*promote

Promoting this video and sending it back into the queue for one more try; last queued Saturday, February 22nd, 2014 11:23am PST - promote requested by eric3579.

This is such a strange debate to me... So if this guy had walked into an embassy and renounced his citizenship... then went off to sing kumbaya with al qaeda or the taliban or whom ever. Problem solved... light him up!...

I don't see what the deal is quite honestly. We don't wait for due process if a citizen takes a bunch of hostages or goes on a killing spree. If we see the opportunity to end the threat, we end the threat

If it is reasonable to attempt a capture this american actively working with Al Queda, then cool, but I'm guessing that it isn't a realistic plan so I just don't see what the issue is here.

Obama has gone above and beyond the usual bureaucrat when it comes to making his own rules and to hell with anyone who wants to oppose him. The media doesn't challenge him because he's a Democrat, the Democrats don't challenge him because he's African-American, and the Republicans don't challenge him because they don't want to be a target of Eric Holder, ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC, etc ad infinitum, plus they're ball-less.
So he's got free rein, he can't be re-elected and he doesn't care too much because Michelle could probably carry on where he left off.

*blocked for me

This video has been flagged as having an embed that is Region Blocked to not function in certain geographical locations - declared blocked by antonye.

Because a hostage-taker is a verifiable imminent threat, and there is documented evidence of how the police ends it, evidence that is then reviewed for any wrongdoing.

The US government's take on imminent threat and evidence is "we just have to use that magic word 'terrorist', and we can kill anyone: citizens, civilians, women, children -- no problem, man!".

Abdulrahman Anwar al-Awlaki, who is Anwar al-Awlakis 16 year old son was targeted and killed. Born in Denver he was looking for his father and had sat down to dinner. He died along with his 17 year old cousin. It's called murder of the innocent.

Also they don't end any threat at all, they create more and more terrorists daily. Just ask anyone who's town has been hit by a Drone attack.

All the ignorant Obamatwits here, including Jon Stewart, thinking he would change in regards to drones are wrong, as usual. Maybe they should of voted for Romney who did say 'we shouldn't kill our way to victory.'

For balance, most of the towns where drone strikes have been made already were completely controlled by people who hated America and harbored or cooperated with those actively working on killing Americans. Take a tour of the hundreds of drone strike targets in tribal Pakistan and you are surveying a region accepting the rule of militants so extreme that the Pakistani government is a secular heresy worthy of death to them. Pakistani law including the death sentence for blasphemy. Those regions being under such strong control of the militants that the Pakistani military can't go there for the casualties they would take trying to do so. The welcome for Americans(long before drone strikes were made) would have been even more vicious.

It is important to state that for as much legitimate reason to 'hate' American foreign policy as there is, there exist huge numbers of people who hate America for their own petty, vile and psychotic reasons. The Islamic fundamentalists that see Pakistan as too secular are plainly one such example, and saying they only hate America because they are justified is making excuses for monsters.

> Maybe they should of voted for Romney who did
> say 'we shouldn't kill our way to victory.'

yes vote for politicians based on what they say

@VoodooV
worst...analogy...ever.

@bcglorf
how does your analysis of the situation in pakistan defend or excuse the execution of american citizens abroad?

@Yogi made the clear example of Anwar al-Awlaki,an innocent 16 yr old american citizen living with his respectable grand-parents,who was executed by a drone strike.

are you suggesting we should just trust the executive branches decisions to murder citizens because the political/religious situation in a certain country?

i am trying to understand your correlation between a political climate and abusive executive powers.

nice strawman.

but the analogy I raised was not about trust or whether or not the person in question was innocent. The question was about constitutionality. We kill citizens all the time on domestic soil because they are perceived to be a direct threat to our safety and no one questions the constitutionality of it. What difference does overseas make? Its not a question of whether or not they ended up being innocent or not, which is quite separate.

so my analogy stands.

if you're going to go to the trouble of calling me out just to deride my comment. I would have hoped you would have provided a better example of why my analogy is so poor.

but you didn't.

not to mention Romney wanted to expand the military.

but we shouldn't expect honest evaluations from lantern53

EDIT: oops, it wasn't lantern53 who said it, so I apologize. It's so hard to tell our trolls apart.

