...but as far as I can tell he's just objecting to a war policy implemented by the commander in chief.
As was so often the case with your daddy, I don't need you to defend my Constitution or tell me what it says, Mr. Paul. I can read it just fine myself.
Thankfully most of the reporting I've seen is staying objective and presenting this as a disagreement rather than Rand Paul standing up for the Constitution against its usurpers.
People freaked out about airplanes when they were developed for war too. A decade from now this allegedly valiant Constitutional stand will look stupid and we'll just be arguing about the important stuff - good and bad uses of a very lethal tool.
Wednesday, March 6, 2013
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Are you talking about the Brennan filibuster? You mean the one which is partly prompted by the Obama administration's claim that it can execute people by drone at will?
ReplyDeleteI have not been following the back and forth with Holder very closely, but I don't recall that claim ever being made.
DeleteIf you want to talk about differences of opinion on this, let's actually talk about what is actually argued -not your renditions of it.
So you haven't been following the back and forth yet I am making something up? *facepalm*
DeleteOh, I forgot, Obama has a (D) behind his name.
DeleteI said I haven't been following it very closely.
DeleteI think if Holder said he could kill anyone at will I'd have noticed that. I am willing to bet I would have noticed it at least. Certainly it's not untoward of me to expect you to furnish... I don't know... a quote of him saying he had the authority to kill Americans at will?
re: "Oh, I forgot, Obama has a (D) behind his name."
DeleteOK I'm getting tired of this crap - please stop commenting on my blog.
Holder argued that in time of attack on American soil (he used the case of Pearl Harbor*) that the President could kill people at will. The way I see things that is exactly the worse time to be handing the President such power, not the most appropriate time. Then there is the camel's nose issue to consider.
Delete*This sort of reasoning also ought to clank out a couple of memories of people arguing that torture is appropriate in the ticking time bomb scenario.
I don't comment on your blog enough that it matters much either way.
Delete"People freaked out about airplanes when they were developed for war too. A decade from now this allegedly valiant Constitutional stand will look stupid and we'll just be arguing about the important stuff - good and bad uses of a very lethal tool."
ReplyDeleteWell, the development of the airplane as a weapon of war wasn't some sort of bloodless thing. For decades it was used as a weapon of mass terror by nation states after all. Let's hope that the development of drones is a bit different from that. Doh!
Ummm, right - and that's what I'm saying we should argue about - how they're used.
DeleteWe want to see drones used in ways that limit civilian casualties, target enemies, and prevent the mass terror of conventional war. Insofar as whole communities are terrorized we want to talk about augmenting their use on the battle field.
These are the discussions we should have.
That is my whole point.
A commander in chief using a weapon to target a military enemy is not a constitutional catastrophy. It is constitutionally banal in fact.
It is a tactical, a strategic, and a moral question.
Actually Daniel, if you knew anything about the fears of the use of the airplane you'd realize that those predicting the worse turned out to be correct.
Delete"We want to see drones used in ways that limit civilian casualties, target enemies, and prevent the mass terror of conventional war. Insofar as whole communities are terrorized we want to talk about augmenting their use on the battle field."
Strangely enough, this was the thinking by many that surrounded the development of the airplane as a weapon. That it would limit civilian causalities and bring wars quickly to an end. Turns out that was and apparently never will be the case.
There is a whole inter-war period debate on the use of air power if you're remotely interested; those who were pessimistic about the use of air power turned out to be basically correct.
I never said it would bring wars to an end. I'm no utopian on that issue even aside from the drone question (although I'm an optimist as far as our ability to make incremental improvements).
DeleteI'm not arguing that drones are inherently more humane either. That's precisely why we have to argue over tactics, strategy, and morality.
We seem to be currently using them in a targeted way, but even though the use is targeted it still seems to be a problem for certain communities as far as the fear it generates. Part of this is precedent, of course. You don't hear people being terrified of drones in Iraq because relative to the bombings and troop occupations the drone use there was very humane. You do hear concerns in the tribal regions because this is something new there.
Anyway - that stuff is worth arguing about.
Same with airplanes.
One can legitimately say "gee - I don't think you should use planes to carpet bomb populations". That's (depending on the circumstances) a tactical, strategic, or moral question.
What's stupid is to say that the mere use of this particular weapon somehow transcends the president's authority to fight a war.
To be honest, LSB, you sound like gun control advocates.
DeleteThere's this weapon that's scary to me because of its potential and because it's different, etc. so instead of regulating how it's used and targeting improper uses of it I'm just going to try to tar it as scary and verboten and make outlandish claims about the people that understand it's a tool that can be used intelligently or illegitimately (as in your "kill Americans at will" allegation).
