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So Anwar al-Awlaki, who was linked with the attempted hijacking of an American plane in 2007, and whose lectures were attented by Nidal Malik asan as well as three of the 9/11 bombers has been killed in a supposedly American air strike.
Full story: Yemeni forces 'kill' cleric Anwar al-AwlakiQuote:
Originally Posted by Al Jazeera
Amusingly it's actually being reported as a Yemeni air-strike... lol
Darn, who is gonna pay the pirates?
A US citizen killed by his country without judicial process. Lovely.
What the hell is going on, lately?
Correction - Two US citizens killed by their government without due process. Since we are talking rampant executive power, maybe we should just merge this in with the police abuses thread.
Well, if he was killed by Yemeni forces, he was sentenced to death in absentia a while ago.
The reports are that they were killed by a CIA drone.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/...O9K_story.html
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Originally Posted by WaPo
Does this mean Lemur won't be able to share any more issues of Inspire with us? :grin:Quote:
Originally Posted by drone
I first heard the news on radio the other morning (or maybe it was this morning? I don't remember) and I thought the same thing. It doesn't seem right to me for the US government to strike one of it's own citizens, even if he/she is a terrorist.Quote:
Originally Posted by drone
So only US citizens should get judicial process?
Seems a case of what's fair for the goose is fair for the gander. Nomone can really call hypocrisy on this one.
Double standards aside, we are talking about the assassination of US citizens by executive order. They have not been declared guilty in a court of law, they are not in a war zone, they are not a direct threat to US military personnel, and they are being targeted by the CIA. This is more than the killing of some terrorists in some made up "war". This is the dismantling of the 5th amendment. Well, continued dismantling, I keep forgetting about Kelo...
Constitution doesn't just apply to US citizens.
So what if a US citizen died in a hostage situation being the hostage taker? Clearly he did not have his due process. The fact that he was killed while committing a crime means that he violated his standing as a citizen and then the option is to minimise risk to innocent civilians. If you can end a situation where you take out a criminal and leave less innocent people dead, then you take that opportunity. Clearly these people committed crimes against America and as such they are legitimate targets for action, since they are in a foreign country and planning attacks on America, so that means they need to be taken out with the least chance of losing innocent lives. That is the prerogative of any nation.
Innocent until proven guilty?
Due process?
What is the USAs legal standing now if a foreign power assassinates one of the USAs citizens who has been accused of being a terrorist?
What does it matter if he was a US citizen he was just born there, bye
the US government should have just gone full troll mode and claimed he was killed by a falling piece of that satellite the other day.
plausible deniability my friend!
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Originally Posted by hero di classico
Lol, thank you. The other people in the thread were making me go :dizzy2:
What happened to innocent until proven guilty? He was proven guilty! :laugh4:
How so? What were his crimes? The judicial branch never heard the case. He has been on a kill list created by the executive branch for over a year, meaning he could be targeted even if no US interest was in immediate danger. He was killed because it was easy, not because it was necessary.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sasaki Kojiro
As was I.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fragony
By attacking his own country. That is considered treason and under the rule of that is liable for the death penalty.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sasaki Kojiro
I do wonder how you are going to capture the guy and get him to trial. Are you going to send in troops to try and arrest him? How certain are you going to be that will succeed in his arrest? What happens if in the attempted arrest he dies and so do plenty of others, now that means more people have died as a result. What happens if he is tipped off about a potential arrest and by escaping he is allowed to plan more attacks, thus more people are killed? That means you are allowing for the possibility of more deaths under the scenarios of trying to capture the guy. Since he is trying to commit crimes against the Nation, that makes him a target and the one that lead to the least amount of lives lost is the most purdent one. Since no one can show a better option, the one taken is the right option.
Ah, so people can get convicted of treason without a trial? How convenient.
Indeed, it seems the Obama administration has decided it can kill anyone it wants anywhere in the world if it decides they've been part of a terrorist organization.
They've presented no evidence, claiming it's "state secrets". Heck, why do we need juries any more? Just let the sheriff decide who's guilty and go kill them.
CR
That would have actually been quite funny. You should sell the idea to Colbert or Stewart.Quote:
Originally Posted by Ronin
As to everyone else (I'm sure I'm going to get flamed): cry me a river. Glad hes dead.
I don't understand the mentality of only caring about the result and not the method.
What don't you like about the method? Airstrike seems pretty sensible? :mellow:Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
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Originally Posted by drone
Have they decided that? Who else have they killed? I seem to remember someone else they killed without trial...Quote:
Originally Posted by Crazed Rabbit
You know what I am saying, Sasaki. Don't be silly. :)Quote:
Originally Posted by Sasaki Kojiro
Only caring about the result and not the method of how the government did it, is the best way to turn the government into a terrorist organization in itself.
