LGP Political Discussion Thread - Latest news at top

[Digitalgypsy66]

J. Strom Thurmond isn't impressed with this filibuster.

[tifosi77]

This filibuster is just awesome, awesome stuff, and what politics should be about. Nice to see a high profile stand against domestic drone use.

Paul has no chance of stopping the nomination, but he's bringing attention to one of the more pivotal liberty issues of our time.

I'm of two minds on his filibuster:

1) Great -- This is how filibusters should be done all the time, and it brought an important subject into the focus of national debate.

2) Lame -- His statements imply that he's all for instances of assassination by drone on U.S. soil if x-y-z has happened, which to my mind is patently absurd. (But then again, I'm against the drone program period.) And he might have accomplished a lot more by spending his 13 hours drafting legislation to expressly forbid the use of drones in the U.S..... the concept of flying killer robots careening around our airspace is anathema to a lot of people, and I don't think it's out of the realm of possibility that such a bill might be veto proof. This program is an utterly terrifying extension of executive authority that goes far beyond the war powers of the CinC, imo.

[DelPen]

I don't thing Paul is for assassinations, he's saying ask for them through the courts so there's a record so when they are rejected because they are illegal in almost every sense the people wanting them can be exposed.

[Gaucho]

Somewhere, Philip K. Dick is wincing.

[stopper40]

J. Strom Thurmond isn't impressed with this filibuster.

A 24+ hour filibuster is impressive

http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/uscongres ... usters.htm

[Shyster]

I don't thing Paul is for assassinations, he's saying ask for them through the courts so there's a record so when they are rejected because they are illegal in almost every sense the people wanting them can be exposed.

I agree with this. I don’t think Paul is in favor of any drone strikes, but at a minimum he would want to force politicians to act while exposed to the sunshine of public scrutiny.

This filibuster is a great example for the Hypocrisy Watch. The Democrats—who are typically considered to be the party of ACLU-type personal liberties—are absolutely nowhere to be found on this issue, and we all know it’s because their guy is in the White House. Republican shills like Limbaugh and Hannity are today trying to claim Paul’s filibuster as representative of the Republican party or the Tea Party, but if Romney had won the presidency and he were now claiming the ability to spatter some of them there Mooslim turrurists, Rush and the others would be lining up behind him and his claimed ability to whack them without due process regardless of whether they might be American citizens.

[Pucks_and_Pols]

I don't thing Paul is for assassinations, he's saying ask for them through the courts so there's a record so when they are rejected because they are illegal in almost every sense the people wanting them can be exposed.

I agree with this. I don’t think Paul is in favor of any drone strikes, but at a minimum he would want to force politicians to act while exposed to the sunshine of public scrutiny.

This filibuster is a great example for the Hypocrisy Watch. The Democrats—who are typically considered to be the party of ACLU-type personal liberties—are absolutely nowhere to be found on this issue, and we all know it’s because their guy is in the White House. Republican shills like Limbaugh and Hannity are today trying to claim Paul’s filibuster as representative of the Republican party or the Tea Party, but if Romney had won the presidency and he were now claiming the ability to spatter some of them there Mooslim turrurists, Rush and the others would be lining up behind him and his claimed ability to whack them without due process regardless of whether they might be American citizens.

Spot on. Politics is like team sports. A guy who "finishes his check" on your team is a guy who "plays dirty" when he is wearing another jersey.

I can see uses for the drone program in the lawless regions between afghanistan and pakistan. but there definitely needs to be strict checks on its uses and oversight. maybe Paul and others who are so concerned about its use can be formed into a select senate oversight committee to make sure PBO, the CIA, and future Presidents do not overreach with these tools?

[tifosi77]

I will speak as long as it takes until the alarm is sounded from coast to coast that our Constitution is important, that your rights to trial by jury are precious, that no American should be killed by a drone, on American soil, without first being charged with a crime, without first being found guilty by a court.

Several times during the filibuster Paul cited hypothetical examples where the government could and should use preemptive lethal force. To that end, what I thought came through pretty clearly was that the concept of a drone strike against a citizen on U.S. soil was not inherently anathema to Paul. The concern was whether or not the president/executive has the unilateral Constitutional authority to make the determination to conduct that kind of assassination targeted killing.

