Re: I'm Surprised That None Of You Civil Libertarians Has Brought Up al-Awlaki

On 10/3/2011 9:18 PM, Kevin J. Maroney wrote:
On Mon, 03 Oct 2011 10:42:07 -0500, David Dyer-Bennet<dd-b@xxxxxxxx>
wrote:
If he'd been killed in a military encounter on a battlefield, I don't
see a problem. Since he was targeted by name for assassination, you
could view that as another thing -- that's deciding in advance, without
due process, that he's an evil man, wheras his happening to be killed in
battle requires his being present in the battle, which isn't staged just
for him.

Yes, precisely.

*If what is said of al-Awlaki is true*, killing him might probably
have been a reasonable step. But is there anyone here who really
believes the US intelligence services has the ability to identify,
with unfailing accuracy, which people, far from any battlefield, are
covert military figures?

================================================================

> *If what is said of al-Awlaki is true*, killing him might probably
> have been a reasonable step. But is there anyone here who really
> believes the US intelligence services has the ability to identify,
> with unfailing accuracy, which people, far from any battlefield, are
> covert military figures?

Yes, but it goes farther. We have a sort of a war here: intense,
secret, and *very* dirty. The actions that seem to originate in our
American government are also intense, secret, and apparently, very
dirty. The failure I think I see is that America *went dirty* with
"termination with extreme prejudice," torture, renditions to places
where they do torture, Abu Ghraib, etc etc, a very long list. Under
the secrecy. Thus one reasonably believes, whatever original intent
may have been (one doesn't hope for much from the Bush administration)
America has since gone just as dirty as the opposition. Which I think
outlines a basic:

Going dirty offers a temporary advantage, but those things go down
into history. And this very old conflict now begins in history: and
where is America in it? America is bringing itself down to a future
third-world character, and it's very far along now with that. Since
America's hands are dirty now, it can't go clean; thus, the remaining
option is to pick up and clear out of there; and let the region clean
itself as it would do in a few decades. And thus, America gets itself
off that path to a security/military state and third world character.

Can America do this? When I listen to Romney saying, America needs
to be strong; America needs a bigger and stronger military, well,
that is not encouraging. But it locks-in a key point (emphasized
today in Alabama), the America of bright hope and future, a light to
the world, *does not exist*. Today's America offers only a very
dark shadow, no light at all; reams and reams of noisy propaganda;
and well above the horizon now where we can all of us see it, "Your papers, please."

Titeotwawki -- Martha Adams [Mon 2011 Oct 10]


.

Relevant Pages