Military
The Obama administration’s extraordinary claims that it has the legal authority to kill an American citizen overseas was finally released on June 23 after years of legal wrangling.
Now that the U.S. government has released parts of its We-Can-Kill-People-With-Drones memo, it’s hard to miss why it was kept secret until now. The memo’s author, needed a loophole to make murder-by-missile a lawful killing rather than an unlawful killing, so he pulls out the “public authority justification” under which the government gets to use force to enforce a law. It’s a novel twist, though, for the government to get to use force to violate the law, claiming the violation is legal on the Nixonian basis that it is the government doing it.
The US on Monday released the secretive memo outlining the Obama administration’s legal justifications for targeted-killings of American citizens by drone strike. Used to justify the killing of American born Anwar al-Awlaki in 2011, a federal judge ordered the declassification of the memo after the American Civil Liberties Union and The New York Times brought a lawsuit against the government. RT’s Manila Chan has more on the long-sought release of the document.
Iraq is descending into chaos, but not for the reasons you’re being fed by the politicians and the mainstream media. The public must come to terms with the fact that the current chaos is directly related to a half century of US military interventions and covert operations in the middle east. Bombing for peace never has, and never will, work.
Ron Paul: Because of the government’s foolish policy of foreign interventionism, the U.S. is faced with two equally stupid choices: either pour in resources to prop up an Iraqi government that is a close ally with Iran, or throw our support in with al-Qaeda in Iraq (as we have done in Syria). I say we must follow a third choice: ally with the American people and spend not one more dollar or one more life attempting to re-make the Middle East. Haven’t we have already done enough damage?
University social science research is being militarised to develop ‘operational tools’ to target peaceful activists and protest movements
What is a huge army of private contractors secretly doing in Afghanistan? A leaked PowerPoint presentation explains.
Modernize and streamline an antiquated VA medical system to get rid of massive paper files that create all the confusion and that excessive red tape. Reach the stated goal of eliminating all the delays by the end of 2015. Our veterans deserve much, much better. And a lot more parades.
The White House will not appeal a federal court’s order to release the memo outlining the administration’s legal arguments for the use of lethal drone strikes against American citizens. The announcement was made Tuesday on the eve of a key Senate vote. David Barron, President Barack Obama’s nominee for a seat on the US Court of Appeals, cleared a procedural Senate vote Wednesday. Voting 52 to 43, Barron will now proceed to a formal confirmation vote. Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky voiced his opposition, saying anyone who argues the president has the power to kill an American citizen without trial “is not worthy of being placed one step away from the Supreme Court.” Lindsay France discusses these and other breaking developments on Capitol Hill with RT’s Sam Sacks.
Abby Martin speaks to Keane Bhatt, journalist and activist about a recent open letter he and many prominent figures signed calling for the non-profit organization Human Rights Watch to close its revolving door with the U.S. government.
Western military deployment represents a continuation of a strategy that has failed in Nigeria—and it’s the latest example of the “war on terror” penetrating deep into Africa.
Stefan Molyneux presents the shocking facts behind the September 11 2012 Al Qaeda attack on the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya: the Washington cover-up; the American arms sales to Islamic extremists; and the deep history of the Arab Spring that turned into an American foreign policy winter of discontent and disaster.
The American people are now overwhelmingly opposed to more war in Ukraine, Syria, Iran and elsewhere. Support for a war against Syria is 500 percent less than for the Iraq war. Support even for the Afghanistan war has collapsed. In fact, most Americans are now strongly opposed to intervention in any Arab country. In addition, a new Pew poll also shows that the American people are sick of the war on drugs, noting that a broad majority of Americans are ready to significantly reduce the role of the criminal justice system in dealing with people who use drugs.
The Obama administration must disclose the legal basis for targeting Americans with drones, a federal appeals court ruled Monday in overturning a lower court decision. The Second US Circuit Court of Appeals, ruling in a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) claim by The New York Times and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), said the administration must disclose the legal rationale behind its claims that it may kill enemies who are Americans overseas.
The rhetoric that has been spewed in recent years about nuclear disarmament is, of course, was always just that: rhetoric. The US government has never seriously considered giving up its nuclear stockpile, or even renouncing a first-use nuclear doctrine. As Dr. Yuki Tanaka of Hiroshima University explains, the Obama administration has not simply continued the aggressive Bush-era stance on America’s nuclear arsenal, but actually extended it. In reality, the Obama administration has simply reaffirmed and even extended the existing US nuclear policy allowing for a first-strike, offensive nuclear war against its enemies. Find out more about the nuclear threat in the new cold war in this week’s GRTV Backgrounder with James Corbett. TRANSCRIPT AND SOURCES: http://www.corbettreport.com/?p=9084