I talked about this in the Osama bin Laden thread. Everyone was soooo excited about how we finally caught the guy and killed him. But as I said in the thread, at what cost? We got warrantless wiretapping, fear mongering, two wars, the rest of the PATRIOT Act etc... But hey, as long as we killed the bad guy, the government did its job and we should be happy right?
I don't mind my local police throwing a mugger in jail for a year without any trial because the he was a bad person and was trying to harm Americans. As long as the bad guy is caught, it doesn't matter how the government operates or what boundaries it breaks, its job is to protect us and since I will never, never break a law I don't have to worry about disappearing for a long time without a moments notice.
But that's not there case. There are ends and there are means. Here is merely a matter of certain means being acceptable to some and reprehensible to others. You all can go ahead and work out which means should and which means shouldn't be in the policymaker's toolkit based upon your arbitrary standards and morals. http://www.freesmileys.org/smileys/smiley-sad050.gifQuote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
My understanding is that the president ordered for him to be killed, and so he was killed. This isn't really a good precedent to establish even if the man was a genuine terrorist.Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
Arbitrary standards and morals = If we all said rape was ok, it would now be ok. lol
It's not a particularly new precedent. In fact, Obama was following a precedent established years ago.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
If you all believed rape were acceptable, it would be acceptable to you.
Do you dislike the word arbitary? Fair enough. Arbitrariness is, of course, subjective. You believe as you do for many reasons, some of them biological and sociological.
This perspective offers you no solutions. It gives you no pleasure, and so it wearies you to read it. Perhaps you are even angered.
Do you get it?
Its newish. <10 years old. Point is that it shouldn't be something to be tolerated.Quote:
Originally Posted by PanzerJaeger
Not what I said. If we all said it was ok to rape, does that make the make the act of rape in and of itself ok? Do you think it is perfectly fine to say that rape is bad in the US because we say it is bad, but it is ok in some tribal land where they think differently?Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
I believe what I believe because they are (or at least I try to have them be) logical conclusions stemming from undeniable axioms. Of course, you would probably deny them, but I doubt you would have a solid reason to refute them.Quote:
Do you dislike the word arbitary? Fair enough. Arbitrariness is, of course, subjective. You believe as you do for many reasons, some of them biological and sociological.
Not angered, not weary. Linear algebra wearies me when I have to do 5x5 matrixes all night long. This perspective intrigues me because it seems self defeating. If we all believed x was acceptable than it would be acceptable to us. So if we all believe that our standards and morals were not arbitrary, then our standards and morals are not arbitrary.Quote:
This perspective offers you no solutions. It gives you no pleasure, and so it wearies you to read it. Perhaps you are even angered.
Kinda, sorta, not really. Not a philosophy major so of course I am completely vulnerable for someone with actual knowledge to wipe the floor with me.Quote:
Do you get it?
Why is it either bad or good in and of itself? How do we know? Why should we care?Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
Undeniable? How so? "Logical" and "undeniable" are excuses.Quote:
I believe what I believe because they are (or at least I try to have them be) logical conclusions stemming from undeniable axioms. Of course, you would probably deny them, but I doubt you would have a solid reason to refute them.
They would not be arbitrary - to us. Correct. What I said was tautological: if you believe something, you believe it.Quote:
Not angered, not weary. Linear algebra wearies me when I have to do 5x5 matrixes all night long. This perspective intrigues me because it seems self defeating. If we all believed x was acceptable than it would be acceptable to us. So if we all believe that our standards and morals were not arbitrary, then our standards and morals are not arbitrary.
I also said that arbitrariness is subjective - like your moral axioms.
Supposedly the Justice Dept issued a confidential ruling on this guy, stating that he was fair game. Not the same as a trial, but at least this was done within some sort of legal framework.
If we're going to get upset about the treatment of American citizens in the GWOT, I'd much rather get worked up about Jose Padilla, who appears to have been tortured until he went utterly insane. Sigh.
-edit-
Ah, here it is:
The Justice Department wrote a secret memorandum authorizing the lethal targeting of Anwar al-Aulaqi, the American-born radical cleric who was killed by a U.S. drone strike Friday, according to administration officials.
The document was produced following a review of the legal issues raised by striking a U.S. citizen and involved senior lawyers from across the administration. There was no dissent about the legality of killing Aulaqi, the officials said. [...]
A Justice Department spokeswoman declined to comment. The administration officials refused to disclose the exact legal analysis used to authorize targeting Aulaqi, or how they considered any Fifth Amendment right to due process.
So everyone agrees that this is ok. Just dont squeal like pickets when Russia next radiates someone or China nominates an ethnic minority leader as a terrorist. And do not cry about backpackers in Iran.
Don't complain in a generation when India and China knock off disidents internal and external.