But one thing that no one has really mentioned in the U.S. drone strike debate is just how one presumes such a strike would even be carried out. An MQ-9 drone carries Paveway and JDAM 500-lb gravity bombs that might otherwise be employed to destroy targets substantially larger than an American mammal..... like, oh, I dunno, an office building. We aren't at the stage (yet.....) where a drone can pinpoint a bad guy and loose a magic death beam or super arrow or something and hit just that person. A 500-lb JDAM raining down on a cafe is going to kill an awful lot of other, presumably innocent, people who had no due process whatsoever. So the hypotheticals that were mentioned several times - a person at a cafe or coffee shop being hit by a drone strike - are, on their face, just silly.

Which is another reason why I thought the filibuster was not as effective as other measures could have been.

[KennyTheKangaroo]

logic dictates that since its ok to burn people alive in cabins, its ok to blow them up with drones.

[shafnutz05]

Am I becoming an Elizabeth Warren fan? God help me

http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/03/07/oh-really-banks-are-too-big-to-jail-elizabeth-warren-isnt-having-it/

Appearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee, however, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder admitted it’s hard to prosecute these megabanks who are in the wrong and argued it could do more harm than good.

“I am concerned that the size of some of these institutions becomes so large that it does become difficult for us to prosecute them when we are hit with indications that if we do prosecute — if we do bring a criminal charge — it will have a negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy,” Holder said on Wednesday. “I think that is a function of the fact that some of these institutions have become too large.” Translation: He literally confirmed that “too big to fail” translates to “too big for trial.”

On Wednesday, Warren fired back a feisty statement in response. “It has been almost five years since the financial crisis, but the big banks are still too big to fail,” Warren said in a statement. “That means they are subsidized by about $83 billion a year by American taxpayers and are still not being held fully accountable for breaking the law. Attorney General Holder’s testimony that the biggest banks are too-big-to-jail shows once again that it is past time to end too-big-to-fail.”

[columbia]

See you at the vegan potluck on Saturday, brother shad?

[shafnutz05]

I'll say this much, Eric Holder might be one of the most incompetent AG's in American history

[Kaizer]

Clarify please, is he saying its okay if they're accused or convicted? If you've convicted someone, they're already in custody and wouldn't require any strike.

[columbia]

If Mr. Paul wants to be taken seriously, he needs to do more than pull political stunts that fire up impressionable libertarian kids in their college dorms.

lol

[shafnutz05]

It's cool to see how much McCain has become a full-blown statist. Time to send the old dinosaur out to the rice paddy

[columbia]

He and Graham aren't backing down on this one.

The one point they have in their favor was the line about Republicans not worrying about certain measures, while Bush was in office.
Then again, it's not news that people are hypocrites.

[shafnutz05]

He and Graham aren't backing down on this one.

The one point they have in their favor was the line about Republicans not worrying about certain measures, while Bush was in office.
Then again, it's not news that people are hypocrites.

Precisely. And remember all of the grand protests on Pennsylvania Avenue about Bush's egregious violations of civil rights? Funny that now that their man is in, and taking Bush's policies and making them 10x worse, it's no big deal.

And, in defense of Rand Paul specifically, he took office in 2011. He's also been on record consistently opposing the PATRIOT Act.

[tifosi77]

Clarify please, is he saying its okay if they're accused or convicted? If you've convicted someone, they're already in custody and wouldn't require any strike.

A person can be tried and convicted in absentia. All of the usual finery of a criminal trial, just no...... um..... defendant. Well, there's a defendant, but they aren't physically in custody. Ordinarily, that sort of thing isn't really kosher under U.S. law. But hey -- we're talking about the War Powers of the President of the United States here, bub. Silly little trifles like 'law' can't be observed if we are to protect our most cherished freedoms adequately.

As Barry Goldwater once said, "Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice." I mean, it's not technically 'liberty', either, but you get the point. This is Important Stuff, dude.

[tifosi77]

He's also been on record consistently opposing the PATRIOT Act.

It's one thing to vote to reauthorize it once it's law, after it has some kinetic energy behind it..... but I wonder how many legislators that voted for that monstrosity in 2001 can look back on it today and say, "Yep, glad I made that happen."