I'm not in the least bit optimistic about the use of drones. They simply make the state more powerful in its efforts to create a more legible population (foreign or domestic) and frankly that comes with all sorts of potentially ugly consequences.
Delete"What's stupid is to say that the mere use of this particular weapon somehow transcends the president's authority to fight a war."
When the President uses drones to fight wars not authorized by Congress then that transcends the President's authority. Drones and other weapons aren't neutral entities when it comes to the relative ease by which they can allow one branch or another to take a bit of hide out of another branch of government.
"You don't hear people being terrified of drones in Iraq because relative to the bombings and troop occupations the drone use there was very humane."
Au contraire. There are continual protests against the use of drones in Iraq by those inside and outside the Iraqi government. Part of this is a simple issue sovereignty; part of it is that civilians have died at their hands. That these protests don't make into the U.S. media doesn't meant that they don't happen.
"There's this weapon that's scary to me because of its potential and because it's different, etc. so instead of regulating how it's used and targeting improper uses of it I'm just going to try to tar it as scary and verboten and make outlandish claims about the people that understand it's a tool that can be used intelligently or illegitimately (as in your 'kill Americans at will' allegation)."
DeleteThis is deeply ironic statement coming from a guy who is constantly bitching about the way the sausage making of the budget process is done - and in particular the current sequestration that is underway. Frankly, the dispersion, use, etc. of technology does not work the way that you're describing here.
One final comment:
DeleteIn other words, the use of technology by society (any society) is never rationally designed or regulated in this way. You mention firearms. Frankly the way Americans use, own, etc. firearms is an evolved, historical process and with what, half a billion guns on the street, something people can't really turn back from without getting over a lot of inertia (you'd have to contemplate something like what Japan did when it rid its society of firearms during the Tokugawa shogunate - and I mean, no thanks). So expect drones to be used in some damn ugly ways and for no amount of regulation to get in the way of that. After all, the government's use of eavesdropping technology is supposedly regulated but no one actually believes that the government follows the rules with any assiduity in this arena.
re: "When the President uses drones to fight wars not authorized by Congress then that transcends the President's authority."
DeleteSo let's argue about wars, not a particular weapon used to fight them.
re: " That these protests don't make into the U.S. media doesn't meant that they don't happen."
OK, once again apparently I can't speak colloquially here. "You don't hear" was meant to be read as "you don't hear nearly as much". I'm not claiming there are no black swans, just making a generalization.
re: "In other words, the use of technology by society (any society) is never rationally designed or regulated in this way."
DeleteRight - so why are you treating drones the way Diane Feinstein is treating guns?
re: "So expect drones to be used in some damn ugly ways"
Umm.. I do. That's my whole point. I think we should deal with that reality as best we can rather than pretend there's something special, scary, or verboten about drones.
"So let's argue about wars..."
DeleteDrones and other technology will make such arguments less likely I suspect.
"OK, once again apparently I can't speak colloquially here."
The use of language requires some precision. And you don't hear nearly as much because the press isn't following the controversy associated with drones in Iraq, Afghanistan or Pakistan.
I'm not acting like Diane Feinstein, but touche on the insult.
"I think we should deal with that reality as best we can rather than pretend there's something special, scary, or verboten about drones."
Whether drones are unique or game changing isn't something we can know right now (I think they could be, and that's also part of the problem). And yes, we, those who are concerned about drones (including Rand Paul), are dealing with them by arguing about the manifest current and future dangers associated with their use.
DK writes: "...but as far as I can tell he's just objecting to a war policy implemented by the commander in chief."
ReplyDeleteI think this is true in a way and not true in another way. It is true in the sense that the debate seems to be primarily about using *drones* to kill Americans in America. The question of the weapon of choice doesn't seem to be a constitutional question.
But on the other hand there is the issue that Obama says he has the right to murder Americans without needing anybody else's permission. That *does* seem to be a constitutional issue if ever I saw one. (and IIRC Rand Paul did aks them this issue per se, no?)
The non-constitutional question of the weapon of choice and the constitutional question as to whether Obama may murder who he wants to murder without having to get anybody's permission are linked of course, also because the two Americans who we *know* were murdered by Obama without a trial were murdered by his drones.
Dk writes: "We seem to be currently using them in a targeted way"
How many innocent civilian deaths per terrorist does still qualify as 'targeted', Daniel? I'm not being rhetorical. Please give me an actual number?
"but even though the use is targeted it still seems to be a problem for certain communities as far as the fear it generates. "
Yeah, it still 'seems to be a problem' for those communities. Seems to be. Odd eh?