@VoodooV

what strawman?
if you are going to accuse someone of using a deceptive tactic at least understand the terminology bubba.

and you are correct.
i did just make a statement and did not clarify my reasons.
so let me clarify:

you compared the imminent threat of hostages who are in danger of physical harm or death to a possible dissident who may..or may not..be plotting harm in the future sometime as somehow being similar.

this is a logical fallacy.
your analogy is flawed.
and it does not stand.

i didnt feel i had to point this out due to the fact that @Yogi had already given you an example of executive abuse of powers.

i mean really..how do you surrender to a drone?

i apologize if i stepped over some imaginary line,or if you think i am attacking you in some fashion.

i am not....but ill refrain from engaging with you in any fashion if that is your desire.

Let's ignore the anti-obama trolls here. lantern and thorns don't give a shit about drone strikes and are really only annoyed because it's not a republican president ordering them.

@VoodooV, I'm afraid I can't agree with your analogy either. If there's a guy with his finger on the button of nuclear missile about to blow up LA, then by all means drone strike his ass. That's extraordinary circumstances.

My problem is that these are not extraordinary circumstances. It has become routine. The USA (and let's not pretend it's just Obama) has legitimised assassination, because they can.

It turns out that drones are an incredibly effective tool of killing with zero risk to soldiers. Bad guys dead, good guys home in time for dinner... political win all round!

And right now, the USA has pretty much a monopoly on the whole drone technology thing. But that's not going to last, and short of repeating the hypocrisy of nuclear weapons ("no nukes for you! only WE get nukes!"), in 10-15 years time, everyone who wants one has drones.

So at that point, what's to stop whatever country from drone striking whoever they feel like? After all, we've accepted that assassination is a valid political tool now. It probably always was, but now we're open about it, which makes it a lot harder to decry.

In theory, I guess you could accuse me of employing the slippery slope fallacy, but I don't think I'm extrapolating by much. The technology is simple and available, and the legal barriers are being removed. It's just a question of how widespread it becomes.

I'm trying to point out the dilemma posed by stateless criminals operating in parts of the world where they are not liable or accountable to anybody. They are not within your own borders, so domestic law and order can't reach them. They are not operating within an extradition country, so that is out too. They in truth are not operating in a region where any country can bring it's own rule of law to bear on them, so even a declaration of war on Pakistan or Yemen doesn't really even fit.

When criminals operate from these regions, demands they be treated like a regular suburbanite, with a reading of Miranda rights before a bail hearing and formal trial including a state funded defends attorney is ludicrous. Acting like that extreme is mandatory is akin to rejecting the real world and demanding we all just pretend hard in some fictional world that is possible. I'm not advocating unlimited executive powers, I'm just observing that stateless criminals can NOT be dealt with through the same channels as domestic thugs.

I could support Obama is he only did more damage outside the country and less damage inside the country.

Right now it's a toss-up.

It will only be a choice of one international criminal over another unless thoughtful citizens ditch both parties provided for anyone to vote for, and perform the voter's coup d'etat.....The naivete that you have a choice in the matter without taking a real choice, is a systemic disease.You are not alone in your inebriation on the political-Koolaid beverage.

Try smashing a few televisions and encourage others to do so. It's cathartic and will free your mind, Neo.

Anti-Obama people aren't trolls by the way @ChaosEngine-They're either seriously deluded into thinking that they are not in some sort of state of willful denial that the prescribed systems of electoral chicanery actually functions as they blindly assume as is spelled-out since they were kids in elementary school, or they can see through the ruse that is, a government by and for her peoples.

Lump me in such a simplistic and obtuse category as 'Obama-for-or-anti' and you may or not, recognize yourself in the former category.

If there's a 'guy' with his finger on the nuclear missile (otherwise known as a false-flag event), it's the same guy or guys who called-in the drone-strike. Who is the 'imaginary' guy you speak of?? Ask yourself, is the insane scenario your offered-up, even possible? Bad guys, good guys? Gimme a break, you're smarter than that.

I believe that "ignore" is the operative and self-delusional tag word here. Keep ignoring the obvious. Seems to work well for some to quell fear of the unknown.

'Republicans bad, democrats good', a broken-record and at least 10 other peep's in any room of folks' discussing politics-as-usual, comforting "safety phrase."

All it sounds like to me is apes in a cage, bellowing for a nutritive meal and the freedom to roam to find it for themselves.

It's 2014 lantern-five-three, nothings a fucking toss-up anymore....It's an insidious program.

Choice and chance are illusory in the political realm.

