Republican candidates for President missed a huge opportunity to really sting Obama. Obama ordered the assassination of a U.S. citizen without even the pretense of due process. One of the moderators at the last debate asked about this. In their haste to appear strong on national defense, Republicans missed a major opportunity:
Newt Gingrich was particularly strong in justifying this action because we are at war. But, he missed the point. Obama never uses the term war on terror. Gingrich should have pointed out that Obama can’t have it both ways. He can’t pretend it is not a war and then ignore due process. There is no question that killing Anwar al-Alwaki was justified. There is little dispute with regard to the threat from this individual. But the problem is that Obama has now set a precedent to kill any U.S. citizen, anywhere in the world, solely because he thinks it is a good idea. Doesn’t that frighten you more than a little?
It is not a stretch to imagine Obama ordering the assassination of someone on the “far right” using the same justification. Just think of all those times Democrats have referred to the Tea Party as a “terrorist” organization. In the deluded world of the liberal left, they have often directly compared the political rhetoric of people like Sarah Palin with militant jihadists. The Department of Homeland security has specifically addressed the “threat” from far right organizations. We really need to wake up on this issue.
If this was an emergency situation, then it would be easier to justify. But it wasn’t an emergency. The decision to order the assassination of this man was made long before the actual event. There was plenty of time to set up some reasonable mechanism for due process. Granted, the traditional court system is too cumbersome, but here are alternatives. A special bi-partisan congressional panel would be an option. So would be a special court, similar to the FISA court. If we set up the FISA court to allow due process before we wiretap someone, shouldn’t be allow due process before we order their execution? How, exactly, does Obama explain the logic that requires the trying of non-citizen enemy combatants in federal court but has no problem in just assassinating U.S. citizens because “he” considers them to be a threat? How, exactly, does Obama explain why waterboarding is so bad, but just assassinating people is ok?
The liberal left had their panties in a wad for 8 years claiming George Bush violated civil liberties. They were wrong, because Bush was very careful to follow the rule of law. Now we have a Democratic President who is not even pretending to follow the rule of law. Isn’t it about time some Republican candidate for President, other than Ron Paul, calls him on it?
TDM
We will probably have to have our own version of “Crystalnacht” before some of us wake up!