[King Sid the Great 87]

He's also been on record consistently opposing the PATRIOT Act.

It's one thing to vote to reauthorize it once it's law, after it has some kinetic energy behind it..... but I wonder how many legislators that voted for that monstrosity in 2001 can look back on it today and say, "Yep, glad I made that happen."

That's a pathetic rationalization for any leader of any organization.

[tifosi77]

Thankfully, none of those nitwits are 'leaders'. So they can be pathetic in other ways.

[tifosi77]

Constitutional disagreement time!

Do the rights recognized in the Constitution belong to 'the people'? (Meaning everyone within the jurisdiction of the U.S.) Or does the phrase 'the people' mean 'citizens only'?

The word 'citizen' is used in the Constitution 11 times in the original Articles and Bill of Rights, another 11 times in Amendments passed after the adoption of the Constitution. And when the word is used, it is in the context of a specific right exclusive to citizenship (like voting), or in describing the qualifications to hold a federal elective office. And for over a century, it has been the law of the land that the provisions of the Due Process Clauses of the Vth and XIVth Amendments were universal, with the SCOTUS stating as recently as 2001 ""the Due
Process Clause applies to all 'persons' within the United States, including aliens, whether their presence here is lawful, unlawful, temporary, or permanent." [Zadvydas v. Davis, 533 U.S. 678, 693 (2001)]

So why, in this domestic drone debate, is the focus on due process for 'citizens' only?

I think this is an important point, because citizenship is an abstract construct. Citizenship can be revoked, along with the rights and privileges thereto. But the rights recognized by the Constitution are natural rights that exist simply because of our humanity. Rights associated with "personhood" cannot be so loosely unbound from their holder. Thus I think the current furor over killing 'citizens' completely misses the point.

[thehockeyguru]

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un today told his troops to be ready for 'all-out war' and instructed them to 'make the first gunfire' if tensions with South Korea boil over.

He also promised a 'great advance' over the border between the two nations, shortly after the North announced that it had abandoned its peace treaty with the South.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2290052/North-Korea-cancels-peace-pact-South-revenge-tough-UN-sanctions-threatens-thermonuclear-war-US.html

[PensFanInDC]

Constitutional disagreement time!

Do the rights recognized in the Constitution belong to 'the people'? (Meaning everyone within the jurisdiction of the U.S.) Or does the phrase 'the people' mean 'citizens only'?

The word 'citizen' is used in the Constitution 11 times in the original Articles and Bill of Rights, another 11 times in Amendments passed after the adoption of the Constitution. And when the word is used, it is in the context of a specific right exclusive to citizenship (like voting), or in describing the qualifications to hold a federal elective office. And for over a century, it has been the law of the land that the provisions of the Due Process Clauses of the Vth and XIVth Amendments were universal, with the SCOTUS stating as recently as 2001 ""the Due
Process Clause applies to all 'persons' within the United States, including aliens, whether their presence here is lawful, unlawful, temporary, or permanent." [Zadvydas v. Davis, 533 U.S. 678, 693 (2001)]

So why, in this domestic drone debate, is the focus on due process for 'citizens' only?

I think this is an important point, because citizenship is an abstract construct. Citizenship can be revoked, along with the rights and privileges thereto. But the rights recognized by the Constitution are natural rights that exist simply because of our humanity. Rights associated with "personhood" cannot be so loosely unbound from their holder. Thus I think the current furor over killing 'citizens' completely misses the point.

We the people OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

I think it only applies to citizens. Doesn't mean I agree or disagree with it. Just answering the question.

[PensFanInDC]

North Korean leader Kim Jong Un today told his troops to be ready for 'all-out war' and instructed them to 'make the first gunfire' if tensions with South Korea boil over.

He also promised a 'great advance' over the border between the two nations, shortly after the North announced that it had abandoned its peace treaty with the South.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2290052/North-Korea-cancels-peace-pact-South-revenge-tough-UN-sanctions-threatens-thermonuclear-war-US.html

I think this is possibly the most serious international tension issue in the world right now. If he actually has the guts to do it this will get bloody and possibly rather radioactive. Boom goes a bomb or two over there and UP UP UP go manufacturing prices on tons of goods. That would be just great for a world economy already on the brink.