@chingalera, I'm not saying there aren't plenty of people with legitimate criticisms of Obama. If all Obama critics were trolls, I'd have to include myself in that. I've said several times on this very site, that I consider him a huge disappointment, even more so because I had high hopes.

Again, I don't think this is a partisan issue. I don't see anyone in the US political scene with what I consider a remotely sensible point of view.

And the "good guys, bad guys" thing was sarcasm... I thought the tone was pretty obvious. And yes, my scenario was entirely hypothetical, that was the point. It's the same fictional "ticking time bomb scenario" that torture, excuse me, "enhanced interrogation" proponents espouse, and I don't buy it there either.

On rewatching I think there is a simpler way to state my point. The dillema as outlined is aerial bombings 'outside a battlefield'. If it the region were declared a battlefield, bombing the enemy would be considered part of prosecuting a war and not require individual warrants issued from a court for each combatant identified and targeted.

For all intents and purposes, places like tribal Pakistan and Yemen ARE open battlefields, but it's not considered polite to the local leadership to say that or make that declaration. To me it seems a lot of the issue revolves entirely around this compromise where the Pakistani military agrees to let us operate as though it is an open battlefield in an all out war, just as long as officially and publicly we never call it that. I agree the compromise is stupid, but I disagree that with choosing to no longer treat the region as a battlefied, I prefer openly calling it what it is and embrace that yes, we absolutely are waging acts of war against these militants and you can pick which side you want to be on in the fight.

Ok, let's change the territory. Forget Muslims and Al Queada and the Middle East and all that.

Let's roll the clock back 30 years, and let's find a comparable scenario where we have stateless actors living in a country who's reluctant to extradite them (either through inability to locate them or because they don't really like the country asking for extradition). These actors are responsible for a number of atrocities committed in the name of a political cause that has some tacit support by the locals of this country.

So we have the IRA hiding in the Republic of Ireland for bombing civilians in Northern Ireland and Great Britain.

Now let's assume the British have drones. Is it acceptable for them to drone strike targets within the Republic leading to civilian casualties? If not, why not?

Hell, let's go forward 20 or 30 years to when Iraq or Afghanistan have drones and the USA refuses to extradite the people that illegally invaded their country and then committed crimes against humanity there. Is it ok to drone strike Texas to get to GW Bush?

This is not a door we want to open. You're happy with it now because you're the ones holding the big stick, but legitimising international assassination because you don't get your way is a recipe for a nightmare.

The difference with the IRA is that both sides were interested in a political compromise. As regards Al Qaida and Taliban type fundamentalists they have no desire to compromise. So I think it consistent that open warfare with the IRA being rejected/avoided, mean while it is war with the Taliban who are trying to turn Pakistan from a nuclear armed Islamic state to an arm of their holy war.

You evaded his question.

The question isn't whose terrorists are "badder." Nevermind the fact I find it hard to swallow your argument that Ireland's terrorists are "less bad" than Afghanistan's/Pakistan's because they were willing to use political means in addition to their violence against civilians to achieve their aims. I think it is pretty safe to assume if Britain had had access to the drone technology during The Troubles it would have used it. British forces didn't seem to have any trouble with shooting civilians during the conflict, nor unlawfully (and often indefinitely) detaining them.

The question is, if Americans are in support of remote assassinations that are carried out by executive decision without scrutiny from courts or any sort of due process, how can they possibly decry the use of such strikes by foreign powers against American citizens?

And there is only one plausible answer to that question--they can't.

@ChaosEngine is saying that these drone strikes, if internationally sanctioned, will open Pandora's box. What say you to that?

I'm simply arguing that the drone strikes be labelled what they are, acts of war against an enemy one is at war with. It should be obvious that is anything but a blanket endorsement of their use. All it does is move the goal posts from formal civilian style courts and police to justification of prosecuting a war against an enemy. Is that really such an absurd or unpalatable position?

But they're not at war. America is absolutely 100% not at war with the nations of Pakistan or Yemen or wherever else they're currently using drones.

They are prosecuting assassinations of private individuals within those states. It is quite literally state sponsored terrorism.

The simple fact is that it is an illegal action under international law. Just because a foreign country doesn't want to hand over one of it's citizens that the USA believes is or has been engaged in harmful acts against your country does not mean you can simply throw your toys out of the pram.

If one of your neighbours assaults you and then runs inside their house, you can't just kick down their door for revenge.

To repeat @SDGundamX's excellent summation of the point:

if Americans are in support of remote assassinations that are carried out by executive decision without scrutiny from courts or any sort of due process, how can they possibly decry the use of such strikes by foreign powers against American citizens?

