What about those here illegally?
What about citizens abroad? (Drone attacks on US citizens suspected of terrorist ties)
Rand Paul starts in on this at about the 1:15 mark. (I've posted this a couple times before...and I still find it funny. Personal problem, I know.)
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I think we can trust Hank to get the legal and constitutional nuance right.
Reasons to lose citizenship by natural born citizens: - conviction for treason or attempting by force to overthrow the U.S. government, including conspiracy convictions.
Abroad, not if they are deemed enemy combatants.
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They constitute an "imminent danger." You don't need to read an American citizen his rights before taking him out if by not doing so you put the public in danger.
Al-Awlaki in Yemen certainly constituted an imminent danger. We were right to take him out.
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The imminent threat of an active shooter is obvious, less so a guy hanging out in Yemen. One is a clear imminent threat, the other a potential threat. I don't think we could shoot a guy climbing the fire escape with a sniper rifle unless he refused to comply with police commands first. Maybe we had the intelligence to support "imminent threat", is there a due process procedure in place here?
Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula was/is one of the most active terror exporters. They have a skilled bomb maker who I think is still at large.
Al-Awlaki ran that group, and he was also one of the main propagandists for the radical jihadi types. He was in contact with the Fort Hood shooter, for instance.
He was a pressing danger.
This case may be a bad example, but there should be some sort of a due process check/balance for situations like this if there isn't.
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unchecked.
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Perfectly in character.
But America NEEDS to be great again.
Omelets require that eggs get broken, or some such bullshit.
I think al-Awlaki posed that level of immediate danger.
But there are lawyers all over the Pentagon these days, which causes no end to complaining. They advise about such matters, for better or worse.
nt danger. In this case, probably justified, but my question is more about the process of determination than this specific case. Wouldn't you agree that it is dangerous to leave it up to military commanders to unilaterally make this determination as it relates to US citizens abroad?
Especially when they involve U.S. citizens. Granted, it is a process that only involves the Executive Branch, but Congress can demand to oversee it, which gives everyone involved pause.
It is not a common thing to do. Al-Awlaki might be the only one.
Also goes back to my question to Frank, how do we determine "battlefield" when no war has been declared (role of congress)?
Basically, anyone who cannot be reasonably captured and is engaged in ongoing operations that pose a material threat to American interests can be liquidated.
Al-Waliki (or however you spell it) is one of eight US citizens killed by drone strikes. Some of the eight were killed by accident (i.e. they were bystanders or hostages) but some were killed on purpose.
I supported Obama's drone strike then and do now.
authority. I have no issue with it at all.
In fact I would have had no issue with droning Assange when he was placing US forces at risk.
I guess for me it comes down to how much you trust not just our current executive branch, but future executive branches. Though I don't have a problem with how it's been used thus far, dangerous precedent, IMO.
Bush and Obama waged it against Al Qaeda under the AUMF Act of 2001. It's now Trump's turn. In the entire time, Obama killed 8 Americans. Of all things, I am not concerned with what Trump might do here.
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Against who?
Obama has fought Al-Qaeda under the AUMF Act of 2001.
It should be something Congress should take up, but the Rand Paul wing and the Democrats make it tough.
final point: The Patriot Act is now used far more often in the war on drugs than the war on terror. RICO is similarly mis-used. Granting unilateral authority to the executive branch is inherently dangerous. Are we to wait to see how Trump or some future executive may abuse this power? I would prefer not. If we abandon our republican (checks and balances) ideals to pragmatically deal with a specific problem, I am concerned about what the future may look like with those protections eroded.
I am not asking for much, just oversight by congress and/or the judicial branch on which US citizens it is open season on.
Considered a combatant on the battlefield.
How is the term "battlefield" defined? We aren't at war with Yemen...
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Not sure I am comfortable with the idea that if I go fishing in Canada or on vacation in the Caribbean that I am not protected from my own government. Sounds a lot like Fidel sinking makeshift rafts leaving for Florida...
I may be taking this a bit to the extreme, but our system was originally designed to prevent such danger. Of course our system didn't anticipate global terrorism, but I think there needs to be some checks and balances instead of an executive/military unilateral process as I understand it to be now.
To his credit, I think Barry O was responsible with it.
The Circus barker playing with his Lincoln logs in Trump Tower, not so sure?
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