Also, the fact that their innocent mothers, fathers, sons, daughters, friends, brothers, sisters and so on are murdered by the American 'Commander in Chief', that when people come to their rescue or come to mourn their deaths those people too are blown to pieces as part of a deliberate strategy by the 'Commander in Chief', probably also doesn't help.
Daniel, it's quicker to just say "Kick Me!"
ReplyDelete:)
Hypothetical. An American citizen, Fetz by name, in 1939 heads off the Germany and joins the Luftwaffe. Come 1942 the president orders him killed either indirectly ("destroy the Luftwaffe") or directly ("Kill that fellow Fetz, he's their most brilliant general.") Constitutional issue? I don't think so.
ReplyDeleteWell, in the latter case you're getting into the tricky issue of whether that is an assassination or not. Assassination is against the laws of war (and is officially against U.S. policy as of the Reagan administration's executive orders on the subject).
DeleteDK writes: "As was so often the case with your daddy, I don't need you to defend my Constitution or tell me what it says, Mr. Paul. I can read it just fine myself."
ReplyDeleteI don't understand you here. Is this what you tell anybody who ever voices an opinion on what is and what is not constitutional?
if not, why not?
Nah- just a rhetorical flourish aimed at a family that for some reason is treated like the guys who really REALLY like the Constitution as opposed to the rest of those Americans who are just indifferent to it.
Deletewell, I sure am curious as to your rhetorical flourishes aimed at the Supreme court.
DeleteThose Paul's! They're just terrible people for selling their brand of politics, etc. with some success! :P
DeleteDK wrote: "I think if Holder said he could kill anyone at will I'd have noticed that. I am willing to bet I would have noticed it at least. Certainly it's not untoward of me to expect you to furnish... I don't know... a quote of him saying he had the authority to kill Americans at will?"
ReplyDeleteHere, perhaps Krugman in his post on speaking truth to power can help you understand why saying that the Obama administration thinks it has the right to kill people 'at will' is a justifiable way of describing that the Obama administration thinks it has the right to kill people without asking anybody's permission or having to justify why they did it or even tell us that they did it.
Krugman wrote: "As Orwell said, the original isn’t just pithier and punchier; it contains vivid metaphors that convey the sense far better than just laying out the argument. Similarly, in reverse, rather than refer to
an economic view that has unfortunately retained considerable influence, possibly because it has a political appeal to some parties, despite extensive empirical evidence that appears to refute the proposition
why not just refer to it as a “zombie idea”? It’s not just shorter, it conveys the sense of what is happening much better — and it places the idea in question in the context of other zombie ideas.
Now, of course, some people get offended when you refer to their ideas as zombies. But if you’re worried about giving offense, you should be an official spokesperson, not an independent commentator."
Similarly for 'kill people at will', I would say: "Why not just refer to it as “the Obama administration thinks it has the right to kill people at will"? It’s not just shorter, it conveys the sense of what is happening much better — and it places the idea in question in the context of other such thuggery throughout history.
Holy crap Narrator. Are you really arguing this?
Delete"Peace is war" is pretty vivid too but Orwell stood pretty firmly against that distortion of language. Powerful honest prose is one thing. Powerful dishonest prose is another thing entirely.
Yes, I am actually arguing this and holy crap, are you actually even questioning that 'at will' is justifiable in a similar manner as 'zombie economics' would be?
DeleteAlso, your second paragraph actually undermines the indignation of your first paragraph.
It's too bad we can't aks Orwell ourselves. i would have bet plenty a bitcoin that he would have agreed with me rather than with you.
"Are you really arguing this?"
DeleteOf course he is, because that is really what is fucking happening.
The Obama administration has decided that it can kill people if it has decided that those people meet certain criteria. The Obama administration is also under the impression that its decision to kill people is not judicially reviewable. "kill-at-will" is pretty good shorthand for what is actually going on. Even if a more accurate description would be: "kill when we decide secretely and unreviewably that somebody meets those criteria."
DeleteAlso, it's remarkable how successful Obama and his posse have been in getting people to think that all sorts of criminal behavior is justified because that behavior is done in the context of war and Obama is the commander in chief.
ReplyDeleteI mean, if you say that the war on terror will never end, that the whole world is a battlefield, and that you don't have to actually prove that the people you kill actually were up to no good, then yes, any kind of murder would be justified by an appeal to "but it's war and I'm the commander in chief".