At the top of your game you changed the rules for the worse. Perfect for the next superpower to play on.
If you don't cry when somebody cuts of your head. Civil law isn't meant for a war. He chosed his pathQuote:
Originally Posted by Papewaio
Ahhh, I love the landscape where this is heading.Quote:
Originally Posted by Montmorency
The human biology is on average probably well approximated by a constant. Human biology appears to have built-in concepts of innocence and justice, and so basing moral on moral feelings (and a bit of logic), we can deduce it objectively to be wrong when the victim is innocent. The subjective part is here the definition of moral. However, the definition used here is not abitrary, regardless of subjectivity. Arbitrary morals would let being e.g. the current weather decide whether the act you are currently thinking of is either moral or immoral.
As for rape as a bad thing in itself, that's a more complicated topic. In an eye for an eye-moral, rapists could get raped as punishment, just as murderers could get murdered (executed).
So someone who helped to organise a few terrorist attacks, or attempted attacks in not fair game?Quote:
Originally Posted by Papewaio
There is a big difference between someone who has committed a crime against other people and what you are describing. If he had his way, he would also attack you, since you are an infidel.
I DO NOT believe this is ok. America has unequivocally failed.Quote:
Originally Posted by Papewaio
Why is that, the backward blitzbeard is sucking goat:daisy: in hell, now the rest of them. Good show, one lessQuote:
Originally Posted by Samurai Waki
This is not how justice is supposed to be served. It is an absolute perversion of the laws that we have held ourselves too.
I didn´t squeal about any of those things...the media did...but they have to fill up tv shows and newspapers somehow I guess....but they are internal matters of each country that make no practical difference to me.Quote:
Originally Posted by Papewaio
as for the backpackers thing...that one is a joke....they were backpacking? really? in the Iran-Iraq border? when a cover story is made up it should be minimally reasonable.
exactly...the law is a polite logical construction for polite everyday situations in a society....there are circumstances when politeness goes out the window.Quote:
Originally Posted by Fragony
Oh. Just because he didn't roll of a Yemeni mountain doesn't mean he isn't your enemy. Why care where he hurt his head when his mother pooped him outQuote:
Originally Posted by Samurai Waki
Why not? There's a guy in our Persian class that plans to go walking in Iran as well.Quote:
as for the backpackers thing...that one is a joke....they were backpacking? really? in the Iran-Iraq border? when a cover story is made up it should be minimally reasonable.
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Oh. Just because he didn't roll of a Yemeni mountain doesn't mean he isn't your enemy. Why care where he hurt his head when his mother pooped him out
Ladies and gentlemen, western civilisation. Yes, 200+ years of humanistic philosophy have led to the fact that people on the internet can still go back to deterministic nonsense like this.
Isn't like he was very secretlive about it. You really don't have to protect them all Hax, you are confused with PokemonQuote:
Originally Posted by Hax
The question is whether or not he himself posed any direct threat to the lives of others. If he did that, then there is the question of feasibility for the various options when it comes to stopping him. If physical detention is either 'impossible' (e.g. on a necessary time scale), an unacceptable risk to the servicemen that would apprehend him, or simply an enormous drain of resources, then taking him out in a drone strike is no different from shooting a hostage taker making a run for it with his hostage.
I might have to redact my statement and take into account that serious mental illness is more prevalent that I thought it seems.Quote:
Originally Posted by Hax
Would you describe this guy as a "dissident"? Did we "nominate" him as a terrorist? :dizzy2:Quote:
Originally Posted by Papewaio
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Isn't like he was very secretlive about it. You really don't have to protect them all Hax, you are confused with Pokemon
We don't convict, let alone execute, people without a trial. Make of that what you will.
Got a better idea? Would kinda have to kidnap him to bring him on trial. And proffesional activists would be just as outraged over kidnapping himQuote:
Originally Posted by Hax
The Justice Department is the executive branch. The same guys who brought us enhanced interrogation techniques. This is essentially the prosecutors determining guilt and passing sentence.Quote:
Originally Posted by Lemur
Yah, I know this is not exactly great, but like I said, at least it was done inside some sort of legal framework. One which Congress should probably examine, and won't.Quote:
Originally Posted by drone
Justice Department doesn't really work inside legal frameworks. They just take words and redefined them to allow for any policy. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_YooQuote:
Originally Posted by Lemur
We know that there are organised groups of armed men out in the world, planning terrorist attacks on other countries: notably the US, but also any "Western" or even vaguely "allied" state; unquestionably including my own (the UK). In essentials, I don't see such men as different from soldiers the US (the UK or whoever is their declared target) is at war with. I don't see a legal requirement to prove their status beyond reasonable doubt. I don't see a moral imperative to apprehend rather than kill them, if - as seems inevitable - trying to apprehend them would put the armed forces at greater danger. In moral terms, I see this as straightforward national defence in an on-going armed conflict.
