President's duty to Protect and Defend ...

[guyton]

The President's oath of office is spelled out in the US Constitution, Article 2, Section 1,

Before he enter on the Execution of his Office, he shall take the following Oath or Affirmation:

"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

His primary obligation is to defend the Constitution ... it is not an oath to defend the US against all real or imagined enemies at the expense of the rule of law.

I'm getting really sick of the POTUS (many of them) claiming their primary obligation is to defend the US, and then using that to justify any number of clearly illegal acts.

[katandmoon]

1. K&R

[MadMaddie]

2. I would ask you the same question I have asked on another thread

If the U.S. knew when and where Timothy McVeigh was going to ignite his bomb would you have approved of the goverment taking him out?

What about Osama Bin Laden in 2000? Would you have approved of taking him out before 9/11?

This U.S citizen made a decision to become and participate in Terrorism against the United States.

What will you say when this U.S citizen with his terroristic leadership orders kill 3000, 50,000, 1 million U.S citizens? Will everyone feign surprise that it happened?

Remember Osama Bin Laden told the world what he was going to do and no one listened.

This guy is telling the world what he is going to do - will we listen or will we pretend that it can't happen again.

This is not fear, this is unfortunately the world we live in.

I will put my Kevlar vest on now.....

[guyton]

4. of course you can defend the US, while ...

... staying within the rule of law. The real world isn't an episode of "24"

There's plenty of lawful ways of preventing a crime when there's evidence that it's about to happen.

(full disclosure: I've never watch an episode of 24)

[MadMaddie]

6. I haven't watched 1 episode of 24 either

All my Republican coworkers love the show....hmmmm

[kag]

9. The Repubs like '24'?

I'm shocked!

[cherokeeprogressive]

17. "If the U.S. knew when and where..."

I should think that if the US had that information in hand, they could have stopped McVeigh before he killed anyone, and they could have stopped him without killing him.

Of course we'll never know...

[roguevalley]

31. Osama isn't American. What if another bush gets in power and

uses this to justify killing students protesting in New York over something? It is against the constitution and I can't support it.

[Ozymanithrax]

32. I would like to answer some of these.

(1) If the U.S. had proof tht Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols had entered a consipracy to blow up a builidng, aquired the material to blow up that building, and planned to do so on April 19, they would be required to do something about it. It is called Conspiracy to comit a crime, and people are arrested for that on a regular basis. (Hutaree) Yes, arrest him or take him down if he resists.

(2) The conspiracy concept comes into play. Yes, arrest him or take him down.

(3) I won't be surprised.

Like the Hutaree, this guy has entered a conspiracy to kill people. Conspiracy is a crime. Arrest him or take him down. You don't have to wait for him to murder 1 or 3000 people. People seem to be hung up on the word "assassinate."


One more thing. Many of us were incensed that Bush was warned that "Bin Ladin Determined To Strike in US" and he did nothing about it. We were angry that many of the conspirators in the 9/11 terrorist attack were under surveilance and not arrested. Would it be better to ignore him until he kills 3000 people?

[MadMaddie]

38. Thank you Ozymanithrax!

This was the point of my response, to spur this type of conversation.

[cliffordu]

33. I'm right there with you.

There are many who don't want to understand the stakes in this world.

Treason deserves death.

[MadMaddie]

39. Thank you cliffordu!!

[eridani]

35. So the insurance CEOs who kill 46,000 a year need to be put up against a wall and shot?

That's a "trigger option" that I could get behind.

[Clio the Leo]

3. a review Article II, Section II of said Constitution might be in order....

... unless you're of the belief that the purpose of the armed forces is to go around building levies or something.

[IndianaGreen]

7. Our Founding Fathers saw large standing armies as threats to liberty

and President Washington warned our nation against foreign entanglements in his Farewell Address.

We need to restore the Constitution as the Law of the Land, and I have been saying that in here since 2001.

[Clio the Leo]

11. Are you an originalist when it comes to the Constitution?

Honest question.

[IndianaGreen]

12. That's the idiot Scalia

I am a civil libertarian.

[Clio the Leo]

14. And Borque.

I'm not either ... which is I why I've never been of the opinion that just because one of the founding fathers thought thus and so ... even if they included it in the original seven articles of the Constitution means things should still be thus and so.

