I don't think anyone would have batted an eye if John Walker Lindh had been killed on the battlefield instead of being captured.So TexasHiker...if a US citizen goes to Afghanistan, joins the Taliban or Al Queda, and takes up arms against US troops, you don't think the troops should shoot to kill that US citizen? If he's firing on US troops, they should just try to capture him for trial?
Fuck that. While capture and trial of US citizens in such a situation would be (in a perfect world) the ideal choice, allowing the US citizen who's actively trying to kill US troops to continue his actions places those US troops in greater danger.
If that US citizen opts to continue his actions, let him pay for those actions with his life.
What's hilarious (to me) about all this Faux outrage by the righties, is that if it was a Republican in office, they'd be defending this instead of attacking it.
I'm not an Obama supporter, didn't vote for him, (for the first time since I started voting in 1972, I didn't vote for the (D) ) but it seems like it doesn't matter what Obama does, as far as those on the right are concerned, it's wrong.
Too many people care more about politics than they do the country.
So TexasHiker...if a US citizen goes to Afghanistan, joins the Taliban or Al Queda, and takes up arms against US troops, you don't think the troops should shoot to kill that US citizen? If he's firing on US troops, they should just try to capture him for trial?
No, this thread is about a panel of people acting as judge and jury.
The other threads were about US citizens not getting due process.
The other threads were about US citizens not getting due process.
Don't you have three other threads on this topic already?
Do you have any proof that Awlaki ever took up arms against the US? Did he ever fire upon another US citizen? As far as I know, Awlaki posted youtube videos and wrote for a website.
Besides the government saying Awlaki was a terrorist, do we have "any" type of proof?
I think the evidence the death panel has should be presented to the public for review. If the government has some kind of evidence against Awlaki, I would like to see it.
No, the evidence shouldn't be presented to the public for review, because said evidence is part of an ongoing investigation of an entire organization and exposing it to the public would jeopardize said investigation.
How do you think this relates to a citizens right to a public trial?
Personally, I do not believe the government had any evidence the accused did anything but talk.
Your personal belief is based on nothing other than solipsism, the idea that nothing exists outside your personal knowledge or perception. I have no reason to believe the government is lying about having such evidence because it doesn't have a motive to lie in this particular case.
Your personal belief is based on nothing other than solipsism, the idea that nothing exists outside your personal knowledge or perception. I have no reason to believe the government is lying about having such evidence because it doesn't have a motive to lie in this particular case. There are many, many other radical Muslims who "mouth off" on the internet and elsewhere, on a daily basis, yet they aren't being accused of planning terrorist acts. There is no reason for the government to arbitrarily choose Al-Awlaki among all radical Islamist mouthpieces to make a false charge.
You and some others here are right to raise the issue of legality and Constitutionality. I don't think I agree with you on the legalities but the notion of an America where we do something like this and no one questions it is a frightening one. On the other hand, you do the issue you raise a disservice by arguing the man's actual innocence. Suffice it to say you think it needs to be tested in a trial and leave it at that.
- wolf
Wow, look who's talking! Just because you have no belief the government isn't lying, doesn't make it true either. You have no proof either.
And looking at recent events, there are far more instances of where the government HAS lied to us then the other way around.
You do remember the secret evidence saying Saddam had WMD?
AQ in Iraq?
Waterboarding? Denied several times before being admitted?
Rendition? Secret Prisons?
"Everyone at Gitmo is guilty" or they are the "worst of the worst"?
Abu Graib wasn't a big deal and barely happened until the pictures got leaked
Wikileaks? Those leaked cables showed all sorts of government lies
I could go on and on, but I think I have posted enough outright lies to show why anyone should be at the minimum, skeptical of any official statement.
I mean, did you see my links? Even the vaunted "unnamed sources" speaking about the evidence admitted it is patchy. If the totally anonymous, we won't tell you what it is is patchy, the reality is probably that it is less then patchy.
Do you have some sort of special memory, where you only question the statements you don't want to believe, LOL?
Let's save a ton of money by getting rid of defense lawyers and trials.
From now on, police and prosecutors have the same laws and requirements of evidence to convict someone, but they just do it secretly.
If they get the evidence someone is guilty of a crime, they carry out the punishment.
What could go wrong?
Like the movie Judge Dread IIRC. Pretty fvcking amazing actually that this can exist. I have no problem and most of us don't with anybody, US citizen or not, being targeted in certain conditions. And this Al-guy maybe did deserve it, but this panel seems to have little oversight or rules, just kind of whomever whenever.
Yawn at the constant use of slippery slope assumptions and fallacies, and false equivalencies.
hey, why not this guy aka AL-Amriki? he's been out of the public light for awhile now... ohhhh, that's right. Adam Gadahn is a propaganda fake. His real name is Adam Pearlman, grandson of the late Karl Pearlman; a prominent Jewish urologist in Orange County.U.S. officials contrast intelligence suggesting Awlaki's involvement in specific plots with the activities of Adam Gadahn, an American citizen who became a principal English-language propagandist for the core al Qaeda network formerly led by Osama bin Laden.
While Gadahn appeared in angry videos calling for attacks on the United States, officials said he had not been specifically targeted for capture or killing by U.S. forces because he was regarded as a loudmouth not directly involved in plotting attacks.
If the federal government does not have to display the evidence in public, then neither should anyone else.
Someone can be charged with a crime, and sentenced to death by a secret panel without being able to offer evidence on their behalf. They will not even know they have been sentenced to death until the police show up to kill them,
Sounds like a plan to me.
And the panel isn't secret, it's the evidence that is.
As opposed to tying your hands while you get constitutional authority to blow up a building terrorists are assembling nuclear suit case bombs to smuggle into the country in shipping containers.
The sad fact is that folk on your side of the argument fail to weigh the risks of legal nicety over against the threat of madness we are up against.
To aid, abet, or affiliate with Al Quaida in any way other than as a spy, an organization which has among it's various aims, destroying America by terrorism, is to declare war war against the American people. If you can be gotten to by the President of those people in any window of opportunity you're toast. We have 9/11 over your fear of Hitler.
You have fun being an idiot don't you? Only the government can prevent evidence from going public when it's a national security issue.
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence.
National security or not, the accused has the right to see the evidence.
Personally, I think the government does not have crap on the accused.