If there is a serious case that Anwar al-Awlaki was not part of an organised group of armed men planning terrorist attacks, then I could start to share the condemnation in this thread. But I am not seeing that, here or elsewhere.
Maybe I am missing some subtlety, but when men start launching rockets or your own civilian airline planes at you, you are entitled to fire back.
Damn, I think I just signed up to the War on Terror. :wall:
Spoken like someone that doesn't know Iran at all.Quote:
I might have to redact my statement and take into account that serious mental illness is more prevalent that I thought it seems.
Sure, walking along the border may just be a bit silly, but if you know the language and you steer well-clear off the borders, there ain't that much that can go wrong.
Maybe I'm missing something but from the artical this guy was openly pro-al-Qaeda who was at the time running around an al-qaeda camp, seems pretty obvious that he was on the enemy's side, and in the middle of an open war, so what's the problem here?
This is true, if you don't ruffle any feathers you are perfectly safe there as a foreigner. Friends of mine went last year, and they had no problems whatsoever, nice picsQuote:
Originally Posted by Hax
The law just hasn't caught up with the reality of war these days. It was designed for a time when conflict was primarily between sovereign states and doesn't take account for the nature of modern trans-national terrorist groups.
Killings such as this don't make me uncomfortable. It is sad that he died but I don't fear some sort of tyranny coming from it. The UK government took similar actions against members of Republican and Loyalist paramilitaries back in the day. We have yet to become a police state, in fact the 'liberties' the government took in that conflict never spilled over into areas of the law and country not affected by it, and things went back to normal after the ceasefires.
A blogger makes some good points:
What should the evidentiary standard be for determining an American citizen poses a threat even warranting discussion of assassination?
I'm not a lawyer. Not. A. Lawyer. So forgive me if there's a legal step that I'm missing.
But this is the question, the one that has to kick in before any of Ben's process — or anyone else's — gets applied. We know that Anwar al-Awlaki (and Samir Khan) are noxious propagandists who are obviously guilty of incitement to murder. We know this because of their public writings and videos. Is that enough to warrant assassination?
I refuse to accept the word of any member of the Obama administration that they are worse than that. When any member of the administration shows me evidence that they are, then I will consider that they are. But the stakes of killing an American citizen on the say-so of the government are, in my non-lawyer opinion, too grave to accept the mere assurance of a government official. To believe otherwise, in my non-lawyer opinion, is to be cavalier about both life and liberty.
Something must guard against President Whomever saying, "Oh, yeah, that guy's a dangerous terrorist. Order me up a double-tap." There must be evidence presented for that proposition. And then there must be a consideration of what the standards are for how great a threat a U.S. citizen represents. Then and only then can someone responsibly enter into a process like Ben's. I see nothing in Ben's process to guard against the whims of President Whomever; and that's the ballgame right there.
It seems completely absurd to me to act as if constitutional principles like that only apply to Americans. Why are some people only making a fuss now that it was a US citizen? That's not in the spirit of the constitution at all. Why does he think the constitution means that AA has more rights than someone else whose only difference is that he isn't technically an American citizen?? :dizzy2: That's only true in a legal sense.Quote:
My friend who goes under the Twitter pseudonym @RBStalin asked if a North Waziristan resident (and Pakistani citizen) has the right not to be Predator'd. All I know is that if the Constitution means anything, it means that Anwar Awlaki has more rights than that guy. You can kill Usama bin Laden all day long and I will never, ever have a problem with it. (I might even pay to see it happen, were it possible -- that is how deep my hatred for bin Laden runs.) But an American citizen must possess protections from government killing that a non-citizen lacks.
Does he really not believe there are moral principles above what the law actually says?
But what did he actually do to deserve a death sentence from the executive branch? There is no open war, not in Yemen. To the best of my knowledge, the worst thing he might have done was to talk some poor Nigerian dude into setting his balls on fire while traveling one-way to Detroit.Quote:
Originally Posted by Greyblades
The real question is clearly not about the assassination of American citizens on the orders of the executive. That has happened, or at least has been ordered to happen before (the soldiers who defected during the Korea war, IIRC). The question is can you live with the damage, the scope creep of the executive, that was implemented during Bush and is still going strong under Obama?
And if not how do you fix it? Who can fix it? The conservatives appointed by Bush to sway the courts towards silent assent with PATRIOT? The myopic crowd focused on birth certificates? Surely not ambitious politicians in Congress?
