Our daughters say we can have a "fuss" and "make up" with two looks within 5 minutes.... and never have said a word.

They like to keep us in the dark.
Makes for a nice, passive public.

My point: forget oversight. Forget due process.

From bmaz:

The most important principle to understand about the White Paper's discussion of 18 USC 1119 is, as Marcy noted, that it is impertinent if the the law of war (formally the "Law of Armed Conflict" or "LOAC") is truly in play. In short, if the Administration is using the AUMF - military force - in an active battle situation, there is no need for further discussion, whether Mr. Awlaki is a US citizen or not. That, of course is diametrically opposed to what the facts were at the action point with Awlaki, and that we now know.

The truth is the Administration used a civilian agency, the CIA, to kill a US citizen without judicial due process, far from the "hot battlefield" and that is why such a deliberate attempt was made in the White Paper to obfuscate the legal basis for their targeting and killing, and why such a seemingly inordinate time was spent in the White Paper on a traditional criminal law statute, 18 USC 1119.

After providing the language of 18 US 1119, and an excerpt from Colleen McMahon's ruling, bmaz goes on to say:

And, as both Judge McMahon and Marcy noted, "Presidential authorization does not and cannot legitimize covert action that violates the constitution and laws of this nation." Well, no it cannot. And that is also consistent with the "Take Care Clause" in Article II, Section 3 of the Constitution requiring a President to insure that all laws (read statutes) are "faithfully executed". That means the President cannot simply abrogate or ignore the clear language of 18 USC 1119.

So, if the target, in this case Awlaki, was killed by a US civilian action in a foreign country and away from a, as Judge McMahon put it, "hot field of battle", then the Administration has a problem. Houston, the Administration has a problem with 18 USC 1119.

Bmaz closes:

Now, in closing, I think we ought to be honest about the nature of this discussion. Fact is, the Obama Administration is never going to actually charge their own people, it is not about that; it is about the root legality of the activity. And the problem is, at root, there is no way to say that CIA-performed extrajudicial execution of American citizens away from the hot battlefield is legal in the face of 18 USC 1119. The Obama Administration is trying to baffle the public with legalistic bull, and is trying to hide their illegal pea under a moving set of inapplicable and inapposite legal shells. But, in the end, it does simply does not hold water.

So, if there's going to be a discussion about due process and about oversight, it can't be held in a vacuum - it has to be in the context of actual targeted killings, al-Awlaki's in particular.  And I think the reason we haven't, the reason why it's been a monumental struggle just to get the minimal information we have, is that the administration isn't just on the  wrong side of the law, it knows it's on the wrong side.

This is not going to end well, I don't think.  Contrary to what you may believe about my agenda and my self-righteous indignation, I would not look forward to how this country would handle the mess in all its ugly glory.  Given how the GOP has reacted to Benghazi - is till reacting to Benghazi - I can't even fathom a scenario where impeachment does not rear its ugly head, and suck all the oxygen out of the room with respect to the many other issues that are crying to be addressed.

probably having to contend with drug addicts, drunks and homeless folks too, not to mention the mentally ill

UNITED NATIONS -- U.S. military attacks in Afghanistan, including drone strikes, have reportedly killed hundreds of children over the last four years, according to the U.N. body monitoring the rights of children.

The Geneva-based Committee on the Rights of the Child said the casualties were "due notably to reported lack of precautionary measures and indiscriminate use of force." link

Unicef, the United Nations children's agency, said in response to the findings: `Even one child death from drone missiles or suicide bombings is one child death too many.'

Did it ever occur to you that the reason we are fighting the terrorists is because we used to find the killing of innocent people unacceptable.  They do it because they don't have huge invasion forces, we do it because we don't want to use our huge invasion forces.  How is the act any different because we drop bombs out of the sky and they strap them to the weak minded ?  The innocent dead acquiring minds would like to know.

I am not suggesting that we be sitting ducks for anyone who has it in for us.  I am suggesting that at some point, we have to decide who we are, and what this country wants to represent.  If I cringe every time I hear one of our fearless leaders bragging about our democracy, proclaiming us to be the greatest, freest nation on earth, I can't imagine how those words strike the people who live in nations we are targeting with drones.

If they hated us for who and what they thought we were before the attacks of 9/11, I don't imagine that hatred has subsided in the wake of who we have become in the years since; if anything, every drone that takes flight over so-called terrorist-rich areas adds more fuel to the flames of hatred.

The approach that's been in use for the last 12 years hasn't made us safer, and it hasn't strengthened our freedoms or our democracy - we are, I believe, weaker as a nation.  So, what do we do about all these would-be attackers and looming threats?  We need better intelligence, better diplomacy and better ways to reach into the worst of these countries with education, with technology, with ways to improve the day-to-day lives of average people.

Which is not a bad recipe for this country - but those in charge seem as determined as ever to keep tightening the economic noose on the least among us and looking around at whatever's left of the middle class to see if there's more they can squeeze out of them.  We are more spied upon, more intruded upon, more scrutinized.  The police state is bigger and more powerful.  We are going backwards and pretending that the only measure of our health that matters is that the fortunes of the elite are still growing.  

Democrats and other politicians broke....

After being pushed by the war protesters who were glorified by the media and influenced by such false reports put out by Walter Cronkite re Tet.

Q: Was the American antiwar movement important to Hanoi's victory?

A:  It was essential to our strategy.  Support of the war from our rear was completely secure  while the American rear was vulnerable.  Every day our leadership would listen to world news over the radio at 9 a.m.  to follow the growth of the American antiwar movement.  Visits to Hanoi by people like Jane Fonda, and former Attorney General Ramsey Clark and ministers gave us confidence  that we should hold on  in the face of battlefield reverses. We were elated when Jane Fonda, wearing a red Vietnamese dress, said at a press conference that she was ashamed of American actions in the war and that she would struggle along with us.

Q: Did the Politburo pay attention to these visits?

A: Keenly.

In the meantime, both Marcy and bmaz over at Emptywheel have been posting extensively on the administration's justifications, especially in light of the NYT article this weekend.