Please try and read what I am saying and not just ignoring bits I've already answered. For starters, I thought I'd been clear in declaring tribal Pakistan as already being, in every meaningful way, a separate and independent state from Pakistan. More over, tribal Pakistan has been actively waging war with Pakistan proper for a very long time now. I even already claimed that at reason number one for considering tribal Pakistan an enemy to ourselves as we'll. After all, if Pakistan isn't Islamic enough for them, we surely are inwilling to compromise as far as the extremist militants there require.

I also don't recall claiming we were at war with Yemen or Pakistan. I claimed that drone strikes are an act of war. Meaning we are, quite extensively, launcing acts of war on land claimed by Yemen and Pakistan. Despite that though, somehow neither government seems inclined to declare it war. Largely because they can't show weakness, and admitting their enemies are in fact in control of that land would be weak in the extreme. So instead you largely see silence as the respective leadership readily accepts the assistance in removing a military threat to themselves that the can't readily admit has already seized large parts of their country.

Sorry, I missed the part where you "declared tribal Pakistan as being ... a separate state from Pakistan". I didn't realise we could do that.

In that case, I declare tribal USA (aka Arizona or Texas, take your pick) in every meaningful way, a separate and independent state from the USA. They're insane right wing christian nations who pretty much share the goals of fundamentalist Islam. They just have better weapons.

When do the rest of us get to drone strike the Arizona State Legislature or the Texas Board of Education?

As for Pakistan or Yemen, what do you think would happen if they declared war on the US? It would be an open invitation to be curb stomped and have haliburton run their country. The fact is, the US are drone striking their citizens and there isn't a god damn thing they can do about it.

I have no doubt that some of the people killed were evil scumbags who the world won't miss. But the video on this very page shows how often civilians were killed.

Besides aren't there laws around declaring war in the US? I'm pretty sure this is not something that should be done away with lightly.

@ChaosEngine, At least take the topic seriously. You can't really think Arizona and North Waziristan have meaningful similarities, can you? If you truly know that little about tribal Pakistan then you should go read up for a long time before rejoining the conversation.

Arizona citizens pay taxes to America, cast votes for American elections and have American funded schools, roads and police. Importantly, the police in Arizona enforce the laws of the American government. Same goes for Texas. The same DOES NOT go for North Waziristan. Pakistani police don't even try to enter most of North Waziristan because the TTP would kill them.

Militants from Arizona and Texas aren't sending weekly attacks against schools and civilians throughout the rest of America, killing hundreds of people every month. Meanwhile, that is exactly what militants from North Waziristan are doing throughout Pakistan today and for a very long time now.

In the even that militants in Arizona and Texas DID commit even one such act, the American police would go in and make arrests. In North Waziristan, the police can not as stated before. More significantly though, not even the Pakistani military is willing to go in and get the militants for the casualties they would take.

You can't just willy nilly decare those situations comparable if you expect your argument to be taken seriously. Given that ground situation, it doesn't take a brilliant leap in deduction to see the very high percentage of top TTP officials hit by drones and reach the conclusion that the Pakistani military isn't entirely unhappy about the strikes.

I again repeat that dropping bombs on another nation is an act of war. You have a good point about that not being something America should be able to do lightly. You are wrong though about why Pakistan isn't declaring war back on America. It isn't fear of America, it is convenience of America JOINING their side in a civil war they are unwilling to call by name.

@bcglorf of course I wasn't seriously suggesting that. Did you miss the smiley to denote "the above is tongue in cheek"?

What I was doing was highlighting the ridiculousness of your argument that you can simply declare "tribal" pakistan a separate state.

Besides whether I think arizona and pakistan are comparable is irrelevant, I have no drones. But the USA have established this precedent, they will have no moral defence against it when someone who doesn't like them eventually gets their hands on drone tech. They can "declare war in all but name:" on the USA and strike civilian targets to get at people they feel mean them harm.

I don't think any imagination is required to know the American reaction if an enemy unilaterally declared war on America and blew up buildings in American cities from the skies. You and might disagree who set that precedent first though.

There is good news though on this front. There haven't been any new Drone strikes in 2014 and the Pakistani military has stepped in using heavier and more conventional bombardment of the TTP. It'll mean increased casualties, but if we are really lucky they will stick it out with boots on the ground and enforce a long term enforcement.