So he might have been responsible for another civilian plane hurtling its passengers to their deaths? And that's not enough for you? I concede, the "might have" is important. But for the sake of argument, if he had, as the US claim, a "direct operational role" in planning the attack, then imo, he's as fair game for a drone strike as any operational commander of an enemy airforce in a time of war.Quote:
Originally Posted by drone
Well, terrorists are not usually known for waging "open war" but regardless, the situation in Yemen recently has verred close to that. Over a hundred people died in the most recently reported week of fighting. The President was badly wounded (40% burns) in a bombing in June at a time when two armored divisions of his army had turned against him. There have been attempts to broker a ceasefire, but my reading is that parts of Yemen currently make Afghanistan and the tribal areas of Pakistan appear under firm government control. I am not saying the conflict in Yemen is led by Al Qaeda, but they are active there. If I were to criticise the killing, it would be on pragmatic grounds of not forcing his tribe and the insurgents into bed with extreme Islamicists. But I don't have a problem with it on ethical grounds.Quote:
There is no open war, not in Yemen.
Problem is that if you agree to have the government kill off everyone who is a "bad guy" with no accountability, you start running into some problems.Quote:
Originally Posted by Greyblades
If he had a direct operational role in the Christmas Day attempt, all the more reason to keep him alive. Incompetence at high levels of your enemy should be nurtured, not eliminated. :yes: From what I've seen, he was a recruiting personality, nothing more.Quote:
Originally Posted by econ21
ACIN sums up my argument. Where does it stop? I don't trust the executive branch to make the right decision, there have been too many examples during this "war" on terror where they have screwed up. We have a "war" on drugs, might come in handy there! The ability to be judge/jury/executioner over US citizens is a power I do not want them to have.
Al-Awlaki was a religious figure first, then a recruiter and then he might have something to do with operational planning, afaik.
But what about if you have the government, with less stringent accountability than usual due to the circumstances, sometimes kill actual bad guys (no "quotation" marks)? What problems do you run into then?Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
What are the differences between al-Awlaki and a Confederate?
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Originally Posted by Sasaki Kojiro
The government could have a 100% success rate in killing only terrorists, but the problem is something higher than logistics. It's about how we think about ourselves, and our relationship with our government. If we choose to demean the soul of the Constitution for the sake of practicality for all situations, then the concepts, ideas and words that make up "Americana" get more distorted and weakened. A culture that is ready to change itself down to its basic principles every time there is an external threat, doesn't make for a strong culture. I think that by catering to every problem by changing ourselves we weaken us and the US as a whole more than if we were to simply implement a procedure that may or may not be long in order for the president to assassinate people.
I guess to make my point clear, I will take your words from before and twist it a bit.
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Originally Posted by Sasaki Kojiro
Vexing.
Legal fictions -- that this is a yemeni attack for example -- have been a hallmark of law for years. Thus, since this was a Yemeni attack, there are no Constitutional questions raised at all.
So much for the strict letter of the law.
In terms of the spirit of the law, this particular dirtbag had never been convicted of treason in open court -- that's straight out of section three, and had never been tried by any court on terrorism charges or the like.
In short, a U.S. citizen was murdered by U.S. citizens acting at the ostensible orders of the Yemeni government to eliminate a target considered dangerous but who was not actively engaged in anything criminal.
Actually, the whole thing is a crap sandwich catch 22.
I don't understand why people think the way we follow the Constitution should change because of these "new"/"21st century" terrorist individuals that are not located on any battle field. This kind of warfare has never been anything new.
It's as if the Founding Fathers had never heard of Guy Fawkes, the man who almost blew up Parliament just a little under two centuries before they got to writing. Terrorism is older than the Constitution.
Where's the change? Apart from not being isolationist.Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
Anyway, principles is what it's about. It's a moral principle that we should get after these people--not pragmatism. Following basic legal principles is what you are advocating here, not moral ones (well, you think the moral lines up with the legal in this case).
It is not at all being isolationist for simply wanting a procedure before an assassination. The change as I have said is in what we expect from government and how we expect it. Do we follow the ideal of checks and balances between government authorities or are we going to toss aside that idea for the sake of having safer lives? A benevolent dictator with the strength and power of the US, can keep us very, very safe. Do we want to push down that road though and leave the Constitution behind? Government and society are symbiotic in my opinion. By accepting a change in how government operates, the culture and people change as well. Even if it is to a small degree.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sasaki Kojiro
It is a moral principle to uphold the ideals of the Constitution since they are the ideals that Americans subscribe to. If those principles clash with the principles of keeping us safe by going after the terrorists, the latter not the former are overruled. It is not up to the government to change the way it operates under such pretenses. The change should only come from when America as a whole has decided to rid itself of some of those ideals in order for the government to operate as it has done. But America has not done that. The responsibility of safety does not allow government a justification for radically changing itself without the support of the citizens.Quote:
Anyway, principles is what it's about. It's a moral principle that we should get after these people--not pragmatism. Following basic legal principles is what you are advocating here, not moral ones (well, you think the moral lines up with the legal in this case).