Also, Daniel, what you fail to see is that if Rand Paul thinks the 'murder Americans without a trial' is a constitutional issue and you think it is not and that Paul is merely objecting to the commander in chief's war policy, then it is at least prima facie incorrect for you to say "Thankfully most of the reporting I've seen is staying objective and presenting this as a disagreement rather than Rand Paul standing up for the Constitution against its usurpers"
ReplyDeleteIf most of the reporting presents this as a disagreement rather than as Paul standing up for the constitution, it means that the reporting has taken a side in the debate, namely the same side you take. It doesn't mean that they're being 'objective'. You just think that it is objective because you think that position is the correct one. But similarly then Rand Paul could say that the people who portray him as standing up for the constitution are doing objective reporting.
Now of course if Rand Paul's position was just silly and the position you and the reporters take the obviosuly correct one, then yes, you could say the reporting is 'objective', but it would be quite a stretch to say that Paul's point is just silly and doesn;t have anything going for it. It seems to me that at the very least there is room for sensible debate on this matter, that there is something to say for the view that the question as to whether the administration has the right to kill Americans (and non-Americans) on American soil without a trial is a constitutional question, and that trying to speak out against that right would then be a way of defending the constitution. This is obviously not just a silly position that can be dismissed.
Also, it seems as if you think that Rand Paul is merely inquiring about drones ("People freaked out about airplanes when they were developed for war too. A decade from now this allegedly valiant Constitutional stand will look stupid and we'll just be arguing about the important stuff - good and bad uses of a very lethal tool.") but that's just not true at all. Just read Paul's actual questions here
http://paul.senate.gov/files/documents/Brennan1.pdf
http://paul.senate.gov/files/documents/Brennan2.pdf
http://paul.senate.gov/files/documents/Brennan3.pdf
"I don't need you to defend my Constitution or tell me what it says, Mr. Paul. I can read it just fine myself."
ReplyDeleteMaybe you can read it just fine, but he can do stuff like filibuster. So I for one like very much the idea that he is attempting to defend the Constitution. He is "objecting to a war policy implemented by the commander in chief" on the grounds that this war policy violates the Constitution. It's quite silly of you to try to make it sound as though "objecting to a war policy implemented by the commander in chief" is somehow necessarily distinct from "defend[ing] the Constitution."
"People freaked out about airplanes when they were developed for war too. A decade from now this allegedly valiant Constitutional stand will look stupid and we'll just be arguing about the important stuff - good and bad uses of a very lethal tool."
Because Obama's extra-judicial killing program has been carried out primarily (or perhaps just more visibly) using drone strikes, many people refer to the extra-judicial killing program as the "drone strikes". If you read much of what has been written about the "drone strikes", (like this one just for fun http://paul.senate.gov/files/documents/Brennan1.pdf ) you will see that much of the objections have to the with the extra-judicial killing part of things.
This isn't people freaking out about drones per say. This is mostly people freaking out about what the administration is doing with these drones (extra-judicial killings) and some much more limited discussion about the drones themselves.
PrometheeFeu,
DeleteQuit trying to attack Daniel's framing device. It is unfair I tell you! Unfair! :P
Daniel,
ReplyDeleteAre you claiming that there are only policy issues on the table and no interesting constitutional issues involved in the recent declarations/acts related to Executive power/authority? If so, are you a "critical" theorist who believes that *all* (or almost all) "constitutional" questions are really disguised policy questions? And there are no "objective" right answers regarding legal interpretation?
If you are not, your claims are implausible. For example, you write "I can read [the Constitution] just fine myself." That may be the case, but you will be quick to notice that the power to "Declare War" rests with Congress, and such a declaration (arguably) has not been made since WWII. So right off the bat there is an interesting constitutional issue regarding the constitutionality of anything in the realm of "war" taking place at present, as well as the questions relating to the initiation and maintenance of military actions in general, and this leads to many other constitutional problems in this domain. Thus, if only Congress can declare war, then only Congress has the power to declare the identities of "enemies in war." Perhaps the Executive has commander-in-chief authority to identify and repel imminent threats against the U.S., but that is just what is disturbing about Obama's White Papers: not only is he declaring the power to identify and kill imminent threats, he also has greatly relaxed the definition of "imminent." According to the White Papers, imminence “does not require the United States to have clear evidence that a specific attack on U.S. persons and interests will take place in the immediate future" (this is how it can wait almost a year in carrying out an assasination). So WP basically does away with any real requirement of imminence. But then, where does the Executive find such powers in the Cosntitution?
Related to the issue of declaring individuals military enemies is a second constitutional issue: the complete lack of procedural protections in the White Papers. All that is required is that “an informed, high level official has determined..." And this procedural element is provided through a simple “balancing” test, taken from Mathews v. Eldridge (a case where Social Security benefits were being terminated, deciding whether had to receive a pre-termination hearing).
To say that there are no constitutional issues at stake and only policy considerations in all of this is implausible.
