Romney had won the presidential election:


Of course, the hypocrisy of most liberals doesn’t get us off the hook on the need to have a coherent view on this. Okay, conservatives, big question now: If this were President Romney, would we be shrugging, concerned, complaining or screaming? I think “concerned.” At the very least, you would want another set of eyes – the House or Senate intelligence committees, or some independent judges – taking a look at the presidential “kill list,” right? At least for the American citizens?...

Senator Ron Wyden, Oregon Democrat, puts it rather bluntly: “Every American has the right to know when their government believes that it is allowed to kill them.”

That doesn’t seem like too much to ask.

No, it doesn't, and I have another big question for conservatives: If the party of the president doesn't matter, why does the nationality of the guy he marks for death? Don't people have a right to life even if they aren't U.S. citizens? Are you comfortable with letting the president kill anyone he deems an enemy of America, as long as that alleged threat had the misfortune to be born outside the United States?

[Lucille]

US Declares War on Us
http://lewrockwell.com/akers/akers201.html


That is, assuming you can read it. Not only does the Injustice Department write in its native Jargon, but its screed also suffers from run-on sentences, acronyms, citations, and the bureaucrat’s bewildering disregard for clarity and grammar. Then there are the factual errors and outright lies: to cite just one of innumerable examples, a sentence on page 5 asserts, "The Department assumes that the rights afforded by the Fifth Amendment’s Due Process Clause, as well as the Fourth Amendment, attach to a U.S. citizen even while he is abroad." But "the Department" clearly "assumes" no such thing since its entire memo pooh-poohs both amendments and all their protection.

Even more pernicious is "the Department’s" deliberate misreading of the Bill of Rights. That document never refers to "citizens" but purposefully to "people." Nor does it enumerate their rights: it cannot, because said rights are infinite in number. Rather, it constrains the State. To that end, it absolutely prohibits government from various crimes, including those "the Department" now encourages, regardless of "the people’s" whereabouts or nationality.

But worse than the impenetrable prose and the falsehoods is the memo’s wickedness. Utter, unmitigated, fathomless evil shrieks from every paragraph – so overwhelming and so nauseating that while the Injustice Department claims authorship, I contend that this commentary originated not in its halls, demonic as they are, but in Hell.

As such, it declares war on everyone everywhere, though it presumably exempts a handful of Feds – the ones who wrote this balderdash and those who will execute it, so to speak. After all, this "white paper" "concludes that the U.S. government can order the killing of American citizens if they are believed" – sans charge or trial – "to be ‘senior operational leaders’ of al-Qaida or ‘an associated force’ … " We’ve seen how messy such assassinations are: when the Fedcoats slaughtered a 16-year-old American citizen because of his father’s identity – yeah, I thought corruption of blood went out centuries ago, too – they butchered eight other folks as well.

Combine Our Rulers’ errant aim with their elastic definition of "terrorist." One of George "War Criminal" Bush’s lickspittles memorably insisted that the word could encompass "little old lad[ies] in Switzerland." Not to be outdone, the Department of Homeland Destabilization-sorry, Security included America’s veterans, anti-abortionists, Ron Paul’s voters – in short, everyone. It seems, then, that we taxpayers are all terrorists. That makes each of us ripe for a federal rubbing out.

Add to these sobering facts Our Rulers’ barbarity, which has already rendered us personae non gratae overseas. Now that a drone could strike us anywhere, at any time, taking out all those unfortunates nearby… hmmm. "International pariah" doesn’t quite convey the desperation of our plight, does it? What country in its right mind will accept American refugees as more and more try to flee Our Rulers’ escalating war on us?

"Oh, it’s not that dire," you scoff. "The memo limits federal hit men to snuffing ’"senior operational leaders" of al-Qaida or "an associated force."’ And I’m just a plain old taxpayer-terrorist." Ah, but expanding the target to taxpayer-terrorists will be child’s play for tyrants who wrung from the Fourth Amendment’s adamant prohibition of "unreasonable search and seizure" authorization for the TSA’s gate-rape.

On the other hand, we might also construe the memo as a suicide pact from dictators so overcome with guilt they want to die.

You’ll recall that Our Rulers have long excoriated anyone who "provid[es] material support to terrorists" – or those they allege to so be. And then, what-ho, "[Wicked Witch of the West and Secretary of State Hillary] Clinton Admits US On Same Side As Al Qaeda To Destabilise Assad Government." Now, if fighting on the same side isn’t "providing material support or resources to designated foreign terrorist organizations" – and not just any old terrorists, either, but America’s arch-enemy, Al Qaeda – I don’t know what is.

Recall as well that Al Qaeda owes its very creation to American busybodies and bureaucrats. Again, I’d say that’s pretty material support.

Yet in their own memo, Our Rulers decree death for "senior operational leaders" of "an associated force." And what is more closely "associated" with Al Qaeda than the sociopaths who spent $3 billion of our money birthing it and currently battle beside it?

After annihilating liberty, the economy, millions of lives worldwide, and basic decency, perhaps Our Rulers have finally plumbed depths so satanic even they can’t stand themselves. Maybe they’re pleading for someone to end their miserable existences with a drone.

Alas, I fear we’re insanely optimistic. These unconscionable monsters will continue marching their megalomaniacal, murderous path until the rest of the world finally tires of them, as it did of Hitler. With their risible but deadly War on Terror, their international skullduggery and manipulation, their cruelty, corruption and now, the signing of our death warrants en masse, the Feds are as much a rogue regime as the Nazis ever were. And they are conjuring the perfect storm: stripping us of our guns while codifying "indefinite military detention" and their "right" to murder anyone anywhere.

Let us pray über Alles rise against this Axis of evil.

[shane77m]

http://youtu.be/QV6ITkhbB8E

[Occam's Banana]

You're probably familiar with the "Bat signal" from Batman - it's a call for Batman's help.

Well, this is the "Swann signal" - it's a call for Ben Swann's help.

It amounts to saying, "Ben Swann, we need you! Please cover this story and break it down for people!"

Ben Swann is on the story: Reality Check: President Obama's rules for assassinating U.S. citizens? (http://www.fox19.com/story/21018007/reality-check-president-obamas-rules-for-assassinating-us-citizens)

[V3n]

Ben Swann is on the story: Reality Check: President Obama's rules for assassinating U.S. citizens? (http://www.fox19.com/story/21018007/reality-check-president-obamas-rules-for-assassinating-us-citizens)


IT REALLY WORKS!!!

edit: (watched video) THANK YOU BEN! Great reporting!!

[Stallheim]

You're probably familiar with the "Bat signal" from Batman - it's a call for Batman's help.

Well, this is the "Swann signal" - it's a call for Ben Swann's help.

It amounts to saying, "Ben Swann, we need you! Please cover this story and break it down for people!"

Oh that is super cool! I am glad I asked.

[presence]

#standwithrand