Indefinite detentions without due process. Warrantless wiretapping. Harassment and persecution of whistleblowers, journalists, activists etc. . Criminalization of protest. An overall climate of intimidation directed against dissenting opinions.

When people criticize the drone policies, I think more often than not it is an expression of discomfort with a wide range of policies connected to the "war on terror" which includes the drone strikes (i.e. "unchecked power over life and death of any citizen or non-citizen domestic and abroad&quot but is not restricted to them.

Since 9/11 we have lost ground on privacy, free speech, and due process protections. This is a bad business for all of us 99ers but good for the one percenters and the officials and legislators in their pockets.

I can think of a lot of good as well as evil they could do domestically.

Notice I said I could imagine a lot of good and evil they could do.

I am concerned that people are becoming used to not having a right to privacy.

US surveillance has nothing on Western Europe. I'm moving to Vienna next month and the visits I've been on are really a shock. Cameras everywhere. And the UK is even worse -- plus cops don't have "probable cause" requirements.

but obviously people are getting used to the new norm of intrusiveness.

You do a marvelous job breaking apart the debates. Seems that nuance gets lost when someone has a point to make or agenda to push. There's a lot of grey area in the use of drones as the technology is new and law hasn't caught up with it...especially on the international front.

As you point out, there have been many drone attacks that have been condoned by the local governments...many that have little to no real jurisdiction over the areas where AQ and other "rebels" hide. To them, these are war zones and those who are targeted are combatants. Thus any tool that can be used is "fair game". Drones are the first step into "push button" warfare that needs to be addressed on an international level as the U.S. may be the first but surely won't be the last to employ these weapons.

Regarding targeting American citizens...the WH memo is very troubling for me as it is for many as the definitions of who is an "imminent threat" can be twisted to suit whomever has their finger on the button. There needs to be some type of oversight; similar to the FISA court, where just cause has to be presented before a judge or panel approves any action against an American citizen.

What the release of the memo does is further the need to address the legality...and to differentiate the use of drones in a "war zone" as opposed for domestic use.

the fake Bush/Obama analogy is misguided to say the least, opportunistic and in people with
alternative agendas that don't seem fact based.

The war on terror encompasses all 3 and even more.
Stopping before someone acts, based on good police work and detective work someone who is about to kill one or thousands (makes no difference if its one or thousands) now that the ability is there to stop them, I say RIGHT ON.

this ain't the innocent 60s(and it wasn't innocent then or ever).

today's drones are yesterday's Truman a-bomb.

Seems killing the one person with possible handful of collateral, to save thousands and thousands and stop the bankrupting of the world like 9-11 did, is a winning proposition.

Life ain't perfect, humans ain't perfect and mistakes happen.

But once again, a good leader won't abuse the power.
A bad leader will do it regardless of any law anyhow
So I say go for it.
(and stop with the Naderistic both are the same. It is bullsheet.)

BTW, manless drones don't require a person in the plane who could be killed or MIA.
That alone saves a life.

imho.
and i can be liberal democratic and still think this.

time has evolved.
It's quaint to say elsewise, however, until ALL terror and all bad people are no longer in a fantasy land of only good people, there will be bad people.

Wise words, my friend.

Time has indeed evolved.

May I feel free to quote you on that?

I will, of course, give you all due credit and attribution.

wouldn't drones just be akin to wellness?
In the old days, one didn't have a vaccine to cure SmallPox.

using the anti-drone logic, should we all die from Small Pox?

The whole argument reminds me of those that refuse to let their kids get chemo or those
that believed Wakefield and now old diseases are back because people don't get their kids vaccines.

Yes, we evolve.

Should we who are sick, refuse the doctor who offers penicillin and die like millions did before it was invented?

Don't abuse the system, and it works.
Those that will abuse the system don't need any laws on or off the books to do just that.

Logic dictates.

I'm totally with you. I think we have finally found away to surgically kill (drone strike) them and, at the same time, preserve the good cells (non-terrorist people) around them for the overall health of the patient (Middle East countries)

"Time has evolved."

with "surgical precision is akin to excising a tumor with a ball pein hammer. Yeah, you might get the lump, but you're doing massive tissue damage around it, too.