No, I don't see how you connect the dots here. If we do a few more of these over the next few years, and then the US gov't kills someone without trial who doesn't deserve it, that won't be accepted. Why would it be?Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
The only thing at stake here is how we treat people like this guy, and how we deal with the terrorism issue. There's no significant link back to anything else from this. Possibly the acceptance of this will lead to some foreign policy/what have you mistakes. But that's a different argument.
That's a bad principle. Instead we should uphold the principles that the Constitution tries to approximate with laws. And the fact that Americans subscribe to them certainly doesn't make it a moral principle.Quote:
It is a moral principle to uphold the ideals of the Constitution since they are the ideals that Americans subscribe to.
America as a whole couldn't decide it's way out a paper bag. That's why we're a republic, not a democracy...Quote:
If those principles clash with the principles of keeping us safe by going after the terrorists, the latter not the former are overruled. It is not up to the government to change the way it operates under such pretenses. The change should only come from when America as a whole has decided to rid itself of some of those ideals in order for the government to operate as it has done. But America has not done that. The responsibility of safety does not allow government a justification for radically changing itself without the support of the citizens.
Except it would be accepted, because it would be "collateral damage" just like every soldier's death in the War on Terror by now. By accepting the procedure all that will happen down the like when this becomes normalized is that people will ask the President to "double check his facts" next time and continue to go about their day sad that an innocent died, but accepting of the situation of "the world we live in" or some other horse**** that I hear people say all the time when deaths are reported.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sasaki Kojiro
Disagree. Acceptance of the ability for one man to be judge, jury and executioner over anybody, citizen or not, makes a big significant link to the ideas that the Constitution was based upon.Quote:
The only thing at stake here is how we treat people like this guy, and how we deal with the terrorism issue. There's no significant link back to anything else from this. Possibly the acceptance of this will lead to some foreign policy/what have you mistakes. But that's a different argument.
What is the difference? Constitution tries to approximate the principle of checks and balances and yet, one man deciding to take a life whenever he feels prudent doesn't run contrary to this?Quote:
That's a bad principle. Instead we should uphold the principles that the Constitution tries to approximate with laws. And the fact that Americans subscribe to them certainly doesn't make it a moral principle.
And yes, my reasoning does make it a moral principle. It is our government, the government works for us. It does not decide what values we place on certain ideas or principles. We do.
This seems like a non sequitor. because I know you can't be saying, "People are too opinionated and stubborn. So just let the guys in charge handle everything and decide what is best all the time."Quote:
America as a whole couldn't decide it's way out a paper bag. That's why we're a republic, not a democracy...
People are divided on THIS guy. You think they'll accept it if someone innocent is killed?Quote:
Originally Posted by a completely inoffensive name
We tried to assassinate Bin Laden without trial too. If we'd succeeded, what would you have said?
"and he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States,"Quote:
Disagree. Acceptance of the ability for one man to be judge, jury and executioner over anybody, citizen or not, makes a big significant link to the ideas that the Constitution was based upon.
There's the judge and jury part...but intentional misreadings aside, the Constitution is written so that the president has the ability to act. It's the point of the executive branch. He can send men into battle. There's a long history for that.
Err, it has a system of checks and balances. But the principle behind that system is to create a government that can function but has restraints on it. Limiting a function is something that has to be answered for. Restraints are not inherently better.Quote:
What is the difference? Constitution tries to approximate the principle of checks and balances and yet, one man deciding to take a life whenever he feels prudent doesn't run contrary to this?
Quote:
And yes, my reasoning does make it a moral principle. It is our government, the government works for us. It does not decide what values we place on certain ideas or principles. We do.
It's not important what values we place on things. What matters is what's actually valuable. The south may not have valued equality, but...
No more than you're saying "the government shouldn't decide everything, they should do a poll everytime" :dizzy2:Quote:
This seems like a non sequitor. because I know you can't be saying, "People are too opinionated and stubborn. So just let the guys in charge handle everything and decide what is best all the time."
Like I said, how many people in Afghanistan and Iraq have been killed, and how many soldiers. They are all "collateral damage", to be lamented but not dwelled upon because there is a "bigger problem" at stake. When innocent US citizens start getting killed, how do you know that they won't be "collateral damage" either? I could argue that we already treat our neighbors as such in the war on drugs. US prison population is enormous, but at least we are keeping the kids safe from the pot, all those posts that CR makes in the police abuse thread are unfortunate but accepted.Quote:
Originally Posted by Sasaki Kojiro
Same thing I said here, same thing I said in the OBL thread. Is the bloodshed of those we hate worth the downside of the process we now subject ourselves to?Quote:
We tried to assassinate Bin Laden without trial too. If we'd succeeded, what would you have said?