They included the ability for future generations to amend the Constitution because they intended it to be a living document.

I dont agree with everything George Washington ever said/thought and I know you dont either. I dont agree with everything Barack Obama ever said/thought .... but I'm being paid to keep quiet on those things.

In pie.... ;)

[guyton]

8. just reviewed it ...

It doesn't say anything about using the power of the military to kill individuals that the executive branch, in its sole discretion, deems to be threats.

And I seem to recall that the power to declare war was reserved to Congress.

[Clio the Leo]

10. hence the remark about the levies. NT

[guyton]

13. levies?

I happen to believe in a strong Defense Department, but under recent (and current) admins they should have renamed it back to the War Dept.

Btw, it also sickens me that we invaded Iraq because we were afraid. Before you say that was reasonable, we were much more afraid of the USSR at the height of the cold war. Should we invade everyone we're fearful of?

[Clio the Leo]

15. Should we never make an offensive maneuver...

.... were we wrong in liberating the Nazi camps?

Yes we were wrong in invading Iraq (both times) and yes we were justified in liberating the Nazi camps.

Am I fond of the notion of US troops intervening in the jurisdiction of a foreign government, well, no ... but would I support sending troops to Darfur ... well, maybe.

Depends on the circumstances doesn't it?

The answers are never as simple as we'd like the to be.

[guyton]

16. intervention

I would support intervention by the UN. But not by any single state, whether it's the US or China or Russia or Iran.

[Clio the Leo]

18. What if Yemen helped us?

Or to put it more accurately, what if we helped Yemen?

What if we helped Yemen and the rest of the UN didn't object?

[guyton]

19. sounds like a police action

Arrest them, give 'em a trial, apply the rule of law. No problem there.

[Clio the Leo]

20. arrest them?

Do you think we're sending in air strikes because we're lazy and dont feel like going to where they live?

[guyton]

24. yes! arrest

and bring them back to the US for trial if the host country can't do it (and is willing to help grab 'em).

[Clio the Leo]

26. TRY a foreign citizen in the US for a crime committed in a foreign country?

Huh?

For that, we're gonna need Gitmo.

[guyton]

30. if there's not a crime they can be charged with ...

what the heck are we doing saying to take 'em out!

[onenote]

36. do you always oppose the use of deadly force?

the old guy that shot up the holocaust museum. was it wrong to take him out instead of disarming and arresting him. heck, he was old, and he would've run out of bullets eventually, so shouldn't law enforcement have waited until he was arrested and could have a trial?

Or maybe the line between when deadly force is appropriate and lawful isn't black and white but depends on all of the circumstances.

[IndianaGreen]

22. Which faction in Yemen? Saleh is hated and despised!

And Saleh has been cahoots with Al Qaeda while taking our money, sort of the Horn of Africa's version of Karzai.

[Clio the Leo]

28. hated and despised by whom?

And why does that matter? Barack Obama is hated and despised.

Should we circumvent the seated government?

I know, I know, we should just leave Al Qaeda alone. I'll save you the trouble.

[kag]

5. Precisely...

illegal codesmilie_remote(':kick:')

[treestar]

21. This is true, though if a terrorist attack happens, it would be difficult for

any President to say, look, it was my duty to protect the Constitution only.

And are you sure this is against the rule of law. International law is a strange proposition, not always enforceable, but it appears we are following international law.

We can't apply our court system outside our borders. If we can capture someone, then try them, whether they are US citizens or not. But if it's war and there is no way to do it, it's not a violation of the rule of law to take them out.

[guyton]

29. theater of war

One of the problems of this 'war on terror' is that it's everywhere, and *anyone* could be considered to be a combatant.

[treestar]

37. Exactly what Bush tried to say when he claimed anyone could be

detained, even in the U.S.

[elleng]

23. PRESERVE, PROTECT and DEFEND the Constitution.

Obviously included within the obligation is to do NOTHING ILLEGALLY.

[guyton]

27. thank you, yes

If we're no longer a nation of laws ... what exactly are we defending :-/

[elleng]

34. Exactly, guy.

[emilyg]

25. k/r