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DOJ: Bush may have authority to order killings in the US. I'm feeling much safer now!
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| occrider |
| quote: |
Exclusive: Can the President Order a Killing on U.S. Soil?
Jason Reed / Reuters
Newsweek
Feb. 13, 2006 issue - In the latest twist in the debate over presidential powers, a Justice Department official suggested that in certain circumstances, the president might have the power to order the killing of terrorist suspects inside the United States. Steven Bradbury, acting head of the department's Office of Legal Counsel, went to a closed-door Senate intelligence committee meeting last week to defend President George W. Bush's surveillance program. During the briefing, said administration and Capitol Hill officials (who declined to be identified because the session was private), California Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein asked Bradbury questions about the extent of presidential powers to fight Al Qaeda; could Bush, for instance, order the killing of a Qaeda suspect known to be on U.S. soil? Bradbury replied that he believed Bush could indeed do this, at least in certain circumstances.
Current and former government officials said they could think of several scenarios in which a president might consider ordering the killing of a terror suspect inside the United States. One former official noted that before Flight 93 crashed in Pennsylvania, top administration officials weighed shooting down the aircraft if it got too close to Washington, D.C. What if the president had strong evidence that a Qaeda suspect was holed up with a dirty bomb and was about to attack? University of Chicago law professor Cass Sunstein says the post-9/11 congressional resolution authorizing the use of military force against Al Qaeda empowered the president to kill 9/11 perpetrators, or people who assisted their plot, whether they were overseas or inside the United States. On the other hand, Sunstein says, the president would be on less solid legal ground were he to order the killing of a terror suspect in the United States who was not actively preparing an attack.
A Justice Department official, who asked not to be ID'd because of the sensitive subject, said Bradbury's remarks were made during an "academic discussion" of theoretical contingencies. In real life, the official said, the highest priority of those hunting a terrorist on U.S. soil would be to capture that person alive and interrogate him. At a public intel-committee hearing, Feinstein was told by intel czar John Negroponte and FBI chief Robert Mueller that they were unaware of any case in which a U.S. agency was authorized to kill a Qaeda-linked person on U.S. soil. Tasia Scolinos, a Justice Department spokeswoman, told NEWSWEEK: "Mr. Bradbury's meeting was an informal, off-the-record briefing about the legal analysis behind the president's terrorist-surveillance program. He was not presenting the legal views of the Justice Department on hypothetical scenarios outside of the terrorist-surveillance program."
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11180519/site/newsweek |
Wonderful. How much longer until the DOJ says that Bush has the authority to sleep with your girlfriend or wife in order to more effectively fight the war on terror? |
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| josh4 |
| quote: | Originally posted by occrider
Wonderful. How much longer until the DOJ says that Bush has the authority to sleep with your girlfriend or wife in order to more effectively fight the war on terror? |
Lets make a clear distinction between the authority to and the power to order killings. The President has had the power to order killings albeit probably not with public knowledge. The Clintons are supposed to have killed a lot of people during his Presidency. |
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| Yoepus |
I mean, in away this sorta sucks. But the President has to have that power... its just sad how our enemies are.
Afterall, if it was the Germans on American soil in WWII, or Russian tanks rolling over Florida nobody would have made a fuss about it..
But because these guys don't wear uniforms and don't say "I am going to be using this plane to blow you up" its sorta frightening. |
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| occrider |
| quote: | Originally posted by Yoepus
I mean, in away this sorta sucks. But the President has to have that power... its just sad how our enemies are.
Afterall, if it was the Germans on American soil in WWII, or Russian tanks rolling over Florida nobody would have made a fuss about it..
But because these guys don't wear uniforms and don't say "I am going to be using this plane to blow you up" its sorta frightening. |
I think we're thinking about different things here. This isn't simply the President's authority to wage war in a theater such as Afghanistan or Iraq. This isn't the President's authority to order an arrest or an effort to stop terrorists even if it involves violent force ... this is the President having the authority to order a killing despite whether there is an imminent cause to use such force. Do you think a police officer is prohibited from using force if a criminal pulls a gun on him? This is an entirely different animal that can only result in a turn for the worse. Let's say the President orders the murder of a civilian for the sake of convenience... what recourse is there if the President was wrong and the guy turned out to be innocent??? Since the President has the "authority" to order killings, how can he be held responsible? Christ, it's a ing violation of the constitution. We have rights to a "fair" trial by jury for A REASON. Are people so willing to give away rights that our founding fathers fought so hard to protect? What's the ing point of this country if we have no inherent ideals to follow? YOu can't pick and choose which ideals you would like to subscribe to based upon the flavor of the month ... that's not the way this country started off. That's not conservatism. |
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