He has the ability to grant reprieves and pardons for Offenses as determined by the judicial branch. Are you telling me that as long as we perceive threats, the president has full reign to do as he pleases? Why bother have a judicial branch if the president is the judge and jury? No, I'm sorry Sasaki, I'm just not getting it this time around.Quote:
"and he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States,"
There's the judge and jury part...but intentional misreadings aside, the Constitution is written so that the president has the ability to act. It's the point of the executive branch. He can send men into battle. There's a long history for that.
And why wouldn't the government function by simply having some sort of procedure for the president to satisfy before sending the assassins? I disagree on what needs to be answered for. Removing restrictions is what needs to be answered for. We do not start with unlimited power granted and work our way down. We start with no power and then we grant more and more power for the government to use accordingly based on proper reasoning, justification, and common sense towards political blowback domestically and internationally.Quote:
Err, it has a system of checks and balances. But the principle behind that system is to create a government that can function but has restraints on it. Limiting a function is something that has to be answered for. Restraints are not inherently better.
I see your point. But ultimately how valuable is safety, and why should we let safety triumph over an emphasis on due process? For more or less, the values the people subscribe to, in regards to what they take from the Founding Fathers are good, valuable ideas. Not great, certainly not perfect, but for the most part, roughly on target. Bad values like slavery under the pretense of "states rights" have been slowly removed in part of because of a greater adherence to the more valuable ideals, all men created equal, and whatnot. I really don't think this is that kind of situation here however.Quote:
It's not important what values we place on things. What matters is what's actually valuable. The south may not have valued equality, but...
Well of course not. No where would I say that the public needs to vouch for every action, but this is about the life and death of individuals, guilty or not. This is not something to completely bow out of.Quote:
No more than you're saying "the government shouldn't decide everything, they should do a poll everytime" :dizzy2:
For my part, I think a man who recruits ten terrorists is more dangeorous than the actual terrorist. Ten times more, in fact. Of course, if is just an imam or scholar, writing vile things in splendid isolation, then dropping a missile on his head may be an over-reaction. Arresting and prosecuting him may be more appropriate, although non-trivial when dealing with a fugitive in a war zone. But from what I've seen, his connection with the terrorist networks was more intimate and hands-on. It's not just the Nigerian he had close personal contact with - there's quite a list of such associations, if wikipedia or your government is anything to go by. The latest report was that the missile that killed al-Awlaki failed to kill an AQ bombmaker also targeted in the same party. It looks to me that he was not merely inciting mass murder, he was conspiring to commit it.Quote:
Originally Posted by drone
The involvement of the executive in this did initially suprise me - what is the President, a career politician with re-election in view, doing deciding the life and death of an individual? In the war analogy, which I still think valid, it would be an operational decision, not a political one. But then thinking about it, I find it oddly reassuring. The US takes the issue so seriously, it's passing it right up the chain of the command. No one below wants to take responsibility. It's when your black ops people starting killing people without any openness or reference to the politicians that you really ought to worry.Quote:
ACIN sums up my argument. Where does it stop? I don't trust the executive branch to make the right decision, there have been too many examples during this "war" on terror where they have screwed up. We have a "war" on drugs, might come in handy there! The ability to be judge/jury/executioner over US citizens is a power I do not want them to have.
Where does it stop? The facetious answer is that it stops when armed groups stop planning to down your civilian airplanes. This is a fairly new thing (as in, post 9/11) for the US and most countries. We've had hijackings before, but the terrorists typically wanted to use the passengers as bargaining chips - that's what the 9/11 instigators were counting on, to keep their victims acquiescent. Past terrorist actions - say the IRA against my country - have been quite limited in scale by comparison. A bomb in a market is probably the grievest blow they struck. The IRA killed maybe 2000 people over 20 years; less than Al Qaeda killed in a day. I think it is quite a proportional response - restrained even - to use a drone to take out what appears to be a key AQ figure.
That's why I don't buy the analogies with the "war on drugs" or the Kremlin using radiation poisoning to kill off an irritating dissident in London. Defending yourself against mass murder is nothing like trying to reduce the use of illicit drugs or criticism of your regime.
For a country like the US, there is a real prospect this terrorist prospect will wilt and diminish, so that we go back to the scale of threat we saw prior to 9/11. For other countries like Israel, the terrorist threat looks more intractable and on ethical grounds I can't condemn them for fighting back against the people firing rockets at them. How to best to get people to stop firing rockets or your own planes against you - the pragmatic side of the argument - is an important one I would not claim to know how to answer with any certainty. Does assassinating terrorist leaders help or hinder your security? I don't know, but it's hard to see a priori that it is always a hindrance.