There are no constitutional issues at stake.
DeleteAny questions were answered when Grant shelled Vicksburg. What is the difference between a drone shell and a cannon ball?
You are really really dull.
Calling someone dull--yeah, that'll change someone's mind.
DeleteGood persuasion technique.
With drones do we need to change minds?
DeleteJohn
DeleteBTW, exactly how dull is someone who doesn't understand how this questions were answered thousands of times during the Civil War?
Wait, you're being serious? That's amusing.
DeleteHume, I read your bio and you are really really dull.
DeleteNo wonder you got out of the law; obviously, you lack the ability to even fix a traffic ticket and have no idea what the Constitution means and so forth. Sitting at home taking distance classes in Philosophy. What a hoot.
Take killing people. Lincoln ordered people shot, with no trial. Confederate POWs who were drawn by lot and shot, just in retaliation for Confederate murders of Union soldiers.
As I already wrote, Grant shelled Vicksburg. Same happened thousands of times all over the South.
I can easily see circumstances were the Military might deploy a drone and kill people. If you lack the capacity to understand the facts and circumstances under which such could happen, then you are a dull.
If you are so smart, why not write useful a draft of a law, like the CIA Charter, that foresees all possible situations? Tell us what circumstances that you can foresee, for the exceptions you write.
What if two people are among 1000 people at high school basketball game and are about to exchange the code to a nuclear bomb and the gov't doesn't know the identity of the participants? Can the President kill 1000 to save 10,000 or 100,000 or 1,000,000?
re: "Are you claiming that there are only policy issues on the table and no interesting constitutional issues involved in the recent declarations/acts related to Executive power/authority?"
DeleteNo, of course not.
I'm claiming that we're faced with a set of disagreements over these issues and not with a Congressional dynasty that is here to bring the light of the Constitution to the unwashed non-libertarian masses.
AH -
DeleteI think you're taking the case a little too far. There's a big difference between saying that you think there's nothing constitutionally suspect about a position you hold and saying the there is not a constitutional issue.
If a Senator and all sorts of lawyers are making a constitutional argument then there is a constitutional issue worth discussing.
You're just confident you're right about that issue.
Also, your repeated off-hand references in your blog to a "General Welfare" federal power illustrates a complete lack of understanding of the complexities of the issue. Perhaps some humility is called for when making assertions in domains very far outside of your expertise.
ReplyDeleteHume can you at least one time come on here and share an argument rather than prancing around and telling everyone they're wrong and that you're smarter than them when it comes to anything in the neighborhood of political philosophy?
DeleteGive me an argument, please.
What are YOUR thoughts on general welfare.
I may not be philosophy student at U Penn but I'm a pretty sharp guy and I think I can actually talk through arguments.
"As was so often the case with your daddy, I don't need you to defend my Constitution or tell me what it says, Mr. Paul. I can read it just fine myself."
ReplyDeleteWhat an utterly stupid remark. So if ANYONE ANYWHERE ever says "X is unconstitutional," everyone's proper response is "I don't need you to defend my Constitution."
Wow.
Gene, thought after we pointed out that I was better read in economics than Mises---I've read Keynes, understood what he wrote, etc., but you lack the comprehension skills and Mises never tried---that you would never show your face again.
DeletePaul said earlier this afternoon that he could tell when people were "two faced" or cynical.
He should know and I wonder what he would say about you.
But to the real point.
Do you agree that, appropriately, the Constitution has an escape valve.
Obama could drone you at a coffee shop tomorrow and then pardon everyone. Of better yet, and I expect this is what Paul fears, all of his followers who have read Shakespeare could come together to drone you, after which Obama could pardon them.
If I were you, I would start burning every copy of Anthony and Cleopatra:
MENAS
These three world-sharers, these competitors,
Are in thy vessel: let me cut the cable;
And, when we are put off, fall to their throats[with my drone];
All there is thine.
POMPEY
Ah, this thou shouldst have done,
And not have spoke on't! In me 'tis villany;
In thee't had been good service. Thou must know,
'Tis not my profit that does lead mine honour;
Mine honour, it. Repent that e'er thy tongue
Hath so betray'd thine act: being done unknown,
I should have found it afterwards well done;
But must condemn it now. Desist, and drink.
Daniel,
ReplyDeleteWatching Paul a moment ago was hilarious.
He said that there was a liberty or right of privacy and then realized how duplicitous that made him on the right of parents to decide whether to have children or not and stopped, mid sentence.
So much for any liberty being the premise of this high farce.
"A decade from now this allegedly valiant Constitutional stand will look stupid and we'll just be arguing about the important stuff "
ReplyDeleteWould it were so!