Being okay with enhanced powers in wartime is one thing. But lets be clear: the "war on terror" is a bullshit war. How do you win a war on terror? Ever try boxing a cloud? Its kinda like that. It is the quintessential manufactured crisis - be dicks internationally until other people get pissed off enough to push back, then use that as justification to a) be even bigger dicks internationally and b) curtail domestic rights. It is a war that can last (and the reduced civil liberties with it) in perpetuity. Are you cool with these powers in the hands of one man, unchecked, indefinitely? Good man or bad? Because thats the scenario. If we only elected good men (and women - i use "man" out of brevity) we wouldn't need a whole slew of laws, checks, and balances. Fuck, just lay off congress, that good man we elected's got this.

This is the 'Good President Fallacy'.

Mind you, uproars are good for the system.

As for Pakistan, they do wink and nod at us because the government is afraid of the fundamentalists among them. They gave us information about OBL then told their people they did not.

there have been many reported cases of such attacks taking place in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen and Somalia,
and by now, I suspect in Mali.

So the habit of blowing up citizens of foreign countries is spreading.

No one should be surprised when the blowback hits in the USA.

edited to add...just found this:

U.S. drone use could set dangerous example for rogue powers
The U.S. military and intelligence communities have increasingly turned to drones for precision strikes against terrorism suspects in Pakistan and Yemen, executing more than 300 remote-controlled attacks during President Obama’s first term. That is a sixfold increase from the Bush administration’s use of drones, according to the British nonprofit Bureau of Investigative Journalism.
Drone use was a rare and almost exclusively U.S. military capability a decade ago, Zegart said, yet today at least 70 countries have unmanned aerial vehicles, or UAVs, as drones are called in security parlance.

http://www.latimes.com/news/world/worldnow/la-fg-wn-us-drones-global-precedent-20130206,0,6491459.story

I share your suspicions about Mali (as well as Chad and Liberia)

thanks for that update.

and a kind of disturbing assurance that Yemen will claim any bombing we did was by their military.

force whose primary purpose is protecting or securing profit making holdings of imperialistic wealthy global private interests. Yes, maybe some are conflating these "issues" but these issues in themselves that you are discussing arise from a collective cultural consciousness that harbors the unmitigated arrogant assumption that we have some kind of divine right as Americans to kill anyone we want, anytime we want, anywhere we want.

These. Are. Not. Our. Countries. If wealthy global private interests had not been invading and exploiting these countries, they would not be interested, in the slightest, in blowing up buildings in NYC. Herb smoking camel herders in the Hindu Kush would have no problem with the US if we, and everyone else, would simply just leave them the fuck alone. Yeah, the Taliban sucks. Just like the oppressive government of most every Arab country sucks. Saudi Arabia is heinous. But we're not killing anyone in Saudi Arabia with drones or battalions of marines. Because, even though they are unspeakably corrupt and mercilessly cruel and oppressive, the royal government of Saudi Arabia is an integral part of the good ol' boys global corporate imperialist club.

We have a lot of problems that need to be solved here in this country, and spending more than half of the money we pay in taxes giving free security services and profit securing personnel/weaponry to wealthy private interests all over the planet is Nationalized Corporatism.

The ways of greed, injustice, violence, death, and destruction cannot end the ways of greed, injustice, violence, death and destruction. They only bring more horror upon innocent human beings.

It's all about money, and if you believe drones are used in Pakistan simply to protect your sweet lil ol' granny in Peoria, well...hey, wanna buy some ocean bottom land 100 miles due west of San Francisco?

Tribal folk in the Hindu Kush don't want Amalgamated Global EarthRapers, Incorporated, plundering their land, ripping up their ground, and polluting their rivers. The people of Afghanistan have been fending off invading imperialists for centuries. Not too long ago it was the Soviet Union. Now it's us.

Honestly, the total selfish, thoughtless, elitist arrogance of money worshiping cultures is frightening. They'll heartlessly kill anyone and anything that gets in the way of their comfort and profit making.

In this century, it's all, and only, about global corporate profits.

It's time to change it, and make it about people.