{"id":41076,"date":"2014-02-11T10:58:45","date_gmt":"2014-02-11T17:58:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/02\/11\/the-legal-let-alone-moral-complexities-of-extrajudicial-killings.html"},"modified":"2014-02-13T14:49:34","modified_gmt":"2014-02-13T21:49:34","slug":"the-legal-let-alone-moral-complexities-of-extrajudicial-killings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/02\/11\/the-legal-let-alone-moral-complexities-of-extrajudicial-killings.html","title":{"rendered":"The legal (let alone moral) complexities of extrajudicial killings"},"content":{"rendered":"
Interesting article, and even more interesting comment section.<\/p>\n

I have no problem saying that extrajudicial killing by the government is wrong (let's leave aside the diplomatic\/geopolitical aspects of operating in another country when they've told us not to), except<\/i> against a combatant in time of war, at which time the "due process" thing is covered by a declaration of war or legal authorization of military force.<\/p>\n

The problem being that, while one can (as the Obama administration, and the Bush administration before them, does) claim that the AUMF and "War on Terror" make remote drone strikes against terrorists, even American citizen terrorists, legal under the rules of war (we'll also set aside collateral damage issues), the slippery slope of declaring all terrorists as enemy combatants who can be killed by drones (or tanks) is that it allows a corrupt, immoral, tyrannical, or even just incompetent administration to kill anyone<\/i> simply by saying that, well, they had good (but, of course, top secret) information that the person killed was a terrorist, so stop complaining.<\/p>\n

Whether you think Obama is the second coming of Christ or the Anti-Christ, that's a dangerous power for even a saint. And it's now in Obama's hands, and the next president's hands, and the next president, and the next …<\/p>\n

So to my mind the question becomes not whether the death of the New Mysterious American Citizen being gunned for would actually be an extrajudicial killing, because it I think there's enough evidence to indicate they're not. The question is whether being able to treat "terrorists" (or "Commie spies," or other past or future threatening groups of individuals who don't wear uniforms of an attacking army) as a group we are at war with is a sound idea, if there are no barriers other than competence and moral fiber to keep that power from being abused.\ufeff<\/p><\/div>\n

\n

\n \n <\/div>\n

Tweaking the Constitution to Make Extrajudicial Killing Easier<\/a>
\n A thought experiment to get assassination advocates back on the right side of the law\n <\/p>\n

View this post on Google+<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Interesting article, and even more interesting comment section. I have no problem saying that extrajudicial killing by the government is wrong (let's leave aside the diplomatic\/geopolitical aspects of operating in another country when they've told us not to), except against a combatant in time of war, at which time the "due process" thing is covered … Continue reading “The legal (let alone moral) complexities of extrajudicial killings”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[106,350,10,17,349],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41076","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-plusposts","category-civil-liberties","category-geopolitical-brouhaha","category-homeland-security","category-military"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1380,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2002\/01\/15\/all_your_prison.html","url_meta":{"origin":41076,"position":0},"title":"All your prisoners are belong to us","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 15-Jan-02 11:09am","format":false,"excerpt":"Interesting. 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