The less facetious answer is that such actions stop if the intelligence does not support them. You need to be fairly confident you are assassinating the right person. Some civilian oversight of the intelligence services and their operational decisions is probably admirable, although inevitably the details will have to be somewhat opaque to the public - you can't publicly reveal all your intelligence when fighting a covert enemy.
As a Brit - a country with no written constitution - your special concerns for US citizens and your constitution are not my own. If Al-Awlaki were a Brit planning to knock my airplanes out of the sky or a Yemeni, it would make not the slightest difference to me. The imperative is to protect your people against terrorist atrocities; the passport and legal rights of a person who has openly declared jihad on you is not the overriding concern. And what some politicos wrote more than 200 years ago does not exercise me greatly. My ancestors fought yours with a lot more restraint way back then.
Ok can we scale back here? I cant help but see a brit verses america "who was in the right during the revoloution" fight derailing the thread in the near future, and as amusing as it might become I dont think the thread will last long that way.Quote:
As a Brit - a country with no written constitution - your special concerns for US citizens and your constitution are not my own. If Al-Awlaki were a Brit planning to knock my airplanes out of the sky or a Yemeni, it would make not the slightest difference to me. The imperative is to protect your people against terrorist atrocities; the passport and legal rights of a person who has openly declared jihad on you is not the overriding concern. And what some politicos wrote more than 200 years ago does not exercise me greatly. My ancestors fought yours with a lot more restraint way back then.
Mmmno, I don't see that happening. What he does is something completely different actually.
Apologies for interrupting your argument, but if you’ll allow me a paranthesis :bow: You are presenting the situation by building the comparison as if it would be just any two countries with different perceptions. Yet that’s not the case, is it? Great Britain is not just a country with a different mindset from the United States, it’s a unique case of organical development. You are not A country with no written constitution, you are THE country with no written constitution. All the rest of us had to go through their watershed moments which left scars to last us centuries. You chaps began so very small and inconspicuous with the ever so mild containment of a ruler whose policy against the french crashed and burned at Bouvines – it almost appeared natural. And while it had its ups and downs, by the time you sealed Charles I’s fate a Preston you had made your point only to nail it down forever when you’ve done in James II’s hopes at Boyne. The perfect example for how this organic development eased your passage through time, you only have to look at the classic example of marxism and how it came into being in your courtyard because it was the only place where a predecessor movement like the Chartists could exist; and precisely due to the same reasons, the anarchist and communist insiders were marginalised in a span of decades only for the movement to evolve into a very civilised socialism. The only patch of dirt in Europe where this went the way it should have in an organic manner. Going through your history, democracy almost seems an inevitable development.Quote:
As a Brit - a country with no written constitution - your special concerns for US citizens and your constitution are not my own. If Al-Awlaki were a Brit planning to knock my airplanes out of the sky or a Yemeni, it would make not the slightest difference to me. The imperative is to protect your people against terrorist atrocities; the passport and legal rights of a person who has openly declared jihad on you is not the overriding concern. And what some politicos wrote more than 200 years ago does not exercise me greatly. My ancestors fought yours with a lot more restraint way back then.
Indeed, the United States never suffered a dictatorship either, yet “a hundred miles is a long distance in England, a hundred years is a long time in the United States” correct? It is a very very young state and it is not ethnically defined, despite all the anti-immigration debate today. Constituted around principles, not blood, the ones who joined in did so in a dash of “I read your rules, should they stay in place I’m coming over”. Adaptation is key, yet americans will forever suffer of schizophrenia in regards to this type of initial rules set down by their “founding” fathers and they shall never escape this context.
The rest of Europe? None of us was untouched by oppression, dictatorship and revolution and the importance of an iron-clad, no wiggle room democratic Constitution is somewhat seared into our brains; European liberals not only will, but have to become hysterical about constitutional infringements.
So if you hire someone to kill someone, then you are not guilty?Quote:
Originally Posted by drone
I suspect the real issue here is not about a constitution or not but about the law. As I said in the OBL case, there's a sliding scale between say the UK bombing a Luftwaffe HQ in 1941 and the police assassinating a suspect in their own country. Neither pole of the spectrum poses particular legal challenges: the former is lawful, the latter not. But then we have cases like OBL and Al-Awlaki that fall somewhere imbetween those two poles on the spectrum of lethal use of state force. My moral intuition is that they are closer to Luftwaffe HQ in 1941 than the police abuse case, but others believe the opposite. That's a fair enough. But I am just not convinced that legal frameworks are sufficiently clear on this grey area to be the main consideration. I would rather rely on ethical and practical issues to decide the debate, giving time for the lawyers to catch up, than make the argument a legalistic/constitutional one. But I admit the legal/constitutional issues are interesting and do need to be debated.